by Tim Meyer
He didn't hold the door for Susan, Shondra, David, or Kyle who followed him, surveying the area for other desperate survivors as they walked. Susan was next to enter the unoccupied post office, following Soren like a puppy, abandoning her duties of lookout. Kyle followed closely behind her, wearing the same dumb grin he had always worn while making mischief. Shondra followed them inside, hovering near the door with an eye on the road. David breezed by her, following Soren's lead.
Near the horizon, light brightened the bruised sky. Watching shades of purple coalesce with full dark didn't sit well with Shondra. If Soren didn't stop taking his sweet time, they'd be forced to hold up in the post office, separate from Mouth, Becky, and Dana for a whole twelve hours. That also didn't sit well with her.
“You should hurry it up,” Shondra said. “We're losing dark.”
Soren searched each box, running his finger along the numbers. He stopped when he found the box whose number matched the key. Without wasting time, he slipped the key into its home and listened as it clicked into place. He opened the door and reached inside the box, rushing to retrieve its contents.
Shondra looked over her shoulder to see what the hold up was. Soren tore open an envelope, paper shavings falling to the floor like large snow flurries. He removed what Shondra thought was four golden tickets.
“What is it?” Shondra asked.
Ignoring her, Soren and Susan exchanged glances.
“I don't get it,” Susan said, turning her attention to the tickets. “Is it another clue?”
Soren didn't respond; didn't need to. His eyes widened like a knowledge bomb had exploded inside his brain. He held the four golden tickets in front of his eyes, studying them, like he had seen them before in a fantasy or distant memory.
“Yes,” Soren said, almost dreamily. “Of course.”
“What is it?” Shondra snapped. With her patience depleted, she had about all the mysticism she could take.
His eyes slowly rose from the tickets and settled on Shondra's unpleasant face.
“You going to talk to us, or are you going to stand there and admire yourself?”
“How dare you talk to him like that,” Susan said, stepping in front of Soren as if taking a bullet for him. “Soren's done a lot for us. Show some respect.”
Although difficult, Shondra kept herself from exploding with laughter; or from doing what she really wanted—bashing Susan's witch-like face into the wall. “Susan,” she said, displaying a false smirk for her enemy. “With all due respect—you need to shut your trap.”
Susan glowered at her, undoubtedly wishing Shondra would go tanning.
Resting a hand on Susan's shoulder, Soren whispered into her ear, “Everything's okay. Why don't you let me handle this one.”
Kyle folded his arms across his chest, a self-satisfying grin stamping its trademark across his face. David's eyes shifted between both sides; Shondra sensed the man didn't know which team to settle on. She didn't have much of a case for hers. Soren had the glam; he had followers, and the ability to shield himself from the sun's death rays.
Not much of a choice at all, she thought.
“They're tickets,” Soren said proudly.
“Tickets for what?” Shondra asked, gasping as if their conversation had physically worn her out.
“The train.”
She balled her hands into fists. She imagined tackling Soren to the ground, wrapping her hands around his throat, squeezing, watching his skin turn blueberry blue. “What train?” she asked, the words squeezing between her teeth.
“Yeah, Soren,” Susan said, the confidence in her voice fading. “What train?”
“We are taking a train, and that's all I can say. Anyone else want to waste more time and darkness asking questions, or do we want to head back to the gas station before light? It seems our friend Mouth isn't coming to pick—”
Something moved. They all sensed it, their eyes shifting back and forth, experiencing the same unsteady behavior of their surroundings.
Shondra lost her balance and stumbled. David crouched, holding on to the small table in the corner. Kyle planted his backside on the chipped linoleum floor, his legs unable to keep him upright. Soren stood, his arms outstretched, as if surfing a giant wave. Susan slipped and fell to the floor, her head bouncing off the linoleum like a rubber ball.
The floor swayed beneath them, shifting side to side. They heard a rumble—like thunder—only it came from below, not above. A deep reverberating groan, as if the earth was having a stomach ache. The walls shook, pictures and other old-world knickknacks falling like melted icicles on a warm December day. Shondra crawled across the floor, toward Susan. The back of her head opened like a budding flower, blood already beginning to puddle beneath her.
“Help!” Shondra shouted as the world continued to tremor.
As David turned his attention to Shondra, who had applied her hand over Susan's wound, the table he held for support shimmied away from him. Seeing the blood pour from the woman's head, David ripped his shirt off and scrambled across the floor and crouched next to Susan. He wrapped his torn shirt around her head. Immediately, blood bloomed in a big red blotch, staining what was once a nice white dark crimson.
“It's not enough,” Shondra said, looking around the vibrating room for another method. “Check the room back there!” She pointed to the door marked “Private”, a word which held little meaning these days.
David struggled to his feet, but managed, fighting the unsteady ground beneath him. The world shook like it wanted to rid everything and everyone clinging to it, and start anew. He stumbled like a seasoned drunk, the quake pushing him left and right, backward and forward. Once he reached the door, he turned the knob and threw his shoulder into the heavy oak barrier. Shondra continued applying pressure with David's shirt, but by the time he reached the door, the shirt was wetter than a pair of used swim trunks. She wrung the shirt out, blood splashing like drain water. She pressed the shirt against the crack in Susan's head again, hoping David would hurry.
He returned as soon as the earth's mood changed, transforming from a turbulent tremor into a gentle feeling of unbalance. Two rolls of paper towels tucked under his arms, David sat beside Shondra, handing her fistfuls of absorbents.
The quake had ended. Soren, who had kept himself standing during the violent vibrations, glanced around nervously, as if he expected the floor to open up and swallow him into the darkness below. Kyle slowly guided himself to his feet, using the wall of PO boxes behind him as leverage. He looked to Soren for answers, the expression on his face suggesting he may have some.
“No,” he said, his voice hushed. “It can't...”
“What is it?” Shondra asked, tossing another blood-soaked towel aside.
Susan was conscious, but in a state of shock. The gash in the back of her head looked a lot worse than it was. Bled worse too. Once Shondra stopped the bleeding and a clot formed, she'd be fine.
“Quakefall...” Soren said thoughtlessly.
“Quakefall?” David repeated, wiping sweat off his nose with the back of hand. “What the hell is Quakefall?”
Soren's head shook like a wet dog. “Nothing.”
“You just said—”
“Doesn't matter what I said,” Soren said, the old him returning. “How is she?”
“She'll live,” Shondra told him. “No thanks to you.”
He flinched. “What do you mean?”
“I mean you could have helped get something for her instead of standing there all high and mighty.”
A wave of relief cleared his suspicions. “Yes. Of course.”
“You're acting weird,” she said. “Mouth is right. You better start providing us with some damn answers or you're gonna—”
“I'm gonna what?” Soren asked, gritting his teeth. “What am I gonna have? Hm?”
“My foot up your ass for one.”
David snickered behind his hand. Kyle didn't seem to find it so funny.
But Soren surprised ev
eryone and kept quiet.
“Two,” Shondra said, motioning to a stable Susan, “Little Miss Sunshine here will be mighty upset with you, not sharing your secrets. Can't imagine she'll want to continue following you much longer after that.”
Soren seemed to take this under consideration.
“Which brings me to my next point,” Shondra continued, throwing her index finger in the air. “Why do you want us to follow you so badly? Seems to me, more people means more mouths to feed once you get to this sanctuary in Alaska. Doesn't add up.” Her eyes drilled into him, expecting answers. She'd get nothing from him. “I think you need us for something. Not sure what. But something. Otherwise, you wouldn't have kept us around this long. That's what you told us, right? That we may be useful? Hmpf. Yeah, right. That's all we are to you. Tools. Items in a cache. Ready to use at your disposal.”
“You think you have it all figured out, do you?” Soren asked, his mouth tight as he spoke. Veins formed on his forehead as his jaw flexed. “You think you know it all?”
“No, but I have a good idea.”
“Very well. Believe what you want.” He stormed past them, not bothering to look over Susan's injury. He planted his foot in the scarlet puddle and bloody footprints followed him to the door. “But I have a train to catch. And unless you plan on being left behind, I suggest you keep up with me.”
-3-
When the quake ended, Becky examined her face and checked for her pulse, making sure she was still alive. She had ducked behind the convenience store's counter when the ground shifted, tucking herself into a ball in the corner. The bathroom was the ideal place to hide—no merchandise to fall on top of her—but she thought it was too risky to move about the store while the quake was happening. She had heard the collision of metal shelving, rows of candy bars and potato chips crashing into one another, the soda case doors opening and slamming shut, and Dana screaming—
Dana.
She had almost forgotten about her sister.
“Dana!” she called, remaining on the floor behind the counter, knees tucked tightly against her chest. “Dana, are you okay?”
No answer.
Slowly, Becky stretched her fear-stiff legs. Once her blood began to circulate and the pins and needles sensation subsided, she used the counter to pull herself to her feet. She gasped when she saw the damage, the place looking looted a thousand times over. Candy bars littered the floor. Stacks of newspapers had spilled, their string bindings broken, millions of words scattered about. Coffee pots had danced off the counter and onto the floor, several jagged fragments sitting in dark mocha puddles.
“Dana!”
A small groan floated from somewhere on the other side of the store. She limped off toward her sister's groggy response. Invisible needles stabbed her feet, her nerves swimming in puddles of pain. She made it around the counter quickly, and searched the first aisle; no sign of her sister.
“Dana?” she called again, less panicky this time around.
“Here,” the small voice answered, her tone above a whisper.
The second aisle was no longer an aisle; two stacks of merchandise—beef jerky products and 2-liter soda bottles—collided against each other, leaving no part of the cheaply-tiled floor visible. Becky walked over the mound of merchandise, plastic packaging crinkling and crackling beneath the weight of her footfalls. She called her sister's name again and listened for her response.
“Over here, Beck,” Dana said, raising her voice this time.
In the back of the store she heard rustling. Becky jumped off the small hill of jerky products and rushed to where she heard Dana. She hopped over some fallen racking and found herself in the back aisle. To her left, the spin-rack with five dollar sunglasses had tumbled, spreading its shades across the floor, most of them broken beyond repair. To her right, pet products covered the floor. Beneath the heap of Kibbles 'n Bits and bags of kitty litter lay Dana, looking up at the ceiling, absorbed by the nothing resting there.
“You okay?” Becky asked.
“Oh, fine,” she replied, continuing to gaze at the nondescript features above.
“You hurt?”
Dana pushed the products off her. “No.”
“Good. Come on out of there.”
“I like it down here.”
“Well, you can't lay on the floor forever, so—”
“Why not?”
“Because you can't.”
“But it's safe down here. No one dies down here.”
“Dana, what are you talking about?”
“No one's ever died staring at a ceiling.”
“Dana, stop being weird and let's go. We have to find the others.”
“What's the point?”
The question stumped Becky.
Dana rose, boxes of Milk-bones falling off her, tumbling to the messy floor. “I mean, really,” she said, turning to Becky. “What's the point? Everywhere we go, people die. Everywhere we go something bad happens. If we stay here nothing bad will happen.”
Becky wanted to smack some sense into her. “We have to go to Alaska. Mom and Dad will be looking for us there.”
“How do you know?”
“I just do.”
“You don't know anything.”
Feeling her patience slip, Becky gritted her teeth. “Dana, stop fooling around.”
“I'm not. Mom and Dad are probably dead. Matty, too.”
“Stop it.”
“No.”
Becky folded her arms over her abs. “What about Soren?”
“What about him?”
“You like him don't you?”
“He's cool, I guess.”
“You think he'll be disappointed if you don't go to Alaska?”
Dana lowered her head. “Yeah... I guess.”
“So, do it for Soren. Since you're sooooooooo in love with him.”
Dana snapped her head toward her sister. “Becky, you're so gross!”
Laughing, Becky dropped to one knee. “Come on, sprout.” She offered Dana her right hand. She wiggled her fingers, inviting her up. “Come with us. I'll keep you safe. I won't let you out of my sight. And Mom and Dad are alive, for the record. Matty, too. I can feel it. Can't you?”
With a twinkle in her eye, Dana said, “Yeah, I kinda can.” She grabbed her sister's hand and Becky yanked her up. Her knees, weak from the quake, barely held her weight.
“We'll see them again. I promise.”
“Don't make promises you can't keep.”
Becky extended her smallest finger. “Pinky swear?”
Slowly, Dana curled her finger around her sister's. “Pinky swear.”
Before they could bury the past, they heard a grown man cry out for help, sounding like a witness to his own murder.
The world blurred before him, a kaleidoscope of gray and black, shades of dark lilac jockeying for space among the morning lights. Mouth tried to move, but couldn't; the muscles in his arms and legs twitched, but did nothing to motor his limbs. It was like being frozen inside himself, cocooned in his own skin. He screamed out, but heard nothing. Had he screamed or imagined it? The world slowly focused, the battered exterior belonging to the convenience store starting to take shape. He looked down and his nose met the concrete parking lot. A sprouted weed tickled his neck. He moved his head in other directions, but something stopped him. He couldn't tell if the pressure on top of his body was a physical object pressing down on him or something internal broke, disallowing control over his motor skills. He didn't feel anything. No pain, no discomfort. Just the feeling of being trapped, a prisoner in his own frame.
He screamed again and two blurs appeared in the convenience store's entrance. At first he thought they were ghosts, reapers sent from Hell to escort him to the underworld, but he realized how ridiculous that sounded, even under the current spell of dizziness and the barrage of fragmented thoughts. He called out to the bleary smears, hoping they came with smiles and good news. They approached slowly and stopped outside his line of sig
ht, no more than six feet away from him. One of them shrieked, although Mouth only heard a warbled version of it.
What? he thought he asked. What is it?
One of them replied, but he couldn't hear the words.
He glanced down and saw a small river of blood flowing beneath him. My blood? He didn't understand. He didn't feel pain. He didn't feel anything. Can't be mine.
Then whose? an internal voice asked.
I don't know.
Look at the facts: you can't move; you can't feel anything; you don't remember the last ten minutes of what happened.
Sure I do.
Then what happened?
I came back from the highway with a few gallons of gasoline—
He could smell gasoline. It was strong, as if he swallowed some and exhaled the fumes.
And?
And that's it.
You don't remember the earthquake?
Earthquake?
See? You don't remember.
I was filling the tank. Then...
Then what?
Then I don't know.
Exactly. You're hurt. Bleeding. Dying.
No...
Yes. I hate to be the one to tell you. But...
You aren't real. This is a dream.
Is it? the voice asked.
No, it wasn't. Mouth could distinguish the difference between dreams and reality. Whatever was happening to him was happening to him.
“He's talking to himself,” he heard a girl say with perfect clarity.
His vision continued to show him cloudy swirls of dark tones, but at least he had his ears to help guide him through this muddled reality.
“He's bleeding, Beck,” he heard Dana cry.
“Dana? That you?” he heard himself say, although his voice was barely recognizable. “Dana, help me. I don't know what's happened.”
She bent on one knee. He could make out her face clearly; fog bordered the area around her head. In the corner of her eyes, he saw tears taking shape, preparing for the fall.
“Why are you crying?” He didn't understand.
“Mouth...”
“Yes?”
“You're hurt.”
