by Thunboe, Bo
“You don’t live near the Wolf River.”
“We took the Illinois Prairie Path from Weston into Kirwin where the two trails intersect.”
“It will be cold. Is it still snowing?” Melinda stood up and looked out the window. She slapped both palms on the glass. “A car!”
Erin threw back the bedspread and scampered after Cammie to the window. A station wagon cruised down a lane of the parking lot. One of those old ones with the fake wood sides. A pack of men appeared below them from out of the hotel lobby, shouting muffled by the glass.
“Coach!” Cammie yelled toward the connecting room. “There’s a car moving in the parking lot.”
“The guy with the red hat and beard is the man who pushed his way into my room,” Erin said. He held his left arm against his chest. She had broken his ribs.
“What guy?” Cammie asked. “What happened?”
Erin told them as they watched. The men stood across the lane, blocking the way. The station wagon stopped and the driver rolled down his window. Three men stayed in front of the car and the fourth, a big man wearing a flannel shirt and no coat, bent down and put his hands on the edge of the open driver’s window.
“I wish these windows opened,” Melinda said. “Maybe we could hear what they’re saying.”
“Probably asking him how he got his car going,” Cammie said.
“Should we go down there and ask him for a ride home? I’m sure my mom would pay him when—”
Flannel suddenly lunged away from the car, dragging the driver out through the window. Melinda screamed, then covered her mouth. The driver was a small man and he yelled and thrashed, his words unclear through the thick glass. The car rolled forward, the driver’s foot no longer on the brake. The three men in front of the big car scrambled to get out of the way but one of them moved too slowly and the massive chrome bumper knocked him down. He tried to crawl away—scrabbling at the ground—but disappeared under the car. One hand was visible as the front tire bumped up over his arm. The car kept moving, the hand dragging along with it. A few bits of cloth fluttered out behind the car, then a long red smear and the car bumped over something—the man—and there he was.
“Oh my God!”
One of the two men who’d gotten out of the way dove through the open car window. The car swerved, then raced forward. It scraped a parked car then abruptly swerved across the lane, banged over the curb and flew up over a row of thick bushes where it got hung up, one rear wheel spinning freely.
The original driver got away from Flannel, ran to the car and yanked open the passenger door. He ducked inside.
The man on the street hadn’t moved. His legs seemed to be facing the wrong direction.
“Is he… dead?”
A rivulet of dark fluid trickled out from under him and ran toward the gutter.
“Look,” Melinda said. The little man was helping a woman out of the station wagon. She was enormously pregnant and walked with one hand on her back, her stomach swinging back and forth in front of her. The little man hooked an arm around her and hurried her away, looking behind them as they fled.
The remaining men gathered around the car and tried to push and lift it off the bushes but the car didn’t budge. After a few minutes, they gave up, checked on the crushed man, but left him there as they disappeared below, probably coming back into the hotel.
“Close your blinds.” Coach had come in from the other room. “You don’t need to see that.”
“We already saw it,” Cammie said. “We can’t un-see it.”
“Are they just going to leave him there? Dead like that?”
No one answered Melinda’s question.
The blood reached the gutter and started to pool there, then a ribbon of it ran toward a drain a few feet away. A cold hand had gripped Erin’s heart as she watched the violence below. People were going crazy. People right here in their hotel.
She hoped it wasn’t like this back home.
Or on the bike trail.
34
Dan froze. The man who had popped out from behind the semi was so close Dan couldn’t even maneuver around him. He was tall and bearded, wore a Blackhawks jacket and red knit hat, and held a long metal bar across his chest.
Dan was only ten miles from home, a three-hour walk, so he could give up the bike. But he didn’t want to. They might need it again. Plus, screw these guys.
“That’s a nice little bike.” A second voice, this one from somewhere behind him. Dan looked beyond the bearded man to the crowds looting the truck. None of them were looking this way. If he could get away from these two, he could get clear. He gripped the handlebar tightly.
He raised his right hand high and as the man in front of him tracked that motion, pulled in the clutch with his other hand and tapped the bike into first gear with his left foot. “I see the computers are free today.”
“While they last.”
Something poked Dan in the back. “Stay still or I’ll run you through.”
He turned his head to see what the man was threatening to skewer him with, but whatever it was dug in deeper. At least it wasn’t a gun.
“What’s the deal, guys? I’m just passing through.” Dan moved a few inches farther back on the seat.
“Leave the bike, and on you pass.”
“Well—”
“Off it.” The bearded man raised his iron bar.
“All right,” Dan said. “Just let me—” He twisted the throttle and popped the clutch. The little bike leapt forward, the front wheel coming off the ground and hitting the bearded man in the chest. He went down and Dan rode over his legs and gave the bike more throttle. A yell from behind him, then several of the men working the back of the Apple truck looked his way. He dropped down into the median then rode back west to the exit and left the tollway. The shouts grew fainter as Dan sped down the exit ramp. It dumped him out heading south on Lake Street into Kirwin.
He slowed. There were a lot of people on the road, most carrying arm-loads of merchandise. He passed a man and a teenage boy carrying a leather couch, then a woman with three small children hauling toys.
Dan rolled past them, slaloming among the cars. There were too many people. He needed to get off the main roads. If he could just get to the east, he could drop off the road onto the Wolf River Trail. It was only—
A two-by-four hit him in the face.
35
Mary stretched out on the couch, hoping for a nap, but she’d never been a good napper. Falling asleep at night was hard enough. Sleeping in the middle of the day when she had things to do never worked, no matter how tired she was or how much sleep she’d missed the night before. According to the old wind-up clock on the mantle it was time for Carson’s meeting anyway. She needed to go in order to see whether he actually did get authority from the mayor like he’d claimed.
She threw off the quilt and immediately shivered against the cold. She crouched in front of the fireplace and saw no flames, just coals rippling as they searched for fuel and air to ignite. At the rate they were using wood, Sean would spend the whole winter collecting firewood. She reached for a log, then changed her mind. She was going to Carson’s meeting so the wood would be wasted. She put out her hands, then turned around and sat on the hearth, the stone warm through her pants. Her gaze passed slowly over their home. The family room flowed into the eating area and then into the kitchen, one big room the full length of the house. Forty or fifty feet of open space. No wonder it took so much wood to heat the place.
She went to the front hall and pulled on her boots and coat. She stopped before opening the door. She would spill too much heat outside by exiting here. She went back through the kitchen and laundry room and into the garage, then out the rear service door, using the garage as an air lock. Little things like that would add up, she thought. And help them survive, or die if they did them wrong.
The sun was out, but the cold was still bracing. Loose snow swirled off the rooftop in eddies along the house. Dan was out ther
e, somewhere. He would get home today, or tomorrow, or the next day. But he would make it. Mary had to protect the family’s interests—from Carson and whoever else came at them—until then.
A sharp gust almost toppled her as she exited the shelter of the house. She pulled her hat down tighter and stuffed her hands in her pockets. She glanced at her van parked askew in the driveway, a splintered piece of lumber trapped under the front tire. Sean hadn’t mentioned a problem with the van and that was good. They didn’t need to talk about every little problem that arose, just those that threatened their survival.
Like this thing with Carson.
She looked both ways before crossing the street out of lifelong habit that had no meaning in this new world. Or maybe it did. Maybe all those zombie shows Sean watched would be right. He said they weren’t really about the zombies; they were about how other survivors were the most dangerous thing in the post-apocalypse world.
She froze. Were they now living in a post-apocalypse world? The worst-case scenario in the reports Sean gave her sounded that bad, but maybe the powers-that-be had followed at least a few of the recommendations to harden systems against EMPs. She frowned. Politicians focused on doing favors for whatever industry would fund their re-election campaigns. They ignored long term risks. And that crazy bastard in the White House had dismantled every program and institution that his “business sense” didn’t like.
But maybe—
“Mary!”
Beth Simpson. She had her husband with her. A big, bearded man who did some kind of work with cars: engines, or maybe it was fixing dents. He always wore camouflage clothing and NASCAR hats. Dan once told her that’s all the guy talked about. The hood of his camo sweatshirt was up and the front stretched across his big gut. He must like to drink beer, too. In fact, that’s where Dan learned about his NASCAR obsession. Simpson had a big TV in his garage and the neighborhood men went over there to drink beer and watch races on summer weekends. He even had a NASCAR sounding name: Buddy.
As the Simpsons approached, Carson appeared behind them on his bicycle. He had that light contraption going on his handle bars that Sean had mentioned. He looked… happy. She hoped that didn’t mean the mayor had given him any real authority.
Beth put a hand on Mary’s shoulder. “Hi, Mary.”
Buddy’s gaze skipped over Mary to look behind her. “Where’s Dan?”
“Still on his way home, Buddy.”
“Isn’t this crazy?” Buddy said. “I hope that turd Carson doesn’t—what?” Beth elbowed her husband in the ribs as Carson rode up.
“Come on in, folks.” Carson leaned his bike against his garage door and led the way inside the house. It was a split level with the family room half a flight of stairs below them. They tramped down the stairs to a ring of mismatched chairs with a big plaid couch flattening one side of the circle. Someone had over-stoked the fireplace and the inferno roared as kindling popped and hissed. Most of the seats were already taken by other neighbors, their faces pale with worry and damp with sweat from the heat.
Mary took off her coat and sat on a rickety chair. She looked around as Carson settled himself in a corduroy recliner. The women made eye contact with her, but the men looked behind her like Buddy had.
“Thank you all for coming. Before we —”
“Is this everyone?” Buddy sat on the couch next to his wife. “There’s like fifteen houses on the block and we got like half that represented here.”
“There are eleven houses on the court, Buddy.” Carson looked around. “I’ve talked to each of you, at least briefly. What I understand is that the Wilsons, Browns, Jorgensens, and Bradys are all away on Christmas holiday. We have someone from all seven of the other families here.”
“Did they tell you at your meeting who did this to us?” Emilio Vargas. He and his wife Rachel had three daughters under five years old. She must have stayed at home with the girls.
“They don’t know,” Carson said. “It might have been a solar phenom—”
“Bullshit. It was the Chinese!” Snick sprang up from his chair. He sat closest to the fire and either its heat or his anger had made his face red. “Are we going to be issued guns to—”
“How much of the country was affected?” Roland Miller asked. He and his wife were empty nesters. They had a son in the military—the Army, maybe—and a daughter who worked at a tech company in California.
“They don’t know,” Carson said. “They—”
“Are we going to war?” Judy Fleck edged to the front of her folding chair. Her husband was bed-ridden with cancer and COPD. Their son, Ed, was a friend of Erin’s and had come over to their house hundreds of times. But not much over the last few years.
Carson stood, hands up, palms out. “Everyone! Please let me tell you what I know then I’ll answer what questions I can.”
Snick sat down and Carson stayed on his feet, eyes scanning back and forth.
“Get to it, then,” Mary said. The little worm was enjoying the attention.
Carson glared at her, then started talking. “It was an electromagnetic pulse like we thought. An EMP. They don’t know the source. It could have been caused by a natural phenomenon or by a device. A weapon, I guess. The effect appears to be very widespread. Certainly, the entire country.”
“How do you know that?”
“My team has an emergency radio that is functioning. The FEMA band came on. They’re still collecting reports but so far it hit our entire country at the least.”
“At the least?” Vargas looked around, then back at Carson. “And at most?”
Carson shrugged, apparently not willing to speculate beyond what he’d been told.
“It was the Chinese.” Snick again, but this time he stayed seated. “They’re just staying silent so they can sneak in here and take what we have. That’s the whole purpose of an EMP instead of a nuke, right? To leave the good stuff behind.”
Everyone ignored the man.
“We’re on our own.” Beth Simpson, her voice barely above a whisper. “If the whole country was hit, everyone needs to take care of their own. No one is coming to help us.”
“We aren’t on our own,” Carson said. He swept his arms in a circle to encompass them all. “We’re in it together. And the city is taking action.”
“What action?”
“They’re taking control of the grocery stores and will distribute food to each CERT community based on how many people—”
“We aren’t staying.” Buddy patted his wife’s knee. “We’ll either freeze to death or starve before spring if we stay here.”
“Where are you going to go?” Snick asked.
“Beth’s family has a truck farm in southern Indiana. They put up a lot of food every winter—canned and cured and such. That’s the place to be. Hell, we don’t have anything to plant even if we do live to see spring.”
“How are you going to get—”
“My Nomad runs.”
Mary sat up straighter. “Our snow blower runs.”
“Older stuff with simple electronics will run. The EMP doesn’t hurt wires. It’s the components it ruins. Capacitors and computer modules and—”
Buddy was drowned out by a rising clamor, but Mary had retreated into her own mind. That’s how Dan would get home. He’d find one of these older vehicles. She was sure of it.
“People!” Carson stood up. “People, please.” When the group got quiet, he continued. “Let’s do a head count for our distribution from the city.”
Carson went around the circle. Snick had five total, including his wife, who Mary had only seen a few times, his twin boys, and a niece visiting for the holiday. Roland Miller and his wife were two. The Flecks were three with their son Ed. When Carson got to Emilio Vargas, the man said, “We’re going with Buddy.”
That didn’t surprise Mary. The Simpsons didn’t have children and Beth doted on the Vargas girls.
“And three for the Fallon family makes—”
“Four,” Mary
said.
Carson faced her. “Is Dan home?”
“He will be.”
“He doesn’t drive an old car like—”
“He will be.”
“I need a solid number for the rationing.”
“He—”
“How’s this rationing going to work?” Miller interrupted. “How’s any of this going to work.”
“By sticking together,” Carson said. “We’ll pool our resources and work together. We—”
“What, we’re all commies now?” Snick sprang up again. “I’m not a damn commie.”
“Nobody’s saying that, Bill.” Carson patted the air again. “We’ll just have a better chance of surviving this if we work together.”
“From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs.”
They all turned to Emilio Vargas. Mary recognized the quote. Karl Marx’s definition of communism. It did sound like what Carson was proposing.
“Exactly,” Snick said. He looked around the room and Mary could guess what he was thinking because she was thinking it too. Buddy Simpson and Emilio Vargas were relatively young—under forty. But they were leaving. The Millers and Flecks were in their fifties, and Mr. Fleck was bedridden. Carson was at least sixty. Labor wise, that meant Snick, and Dan, would be carrying a disproportionate amount of the weight. And so would she, and Sean. And she doubted any of these people had as much food put away as she did, which meant her family would get back much less from the pool than it put in. Being part of Carson’s group would decrease their own chances at survival.
They had to think of their own family first. She said it whenever one of the kids, or even Dan, proposed skipping a family event. She hoped both Dan and Erin remembered the words. They would help Dan stay focused on getting home and comfort Erin with the knowledge that her family would come for her.