Salt of Gomorrah

by Alex Mersey

  Then he saw it was attached to the decapitated upper torso of a young woman, a girl with matted hair and a frozen, glassy stare.

  He turned abruptly, not quick enough. The image of intestines spilling out from the hacked and bloody mess of her stomach imprinted on his brain, soured his gut and wrenched bile up his throat.

  He swallowed hard, walked faster. “You okay, kid?”

  “Can I open my eyes now?”

  “No!”

  Lynn pulled her gaze from another wreckage, frowning at him “What is it?”

  “Nothing.” He didn’t look back, marched forward across the Greenway to the promenade.

  There was less obstruction as they headed south along the river, so long as they took care to navigate around the huge bites of the promenade that had dropped into the water. Some trees still stood, coated in thick layers of ash.

  The landscape across the Hudson eerily resembled Manhattan, obliterated to ash and dust, rubble and ruins. The river itself was a flowing graveyard, carrying cars, debris, floating bodies.

  The light faded fast, almost gone by the time they reached the pier. That is, the concrete rockslide that was left of the pier, but that was a good thing. It gave them scrambling access to the water.

  Sean let the kid off his back and stepped closer to the edge. The hull of an overturned boat bobbed below, either anchored or blocked from drifting by underwater rubble.

  “Do you think it’s still seaworthy?” Lynn joined him, looking down. “If we can get it turned right side up?”

  The shape and length of the hull indicated a small sailboat. “We’ll never get that thing turned about.” Something bobbed alongside it, maybe just a shadow. He shrugged the coil of rope from his shoulder, let it drop to the ground. “I’ll go take a look.”

  “I’m coming with you.”

  “If you fall in, you’re on your own.”

  She threw his words back at him with a dour look. “If you fall in, you’re on your own.”

  The difference being, she probably meant it.

  Sean squatted to start crab-walking down the rocky slope.

  “Johnnie, stay right there, okay? I won’t be long,” Lynn called out as she dropped down to slip-slide behind him.

  “Will he stay?” Sean said. In his limited experience, kids rarely did as they were told.

  “He’ll stay.”

  “He’s a good kid.”

  “Yeah,” she said softly at his back. “He’s a good kid.”

  The boulders became smaller, looser, as they neared the bottom.

  Sean stopped, straightened.

  The water slapped against the rocks, dark and forbidding. The hull was further from shore than he’d thought, at least fifty strokes. He squinted into the blackness as he pointed. “I think that’s a boat attached to the hull, an inflatable raft or rubber dingy.”

  “You’re not swimming out there, now?” Lynn said.

  He glanced up across the moonless, starless night. He’d swum the Hudson a couple of times, was familiar with the currents.

  “Sean?”

  He heard the warning in her tone, didn’t disagree. The urgency to get off this island hadn’t lessened. It wasn’t just the potential exposure to radiation. They were sitting ducks here, with nowhere to run and no place to lose themselves in. He never wanted to be in that position again, digging his heels in and closing his eyes and praying for a miracle, because what else was there to do?

  “Besides,” Lynn went on, “I’m not taking Johnnie out on the water in the dark. I didn’t realize the river would be so cluttered. It would be like playing dodgeball, blindfolded, and using cars instead of balls.”

  Sean sighed, swept one last look across the Hudson. Some of the panic had fled with his call to action. With it, reason returned. They couldn’t run fast enough, far enough, to outrun another (nuclear?) strike on the mothership.

  Don’t be reckless.

  We’re alive.

  Keep it that way.

  He nodded. “First light, then.”

  “First light,” Lynn murmured.

  ∞∞∞

  New York summer nights were usually warm and humid. There was a chill in the air this evening, though, that Sean couldn’t shake.

  They stayed close to the pier, snacked on protein bars, then tried to settle down and get some sleep. Lynn wrapped the kid close and spread out on the ground, using her backpack as a pillow. She had a hoodie for Johnnie, and some spare t-shirts to layer for herself.

  Sean sat against a tree stump, tucked his knees in with his arms folded around them. No light came from the mothership. Didn’t they have damn windows up there? The silvery mist that swirled below didn’t appear to give off any glow, yet it was clearly visible.

  The night fell to utter and complete silence around him. The kid didn’t talk much. Neither did the mother. But their sparse chatter had filled some of the emptiness, staved off the ghosts of Manhattan.

  Now it was just him, alone with his thoughts and those ghosts.

  The people in his life. His business partner, Jacob, and his pregnant wife. Their PA, Sara, and the new apprentice she’d recently taken under her wing. The network of colleagues and clients he’d built up over the years, some of whom had become good friends.

  The familiar strangers he passed every day, acknowledged with a smile, a small wave, a throw-away comment. The night doorman working his way through business school. The busker at 2nd Avenue subway station. The baristas at his local Starbucks. The list went on and on, faces he’d never see again.

  All the rest, the millions of Manhattans he’d lived alongside but never really seen. Somehow they were just as important, the buffers of society and humanity.

  The thoughts and memories sank to the pit of his stomach like a dead weight, pulling at the fringes of his sanity. Sean knew he had to let it go, stay strong and look forward, and he would. But not just yet. He let the people, places, names, faces, roll through his mind and heart, over and over…

  - 9 -

  Chris

  “Williams! Come on, man. Williams!”

  No response.

  How long had it been now?

  Chris had no idea. His phone was out of juice, or maybe broken, he couldn’t tell. He’d lost all sense of time, of space, of sanity, since the crash-stop.

  The blackness was all consuming.

  He couldn’t even see his hand right in front of his face. He couldn’t see Williams, who sat right beside him, who was out cold—probably something to do with the massive lump on the back of his head that Chris had discovered when he’d blindly felt the man for injuries.

  Should he shake Williams awake? A hard slap? Did that even work? Probably not a good idea with a head injury.

  “Williams!”

  Chris had already felt for a pulse, good, strong, the man just wasn’t waking up.

  “Maybe it’s normal.” Chris massaged the stiffness from the back of his neck. “And now I’m talking to myself.”

  Concussion, maybe? Williams had hit his head at 120 mph. Chris knew, because he’d asked straight after the bullet had supposedly pulled out of the underground station. Not a train, really, just the one small capsule with four luxurious seats. The maglev technology was so smooth, it had felt as if they weren’t moving at all, and then they weren’t, and he’d gone flying into Williams at 120 mph.

  “Williams!”

  A low, guttural rumble.

  Chris turned in the direction of the grunt, patted until he found Williams’ thigh. “Williams! Are you awake? Can you hear me?”

  Williams swiped his hand away. “Could you not shout?”

  “Thank God.” Chris almost laughed. He definitely smiled. “You had me worried there.”

  “How long was I— We’ve stopped?” He must have tried to sit up straighter, because there was a groaned curse, then a soft thud as he collapsed back against the bucket seat. “Chris, are you okay? Hurt?”

  “I had a soft landing,” Chris said. “Sorry ab
out that, by the way.”

  Another groan. “Ah, that explains it.”

  “You hit your head,” Chris informed him.

  Williams must have tried to move again, which ended in another agonized grunt.

  “Stop that,” Chris said. “Are you hurt anywhere else?”

  “I’ll be fine.”

  “That’s not what I asked.”

  “There should be a panel that opens,” Williams said instead of answering. “Below one of the seats. The emergency kit should be in there.”

  “I’ll find it.” Chris slid from his seat to the floor so he could explore the smooth underside of the built-in seats with his fingertips. If Williams was delegating, that meant he was worse than he was saying. Even worse than Chris had thought, which hadn’t been all that good to begin with.

  “How did I end up in this state?” Williams said, his voice too shallow, his breaths uneven.

  Chris paused. “You don’t remember?”

  “The last thing I remember, I was sitting across from you, the lights were on, we were moving.”

  “Yeah, well…” Chris felt a knobby protrusion and twisted. The panel dropped open and he reached inside, tentatively feeling his way. “The power must have cut out. We slammed to a halt and I was flung across into you. Again, sorry about that.”

  “This shouldn’t have happened.”

  “No shit.” Chris’ searching fingers stumbled across a canvas bag. He found purchase and hauled it out of the hidey hole.

  “No, I mean this really shouldn’t have happened,” Williams said. “Even if the backup power failed, the bullet’s supposed to decelerate slowly as the magnetic charge on the tracks dissipated.”

  Chris felt along the canvas seam for a zipper. “You a scientist now?”

  “It was in the security brief when the new Metro links were put in.”

  He could imagine the dour look Williams would be giving him. “Nice to know that knock on the head hasn’t affected your lack of humor.”

  “Found anything yet?”

  “Oh, yeah, I’ve got the emergency bag.” Chris finally realized why he couldn’t find the zipper. The bag was actually a backpack with Velcro fasteners. “And you’re wrong about that techno babble. The stop felt…hell, I don’t know, maybe like we’d flipped into reverse thrust or something to a dead stop. Okay, I’ve got the backpack opened,” he said as he stripped the Velcro open and delved inside.

  “There should be glow sticks,” Williams said. “Long tubes—”

  “I know what a glow stick is.”

  No comeback.

  “Williams, you okay?”

  “Hmmm.”

  Shit. Chris fumbled through the bag and brought out something that felt like a glow stick. He cracked the tube and tossed it aside as the bullet interior lit up in a green glow.

  Williams was slumped on the seat, one arm wrapped around his midriff. His eyes came to Chris, not quite focused. “There should be a First Aid kit in there.”

  With the light, Chris quickly located the small plastic box. “What do you need?”

  “Just bring it here.”

  Chris snapped the box open as he placed it on the seat beside Williams. His gut lurched when he got his first proper look at the man. A sheen of sweat covered his face. And the colors were off with the green glow, but he was pretty sure the dark skinned man was paler than him right now.

  Williams kept that arm around his chest as he shifted to grab a bottle of pills. He twisted the cap and dumped a couple into his palm.

  Chris tossed the backpack upside down, spilling the entire contents onto the floor, found what he was looking for. He opened the bottle of mineral water and handed it to Williams, who’d already swallowed the pills dry. He exchanged the bottle of pills in Williams’ hand for the water.

  Williams took a long gulp. “Thanks.”

  “You don’t look good, man.”

  “Don’t worry about me.”

  Chris glanced at the label as he returned the pill bottle to the box. Vicodin. How many had Williams taken? At least four. He looked Williams over, sick to his stomach with worry, especially when he considered why Williams’ arm was wrapped protectively around his midriff.

  “Is it your ribs?” he said. “Did I crack something when I smashed into you?”

  Williams took another drink of water, then passed the bottle to Chris. “I’ll live.”

  “Is there anything I can do?”

  “I’ll be okay,” Williams said. “Drink.”

  Chris hadn’t realized how thirsty he was until the cool water hit the back of his throat. He took a second sip, then capped the bottle.

  “We should get the door open.” Williams nudged his chin. “There’s a manual override.”

  Chris looked, saw the red lever and stood. “Hey,” he said when Williams put his head back, eyes closed. “Don’t pass out on me.”

  “Just thinking.”

  “About what?” Chris said to keep him talking, and awake, as he crossed to the red lever.

  “How long we were travelling before the power cut out.”

  “A couple of minutes, two, maybe three.”

  “We couldn’t have got very far.”

  “Good.” Chris had to use both hands, put his weight into it, to pull the lever down. The door popped. “Then it’ll be a short walk back to the Shelter.”

  Williams sat up straighter. “We’re not going back.”

  “Still following orders?” he snapped. “The mission’s over, soldier.”

  “I’m not a soldier.” Williams slid his hand inside his jacket, pulled out his cell phone.

  The rush of anger fled as quickly as it had surged. “I know why my father sent me away.”

  Williams’ eyes lifted from the cell phone. “Why’s that?”

  “He thinks the Shelter’s not safe...” Chris dropped onto the opposite seat and spread his legs out in front of him. “Or, at least, that it won’t be for much longer.”

  “And if that’s the truth?”

  “Then I should be there with him,” Chris said flatly. It was just the two of them now. His grandfather was some stranger he rarely saw. Two weeks ago at his mom’s funeral. A few summers back, when his mom had taken him for a short visit to the ranch. Before that? Chris couldn’t even recall.

  “You want to die?”

  “He’s the only family I have left.” Chris gave a harsh laugh. “You wouldn’t understand.”

  The seconds stretched into minutes as Williams stared at him, assessing, searching. Then, “My village in Nigeria was raided by mercenaries. They killed all the men, the older women, took the younger girls with them. My mother, she pushed me behind her back when they entered our home, fell over me when they shot her in the chest. Her dying breath, she told me, ‘Shhhh.’ I was five years old, the last of my family had been slaughtered before my eyes, and I knew I wanted to live. So I held my breath and stayed right there beneath her, didn’t move for hours after the mercenaries had left.”

  “Holy shit, Williams, I’m so sorry.” Chris looked at him, shell-shocked. He hadn’t even known Williams wasn’t born and bred in the USA. His accent was pure Ivy League. “Is that why you joined the FBI, to protect people?“

  “I do what I do because I do it.” The man’s eyes narrowed into him. “Do you know why I told you that?”

  Since the only thing he came up with was some version of a deathbed confession, Chris kept his mouth shut. He was still stunned by the revelation.

  “God himself can’t keep alive a man who has a death wish,” Williams said after a long pause. “Do you want to live, Chris?”

  Chris frowned at him. “That’s a stupid question.”

  Williams arched a brow.

  “Yes, I want to live,” Chris spelled out.

  “Good, that makes my job a hell of a lot easier.” Williams lowered his gaze, fiddled with the phone. “It’s dead.”

  “So was mine.”

  Williams looked at him, processing, then he gru
nted. “That’s why we’re not going back. We’re not going to Mount Weather, either.” He slipped the useless phone back inside his jacket as he spoke. “The tunnels are shielded from any kind of interference and the bullet runs on the same closed circuit as the shelter. The generator should have kicked in.”

  “But it didn’t.”

  “We have to assume there’s been an attack on our grid.”

  Chris’ throat tightened. “An EMP?”

  “We’re sitting in a giant Faraday Cage that extends from the Shelter and throughout the tunnel.” Williams said. “Whatever did this is worse than any EMP and more than likely took the power out at Mount Weather, too. There’s no manual override on the security systems at either the Shelter or Mount Weather. No way up or out the tunnel at either end.”

  “We’re trapped down here?”

  Williams shook his head. “There’s an emergency exit about two thirds of the way, just outside Leesburg.” He stood, masked the momentary lapse that betrayed an expression of pain. “It’s probably a twenty to thirty mile walk and we’ll need that backpack put to order.” He waved a hand over the items strewn across the floor.

  “You want to walk?” Chris scowled at him. “Right now?”

  “No time like the present.”

  “You look like you’d fall flat on your face after half a mile.”

  “I’m fine.”

  “So you keep saying,” Chris grumbled, but he slid to the floor and shoved everything back into the pack.

  Two half-liter bottles of water.

  First Aid kit.

  A handful of nutrition and chocolate bars.

  Another glow stick.

  Flashlight and extra batteries.

  Compact paper map.

  A pack of…something. He held it up to read the content description: White surgical masks. Huh.

  When he was done, he slung the backpack onto his shoulders.

  “You okay to carry that?” Williams said.

  “I’m not the one growing a tennis ball out the back of my head,” he mumbled, collecting the glow stick he’d tossed onto the floor earlier before leading the way out the bullet and onto the raised platform track. “This is going to be a walk in the damned park.”