Apocalypticon

by Clayton Smith

  “Yeah.”

  “As a crutch.”

  “Yeah, why not?”

  “Why don’t I use it as a bat-getting tool instead?” he asked, drawing the blade from the sheath across his back.

  Ben’s mouth fell open. “Wow,” he whispered.

  “What? What happened?”

  “Hold on, keep holding it up like that.” He hobbled to the other side of the bridge and turned back to look. “Awesome,” he breathed.

  “What? What, what, what?” Patrick cried.

  “You’re standing amid a jungle of wrecked cars on a deserted bridge holding a giant blade over your head with a curtain of greenish-yellow fog behind you.”

  “Yeah? And?”

  “You look like an anime hero.”

  “I do?!” Patrick squealed.

  “Seriously. I’m gonna call you Patku from now on.”

  “That is so awesome.”

  “I know! Let me try.”

  “Let you ‘try’? No, I will not let you ‘try’ the machete.”

  “Come on. I’ll trade you for the bat.”

  Patrick considered this. His ankle really hurt, and the person Ben was most likely to injure with the machete was himself. “Fine. I will let you borrow the farmer sword. And I will borrow the bat. When I don’t need it anymore, we trade back.”

  “Okay.”

  “No questions asked.”

  “Okay, okay!” It was Ben’s turn to make grabby hands. Patrick handed him the machete and snatched the bat. He put his weight on it and hobbled away across the bridge. Ben held the machete in the air. “Pat! Patku! How do I look? Huh? Pat, look! Come on, Pat, seriously. Seriously! How do I look? Pat? Pat! Goddammit.”

  Because of the fog, they couldn’t make out anything of downtown until they were almost across the bridge. Like the gloomy, wiry outline of a gray ghost, the St. Louis Arch slowly emerged from the brume. It was still in one piece, though it now leaned precariously out over the river. A missile crater at the southern base evidenced the likely cause.

  “Tough old bastard, isn’t it?” Ben remarked.

  “Like the president for which it is named,” Patrick said.

  Ben blinked at him. “President Arch?”

  “Yes, President Rory Arch. He freed the carnies and passed the historical Clown Neuter Act of 17-aught-4.”

  “Okay, this time I’m almost positive you’re being sarcastic.”

  Patrick sighed. “The Arch’s proper, Christian name is the Jefferson National Expansion Memorial. It’s named after Thomas Jefferson.”

  “He was a tough old bastard?”

  Patrick shrugged. “I actually never met the guy.”

  The skyline slowly phased its way into view, and Patrick was surprised by how intact it all was. Many of the buildings had visible scars and holes from the Jamaican missiles, but unlike Chicago, where buildings were still being toppled with alarming regularity, most of the St. Louis skyscrapers still stood tall. Maybe the exploded bridge was an anomaly.

  “What’s our Highway 40 errand?”

  “It’s more of a tribute than an errand,” Patrick said. “And it’s right there.” He pointed straight ahead to a massive brick wall that ran the perimeter of an entire city block. The corner of the wall closest to them was a series of high brick pillars that came together above the highway in gracefully curving arches. Fixed to the top of the wall were two giant red birds; between them, a sign bearing dark red, heavy-block letters spelling BUSCH STADIUM. Well, technically it read B SCH TA I M, but Patrick’s brain didn’t register the missing letters. In his mind’s eye, the sign, and indeed the entire stadium, was as pristine as the day it was built. It was here the St. Louis Cardinals dug in and made their stand against incredible odds in 2006, and again in 2011, winning the two World Series championships that, in a way, had given shape and definition to Patrick’s adulthood. Busch was the stadium of heroes and legend.

  “Patrick, are you crying?”

  “No,” he said hurriedly, wiping his eyes. “I got some Monkey dust in my eye.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  Patrick was prepared to walk down the eternally long Clark Street ramp and double back to approach the stadium from street level. But providence, it seemed, had other plans. Some desperate fan (or thief, more likely, Pat thought sadly) had lain a wide plank from the highway’s edge across to the open-air walkway inside the stadium, a distance of about sixty feet. “This is the Bridge of the Gods,” Patrick said, confident that it was true. “It is meant for our passage.”

  “Yeah, that--that doesn’t look stable.”

  “The Spirit of the Illinois put it here for our safe passage.”

  “The Spirit of the Illinois is a Cubs fan,” Ben pointed out. He pushed his hand down on the edge of the board. It bounced and nearly fell off the ledge. Patrick grabbed it just in time and struggled to keep it in place.

  “It’s perfectly safe,” he insisted. “Just don’t bounce on it.”

  It took very little discussion to determine that Patrick would go first, or they would not go at all. He hoisted himself onto the plank, steadying his weak leg with the bat. “See?” he said, once he had gained what only a paraplegic might refer to as “footing.” “It’s fine.” He shuffle-stepped across the chasm, inching his way slowly toward the stadium. The board began to sag and creak. Patrick didn’t hear it over the sound of his determination.

  “Pat, seriously. We’ll go around. This is insane.”

  “It’s not insane. Stop talking to me.”

  “It is insane. The board is cracking. Can’t you hear it?”

  “All I hear is Jose Oquendo waving me in. Please stop talking. I’m concentrating.” He sank into the middle of the plank, arms out like a tightrope walker. Ben pushed down on the board with all of his weight. He closed his eyes. He couldn’t watch. And yet somehow, miraculously, when he opened them again, Patrick was stepping over the other end of the board and into the stadium. “See? Piece of cake. Okay, your turn.”

  Ben looked over the edge of the interstate. Then he looked back at Patrick. He shook his head.

  “What?”

  “I’m not coming. I’ll wait here.”

  “Oh, come on, it’s fine!”

  “Screw off. I’m not coming.”

  “But, Ben, you love baseball!”

  “I hate baseball. I’ve always hated baseball, I don’t know anything about baseball, and there’s no baseball happening in there anyway.”

  Patrick conceded these points. “Okay, fine. Don’t move. I’ll be back in ten minutes.”

  Forty minutes later, Ben began to worry.

  •

  It wasn’t exactly the field of his dreams. The grass was dead and brown in the few patches where it hadn’t burned away. The bases had all been removed, stolen, most likely, by early M-Day looters who still thought they could sell valuables for a few bucks, or maybe by transients looking for makeshift shields or pillows. The scoreboard was battered and broken, maybe by the wind, maybe by hoodlums, probably a combination of the two. A missile had landed in left field, another in the third base line upper deck. Wind-borne trash covered the dirt and the stands, and the fog had settled so heavily in the basin of the stadium that he couldn’t see the lights above. The most disturbing sight, though, was the jerseys.

  The apocalypse had occurred during a home game. It was a fact Patrick hadn’t thought about for years, but he clearly remembered it now, furtively checking in on the score from work, sneaking the Internet radio broadcast via earphone under his desk, quietly cursing the MLB for scheduling a rare mid-week afternoon game. The Giants had been in town. Strictly speaking, the Giants were still in town. Their jerseys littered the infield and the visitors’ dugout. A few of the jerseys were still wrapped around skeletal fragme
nts; they hadn’t liquefied completely, meaning it went slower and more agonizingly for them. Most of the uniforms rested flat on the ground, stained a horrid rusty brown from their internal fluids, stuck to the ground with globs of dried intestine and marrow. Then he remembered something else he’d heard during the broadcast. His heart leapt with anticipation, but he didn’t want to rush the discovery. He wanted to savor it. So instead of heading to the dugout, he took a lap around the bases.

  There were no Cardinals uniforms in the field. Apparently even the rookies had consumed enough cremated cadaver during their time in St. Louis to survive the chemical blast, at least long enough to get off the field. Halfway between first and second he found number 48, Pablo Sandoval. Stuck to third base was number 29, Hector Sanchez, and at home plate, short sleeves fluttering in the wind, number 58, Andres Torres. All as dead in life now as they had been in Patrick’s heart after the 2012 NLCS.

  He stood on home plate and looked into the stands with grave sadness. Most of the fans seemed to have gotten out safely enough, but there were still several hundred red shirts fluttering around in the seats. Probably trampled in the initial panic, he thought. Or else maybe the relatives or loved ones of die hard fans, not from the area, but tagging along for support.

  He hopped the low brick wall and climbed the stairs behind the third base line to the Infield Box section. He didn’t remember exactly where they’d sat when they brought Izzy to her first Cards game, but this was about right. He chose a row at random and sat down in the aisle seat. As a St. Louis expatriate living in Chicago, he’d missed the chance to raise his daughter on the family team, and they’d only made it to one game. He’d promised more, but life was so busy, trips were too short, they’d be back another time, it would work out better later. They had shared one game, Patrick, Annie, and Izzy, just after her fifth birthday. These were their seats, or they were close enough. This was his memory. He looked out over the field, at the tacky brown remains of the players and fans who had been. He was glad that she wouldn’t see it like this.

  He allowed himself a few minutes to remember. Annie yelling, “Put in Todd Worrell!” and “Mark Sweeney, hit a home run!” despite the fact that neither had been a Cardinal for over a decade. Izzy wrestling with a souvenir soda cup as big as her head. Annie picking a fight with the Cubs fan two rows over, because what the hell was a Cubs fan doing at a Cardinals/Mets game? Izzy’s sheer delight at throwing peanut shells on the floor without getting scolded, Patrick’s sheer delight at not having to scold.

  He slipped the weathered note from his back pocket and unfolded it carefully. He sighed back his tears as he read, and remembered.

  After a few minutes, he returned the note to its protective pocket, slapped the plastic armrests of the stadium chair, and got to his feet. He had one more stop to make.

  He’d saved the most satisfying for last.

  The year before M-Day, in a somewhat controversial move, the Giants brought Barry Bonds onto the staff as the hitting coach. He only traveled with the team part-time, despite his sizable paycheck. But he had traveled to St. Louis. Patrick hopped down into the visitors’ dugout, and a goofy smile spread across his face. Laying in a heap next to the steps was a jersey with the name BONDS stitched across the shoulders. “All the steroids in the world can’t save you from the apocalypse,” he said.

  Under normal circumstances, Patrick found himself repulsed by the idea of anyone taking pleasure in someone’s mortal demise. But this wasn’t someone. This was Barry Bonds.

  Patrick dug through his bag and pulled out a lighter. The Great Chicago Chaos had taught him that the puddled remains of M-Day victims burned like kerosene, quickly and furiously.

  “I’ve waited a long time for the chance to set you on fire,” he said, clicking the lighter and holding the flame to the jersey. It caught instantly, flaring up in a low whoosh. Liquefied Barry burned bright. The flames consumed the entire uniform and reduced it to ashes within seconds. Patrick gave a curt nod as he watched the number 25 char into oblivion. “You’ll never hurt baseball again.”

  When the fire died, he toed the ashes into the shape of an asterisk. Then he stuck his hands in his pockets and wandered off the field.

  •

  “Yours or mine?” he asked as they finished up a meal of cold beans and energy bars on the roof of a Land Rover overlooking the river.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Whose family do we check in on first? Yours or mine?”

  Ben snorted. “Yours.” He stabbed at the bottom of his can, turning the last few beans to mush. Then he hauled back and threw it over the side of the highway.

  “Geographically, it makes more sense to do yours first. Mine’s on the South Side; it’s on the way out. We should hit up Maplewood while we’re up here.”

  Ben shook his head. “Nah. Let’s go do yours.”

  “No, seriously. I don’t want to backtrack. We’d have to go up 270, and Momo’s probably wreaking havoc on the corridor.”

  “Who’s Momo?”

  “Momo! Momo the Monster.”

  “What the hell are you talking about?”

  “You’ve never heard of Momo?”

  “No,” Ben said flatly.

  “Pull out your iPhone, look it up.”

  “Har, har.”

  “He’s a sasquatch! Lives in the woods! Eats babies and Reese’s Pieces!”

  Ben shot Patrick a suspicious glare. “Are you kidding me with this shit?”

  “Not at all. Well, maybe the babies and Reese’s Pieces part. I think that’s E.T. But he definitely lives in a cave.”

  “Then we’ll stay away from caves.”

  “What about the Cave of Wonders? Can’t stay away from that one, huh?” Patrick planted his feet and went up for another high five.

  Ben just stared at him. “Is that a euphemism?”

  “Heck yes!” Patrick pushed at the air, waiting for the second half of his high five. It didn’t come. “Momo lives along 270. I’m not circling back that way. We go see your family now.”

  Ben waved him off. “Forget it. Let’s just see yours and go.”

  It was Patrick’s turn to look suspicious. “You don’t want to see your family?”

  “What’s the point? So I can see them living in post-apocalyptic suburban hell?” He hopped off the Land Rover and began pacing on the asphalt. “My mom’s always sick with something, the flu, or shingles, or what she thinks is jaundice but turns out to be kidney stones, or what she thinks is kidney stones but turns out to be rickets. She’s spent half her life hooked up to machines and taking pills. If she’s survived this long without electricity or reliable food supplies, she’s paper thin and probably crying her eyes out every night for my sister and me, when she’s not in too much pain to think from whatever new-world super virus she’s probably caught. And my dad, Christ, he’s such a stubborn asshole. He won’t take help from anyone. The man has no survival skills. He’s probably holed up on the living room floor, shitting himself and eating rats. Literally, eating rats. He couldn’t keep a house clean with all the marvels of modern technology. I grew up with cockroaches in the kitchen sink. I can’t even imagine what the house is like now. If they’re alive, they’re in horrible shape. Best case scenario, they’re dead, and that’s a shitty best case scenario. I don’t want to know.”

  He wandered off down the highway, kicking at tires as he went. Patrick let him get a good distance before climbing down off the Land Rover and following at an easy pace. By the time he caught up to his friend, Ben was lying down on the center stripe, arms crossed on his chest. Patrick stood awkwardly by his head. “You okay?”

  “No.”

  Pat tossed his bag down and sat against a truck tire. “What if they are okay? Most of the people around here must’ve survived, right? Maybe someone is taking care of them, maybe s
omeone beat your dad into submission. With giant logic fists. Or a reality hammer. Men in your family like getting hit with hammers, if I recall correctly. Or maybe your sister made it back? She was only, what, four hours away? What if they’re fine, and it’s killing them not knowing what happened to you? What if seeing you alive and well, or, you know, alive and beaten with bats and car parts, what if that’s the thing that completes the whole picture? Makes the circle of life move one jump ahead of the breadline, and all that?”

  Ben dug the heels of his palms into his eyes. “Why would I want to do that to them? Show up, ‘Hey Mom, I’m fine, great to see you, going to Disney World now, so long.’ It’s a lose-lose game. Like fucking Battleship.”

  “You could always stay,” Patrick suggested. “If they’re fine, I mean. You could stay. Damn, what do you want to go to Disney World for anyway? You hate children; it would just make you depressed.”

  “Are you kidding me? I’m in this ‘til the end. I’m still pretty sure you’re gonna try to off yourself sometime in the next three days. I’m not letting you out of my sight. Besides, what am I gonna do, stay here and rebuild a life in the new frontier? Who am I, Charles Ingalls? I left the ‘Lou for a reason. I’m an adventurer, and so far this has been about the dumbest adventure I can think of, and I’m not gonna bail now that we’re finally getting to the good part. We’re headed into the creepy South. I love the creepy South.”

  Patrick smiled. “I know you do, Ben,” he said, giving him a little kick in the arm, “I know you do.”

  “So fuck it. Let’s not go down that road.”

  “Literally.”

  “Literally,” Ben agreed. “Let’s go to the Deen Ranch.” He wiped his eyes and jumped to his feet. He offered Patrick a hand to help him up. But Patrick just sat there, looking down and twirling the wedding ring on his finger. For nearly five minutes, he sat in quiet contemplation.