Post by bretf on Jun 15, 2019 19:25:58 GMT
Chapter 1
Chad Smoke stared at the dark house and willed Aunt Heather to appear. He’d been huddled in the ditch most of the night, the frozen ground leaching away his body heat. He was numb and exhausted but his discomfort paled in comparison to his anxiety. Aunt Heather, where are you? What’s happening? I’m scared! he tried to convey mentally.
She’d gone to the house to make sure none of the men who’d raided their home were still hiding inside. Before she left, she ordered him to stay put no matter what. It was a tense wait and he strained for any little sign of what was happening. His imagination ran wild; he heard phantom sounds and pictured the goons jumping out at her. His greatest fear was gunshots from the house. Coupled with the other scenarios flashing through his mind, he was certain if he heard shots it could only end in tragedy.
As he peered at the house in the pre-dawn gloom, he steeled his resolve. He would have to ignore her order; she’d need him after all. The thought terrified him but he would put his fear aside if her life was in jeopardy. His anxiety mounted while he crouched in the ditch prepared for the worst. Please, Aunt Heather, come out and say it’s all okay!
The tense silence was shattered when someone inside the house shouted, “Get the Mateo!” and a single, ominous shot rang out. His muscles jerked from the unnaturally loud blast, his heart raced and pounded against his chest wall, and he stared at the house even more intently. Aunt Heather! Despite his terror and concern for her, he wondered why the man yelled his brother’s name. Could he be in there?
The sound of the shot had barely faded when he heard the heavy pounding of booted feet. Wide-eyed, he stared; it wasn’t Aunt Heather. Swarthy bikers poured out of the house and charged straight at him. Was his brother Mateo with them? Could he, should he fire at them before they were on him?
He had little time to decide. Wide-eyed, he tightened his hands around . . . nothing. Where was his rifle? What happened to it? He had to find it! It wasn’t on his lap where he’d cradled it all night and the man leading the charge was bearing down on him! Chad’s heart pounded and he gasped for breath as he flailed about searching frantically.
He jolted awake in a panic, still immersed in the nightmare. The dream was vivid, too vivid and held him tight. His consciousness didn’t register the fact he’d woken as he fumbled around in blind terror, trying in vain to locate the missing rifle. Instead of the firearm he grasped and pulled a human arm. His sister Alison mumbled in her sleep, jerked her arm free, and rolled away from the offending hand.
Wha . . . Alison, what are you . . . where . . . he thought. She shouldn’t be in the ditch with him. She should be in the root cellar. But . . . if they weren’t in the ditch . . . where were they?
Disoriented, he looked up and saw windows. The little amount of light managing to pass through the dirty panes did little to ease his confusion. It was all wrong . . . Aunt Heather, the ditch, the bikers . . . He focused harder and realized he was in his sleeping bag and warm, blissfully warm, not numb from cold as he’d been in the ditch. Looking around, he made out the lumps of his sleeping family and it all came back to him in a rush.
He wasn’t in the ditch and they weren’t at home. They’d fled their home the previous day, what was left of it anyway, evading the bikers who’d trashed it. Their destination had been Aunt Heather’s home in the boonies, but they didn’t find the safe haven they’d anticipated. Destruction and disorder were widespread.
Rather than the ditch or Aunt Heather’s house, he and his family were in a shed where they’d bedded down the previous evening. The building was on a ranch not far from Aunt Heather’s home. Her destroyed home, he amended. Jerry, a neighboring rancher had taken them in, fed them, and given them shelter in the out-building. Chad looked at the indistinct, sleeping forms near him and wiped the tears flooding his eyes.
His family, all together again; his seven-year-old twin sisters Alison and Brooke, Aunt Heather, and thank God, his parents, Dan and Lisa Smoke, made up those lumps. Chad’s breathing returned to normal as he looked at the lumps on the shed’s floor and focused on the two which were his parents. He sniffed and wiped at his eyes again. His mom and dad were with the rest of the family for the first time in weeks, for the first time since his dad had been quarantined for exposure to genetically engineered smallpox.
Despite his wiping, a tear slid down Chad’s face as he looked at them. After first his dad, and later his mom came down with the disease, he’d feared he’d never be so close to them again. In fact, he’d been certain they’d both die. The disease was fatal to all but a few who caught it, yet they’d managed to survive. Another tear slid down his face when he thought of his dad’s best friend, Matt. He hadn’t made it, dying in the Smoke Family’s shop while Dan helplessly watched. Chad brushed away more tears.
The virus they’d caught only resembled smallpox of the past, the disease that’d been eradicated decades earlier. It was a super-virus, a biological weapon developed by Russian scientists and released by Syrian sponsored terrorists at the Super Bowl. Due to the considerable exposure the game presented, the virus went global.
Chad’s parents moved into their shop when they became sick and left him to care for his sisters and everything else at their small farm. It was a huge job, considering he was only thirteen, and he’d been terrified most of the time. It’d been an immense relief when his mom’s younger sister Heather showed up to help. However, as is if the situation wasn’t bad enough, other events the night she arrived made everything monumentally worse.
The pandemic had crippled nations worldwide and it led to harsh retaliation by the United States against Syria for releasing the virus. Russia was not pleased. Their displeasure culminated on THAT DAY, when they’d done the unimaginable and unleashed their nuclear arsenal to destroy the United States. The United States responded in kind. The world as they’d known it ended That Day and the sky had been blanketed by thick gray clouds ever since as a constant reminder.
With society destroyed, much of the remaining population faced starvation. Nuclear winter and lack of fuel for crop production meant the situation would only get worse. No relief was coming.
Less scrupulous survivors saw the collapse and absence of order as an opportunity. One such group trashed the Smoke’s home, the family managing to escape following a harrowing shootout.
The memories flooded Chad’s mind. The weeks dreading his parents would die, the seemingly endless night in the ditch, the gun battle and dead bikers, and his relief at seeing his dad and Aunt Heather safe.
Though he tried to dismiss it from his mind, his thoughts returned to the shootout. What if . . . it . . . turned out . . . different? What if . . . Aunt Heather was slower? His breathing sped up again like he was back home, seeing the shootout with a different outcome. Stop it. It didn’t happen that way. Aunt Heather was quick enough. No, not quite. That one guy escaped. But she and Dad got us away and those guys never found us, he told himself. So it was quick enough. Barely.
But what about Mateo? Why was he in the dream? Chad asked himself. Was it because he’d been thinking about his half-brother the previous evening? Was it possible he’d turned into a parasite, preying on the weak? He couldn’t have . . . could he? Chad prayed he hadn’t.
After the shootout, the terrified family had endured an anxious trip to Aunt Heather’s home, only to find it had also been destroyed. Her neighbor, Jerry, accompanied by his sons Claude and Art were at the smoldering remains of the house and offered them a place to stay. Having no other options, the Smoke family accepted. They’d become refugees, sleeping on mats on the floor of a stranger’s shed.
Although his racing heart and rapid breathing had returned to normal, Chad knew he wouldn’t be able to get back to sleep. Not after reliving the previous day. He got out of his sleeping bag, careful not to disturb Alison again and dressed as quietly as he could. Before he stepped away, he pulled Alison’s sleeping bag up over her. She’d managed to half-extricate herself when she’d rolled away from him. Brooke didn’t need to be covered; she was no longer in the bag she’d started the night sharing with her sister. Instead, she was snuggled against their mother, the sleeping bag pulled tight to the girl’s chin. Both girls tended to get out of their covers at night and Chad guessed his mom had covered her recently.
He tiptoed to his coat where it hung on a nail and shrugged into it. A part of his wardrobe since the nukes, he belted on his holster and revolver. After picking up his shotgun, he slipped outside.
Heather’s mouth curled in a resigned smile as he left. She got up, dressed, and followed after him. She was having a hard time sleeping as well. Outside, she didn’t need to look for him. He was near the door, blowing on a steaming mug.
“What do you mean, getting up so early? I could have used more shut-eye, but no, you had to go and disturb me,” she said.
He missed the joking tone in her voice. “Sorry, but I woke up and remembered everything that happened yesterday. I didn’t think I’d be able to get back to sleep.”
“I know what you mean. It’s hard to shut your mind down at times. So, what’s in the cup and where’d you get it?” Aunt Heather asked.
“It’s tea.” He sipped from the mug and took a couple steps so she could see, and pointed to a small table behind him. Two thermoses and five mugs were on it. “I’m guessing Jerry set it out for us. The thermos on the right has coffee.” He made a sour face at her. “I still don’t know how you drink the stuff. It’s nasty.”
“I have to admit, it’s an acquired taste, but I’m glad Jerry has it and is willing to share. We’ll have to thank him when we see him.” She poured a mug full, steam dissipating into the chilly air. She grimaced at the absence of cream and sugar but sipped from her cup anyway. “Yeah, it’s harsh. This reminds me of stories of cowboy coffee,” she said.
“Cowboy coffee?” Chad asked.
“Yeah, strong enough to float a horseshoe. But when you need coffee bad enough, well, any coffee will do.”
Chad rolled his eyes and said, “So Jerry,” he said and pointed to the pen behind the large barn. “He’s feeding the stock.” He took another sip from his mug while he considered what he wanted to say. “So . . . how well do you know him? Are you sure we’re going to be all right here?”
Heather sipped and relished the hot, strong flavor. “Are you sure you’re only twelve?”
His answer was an eye roll and Heather chuckled at his standard response for her indicating he was younger than he was. She knew full well he was thirteen.
“Well,” she said, “With my work, I ran into him on occasion but never spent a lot of time around him. Still, I think he’s a perfect complement for this country: he’s harsh, yet caring, dangerous, yet peaceful. I believe if you treat him right he’ll be your trusted friend and support you. And I believe if you cross him, you’ll regret it. I don’t know if that answers your question, but I think he’s a good guy and we can trust him.”
“Well, we had to go somewhere, and so far he’s better than anyone else we’ve been around recently,” Chad said. “And Aunt Heather, I’m really sorry about your friends and your house.”
Heather grimaced. Her friends had been killed when her home was razed. “Thanks, Buddy, now don’t get me all weepy again. Kate and Rudy were good people. The house, well, it was only a house.”
Chad didn’t respond. Maybe hers was only a house, but his family’s house was so much more. It was home; the only home he and his sisters had ever known. It was full of lifetimes’ worth of memories and now it was gone. Only the memories remained and they were certain to fade. They’d lost much more than a house.
He took another sip of his tea and stared into the mug. “Let’s go help Jerry feed those cows. It sounds like we don’t want him mad at us. We sure don’t want him to evict us for being slackers and throwing us out with all the people who are starving.”
She took a drink and set her mug down. “You know you could act like an irresponsible city kid until I finish this.”
Chad shrugged, and after another look at the rancher feeding the cattle, he left his shotgun where it leaned against the wall and he and his aunt fell into step together.
Chad Smoke stared at the dark house and willed Aunt Heather to appear. He’d been huddled in the ditch most of the night, the frozen ground leaching away his body heat. He was numb and exhausted but his discomfort paled in comparison to his anxiety. Aunt Heather, where are you? What’s happening? I’m scared! he tried to convey mentally.
She’d gone to the house to make sure none of the men who’d raided their home were still hiding inside. Before she left, she ordered him to stay put no matter what. It was a tense wait and he strained for any little sign of what was happening. His imagination ran wild; he heard phantom sounds and pictured the goons jumping out at her. His greatest fear was gunshots from the house. Coupled with the other scenarios flashing through his mind, he was certain if he heard shots it could only end in tragedy.
As he peered at the house in the pre-dawn gloom, he steeled his resolve. He would have to ignore her order; she’d need him after all. The thought terrified him but he would put his fear aside if her life was in jeopardy. His anxiety mounted while he crouched in the ditch prepared for the worst. Please, Aunt Heather, come out and say it’s all okay!
The tense silence was shattered when someone inside the house shouted, “Get the Mateo!” and a single, ominous shot rang out. His muscles jerked from the unnaturally loud blast, his heart raced and pounded against his chest wall, and he stared at the house even more intently. Aunt Heather! Despite his terror and concern for her, he wondered why the man yelled his brother’s name. Could he be in there?
The sound of the shot had barely faded when he heard the heavy pounding of booted feet. Wide-eyed, he stared; it wasn’t Aunt Heather. Swarthy bikers poured out of the house and charged straight at him. Was his brother Mateo with them? Could he, should he fire at them before they were on him?
He had little time to decide. Wide-eyed, he tightened his hands around . . . nothing. Where was his rifle? What happened to it? He had to find it! It wasn’t on his lap where he’d cradled it all night and the man leading the charge was bearing down on him! Chad’s heart pounded and he gasped for breath as he flailed about searching frantically.
He jolted awake in a panic, still immersed in the nightmare. The dream was vivid, too vivid and held him tight. His consciousness didn’t register the fact he’d woken as he fumbled around in blind terror, trying in vain to locate the missing rifle. Instead of the firearm he grasped and pulled a human arm. His sister Alison mumbled in her sleep, jerked her arm free, and rolled away from the offending hand.
Wha . . . Alison, what are you . . . where . . . he thought. She shouldn’t be in the ditch with him. She should be in the root cellar. But . . . if they weren’t in the ditch . . . where were they?
Disoriented, he looked up and saw windows. The little amount of light managing to pass through the dirty panes did little to ease his confusion. It was all wrong . . . Aunt Heather, the ditch, the bikers . . . He focused harder and realized he was in his sleeping bag and warm, blissfully warm, not numb from cold as he’d been in the ditch. Looking around, he made out the lumps of his sleeping family and it all came back to him in a rush.
He wasn’t in the ditch and they weren’t at home. They’d fled their home the previous day, what was left of it anyway, evading the bikers who’d trashed it. Their destination had been Aunt Heather’s home in the boonies, but they didn’t find the safe haven they’d anticipated. Destruction and disorder were widespread.
Rather than the ditch or Aunt Heather’s house, he and his family were in a shed where they’d bedded down the previous evening. The building was on a ranch not far from Aunt Heather’s home. Her destroyed home, he amended. Jerry, a neighboring rancher had taken them in, fed them, and given them shelter in the out-building. Chad looked at the indistinct, sleeping forms near him and wiped the tears flooding his eyes.
His family, all together again; his seven-year-old twin sisters Alison and Brooke, Aunt Heather, and thank God, his parents, Dan and Lisa Smoke, made up those lumps. Chad’s breathing returned to normal as he looked at the lumps on the shed’s floor and focused on the two which were his parents. He sniffed and wiped at his eyes again. His mom and dad were with the rest of the family for the first time in weeks, for the first time since his dad had been quarantined for exposure to genetically engineered smallpox.
Despite his wiping, a tear slid down Chad’s face as he looked at them. After first his dad, and later his mom came down with the disease, he’d feared he’d never be so close to them again. In fact, he’d been certain they’d both die. The disease was fatal to all but a few who caught it, yet they’d managed to survive. Another tear slid down his face when he thought of his dad’s best friend, Matt. He hadn’t made it, dying in the Smoke Family’s shop while Dan helplessly watched. Chad brushed away more tears.
The virus they’d caught only resembled smallpox of the past, the disease that’d been eradicated decades earlier. It was a super-virus, a biological weapon developed by Russian scientists and released by Syrian sponsored terrorists at the Super Bowl. Due to the considerable exposure the game presented, the virus went global.
Chad’s parents moved into their shop when they became sick and left him to care for his sisters and everything else at their small farm. It was a huge job, considering he was only thirteen, and he’d been terrified most of the time. It’d been an immense relief when his mom’s younger sister Heather showed up to help. However, as is if the situation wasn’t bad enough, other events the night she arrived made everything monumentally worse.
The pandemic had crippled nations worldwide and it led to harsh retaliation by the United States against Syria for releasing the virus. Russia was not pleased. Their displeasure culminated on THAT DAY, when they’d done the unimaginable and unleashed their nuclear arsenal to destroy the United States. The United States responded in kind. The world as they’d known it ended That Day and the sky had been blanketed by thick gray clouds ever since as a constant reminder.
With society destroyed, much of the remaining population faced starvation. Nuclear winter and lack of fuel for crop production meant the situation would only get worse. No relief was coming.
Less scrupulous survivors saw the collapse and absence of order as an opportunity. One such group trashed the Smoke’s home, the family managing to escape following a harrowing shootout.
The memories flooded Chad’s mind. The weeks dreading his parents would die, the seemingly endless night in the ditch, the gun battle and dead bikers, and his relief at seeing his dad and Aunt Heather safe.
Though he tried to dismiss it from his mind, his thoughts returned to the shootout. What if . . . it . . . turned out . . . different? What if . . . Aunt Heather was slower? His breathing sped up again like he was back home, seeing the shootout with a different outcome. Stop it. It didn’t happen that way. Aunt Heather was quick enough. No, not quite. That one guy escaped. But she and Dad got us away and those guys never found us, he told himself. So it was quick enough. Barely.
But what about Mateo? Why was he in the dream? Chad asked himself. Was it because he’d been thinking about his half-brother the previous evening? Was it possible he’d turned into a parasite, preying on the weak? He couldn’t have . . . could he? Chad prayed he hadn’t.
After the shootout, the terrified family had endured an anxious trip to Aunt Heather’s home, only to find it had also been destroyed. Her neighbor, Jerry, accompanied by his sons Claude and Art were at the smoldering remains of the house and offered them a place to stay. Having no other options, the Smoke family accepted. They’d become refugees, sleeping on mats on the floor of a stranger’s shed.
Although his racing heart and rapid breathing had returned to normal, Chad knew he wouldn’t be able to get back to sleep. Not after reliving the previous day. He got out of his sleeping bag, careful not to disturb Alison again and dressed as quietly as he could. Before he stepped away, he pulled Alison’s sleeping bag up over her. She’d managed to half-extricate herself when she’d rolled away from him. Brooke didn’t need to be covered; she was no longer in the bag she’d started the night sharing with her sister. Instead, she was snuggled against their mother, the sleeping bag pulled tight to the girl’s chin. Both girls tended to get out of their covers at night and Chad guessed his mom had covered her recently.
He tiptoed to his coat where it hung on a nail and shrugged into it. A part of his wardrobe since the nukes, he belted on his holster and revolver. After picking up his shotgun, he slipped outside.
Heather’s mouth curled in a resigned smile as he left. She got up, dressed, and followed after him. She was having a hard time sleeping as well. Outside, she didn’t need to look for him. He was near the door, blowing on a steaming mug.
“What do you mean, getting up so early? I could have used more shut-eye, but no, you had to go and disturb me,” she said.
He missed the joking tone in her voice. “Sorry, but I woke up and remembered everything that happened yesterday. I didn’t think I’d be able to get back to sleep.”
“I know what you mean. It’s hard to shut your mind down at times. So, what’s in the cup and where’d you get it?” Aunt Heather asked.
“It’s tea.” He sipped from the mug and took a couple steps so she could see, and pointed to a small table behind him. Two thermoses and five mugs were on it. “I’m guessing Jerry set it out for us. The thermos on the right has coffee.” He made a sour face at her. “I still don’t know how you drink the stuff. It’s nasty.”
“I have to admit, it’s an acquired taste, but I’m glad Jerry has it and is willing to share. We’ll have to thank him when we see him.” She poured a mug full, steam dissipating into the chilly air. She grimaced at the absence of cream and sugar but sipped from her cup anyway. “Yeah, it’s harsh. This reminds me of stories of cowboy coffee,” she said.
“Cowboy coffee?” Chad asked.
“Yeah, strong enough to float a horseshoe. But when you need coffee bad enough, well, any coffee will do.”
Chad rolled his eyes and said, “So Jerry,” he said and pointed to the pen behind the large barn. “He’s feeding the stock.” He took another sip from his mug while he considered what he wanted to say. “So . . . how well do you know him? Are you sure we’re going to be all right here?”
Heather sipped and relished the hot, strong flavor. “Are you sure you’re only twelve?”
His answer was an eye roll and Heather chuckled at his standard response for her indicating he was younger than he was. She knew full well he was thirteen.
“Well,” she said, “With my work, I ran into him on occasion but never spent a lot of time around him. Still, I think he’s a perfect complement for this country: he’s harsh, yet caring, dangerous, yet peaceful. I believe if you treat him right he’ll be your trusted friend and support you. And I believe if you cross him, you’ll regret it. I don’t know if that answers your question, but I think he’s a good guy and we can trust him.”
“Well, we had to go somewhere, and so far he’s better than anyone else we’ve been around recently,” Chad said. “And Aunt Heather, I’m really sorry about your friends and your house.”
Heather grimaced. Her friends had been killed when her home was razed. “Thanks, Buddy, now don’t get me all weepy again. Kate and Rudy were good people. The house, well, it was only a house.”
Chad didn’t respond. Maybe hers was only a house, but his family’s house was so much more. It was home; the only home he and his sisters had ever known. It was full of lifetimes’ worth of memories and now it was gone. Only the memories remained and they were certain to fade. They’d lost much more than a house.
He took another sip of his tea and stared into the mug. “Let’s go help Jerry feed those cows. It sounds like we don’t want him mad at us. We sure don’t want him to evict us for being slackers and throwing us out with all the people who are starving.”
She took a drink and set her mug down. “You know you could act like an irresponsible city kid until I finish this.”
Chad shrugged, and after another look at the rancher feeding the cattle, he left his shotgun where it leaned against the wall and he and his aunt fell into step together.