by Ryan Horvath
The streets of Los Angeles erupted in gangland gun battles that law enforcement was powerless to do anything about. The firepower in the gangs’ possession was more than the LAPD would have thought they had. The only upside to this was that the gang members were butchering each other as well as the cops.
Rival gangs in Miami joined forces and bombed police departments throughout the city. With the amount of dead policemen and the ones in hiding, afraid to end it like their brethren, the city quickly became a lawless nirvana in the steamy southern October evening. Stores were robbed and their employees either died cowering in fear or fighting to defend their establishments. Men snatched women, and in some cases, other men, from the streets and raped them in alleys at gun or knife point before ending their victim’s life with a bullet to the back of the skull or a bloody smile three inches south of and far bigger than their usual one. The freeways became a snarl of wrecked vehicles, fighting people, who may have been neighbors or co-workers when they got up this morning, and grisly corpses, who were victims of cars, blunt and sharp instruments, and various calibers of gunfire. It wasn’t long before this sparkling city of sunshine began to burn unchecked like its forest nestled cousin on the west coast. To his credit, the mayor of Miami tried to connect with numerous contacts he had in the federal government in attempt to get some assistance for his city but some calls went unanswered, some rang busy, and some simply did nothing. He watched, astonished and in tears, the chaos in the streets from his fifth floor windows of his condo hi-rise. A kitten sat at his feet; she was calico but nearly all white with a bright pink nose and golden eyes and the mayor had, just seven days earlier, been strangely drawn to and compelled to adopt the kitten from a local no-kill shelter while he had been driving home from City Hall and he and the kitten already shared an unusual and remarkable bond. The mayor felt like a stupid failure in spite of the fact that he had recently mastered many mathematical disciplines that, ten days ago, would have given him a headache just to look at.
And, although it would never be recorded, the city of Boston’s suicide rate increased by one hundred forty-two percent.
The United States was not the only nation experiencing chaos in the aftermath of the eclipse.
In one of South Africa’s two nuclear power plants, the safety technicians who were supposed to be monitoring the fusion reactor abandoned their posts to flee the country with their families. With no one to regulate the coolant levels in the reactor, the core overheated and went into meltdown. Clouds of poisonous and deadly radiation mixed into the air and contaminated plants, animals and humans and rendered that region of Africa uninhabitable.
Thousands of miles to the north and west, on the Iberian Peninsula, riots had broken out in the city of Lisbon. People armed with guns, knives, bats, metal pipes and various other deadly items invaded banks, grocery stores, hardware stores, gas stations and pilfered them of goods. Anyone who gave resistance to this mob was quickly slaughtered and the streets soon filled with the blood of the fallen.
Supporters of the former Soviet Union used the distraction as an opportunity and seized control of the government in the city of Moscow. Their militia men dragged the seated president and prime minister onto the sidewalk out front of the Kremlin and shot both men in the head so many times that that they would never be identifiable by family or dental records. They did this on Russian national television and warned the world to stay away from Russian soil.
But the President was unaware of all of these things that were transpiring both in his own back yard and around the world as he left his office and was surrounded by a team of Secret Service agents. When they entered the White House Briefing Room, the President paused behind the partition that concealed his entrance to the room. He took a deep breath and tried to compose himself. He knew what he was up against when he stepped out into the view of all the reporters who were currently abuzz in the room. He thought he would be lucky if they even let him say anything before they tore into him.
The President steeled himself and stepped as proudly as he could from behind the partition and headed for the podium. The room silenced at the sight of him. Camera flashes bounced off the wall behind him. When he reached the podium, he turned to face the crowd that, to his surprise, stayed silent. There were about forty members of the press in attendance with two network cameras set up behind the seated reporters. A few others stood snapping still photos. All eyes were on the President expectantly. He noticed some of his staff was in attendance, including his chief of staff, one of his senior advisors, his press secretary, and her assistant.
“Good evening ladies and gentlemen,” the President began but that was as far as he got. When he had begun speaking, the press secretary’s assistant raised his hand in a closed fist to his mouth as if to stifle a cough, but what the President couldn’t see was the tube concealed in the young man’s fist and before he knew it, the President felt something prick his skin and lodge in his neck. He reached for whatever was there as the Secret Service agents rushed around him and toward the young assistant. The President started to feel suddenly very wrong and he slowly collapsed into the arms of the supporting agents. One of the agents at his side plucked whatever had lodged in the President’s neck and looked at it. As the President’s vision began to blur, he recognized a small dart in the agent’s hand. Seconds later, his eyes shut and he did not open them again because, sixty seconds later, he was stone dead.
The young North Korean assistant to the press secretary had laced the dart with cyanide and he knew he had used enough to make sure the American President would be eliminated. As he was tackled to the ground on his stomach and his arms were wrenched behind him and handcuffed, he confirmed the cameras were still rolling and he knew his superiors would be pleased by the public execution of the American President. The young assistant crunched down on a gel pill he had hidden between his teeth and cheek and took his own lethal dose of cyanide.
The Supreme Leader of North Korea had indeed seen the successful assassination of the American President and authorized phase two of his plan. With the United States reeling over the thing in the sky and now the public death of their beloved leader, the Supreme Leader was ecstatic to move forward and cripple the stricken nation. The nation’s nuclear weapons were about to be tested. They only had three functional missiles that could carry nuclear arms to the United States and the Supreme Leader intended to shove all the fire power up the westerner’s asses at once.
The Supreme Leader stood over his team of subordinates and directed them to target the cities of New York, Chicago, and Los Angeles, thus striking the nation in its three largest cities as well as making the western, central, and eastern portions of the country buried under nuclear fallout. The Leader commanded and his targeting officer set the coordinates for the missiles. When he was finished, he nodded up to his commander.
The Supreme Leader then flipped the cover over the LAUNCH button and said in his native tongue, “For United Korea. Die, you sons of bitches!” Then he pressed the button.
From their concealed place in the North Korean soil, the missiles armed with nuclear warheads, which the Supreme Leader had been told were roughly five times as powerful as the bomb that had been dropped on Hiroshima decades ago, took off into the sky. As they assumed their trajectory, the targeting officer who had laid in their course soon realized something was wrong. Sweat poured down his brow and he tried to see what had happened without alerting the Supreme Leader that there was a problem, which he’d notice for himself at any moment, given the missiles were going in the wrong direction.
The targeting officer scanned his computer, and soon found his error. When he estimated where the missiles were actually headed he knew the Supreme Leader was not going to be happy that the only three missiles they had were not going to their intended targets.
“What is going on?” the Supreme Leader questioned. Confusion and anger were written on his face.
The other techs at the workstation looked at their leade
r with baffled expressions except the targeting tech.
The targeting tech stood. “I…I…I am sorry, Great one. I made a mistake in the targeting,” he finally admitted. His perspiration stung his eyes.
The Supreme Leader glared at the targeting tech with bold hate and ire. The tech felt warm urine running down his leg and collecting in his shoe. The Supreme Leader turned his attention back to the monitor and watched the missiles progress. After a moment, everyone in the room was watching.
Minutes later, the group of men watched in mortified silence as their missiles reached the mistaken targets. The cities of Perth, Darwin, and Sydney on the continent of Australia were wiped off the map along with more than twenty five percent of the Australian people. An unusual high pressure system off the coast of Sydney prevented the fallout from moving east and instead, it spread north and south along the continent’s coast and before long, nuclear fallout caused Melbourne and the country’s capital of Canberra to add their citizens to the death toll.
The targeting tech looked back to the Supreme Leader and the last thing he heard was, “You stupid son of a bitch.” The Supreme Leader had taken his gun from the holster around his waist and he put a nine millimeter bullet between the eyes of the targeting technician. He then spat on the man’s dead body where it had landed. He left the room and headed to the roof. He looked worriedly to the sky and wondered when the world would retaliate for the destruction of the land down under.
Friday was a dark day in the history of humanity. By the end of the day, over six hundred million human beings were dead either by murder, suicide, execution, accident, or act of war. Many countries’ governments had fallen apart and laws and law enforcement failed to control the downward spiral of society.
Six hundred million dead in less than half a day.
That was the tip of the iceberg.
60
KAREN, AMANDA, AND BLAZE & ART
“Blaze? Where are you leading us?” Karen puffed as she ran a few paces behind the Dalmatian.
Amanda was keeping up with them just fine in spite of the fact she was using her arms to prevent her breasts from swinging around uncomfortably while she ran. Karen felt terrible she had lost the shirt in the hellacious basement and even worse that she hadn’t been smart enough to try to grab something from the bag of clothing in her back seat. She hadn’t even been able to grab her purse which meant no cell phone which meant they were on their own.
“I’m not sure,” Blaze barked in response. “There’s just something this way. It’s familiar but not familiar.”
“What?” Karen persisted.
“What did he say?” Amanda asked.
“He doesn’t know. What he said doesn’t make sense,” Karen replied.
Amanda chanced a look behind her and saw the green eyed giant of a man was still after them. The distance between them and him hadn’t changed much but Amanda knew that he was stronger than they were and, as she hadn’t eaten in days, she would tire out long before he would and would either fall back in his clutches alone or cost her and her sister their lives, probably the dog too.
“I’ll follow him. It sure beats the alternative,” Amanda said turning her gaze forward again as she ran. “But I’m not sure how much longer I can run. Being on that damn table, I’ve got a cramp coming.”
Suddenly Blaze stopped short and turned his head to his left. “In there,” he barked in command. He was indicating a field of corn stalks that was full of un-harvested ears of corn. The plants were gold and dry at this late time in the season. “We can try to lose him in those plants,” Blaze woofed and dashed toward the corn field.
“Follow him,” Karen instructed and the two women raced after the dog. Once in the corn, the two women quickly became disoriented. Blaze sped over to them.
“C’mon,” he woofed quietly. “Move slow. Try not to disturb the plants.” He led them deeper into the field.
“Blaze,” Karen whispered. “What did you mean about what you smelled back there?”
“Smell,” he corrected with a soft chuff. “I still smell it. Something like something from where we lived, Master Karen. But it’s not quite the same.” He stopped moving suddenly. His nostrils quivered as he looked toward the direction they had come from. Excitement came across him and his tail began to wave frantically. “The bad smelling man!” he barked. “He didn’t follow us into these plants. He’s moving away!”
Karen stopped and grabbed Amanda’s upper arm to stop her.
“What gives?” Amanda prodded.
“Blaze says he’s not coming after us… that he’s moving away,” Karen answered.
“Bullshit. If you’d have seen how much his prick throbbed when he had me… He’s not letting me, or us, get away. There’s no way he’s giving up. That dog is wrong,” Amanda said firmly. Fatigue started to settle over Amanda now that she had stopped running.
“That dog,” Karen started angrily, “followed that man’s fucking smell across half this country to find you. He knows what he’s saying.”
“Half the country?” Amanda said sounding bewildered. “Where are we?”
“We’re in Minnesota. That man kidnapped you from my grocery store and drove you across ten states to bring you to that hell hole back there. That dog is the only reason you’re free right now so be grateful and don’t talk bad about him,” Karen scolded.
Amanda was stunned by her sister’s revelation and her harshness. She looked shamefully at Blaze and said, “I’m sorry.”
Blaze wagged his tail a little faster.
“Jesus,” Amanda started. “I’m so hungry.”
“We’ll get something soon,” Karen reassured, having no idea if that were true. She pulled Amanda close to her. “Blaze? What’s our next move?”
Amanda opened her mouth to protest leaving the decision of their fate up to a dog but thought better and closed her mouth without speaking.
“The bad smelling man went back to that house we were all in,” Blaze barked.
Amanda thought for a moment and said, “If he brought me all this way, we have to assume he knows the area. And we don’t. So he probably knows the borders of this field and could be waiting for us anywhere we come out.”
“I think what I smelled earlier was a way to safety,” Blaze barked.
“Safety? What do you mean?” Karen questioned.
“Even though it’s a familiar smell, I can’t quite remember why. It just reminds me of something from home,” he woofed in response.
“How far?” Karen asked.
Amanda recognized that her sister had fully given her trust to Blaze. If the pooch got them through this, she decided she’d give him her trust as well.
“It’s not far,” Blaze answered. “Farther than the bad smelling man is now but still pretty close. If we go that way, we should find it.”
“I need… I need… to rest a bit longer,” Amanda said wearily and she slumped down on her bottom.
Karen knelt down next to her and held her sister from behind. Blaze moved in and licked Amanda’s cheek twice. Amanda laughed softly at this. A moment later, she was asleep.
The sun shone down brightly on them. The air was slightly cool but the heavenly warmth made it barely noticeable. The fragrance of over ripe corn toyed with Karen’s senses and her stomach growled. She did not have the heart to wake Amanda right away so she merely sat holding her sister against her and listened to the corn rustle in the breeze. Blaze sat on his rear legs with his ears cocked, and listened and smelled for any signs of danger. A little over an hour later, Karen shook Amanda awake.
Amanda blinked, looking surprised by her surroundings until her memory set in. “How long was I out?”
“Not long. An hour or so. Feel better?” Karen said and rubbed her sister’s bare shoulders.
Amanda laughed low but deep and nodded. “The sun feels great. But what I wouldn’t do for a bacon cheeseburger right now.”
Karen chuckled with her sister and thought, if they ever got out of t
his, she would take Amanda to Mitzi’s in Farmington and let her taste a real home cooked meal. Suddenly she realized something.
“His funeral is tomorrow. I’d almost forgotten,” Karen said.
“Whose?” Amanda said and then, “Oh, right. Don’t worry. We’ll make it back for it.” She tried to sound convincing but couldn’t pull it off.
Karen was looking off in the opposite direction and she said, rather casually, “No. I don’t think we will.” She was quiet for another moment before she stood, kissed her open right palm and waved it in the air. “Good bye, Jack. I’ll always love you.”
Blaze’s ears pricked at this and he began to dance in a furor. “Master Karen!” he barked. “That’s it! That’s what I smell. It’s Jack. But he’s… different somehow.”
Karen’s heart sped up and she grabbed Blaze’s head and vigorously began to scratch his ears.
“What is it? What’s he saying?” Amanda was standing again now too.
“He says he smells Jack,” Karen responded through a broad smile. “I don’t know how it’s possible but he smells Jack.”
“That way,” Blaze chuffed, indicating the direction he had before.
“C’mon,” Karen said. “Let’s get moving.”
The trio began slowly moving through the corn.
Art stopped running when he saw the spotted dog lead his prey into the corn field. He smiled where he stood. He knew the area well and he knew it would be very easy to spot the bitches from two of the remaining three sides of the field they could exit from. There was a road he could watch from. If they came out the third side, they’d find themselves having the road he’d be watching from as their only escape.
