by Ian Daniels
"I'm serious man. If things keep getting any worse, being the only not-white guy in these parts could get pretty crappy," I leveled with him, remembering my confrontation with Jacinto and the elitist, racist lady at the train station.
"Things are already crappy my friend, but I am afraid that you are right. We have our Lincoln gassed up in the service shop, I don’t like this snow anyway."
I looked out the shuttered window at the initial skiff of snow as he gestured and realized that it might be time for is to be on our way as well.
"You take care of yourself," I shook his hand.
"You too my friend. There are mean men out tonight, but I think you may be able to handle it," he said curiously darting his eyes at the others, then patting my armored chest knowingly.
"Is he a Muslim?" Danielle asked me as we drove down the dark street away from the gas station and taking a back way over towards the college.
"Naw, I think he's Indian or Mexican or something."
"What?" she recoiled at my perceived ignorance.
"Well hell how am I supposed to know? I never felt the need to ask and if you did ask him, he'd just say he's Australia or something. He drives a Chevy, smokes Marlboro's, drinks Budweiser, and eats convenience store hot dogs. That’s all I need to know."
"So you trust him?"
"I have a hard time trusting anybody these days," I had to restrain myself from looking at Blake in the rear view mirror as he worked to peer his head around and see over an overgrown bush on the side of the road.
"This is perfect," Blake rubbed his hands together.
"Excuse me?"
"A riot... it’s the perfect distraction for us to slip in while the opportunists are busy looting. We get in, grab some gas, and get out."
While the other opportunists were busy looting... I had to remind myself why it was that we were out here and doing what we were planning on doing. He unfortunately wasn’t wrong, again, and I sighed, loudly.
Chapter 17
“There's the entrance,” I checked my borrowed police map for the hundredth time. “Let's park over there,” I pointed at an old brick building and Clint looked all around us then slowly backed the truck into the indicated area about thirty yards from the spot.
The four of us jumped out of the truck as soon as it stopped. In the distance we could hear the dim buzz of activity giving a surreal value to the rioting and looting we knew was going on. We were displaced just enough to feel oddly insulated from it as we listened to yells, crashes and other loud noises. A few small orange lights that still had power going to them broke up the darkness and shadows of the random buildings that sat close by.
“Blake, let’s check out the tunnel. You two hang by the truck,” I motioned quickly.
Blake and I made our way over to the ancient pump house building that housed a service entrance to this section of the steam tunnels. The door itself was locked, one good whack from Blake’s sledgehammer easily swung it aside. My flashlight blinked on as I disappeared into the small building. Other than some pipes rising through the floor with gauges on them, there was nothing much to see.
Blake’s hand on my shoulder about gave me a heart attack.
“Check it out,” he pointed his flashlight to the ground.
A hinged steel grate on the floor covered the small set of stairs that led to another steel door. We had found the entrance.
It took us both to lift the heavy steel grate aside. Blake jumped down the small flight of steps before I could completely check the whole area out. What I was really looking for was any wire or small magnetic sensors that would sound an alarm. After taking my time to check now that Blake had literally jumped in before looking, I came up empty, still not quite believing that there were none.
The big steel door was secure but it surprised us both when there was only a simple latch and knob to secure it. No dead bolt or crossbar, one more whack from the sledgehammer again opened the way for us.
After recovering my nerves... again, from getting surprised by a big rush of air as the door opened and the vacuum of an air system was broken, we looked in. Our lights were lost down the long dark tunnel. The walls and ceiling all looked to be solid concrete and the floor was dry, smooth and flat, just what we needed. The best part was that it wasn't too stuffy to breathe and had only a little bit of the telltale musty smell permeating throughout.
“We’re in,” I radioed to the others.
“Copy. Regroup and we’ll get moving,” Clint radioed back.
Meeting back up at the truck we all paused momentarily and stared at each other.
“So what now? Do we just all dive in and go for it or what?” Danielle asked.
Like it or not, she seemed eager to get this foray over with. I, on the other hand, had my eye on something else.
“The hell is that?” I pointed to Clint. I noticed he had swapped his shotgun out for something different. It was a big gun and seeing as how it looked modern and not from one of the last two centuries, it looked completely foreign for him to be holding.
“Hmm? Oh yeah AR10. Got the idea from those Department of Energy guys,” he shrugged.
“Is that a damn thermal scope?” Blake inspected the big device on the top of the gun.
“Just night vision, I didn't want to spend all of your inheritance on it,” Clint laughed.
“Could we...?” Danielle’s impatience was growing.
“Two groups?” I asked, defaulting again to Clint.
“Yep,” he confirmed. “Just like at the church. You two scout it, Blake and I will hold up here. I’ll check close by around here, should’ve done that right away anyway. Blake you cover the truck and the entrance. You two check out the other side and report back.” He was in full no messing around mode now.
“I don’t know how the radio signals will be once we get in the tunnels but if we lose contact, we’ll check in as soon as we’re in the open again,” I told him happy to not give Danielle a chance to balk at the idea of going with me again. “Just like at the church,” as Clint had said.
“You okay with that Honey?” Blake asked his wife, maybe noticing something about her that I didn't pick up on.
“What? Yeah I'm fine. I think this is stupid and wrong and I don't like it at all... but I can’t come up with anything better so let's just get it over with,” she finally acknowledged.
I agreed with her. I had heard that when a family member gets seriously sick, people will go to great lengths but I had never seen it first hand before until now. I was watching... living...participating in the desperate and stupid lengths that otherwise nice people will quickly find themselves going to in order to save a loved one.
I quickly went through everything in my head again, running the pros and cons and again coming to the conclusion that this was the safest and most solid of the idiotic ideas that we had. There were a few unknowns but I would feel better about the whole situation if we didn't have the one wild card blowing around in the wind with us. If we could temper down Blake’s new found arrogance or whatever it was, we might be able to avoid a full fledged disaster.
“Worst case is if you need help, launch a red flare as high and as far towards us as you can and we’ll come running, alright?” Clint said, moving us forward.
Danielle and I got through the steam tunnels with virtually no problems. We went with our flashlights on for most of the way even though some sections were still lighted. I figured those were the areas tied into a nearby building or even underneath one, where an emergency generator was still using the last of its gas to power any emergency lighting.
We finally came to another door, this one unlocked from the tunnel side. Opening it slowly I saw that we were right where I expected to come out. The tiny room was dark and the one wire lined window looked out through the mouth of the small parking garage.
After propping the tunnel door open so it would not shut and lock behind us, we came out through the garage opening and the forgotten snow assaulted us as we emerg
ed. The area was hidden out of the way and offered a wide view of three different college buildings, including the Maintenance Center with the propane tanks still in their protective enclosure.
Beyond the other two buildings and maybe still too close for comfort, was one of the more main streets connecting the areas of the college to downtown. Noises coming from that direction were much more distinct, not to mention louder, as they were not so far away anymore.
Through it all we could pick out a mash of distinct sounds, like glass breaking or a car horn blaring, all mixed with the general din and hum of a full-on riot. Feet running, children crying, voices yelling, fires crackled in dumpsters, trashcans, or in the buildings themselves, more people running… there was so much that you couldn’t discern a specific direction of the underlying anarchy, but you knew what each sound was when you heard it.
We eased up to and then around the side of one of the brick campus buildings that sat off to the side of our targeted Maintenance Shop.
“They used to hold math classes here if I remember right,” I whispered to Danielle as we peeked around the corner. Our eyes were suddenly transfixed by the insane reality of what we were looking at.
A half mob was moving through the street, taking out their vengeance on anything in their path. Some even circled to go out of their way to get to something they really liked or wanted to break. Or maybe they just wanted to beat on something else that they had missed on the first trip around. It was a rolling crowd of destroyers intermingled with those trying to protect their own.
Some of the poor, innocent or just plain overwhelmed, simply watched it all unfold around them. The zombies were out staring or meandering around. Random people walked down the middle of the street, they looked stunned, shocked into oblivion and unaware of anyone else, much less themselves. I started to get the impression that these people had come to the rally or demonstration out of good faith, only to have the whole event occupied and washed away by a ravenous horde bent on riot and destruction.
Focusing in on little pockets of activity with my monocular, I could see people grabbing things out of others’ hands, pushing them down to collide with the pavement, all for stuff that didn’t rightly belong to either one of them. Old people cowered in fear in doorways and alcoves. Faces full of fear and dread peered from behind curtains in upper story windows of apartments. Three armed men sat atop a distant building, waiting ominously lest they have to protect their homes or businesses.
There were others that were armed too, but besides their pistols or rifles, they were armed with cases of beer. Their looted, then discarded cardboard boxes and empty, crushed cans created a trail to follow like an alcoholic Hansel and Gretel. We could see for the better part of three city blocks in both directions and it was the same scene wherever we looked.
And it was a family affair. Moms handed their kids stuff to carry that they stole out of the few little hometown shops. Middle aged people finally getting what they thought they had been denied but always deserved. Some took it as a green light to tell off or beat up someone else that they once had an unresolved beef with. It was pure insanity.
I thought I had been more or less prepared to see a mob running rampant through the streets I grew up riding my bicycle on. Some things, like the looting, were almost to be expected. What was unexpected was to see those who reveled in the calamity and chaos. It was as if young people were acting out their favorite books or games. They smashed things for the sake of destroying something that was once whole and good. They reveled in the random violence being dolled out by their own hands. They were hurting people for the fun of it, all to run up the high score in their new real-life video game. This was much different than when I had used the same comparison when talking to Clint about Blake. Blake was something else, both better and worse than what I was witnessing here. Some of them covered their faces with masks or bandannas, most went carelessly by, mindless of whether someone recognized them or not.
My stomach hurt to see that. Had people fallen so low? I was young but my generation never did stuff like this; we never did stuff just to cause hurt. My friends and I had caused harmless trouble; we still had morals and ethics though. Had this newest generation been so failed by their parents and the world that this was considered acceptable? They were making a game out of it; one upping each other, who could do the worse deed.
"Why would they do this?" Danielle whispered to me.
"They’ve all just had it, they’ve just given up," I told her.
They had. Everyone had finally fallen so low as to be at war with each other. Finally frustrated or tired of trying so hard and never getting anywhere and they were lashing out at the first available targets: each other.
A specific scene caught my eye and I pointed for Danielle to look down the street. Through the snowy darkness we could see two guys and a girl. One of the guys was pushing the other in a shopping cart as he bashed mail boxes and anything else breakable with a baseball bat, laughing all the way to the next one until they ran out of stationary targets. That’s when they noticed the Zombies. The first kid, his ski goggles firmly in place, jumped out of the cart and literally ran up to flat out swing for the fences, hitting a guy right in the melon with his aluminum bat.
The sound was sickening and what didn’t instantly mush in his head, cracked open right there in the street. That was when I decided I wouldn’t be watching a twisted version of this Zombie Home Run Derby again. The kid briefly assessed his handiwork and then took off after his next victim, this time a family of five. The mother and father were trying to escort their kids along the side of a building, hoping to avoid the chaos.
When the mentally-ill Babe Ruth wannabe lined up for his swing, I placed a suppressed, high speed bullet right in between his shoulder blades. He cried out, rigidly flailing his arms outward and sagging forward to land face down not three feet in front of his intended targets. The Mad Batter writhed in paralyzed shock and incredible pain on the sidewalk as his friends abandoned him, running away and exposing their true cowardice.
It wasn’t a wounding shot and it wasn’t a killing shot, it was a 'what the fuck is going on?' shot. What other options did I have? Kill him outright or wound him in a leg until the infection from a shoddy amputation attempt finally overtook him? Sometimes people just need to be shot I guessed and motioned to Danielle that we should be moving on... quickly.
We didn’t talk as we got back to the tunnel entrance or as we moved through it to the other end where Blake and Clint were waiting for us. I was lost in trying to stay alert and suppress all the other thoughts of what I had just seen that were threatening to invade my head and distract me from the here and now. I was pretty sure Danielle didn’t know what to say either. This might not have been her own hometown but she had adopted it and loved it like it was a long time ago.
“Hey, are your radios broken or what?” Blake sounded angry as we reappeared on the other end.
“Must’ve lost the signal or something,” I mumbled and walked past him, headed for the tree where I had left my backpack. I sat down heavily, retrieved an extra bottle of water and chugged nearly the whole thing.
“Well, what’d you guys find?” Blake asked again looking back and forth between the two of us.
I made eye contact with Danielle and finally leaned my head back against the tree and closed my eyes. She took my silence for what it was and tried to put her own thoughts into words.
“What did we see?” she repeated, pausing as Clint reappeared through the overgrown bushes like a ghost. “It was crazy! People fighting, smashing stuff… there were even little kids with paintball and pellet guns plinking at people like it was cool. I swear I heard someone playing a drum set. It's a freaking circus. A couple of older guys were walking around in the middle of the street shooting at stuff. It was insane. It's like you hear about those mobs that burn down a police station because there wasn’t enough police to help them. Why in the world would they do that? I don’t get it, it doesn’t ma
ke sense!” she rattled on.
"And what're you, bored?" Blake asked sarcastically when he saw me sitting motionless with my eyes still closed.
“We took out... engaged, a couple of hostiles and then got some space and high tailed it out of there,” I ignored his tone and finished the recap for Danielle.
“Okay but what about the propane? Is it there? Can we get to it?” Blake excitedly hurried past the gravity of what we were trying to relay to him and produced the furniture dolly from the back of the truck to help us move the heavy cylinders.
“It's there,” I opened my eyes and confirmed.
“Blake, didn’t you hear me? We’ve got to get out of here!” Danielle was shaking slightly from that perfect mixture of fear and adrenaline.
“Babe, I hear you and I’m sorry, but it’s not like we didn’t know that there are people going nuts in the streets. Heck it’s almost better this way. It’s a perfect distraction. If we can get enough gas we’ll be setup like kings!”
“What do you think?” Blake asked, turning to me, oblivious of the hurt feelings of his wife.
“Dani said it, it’s a mad house.”
“What? Come on! This is the type of shit we can be good at! What’re you afraid of?”
"Don't mistake pessimism for fear," my eyes tried their hardest to bore holes through him. “I’m not all that hot to go wading through people that are hell bent on death and destruction, but I do think that we can still pull it off.” I amended after slightly giving in to the look of disappointment on Blake’s face.
“Okay then,” he visibly brightened.
“No, there’s no way. If that mob comes any closer it’s too far to the cage from where the tunnel comes out and you guys will be hauling a hundreds pounds,” Danielle objected again.
“Look, it’s what we expected. We’re geared up and ready… and we need this. This is nothing, it’s not a surprise, we’re still a go.”
Blake almost sounded exasperated by our assessment of the situation. I could sense he was fighting with his temper and mentally crossed my fingers.
