by Amy Cross
The Sickening King
(The Grid II)
Amy Cross
Copyright 2012 Amy Cross
Published by Amy Cross Books
Smashwords Edition
***
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Prologue
The desert sun shone down, reflected in the piece of scrap metal in Herge's hands. The old man squinted and looked away, his gaze falling on the large dome of the nuclear power station in the distance. He sniffed. Something wasn't right, but he couldn't put his finger on it. All he could do was keep walking. And so, dropping the piece of metal, he staggered naked and unwashed towards the dome.
Above him, a vulture circled. Herge looked up.
"Fuck you," he said.
Before the disaster, Herge Wempadore was a trust fund manager in Salt Lake City. He had an office on the fourth floor of a small building in the lower part of town. He wasn't rich, not by any means, but he had money. He made $75,000 per year (before tax) and he drove a Mercedes-Benz. He ate out once or twice a week, and he had a nice enough wife. He was happy, though he often watched his younger colleagues as they went out drinking and fucking, and he wished he could have had that kind of life. Still, he never complained. He just got on with things.
Then the disaster came and Herge's life was destroyed. The city became a waste-zone, populated by violent bums and small militias. Herge, like most people, expected the army to arrive at some point and restore order. It took almost a month before Herge understood that there would be no rescue. Later, he met a guy who claimed to know what had really happened: a huge magnetic shock-wave had erupted from the sun, hitting Earth and destroying the magnetic charge that generates electricity; for the next twenty years or so, this man told Herge, there would be - could be - no electricity on Earth.
So now Herge was out here in the Utah desert, because he had to get out of Salt Lake City and he figured he should head for the military base somewhere out here. But without maps - without Google, without GPS, without a smartphone - he had become hopelessly lost. He had been out here now for three weeks, and he was finally out of water and food. He knew he was dying, and he had given up looking for the military base when - at last - he spotted the nuclear power station in the distance.
He was close. Maybe three hundred metres from the main gate. He knew this was his last chance. If the station was abandoned, or if the inhabitants refused to help him, he would die out here, and that damn vulture would pick his bones. A good day for Herge would be a bad day for the vulture, and vice versa. And although Herge desperately hoped that there would be some kind of salvation when he reached the power station, he was resigned to the fact that most probably he would be dead soon. After all, even if there were people alive there and even if they had food and water, why would they bother giving any of their precious stash to Herge? He knew one thing for sure: if he were in their position, he damn well wouldn't give him anything.
Eventually Herge staggered to the fence surrounding the base. A sign warned 'ELECTRIFIED', but of course that was somewhat out of date. Herge casually banged his hand against the fence as he tried to open the gate, which was padlocked shut. Herge sighed and looked up at the top of the fence, which was covered with barbed wire. Climbing up would be almost impossible, and getting over would be potentially lethal.
"Hello!" Herge called out, his hoarse voice echoing between the large concrete buildings. He waited, desperately hoping that someone would respond, but there was nothing. "Hello!" he called out again, but the effort was tiring and he leaned against the gate, resting for a moment. He looked up. "Fuck you," he said to the vulture, which was still circling.
After a minute or two, Herge staggered along the edge of the perimeter, hoping beyond hope that there might be some other way into the facility. But as he walked, he felt himself becoming weaker and weaker. At first, he put this down to heat-stroke and malnutrition, but then he felt something strange in his mouth. He reached in and pulled out a tooth, and no sooner had he realised what it was, than another one came out. Within a couple of minutes, more than half the teeth in his mouth were out, and the rest were loose. And as he examined them one by one, he noticed something falling from his head. His hair was coming out. And then something else: he felt a burning sensation on his hands, and he noticed the skin was becoming red and sore.
He looked over at the dome of the power station, and he realised that the eerie silence was in fact going to prove fatal. With the nuclear material undoubtedly inside that dome, silence meant only one thing: there were no cooling mechanisms running. Herge's (very) limited understanding of nuclear technology notwithstanding, he understood that a meltdown would have triggered a collapse of the nuclear materials into a containment facility below the reactor, but the system would have been designed on the assumption that someone would be around to start a clean-up. But there was no-one around, so radioactive material was obviously seeping out.
Herge paused. He was starting to feel a kind of sore, rough pain in his belly, around where his liver was. He sat down on the hard desert ground and he finally, after all this time, accepted his imminent death. There was no doubt any more, and no need to hope for salvation. He was dying, and he had only a minute or two left. The sudden certainty of his fate was strangely comforting, though he had to admit he had always wanted to go out with a bang rather than a whimper.
He looked up at the vulture, and he smiled. The bird would pick his carcass apart, but the radiation would prove fatal for the dumb creature. That, at least, was some kind of victory. And thinking this, Herge allowed his head to drop and his eyes to close, and he sat there waiting waiting waiting until finally his conscious mind just drifted off and all that was left was his dead body.
***
High above, the vulture circled for another twenty minutes or so, unwilling to accept too quickly that its prey was dead. After all, even a sick and dying human could still injure a bird, and the vulture knew it would be better to wait than to risk going in too early. The human wasn't going anywhere, and was clearly on the cusp of death. Also, there were no other vultures nearby, so there was no need to compete for food. This carcass was ready and available, and the vulture was smart enough to wait. But eventually the bird realised that the human hadn't moved for nearly half an hour, which in this heat meant only one thing: death.
The vulture landed a few feet from the human's corpse. Still cautious, the vulture stepped past the corpse, keeping a beady eye on the chest, watching out for any sign that the body was breathing. But the human was dead, and soon the vulture was confident enough to step close and reach out, pecking at the human's shoulder. The peck drew a little blood, but the human didn't respond. The vulture understood what this meant: it was confirmation that the human was dead. Stepping closer, the vulture pecked at the shoulder again, but this time with enough precision to rip away a sizeable strip of bloody flesh. Once it had eaten the flesh, the bird took another peck and ripped away more from the body. Fresh human meat was a rarity and the vulture knew that this body would allow it to survive another few days. Just as the human had been close to death, so too had the vulture, which was struggling to find much to eat out here in the desert.
The vulture started pecking at the corpse's face, pulling flesh from the cheek. It was g
ood flesh, succulent and nutritious. The bird looked at the horizon, double-checking that there were no other birds in the area and that it would not have to share its carcass. Fortunately the sky was empty. The vulture returned to its task, picking flesh away from the dead man. The bird had decided to use this feast to boost its energy reserves so that it could fly south, where it would hopefully find something more stable, a better source of food. Although the bird didn't understand exactly what had happened, it knew that the human world had been changed. It was quieter, and slowly there were becoming fewer and fewer humans. The bird didn't mind, but it had to work out how to -
Suddenly the human reached a hand out, grabbing the bird around the neck. The human raised its head, half the flesh eaten away. A pair of yellowing, dead eyes stared at the bird, which squawked and struggled to get free. It had been so sure that the human was dead, so certain, yet now -
The human pulled the bird close and bit straight through its neck, sucking its blood. The bird fell dead, and the human continued to feed on its carcass. As it swallowed, most of the pieces of flesh fell straight out of the pecked holes in its neck. But the human barely noticed. It was driven purely by a desire to eat, and it didn't recognise that its stomach wasn't getting full. When it had finally eaten all the flesh on the bird, it began to chew on the bones. And when it was finally finished, the human noticed the chewed lumps of bird meat that had fallen out of its neck and into its lap. Without understanding, the human picked up the lumps of meat and ate them again. It continued in this vein for several hours, eating and eating without realising how the meat was falling out through the hole in its neck. This carried on until finally the human stopped eating and turned its head. It looked up to find someone had emerged from the power station and was standing on the other side of the fence.
"Great," said the figure with a thick Texan accent. "Breakfast".
Chapter One
"When the wind blows from the south," the old lady says slowly, staring down at the bowl of water next to her feet, "people get sick". She pauses, narrowing her eyes. "It's a kind of sickness I've never seen before, but I'm almost certain it's linked to radiation. There are more than fifteen nuclear power stations to the south, and if this wind is blowing radioactive material towards us, it's only a matter of time before the sickness spreads". She looks up at me and smiles. With her wild white hair and the rags she wears, she looks like some kind of crazy old-time shaman. "Trust me," she adds, "before all this started, I was Professor of Cellular Medicine at Carnaby University in New York State. I know my shit".
I take a deep breath, not sure what she wants me to do. "I don't know anything about this kind of thing," I say. "If you're saying we should move, then that's fine. I agree with you. But where to? Where can we go that's safe?"
"What's your name again?" the old woman asks.
"Emma," I say.
She reaches out a hand and we shake. "I'm Susannah Doyle. Doctor Susannah Doyle. And if you want my advice and if you value my opinion, I can honestly say that I can't really think of a single way to escape this sickness entirely. It's too... everywhere. And even if you get far enough away from the source so that the wind can't blow it in your direction, you'll probably get too close to another source. The truth is, this whole country is riddled with nuclear reactors that are completely out of control". She looks at me sadly. "I'm so sorry".
"What for?"
She smiles. "You're so young. And beautiful. And... You should have had such a wonderful life. Happy. Contented. Fulfilled. But now, I fear for the world in which our children must live".
"I'll be okay," I say, although I'm not even convincing myself.
"You have to remember," Susannah continues, "that we no longer live in an age of morality. In the old world, you did things because they were morally right, and you were rewarded. But now, you have to do whatever is necessary to ensure your survival, on a day by day basis. And that means being selfish. Can you manage that, Emma?"
I nod. "Sure".
She smiles. "I hope you can," she says, with an inescapable look of sadness etched on her face. I can't shake the feeling that she knows things that I don't know.
I pause. "So there's no hope?" I ask.
She shakes her head. "Not in this country, at least," she says.
"So you're saying we should leave America?" I ask.
She laughs. "How?" she says. "Where are you gonna get a boat, honey?"
I sigh. It's been almost a year since the disaster happened, and although I'm learning a lot of stuff fast, I still feel like a child sometimes. I can't help making assumptions sometimes; I guess I'm just used to a world in which stuff can be acquired fairly easily. I still occasionally find myself thinking I can go and check something online, or that I can just email someone for some help. The sad truth is, I still haven't adapted to this strange new world.
"I'm sorry," says Susannah. "I hope I didn't make you feel bad. The truth is, there are probably plenty of boats knocking around if you know where to look". She smile. "The shore might be a good place to start".
"And go where?" I ask. "Europe? Asia? I don't..." Again, I feel stupid. Why didn't I pay more attention in school? My knowledge of Europe and Asia is pretty much zero, so the idea of trying to take a boat over there is terrifying. Added to that, I have no idea how to sail a boat or how to navigate. The whole idea is insane, and there's clearly nothing I can do to get out of here. "It's like the whole world has just fallen apart, and we're just stuck exactly where we are".
"Well," says Susannah, laughing, "that's kind of true, isn't it? But it doesn't mean we have to just sit around and accept it. We have to be brave. We have to not be afraid to strike out in new directions. If you just sit around here, nothing's going to happen. This place is just a place for old people to die".
"Not just old people," I say.
"Very true," she replies. I can feel her eyes fixed on me. She seems to find me interesting, for some reason that I haven't quite worked out yet. "Parents?" she asks.
"What?" I reply, surprised to hear the word.
"Your family," she says. "Where are they?"
"I don't know," I say, shaking my head. "My parents were in California when the solar flare hit. I've got no way of knowing where they are now. I've kind of given up wondering".
"Who else?" she asks. I stare at her, and she laughs. "There's someone keeping you here. I can tell. And if it's not your parents, then who is it?"
I sigh. This is a conversation I really, really don't want to have. It's a conversation I've been putting off for a long time, trying to avoid having with everyone I meet. But there's something about this woman that seems to allow her to see deeper into my soul than anyone else, as if she kind of knows what I'm thinking.
"What's his name?" she asks, sounding kind and concerned.
"It's not -" I pause. "I'm not in love with him or anything," I say. "It's just that I had this friend, and... Well, he wasn't even a friend. I just knew him. And he seemed okay, and he helped me out after the solar flares hit, and then he..." I sigh. "I don't really know what happened to him, but..."
"You'd like to find out," Susannah says. "That's natural. It's called curiosity, and we all have it. The problem is, with the world the way it is these days, there's not much of a chance to satisfy it, is there? You can't just go onto Facebook or whatever and find out how someone is". She pauses. "Your friend is probably dead -"
"Pierce isn't dead," I blurt out, but I immediately realise how stupid that sounds. The truth is, Pierce probably is dead. The last time I saw him, he was being pulled back into a building that was being overrun by rioters. Pierce might have been good at talking himself out of situations, but I doubt he'd have had much luck with those people. All they cared about was smashing up the town. To them, Pierce would have been just another kid with a big mouth. Maybe they kept him alive a little longer than usual, so they could torture him, but I'm pretty sure they would have found no use for him.
"I hope you're right," Susan
nah says. "But there's no way you can find out for sure, so don't spend all your time worrying about it. All you can do is decide what you're going to do, and how you're going to live the rest of your life. You have to make big decisions. Leaving America, crossing the ocean, used to be something we all did in a few hours, but now it's a life-long decision. You can't suddenly change your mind and just come back".
"I know," I say. "But I'm American. I belong here".
"There's no America any more," Susannah says. "There's no anything any more. It's just land, with people living according to their own rules".
"But it'll come back," I say. "America will come back. The government will sort things out".
Susannah shakes her head. "Don't waste your life waiting for something like that to happen. You want my advice? Find an island. Find some friends, make sure you're prepared, and go find an island out somewhere in the Pacific. It doesn't have to be big. Just find a place and start your own new life there".
"I'm not going to an island," I say.
"It's your only chance to escape the sickness," she replies. "Even that might not be enough. It might be carried on the wind and it might spread across the water, but you have to at least try to get away". She stands up. "Come with me".
We head out of the tent and into the hot desert sun. All around us are a dozen more tents, part of a small community that has set up here around a watering hole. It's hardly a paradise, but there's enough food and water in the area to keep twenty or so people alive, and we've formed something of a community. My job is to help fetch water from the secondary waterhole a few miles away. It's a long walk in hot conditions, and I have to do it twice a day. Despite the heat, I always cover up with a sheet to try to avoid sunburn. But we need the water, so I have no choice but to go.
