Морин Макхью - Wastelands - The New Apocalypse

“Never.”

The glitter of shattering glass splintered the air. Felicia screamed, a short, sharp bark of terror—

“Shut her up,” Natalie snapped.

—and in the silence that followed, in the shifting purple shadow of the great room with its sectional sofa and the gray rectangle of the flatscreen and their sleeping bags like the shucked skins of enormous snakes upon the floor, Kerans heard someone—something—

—let’s play a game the game is called what if—

—test the privacy lock of a back bedroom: a slow turn to either side. Click. Click .

Silence.

Felicia whimpered. Kerans blew a cloud of vapor into the still air. He clutched Felicia’s fingers. He remembered a time when they had made hasty love in the bathroom at a friend’s cocktail party, half-drunk, mad with passion for each other. The memory came to him with pristine clarity. He felt tears upon his cheeks.

And still the silence held.

Lanyan snapped off the safety of the Benelli.

Natalie put her back to the foyer wall, reached out, and flipped the deadbolt of the front door. She pushed it a few inches ajar. Snow dusted the threshold.

“The Yukon locked?” she whispered.

“No.”

Once again, the thing tested the lock.

“Dave, don’t leave me—”

“Natalie—”

She froze him with a glance, and something else she had said came back to Kerans. The rules have changed now. We have to look out for ourselves . God help him, he didn’t want to die. He choked back a sob. They had wanted children. They had tried for them. In vitro, the whole nine yards.

“I won’t leave you,” he whispered.

Then the privacy lock snapped, popping like a firecracker. The door banged back. Something came, hurtling down the hallway: something big, hunched over the floor, and God, God, shedding pieces of itself, one, two, three as it burst into the room. Guns spat bright tongues of fire, a barrage of deafening explosions. The impact flung the thing backward, but the pieces, two- or three-foot lengths of leg-pumping fury, kept coming. Snapping the Benelli from target to target, Lanyan took two of them down. Natalie stopped the third one not three feet from Kerans’s throat. It rolled on the floor, curving needle-teeth snapping, leathery hide gleaming in the snow-blown light, and was still.

Those alien cries echoed in the darkness.

“Time to go,” Natalie said.

Lanyan moved to the door.

Felicia clutched at Kerans’s hand, seizing him with a tensile strength he did not know she still possessed. The cocktail party flashed through his mind. They had wanted children—

“Felicia—” Kerans said. “Help me—”

“No time,” Natalie said.

And Lanyan: “I’m sorry, Dave—”

The moment hung in equipoise. Kerans wrenched his hand away.

“Time to go,” Natalie said again. “We can’t wait. You have to decide.”

And regular as a metronome inside his head: the rules have changed the rules have changed the rules the rules —

Natalie ducked into the night. A moment later, Lanyan followed.

Glass shattered at the back of the house, one window, two windows, three.

“Don’t leave me, Dave,” Felicia sobbed. “Don’t leave me.”

Outside the Yukon roared to life.

The rules have changed. We have to watch out for ourselves now.

“Dave,” Felicia said, “I’m scared.”

God help him, he didn’t want to die—

“Shhh,” he said, brushing closed her eyelids with his fingers. “Never. I’ll never leave you. I love you.”

He bent to press his lips to hers. His fingers fumbled at his belt. They closed around the blade.

A moment later, he was running for the Yukon.

Richard Kadreyis the New York Times bestselling author of fifteen novels, including the Sandman Slim supernatural noir series. Sandman Slim was included in Amazon’s “100 Science Fiction & Fantasy Books to Read in a Lifetime.” Chad Stahelski of John Wick fame is set to direct it as a feature film. Richard has also written comics for Heavy Metal, Lucifer , and Hellblazer . His newest book is Hollywood Dead .

There were three million people in L.A. when the party started. Now there’s a few hundred scattered around in shopping mall emergency shelters, office buildings, and the subway tunnels. It’s okay where I am, but most of the others I talk to by radio are running out of food and water, so they’ll have to go scavenging soon. We’ll be down to less than a hundred people left by the end of the month. If the Rollers don’t get them at night, Floaters and Stingers will get them during the day.

That’s just how things are now.

It’s hard to stay focused on anything besides life and death. Each minute is a choice: stay inside and live or go outside and die. It was easier when there were other people here with me. Now that I’m the only one it’s harder to justify waking up, much less staying alive. The army is gone. The government vanished. Even the crazy militias and God squad true believers who fought the freaks are gone. No white knights or cavalry riding to the rescue.

We’re alone.

Actually, I should say they’re alone. The other shelters. I’m never alone.

I wear noise cancelling headphones all the time now and when I forget to recharge them, I hear voices screaming my name day and night.

The truth is, I’d feel sorrier for myself if I wasn’t a big part of what happened. Maybe I’m the main reason. Hell, there’s no maybe.

It was my fault.

Now that there’s no one around to blame me, I can go over it and put the pieces together.

I’m what you call a celebrity bodyguard. Was a bodyguard, excuse me. I’ve taken care of starlets, studio heads, corporate assholes, and even a few foreign diplomats. I was good at my job. Could turn on the charm when I had to. People appreciate that in a big guy. Everybody loves a gentle giant. And even though the giant might get sick of it, not showing it is part of the charm. I took good care of people and got paid well for it. My wife, Macy, was a casting agent at one of the big talent agencies and she was good at her job too. We were doing all right.

Then Bill fucked everything up by talking me into doing a job with one of his clients.

He’d phoned me just after noon and said, “Darla’s parents are going home tomorrow, which means they have to go on the Universal Studios tour tonight. Darla will never forgive me if I don’t take them.”

“Seriously? It’s been ten days since I had a night off and you want me to make it eleven so you can see a plastic shark?”

“It’s my in-laws want to see the goddamn shark. I’m just a victim of circumstance. Come on, man. I’ve covered for you plenty of times.”

“And I’ve covered for you too. But I’ll do this extra special favor for you now because I’m that kind of guy.”

I could hear the relief in Bill’s voice. “Thanks, man. You’re a life saver.”

“All part of the service, man. Now, what kind of run is it?”

“It’s easy. You’re going to play chauffeur from Beverly Hills straight down to LAX, then you’re a free man.”

“Damn. I hate having to take care of people and drive their asses too.”

“I know, but it’s what the client wants,” said Bill. “He’s squirrely. Rich as fuck and afraid of everything. Don’t touch him. That’s rule number one. Don’t shake his hand or anything. Just get him in the car.”

“Sounds delightful. Just text me the particulars and I’ll be there.”

“Thanks. You’re the best.”