Bobby Akart - Armageddon

Because their watches no longer functioned, telling time was impossible. They basically mapped out a day’s worth of travel, and once they reached a certain point, they’d begin looking for a spot to sleep for the night. And, with a little luck, they could find more gasoline.

Pueblo had been their designated stop, but because of the thick smoke that engulfed their truck, they had been forced to continue on. Darkness was setting in, and like the previous few nights, the winds and cold air picked up with the lack of any sunlight.

“What’s the next decent-sized town?” Owen asked.

Lacey paused for a moment as she flipped through the pages of the map book. “Well, it’s roughly two hundred forty miles to Dodge City, Kansas, where we ditch Highway 50 and start working our way south.”

Owen nodded and glanced at the fuel gauge. He did some quick mental calculations based upon the remaining gasoline in the containers.

“We’ve got enough fuel to make it. It all depends on if we wanna push—”

He stopped midsentence and unconsciously let off the gas pedal, causing the truck’s torque to drop the front end. The unexpected change in momentum thrust both Lacey and Tucker forward in their seats.

Within seconds, their trip came to an abrupt halt.

Wednesday, October 30

Near Amelia Court House, Virginia

Peter began to wonder if there was such a thing as having too many firearms. In addition to the duffel bags strapped to the bicycle’s rack, he had a Remington 700 hunting rifle tied to the top. He still rode with a backpack and the sling bag that contained his original stash of handguns with ammunition. It now contained a Glock pistol and extra magazines for the AR-15, which was also shouldered on his back. In addition to being bulky, it added quite a few pounds to the load he had to carry.

Yet he pedaled on. Much farther than he’d originally envisioned when he set out that day. He’d crossed over Interstate 64 and the James River, both of which led directly into Richmond barely thirty miles away to the east.

Hour after hour, he put distance between himself and Washington. Gradually, the number of refugees on the road thinned out, as did the number of dead. He tried to reason with himself as to why that was the case. He surmised it was the fact he was in a more rural area. Then he contemplated how the passage of another day had resulted in more people dying from dehydration or radiation poisoning.

He’d been judicious about wearing the gaiter over his face. The frigid arctic air that had invaded the Continental U.S. made the face-covering more tolerable and even a necessity. At first, he’d cursed the cloth gaiter as being akin to wearing a diaper over his face, but eventually he got used to it.

He was also diligent about taking the potassium iodide and the other supplements he’d acquired. Only time would tell if they helped him. All he knew was that it had been several days since DC had been hit, and he was not feeling the ill effects of the radiation that raced outward from the nation’s capital.

He continued to tick off the miles as he drew closer to the small town of Amelia Court House. In Virginia, many of the towns that were also a county seat were called Court Houses.

Unlike the word courthouse, which applies to the actual building that was the center of government in a town, places like Amelia Court House, and its more famous neighbor Appomattox Court House, where the end of the Civil War was negotiated, were common across Virginia.

The town appeared to be little more than a crossroads from what Peter could tell on the map, but he was uncomfortable traveling through it in the dark. He’d decided it was better to see what lay ahead of him rather than continuing to travel on unfamiliar roads at night.

Peter barely caught a glimpse of a barn sitting on top of a hill off the highway. The gravel road was overgrown with weeds, and the galvanized mailbox was rusted, barely hanging onto the wooden post in the ground. Everything about the place looked abandoned, so he took a chance.

It was difficult to ride up the hill on the part gravel, part dirt driveway. Each time he hit a sharp edge of the limestone rock, he feared he might puncture a tire. The thought caused chills to run up and down his spine as he envisioned walking a thousand miles to the Keys.

The long tree-lined driveway wound its way up the hill toward a clearing. Once he’d made it into the opening, he was able to see a white, two-story farmhouse sitting near the barn. Peter was leery of his surroundings. The buildings appeared to be abandoned, but without entering, he really couldn’t make that judgment.

In a world without electricity, it was not unexpected for a house to be dark inside. However, most farmers kept a ready supply of candles or even kerosene lanterns, as power could frequently be lost in a storm. Unlike metropolitan areas where power lines were buried underground, most rural areas still utilized old-fashioned power poles spaced a few hundred feet apart. It was not uncommon for trees or heavy limbs to strike a power line, leaving residents in the dark.

Peter gently laid his bicycle on its side in some tall grasses. He opted to carry his handgun inside to check out the house instead of the more powerful AR-15 or the hunting rifle. He was not that familiar with the AR-15, having only fired a similar weapon in Abu Dhabi under duress. He had no recollection of how the gun worked. Plus, he’d replenished his supply of nine-millimeter ammunition on the bridge that morning.

As he trudged up the hill toward the house, he began to get an uneasy feeling that he was being watched. Perhaps it was the eerie weather that lent the appearance of a horror flick. Or perhaps it was the fact the farmhouse looked like so many others in movies where mass murders took place or hauntings scared people to death.

He tried to shake the thought out of his head. Peter laughed, chastising himself aloud. “Get a grip, Pete. Norman Bates doesn’t live here.”

Peter decided to take a different approach than he had the night before at the golf course clubhouse. He knocked loudly to make sure anyone lurking behind the thin white curtains adorning the windows wouldn’t consider him a threat.

“Hello? Is anybody home?” he shouted loud enough to frighten off an eastern screech owl that was hanging out near the barn, looking for field mice.

After no answer, he tried again. “My name is Peter Albright! I’m from Wash—um, Fairfax. I’m making my way home to Florida, and I wondered if you’d let me sleep inside tonight.” These days, claiming to be from the District didn’t endear him to those outside the Beltway.

There was no answer and no sign of activity. He tried banging on the door again.

“Hello! I’m unarmed,” he lied as he surreptitiously shoved his pistol into his paddle holster. He held his hands high in the air to sell the subterfuge.

Peter walked up and down the front porch. The wooden boards gave under his feet, weakened by years of exposure to the elements. He reached the end of the wraparound porch and stared over toward the barn. He glanced down the side of the farmhouse and then upward toward the bedroom windows. The glass was still intact, and there was no sign of a candle flickering inside.

Convinced that the property was vacant, Peter walked to the back of the house to check for vehicles. When he found nothing, he made his way into the barn. There was an old tractor inside and farm implements scattered about. The horse stalls were empty, and there was no evidence of livestock feed stored anywhere.

“Well, alrighty then,” he muttered as he wrapped his jacket around the front of his body. The plunging temperatures left him dismayed. He’d learned a lot about nuclear winter in the last couple of weeks, but he hadn’t thought they meant it literally. Perpetually cloudy skies were one thing. Subfreezing temperatures in late October were another.