Staggering forward, Rachel ripped off her gas mask and discarded it. She breathed in cold air but felt warm from the fires around her. The children swarmed out of the clouds of smoke and pulled off their gas masks as well. Still moving, Rachel drew her Glock from its holster.
At least a dozen armed soldiers with glowing eyes leapt from each truck.
Fight . . . until . . . the end . . .
Sixty-five
January 1
At least thirty-six soldiers with glowing red eyes aimed their guns at Rachel, who sank to her knees, exhausted.
In the sky behind them, the helicopters collided in midair, creating yet another double explosion, this one rolling across the sky like thunder. Many of the soldiers turned to look behind them as the two burning aircraft fell to the field, flames cascading across the grass like waves.
Rachel forced herself to rise one last time.
The soldiers faced her, then fell to their knees. Not one of them remained standing. Then the men and women vomited onto the lawn.
What the hell’s going on?
The soldiers continued to puke and gasp, and when they looked up with expressions even more confused than hers, the red had left her eyes.
Lowering her gun, Rachel looked at her watch, which flashed 12:00 a.m.
Several of the soldiers rose, regarded the weapons in their hands, and threw them to the ground. Moving in circles, they looked at their neighbors, then at their surroundings.
Turning her back on the spectacle, Rachel returned to her party. Betty had tears in her eyes. Kneeling beside the woman, Rachel faced the kids. Tears streaked Barry’s eyes as well. All the children wept, their faces lit in orange from the fires. Rachel cried as well. The kids circled her, pressing against her from all sides.
Judgment Day? Rachel wondered.
No, New Year’s Day.
Epilogue
The Julian Year
By Julian Weizak
January 1
I awoke outside, shivering and covered in vomit, cold wind in my face. The sky exploded with light, and confetti and paper streamers rained down on me. I stood on wobbling legs, my stomach still performing gymnastics, surrounded by people, many of them doubled over or on their hands and knees. Thousands of people, maybe a million. Where the hell was I?
Times Square.
The stench in my nostrils was unbelievably foul, and I realized I wasn’t the only person covered in vomit. A million people can produce a lot of barf. My head swam in a sea of disorientation.
Disorder, I corrected myself. I had become Disordered. Possessed.
You should have killed yourself, you worthless piece of shit, a voice screamed in my head.
Spotlights swept over the crowd, highlighting confused faces: black, white, brown, yellow, male, female, young, adult . . .
Human.
In the mass of human bodies and the stench of vomit, I didn’t see a single red eye. At the downtown end of the square, at One Times Square, scores of people stood on a stage overlooking the crowd. The Times Square Ball glowed golden light behind them, and the giant screen on the wall above showed soldiers and figures in suits, all of them looking as confused as I felt. I thought I saw President Lopez but I didn’t care.
The confetti continued to fall. The cavalry had arrived after all; we were saved and a new year had begun. Spreading my arms, I gazed at the chaotic sky and laughed with tears in my blue eyes.
The Julian Year
By Julian Weizak
Three weeks later, I sat at the bar in Stony’s Tavern, nursing a pint. Only it wasn’t Stony’s anymore; Stony was gone and so was his family. The current owner is named Joe, which isn’t as colorful. He’s a pirate homesteader, like a lot of private business owners right now. The city and the IRS have got their work cut out for them, but hey, the wheel’s got to keep turning. At the moment, I’m still living rent free in a double studio. If the building ever goes co-op, I’m in big trouble.
On the tube, President Lopez shook hands with the prime minister of Canada. After seeing her with glowing red eyes, I prefer her this way. Rhodes is never coming back, which is a shame. He was a good man forced to make decisions no man should have to make. A lot of good people are never coming back; some estimates say as many as three billion.
History will have to sort out which decisions made by our leaders during the tribulation were right and which ones were wrong, but history’s got a lot of catching up to do. That’s where guys like me come in. I may not know which Regan MacNeil possessed my body for three hours, but I’m certain I have a book inside me. Hell, the first draft is already written.
“Wow, you got chubby again.”
I was so busy staring at the TV that I didn’t see the woman beside me, and I almost dropped my glass. “Rachel.”
Smiling, Konigsberg gave me a hug, which felt good. She felt good. And she smelled good, like early spring.
“How did you find me?”
“Who says I was looking for you?” She slid onto a stool.
Rachel motioned for Joe to serve her what I was having. She looked years older. A lot of us do.
“When did you get back? Where have you been? Why—?”
She pressed one finger against my lips. “Take it easy. One question at a time.”
I took a breath. “When did you get back to the city?”
“A few days ago. I went out to the island, but my folks’ aren’t coming back. I guess you could say I’m staying at a shelter.”
Meaning an abandoned apartment or building. “I’m sorry to hear that. So where the hell were you?”
“Are you asking as a reporter?”
I shrugged. “I’m a newspaper man but I’m not a reporter anymore. The army and the city got together, and the Restoration Committee wants me to serve as interim editor in chief of the Daily Post during its relaunch.”
“You’re a big deal, Weizak.”
Joe set a pint of Guinness on the bar. I raised my hand, communicating that I had it covered.
“We’ll see. It’s just a website. I don’t think we’ll see newspapers anymore. I told them I won’t edit for the army or the city; they need to find a private buyer. Fortunately, they already have their hands too full to worry about controlling the media. What about you? Are you going to put on that NYPD uniform again?”
Rachel sipped her pint, then shook her head. “I’ve seen enough killing to last a hundred lifetimes. I need to get involved with something positive.”
I saw she had a lot on her mind. “Like what?”
“Like rebuilding society. A third of the population is gone, including a lot of parents. I got close to some kids while I was down below. I guess you could say they broke me down. I never knew I had a maternal side. I want to help take care of them.”
“How many?”
“Me and another woman brought twenty-four of them back with us.”
I almost did a spit take. “That’s twelve apiece.”
Rachel laughed. “I know, right? But they need me. I feel a responsibility to all of them.”
“It sounds great but why come back here?”
She looked at me like I was an idiot. “Because this is where I choose to be.”
I drank my beer. “I’m kind of busy right now, what with the website and everything.”
“So? Did I say anything about you?”
Thank God she said it with a smile. “Would you like to have dinner with me sometime?”
She sipped her beer again. I thought it was to hide a smile that had disappeared by the time she set her glass down. “I’m busy too. I have to make a home for two dozen kids.”
“I bet they’re cute.”
“They’re monsters but I love them.”
I stared into my glass. Somehow the courtship of two flawed human beings seemed unimportant considering the magnitude of responsibilities that lay ahead.
Rachel guzzled her beer and set it down. “Valentine’s Day is next month.”
“Now there’s
a tradition that doesn’t need to be preserved.”
She wrote on a napkin. “That’s my number. Why don’t you give me a call? I’ll let you wine and dine me since I don’t have a birthday for two more years.”
I slid the napkin into my pocket, and she winked at me and left the bar. I don’t think I’ll wait until Valentine’s Day to call her.
On the TV, an evangelist spoke to a political pundit. Commentators, scientists, and theologians were having a field day with the Omega Disorder, and they will probably continue to do so for generations.
I don’t know anything for sure, but I believe this much: we were tested or punished or both, either by God or some other cosmic intelligence. Or maybe the herd just needed to be thinned. Because of bad decisions made by world leaders, at least three billion people perished; because of a reversal made by others, maybe four billion survived.
And every December, as we look forward to different spiritual holidays, we’ll also dread the changing of the year, because we have no way of knowing if this unexplained phenomenon will revisit us. Except for the leapfrogs like Rachel, we’ve all got a little bit of the devil inside us.
Acknowledgments
Thanks to John Renna and my wife, Tamar, for their advice and assistance in the creation of this book, which was an enormous project, and to everyone at Medallion Press who worked so hard to make the TREEbook™ (Timed Reading Experience E-book) format a reality; special props to my editors. The idea of an e-book with seamless story-branching technology was ahead of its time.
And thank you to everyone at Medallion for making this e-book, incorporating my preferred story branches into one epic story, available to the masses in traditional e-book formats. I consider this my best novel and hope you do too.
Bio
Gregory Lamberson
Gregory Lamberson is the author of the occult detective series The Jake Helman Files (Personal Demons, Desperate Souls, Cosmic Forces, Tortured Spirits, Storm Demon, and Human Monsters) and the werewolf series The Frenzy Cycle (The Frenzy Way, The Frenzy War, and The Frenzy Wolves) as well as Johnny Gruesome, Carnage Road, and The Julian Year. He is a two-time winner of the IPPY Gold Medal for Horror, a three-time Bram Stoker Award finalist, winner of Dark Scribe Press’s “Best Small Press Chill” Award, and winner of the Anubis Award for Horror. Lamberson is also an award-winning filmmaker whose work includes the midnight movie cult classic Slime City, its sequel Slime City Massacre, and Dry Bones. Fangoria called him “the hardest-working man in horror.” His website is www.gregorylamberson.com.
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