Scott Nicholson - The Shock

Pete snarled and reached from behind the bar to swipe at Arnoff. “You goddamned animal.”

“How far north?” Arnoff repeated. Even in the bad light, his eyes and teeth gleamed with a fierce menace that briefly sobered Pete.

Pete gave a weak wave of surrender and disgust. “To the Blue Ridge Parkway.”

“I need more than that. The parkway’s nearly five hundred miles long.”

“Milepost 291, he called it. Don’t know what that means.”

“You better not be shitting me, or I’ll track you down and leave you hanging on a lamppost so the Zappers can eat your liver.”

Pete snorted in disgust and reached for another bottle in the row behind him. Campbell watched the tableau in the dusty bar mirror and was startled by the person standing to the left of Arnoff. Campbell tilted his head to the side to be sure the reflection belonged to him. Gaunt and stubbled cheeks, windswept hanks of greasy hair, deep purple wedges under each eye.

I don’t know about zombies, but we’re becoming the living dead .

Arnoff rested his rifle against a bar stool and fished a map and flashlight from his pocket. He wiped away the pool of liquor with one elbow, and then spread the map on the pitted wooden surface. Campbell couldn’t help bending over and looking when Arnoff switched on the light.

“What town is that near?” Arnoff asked Pete.

“Who do I look like, Ranger Rick? I heard him mention ‘Boone.’”

Arnoff ran a stubby forefinger along the map of North Carolina, outward from the red circles he’d drawn to mark their current location and his route since leaving Charlotte. “About a hundred miles. Should be able to get there in a week to ten days of hard walking.”

Pete laughed again. He no longer bothered with a glass, sipping straight from the bottle of Knob Creek and wincing at the taste. Campbell studied the map, noting the small towns that dotted the highway to Boone. Arnoff scowled at him and folded the map with crisp efficiency.

Taking up his rifle, he headed for the door. “You guys coming, or you going to wait here for the Zappers?”

Campbell shouldered his pack and followed. Pete, however, didn’t move from his position behind the bar. He stared past them as if lost in a Happy Hour from long ago, where the beer flowed and the Stones kicked from the speakers and the neon lights winked their green and red seductions.

“Come on, Pete,” Campbell said, waiting at the door. Arnoff, after making sure the street was clear, headed across.

“You’re getting to be as much of a bossy asshole as Arnoff,” Pete said, although he came around the bar, nearly tripping on a dead biker whose leather vest was splotched with the excrescence of death.

Arnoff was already down the block, about to turn the corner. Campbell was afraid the man would leave them behind. And as bad as the Arnoff option was, Campbell imagined it would be far worse to spend another night alone in a church steeple. He dodged between vehicles, ducking low in case any Zapheads were around.

When Campbell reached the corner, Arnoff was barely in sight. The man had forgotten all about them.

Campbell turned and motioned for Pete to hurry. Pete had just exited the bar and squinted against the glare of sunset. He dragged his backpack with one hand, and the other gripped a quart bottle of liquor by the neck. As he staggered forward, slumped and skulking and jerky, Campbell fought a wave of irritation.

What a loser. He looks just like a Zaphead, the way he’s —

The distant volley echoed off the canyons of the building facades. Pete’s head lifted, mouth open in shock. The sudden blossom of crimson on his shirt spread across his chest. Then his legs folded and he dropped, the liquor bottle smashing on the sidewalk.

Campbell ran toward him, keeping low. “Hold your fire!” he screamed, not sure it would do any good.

The soldiers clearly didn’t care. Anyone not in uniform was a target. The Captain’s words came back to him: “ We’re the government. You’re either with us or against us .”

Campbell expected the next bullet to pierce his own flesh, and he almost welcomed it. But all was silent as he knelt in the dead town beside Pete, whose blood mixed with the tequila in a sick and final concoction. Campbell knelt, muttering to his dead friend, as dusk fell around him.

It was After.

And he was alone.

Jorge helped Franklin barricade the compound after their return. The sun was sinking, sending long fingers of shadows across the leaves and grass. The surrounding mountains were striated in bands of black and reddish brown, the thick haze wreathing the horizon. The first flickers of aurora borealis were visible in the far northern sky, lime green and magenta tufts hanging like a shaman’s psychedelic vision.

“Think they will come for us?” Jorge asked Franklin.

“Hard to figure. They weren’t acting right.”

“They weren’t attacking. But they were attracted to the woman.”

“Maybe they wanted her baby.”

Jorge thought of Marina and what he would do if Zapheads took her. The near-hysterical woman was inside, being comforted by Rosa. Her baby was safe, and Jorge vowed to help Franklin defend the compound to the death. This was their homeland now.

Franklin ran a hoe handle through a metal spool of barbed wire as Jorge slipped on a pair of thick leather gloves. He climbed a short ladder and pulled a strand of the wire across the top of the wooden gate as Franklin clipped the wire with cutters. He wound it among the planks in big, loose loops so that anyone who tried to climb the gate would become entangled in the barbs.

Franklin had placed a series of spotlights in the trees on the perimeter of the compound. He’d told Jorge they wouldn’t burn long off the battery system due to their high wattage, but the light was an additional security measure if they needed it.

“You were prepared for defense, not just survival?” Jorge asked as they gathered the tools.

“A lot more going on up here than just me,” Franklin said as they headed for the faint reddish glow from inside the cabin.

Jorge found himself looking forward to sitting around the cozy, candlelit interior with more people to care for. He’d agreed to take the first watch tonight, even though Franklin had declared his alarm systems up to the task. “What do you mean?”

“The parkway. That’s one hell of a road. Government pitched it as a scenic route for the tourists, but it was built to hold up to heavy truck traffic. Real heavy traffic.”

“I don’t understand.”

“I’m not the only one who thought this was a good place to hole up. Some in the Preparedness Network believed there’s a secret military bunker up here. Makes sense. You’ve got a road built to withstand aerial bombing in an area with no real industrial value.”

“Is that why you brought me and my family to your compound, and why you’re willing to bring others?”

Franklin stopped just outside the cabin. From inside came the low murmur of women talking.

“A real survivalist knows it’s not just about surviving,” Franklin said, squinting up at the aurora that was almost bright enough to read a book by, if not for the muting effects of the haze. “It’s about living . Just having food, supplies, and ammunition won’t do you any good in the long run, because what kind of life is that? You hide in a bunker for twenty years, all alone?”

Jorge hadn’t considered survival as anything beyond the next breath. Each day since the solar storms had been a challenge, but he had to admit that he felt more vibrant and his senses –all his senses—were keener and more vivid than they had been since childhood. Perhaps the prospect of losing the world had imbued it with a deeper mystery and richness.