Storm gathered up the backpacks. The bloody oxygen tanks were as heavy as hell! He shouldered the bags and launched himself through the open door. The orange light reflected off the sheen of sweat on his arms, just as it did off of the white paint on the walls of the clinic. He dared not look up as he stumbled, half dragging the bags toward the car.
A droning noise was building to an incredible pitch. The sound was similar to one he had heard months ago. The whole region heard it. Some said it sounded like a stick run around the rim of a large bronze bell. Others said it was more like a Tibetan singing bowl of a colossal size. Now it was so very loud it must have been amplified by the firmament itself.
His legs were shaking by the time he reached the car. Martyn’s final words repeated in his head.
“Keep moving. Make haste to your sanctuary.”
The awful grinding ceased as suddenly as it began. He let the bags down gently to the ground, not wanting to break the vials he had collected, and fumbled with the keys. There was the rumble of another meteor passing over the town. He lifted the bags onto the back seat and closed the door.
Champ was missing.
The mutt must have slipped out when he arrived. He slammed the door shut and jabbed the key into the ignition, but he paused when he heard a wet slopping sound near his feet. He looked at the floor in front of the passenger seat, and there under the dash with its nose pressed against the firewall was Champ.
The dog rolled its eyes in fear, licking the saliva that ran from its jowls and gave a long, pitiful howl.
“Hey, mate. We are going to make it out of here, I promise.”
Storm knew he was speaking to himself as much as to Champ. He nodded his head to confirm as much.
Above the car, pink light seeped through the lurid cloud mass, tumbling, and twisting, like lengths of intestines strung over the town. The brightness had dimmed as if something huge was passing above the soup of moisture and compounds that made up the cloud cover. The light of the Sun was noticeably diminishing, as its electrical energy, its very lifeblood, was absorbed in ever-greater amounts by the approaching dark star.
Earth’s own electrical field was reacting in strange ways. Energy waves swept inwards and outwards rendering themselves visible in the sky above. The controllers acting on behalf of the elites struggled to keep the vast plasma screen in place.
If Storm had dared to look up at the cloud ceiling, he would have seen small waves that peeling away across the entire breadth of it. It was the same pattern repeating itself again and again. The pulsing sky increasingly resembled the underside of a living organism.
The Reclusive Orderly
The meteor shower had eased off and he no longer felt the apocalypse was upon him. The sky was back to a familiar steel gray, the flaming orange having moved on, but there remained a rippling right across the cloud base. The vast belly of a ginormous fish floated above the town. It was bearable if he did not gaze up for too long. That he did have a target on the ground to focus his attention on, made it easier to avoid raising his eyes to the damn awful sky.
Black smoke scudded across the town, driven by wind bursts until it resembled a mess of meteor trails. Most of the house fires had started in the bush after strikes by meteoroids and lightning. The wind carried the embers under the eaves of the older houses where the dry wood shouldered until it ignited. With no fire service and no neighbors to come running with buckets and hoses to put out the flames, it looked to Storm like the town was doomed to burn.
The flames did not appear to be lapping the better-heeled section of Coona. It gave him reason to be optimistic about finding a good set of wheels. In one of those richer streets there was a late model four-wheel drive with a full tank of gas waiting for him. His plan was to start with the outer ring road and work his way back toward Main Street.
He pulled up at the curb beside a cottage on a corner section. The place was well kept. He could see the lawn had been mowed only days before, and the gardens were well tended. At the end of a driveway stood a tidy garage with double doors that he guessed would be locked. The place looked promising.
Natural caution and simple politeness made him press the electric bell of the front door twice, but there was no chime to be heard. He waited a short while, but he heard no sound from inside. From where he stood on the front porch, he could see the garage had a small side window set in a side door.
He walked down the path and peered through the glass. The interior was too dark to see all that much but he could only just make out the shape of a vehicle. He decided it was the right size to be a four-wheeler and he would take it, that is, if he could find the car keys inside the house, and if it had gas in the tank. First, he was going to need to take a closer look.
Storm kicked the door several times before he dropped his shoulder and braced himself to take a run at it.
The voice in his ear was soft. “Are you after my car?”
He spun around to face a large stocky man in his twenties and dressed like he was on his way to the beach. The stranger stood barefoot in a T-shirt and board shorts. Yet it seemed to Storm the man did not look like someone who spent a lot of time outdoors. The short-cropped black hair, dark stubble, and purple rings under his eyes made the pale complexion even more so. He looked like a gamer.
“You wanting to steal my car?” The man asked again, gesturing at the garage. He didn’t look angry, so much as plain tired, and just a little surprised.
“I was hoping to find a spare can of petrol,” Storm lied. “I thought the house was empty.”
The pale figure eyed him up and down with a nervous intensity that put Storm on guard.
“None of the pumps in town work,” Storm added.
It wasn’t like an explanation was necessary, but he knew if you keep talking people relax, thinking you aren’t so smart after all. How the hell had the feller managed to sneak up on him, he wondered?
The man raised his chin to regard Storm with the kind of haughty look a school teacher might use on an errant student.
“Why do you want to leave the town? It’s just the same outside of Coona, isn’t it?”
“What is?”
“The tornadoes and meteors… I mean it’s going on everywhere, right?”
Storm decided it was best to play the fool.
“Ah, yeah. I guess.”
“You guess?” The man asked in surprise.
“Look, I’m sorry for barging onto your property. Okay? I’ll try another house.”
“I hid in the attic,” the man said. “They didn’t look up there. They probably thought old folk lived here. The hospital is only a block away.”
He spoke quickly as if he had little time to say all he needed.
“Smart thinking!” Storm replied.
He was sizing up the man, in the way he imagined a street fighter might size up an opponent. They were both about the same height. The man was a little taller though, and he had long arms. Perhaps he could make a dash for the car. Then again, he doubted he would cover the distance before he was tackled. He looked into the stranger’s face. Mate—your eyes, he thought. Was it fear or craziness he could see in them?
“Yeah, it was too,” the pale man said with a small smile of pride. “All things considered.”
He looked pleased with Storm’s compliment, and suddenly his dour expression brightened.
“Hey! You know what? There’s a gas burner in the house. I can fix us a coffee. Do you want one?”
“I better keep moving.”
“That car wouldn’t be much good. It’s been sitting in the garage for six months. The head blew on it and that means it will need a new engine. Almost two grand’s worth! That’s what the mechanic said.”
“Sorry to hear it. Well, I gotta go. Good luck.”
The man looked disappointed. He shifted about like he might be having problems coming to a decision, or perhaps he was looking for Storm’s Achilles heel.
“If you’re traveling far, you are going to ne
ed something dependable. Something that won’t break down. That has enough power to pull you out of the rough—if you go off the road.”
“Yeah,” Storm replied. “That’s just about what I’m looking to find.”
“Something a security patrol might not bother to stop. How about a service vehicle? Like a truck?”
“Yeah—that would be good—I guess,” Storm said.
He had forgotten about the possibility of encountering security patrols on the roads.
“I can get you something like that. If you can take me a little past the hospital, I’ll show you.”
Storm hesitated before answering. Then he thought, to hell with it.
“What if you pull a knife on me—then leave me on the side of the road?”
“If I was going to ambush you, I would have done it when you had your back to me,” the man told him with a solemn expression.
It was difficult to argue with the logic of the man’s argument. Storm stuck out his hand and introduced himself.
The man stared at Storm’s hand with surprise, before he grasped it with both of his.
“I’m Darren Calder. I gotta tell you, I’m really pleased you turned up.”
It was a two-story brick block not far from the hospital buildings. Storm parked on the concrete drive beside a flagless pole. He shut the car door quietly and glanced up and down the street for a sign of movement. The building resembled a small fortress. It was all function and little charm. The building took up the corner of an intersection. It was far too much open space for Storm’s liking, and without a single tree to hide the car.
They stood in front of two large commercial sized garage doors, each wide enough for a small truck. Both were locked.
Storm turned around to say as much to Darren, but his passenger had vanished.
“Shit, this is not good!” Storm muttered under his breath.
It would be around noon and he should have been back on the road. He heard the clink of keys and the garage door flipped up with a bang.
“What the fuck!” Storm leaped back. “You scared the bejeezus out of me!”
Darren had a proud grin on his face. In his outstretched hand dangled a large ring of keys.
“It does help to know where these are kept. So what do you think? Will it do?”
With the red lettering, iridescent yellow strip above the grill, and the checkered stripe along the sides, the white wagon was instantly recognizable and totally unexpected.
“An ambulance?”
“A Volkswagen T5 Transporter!” Darren exclaimed and slapped the hood, grinning at Storm’s reaction.
“Do you think it will do the job? We could try for something more comfortable. But, I guarantee it’s been well-serviced and has a full tank.”
“It’ll do,” Storm told him.
The ambulance was pretty damn good in fact, but he didn’t want to give Darren the idea he was owed anything.
“Good,” Darren replied. “Because I can’t have slept more than three hours since they cleared the town. You drive the first half, and then I’ll take over. Where are we going?”
“There’s two of them,” Storm said, pointing to the second ambulance. “You take one and I take the other.”
“I’m really tired!” Darren complained.
“Haven’t you got somewhere you have to go?” Storm asked.
“No, mate. I could stay here in Coona or I could go with you.”
“Well—” Storm began.
“Oh—I get it. You don’t trust me, do you?”
“It’s not so much that I don’t trust you,” Storm exclaimed. “I don’t even know you!”
“There’s a group of you, isn’t there? You don’t want to risk bringing some whack job back with you and putting everyone’s life in danger,” Darren said, nodding his head vigorously. “I get it.”
“Yeah—well,” Storm took a step backward.
He didn’t want any conflict, even if it meant looking for another vehicle. He knew he didn’t have time to do that.
“That’s how it is. Sorry mate, I can’t take you with me.”
Storm was unsure what was going to happen next and suddenly he felt very still inside. He was not going to leave without the ambulance.
Darren’s response took a long time coming. He appeared to be in pain. He shifted his weight from one foot to the other, staring beyond the open garage door. Finally, he turned his dark-ringed eyes back to Storm.
“I wouldn’t bring someone I had just met into my group either. Not in this kind of situation. No way. I would only trust familiar faces.”
He gave a heavy sigh.
“Look, I work at the hospital—I did work at the hospital. I was an orderly. Wheeling people around in their beds most of the time. It wasn’t one of those skilled jobs. I’m not like a nurse or a paramedic.”
He cleared his throat.
“But I know a lot of useful stuff—I’m someone you could do having by your side. Honest!”
Storm stared at Darren’s pale face. He had been wrong about Davenport.
“I suppose—well—okay. But—if you turn out to be trouble, you’re on your own.”
Darren grabbed Storm’s hand and shook it vigorously all over again.
“Thanks! I mean it! I won’t be trouble.”
Storm knew it was better to have help than to go it alone. The two of them needed each other. That was true. Just the same, he was going to watch Darren, and let him prove himself one way or the other.
Bird Clouds
They were approaching the Pilliga forest and close to the turnoff, thankful not to have encountered roadblocks along the way. The two had even begun to relax. In the distance, they could see a shifting black mass above the tops of trees.
“Birds,” Storm said. “A lot of them!”
“What do you think they are?”
“All sorts,” Storm replied. “Looks like they’ve had a fright.”
They watched the spiral of black specks wheel and spin. The edges of the moving mass spread and pulled back. The two watched as the flock began to disperse like a vast quantity of oil across the surface of the sea, breaking up to dissipate over the plains.
“So what happened in the town?” Storm asked. “Where did all the people go?”
Darren turned to Storm with a look of surprise. “I thought you knew. Weren’t you watching?”
Storm watched the last of the birds merge into the gray.
“I only got into town around noon and the place was already deserted,” he said.
“It was the Army!” Darren said nodding to emphasize he had seen as much with his own eyes. “They banged on doors and herded everyone into the streets. They would have taken everyone to that camp on the other side of Pilliga forest.”
“The one they say is outside Gwabegar village?”
“Yeah, Gwabegar.”
“Did you see how many buses it took to empty the town?”
“None. They were all put on a train.”
“No way! So that was the reason they’ve been repairing the old train lines? And they told us they were planning to re-open the railway to bring through tourists,” Storm said.
He remembered all the excited chatter in the local paper over how a train service would rejuvenate the entire region.
“Yeah, that was a bullshit story,” Darren said.
“Bloody liars!” Storm exclaimed.
“They woke me at two in the morning with this long blast on the horn,” Darren said with obvious enthusiasm.
Darren was encouraged by Storm’s reaction to his story and continued with enthusiasm.
“The troops were everywhere with spotlights and megaphones. They began emptying houses straight away. So where did you say you were hiding?”
“In Marsfield.”
“I bet they’ve been through all those villages by now,” Darren said.
Storm didn’t reply. The thought had occurred to him that everyone at Marsfield was rounded up after he left for Coona.
That would mean no one would be waiting for them at the rendezvous point.
“There must have been foreigners with the soldiers,” Darren told him.
“Oh, yeah?”
“I heard Kiwi voices, and Brits, Yanks, and maybe Canucks. They were civil to everyone—for the most part. Almost friendly, you know? But if anyone messed about—shit—they really went off. The train came back at daybreak. I should think they returned to pick up the stragglers. I could see it coming up the tracks through the ventilation shutters of the attic. Dude, it was one bloody long train! Like those super long ore carrying trains they have on the coast. The ones that carry coal from the mines. Only it was pulling carriages and not coal buckets.”
“They came back?” Storm exhaled.
He missed the last train as well as the patrols on the road. He had been lucky.
“Are you sure they took them to the camp?”
“What else is up this way? And it didn’t take them that long to unload and get back to the town. So they didn’t go far.”
“The camp must be freaking huge!” Storm exclaimed. “I heard you never get out of those places once they have you inside.”
“Bet they put out those stories themselves,” Darren said. “Now they have them right across the country. They want us to be afraid, you know? That way, we all give up our rights without a fight and do as we’re told.”
Storm fell quiet. Darren was definitely an oddball. He was clever though. And it actually helped a little that he hardly ever shut up. Damn, if Darren’s comment hadn’t served to sharpen his frustration though; keeping him right there in the moment—right where he had to be.
Jubilee Year: A Science Fiction Thriller (Erelong Book 1) Page 21
