Gray Skies

by Justin Bell

  “Rhonda?” he asked, his voice low and cracking. “Are you okay?”

  There was no response. He twisted, a stabbing pain pulling at the muscles in his neck, forcing his eyes nearly closed, but he looked over in the driver’s seat for his wife. She was there, her head slumped over, dark hair spilled out across her right shoulder, covering her face. Leaning off to the left, the seat belt kept her from being slammed all the way into the driver’s side window, with the cab of the RV tipped up on its left side. If he didn’t know better, he’d have thought she was asleep, though the alternative felt far more likely and far more frightening.

  “Rhonda?” he shouted. “Rhonda, wake up!” He struggled against his strap but was hesitant to unbuckle himself, as he was likely to tumble down on top of his wife, who already looked half broken.

  Her head moved, just a little. A small, almost inaudible groan escaped her lips.

  “Rhonda!” he shouted, his voice echoing off the metal interior of the front of the camper.

  She turned her head, the hair drifting away and revealing a blood streaked right cheek. It soaked her whole face, and as she turned, he could see that her hair looked somewhat matted in the front, near the crown of her forehead.

  “Oh, God, Rhonda, talk to me!”

  “Don’t yell so loud, Phillip,” she mumbled. “I’ve got a hell of a headache.”

  Phil’s heart slowed, and he not only smiled at the sound of her voice, but the relative coherence of it. She’d obviously been beaten up, but she seemed mostly with it.

  “We got t-boned,” Phil said.

  “Yeah. Plow truck, I think,” Rhonda murmured. “Saw it just before it happened.” Her eyes burst open, and she tried to jerk awake, but the belt held tight, pulling her back to the seat. She winced in pain. “The kids,” she said, “where are the kids?”

  “I haven’t seen them,” Phil replied quietly. “I don’t know.”

  “We need to get out of here.”

  “I know. Unbuckle yourself and crawl out if you can. If I go first I’m going to fall down on top of you.”

  Rhonda nodded, reached back around to the belt buckle, and started fidgeting. Finally the strap came loose and she was able to move around somewhat, though the driver’s side door was pinned against the ground. Ahead of her the windshield was starred and nearly shattered, safety glass almost broken completely through, and she pulled a knee to her chest and thrust out with the heel of her boot. She struck the front window, and it cracked and bent, but held.

  “Try it again!” Phil said. Out of the windshield he could see a splash of light along the ground that looked disturbingly like approaching headlights.

  Rhonda kicked again, and again the windshield bowed and gave, but it didn’t break free.

  “Is that a car coming?” she asked.

  “I think so. Should we wait for help?”

  “I think we need to get out and move as quick as we can,” Rhonda replied. “I’m not sure that plow slamming into us was an accident. It’s not like there’s much other traffic on the road.” She kicked again, and the second time a sharp crack sounded from the edge of the windshield. The corner of it broke free, bending out into the night. Rhonda moved towards it, pushing it further with her shoulder, grunting as she tried to worm her way out and through. The headlights outside had stopped, showing two round, white orbs on the ground.

  “Careful, Rhonda!” Phil shouted after her as he worked his own belt.

  “You there!” came a voice outside. “Don’t move!”

  Phil scowled out of the window and saw his wife on all fours, crawling along the grass with a figure looming above her, holding a long weapon with two hands.

  “Get up on your knees!” the shadowed figure shouted and Rhonda eased backwards, bringing herself up into a kneeling position.

  “I got one!” shouted the man, looking out over his shoulder. The weapon raised in a firing position and looked ready to unload. Phil struggled with the seat belt, his angle bad, and half the window still between him and the gunman.

  “Is anyone else in the RV?” the man barked, jerking his weapon to match his question.

  Rhonda didn’t answer. Phil struggled with the belt.

  “Answer me or I will kill you!”

  Phil had no doubt he would. Rhonda sat there silent, and he wasn’t sure if it was for his own sake or for fear they might go looking for the children.

  “Talk to me!” he thrust his weapon in the air at the kneeling woman, and Phil was certain he’d shoot; certain he’d put a bullet in the head of his wife right there in front of him on the side of the street. His thumb snapped on the unlatch button, releasing him and sending him tumbling down.

  The noise of him slamming onto the inside of the driver’s side door caught the gunman’s attention, and he swiveled just as Phil released his pistol from its holster, swinging it around and out of the broken windshield. The barrel of the rifle came around just as Phil pulled two shots, double tap just as Greer had instructed, aiming for center mass. With a grunt, the man stumbled backwards, his weapon raising up to the sky and blasting a swift series of automatic gunfire up into the clouds.

  “Move, Phil, move!” Rhonda shouted back at him, scrambling to her feet. Phil pushed his way through the broken windshield, ignoring a flare of pain in his back and across the scalp of his head. A few loud pops of gunfire echoed and Rhonda veered right just as puffs of blown ground erupted just beside her. She had her own pistol in her hands and swiveled around, roaring off two shots of return fire, the night brightening with each burst of white and yellow. Phil crawled out and stumbled up into a standing posture, his eyes tracking movement in the dark and brought his own pistol up, firing three times at the moving shapes.

  “Go!” he shouted.

  “No!” Rhonda shouted back. “The kids!”

  “We’ll be no good to them if we’re dead!”

  More gunfire chattered back, stitching rooster tails of dirt up between the two, and Phil peeled back slightly, turning and firing again.

  “We’ve only got so much ammunition! Rhonda, we need to go!” He lunged forward and grappled her across the waist, throwing her up over his shoulder.

  “Phil we can’t!” she screamed as he carried her, shambling across the road. He heard gunfire behind them but bullets screamed off the metal surface of the RV and weren’t coming close. They were engulfed by the darkness and he hoped the surrounding gunmen couldn’t see them as they half stumbled, half ran away from the RV and towards perceived safety.

  Chapter 6

  “How are you holding up?” asked Liu, turning back to look at Max who was lagging behind him and Brad. Max’s limp had gotten steadily worse over the past two hours of walking, and he was starting to struggle just to stay upright. The night was a pitch-black blanket, and Liu could barely see the boy, a fact that made him somewhat nervous.

  “I’m okay,” Max replied, though his voice was weak and pained.

  Brandon approached him, holding out his hand. “Come here. Hop on my back.”

  “No,” Max snapped. “I can make it.”

  “I know you can. But you need to save your strength. We’re approaching the west ridge of Peoria, and we’re about to get into some urban centers here. Room to dig in, and hopefully a place to find a car. I want you to be good to go if we have to scramble or hide.”

  Max nodded. “Fine.”

  Liu crouched down, and the boy wrapped his arms around his neck, then rode him up into a standing position, remaining piggy backed as the CBP agent progressed forward, catching up to Brad just ahead.

  “You’re doing all right, Brad, right?”

  Brad nodded. “I’m okay.”

  In silence they followed the gentle curve of the road, staying just off the shoulder, walking through tall grass to avoid any possible chance of being spotted. They’d returned in the direction of the barricade but purposefully drifted west, just in case whoever ambushed them was tipped off by the border officers. Liu was at the point where
he didn’t know who, if anyone, he could trust. He hated that feeling, but like it or not, it was the only thing that was going to keep him alive.

  “So what were your parents’ names, Brad?” Liu asked. “If you want to talk about them.”

  Brad kept walking, his eyes facing forward. He didn’t reply for a few moments, and Liu was just about to ask a more innocuous follow up question.

  “Jeff and Monica,” Brad replied.

  “What did they do?”

  “Dad ran a food truck and mom was a lawyer. She spent most of her time at work though we always made sure to do something during the weekend.”

  “What did you and dad do when mom wasn’t around?”

  Brad shrugged. “Sometimes we’d throw a football. There wasn’t a lot of yard space where we lived in the city.”

  “Which city?”

  “Denver.”

  Liu nodded.

  “You hear anything about Denver?” Max asked from behind him. “We left in a hurry ’cause of the explosion in Utah. We figured radiation would be coming.”

  Liu chewed his lips for a moment, trying to figure out a way to frame an answer. “I haven’t heard much good news,” Liu replied. “Radiation overtook Denver over a week ago. Most states west of the Kansas, Nebraska, and Dakota border are uninhabitable.”

  Neither boy replied to this revelation.

  “Texas got hit as well,” Liu continued. “Not sure if you knew that yet.”

  Brad shook his head. It occurred to him they’d been so busy running for their lives, they hadn’t really stopped to consider what might be going on in the rest of the country. Much less the rest of the world.

  “And you think Americans had something to do with this?” Max followed up.

  “Unfortunately it’s looking that way, yeah. North Korea was the main aggressor, but it seems like they had help.”

  “Are we going to fight back?” Brad asked.

  Liu shrugged, which was difficult with Max perched on his back. “Not sure. We may already have. I’ve been out of touch for a little while.”

  “Because of what they did to your wife?”

  Liu cleared his throat. “Well, partly, yeah. And partly because I need to chase down all of these leads, and there isn’t exactly a reliable form of communication in place at the moment.”

  They continued walking without speaking, following the path of the road. Up ahead they could see the shrouded, square shapes of emerging urban sprawl, crawling up out of the darkness like alligators slowly sneaking from the murky depths of Florida swamps.

  “Mr. Liu?” asked Brad as they walked.

  “What, buddy?”

  “Is this the end of the world?”

  Liu drew in a breath, going through possible responses in his head. Questions like that were precisely the reason why he hadn’t wanted to have kids. The hard, uncomfortable questions that nobody wants to answer, much less answer with consideration to the fragile psyche of an eleven-year-old in mind. Especially one who had gone through as much as Brad had gone through.

  “As long as some of us are alive and willing to do good for the world, it won’t end, buddy,” Liu replied, not even fully believing the words himself. In truth he could almost picture the planes screaming towards North Korea, hurtling over the Pacific. He could imagine the submarines coming to the surface and preparing their ICBM’s. Mushroom clouds billowing out on the horizon, annihilating all in their path, magnitudes greater than the small devices that had already nearly broken America in half. Once those first ICBM’s launched, it truly would be the end of the world.

  “How long until more devices detonate?” Max asked. “Will they come here?”

  “I don’t know,” Liu replied honestly. “I can’t see the future, and at this point I’m not sure I’d want to. Just know there are good people trying to do good things, and they are doing whatever they can to stop more death from happening.”

  They angled right, crossing the grassy lawn, heading towards a row of squat, wide buildings, holding the trademark shape of fast food restaurants, convenience stores, and car dealerships. Food and transport, just what they were looking for.

  Brad looked over his left shoulder and could still see the barricade from where he was, a rudimentary stack of metal plated walls, interspersed with police and government vehicles, blue lights slicing through the cloud cover. He followed the path of the strobes of blue lights, watching them walk the contours of the clouds. They looked like storm clouds.

  “Okay, now we’re getting somewhere,” Liu said, walking down the grass slope on the opposite side of the low climb, walking down towards a shopping plaza which was drenched in darkness but still visible for what it was. From their angle they could look out across a two-lane road and could still hear the gentle lapping of Peoria lake from the other side of route 29.

  Moving from grass to pavement, the three of them walked out into a parking lot, then moved over towards the road where they could see what looked to be a used car dealership just across the road.

  “Maybe it’s a Ferrari dealership,” Max said eagerly over Liu’s shoulder.

  “I kind of want a Porsche,” Brad said.

  “I’ll take just about anything with four wheels and an engine,” Brandon said. He ran his hand against the sloped hood of the first car, then lowered into a crouch, with Max slipping down off his shoulders onto the ground. “Toyota,” he said. “Love it.”

  Brad broke off to the left, walking between two cars and looking out into the rows of automobiles. He squinted through the darkness before feeling a hand press to his shoulder. He turned and saw Liu pointing towards a large, dark building in the near distance.

  “I don’t suppose either of you know how to hotwire a car?”

  Brad and Max both shook their heads.

  “Then we need to head into the offices, see if we can find some keys.”

  “In there?” Brad asked, looking nervous.

  “Nothing to worry about, big guy. In and out, it’ll be quick.”

  Brad nodded and fell in behind Liu and Max as they wove through vehicles, heading towards the large building ahead. The entire front side of the structure was blanketed in windows, and as they drew closer, they could see emergency lights within the building still illuminated, shining through the clear glass, revealing shrouded shapes of vehicles on the bottom floor. Liu reached the front door and checked the handle just in case, though he knew it would be locked.

  “You guys see anyone?” he asked and Brad drifted off one way while Max curled around the building and looked the other way.

  “Clear this way,” whispered Max.

  “Same,” said Brad.

  Liu flipped around the P2000 pistol in his hand, cocked his arm, and swung it, slamming the butt of the weapon into the slab of clear glass on the front window. It shattered, breaking inside, scattering jagged shards across the neatly manicured carpeted floor. Brandon braced himself, waiting to hear an alarm, but nothing happened. Carefully, Liu reached inside the door and snapped the lock, peeling open the metal frame of the door, then braced himself, waiting for an alarm that did not come.

  Liu took a step in, swiveling his waist and arcing the pistol, clamped in two hands, across the perimeter of the expansive lobby, eyes darting in each corner, well-trained awareness scoping for any sign of motion.

  “We look clear,” he whispered and the two boys drifted in after him. “We need to find the sales manager’s office,” he said. Brad stopped and looked at the car in the lobby, a cherry red sports car sitting at an attractive angle, a series of spotlights angled around it, which would have been bathing it in some kind of enhancing light if the main power had still been on. A few desks were scattered around the lobby, and a stairway went up to a second level.

  “Max, keep an eye out,” Brandon whispered as he made his way to the carpeted stairs and climbed them two at a time, heading up towards the landing. Brad followed close behind, watching out the windows.

  Max leaned against the red
car, drawing in a deep breath and trying to ignore the stab of pain in his left hip, which had gone from nuisance to downright bothersome. He popped the speed loader out of the revolver and checked to see how many rounds he still had. Only five. He hoped someone else had grabbed the duffel bag from the wrecked RV, or they would all be in a world of hurt. Sliding the chamber back in the pistol, he spun it, then stopped it and adjusted to make sure the rounds lined up, then tossed it from hand to hand. He turned it over and looked at the smooth polish of the weapon and the dark contoured grip, and he ran fingers along the straight barrel, marveling at the design and craftsmanship. His infatuation with the pistol had not subsided much since taking it from the ex-convict at Vernon Academy, though that felt like a lifetime ago, and the gun had seen its share of action since. Greer had shown him how to tear it down and clean it, then put it back together, though it had been a few days since he’d done so. Max looked up over his shoulder and saw the vague shadow of Liu and Brad rifling through one of the offices up on the second level, then turned back.

  It was just out of the corner of his eye he spotted a light. Not one light, but two lights, maneuvering through the narrow aisles of cars out in the parking lot. And not just lights, headlights. A car was coming.

  “Brandon!” Max shouted, coming around the backside of the show car. “Brandon!”

  Up on the second level he saw the shadows moving, but no clear indication they’d heard him. He turned and looked back out the large window. The car was easing to a stop outside, and he thought he could see three figures inside.

  “Brandon!” he shouted, more loudly this time, and started across the floor, towards the stairs. As he hit the third stair up, Brad appeared by the top landing.

  “What’s going on?”

  “We’ve got company!”