by A. K. Meek
Next to the pile several bodies had been stacked.
Someone had dragged corpses and were building a mound of them. Men, women, children. There was no discretion. Nate looked away, not wanting to study them any longer than he needed to.
Silver bullet casings, similar to the ones in Haven, the same as the ones the machine gods fired, were scattered through the grass.
Nate’s stomach turned at the thought of the helpless civilians being slaughtered. “Come on,” he said, grabbing Juan’s arm. “Let’s get everyone through here quickly.”
Nate rushed his group past the gas station.
Another couple of miles, and roadside signs showed that Highway 377 would intersect with Highway 98. Nate remembered the highway, and as the twenty-five rested, he checked his map.
Ninety-Eight ran along most of the Florida Panhandle coast. They were so near now.
“What’s that?” Tala, who had been scanning yards ahead, leveled her rifle and scooted off the road onto the overgrown shoulder.
Nate pulled his pistol and motioned for the rest to take cover.
Since the trailer was in the middle of the road and couldn’t be offloaded, those carrying rifles made a barrier in front of the injured. The rest scattered into the brush.
Off the road, near a tree line that ran parallel to it, Tala motioned with her rifle barrel.
Cautiously, crouching, Nate moved to her position.
Off in the weeds lay a man—a child, really—dressed in Army fatigues, his face frozen in fear. He still clutched his rifle, as if at any moment he could sit up in the grass and start firing at his enemy.
About fifteen feet away in the grass, the rest of his company lay scattered.
Further up the road, burnt roadway and small blast craters indicated a battle had happened here. A terrible battle.
In the distance, waves crashed.
Nate and his scouts inched forward on the roadway, anticipating an attack.
At the intersection of Highway 377 and Highway 98, an Army tank had left solid roadway and was now stuck half-buried in soft sand. The barrel pointed skyward.
Other signs of the military dotted the road.
Overturned, burned-out vehicles, discarded uniforms, and bullet casings littered the area. Mixed with the tarnished brass M-16 shells were bright, large shells.
More machine-god bullets.
“Do you think they’re still here?” Tala said, eyeing the tank.
Nate didn’t need for her to elaborate. He wondered the same about the machine gods. The battle didn’t look recent. The mechs that tore up this area couldn’t have been those they encountered, and beat, in Miriamville.
“I don’t think so, but let’s get through here quick.”
He went back to the trailer with the wounded, and had the group continue.
Gusts of ocean wind swirled thin layers of sand onto the road. The air smelled fresh.
More houses appeared, lining the sides of the road. A typical beachfront community. The colorful bungalows had burned, the blues and yellows now charred.
Alert, especially after seeing the remains of the battle a couple miles back, the soldiers walking point kept their M-16s welded to their cheeks, barrels swinging left and right, eyes squinting. They scanned the abandoned houses for any threat.
Only an occasional seagull greeted them.
The road split and Highway 98 wound its way directly to the coast, just beyond a thin strip of palm trees and shrubs. The dull roar that was always present grew as they neared.
Tall hotels shielded the beach.
“Keep an eye on the balconies,” Charles said. “If I were a sniper I’d be hiding up there.”
Nate nodded.
Enoch’s hacking cough filled the air.
The roar came and went as waves crashed onto the fine Florida sand, drowning out any coughs.
Once they maneuvered between two hotels, they saw the water, the Gulf. Rags and trash littered the beach.
They parked the trailer-gurney in the parking lot between the hotels, and the ones that could walk continued on to the Gulf.
A couple people cheered. Several more clapped.
“Oh, no,” Meredith said. “There’s nothing here. It’s all destroyed.” She started crying.
Desiree laughed and kicked off her shoes. She grabbed Paige by her arm and led her down the beach to the water. They dived into the wet, smooth sand and screamed when a wave of foam washed over them.
“It’s all gone,” Martin said, looking away from the girls, scanning the beach. “I knew it. We’ve come all this way. I knew it was hopeless.”
Nate’s lungs rasped with the moist sea air. He fought to swallow the itching, burning sensation in his throat.
What did they expect? What did he expect?
Since Bartel, Will had fed them a dream, his dream, of what he wanted. Not what was real. He fed it and everyone swallowed it. Nate had swallowed it. They risked everything to get here.
After Will was gone, Nate continued the dream because of the orange fog.
The lie.
He had no better idea of what was here than Will. But as he quickly realized, they needed a goal. Something to look forward to.
Maybe Will’s idea to lead them here on a whisper had kept them all alive.
Perhaps the brother helping brother idea, the safety is a state of mind idea, all came about because of Will’s simple idea to make the goal some pie in the sky dream.
It didn’t matter if it was true or false, as long as it kept everyone focused on the goal.
But wasn’t that what Will had told Nate so long ago, when he had Tala and Juan race? Keep everyone distracted.
Nate’s smoke and mirrors management.
The ones that could walked onto the beach, to the edge of the world, where one step more would plunge them into the Gulf.
“What do we do now?” Juan said, kneeling down, lifting a waterlogged rag with his rifle barrel.
Nate knew there would be nothing left. Whatever might have been there was gone.
Nothing.
“We continue on,” he said. “We live along the coast. We collect seashells and strand them onto necklaces.” He watched the girls playing in the surf. “We live and raise our children in this new world. We survived. We survived the collapse of our nation.”
They watched the girls, playing, laughing, oblivious to what they had faced.
“Hello.”
A voice came from behind a mound of debris on the beach, Styrofoam containers and pallets stacked several feet high.
Juan dropped to one knee, leveling his M-16.
A young lady, white, with dirty, matted hair, stepped from behind the pile of refuse. Her blouse and pants had large rips. She hesitantly moved to them on the beach, holding a bundle of rags in her outstretched arms.
“Please, help. Help my baby. He’s weak and hungry. I’m not his birth mother so I can’t feed him. He hasn’t cried for an hour. Help.”
Nate lifted his arm and coughed into his sleeve. After a half minute his coughing subsided enough so that he could suppress it. He lowered his arm, ignoring the flecks of blood on his chemjacket sleeve.
“Join us,” he said, “you’ll be safe here.”
Town on Fire:
25 Bombs Fell, Season Two (Book 2) Excerpt
Chapter 01.01 THE BURNING
Each blow sounded like a shotgun blast and Johnny’s head was the paint-filled milk jug. He winced as his hammer missed more of the nail head than it connected. The two by four that was to become part of the deck frame was getting the beating of its life.
The scalding Georgia sun and the fact his pasty white body was still recovering from his mid-week, one-man party last night left him hungover and dehydrated, which didn’t help his lousy depth perception and minimal carpentry skills.
He cursed as his hammer bent the nail to the point he had to pry it from the board. He hoped no one else saw. He’d been screwing up plenty.
But on the other
hand, he wouldn’t care if Bob, the on-site general contractor, the man who stupidly gave him a chance in a moment of pity, fired him. Then he could go home and sleep off his hangover, maybe even be ready for tonight. His kids were going to their friends for a sleepover, so he could start his weekend a little early.
“Do you hear?” Bob’s baritone smoker’s voice carried over the deck construction. Nail guns and dump trucks could be heard in the distance—a new housing community springing to life.
Johnny paused and wiped his sweaty head with the off-white Led Zeppelin Swan Song shirt he had stripped off an hour ago. He’d been wearing it over his sunburned neck as a poor man’s scarf. “No,” he said, just loud enough so as not to echo in his skull any more than necessary.
Bob’s head was cocked to the side. His chubby brow furrowed like he was straining to remember his sixth-grade locker combo. “Hear that?” He put a plump finger to his rosy, sunburned cheek. “Sounds like explosions.”
Thinking the drunk from the night before was creeping back, Johnny shook his throbbing head so that he could hear what Bob heard. Sure, his hammer sounded like a shotgun, but that was cause of the Budweiser. “You heard that?” He held up his hammer and studied it, like he’d suddenly grasped Mjolnir with all its amazing power.
Bob shot him an annoyed look. “What’re you babbling about? Listen.” His ear went higher in the air. “In the distance. Sounds like bombs. I think I felt the ground rumble.”
At that point Johnny decided he wasn’t the only one to have a mid-week binge. He looked around, up in the cloudless hot morning, to see if he could find any proof of Bob’s delusions.
High above, several objects—not much more than metallic glints—darted across the sky, fading into a hazy horizon. He shrugged. “I don’t hear anything,” he said, then went back to beating the life out of the two by four.
From the corner of his eye he watched Bob go to his truck and slide into the seat. He grabbed his CB mike from where it dangled over his visor, and spoke into it.
Hammer.
Hammer.
Miss.
Hammer.
Miss.
Glancing again at Bob, Johnny saw his face change from curious to concerned. He slid the rest of his oversized butt into his truck and slammed the door.
His truck fired up.
He rolled down his window and yelled, “Roscoe, keep these guys working. Something’s going on in Haven.” He threw his F-250 in gear and fishtailed away from the construction site, spitting gravel.
Haven was the town nearest Bartel, about six miles away.
Roscoe, a thirty-year-old truck driver fired after his third DUI, worked at the other end of the deck. He stopped, scratched his backside, spit the chew from his mouth and ground it in the dirt like a cigarette butt. He gave Johnny an apathetic look, said, “Keep working,” then went back to securing his section of framing.
They were used to Bob making quick exits since he was a part time deputy sheriff, which he reminded everyone of at every opportunity. But everyone knew he only was one because his family owned half the town. Integrity or upholding the law definitely weren’t a factor.
Instead of pulling the nail out, Johnny decided to hammer it completely into the board. Bob wouldn’t know, Roscoe wouldn’t care.
Hammer.
Hammer.
Sirens grew from background ambient, and within moments police cars zipped past the new development’s access road. Lights flashing, sirens wailing, all heading in the direction of Haven. As the cars disappeared from view, Johnny wondered if there was an accident on Highway 127, like the overturned beer truck trailer last week. He’d managed to score a couple of cases.
“Hey.”
He turned to Roscoe, who was holding his cell phone to his ear. “Sirens are going off in town.”
Scanning the clear sky again, Johnny’s slow, pickled mind attempted to process the statement. “There’s no clouds. How can there be a tornado?”
“I didn’t say a storm,” Roscoe responded. “We need to get back to town.” He moved with an urgency unlike any Johnny had ever seen in him, causing the hair on the back of his neck to prickle. That prompted him to follow Roscoe’s lead, quickly gathering their tools. They loaded them in Roscoe’s truck.
Johnny slapped his greasy shirt back onto his nutrient-deprived shoulders, then climbed in the bed of the truck. He found the comfortable spot on the spare tire then leaned against the cab.
Roscoe opened the door and rubbed behind the ears of Rascal, a stray Rottweiler the size of a small horse. He snapped his fingers and motioned for the dog to move. The dog obediently shifted himself from the driver to the passenger side of the bench. Roscoe jumped in and started his truck.
Johnny didn’t mind giving up the passenger seat after Roscoe found the dog, he just wished he had the cooler from the front so he could grab a beer. The truck sped back to Bartel.
They heard the end of the world before they saw it.
Sirens began again, drowning out Roscoe’s misfiring engine. The disaster alarms had gone off once, maybe twice in the past couple of years. That was for a summertime exploding supercell that threatened to drop a tornado on the small town.
This time, though, the siren warbled in an odd way. Johnny thought maybe a pigeon had made a nest in one and got stuck.
Cars zipped past, heading away from town. As they neared Bartel, drivers became more erratic, more aggressive, like everyone needed to be somewhere other than where they were at that moment.
Maybe it was the cars, maybe it was the sirens, or maybe the continual throbbing hammer blows in Johnny’s head, but his skin began to crawl with apprehension. The kind of apprehension you feel when you stuff a carton of smokes in your jacket before leaving the Seven-Eleven, hoping the Pakistani cashier didn’t see.
A courthouse presided over the heart of Bartel. A town square of small shops and professional offices surrounded the old building. People streamed from the businesses toward the courthouse.
Cars skidded sideways into parking spots. Some jumped the curb onto the lawn. Drivers rushed out and shot into the building. Parents dragged slow, crying children by tiny arms.
A siren mounted on top of the courthouse wailed menacingly for another second, then cut out. Screams and panicked voices replaced the siren.
“…under attack…”
“…bombed…”
“…shelter…”
And the panic that swept over the small town nestled between peanut farms and pecan orchards also swept over Johnny.
He traded his hangover for a sudden fear of whatever everyone else feared, even though he didn’t know what it was yet. But the fear was as real as the hangover that it had replaced. He needed to run like everyone else needed to run.
He slapped the back cab window for Roscoe to slow. Johnny leaped from the truck bed and sprinted for the courthouse, joining the frightened crowd. He neared the marble steps that led to the double doors. Bits of conversation bounced in his head.
“…Haven bombed…”
“…we’re next…”
“…the apocalypse…”
“…fallout shelter…”
That clicked with him; he remembered stories he’d read in the Bible as a child. The end of the world. And all the stories that made good end of the world flicks were now happening to this unsuspecting town. Just like in the movies.
His stomach spasmed. He pushed others out of the way as he fought up the crowded stairs to outrun the unknown.
“John!” Someone grabbed his arm.
He spun wildly, ready to punch whoever was keeping him back but almost tripped over his own feet.
Tom, a man he only knew slightly, but still resented because of his seemingly perfect life, held his arm.
“Where are your girls?” he asked.
Johnny’s face must not have reacted because Tom said again, but more slowly, “Annie, Abby, are they still at school?”
In a sudden moment of clarity, Johnny rememb
ered he did, in fact, have two girls. And they were still at school, probably freaked out of their little minds.
Rather than acknowledging he was a crap father and had forgotten about his kids altogether, he looked at his left and then right hand in a vain attempt to make it seem like he had just lost them.
“I’m going to get Justin,” Tom said. “Do you want to come?” Tom’s wife ran up to him and clutched his arm. She had been crying and makeup had run down both cheeks. Her hands visibly shook as she held onto her husband.
Johnny nodded even though he didn’t want to go.
Tom hugged his wife and pressed his face against hers before wiping one cheek. “Go get my son,” she said in a trembling voice.
His face, grim but determined to achieve the given task, turned away, his eyes saying he would find their son or die trying. “C’mon,” he motioned to Johnny. He shot back down the stairs. Johnny followed, struggling to keep up.
They rounded the courthouse, dodging people scattering in every direction. Many stole glances as they scurried about. Many more appeared to be running nowhere in particular. They ran because everyone else ran. All were swept up in the emotion. Just like Johnny.
He recognized Tom’s red Mustang when the rich man pressed his fob. Headlights winked in acknowledgment and the doors unlocked. They hopped inside and his car roared to life. He crawled away from the parking spot because of the panicked humanity darting past heedlessly.
Several times he gunned his engine as they crept along, a not too subtle way to encourage people to move. Then he resorted to laying on his horn.
Johnny’s daughter Annie and Tom’s son Justin were classmates. The parents had only talked a few times, when the class had some event. Parent/teacher conferences or end of semester recitals. A couple times Annie brought home a bag of various canned goods. Tom had given her the bags saying they ran out of pantry room at home and needed to get rid of the food. It wasn’t charity.
Johnny didn’t mind if people gave him food or handouts. He had drunk away any remaining pride two years ago. That was when his wife Lisa overdosed on meth.
Once clear of the congestion that was downtown Bartel, Tom gunned his car and cleared the seven blocks to Nelson Middle School.