The Barbarous Road_A Post-Apocalyptic EMP Survivor Thriller

by Ryan Schow

  Then the boy opens his mouth and says, “Tyler.”

  The world comes spiraling into me and I jolt again, this time I’m awake for real and sweating, breathing heavy. Bailey is still on top of me, lightly snoring. The blankets have shifted, her naked bottom peeking out from the covers. I pull the blanket back over us, try to relax, try to fall back asleep, but I can’t. All I can think about is Tyler. What he must have gone through in his final hours of life.

  Why didn’t he just eat the peaches given to him?

  My mind is suddenly traveling down dozens of roads at once. I’m thinking of the men in The Warden’s prison: the one who got shot, the one who hung himself. Then I’m thinking of the one I might have beaten to death in the middle of the night. And then I think about The Warden and how I know for certain that, in him, I’d seen the true face of evil. He touched something in me. A live wire. I didn’t have to kill him. I could have broken his arms and legs. I could have let him starve to death. Would I do it all different now? Would I?

  That’s the real question, isn’t it? The answer is, I don’t know.

  Having analyzed and overanalyzed my behavior a hundred times since that moment, each time I wondered if I’d do anything different. Each time, however, I come to the same conclusion: the world is a better place without that lunatic in it.

  Tyler shouldn’t have had to pay that price, though. He didn’t deserve to die.

  My mind is turning away from him because the pain of his absence is starting to tear at me. My thoughts go to the drones. To Indigo. To Margot even. I don’t wish anything bad on her or Tad. Well, maybe Tad. He was a selfish prick when he ripped apart our family, and he deserves a few bad things for sure, things that would really scrape the crap off his soul. But maybe not too much. If he lost his Tesla, that would be good. If he didn’t have a job to feed that gigantic ego of his, that would be even better.

  Speaking of Tad, when you strip down today’s men, they’re seldom defined by who they are, what their moral compass is or how much good they do in the world. This is the sad truth. Instead, where I’m from, we’re measured by our job, our income, all our precious little things. Times are changing though. When all of these material things are stripped away from Tad, who will he really be? Most likely, he wouldn’t be the man Margot thought.

  That’s my conclusion. My belief.

  Bailey shifts off my chest, sliding down my side a bit, her body fitting nicely into the back of the couch. Would she really leave her fiancée? Come with me if I ask? Do I want to bring her home with me? I do. I really want her to come home with me. But how do I introduce her to Indigo?

  The worry I carry around for my daughter is like an extra piece of luggage. One that’s loaded with concrete rather than clothes. I’m so scared for her. When this finally becomes too much, I feel the warm sting of tears hitting my bloodshot eyes. Boiling over, they trickle down my cheeks and I don’t care. I let them flow. Right then Bailey takes a deep breath, then opens her eyes and looks up at me. She touches my face, feels my sadness.

  “Are you okay?” she asks, brows furrowing.

  “I am.”

  “Are you asleep?”

  “No,” I reply. I can’t sleep.”

  “Bad dreams?” she asks, yawning and shifting off of me, pulling the blankets around her body like she’s about to head to the bathroom.

  “Something like that,” I answer, wiping my eyes.

  She finally crawls over me, smashing my thigh, almost crushing one of my nuts. She successfully works her way off the couch then shuffles into the nearest bathroom and shuts the door. I can’t help listening to her going pee. The house is small. Intimate.

  When I first met her, I had no idea we’d would spend this kind of time together, that she would actually draw down my defenses. Or help me set the worst parts of myself free. Yet here we are. Together.

  When she returns, I say, “Your panties are on the floor.”

  “I was about to get them,” she says, working them up while trying to keep the blanket on.

  “I’ve already see you a few times, you know.”

  “Yes, but there are no waxing centers or estheticians available, so…honestly, I hope you have a thing for seventies porn.”

  I laugh, then she laughs, and then she drops the towel and wiggles her panties back into place before settling down beside me.

  “You can sleep in the bedroom,” I tell her. “I’m just taking first watch.”

  “It’s too lonely in there.”

  Chapter Eight

  The next morning Marcus and I head into town while the girls make breakfast. It wasn’t our idea, it was theirs. Bailey told me she wanted some time to get to know Corrine. She said they needed some girl time for sure.

  “How do you know she wants girl time with you?” I ask.

  “You wouldn’t get it.”

  “Four sets of eyes are better than two when it comes to a scavenger hunt,” I tell her.

  “She’s been through an ordeal, Nick. She needs this.”

  “We’ve all been through an ideal.”

  “She was raped,” she says to me, and yeah, I get it. I just don’t like thinking about it because it makes me worry about Indigo. Which I’ve now become obsessed with, but not in a good way.

  So Marcus and I set out on foot going from house to house looking for keys. Not to the house, or the family car. We’re looking for keys to a boat.

  Any boat.

  “The houses we choose, you knock and if there’s no answer, I’ll go around back and kick open the door. Or break a window. Or do whatever I have to do to get inside.”

  “Break a window?”

  “Try not to, but yeah,” he says. “Don’t overthink it, just know we have to get in. And be quiet because I’ve already been put on warning earlier.”

  I have a Glock, like Marcus, but I pray I don’t have to use it. The things I did getting us out of The Warden’s prison gave me nightmares. I didn’t use a gun on him, but I would have. I should have. These last couple of days, in the early mornings, as I’m drawing up out of a deeper sleep, I think I hear the sounds of him gurgling to death.

  Wiping my mind of this, I try to focus.

  Bailey said not to be out more than an hour, and this was what Marcus was planning on doing anyway. I think it’s his way of trying to get over the fact that we lost the boat.

  Rather, I lost the boat.

  We hit a couple of homes, head in some Marcus already entered a few days back, then meet up in the street.

  “This seems like a waste of time,” I say.

  “Until it isn’t.”

  Looking up the block, I say, “You were pretty good with that rifle.”

  “Thanks.”

  “Did it bother you that you shot those guys?”

  “No.”

  Now I look at him, scan his face for signs of false bravado and see only a iron-spine soldier. There is no bluster here. The man is a hard shell. No feelings at all.

  “You learn to shoot in the military?”

  “No.”

  “You’re not very conversational, are you?”

  “Not really.”

  “You could try,” I hear myself saying. “I mean, if we’re going to spend some time together, you could not be such a cold shoulder all the time.”

  “You want me to be fake?”

  “If it makes you more likeable, and more comfortable to be around, yes.”

  “You really are a girl, aren’t you Nick.”

  “Yes, Marcus, I am.”

  “My father taught me to shoot,” he finally said. “He was a hard nosed son of a bitch. A product of the Marines. He said you’re nothing if you’re not a soulless, heartless killing machine.”

  “He really said that?”

  “Those guys have egos. The guys like my dad, anyway.”

  “You follow in his footsteps?”

  “No,” he says, heading to the next house. “I went into the Army. Found my way into Special Forces.”
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br />   “You wanted to be as tough as him?”

  “You’re terrible at this, Nick.”

  “I’m not a very social person. I mean, for work yeah, but with others? Not so much. Like you, I prefer to keep to myself. But for different reasons entirely.”

  “Well look at this,” he says with a grin, looking back at me over his shoulder, “we actually have something in common.”

  I huff out a conciliatory breath.

  “When you’re in Special Forces, you grow your beard, develop a crappy attitude and basically tell just about anyone you want to suck it.”

  “You really that hateful?” I ask.

  He stops, turns and hits me with those steely eyes, and says, “Yes, Nick. I’m really that hateful.”

  “Why?”

  “Bad upbringing. Always at war with something. Maybe there’s something wrong with me. I think…I think there are guys like me who are simply better behind a gun, on foreign soil, living alone on a base in a country that’s always perpetuating war.”

  He knocks on the front door of the next home, waits. We both wait. Then, just as he’s about to kick it in, the door opens and a little girl answers. She must be seven years old, brown hair brushed thoroughly and held in place with a headband and a bow. She’s wearing a dress and has both light and vibrancy in her eyes. Seeing her, it’s almost sad. I don’t think I’ll see the light in anyone else’s eyes for a long time. Maybe never again.

  “Abigail, you are not to answer the door!” comes the sounds of a younger woman rushing to the door. The woman is frazzled, scared, looking between the two of us and realizing we are going to be a problem.

  Marcus puts a hand up and says, “We didn’t mean to bother you.”

  “What do you want?” she asks. I can see it in her eyes, how she wants to shut the front door, but to do so means she’ll have to come toward us and she isn’t terribly anxious to do that by the look of her. She’s waving Abigail over, but the girl isn’t budging.

  “Just going door to door,” he says.

  “Abigail come over her, honey,” she says, panic in her voice.

  “We’re not going to hurt you, or Abigail. We’re as lost in this thing as anyone right now.”

  “You’re the guys with the big truck, right?”

  “Yes ma’am.”

  “That’s Chester Spoon’s house,” she says. Abigail finally walked over to her. “Go upstairs pumpkin, wait for mommy.”

  We watch the little girl leaving. She turns and waves; Marcus and I wave back. It’s all very civilized.

  “Chester hasn’t come back, ma’am. A lot of people haven’t come back home and we don’t expect them to.”

  “Chester worked in the city. Some kind of lawyer or something. Real uptight, you know?”

  “I know the type,” Marcus says.

  “What can I do for you then? I mean, if you’re not here to rob me or tell me what’s going on…do you know what’s going on?”

  “Drone strikes all along the coast. Not sure why.”

  She looks over at me and says, “Who’s he?”

  “The eye candy,” Marcus grumbles, not an ounce of humor in his voice.

  At first I almost laugh, but then I think about it. How guys like this must absolutely hate guys like me. I have a skater’s frame, uncut hair, a “whatever, bro” type of attitude. Oh, and apparently I get the girls with my good looks. Marcus isn’t unattractive, for a guy; he’s just got a steep air of “go F yourself” he carries around with him 24/7. Except for when I saw him with Corinne. With her, it’s like that hard veil is slipping. Maybe he really is a warrior. Never destined to be a romantic, a good friend, the kind of guy you can just crack a cold one and chill with. Am I making a mistake trying to be friends with him? He’s a battle axe, a battering ram, a human time bomb. That’s not someone anyone wants to be friends with.

  “I haven’t got anything of value,” she says, more confident now.

  “You have Abigail, ma’am. And in case you haven’t figured it out, people without bad intentions like yourself, they stay inside while the cretins and the monsters run the streets. You want to keep the one thing of value to you safe. I suggest you never let her open this front door again. And if you need food or help, just come over to the Spoons and we’ll help you.”

  “I appreciate that.”

  “Is this your house?” I ask.

  “It’s my father’s home. We’re staying with him, but he hasn’t come back yet.”

  “Is he overdue?”

  “Yes.”

  “By how long?” I ask.

  Now her eyes get a bit glossy with tears, like she’s been avoiding this answer. Like she’s been putting it off for days and now that she’s having to answer it, reality is setting in hard and fast.

  “A few days. Maybe more.”

  “Did you see him before the city was attacked?”

  “He went down south to visit a girlfriend. My mom, she passed a few years back. Me and my brother finally convinced him to…see other people. He wasn’t the romantic kind, but he did make some friends.”

  “My mother passed, too,” Marcus says in an unusually sensitive moment.

  “How’d she die?” she asks, wiping her eyes, Nick the eye candy all but forgotten.

  “My father wore her down, broke her soul, and I disappointed her by following close enough to my father’s footsteps to crush the last of her will to live. So maybe we killed her. Maybe she died because there was nothing good for her in this life. That’s what my father told me. I guess I didn’t start to believe it, but now, maybe now I think I’m starting to believe him.”

  The woman who was terrified of us only moments ago goes to Marcus and gives him a hug. He doesn’t ask for it, or really open up to it at first, but she hugs him anyway. Looking on, I can’t help thinking this is either the saddest moment ever or the most uncomfortable.

  “She loved you enough to go,” the woman says. “But she loved herself enough to go, too.”

  I don’t know what that means, or if she’s right. All I know is that Marcus is carrying around some serious demons. If his father really was that bad, and he did truly hate everything and everyone, then Marcus being the way he is makes sense. This has me wondering if maybe I’ve been poking a bear thinking it’s a pup.

  Not smart, Nick.

  When she pulls back, he says, “Thank you for…”

  “It’s okay,” she says.

  “I hope your father comes back,” he offers.

  “He’s gone. I’m sure of it, I just didn’t want to admit it to myself.”

  “Does he happen to have a boat down at the Marina?”

  “Yeah, why?”

  “We’re trying to get off the island,” he says, being truthful.

  “Why?” she asks, her concern shifting.

  “Because those drones, there’s a chance they could come back. Or worse. I think it’s not a really good time to be on land.”

  “So you want my dad’s boat?”

  “We want a boat.”

  “Should I get out of here, too?” she asks.

  Shifting his weight on his feet, swallowing hard, he says, “If it’s your boat and you want to get out of here, we could work together. Maybe find a way to help each other, keep you and Abigail safe.”

  She smiles an uncomfortable smile, then says, “Have you been to town? I mean, you said the coast is on fire. Have you seen…other towns and stuff?”

  “Yes.”

  Now she’s hanging on for that miracle we can’t give her, that miracle we won’t give her. In times like this, people need to stick together, but they need to be honest, too. Whatever measures of hope they have for a better future, Marcus taught me these hopes are pretty much futile as long as the drones are still flying.

  Just then one zips overhead. Not a big one, but one that’s moving fast enough we can hear it whirring past.

  “Uh, Marcus?” I say.

  “I heard,” he says turning to me, his expression unchanged.
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  “Was that…?” she asks, her expression betraying her.

  This was not a woman who would’ve been able to withstand the kinds of hell we’ve been through. Would she have survived the attack on the conference center? The collapsing hotel? Would she have survived The Warden? Corrine’s gang of opportunists?

  Probably not.

  She would’ve been a liability. And Marcus had made it clear: we were not taking on liabilities. He didn’t want someone else to care for, someone else to complicate matters or slow him down in the event that he/we needed to run for our lives. Another drone zipped by, this one flying lower, slower.

  “Marcus,” I say gently, “I think we have a problem.”

  “We do.”

  Just then four or five drones hover over, strafing the houses with gunfire.

  “Get inside,” Marcus barks at me. “Get them to safety!”

  With that I move inside and close the door, thinking I want to get back to Bailey instead. Marcus is a man of war, though, so I follow his lead. Still, as I’m telling this woman to get her child down with all of us, I’m starting to get pissed off. I don’t know this lady. I don’t know her child.

  But Bailey…

  There’s something between us. She’s right. Maybe it’s because she needs someone like me, and I need someone like her. Maybe we’re destined to be each other’s lifeline.

  “We need to get you somewhere safe,” I say, my mind scrambling because when it comes to the drones, maybe we can survive gunfire, but if they start launching missiles, well you could pretty much stick a fork in us. We’d be done.

  When she rushes upstairs after Abigail, I pop back out front and search the skies. Down the street a good block, I see the Mack truck. The door’s open; I see Marcus’s legs hanging out. Then he’s running across the street with a long rifle. Jesus in heaven, is he going to try to shoot at them?

  Overhead, the drone activity is increasing. I see a half dozen of them buzzing around. Are there more on the horizon? Dammit, there are!

  Just then, further back on the island, an explosion blows a hole in the early morning silence. The woman is rushing down the stairs with wide, terrified eyes.

  “Get the keys to the boat!” I yell.