Fools' Apocalypse

by Anderson Atlas

  Ben continues down the stairs, lighter on his feet, successfully compartmentalizing his emotions.

  Outside, the air is sweltering. Frickin’ Hades out here. Rain clouds swarm overhead and smoke adds to the gloom, staining the sky a putrid yellow. Cars and bodies litter the streets and sidewalks. Trash and debris are everywhere like the aftermath of a big outdoor concert—except everyone is sleeping it off for good.

  After looking around Ben decides to go somewhere familiar. He walks up town a handful of blocks to Francisco’s Big Bellies, his favorite breakfast burrito place, hoping to find some leftovers. He rounds the corner and sees Francisco’s front windows. Big brightly painted letters advertise the Big Red Chick Pig Burro. He likes that one; can’t say its name after a bong hit or two but it’s mad of eggs, a red sauce that makes his nipples hard and huge chunks of sausage. The front door opens easily, chiming the bell. Rick ain’t here, neither is cute Juanita. Maybe she survived. She was my girl, or at least should have been.

  Ben feels a little crazy, detached. He’s so fuzzy in the head he can’t think straight. But that’s how he’s moved through life since high school.

  Chairs are knocked over. Half-filled cups of coffee sit on the tables along with half-eaten burritos and empanadas. Ben moves around the counter. The muffins behind the glass still look good. He grabs one, crams it down his throat, and sticks one in his pocket for later.

  “You guys take an IOU?!” Ben yells with a mouth full. He finds a cooler in the back with precooked food. The power has only been out for, what, two days max? There are no eggs, but he finds a tub of potatoes and a package of precooked bacon and wraps them up in Francisco’s famous huge tortillas. He returns to his favorite seat at the far end of the counter, dirty counter. Franciso always kept a clean place. Ben clears the counter with a wide swipe of his arm. “There you go, buddy, where ever you ended up.”

  The cold breakfast burrito feels heavy, dry. His head sways for a minute, so he just stares. This will be the last time he eats here.

  When the feeling passes, he holds the burrito into the air, “Frankie should have gotten a red syringe!” He shouts and bites into the burrito. So good.

  After breakfast he suddenly get a rush of energy and decides to look around. He feels like a kid.

  An old man, dead as roadkill, lays half on the sidewalk, half on the road at the corner of Morningside Avenue, gripping his cane like it was made of gold. Ben pulls it from his fingers and walks around swinging it over his head and twirling it on his finger. He runs up to a car and smashes the cane into the window. The glass shatters and the cane cracks. The pain resonates through his bones like a tuning fork. He throws it aside and turns toward Central Park.

  A growing cloud of smoke obscures his view, but he’s been all over this city and can navigate it with his eyes closed.

  Ben wishes he had a real gun. A really big fuckin’ gun. As he turns the corner and his desire is realized. There’s a sandbag wall sheltering a military Humvee.

  Of course the Humvee doesn’t start. So Ben checks the dead soldiers for weapons. They have been stripped already, but he doesn’t give up. These guys always have backups. With his awesome good luck, he finds a small revolver in the boot of one of the dead soldiers. It’s loaded, but he can’t find any extra ammunition. Well, he has six shots.

  Ben moves to the park. He wants to use one of the bullets badly but decides to wait until he gets to the park. Maybe he’ll try shooting a duck or something.

  Central Park is just up ahead. The corpse piles seem to multiply. During their last moments they started hanging on each other. Some are heaped, others are merely holding hands, like brothers in death.

  It makes his chest tighten, so he looks away. He goes to the lake looking for a duck. There aren’t any or any other kind of bird for that matter. Live ones anyway. There are some dead ones along the waterfront.

  The park is creepy without anyone around. It’s like he’s in the eye of a hurricane. Dark clouds thicken, creating nice nooks and crannies for shadows to grow.

  Ben goes back to the street and takes aim at a traffic light. He steadies himself and slowly squeezes off a round. Boom! The traffic light bursts into shards. It feels good, but it doesn’t get rid of the dark feeling growing inside him. The feeling is kinda like when he takes too big a hit off his bong and can’t breathe. He’s just gotta ignore it, but it’s in his veins thumping and swimming through his body like death trying to crash the party. He takes a drink of whisky.

  “Hey!” yells some guy from across the road. He hurries toward Ben, his jet-black curly hair flying back. He has a black beard and, as he gets closer, jet-blue eyes. He’s got a huge hiking backpack on with water bottles clipped to the shoulder straps, and a pistol in one hand.

  “Have you seen the military?” he asks. “Anyone, for that matter?”

  Guy looks like a regular enough dude. Ben could take him in a fight if he had to. “Nah. No one left but dead bodies.” After Ben says the words, he wants to barf. The feeling passes. “Where you headed? Looks like you’re gonna hike a mountain.” Ben tries to sound as pleasant as he can. Little does this guy know, he’s the killer, the mass murderer, the blade of the sickle.

  “I’m getting out of the city. Everyone’s dead. The fires are getting worse and I think I heard a building collapse.” He looks Ben up and down as if he’s trying to decide if he’s real. “It smells bad and only getting thicker.”

  “Yeah, no shit.” Ben looks around. “I guess I’m gonna do the same.” He actually feels better now that he’s not alone, which is weird.

  “My name’s Ian.”

  “What’s up? I’m Ben.”

  Chapter 1.10

  Tanis

  Escape into Hell

  Tanis is locked in a pitch black vent and has been for hours. He yells for his dad and screams for ma. He cusses every word he’s not allowed to say and kicks and screams some more.

  After blacking out for a long time he wakes, hoping he’s been dreaming. It’s so hard to breathe. There are so many other places better than this place. Like the time when he was forced to go to the opera with his class and his mother tagged along. That would be better than this. Or that time he was forced to ride a stinky horse. Or when he had to put on a tie and go to church. Hell, he’d rather be in jail, pinned underneath a Sumo wrestler, or on the sinking Titanic!

  The walls get tighter. Tanis feels like some creature is crushing his rib cage. He needs to expand! To stretch out!

  He passes out again.

  When Tanis wakes, he checks his cell phone, still dead and so is the tablet. He’s not as panicky so he finishes the water he has and, luckily, there’s a candy bar in the front pouch. It’s melted, but good.

  Time seems frozen and he has no idea what to do.

  There’s a noise. “Heeeeelp meeeee!” he yells.

  Someone bangs on the wall. Tanis screams as loud as he can. Light breaks into the vent. It’s so bright. Someone’s hacking into it with an axe. They widen a crack in the ceiling, right above his head. Dust from the broken drywall filters through, making him choke and cough. A voice on the other side speaks up. “Do you have anything to help me pry this vent open?”

  Tanis takes out his pocketknife. The blade won’t cut the metal but there’s a can opener that seems to work. “Yeah! I’m cutting now!” He slowly works open the metal, carefully folding open a section and squeezes out. A wave of relief floods his lungs.

  The wall has been hacked to pieces. Tanis steps over the mess and into someone’s office. Dust covers him like powdered-sugar. He wants to hug whoever saved him, but they’re gone. The axe leans against the wall next to a box with a red label. The label reads:

  To the brave soldier that stood on the front line. Stab this into your arm. Otherwise, you die.

  ~ Zilla

  Inside the box is a red syringe. Tanis hates shots, almost as much as cramped vents. He looks at the vent. Nah, I hate that vent more than anything—including shots, clowns, or
that bimbo jockin’ my dad. He drops the needle into his arm and presses the plunger. Heat travels through his shoulder and into his neck. He puts his head in between his knees and fights a wave of the pukes until it goes away.

  The entire floor is quiet. He runs to his dad’s office. The door is still locked. Tanis checks the cubicles. No one is around. A hand is pressed to the inside of a frosted window at the end of the cubicles. Tanis takes the axe to the door. He tries to peer into the room, but the frosted glass blurs everything.

  The hand twitches.

  “Stand back!” He yells and hacks at the doorknob until it flies off. The door doesn’t open all the way. A dead, bloated woman blocks it. Tanis is hit with a putrid smell. He covers his nose and mouth with his shirt trying to block it out but can’t. It’s too strong.

  Everyone inside are dead, his dad is at the far end of the pile, lying on some strange lady. His eyes and nose are covered by thick, dark-brown, gooey stuff and his mouth is wide open. Tanis takes a step back as tremors roll inside. No, Dad.

  He runs away as fast as he can, clutching the axe to his chest. Down the stairs, leaping two steps at a time until he gets to the lobby. The big glass doors are locked, so he swings the axe. The glass shatters but doesn’t fall. It hangs on the doorframe in wicked spider-cracks. Tanis hacks and hacks until his arms ache and there’s a wide enough gap.

  He carefully squeezes through the hole in the glass and steps outside, stumbling to the sidewalk, weak and tired. Cars pack the street, but the drivers have ditched them or are dead at the wheel. Bodies are everywhere. Everyone is fucking dead!

  A horse comes from an alley. Tanis leaps out of the way but it follows him. It’s a police horse, and it’s sick. One eye is filled with so much puss it looks like a baseball landed in its skull. Tanis manages to jump away just as the thing head-butts the building. It falls to its knees making seriously strange sounds.

  Tanis runs so hard tears fly behind. Some guy on the sidewalk spits up phlegm and chokes on it. Tanis can’t help him; he can’t help anyone. He needs his ma.

  The smell of smoke and ash chokes the street. Tanis runs to a pay phone, but it doesn’t work. He turns around and around. Home. Which way to my home?

  He starts walking north.

  This isn’t real. Is it? His stomach pinches like knives are in his guts are making sushi. Bile bubbles up in the back of his throat. He’s starving, but can’t imagine eating. Among dead and bloated corpses, the last thing he thought he’d be looking for is a cheeseburger, but he can’t help it.

  First, find something to eat, and then go home. He passes a digital camera store, then a hotel. Finally, there’ a small market. The security shutters are down. Through the slats he can see the food, but also the owner, lying in the middle of an aisle, dead. Tanis takes out his Swiss Army knife and tries to pick the lock with the blade, but it won’t work. He needs something thin. A lady down the way, laying face first on the pavement has her hair in a bun. Tanis runs to her and finds a bobby pin.

  An hour later, the lock turns. He wasn’t too shocked. His father gave him a lock pick set for Christmas a few years ago and taught him how to use it. It was fun. He never thought he’d actually need the skill.

  Inside, the shelves are loaded. He grabs soup, beans, and all the chocolate and gum that will fit in his bag. He leaves with his mouth full of little powdered donuts.

  The owner is an old guy. He has a white apron and a photo in his hand. It’s a pretty girl at a barbeque. Tanis runs out of the store as fast as he can, wanting to scream some more, to hit something. The sugar is stuck in his throat.

  Tanis stands in the middle of the cluster-fucked street and cries like a baby. He sobs hard, so hard it hurts his entire body. Gotta get home. Everything he knows is there so he starts walking.

  Before long, he sees the sign for the Queensboro Bridge.

  The closer the bridge gets, the worse his body feels; stomach pain twists his guts, and his head thumps. After jumping a small iron gate that surrounds a restaurant patio he sits at a table. The black metal chairs and matching tables are covered in an ash-like dust. They look hundreds of years old. He chugs some water. The wind picks up, brushing away the sweltering heat, but the gross odor in the wind gets worse. He’s ready to see another person alive, ready to be home.

  A deep explosion goes off somewhere toward Central Park followed by a bunch of pops. Someone is alive over there. He’d go looking for them except he doesn’t want to mess with anyone packing a machine gun. Tanis decides to get going. Call it instinct, but he moves faster and closer to the buildings, trying to stay out of sight as best he can. He wishes he had his rifle. It’s a twenty-two caliber hunting rifle with a serious scope and an insulated barrel for quiet recoil. He’s a good shot, having been to the gun range with his dad many times.

  Tanis turns the corner at 2nd Street. There’s a massive buildup of cars on the on-ramp. It would be impossible to navigate the mess, unless he had a monster truck.

  He jumps on a red Jeep then hops onto the hood of some old, crappy car, hopscotching to the straightaway. Most of the cars are deserted, but a few still have people buckled inside. They’re all stiff and dead like crash test dummies. Some look like they’re just sleeping. He hops on a beat-up yellow cab and then to the bed of a blue truck.

  An overturned cop car sits upside down on top other cars. The cop car is smashed. It probably tumbled from the upper ramp. Maybe there’s a weapon inside, at least a night stick. Tanis works his way around it then stops.

  The doors are folded inward slightly, but the bent up hood of the Lincoln it’s laying on hood is preventing the passenger side from opening. He wrestles to bend it out of the way. Doesn’t budge. There are probably no guns inside anyway.

  “Hey, you! Help me!”

  Someone’s inside the car. A cop! He pulls on the hood as hard as he can.

  “I got you!” He feels a rush of power in his arms.

  Finally, the black hood gives way and he bends it as far down as it will go. With the car door unblocked, he grabs its handle and tries to wrench the door open. It’s stuck.

  “Oh my god,” a lady cop yells. “Get me out, You’ve got to help me.” She kicks the door like a rabid dog. She’d have chewed her arm off if that would have freed her.

  “Can you, like, kick at the same time I pull?” Tanis asks.

  “Grab the edge that is closest to the handle,” she says. “I’ll count to three.”

  They simultaneously kick and pull. The door makes a loud creaking sound and finally opens. He reaches in and helps her out. She has barely enough room to slip by the twisted metal. Not quite enough room, actually. Her shirt rips on a jagged metal piece and cuts into her side. She takes it like a man. She’s a cop after all.

  Tanis gives her some water. “I’m Tanis.”

  “I’m Officer. . . scratch that, just call me Hana.” She’s in bad shape and looks how he feels.

  “You been in there for a while?” She’s pretty for a cop. Dirty blond hair, nice lips, green eyes, and thin. She’s wearing a white tank top and dark blue slacks.

  Hana attempts to stop her side from bleeding by balling up her blue shirt and pressing it on the wound. “I’ve been trapped for days.”

  Tanis gives her some beef jerky.

  “Thank you.” She devours the salty meat.

  “I was trapped, too. In a building. I have no idea how long I was in there. I don’t even know what happened,” He says, intentionally leaving out the fact that he helped Zilla bring down the satellites. He’s only fifteen, but smart enough to see that he was stupid for trusting Zilla. He’d uploaded a computer virus that did way more than steal a bunch of emails. Tanis never even questioned Zilla’s intentions, he just let him in his dad’s computer on a whim. Stupid! Now the city has been wiped out and everyone murdered. Someone will be after Tanis. His part will be obvious to anyone following the trail of the virus. He has to be careful what he says. In fact, he’ll never speak of it again.

  �
��I was locked in my dad’s office. Don’t know how the door got opened.” Tanis’s head hangs.

  Hana tries to smile. “We’re lucky.” She drinks more water then looks around. “No one could hear me yelling, or they just ignored me. I heard huge explosions. They rocked the car, getting my door more jammed up. Then everything went quiet.”

  Tanis tries not to watch her adjust her sports bra and reaffix her thick, black belt to her waist. She’s nice lookin’, that’s for sure. She’s maybe a bit younger than his ma, but not by much. Hana checks her pistol, pulls the hammer back, then clips the holster strap over the cocked hammer.

  Hana runs to a woman that’s lying in between the cars. “Hey!” she yells.

  Tanis follows her. Hana rolls the woman over. “Whoa!” The woman is still wearing a hospital mask, but her eyes are bloodshot, and her jaw is covered in mucus. Her skin looks white and leathery, and the veins are swollen. The woman is dead, very dead.

  “What happened?” Hana asks. “It wasn’t supposed to be like this.”

  “I don’t know. But the whole city is dead.” Tanis looks away, choking down his emotion. “I walked through a million bodies.”

  “Whatever made people sick ended up killing them. The CDC said it was a non-lethal bacteria.” Hana mumbles to herself. She looks up. “But it was much more than that. I saw rocket launch. I think it was an EMP attack that killed all the cars and the electronics. This was a seriously well-planned attack.”

  “Yeah, totally fucked everyone.” Tanis mumbles, feeling shame in every nerve and twist of his guts. If he hadn’t done his part, none of this would have happened. The military would have been able to organize a better response if they still had satellites.