The Old Man & the End of the World | Book 1 | Things Fall Apart

by Harrison, William Hale

  He sighed. “I don’t know. My family has contingency plans. You know my Uncle Owen. He may be old but he’s still one of the toughest bastards I’ve ever met. When he says it’s time to go, I’ll really have to think about it. But you know, I want to stay here as long as I can. People are going to need us, need the news, more and more the worse it gets. It just feels like that’s important. Maybe it sounds corny, but that’s how I feel.”

  She smiled at him. “How’d you like to cook me dinner tonight? Your place?”

  Eighty Mile Beach, Australia

  May 14th

  Jerry “Jocko” Wilson sat up in his sleeping bag and stretched, scratched himself, and then walked over to a nearby clump of beach grass to piss. As he stood he watched a huge flock of wading birds rise up from the ocean’s edge and take to the sky. Must be thousands of ‘em, he thought. Curlews, maybe. He had no particular interested in birds himself.

  When he finished, he stepped over to his old 4WD Toyota troopy, reached into the open passenger side window, grabbed himself a bottle of water and a couple protein bars and leaned against the vehicle to eat. The sea was calm today, he saw, the low waves rolling in gently in an endless succession. “Sissy waves,” he said to himself. “Not even worth gettin’ a board wet.” As a teenager growing up near Perth, he and his buddies had been surf rats, spending all their free time surfing off Trigg Point and Perth’s other surf meccas, and then as they got older, traveling up and down the Australian West Coast to catch the best water.

  Then came Nancy, and later the kids, and Jocko had taken a job a hundred miles inland driving for Nancy’s dad, a propane distributor. Now he only surfed a few times a year. He didn’t regret it because he’d developed other interests.

  He walked to the back of the troopy and checked to see that the battered Airstream trailer was still properly hitched. It was all exactly as he’d left it the night before, of course, but he was a careful man. He rolled up his sleeping bag and stowed it in the back of the Toyota, and then picked up the plastic ground cloth he’d laid out the night before, shook as much of the fine white sand as he could off of it, folded it up and laid it next to the bag. He got in and fired up the car, and automatically checked the gas gauge. The tank was full, the needle squarely on the F.

  Last night he’d pulled off the road a half mile from the lone gas station for miles and sat and waited in the darkness. Finally at 2:00 a.m. he got out of his car and peered into the night as far as he could see, both to the north and the south. When he was as confident as he could be that no other vehicles were coming, he drove to the brightly lit station and pulled up to one of the two pumps. He started the gas flowing into his tank and went inside.

  He nodded at the young clerk behind the counter, a skinny kid with a high and tight haircut and tattoos on both arms. The younger man reminded him of himself at that age. He grabbed a six pack of water out of the cooler and a bag of crisps and set them on the counter. “How long d’you reckon it is to Willare?” he asked.

  The kid looked at the dusty caravan he was pulling and said, “With that rig? Maybe four and a half or five hours. Road’s good most of the way. They had some washouts up north, but I hear they’re all fixed.” He paid for the water and the crisps and went outside to the pump. A huge shadow flitted over him and he ducked reflexively. He looked up to see two large moths, each of their wings the size of one of his hands, flitting around the lights above him, casting giant shadows.

  The pump finally made a clunking sound and the numbers on the pump quit spinning. He opened the back of the Toyota and pulled out four dark green five-gallon jerry cans, set them on the ground and filled each one. When they were safely stowed, he fired up his troopy and pulled back out onto the highway. He drove a few miles until he found a turnoff onto the beach he remembered from his surfing days, where he pulled off and went to sleep on the sand, far from prying eyes. It wouldn’t do to have anyone look too closely.

  He steered the car and the trailer back out onto the highway and headed north. It was a beautiful day, with a brilliant sky the color of a piece of turquoise. On one side of the road the sea stretched toward the horizon in shades of blue and green. On the other side, the land was dead flat, sandy red soil covered in chest high scrub as far as the eye could see. After a while the road turned away from the sea and headed northeast. Clumps of trees turned into forests and soon greenery decorated either side of the road, nourished by the recently ended rainy season.

  About four hours into the drive he decided he needed to piss again, so he watched for a turnoff. Presently he came across a dirt road that angled south. He drove down it a hundred yards or so until he was sure he was out of sight of the main road and pulled over.

  After he finished relieving himself, he walked back to the Airstream and peeked in the window. The girl was still there just as he’d left her, sitting on the hide-away sofa. She was fourteen years old and totally nude except for the bag he’d placed over her head. Her hands were tied tightly together and hung from a heavy hook that Jocko had fixed on the wall above her. He looked down at her body, at her budding breasts and long coltish legs and shook his head. He looked around him, and back toward the highway. Not now, he thought. Not here.

  A half hour later he passed the truck stop. He had hoped it would be empty, but there were a half a dozen vehicles parked in various patches of shade around the dusty orange clay parking lot and a couple cars pulled up at the pumps, so he kept driving. He still had a quarter of a tank left, plus the cans, so he figured it would be okay.

  Soon the sound of his wheels on the pavement changed in pitch as he crossed the long bridge over the Fitzroy River. He pulled some beef jerky out of a bag and chewed on it as he drove, washing it down with bottled water that was now lukewarm. About twenty minutes past the river, he spotted what he’d been looking for. A two-lane paved road turned off the highway to the south. A green sign on a post at the turnoff said “Looma CPA.” He turned off the highway, his tires crunching on the gravel, and headed through the trees.

  He drove south past the turnoff to Looma, and the road changed to gravel. Farther along, he crossed the Fitzroy River again on a rickety bridge. He past the cluster of buildings at Myroodah Station and the road got rougher. The gravel ended, and the road, what was left of it, was the same orange color as all the dirt around it. After a while he got out and poured two of the jerry cans of gasoline into his tank and started up again. The road wasn’t really a road anymore, It was hardly more than track through the clay and brush in the vast desert. In the distance he could see the jagged tops of the St George’s Range. South of here, for a thousand miles, there was nothing but rocks and scrub. The perfect place.

  He bumped along for over an hour until the road had nearly played out and he figured he’d gone far enough. He started scanning the brush on either side of the track until he found what he was looking for, a log in a clearing that spread out along one side of the track. That’ll do, he thought. He turned the wheel and drove carefully through the brush, circling around until he was back on the trail and pointed north.

  He got out of the Ranger and went back and unlocked the Airstream. The girl inside reacted immediately, kicking her legs out and straining at her bonds. Approaching her carefully, he picked up a rope that lay on the counter nearby, a short length with a big loop at either end, and draped one loop over her head so it slid down until it rested on her shoulders. He grabbed the catch pole leaning in the corner and slipped the noose around her neck. She began jerking her body around and thrashing her legs. “You need to be a good girl, now,” he said. “None of that.”

  He wedged the pole tightly under his left arm and held it in an iron grip with his left hand. He took a knife from a sheath on his belt and cut the rope on her hands where it hung over the hook. The moment her hands came free, she went wild, kicking and lurching and clutching at the catch pole. He held on tight and then said, “Come on, love. We’re going for a litt
le walk.” He used the catch pole to steer her out the door of the trailer and over to the log. He grabbed the other end of the rope hanging loose from her neck and draped the loop over a thick branch that stuck straight up off the log. The girl fought and thrashed the entire time.

  He reached out and snatched the bag off her head.

  Her eyes fixed on him and her mouth opened in a hungry grimace, her teeth bared. She tried to snap at him, at the pole, at the air around her. Tears welled up in his eyes. “Shh, shh,” he said. “You’ll be okay here, love. There’s lizards and things to eat, and there’s no one around for miles and miles for you to hurt.” His heart broke once again as he looked at the thing that had once been his daughter. “I know we was supposed to take you in and all, but they’d have killed you. And we just couldn’t do it, your mum and me.” His body ached with the need to take her in his arms, to pick her up and hug her like he had done a thousand times since the day she was born. “You’ll get out of this soon enough, I reckon. Everything’s real loose. Shouldn’t take you long at all, clever girl like you, and then you’ll be free.

  “You know I love you with all my heart, baby girl. And I always will.” The tears streamed down his cheeks as he loosened the catch pole noose and flipped if off her neck, threw the pole to the ground and ran for his car. She leapt after him but was yanked back by the short rope and fell to the ground.

  He jumped into the Ranger, threw it in gear, and stomped on the accelerator. Clouds of dust flew up behind him. They hung in the air momentarily, and then a breeze blew past and they were gone.

  Yaizu, Japan

  May 17th

  The bell rang announcing the end of the school day, and Mitsuyo Murata, aged twelve, quietly closed her book and put it in her desk. Like all of students in the room, she wore a face mask. Hers was green and printed with bright yellow flowers. All the children wore uniforms; the boys in white shirts and navy-blue ties, and the girls in navy blue dresses with large white collars that made them look like sailors.

  Along with the 32 other children in her class, she stood next to her desk and bowed deeply to the teacher at the front of the room. “Good day, sensei!” they all said together. The teacher bowed back and said “Good day, children,” and the class exploded in a cacophony of chatter and laughter. She grabbed her heavy book bag from behind her desk and headed toward the door, falling in step with her best friend Hiromi. She had finally talked to that dreamy new boy, Takeo, at lunch today (he is so cute!!!) and Hiromi teased her relentlessly. “Maybe you’ll get married and have his babies!” she giggled. Mitsuyo stuck out her tongue and they both fell together laughing.

  When they reached the vice principal’s office she stopped at the end of a line of students and smiled at Hiromi. “Wait for me outside okay?” Her friend nodded and scampered off to join a group of giggling girls who were heading out the front door. Mitsuyo dropped her book bag on the hallway floor and got in line.

  There were eight other students in line and they were all taller than she. Mitsuyo felt tiny and childlike among them. Barely five feet tall at twelve years old, she had a round face with shoulder length hair and bangs cut straight across her forehead. She was shy around adults and tended to cover her mouth when she laughed; a bicuspid grew out from way too high on her gums and stuck out crookedly, and she was very self-conscious about it. Her mother assured her it would settle into its proper place as she grew, but she still cringed every time she looked in the mirror.

  Mitsuyo was the only seventh grader in line; the rest were in eighth and ninth. Some of the older boys had already gone through growth spurts and were nearly as tall as adults. They were mostly her friends, except for that horrible Katsuo Kanehara, a handsome ninth grader who apparently thought he was God’s gift to women and seemed far too stuck up to talk to Mitsuyo, who would never talk to him, even though he was very good looking.

  Young and small as she may be, she still outranked them all.

  When her turn came, the vice principal smiled at her and handed her a long sword in a lacquered scabbard and a cloth belt folded neatly, bowing as he did. She accepted the items in her outstretched hands and returned the bow. The sword’s name was Willow Leaf and had been in her family for two hundred and fifty years.

  When the US forces occupied Japan at the end of World War II, they had been concerned about the safety of the GIs in a country with millions of swords, so they had ordered them to be collected and destroyed. Most Japanese dutifully turned over treasured family heirlooms and many wept as they watched truckload after truckload dumped into Tokyo Bay. But her great grandfather had taken his best swords and hidden them. When the Occupation officially ended in 1952, swords slowly reappeared.

  Mitsuyo wrapped her belt twice around her waist and tied it in front. Then she slid the scabbard partway into the belt so that the end of the sword’s handle lined up with the midline of her body. Her practiced fingers found the cords hanging in a loop from the scabbard and without looking she tied them in the intricate series of loops that would hold the sword in place.

  The rest of the students stood waiting for her to finish. She led them out of the front door and onto the school’s lush green lawn. There was no laughing or chatter as they all took their places in two lines facing her. At an unspoken signal, they all bowed deeply and she bowed back. Then her sword flashed out of its sheath and she led them in an intricate kata, their swords all slashing and thrusting in unison.

  A photo of the exercise would soon be displayed across the internet. A student had crouched on one knee and captured a shot of Mitsuyo, left hand clutching the scabbard where it passed under her belt, right hand thrusting the sword forward, its blade perfectly parallel to the ground. Behind rose Mt Fuji, the snow gleaming on its peak. Titled the picture “The Spirit of Bushido.”

  Students packed the lawn around them, watching the exercise. When it finished, the others all bowed to her again, and then they broke up in groups of two or three and went back into the school to retrieve their book bags. The swords stayed at their sides.

  The ownership of guns is generally forbidden to ordinary citizens in Japan, but the ownership of swords is not. With the devastating appearance of the Tawada-Soseki parasite, interest in the martial arts had soared, especially kendo, a traditional sword fighting discipline. Mitsuyo had studied a related art, Itto-Ryu, since she had been old enough to hold a sword. Her father owned a kendo dojo and was a grandmaster at both kendo and Itto-Ryu, as was her grandfather and her great grandfather. The Murata clan had been sword masters longer than anyone could remember. Some of her ancestors had even been sensei to Shoguns. Like all devotees of Itto-Ryu, Mitsuyo spent countless hours practicing her sword strokes on thick stalks of bamboo, which were said to have the same consistency as human bone.

  Now her father’s school was full. He had even begun to add extra classes to keep up with the demand.

  Japanese authorities had made it legal for anyone over 18 to carry a sword in public. Children under 18 could only carry if they had achieved the first dan, or level, in one of the sword arts. Itto-Ryu did not recognize age in awarding dan. It held children to the same rigorous standards as an adult. Mitsuyo was one of only a few students her age in the entire country to have achieved the fourth dan in Itto-Ryu, which qualified her as a sensei, or instructor. With the police and the National Defense Force spread thin, martial arts experts, even young ones like Mitsuyo and her fellow acolytes, were considered an extra line of defense.

  Although Japan had one of the world’s highest infection rates, the ratio of primary to secondary infections was one of the lowest. The Japanese people were imbued with a deep sense of duty and obligation toward the country and the rest of Japanese society. When a family member displayed the early signs of infection, the entire family would escort their loved one to the nearest collection center. There would be hugs and tears, and the stricken loved one would usually enter the center carrying a stack of white box
es tied with string, each containing a special dish or treat to be eaten while in isolation. The isolation centers were very much like the American ones; large spaces filled with chain link fencing, but here, at least each cot had a blanket, with soothing music piped in.

  When Mitsuyo rejoined her friends, book bag over her shoulder, she became once again a happy chattering twelve-year-old, albeit one with a sword at her side. Together they began the long walk home. There are very few school buses in Japan. Japanese students, even very young ones, take public transportation or simply walk. Japanese children, from an early age, are taught to be self-sufficient.

  They decided to take the longer way home, which took them along the harbor.

  Yaizu was a fishing port, with processing plants that handled thousands of tons of fish every year. Mitsuyo loved the waterfront, loved seeing the fishing fleet roll in and out. She liked all the sounds; the boat horns, the slam of the heavy equipment and the screeching cries of the clouds of seagulls. Her father used to take her fishing here when she was little. It always brought back happy memories.

  “Look!” Hiromi grabbed her arm and pointed. “Something’s not right!” A big trawler churned toward the wharf at a sharp angle, clearly out of control. Fisherman on the wharf grabbed their long poles and buckets and raced away to avoid the inevitable collision.

  With a deafening screech of metal on concrete the ship struck the wharf and skidded along its side. It finally came to a stop when it hit a protruding pier, its bow rising as its rapidly turning propellers tried to force it up onto the concrete.

  There was a sudden flurry of activity on the deck. “Infected!” someone screamed, and her friends all ran off as dozens of naked Infected jumped or fell from the ship. Some landed in the water, but most thudded to the concrete wharf below.