“We’re gonna die,” Cindy suddenly mumbled.
I didn’t even respond, my eyes were glued to the scene unfolding outside. We’d finally entered the downtown area and it was like driving into hell.
Cars were ablaze on both sides of the road. Some of the buildings were falling apart, the concrete shedding like skin to show the iron framing underneath. Others had been broken into, looted and set on fire. The earthquake had been there, but it looked like the residents had done worse damage.
“Go back!” Jake said. “Back up!”
“We can’t,” I replied grimly. “There’s nowhere to turn around.”
People were everywhere, throwing rocks and flaming glass bottles at anything within range. Mobs of them cluttered the streets, fighting amongst each other like packs of wolves.
“Oh, my God, Max!” Cindy screeched. “They’re killing him, they’re fucking killing him.”
I stared out of the right side of the car. There was a man on the ground and a group surrounding him. They were armed with bats and pipes and were beating the man like he was a piñata.
“We can't help him, we have to go,” I replied.
"No… This is just wrong," Cindy groaned. "We have to do something."
"If we stop this car, we are going to die with him.”
As I looked back to the front, a group started to form ahead at the next intersection. Another group was closing in from behind us and I felt my last bit of hope fade away. We were about to be trapped.
A flaming hummer had crashed into the coffee shop across the street and several troops and police officers lay dead near the wreckage. They’d been nearly stripped naked, the mob leaving only their helmets and shirts behind.
Everything was moving in slow motion and I felt a stab in my chest, fearing that shortly we would share the same fate as those men. It was like I was watching a movie, I couldn’t make sense of what was going on and my mind was trying to detach me from it all.
“Watch out!” Brent suddenly shouted.
From the right a man jutted out of the shadows and swung a metal pipe at the car, taking off the side view mirror. I swerved and mashed my foot on the gas as my heart skipped a beat and my bladder tried to empty itself.
“Get us the hell out of here!” Jake screamed.
“I’m trying!” I shouted back.
People were darting out from everywhere. Some were fighting amongst themselves others were hell bent on getting inside of our car. My survival instinct took over and anyone unlucky enough to be in our path became pins in front of a raging, bowling ball.
Thuds and wet smacks sounded against the windshield, but I didn’t slow. The crash of rocks and other projectiles hit the hood. Some glancing blows, some direct impacts that shattered the glass, but fuck it, I was unstoppable.
Maybe I’d lost my mind. Maybe all of the stress had caused me to completely snap or the adrenaline from fight or flight turned me insane. Whatever the cause was, I drove that little SUV like a damn A1 Abrams tank.
“Bring it, you fuckers!” I yelled out in an uncharacteristic voice.
I hopped the curb and turned down another street. The growing mob continued to follow, but I saw light up ahead. More thuds, more bodies bouncing off the impenetrable armor. Cindy was yelling and Jake may have been crying, but I couldn’t hear them. I was a mother fucking wrecking ball.
“Faster!” Brent screamed. “Get us out of here!”
Swerving, I straightened the wheel then stomped the accelerator through the floor. I could feel the truck groan as it sucked up the last bit of gas and I hoped the engine still had some fight left in it. I was pushing it to the limit, but cars didn’t run on hope. Our flight from the city might be short-lived.
“Turn, turn!” Brent yelped.
The road up ahead was blocked by another gang of looters. I whipped the wheel hard to the left and bashed into a flaming parked car. Glass shattered into the cabin as the flames flickered right outside.
“Dude, watch out!” Brent annoyingly continued.
“Shut the fuck up!” I roared. “The last thing I need right now is a backseat driver.”
I slung the Ford back onto the road and sped up, causing the engine to shutter like a hypothermic infant. It made a loud clunk then rattled violently. The steering tightened and we began to powerlessly drift down the road.
“Oh shit!” I grumbled.
Straining, I turned the wheel and we veered into an alley. The SUV careened into the wall, the metal scraped along the side with an ear-piercing shriek. We bounced back onto the road then coasted for another twenty yards before coming to a complete stop.
“Did they see us?” Brent asked.
“Let’s hope not,” I replied and switched the key to off.
The sun had gone down and the fires provided the only light now. If we were lucky, we’d lost them when we pulled into the alley. The dark was our only chance of making it out of the city alive.
“I’m scared,” Cindy whispered.
I reached out and grabbed her hand. I cupped it in mine and gave her a reassuring smile. “We’ll be okay. We just have to stick together.”
Cindy tried to smile back, but it was painful. Instead she closed her eyes and tried to wish her way out of the city. We sat there for half an hour in the dark. No one made a sound except Jake’s heavy, mouth breathing.
In the distance, we could hear the city tearing itself apart. The crackle of gunfire echoed in sporadic bursts. Every thundering, snap sent chills down my spine. The loud hoots and yells of the mob made the hair on my arms stand on end, if the looters didn’t kill me, my nerves would.
The earthquakes, the destruction had torn the world apart, turned this city mad. I didn’t think it was possible, but in a few days civilization had destabilized to the point where barbarians loomed in every corner. What had made the world so insane? Why were humans so eager to run head first into their own savage death?
As I sat there in the dark I contemplated my own existence. I’d spent so much time trying to figure out how to save humanity that I hadn’t thought about saving myself. I knew this was all going to happen, yet I was no more prepared than anyone else. Now hope was my best plan to survive the night.
“I think they’re gone,” I finally said in a low whisper.
I clicked the dome lights off and slowly opened my door. Swallowing, I stepped out of the car and felt my body soak into the darkness. I felt fear crawl up my back and the weight of every decision I made.
“What do you see?” Jake asked.
“I’m gonna check the road,” I replied. “Stay here.”
In front of us was a dead end, a wall where the parallel buildings met. To the other side the alley opened onto the narrow street we’d come down earlier. It was dark and smoke filled the air, but that was good for us.
One foot after the other, I moved through the narrow alley. No matter how slow I went the crunch of broken glass and gravel sounded like amplified symbols and a high school marching band. It took a lifetime to reach the wall at the end.
With a deep breath, I leaned my head out and looked from side to side. I strained my eyes, peering through the dense smoke, scanning for any type of movement. But there was nothing and after a few minutes I was convinced we could at least make it to the next street over without being detected.
“Grab the bags and let’s get moving,” I told them as I made it back to the car.
“Moving to where?” Jake asked.
“We have to find another car. We can’t stay in here for the rest of our lives.”
Groaning Jake started to gather his things. Cindy shot me a look, but stepped out of the car and tightened the straps on her bag. Brent followed her and after five long minutes Jake was finally ready to go.
“This way,” I called.
We stepped into the street and headed up toward the next block. I could hear the rioters in the distance and what sounded like a police intercom. I smiled, the thought that some level of order still exist
ed was comforting.
It was cool outside, but the stress and the muggy smoked-filled air had me sweating. My nerves were fried and every little sound nearly gave me a heart attack. The brick walls in the alley acted like a megaphone, amplifying even the smallest of noises, screaming to anyone that would listen that we were making our getaway.
Stopping at the end of the building, I looked across the intersection and swallowed. There was another suite of buildings across the street and buildings meant cover from prying eyes. But to get there we had to cross a four lane road.
“We’ve gotta make it to that next set of stores,” I said to no one in particular. “We can probably find some place to hide for the night.”
“Dude, I’m not going out there,” Jake retorted. “It’s too open. You saw what they did to that guy.”
“We can’t just stay here. If someone comes from behind us we have nowhere to go.”
“Let’s just go back to the car. We were safe there.”
“And what then?” I asked him. “The car doesn’t work and we have to get to Wyoming…soon. The car isn’t safe either.”
“I’m with Max,” Brent added. “I’m not staying over here.”
Cindy grabbed my hand and squeezed. Her fingers were sweaty and I could see in her eyes that she’d rather be any other place, but she was as ready as she’d ever be.
“I’m going,” I said and took off.
I pulled Cindy along and ran as fast as I could. She easily kept stride with me as we zipped through the smoke that floated in the air. I didn’t look back for Brent or Jake until we’d made it into the next alley.
Slamming into the wall, I turned back and stared across the street. Brent was speeding toward us and Jake was a few steps behind. Every couple of paces Jake would look back like he was trying to get caught.
“Hurry the hell up!” I growled through clenched teeth.
Gasping for air, they made it into the alley just as a small group of men appeared from around the corner. It was hard to see them through the smoke, but I counted at least five. They held bats and metal pipes in their hands and I didn’t think they needed them for their own protection.
“Quiet,” I said and looked back to Jake who was heaving like a bear that’d lost a lung.
The men were close. They’d stopped only a few yards away and started talking with wild animated gestures.
“I’m…. hungry…fucking…sideways…plans,” the men shouted in fragmented sentences, broken up by all of the background noise.
They all started to laugh and shove each other before casting a glance back toward the alley. One of them pointed in our direction then said something that I couldn’t make out. Another one glared back at us and took a step in our direction.
With trembling legs, I squatted and Cindy did the same. We were just out of sight at the corner of the wall. It was dark and smoky enough that I didn’t think they could see us, but the ground was cluttered with trash and one wrong move would send them our way.
They started laughing again then turned around and began to head further up the street. Through the crawling fog, I could see them swinging the bats at the air like they were practicing for someone’s head. Whoever they came across that night was probably not gonna make it home.
Out of nowhere, Brent suddenly coughed and I snapped my head around. He shoved his hand over his mouth, but it did nothing and he let out another muffled bark.
The men stopped and turned back toward us. “Hear something?” one of them asked.
With blank faces the others looked back silently and watched. Their eyes scanned the area for a minute, but they quickly became disinterested.
“Let’s go,” another voice said and the men started to turn back around.
Brent started to cough again and Jake grabbed him and smothered his hands over his face. Brent’s eyes bulged as he tried his best to hold it in. He turned red and lurched forward over and over, straining to keep quiet.
Jake squeezed harder, but Brent started to squirm and fight against him. He pushed away then turned toward the building. Doubling over, he made an inhuman sound and puked out a mixture of blood and water all over the cement. He tried to say something, but started coughing so violently he fell to the ground.
“Who the hell is that?” one of the men snarled.
I looked back and Jake gave me a helpless glance. Brent was on his hands and knees. Blood and spit dripped from his mouth and pooled onto the concrete. Every few seconds he’d gag and go into another coughing fit that only seemed to get louder.
“Get him up now,” I said to Jake as I rushed to help him. “We’ve gotta get the hell out of here.”
Holding Brent in between us, we had no choice, but to try and run. Once again, I was leaning on hope that down the alley there was a way out. But I knew sooner or later our luck was going to come to an end.
Cindy took off and we followed behind her. She sprinted down the alley like she was back in college, quickly leaving us in her dust. Brent wasn’t helping as he coughed and puked along the way.
“Down there,” I heard one of the men say as the thud of footsteps sounded behind us.
We followed Cindy down another, alley and sped up. It was narrow and we barreled through trash cans and empty boxes like a snow plow. Poor Brent was like a battering ram, but we didn’t have the luxury of being gentle.
Suddenly, ahead of us a door swung open and a middle-aged man stepped out holding a meat cleaver. He was wearing jeans and a filthy, white t-shirt that accentuated his beer gut. His ruffled, brown hair was intermixed with strands of white and his eyes were wide with shock.
Cindy fell back, sliding onto her hands to stop. We nearly dropped Brent as we skid and almost crashed into her.
“Get back!” I shouted, the only defense that I could muster against his gleaming blade.
The man narrowed his eyes and glowered at me then looked down at his knife hand and gasped. “This…this isn’t for you. Come quick inside. You don’t want to know what they’ll do to you if they catch you.”
I turned toward the alley. The men hadn’t made it around the last corner yet, but I was sure they were on the way. I looked back at the man and considered how much of a threat he could really be. He was armed, but there was one of him and three of us that were still ambulatory. We had better odds against him, even if they were slight.
“Hurry up!” he urged.
With my free hand, I grabbed Cindy’s arm and pulled her to her feet. “Stay close,” I whispered.
I shot a quick glance at Jake and he looked back down the alley then nodded. Swallowing, I stepped forward and followed the man into the building. He slammed the door behind us and we were immediately cast into darkness. I shivered from the cold and wrinkled my nose at the smell of gas that seemed to fill the nebulous room.
“What is that?” Jake asked.
There was a thud and something clunked in the shadows. The smell grew stronger and a throaty growl rumbled up ahead of me. It sounded like a lawnmower or some kind of motor bike.
“What the hell is going on?” Jake pleaded.
There was no response, just a louder whine from the motor. I could feel it getting closer, feel things moving in the dark all around me, like a storm brewing just out of sight.
“Hey! Where did you go?” Jake continued. “Max…Max what is that damn noise?”
I finally recognized the sound, but I didn’t answer. We’d made the wrong choice. We’d left the smoke-filled alley and the unknown assailants behind and entered a dark room with a crazy butcher wielding a fucking chainsaw.
CHAPTER 14
WE’RE ALL JUST WAITING FOR THE END
I tightened my grip on Cindy's hand and pulled her closer to me. She buried her face into my chest and groaned in fear, flinching as the grumbling grew closer.
Brent collapsed to the floor as he slipped from my grasp. His body made a muffled clump that vanished in the dark.
“What the hell is that?” Jake shouted. “Sir
…sir where did you go? What’s going on in here?”
Something slammed behind us and I whipped my head around. The droning sound suddenly stopped and an overhead light shot blinding rays into my eyes.
“Argh!” I growled and squinted.
My eyes watered and burned and my hand did nothing to shield them from the light. Wincing, I slowly opened them, blinking the tears away. The small room gradually came into view and I could see the man standing in front of us.
“Sorry,” he started. “The generator pulls the power from the lights momentarily. I need it to run the lock. Come with me.”
He headed off further into the building. I looked at Jake and nodded my head to follow him. Bending down, I grabbed Brent’s arm and we dragged him along.
“In here, in here,” the man called back to us.
We followed him into a smaller room with a round, wooden table in the center. There was a dim light hanging from the ceiling that cast an orange glow against the cream painted, brick walls. The gas smell wasn’t so strong in there, but the scent of standing water and old wood had taken its place.
“Our friend needs help,” I said softly.
“Please have a seat,” the man replied and started to pull chairs out. “Sandra…Sandra. We need you out here.”
There was some rustling in the back then a thin, redheaded lady stepped around the corner and gave us all a discerning look. With her head cocked to the side, she clicked her teeth then let out a heavy sigh.
“Carl, you can’t…you can’t keep doing this,” she groaned. “You’re going to get us all killed. You know it’s not safe out there.”
“Just help the man damn it,” Carl replied.
Skeptically, the woman stepped toward us and gave Brent a look. “What happened to him?” she asked.
“Not sure,” I replied. “Had a bad cough then threw up blood and pretty much passed out.”
The woman looked over him briefly then touched his forehead with the back of her hand. She raised her eyebrows then leaned toward me. “Leave now,” she mumbled lowly.
“What?” I asked, uncertain if I’d actually heard her.
Deconstruction- The Complete series Box Set Page 25
