by James Sperl
The table remained transfixed. As Andrew paused to consider his next words, Clarissa became aware of a striking transformation. Jon may have been the Guy In Charge when it came to his small band, but the assured way Andrew commanded the room left little doubt as to who the actual leader was. His calm, level-headed approach to conflict and his unflinching acceptance of the situation made it easy to instill confidence in him. It didn't matter that he had a home on enviable acres of private, remote land or that he had squirreled away enough food and supplies to see him through any worst case scenario. Clarissa felt he would have been looked to as an equally effective leader had they all been trapped in a high-rise apartment building in downtown New York with only a loaf of bread and a bottle of ketchup to share between them. Andrew was born to lead. The only problem was convincing him of it.
“But what we do know,” he went on, “is this: whatever has arrived to turn our lives upside down has not—to our eyes at least—been violent. Have people disappeared? Yes. Lots of them. But there are no reports of bloodshed relating to skirmishes, attacks, or any other engagement. Nothing that's been directly linked to whatever's causing this to happen. Not one. However people are vanishing, it's happening without witnessed violence.” He sighed then went on. “That same lack of violence, unfortunately, cannot be said for a portion of the remaining population. And that's what I'd like to talk to you all about now.”
Andrew launched into Travis and what he had done to Andrew's neighbors, the Railleys. He kept the gory details to a minimum but conveyed enough of what had happened to draw expressions of genuine revulsion. Those expressions, however, morphed from disgust to outright fear when everyone learned that not only had Travis already set foot on Andrew's property but that he had also made a not-so-subtle vow to return.
He painted a clear portrait of the sort of person they were dealing with, but even though Clarissa already knew what Travis had done and what he was capable of, it wasn't until Andrew uttered the word “murderer” that her stomach caved in on itself.
Yes. Travis was a murderer.
Acknowledging that upset her, especially when she considered her personal history with him. Though not quite murder, the things he had done ranked equal to murder in her eyes. But to hear that word—murderer—to have someone else other than her declare his villainy, both filled her with satisfaction and sickened her down to her core.
When Andrew finished explaining the situation, the table hovered in contemplative silence. But it didn't last long.
“Well, I can't speak for anyone else,” Jon said, drawing looks from his husband and son, “but if you need an extra hand to defend yourself against this Travis person, I'd be honored to help. If, you know, we're still here when he comes back.”
“Me as well,” Cesare said. “You've been very kind taking us in, Andrew. Opening your home, sharing your food. If this guy returns before we move on, consider me at your service.”
Sean rolled his eyes playfully. “And we're not going anywhere without him,” he said, thumbing over his shoulder at Jon, “so you can count us in too.”
Andrew smirked, but it was devoid of smugness. Rather, his barely there smile had an air of concession about it, as if he recognized that he had been played into a corner. Jon, Cesare, and Sean had each individually promised to help—contingent upon the idea that they were present to do the actual helping. What at first had been Andrew's unwillingness to take in a bunch of seemingly trustworthy strangers had transitioned from begrudged agreement to dependent exchange—each group needed the other to survive.
Clarissa felt a wave of relief sweep over her. Andrew would no more ask Jon and his group to leave now than he would show Clarissa, Valentina, and Rachel the door. People needed people, and she thought Andrew slowly came back around to this realization.
But having Jon's group here only evened the odds. While their chance for survival against Travis had improved, it was in no way a guarantee. Though she often wished she didn't, Clarissa knew Travis. She knew what he had done, and she knew what evils he would unleash if given a chance. Yes, even after all this time, she still knew him.
Just as she knew terrible things would soon happen.
CHAPTER 26
Andrew rose with the sun. He tended to the chickens and milked the goats, as he always did, but mostly he trolled around his property mulling over the decision he had made the previous evening.
It was one he started to regret.
On the surface, inviting Jon and the others to stay made sense. If Andrew were going to mount a defense against Travis, he would need more people. It was simple math. But instead of feeling confident that he had leveled the playing field, the decision to enlist a citizen militia jabbed at his brain with the effectiveness of Chinese water torture.
What had he done?
He was no military man, and Clarissa, Valentina, and Rachel could no more survive a firefight with violence-crazed thugs than they could fly to the moon by flapping their arms. Andrew had understood this, which is why he put into effect an escape plan and loaded down the flatbed with as much food as it would hold. They stood no chance. Even if he and the girls somehow managed to fend off Travis and his roving mob of psychopaths, it wouldn't be without casualties, and Andrew couldn't have that on his conscience.
Then last night happened, and everything he had set into motion evaporated. It was as much Clarissa's fault for talking him into allowing Jon and the others to stay as it was his for thinking it was a good idea. Perhaps he saw in that unspoken moment what she did. With Jon's group, Andrew stood a chance—a chance—to remain in his beloved home on his idyllic parcel of land. He had lost a lot to get to where he was, more than any person should have to suffer through to achieve his or her goal. But he had. He had picked himself up, dusted himself off, and corralled what floundering life energy he had left and devoted it to building a home as a tribute to his wife; it was a shell of stone and wood that made a poor stand-in for her heart, but it was someplace he could live inside nonetheless until the day he died.
What clarity the morning brought.
It was ludicrous what he had persuaded everyone to believe. There could be no battle against Travis, no matter how badly he wanted to avenge his neighbors and cling to his current way of life. It would be an annihilation. People would most surely die, but it was what would happen to those who Travis captured that haunted Andrew's waking dreams. He didn't know much about Travis, but he had seen enough apathetic students in his time to recognize that Travis's disdain for humanity surpassed those in Andrew's classroom by a distance attained at light speed. His eyes were black holes of soulless existence behind which lurked only the foulest sort of darkness. He reveled in the misery of others, which made him infinitely more dangerous now than before things started going to hell. Now was his time. The world had become his playground, a free-for-all killing field for him and any other person predisposed to view ceaseless acts of murder as entertainment. And apparently, there were many.
That's why no one could stay.
Andrew hadn't quite worked out how he would break the news to Jon and his traveling companions, but it needed to happen soon before everyone got comfortable. It left a bad taste in his mouth to renege on a prior agreement—that wasn't how he operated. Honesty and integrity were lifelong components of his day-to-day life, but sometimes extenuating circumstances forced one's hand. If rescinding his invitation to Jon and the others so that they may live didn't qualify as such, he didn't know what did.
Plodding up the porch stairs with the morning cache of eggs and milk, Andrew pushed through the front door. He was hit in the face with the aroma of fresh coffee and frying grease.
They were in the kitchen again, busying themselves with more of his supplies. Cesare hunched over the stove, Sean and Jon plating whatever he had concocted and delivering it to the table of patiently waiting women whose smiles were so wide they threatened to split their faces. The sight took him aback. He'd never had these many people in his kitchen bef
ore. Hell, he'd never had these many people in his house before. The feeling was alien as if he were peering through a looking glass into his own life from a foreign vantage point.
Clarissa was the first to spy Andrew, as he eased the door shut with a hip.
“Andrew!” she called. “Perfect. You're just in time for breakfast. Cesare's making omelets and homemade hash browns. Come sit with us.”
Cesare wrenched around from his position over the stove to look at Andrew, offering only a brief glance before he returned to the skillet in front of him. “I hope this is okay,” he said. “I wanted to ask you before I started cooking, but I couldn't find you.”
“No,” Andrew said, as he walked into the house. “It's fine.”
Jon eyed him suspiciously. “You sure? The last thing we want to do is be a burden or overstay our welcome.”
“Yeah,” Sean followed, “we just want to be able to help out in some way until we can establish a routine.”
“It's 'yes,' Dad,” Evan declared triumphantly. “Not 'yeah.'”
Sean stuck out his tongue playfully.
Andrew made for the refrigerator and placed the eggs and milk inside. “No, it's fine,” he said again. “I appreciate you all taking the initiative to help out.”
But it wasn't fine. Not really. The likelihood of imminent death for most of the people in his house notwithstanding, another factor prompted Andrew to reverse his decision. Though minor in comparison, it had, quite frankly, crawled under his skin the more he gave it thought. He had set himself up quite nicely out here in the woods. He had land with a productive garden and animals, a limitless supply of well water, and enough food to last for eons. But that was the trick of it: he had only set himself up. Nowhere in his planning did he allow for the possibility of others. Somehow he had gone from a sanctuary of one to a commune of nine. Such a large and unexpected number of people would race through the supplies he had so meticulously and painstakingly stored if he didn't employ some strict rationing. And he would have to. Whatever was happening didn't look to be going away anytime soon. They were in it for the long haul, and as such, his already heightened fear of trying to survive the current world-altering event now amplified by the power of nine.
“Can I get you some coffee?” Clarissa said, jumping to her feet.
Andrew stayed her with a hand. “No, thanks.”
“You want something to eat? Cesare's omelets are to die for.”
“I've got toast here as well,” Jon added. “Just let me know what you'd like, and I'll put a plate together for you.”
“No, really, I had a little something earlier. I'm fine. Though there is something I'd like to—”
The lights in the house dimmed to blackness. Everyone froze, the sizzle of frying potatoes the only sound.
“We lose juice?” Jon said.
Andrew reached for the nearest wall switch and toggled it to no avail.
“Looks that way,” he said.
“There's no power?” Elenora said. “What does that mean?”
“We don't know that it means anything yet,” Andrew assured. “Could just be a random outage. Either way, give me a couple of minutes to fire up the genny, and we'll be right as rain.”
“You've got a generator?” Sean asked just before he shoved a forkful of egg into his mouth.
“I do,” Andrew replied. “And a solar array. But apparently, it hasn't generated enough power to keep us live.”
Tending to the solar panels on his roof had been on a lengthy to-do list for weeks. What used to be eight to ten hours of direct sunlight a day, the panels' exposure had been reduced to less than half that amount thanks to a healthy spring and dense tree growth, which shaded the entire array from mid-afternoon on. Couple that with several recent overcast days, and it didn't surprise him to learn that his personal power supply had failed him. Andrew wondered what else he had put off would come back to haunt him.
“Come on, Dad,” said Evan with a teasing eye roll. His blond bangs were swooped over an ear to expose an acne-pocked forehead. “Look at this place. You see how he's set up. Did you really think he wouldn't have a generator?”
Sean squinted at his son with good-natured menace. “Watch it there, wiseguy. I'm still your dad, you kn—”
The explosion that stole Sean's words and shook the house brought everyone to their feet in clumsy, petrified unison. Windows shuddered in the aftermath, and anything resting on a shelf clattered noisily back to silence.
“What the hell was that?” Valentina blurted.
Andrew was already at the door and pulling it open, Jon and Cesare just a few steps behind him. Everyone trotted onto the porch and locked on the illuminated point that bloomed on the horizon.
The fireball rose lazily in a loosely formed mushroom cloud, easing over the tree tops with demonic grace. It was a considerable distance away, but close enough to send ripples of panic through everyone who gaped at it.
“What is that from?” Sean asked just above a whisper.
“Given the fact that our lights just went out,” Jon said, “I'd wager it's the local power station.”
Andrew peered from under the porch roof to inspect the brightening morning sky.
“I don't think so,” he said. “The nearest fossil fuel power station is in Klamath Falls, and that's well over a hundred miles away as the crow flies. We'd never see an explosion from that distance. That looks like something local. A gas station, or a natural gas rupture, a stove that got left on in someone's home that finally ignited. Might've been a rail or highway collision involving tankers or other flammables. Could've been lots of things.”
Yes, it could have been. And that's what prickled the hairs on the nape of Andrew's neck. He didn't know of a nearby facility capable of generating an explosion of such magnitude. What they all saw had been purposely done. In the pit of his stomach, Andrew felt the explosion was a deliberate act of extreme vandalism. Someone had caused it. Travis's parting words echoed in his mind: It's a new world order. Even so, things were heading south faster than he anticipated.
“I've got no bars!”
It was Rachel. Everyone turned to find her staring at the face of her Samsung in abject horror. The sight of her tapping madly on the black glass of her phone required no explanation. One by one, everyone dug into their pockets and fished out his or her cell phone.
“Me either,” said Clarissa.
“Or me,” seconded Evan.
Valentina speed-dialed a number only to offer a third confirmation of failure by way of a shaking head.
Sean scrolled and tapped with the impatience of a child, but he was unable to place a call as well. “Damn it!” he barked in frustration. “You think the explosion took out some cell towers?”
“It's possible,” Jon responded. “Maybe even likely. But even if it did, you'd need to knock out more than just one to disrupt service for an entire area. We'd still have some overlap from other towers.”
Andrew nodded. “Perhaps, but remember, we're on the fringes of a national forest. Reception out here has always been spotty. Frankly, I was lucky to have the signal that I did, considering there's such a poor line of sight and tower placement is so far apart. That said, we might have even lost the signal before the explosion.”
Rachel stared at Andrew with big, wet eyes. “So I'm not going to be able to call my parents now?”
Clarissa moved up beside her and placed a hand around her waist.
“Doesn't appear any of us will be able to call anyone,” said Sean, who thrust his phone back into his pocket.
“So we've got no phone?” Evan said. “Or electricity?”
The questions were rhetorical, but the implication behind them was where the answer lay. Andrew dreaded this day would come, and now that it had, he knew it would be a game-changer. With no means of communication and the power out, he and the others were effectively cut off from the rest of the world. They were officially on their own.
“You all should probably think about movi
ng on soon,” Andrew said to Jon's group. “This is only going to get worse. You'll want to be someplace safe before it deteriorates further.”
The statement came at everyone like a blindsided punch. Mouths searched for words the way a land-stranded fish gulped air. It wasn't how Andrew intended to let everyone know that he had changed his mind, but he doubted there would ever be a right moment. For reasons he couldn't explain but felt deeply, time was of the essence now.
“Andrew?” Clarissa said, her face screwed into a look of absolute incomprehension. “What...what're you saying?”
“Yeah,” Jon said, stepping forward, his expression striking that precarious balance between confusion and anger. “I don't understand. Last night you said we could stay.”
“That was last night. This morning, I've had a change of heart. It's just not going to work. I'm sorry I got your hopes up. I really am. But this arrangement is in no one's best interest.”
Astonished looks metamorphosed to fear. Elenora clung to Cesare as if she might topple at any moment; Evan edged between his fathers, book-ending himself with parental protection. The only thing that could have made their expressions more heart-rending, Andrew thought, was if he had pulled a gun for emphasis.
He didn't want it to go like this. But he couldn't turn back now. Deep down he knew he was doing the right thing. Jon and his group were justified in feeling betrayed. In their mind, they thought they had gained a safe house, a one-in-a-million hideaway replete with food stores and a prime location, but they didn't know the whole story. Even if Andrew described every grisly detail of Travis's savagery against the Railleys, it would still likely fail to convince them to pack up and leave. Desperation had a way of blinding a person against reality. The rub was that Jon and his group did seem like decent people, but Andrew wasn't going to let that get in the way of good decision-making. He was doing them a favor. At least, that's what he told himself.
