6:00 Hours: A Dystopian Novel

by Chad Evercroft

  “If anyone tarnished his name, it’s the President himself. If he did not hire Baxter for personal reasons, then he ultimately has nothing to fear. And if he did, well, he’d better be prepared to face the music.”

  “You’re naive, Robert. I hope you’re ready to vacate that office of yours. Never have I met somebody who understands nothing about politics.”

  “I understand it too well. It doesn’t mean I have to like it, or play the game dirty. My job is to protect people. Not people like you, Mr. Vice President, but people who are vulnerable and who can’t buy safety.”

  “You’re finished. Your career is over.”

  Robert could tell Terrace was floundering. His anger made him sound unhinged and thoughtless. Robert couldn’t help but smirk.

  “If you get rid of me, you’re pounding the last nail in the President’s political coffin. People will know you wanted to hide the truth. I’ll be a martyr. Is that what you want to happen?”

  Terrace was silent. Robert could hear him breathing - short, hoarse draws - and could almost feel the fury crackling through the phone line.

  “I didn’t think so. Have a good rest of your day, Mr. Vice President.”

  Robert hung up. He looked at Claire and raised his eyebrows, asking her what she thought. She broke into a smile and clapped her hands noiselessly, like she was at a golf match.

  “Well done, sir,” she said. “I couldn’t imagine you saying it any better than that.”

  “There will probably be some consequences,” Robert mused. “Funding cut or some other low-key jabs they’ll try to keep from the media. But I think we’re coming out of this relatively unscathed.”

  Robert stood and stretched, pulling one arm across his chest, and then the other.

  Now if I only knew if Rachel was safe.

  Claire’s phone buzzed in her pocket. It reminded Robert of a bumblebee, like the ones in Claire’s hair. She answered the call.

  “Claire Doherty.”

  Robert could hear faint murmuring on the other end, and Claire’s lips parted slightly.

  “Are you sure?” she asked. “My God. He’s right here. I’ll hand him over.”

  Claire held out the phone. It almost looked like she had tears in her eyes.

  “Sir, it’s one of the pilots. He said he found your daughter.”

  Robert’s heart stopped beating for a moment. He grabbed the phone from Claire and pressed it to his ear.

  “Director Morgan speaking.”

  “Sir! I just wanted to tell you that we just picked up your daughter in Genoa!”

  The pilot yelled, his voice barely audible above the whir of the helicopter.

  “Is she ok? Can I talk to her?” Robert yelled back.

  There was a few moments of scuffling as the phone was handed over.

  “Daddy?”

  It was Rachel’s voice. Robert had to sit down. He put his hand on the desk to steady himself. He shut his eyes tightly, tears squeezing out. He could barely speak.

  “Sweetie? Are you ok?”

  “I’m ok, Dad. I hurt my hand a little, but the medic took care of it and everything is ok.”

  “Oh, thank God. We were so worried.”

  “I tried to call, but I couldn’t get reception.”

  ‘It’s okay. You’re safe now. That’s all that matters. Your mom will be so relieved.”

  As Robert spoke, Michael came into the room. If Robert had been paying attention, he would have noticed that Michael looked a little pale. He pressed a manila folder to his chest, a ring of sweat darkening the neckline of his white Oxford shirt. His tie had been discarded long ago.

  “Director Morgan?” Michael whispered, loud enough to let Robert know it was important.

  Robert held up his hand impatiently, but Michael insisted.

  “Sir,” he pressed.

  Robert held his hand over the phone and looked up.

  “What is it, Michael? I’m talking to my daughter. They just picked her up.”

  “It’s your wife, sir,” Michael said.

  “What about her?”

  Michael began to speak, but stopped. He cleared his throat.

  “Director Morgan,” he began softly, “The storm. It must have been worse in the city. It...your wife. There was a lightning strike. A tree fell through the roof. She…she was resting. A neighbor called. I just talked to the medics. They...they couldn’t get there in time. ”

  Michael paused again and took a deep breath.

  “I’m sorry, sir, but your wife is dead.”

  Claire’s phone slipped from Robert’s hand and hit the table. Rachel’s voice could still be heard - faint and far away - through the speaker.

  “Dad? Dad, are you there?”

  Her voice echoed against the table and through the room like a whisper.

  Outside, the rain persisted. The drops hit the sidewalk hard, like the drumming of fingers. The trees curved, bowing to the wind, stretching out their branches against the ECAG windows. Hands of lightning crackled through the dark sky and the thunder clapped. In the hallway, worker drones moved back and forth, up and down the elevator, papers spilling from binders, while in Robert’s office, everyone stood frozen. Claire held a hand to her mouth. Michael’s eyes were lowered to the floor. They could all still hear Rachel on the phone, calling for her father.

  “Hello? Dad? Did I lose you?”

  Final Word

  Thank you very much for reading my book. I hope you enjoyed it and found what you were looking for.

  Recently, I have started writing under the Pseudonym Ashton Karver, releasing new books in the Science Fiction, Crime and Dystopian Genre. Please feel free to check out the author page of my new Pseudonym Ashton Karver.

  Below you can find an excerpt of my new Dystopian Novel Prepper Mortality.

  ~ Chapter 1 ~

  Big city life, big city problems. Cars that puff balls of smoke into the lungs of non-smokers and smokers alike. Electronics buzzing left right and center, the signals working their way into our brains, dancing in between and on top of brain cells, mucking things up. I could just imagine the signals forcing their way in- lightning-like. Important memory? Zap. IQ? Zap. Life expectancy? Zap. Zap! Zap! Zap!

  Nope. Not for me. I like feeling the grass beneath my skin, tickling and itching in all the uncovered regions. I like the feeling of it between my fingers, the way it sounds when I rip a handful out of the earth. And the smell. The smell of nature is enthralling, rejuvenating. Big cities, well, they smell of death. Not the rotten kind of death that should be shoveled six feet under- though I must admit there are some places in the city that ooze that kind of odor. Big cities smell of half dead people; ones with rotten souls and fried brains. They’re all zombies there anyways, so I doubt they mind it. Sure, they might not be digging into the flesh of humans with their porcelain veneers, but deep down, they’re all dead. Dead yet still waiting to die. Maybe they don’t know it. I guess life’s hectic enough in the big city to keep them unaware.

  Granddad said something to me years ago that summed up their livelihood pretty well. He said, ‘almost dying keeps them alive.’ That was it. No explanation, no examples. Nothing. ‘Almost dying keeps them alive.’ My ten year old brain went crazy that day. I couldn’t understand how rotting livers and half-baked brains could make anyone feel alive. They ought to know that they’re dying. They had to feel the life seeping out of them- bit by bit.

  It wasn’t until a few years later that I fully comprehended granddad’s statement. Big city people were always dodging cars, surviving train wrecks, and trying not to get shot. When they’re in the thick of the danger, and they manage to escape, they feel alive. It’s the thrill that doesn’t make them aware of how dead they are before they’re ready to have dirt tossed on top of their coffins.

  Berkon’s people aren’t like the city folk. We’re alive. There’s fresh blood pumping through our veins and fresh air filling our uncontaminated lungs. Berkon’s people die from old age, not some random ailm
ent that they brought on themselves. Okay, so maybe that’s what a lifetime in this place led me to believe. I’m a third generation Berkonian- that’s what we call ourselves. Not Americans, not people from Alabama, Berkonians.

  On my thirteenth birthday, like all other thirteen year olds, I was taken on a trip to the city, packed in a minibus (one of the only times it was determined fit to pollute the atmosphere) and driven a few hours all the way to a place that left me with wide eyes and a dropped jaw. It was horrendous. People on the corner, sitting in their own filth. Trash on the ground, screaming, hustling and bustling. Too much, just way too much. Everyone looked grumpy, like they’d not only had a bad day, but were prepared to have only bad days from then on. We didn’t want that. No one wanted that, to be living in an environment so cold, so lifeless. So, of course, we stayed in Berkon, never dreaming of stepping a foot off our fertile soil.

  I saw the big city and I wanted none of it. That is, until two year ago when I met Maximillian or rather, Max as he likes to be called. A shy boy, my complete opposite, but I guess that’s what made him so interesting. I was sixteen years old at the time and just like boys, girls have their hormones going wild at that age. There he was, dark hair, almost jet black and eyes just a shade lighter. A tiny little dot preceded his lip and signs of stubble traveled from his cheeks to his chin. Tall but not gigantic, built but not monstrous. I was his opposite, short and skinny, blonde hair that looked white in the right- or wrong- light. Rather than a single mole I had a freckled nose and freckled cheeks. In the beginning, there was only one thing we had in common- our ages.

  Maximillian Brown’s mom, Penny, moved to Berkon after what he likes to call, her biggest mental breakdown yet. Always looking for new family- people who thought like us, prepped like us, wanted to be alive like us- there was little hesitation when it came to letting them in. Of course, they had to be stripped of each and every electronic device before they were allowed through the checkpoint. They were interviewed and questioned, examined and tested and then, finally, allowed to mix with the rest of the Berkonians- granted citizenship, so to speak.

  Maximillian was a furious kid, a quiet kid but a furious one, not unlike the people we saw on our trip to the city. However, he had no choice but to get along with someone. Most of the other girls had tried to grab his attention, showing an ankle here, jutting out a hip there, and every once in a while, unbuttoning their shirts a little too deep. He didn’t care for them much and having been rejected enough times, they decided it was best to let him be. Being left alone, unfortunately, becomes frustrating even for those who wish to be left alone. When Maximillian noticed that he no longer wanted to be alone, I took the opportunity to introduce myself. Sure, a part of it was due to the hormones bursting through my veins, but another part- perhaps a bigger one- just wanted to learn about the things he’d seen.

  In Berkon, we learned through pictures of all the horrid things the city has to offer. People didn’t only die there, they killed themselves. We learned of planes falling from the sky, bringing hundreds of people to extinction all at once. Our teachers taught us of all the chemicals packed in foods and showed us pictures of the effects they had on the human body.

  The city wasn’t a place for people like us, people who want to live. I can’t count the amount of times I’ve heard that said to me or the amount of times I’ve said it to myself after hearing one of Max’s stories. What I knew, was that the more I spoke to him, and the more he showed me, the less I believed in the information I was being fed. From Max, I learned that being a farmer was great but being a pilot was better. I learned that counting knives and forks was boring but counting molecules was much more enthralling. See, Max knew the city, in and out, corner to corner. All his life, he’d called it home. He wasn’t the oldest of the ‘kids’ to join us but I guess one could say the most defiant.

  There were rules about spreading rumors about a better life and Max was breaking all those rules by telling me these things. He wasn’t a liar though. He had pictures, tons and tons of pictures to back up his stories. How on earth he got them into Berkon, I had no idea but I saw them, with my own two crystal blue eyes. Pools and white sand beaches, buildings so high, they looked only inches away from grazing the sky. Parties where people splashed colorful paint all over each other, rollercoasters and elevators, churches bigger than neighborhoods and houses with fences all around.

  Because of Max, my dreams grew more interesting, my imagination ran wild and I- somewhere deep down- considered horrible actions. I was afraid of what I knew. The place we were taken at thirteen years old was a different place than the one Max introduced me to. He said it was a scare tactic and like a cult, the superiors controlled and limited the information we received. It kept us obedient, believing that we had it better and there was nothing more to go in search of. I hated that word- cult. It’s what Max often referred to us as when we were alone. I guess my hatred might have somewhat stemmed from the fact that I believed, at least partially, that we weren’t very far from being what he thought we were.

  Chapter 2

  Regardless of the names and adjectives Max used when describing Berkon, we aren’t bad. We aren’t horrible people. We’re peaceful. We take care of the land, the water, the air. Incest is strictly forbidden and the punishment for such a thing is high. We’ve got a town doctor who showed us pictures and informed us of the dangers that came with bedding a close relative. Needless to say, we were afraid of the thought and we’re a people driven by fear.

  Our town is small, with a mere 150 families and counting. People are always coming here, looking for a cleanse or running away from something. When I say ‘coming’ here, it’s not to be taken in the literal sense. Many people don’t know about us and according to granddad, there’s someone, or a group of someones recruiting. How this is done, I have no idea. It’s also one of the things Max’s box of knowledge isn’t certain of. His mom might have known about us or heard about us from his dad, who passed away shortly before she showed up in our town. A sad story he says little about. I never ask, never pry.

  Max is usually free with giving information and so I figured that when he’s closed off about something, it’s better not to pry. He’ll tell me what he wants me to know, and he’ll answer the questions he’s comfortable with. The ones that get a shrug or a ‘not now, Pearl,’ are the ones I bury and never bring up again. Though I must say, the story of his dad is one I find intriguing. It wouldn’t teach me more about the world outside of Berkon, but it would teach me more about the world inside Max’s head.

  Everyone in town is convinced that we’ll start popping out babies pretty soon. I’m eighteen, as is he and people in Berkon aren’t like people in the city when it comes to age. Eighteen is a very appropriate age to bring a child into the world. And there’s nothing Berkon loves more than a newborn. A reason to throw a party, gather round, sing songs. The mothers get to be celebrities for a while and the dads earn a badge of honor. We don’t worry about college or any of that stuff. Sure, we can get internships in the different areas in town and learn a trade or two. Soap making or sewing, baking or dentistry. The clever ones are usually encouraged to assist Dr. Lynn in the clinic and learn about the human body. Apparently he’s not a real doctor- according to the rest of the world and a piece of paper. But in Berkon, he’s all we’ve got and he’s pretty darn good at what he does. He’s the one who pulls the babies out of their mommies too. Unlucky for him, he won’t be pulling one out of me, not anytime soon. Sure, I’ve got a massive crush on Max and each time I’m around him, my belly does weird things, like it’s opened the door to an army of fairies and they just won’t stop dancing around.

  I’ve wanted to kiss him, so many times and lots of times, he looked at me like he wanted to kiss me too. But that’s all that’s ever happened, weird stares, uneasy feelings and then a punch in the shoulder or a joke to break the ice. We’re eighteen. Eighteen! If it were any other boy in town, I don’t think I would be intimidated, but Maximillian B
rown, isn’t just any guy in town. He’s a rebel, a rebel who makes my head think weird thoughts and my heart beat irregularly.

  Two years is how long we’ve been dancing around a relationship. Sometimes I think he’s not interested; that he sees me as a friend and nothing more. I don’t want this to be true, but I’m not brave enough to risk our friendship in search of something more. I’m not ready to lose the only person who can teach me about the real world and so, if he doesn’t make a move, neither will I.

  Chapter 3

  Max met me at our spot, a little hill overlooking the corn field. It’s the first place we snuck away to and the place we kept returning to. No one ever comes out here. We have no reason to worry about eyes or ears, waiting to report us. I can just listen to him, unrestricted. Lay my head back on the grass and imagine that clouds are playing out the scenes he speaks of.

  ‘It’s almost time,’ Max said, slapping a hand against my hip. ‘Are you nervous? I bet you are. You just act like you’re all brave and stuff, but you’re really just a big ball of nerves.’

  ‘Whatever. Honestly though, I wouldn’t say I’m nervous. Excited, but not nervous. I’m gonna need your help though, with some girly things.’

  ‘I already told you, you don’t need to worry about what you wear. Trust me, we’ve got lots of weirdos in Birmingham, you’ll fit right in.’

  ‘I’m not weird, ‘I protested. ‘Plus, I’ll have you know, right now you’re on my territory and I for damn sure can get a bunch of Berkon’s fittest hunks to roll you around this corn field if you mess with me.’

  ‘Don’t have to tell me twice,’ he chuckled, turning his hand up in a surrender. 'But seriously, are you still up for it?’

  ‘Yeah. I am. Though I gotta say, I’m not sure I’m up for the shit I’ll be in when we get back.’

  ‘What are they gonna do- lock us in a room and throw away the keys?’