WYRD BOOK 2.0

By

Nick Cole

Copyright © 2015 by Nick Cole

Chapter One

Braddock attached his static line to the wire that ran the length of the red-lit cargo bay. The rear ramp of the C-130 began to lower, exposing golden morning sunlight. Air rushed in to beat at digital cammo fatigues and rucksacks. It had been dark when the three military transports had lifted off from the base out in the depths of Death Valley. Braddock could now see the two trailing C-130’s that made up the rest of Task Force 19 behind them, one below and one above the open ramp door. He circled his hand once and the rest of his company stood and began to attach their static lines to the wire running the length of the interior. Each of the mercenaries had been highly trained before ever leaving the military for private contract work. They knew the drill.

Braddock checked his watch once more. Three minutes to oh-nine-hundred. 22 September. Below, out the ramp door and a couple of thousand feet down, herds of wandering dead mixed in and among the vast empty sprawl of southern California. The two trailing C-130’s, each slate gray, each marked with the Tarragon logo, adjusted their positions to jump altitude.

1500 feet.

Braddock thought of the... man... known as Mr. Steele. Of his face and what lay beneath it. After landing out in the nowhere end of Death Valley, after watching LA go up in a low-yield nuclear blast, they’d gotten out of the chopper in the middle of a dry and seemingly endless waste surrounding an old abandoned military base. The massive... man... machine-thing... that had taken out multiple hostiles from a moving helicopter atop the US Bank Tower had then purposefully strode off across the tarmac of the runway toward a lone air traffic control tower. After that, Braddock hadn’t seen Mr. Steele again. Instead he’d been greeted by 1st Sergeant Bannon and led to the company he would take charge of. Echo Company was made up of ex-soldiers who’d somehow disappeared down the rabbit hole that surrounded the mysterious Tarragon Corporation.

Now, back in the C-130 speeding above the ruins of Southern California, they were two minutes out from jumping on Task Force 19’s current objective, Iron Castle. The orders that came up on a secure new smartphone, issued to Braddock along with all the high-speed gear he could strap, all embossed in gray relief with the Tarragon Logo and the like of which Braddock had never seen before, were to secure a perimeter around objective Iron Castle and begin sweeping operations. All zombies and survivors were to be terminated.

Again Braddock remembered his Handler’s voice. What she’d said. In his mind he could still see the web address he’d found her at for their last conversation: dept19.net/doormouse

Did it still exist? Or had it been burned? She’d instructed him to do, “Whatever it takes.” After Operation Pitbull, the voice, the woman on the other side of the link, was probably the last surviving representative of government.

Do whatever it takes to stop whoever it is that’s destroying America, and the world.Those had been Braddock’s final orders. Do whatever it takes to stop Mr. Steele.

Yellow light.

Thirty seconds to Jump.

Braddock was running his hand across his gear when the C-130 just off the port wing exploded. A dark shape, an attack jet of some sort, raced away behind the flight of cargo planes and tore off into the foothills to the east. As it peeled away, Braddock tracked and identified it as an A-10 Warthog close air support aircraft. Already the burning wreckage of the breaking apart C-130 was raining down into the neighborhoods of Santa Ana just below. Far out behind them, Braddock could see the A-10 turning back toward the flight. He knew it was coming back for another pass, and he knew they were sitting ducks inside the slow and low C-130’s.

Nothing in the Op Order that had come in on the snazzy, new smartphone had said anything about expected resistance. The government had collapsed, and for all intents and purposes there were no active combat-ready units left in the American arsenal. A mile behind them, the Warthog leveled out and a second later launched an air-to-air missile that snaked toward them like a smoking sidewinder. Both C-130’s peeled away from each other, ejecting flares and chaff. Braddock and the rest of Echo Company were thrown against the interior of the fuselage.

The Captain of Braddock’s C-130 was screaming, “Scrub the mission” over the net. One of Braddock’s men, a guy who’d identified himself as Tim Ward back at the base in Death Valley, disconnected from the static line and ran for the open cargo ramp. There was a loud BANG. Metallic. Awful. But distant. Suddenly the C-130 pitched violently to starboard and Braddock could see the other bird on fire and nose diving straight into a small hill.

The disconnected soldier ran for the cargo ramp, and in that moment Braddock thought that wasn’t such a bad idea as he heard the A-10 whir-hum past the C-130 like a streak of whining death as it fired its chain gun into the fuselage. Large holes erupted across the top of the cabin, shooting sudden shafts of daylight down on bleeding and maimed men.

Then the lights went out. Braddock was blind.

Men all around him were screaming. Yelling. Braddock waved his hand in front of his face.

“I’m, blind!” screamed the desperate pilot over the open communications net. Braddock and everyone else could hear him ask the co-pilot, “Can you see anything!?!”

Braddock reached up and felt the static line. His fingers closed around the D-clip.

Time to jump, he thought to himself.

He felt the plane level out.

“Can anyone onboard see anything?” asked the pilot over the net, the terror barely contained within his voice. Braddock heard several men around him frantically admit that they too could not see as they swore and cursed.

“Must be some kind of weapon,” Braddock muttered and continued to wave his hand in front of his sightless eyes.

He waited for the A-10, for the demonic sound of it to come back, rushing at them again for one last final pass... and then blow them to bits. And when it didn’t, maybe, thought Braddock, maybe the A-10 pilot had gone blind too. Braddock let go of the static line.

Blind, in a wounded bird, jumping into the Zombocalypse would only take him away from his objective, even if it meant saving his own life.

Whatever it takes, he remembered her saying again. Whatever it took he would kill Mr. Steel.

A few minutes more of blindness and men were crying. One was screaming about Hell. The blindness... the darkness was so deep it felt real. Even to Braddock. Like it was a living thing that could be touched.

The pilot came over the net once again. His voice was now almost lunatic and his teeth chattered across and over each word. “I don’t know what’s going... on... but I’ve got us locked back into the... autopilot. We’re returning to base. M-mm-mission... scu-scrubbed.”

Braddock unhooked his static line and sat down. He thought about nothing. He tried to block out everything. The drone of the engines. The whistling air racing across the shot-to-shreds fuselage just beyond his head. Grown, hardened killers, sobbing like frightened children all around him. And even the nightmare underneath Mr. Steele’s face.

But he couldn’t forget that. Once you’d seen what lay underneath the face... you couldn’t forget it. Ever.

“Iron Castle” was scrubbed. For now.

Holiday, Frank, Ash, Ritter, Candace and Dante had each finally, feeling their way out to the street and calling for help, found each other.

They too were blind.

They knew they were now sitting in the middle of the street. They could feel the narrow hot road beneath them that ran through the close packed townhomes of the Vineyards.

“What the hell is going on?” hissed Dante.

Of course Frank said he didn’t know, but urged them to remain calm nonetheless.

“I don’t even know who in the hell you are... and you’re telling me to be cool?” hissed Dante at Frank even louder.

“Maybe you nailed it on the head, big man,” said Ritter, his voice dry and husky in the morning heat they could feel rising on their faces. “Maybe this is hell. Maybe we didn’t make it out of that office building.”

Holiday said nothing. He could feel someone, maybe the woman known as Candace leaning against him. Touching him and jumping every time she’d get too close. Her skin was cold and thin. The darkness seemed to smother voices as everyone around him asked a question or argued with someone else. It felt to Holiday as though his face were hidden under a pillow. As though he were listening from behind a thick curtain to something not meant to be listened to. A feeling that felt familiar to him though he could never recall having actually listened to a conversation from behind a thick curtain. Or any curtain.

When the blindness, which is what Ash thought of it as, hit, she’d been checking the still unconscious kid. They told her his name was Skully. Now sitting in the street as the morning heat began to rise, her mind raced rapidly through medical conditions that could cause mass blindness. She kept coming back to stress.

“Least that weird wind stopped howling and stuff when it all started,” muttered Dante. “Thought it was like a tornado comin’.”

Ash had wandered out into the street, leaving the townhome they’d set up as an aid station, to look for help. When Ritter finally answered her calls she found out he too was blind. An hour later, all of them huddled together with no one really saying anything productive and Ritter and Dante working themselves up into a serious fight while all of them were just hoping it would end soon, Ash announced, “We’re suffering from a sort of group psychosis brought on by emotional stress.”

That stopped everyone.

“How so?” ventured Candace after a moment. “How could we all be suffering from the same thing?”

“Trauma,” stated Ash. But the statement came out like a guess. “After what’s happened... what we’ve all seen and been through... this must be some sort of mental breakdown. I mean...” her voice halted. Even she, after all she’d been through, all she’d seen, couldn’t believe she was about to say what she’d say next. “The dead. That thing in the fog...”

“What thing in the fog?” whispered Dante frantically, his voice low and serious. Ash continued, ignoring him.

“All of this might be just too much for the human mind to rationalize. It’s happened before. Like people seeing... an oasis that isn’t there when they’re dying of thirst.”

“Does that ever really happen?” asked Ritter. “I mean, movies yeah, but really? C’mon Doc, I ain’t buying that.”

“It does,” shouted Ash, sick of it all. Sick of the whole mess. “It does happen!” She took a shallow breath. Waved her hand in front of her face once more. “It does,” she whispered.

“Listen, all I’m saying is that this might be stress related, and if it is caused by stress, then the good news is it’s not physical. It’s not something... it’s not a permanent condition. If we can all just take a breath and relax, we might... see again.” Ash realized she was talking with her hands and that it didn’t matter because no one could see her doing it.

Everyone heard Dante suck in a lungful of air and then exhale like a cartoon bull might snort in anger just moments before charging Bugs Bunny the Matador.

“Nothin’!” he muttered.

“Give it a moment,” Ash said in her most soothing, I’m-a-doctor-and-I’m-here-to-help-you voice.

“Just relax.”

For a few minutes they sat there, in the middle of the street. Breathing slowly. Breathing deeply.

“What about the zombies?” asked Candace. “The dead. They could be...”

“Not helping,” interrupted Ash.

Silence.

Then Frank spoke. “Food.”

No one replied. But Frank knew they were listening.

“I have this one dish,” Frank continued. His baritone voice used to telling intimate stories, anecdotes, chit-chat between lounge standards like Summer Wind and I Left my Heart in San Francisco. “I have this one dish that used to always settle down my...”

He paused.

“It used to settle down someone I love very much. It’s my secret recipe. Probably the one...” he paused again, his voice catching in his throat. If they could’ve seen him, they’d have seen the tear that escaped one eye and ran away. Frank knew they couldn’t, and so he let it run as if that tear were something, or someone, that just needed to be let go of. Some poison that needed letting. He sighed and said, “It might just be the only thing I ever did right in my whole life.”

Silence.

A crow barked at something far off.

“Maybe,” muttered Frank.

“What’s the dish?” asked Ritter.

Frank came back from wherever, whenever, he was. “Pasta Aglio e Olio. It’s so simple anyone could make it, but when it’s done right... well, it heals a lot of things. Even broken hearts, maybe. Maybe.”

“How...” Candace paused. Swallowing. “How do you make it? “Pastaolio”,” she asked, mispronouncing the dish.

Frank sighed again. It was the sigh of someone lifting all the weight the world could possibly settle on one man, or woman, off themselves, one more time, again. “Pasta Aglio e Olio.” His voice softly sang the name like it was some love song they all once knew. “I haven’t made it in a long time. Probably only make it one more time in my life. Maybe.”

No one said anything.

“My dad was blind,” said Dante. “But he could fry up a chicken like nobody’s business.”

“My moms made Rice-a-Roni,” muttered Ritter. Then added, “When she felt like it.”

Holiday tried to remember something someone who’d loved him had cooked for him. But he couldn’t. He couldn’t remember the dish or the someone.

Silence.

“Pasta Aglio e Olio is the best,” continued Frank. “It’s real simple. It’s just cooked pasta, olive oil, good olive oil, red pepper flakes, fresh garlic, and chopped parsley.”

“Sounds boring,” announced Ritter.

“Yeah,” replied Frank. “It does, but you see that’s the thing, kid, it’s probably the most comforting dish you’ll ever have. You come home on a cold night in Chicago and make that, and whatever the world tried to do to you doesn’t matter so much. Hell even the... But I left one thing out.”

No one said anything.

“You see, the dish comes together all at once. The red pepper flakes, the garlic, the parsley, good olive oil, all of it goes in the pan at the last minute. You even turn off the heat after you put the pasta in. Then, and this is my secret and there are certain people from certain families of certain persuasions that if they knew this next step, they’d throw you out forever... well that’s not important, but this is my little secret. Parmesan. You grate up a nice amount of it and fold it into the hot pasta just after you add the rest of the ingredients. Then serve. Then, life... and all the madness, it ain’t so bad for just a little while.”

No one said anything.

The crow from down the street barked again and each of them thought of the dead. Each of them saw more of the dead at the gate to the complex. The flimsy mesh gate.

“They’re coming,” whispered Candace.

“No!” said Frank firmly. “They’re not coming. We’re safe. Pasta Aglio e Olio.”

Everyone waited.

“Pasta Aglio e Olio,” Frank whispered again to himself. Only those sitting near him could hear him barely whisper, “Make it all better.”

The darkness began to lift.

“I can see something,” whispered Holiday.

Then...

“Hey... wait... me too,” said Ash. “I can see... something...”

The others waited. Dante grumbled that he still couldn’t see “nuthin’”.

“Open your eyes,” suggested Ritter sarcastically.

“My eyes are open!” shouted Dante. “And I can’t... wait a sec... I see shadows! I see shapes... like everything’s under water in a dark pool.”

“Pasta Aglio e Olio,” whispered Frank again.

An hour later, waiting, resting, listening to Frank again and again repeat the name of his secret dish, imagining what it would be like to taste good comfort food again, finally, the darkness was gone.

“That was something,” muttered Ritter as they all began to get up from the street. In the distance, the crow, watching from atop the light post, called again as though it were accusing them of something horrible, then it leapt into the air, beating its wings in a dry leathery flap as it climbed off and into the hot sun and murky haze.

Chapter Two

The work of castle-building began in earnest the next day. The day of blindness had come and gone. The night had passed and the fog that had come up in it, suddenly and from everywhere, was gone now, too.

The survivors knew that each day might be their last. Frank fed them. They locked themselves away at night, inside vacant townhomes along the street. Waiting until dawn. Most were asleep by the time the western sky surrendered to the blue of early evening.

Others watched the night throughout its length. Watched its clarity become obscured by the swirling mist rising. And in time, everything lay under a thick blanket of immense cottony quiet. Holiday stepped out onto his front steps, feeling the misty night and the garden cool on his sun-parched skin.

The foggy street and the orange light thrown from the streetlamps beckoned him into its undulating nothingness, promising him a drink, as much as he could drink, somewhere within its emptiness. He could walk away again, he thought to himself. He could walk away from Frank and Ash and the newcomers and never return.

He’d barely escaped with his life the last time. He’d rescued four other survivors almost by accident, shooting one in the process. That had been a long day of surprises, capped by emergency field surgery and jury-rigged blood donation. But the biggest surprise had come from Ash. Ash was a doctor. A surgeon actually, she’d told them all in that stunned moment of silence as Skully, the kid Holiday had accidentally shot during the rescue attempt, bled out in the back of the butterscotch and gore-spattered Cutlass Sierra.

Dying.

She’d saved the kid’s life and when it was all done she’d slapped Holiday straight across the face and walked away.

And Frank...

The bottle was still where Frank had set it that night. At the bottom of the steps that led up to Holiday’s townhome.

“I can take it,” Holiday said to no one in the garden quiet. “And just go off and...”

He felt his body tense. Tense to bend down and touch the bottle. And to touch the bottle was to pick it up.

“... to pick it up... and if you pick it up,” he told himself. Well, you know what happens next. The cap with the paper seal... comes off... and the fumes inside hit and...

... game on.

He tore his eyes away from the bottle and watched the night. He remembered the thing that had walked through the fog on that last night when it had just been he and Ash and Frank enjoying port and cigars. Whatever it was, that thing that moved through the fog above them, it had been gigantic. The footprint alone, the one that made a deep impression in the burnt-out remains of the avocado orchard, had been enough for Holiday to lie down in, crossways. Frank had said the footprint was like something from the “outer dark” and that had struck Holiday as odd... and even somehow, true.

Holiday’s eyes had fallen again to the bottle Frank had left for him.

He had a problem.

Maybe, he told himself.

Or maybe other people had a problem with his drinking. Frank said they were counting him out. Had counted him out and then he’d left the bottle for Holiday to destroy himself with.

It was still there. Waiting.

The fog swirled across the silence of the night.

And maybe it was something about that swirling fog and Frank’s “outer dark” comment and the feeling of a deep without a bottom that caused Holiday to turn back toward the front door and step within his townhome. He quickly shut the door behind himself, feeling that the fog had suddenly come closer and nearer in that instant and that it wanted to... touch him.

He told himself he’d gone inside because he didn’t want to drink. He even believed it once he’d said it. But in truth, as he lay in bed and listened to the night, watching the light make shadows along the wall, it was more about the fog and the “outer dark” than the bottle waiting on the front steps.

By early morning the fog began to disappear, withering in the blinding sunlight. One by one, all but Skully came out onto the street again.

Frank had set up a folding table near the kiddie park. He had several thermos’ full of coffee and a few rolls set out. Mugs of different stamp and color completed the snack selection on the table. There were also yellow legal pads and pens.

Holiday took a mug that had San Giorgio written across its face and poured some coffee into it, getting a blond version of the black he usually preferred.

“I made both,” said Frank watching him. Frank was clean shaven, dressed in light work clothes and smiling. He turned to some notes he was making, saying nothing else to Holiday, greeting each newcomer as they arrived in the kiddie park.

Dante.

Candace.

Ritter.

He handed out the yellow legal pads and told each it was theirs to keep and to make any notes they might need. He also gave them a pen.

Within an hour, they’d all assembled save Ash and Skully. Ash had made a brief appearance, pouring coffee and speaking in hushed tones with Frank. Then she turned and went back to Frank’s townhome. If she’d noticed Holiday, it didn’t show.

“Welcome everybody. First, I’d like to start fresh. I imagine the medical emergency that was occurring when we all first met, and then not being able to see there for a little while yesterday, might have made introductions difficult so... I’m Frank,” He looked at Candace, Ritter, and Dante.

“Woah, this like AA or somethin’?,” asked Ritter. “Cause I ain’t got no problems. It’s medicinal. I gotta scrip.”

Frank smiled patiently.

“Jes’ kiddin’, hoss.” Ritter laughed. His laugh was dry and tired, almost soundless. No one else joined in.

“In a way, you’re right, son,” said Frank. Ritter’s eyes went momentarily wide at the word “son”. But Frank continued. “We’re all here because we have a problem.”

Frank paused. He looked at each of them, making eye contact. Checking for some quality. Examining what he found within. Withholding judgment.

“Our problem is that it looks like, for all intents and purposes, civilization may have just folded and gotten up from the table in light of... well, in light of the zombies. To tell you the truth, I don’t know what those things are. Maybe they’re just really sick people. Some virus. A terrorist attack even, I don’t know, we’ll let Stephen King figure it out. Whatever it is, they are antithetical to life.”

He paused and took a drink from his mug.

“I for one would like to go on living and my guess is, if you’re here, you made that same choice once everything went to hell in a handbasket last week. Yeah, that’s how long it’s been. A little over a week and no emergency services, national guard, army or marines.”

No one said anything. Candace, wearing jeans and a flannel shirt shifted uncomfortably. Her power suit was gone.

“So that means we’ll need to take care of ourselves for the foreseeable future,” continued Frank after setting his mug down. “And that’s why we’re here. All of us, together, are going to decide how to take care of each other. So that’s the first of many votes we’re going to take. If you want to take care of each other and try to make it through whatever this is... then raise your hand. If you don’t, don’t. You can take a day to get some supplies and we’ll do our best to help you, then head on out of here and go wherever it is you think is better. Sound fair? So let’s vote. Right now. Everybody in favor of taking care of each other, raise your hand.”

At first no one did. Everyone looked at nothing. The ground. The sky. A few sidelong glances, seeing if anyone else’s hand had gone up. Everyone avoided Frank’s smile.

Candace raised her hand.

Then Dante, watching her, raised his massive paw.

Holiday next.

And finally, with a mumbled, “whatever,” Ritter stuck his spindly twig in the air.

“Good,” said Frank, acknowledging everyone except Holiday. Then, “Good. Okay, the next vote we need to take is on how we’re going to survive. If you’ve got an idea, then now’s the time to raise it. So let’s hear it, people, whaddya got?”

No one said anything.

“What about the Marine Base at Pendleton?” asked Candace.

“I thought about that,” said Frank. “I was a marine back in ‘Nam. Seventy-three. But that means we’d have to fight our way down to the 5 south and through the rest of Southern Orange County and then on down to the base at the tip of San Diego. That’s a lot of road, through hostile country, I might add. And we don’t have a lot of weapons.”

“How do you know it’s hostile?” shot Dante, his bark breaking the morning calm. “How do you know that, man?”

“I don’t, son,” said Frank.

“The marines aren’t controlling anything,” interrupted Ritter. “They got lotsa helicopters. But they ain’t flying patrols or looking for survivors. That means they aren’t even interested in getting all up into Southern Orange County. Now, the OC is nothing but neighborhood after neighborhood of housing tracts. It’s a bedroom community. People down here tend to have medium to large families or, down in the barrio, you might have several families to a house. Last time I checked, the local population was pushing two million. If that infection is running wild, and it looks like it is, we have to assume a high percentage of that two million are now infected zekes... I mean zombies. Those bedroom communities are perfect breeding grounds for the infection. The initial infection probably progressed relatively fast. Still, there may have been some holdouts. Other survivors barricading themselves in secure locations like hospitals and malls. Stuff like that. As those locations fall, which they will, that means the infection will increase and we’ll see more zekes out and about.”

Everyone stared at Ritter. His ghetto-speak had disappeared for a moment. Then it returned.

“Jes’ sayin’ and all,” Ritter said with a shrug, then looked off and waved his long hand at nothing.

“So there’s nowhere we can run?” asked Dante to no one as he threw up his massive hands. “Nowhere?” His eyes were wide and his face twisted into a snarl. “Man, I can’t believe this!”

“Until we hear something from someone, no,” said Frank after a small pause. “There’s nowhere to run to.”

“So then, what are we s’posed to do?” shouted Dante.

Silence.

“Vote on a plan,” replied Frank softly.

“There ain’t no plan!” yelled Dante even louder.

“Not yet, son. But we’re making one, together. Right now.”

Silence.

“So,” began Ritter. “I got a feeling you gots to have a plan and all, chief. So rather than asking us a bunch of stupid questions... why don’t you jes’ tell us what you got in mind. Then we all vote on it.”

Frank cleared his throat. “Alright,” he picked up his yellow legal pad. He cleared his throat again. “I suggest we build a castle.”

He stopped. No one said anything. What do you say when someone asks you to build a castle? Unless you’re with a four year old and it’s a day at the beach, it isn’t something often discussed in adult world.

“We build a castle to defend ourselves from whatever has happened out there,” continued Frank.

Then again, the world had ended. So maybe it was time for adults to talk about building castles again.

“Like medieval knights and stuff,” said Ritter, his voice blunt and less sarcastic than usual.

Frank smiled.

“A castle was used for defensive purposes. To wait out a siege by an opposing army. To gather your resources. To have some place safe to rest and train. It’s still something that’s employed by modern armies when they build an observation post in enemy territory, or what we used to call back in ‘Nam, a forward base. Basically it’s a fortified position inside enemy territory. That’s how we need to think of everything.” He waved a knife-edged hand to encompass the world beyond their circle. “Out there, until we find someplace safe to run to, for now, kids, everything out there is enemy territory. You go outside that front gate, expect trouble.”

“You got my word on that,” said Ritter. “It’s cray cray out there.” Ritter slouched down in his folding chair and extended his legs while folding his arms.

“Right,” continued Frank, warming to his argument. “And you try to hold out in enemy territory with no safe place to rest, or resupply, and you might make it a few days, three at the most. But if you’ve got some walls to get behind, and some people you can trust and depend on to watch your back, then you can catch your breath, rest and keep the enemy at bay.”

Dante shot up out of his chair and began to storm off toward the slide. A few steps across the green grass and he turned like a bull. Like he was going to charge back at Frank.

“You wanna build a damn castle, like at Disneyland?” shouted Dante. Candace walked over to the big man and rested her hand on his bulging shoulder. Dante shook it off and walked farther away. “You ain’t the boss anymore!” he shouted at her.

He sat down at the edge of the park, on a tiny bench, lowered his massive head into the catcher’s mitts that were his hands and screamed behind them. Candace turned away.

For a long moment they listened to Dante sob.

“Yes, Dante,” said Frank softly, kneeling in front of the black giant. “That’s exactly what I want to do. Except... a real castle, not a make-believe one.”

“And how do we do that?” sobbed Dante from behind his fingers.

“Well, a lot of it’s already done for us. This place has four almost complete walls.”

“It does?” said Dante still hiding behind his fingers.

“Sort of. But there are some holes in those walls. All we need to do is patch those holes and these things can’t get in here, once we shut the gate.”

Dante wiped tears and snot from his eyes and nose.

“What kinda holes?” he asked, his bloodshot eyes glaring at Frank.

“Oh...” Frank stood with a groan. They heard his knees pop. “Bedroom windows. Front windows. Spaces between the buildings and the main entrance. The doors facing outward are all dead bolted and locked. But once we fill in those gaps we’ll be pretty safe. I promise.”

“You can’t promise that,” mumbled Dante.

“No. I can’t. But it’s the best we can do for right now. And... it’s all we got.”

After a moment, head down, Dante lifted his massive arm, the bicep and shoulder muscles stretching the business shirt he’d worn all week back at Green Front Technology.

“Alright, then I vote for that.”

So did everyone else.

Chapter Three

Ash stood over Skully. She’d just used the last of her morphine and now she watched the scrawny, shaven-headed boy’s chest slowly rise and fall.

“That’s it buddy,” she whispered. “After this, you’re going to have to get by on Anacin, or whatever it is they have here.”

She put two fingers on Skully’s wrist and raised her silvery watch into a morning sunbeam. She stared at the watch, finding the heartbeat. Watching the red Hammer and Sickle on the watch’s face. It helped her focus on the slow rhythmic pulse.

Low.

She stood back, watching him.

His eyes fluttered.

He was thin. Too thin. Bony. Small. Hollow cheeks and a shaved scalp. A small, strange tattoo on his wrist.

The bullet had nicked the bottom of the rib cage and she’d had to chase down bone fragments to clean the wound. But the bullet had missed the liver. The round was practically pushing through the small of the kid’s back and she’d toyed with the idea of just making a cut and popping it out. But she couldn’t risk another incision site. It would increase the likelihood of infection. So she’d moved the liver aside, gently, and gone in after the bullet with Frank holding a flashlight over her shoulder and someone else holding the retractors.

Now the recovery room that was once the dining area was quiet. The townhome, Frank’s, was empty save her and the boy. Distantly she could hear hammers pounding nails into plywood on the other side of the neighborhood.

“More painkillers and antibiotics,” she mumbled to herself. “An autoclave... if it’s possible,” she added in a whisper. Frank had found her an empty townhome they could set up as an “aid station”. That’s what guys from ‘Nam called a Casualty Collection Point. She’d known old Sergeant Majors that still used the term.

She watched the boy and listened to the distant sound of construction, echoing out across the quiet neighborhood and the dead silence of the world beyond.

Frank, Dante, and Ritter carried another sheet of plywood into the third house they’d fortify before lunch. Two stories above, Candace watched from a rooftop, holding the sniper rifle and Frank’s binoculars. If she saw any of them, any zombies coming, she was to use the whistle Frank had given her. But she wasn’t to shoot unless it was absolutely necessary. They only had three bullets left for the large caliber rifle Holiday had taken from the downed helicopter.

She scanned the surrounding hills, homes, and empty spaces of field and road. It was dry and quiet across the suburban wasteland withering under another day’s blanket of sun and heat. The sky was hazy, but any of the distant fires they’d seen down in the valley below had burned themselves out.

The surrounding quiet was unreal. Thick. Like a blanket, or even a living animal that smothered its victims with its heavy weight. Or like something waiting out beyond the perimeter, something waiting where it couldn’t be seen.

“When we gonna make a run up to the store for more food and y’know... stuff. I need some smokes, bad.” Ritter was shirtless, his body muscled yet pasty, slick with sweat and grimy with dirt.

“Let’s get this finished up,” grunted Frank as he pushed the plywood board up into place, covering a window, with Dante matching his movements on the other side of the board. “And then we’ll make a run. There’s a store nearby called the Market Faire.”

Holiday maneuvered in through the tight doorway with three heavy two by eights on his shoulder. He set them down on someone’s faux leather couch underneath a picture of a family posed in matching khaki pants and white button down shirts, as waves and a Southern California sunset completed the portrait.

“Find the studs and anchor to that,” said Frank, breathing heavily.

“Yes sir, boss man,” said Ritter and dragged a hammer off a belt loop while reaching into his pants for more of the long iron nails. Dante was already placing one into the two by eights.

Holiday waited for Frank to tell him what to do next. But Frank hadn’t. Wouldn’t. For every job that needed someone to do something, Frank had just picked someone else. At times he would even look at Holiday, but he wouldn’t see him, or at least that’s how it felt to everyone.

Holiday wondered if they were all in on it. If everyone else was counting him out too.

They were sealing up the front wall, or what Frank had called “the Southern Wall of the Castle”. The defenses he’d put up with Ash and Frank seemed almost flimsy to Holiday compared with Frank’s new plans. But the work was slower. Right now they were just trying to seal the ground level outward-facing windows in the townhome units. Eventually they’d have to seal the gaps between the building with more than just wire and fencing. Flimsy wire mesh wouldn’t hold up against a crowd of zombies like the ones that had surrounded the Green Front Headquarters, or so Ritter declared and Candace and Dante silently agreed.

The Fence would stay. It would be a guide for their future wall, said Frank. But how to get the materials for a wall that was worth putting up was the question that pulled at the back of Frank’s mind that whole hot sweaty morning of a seemingly endless summer, even though the calendar read mid-September.

The Southern Wall was the wall that contained the main entrance and faced the rest of Viejo Verde and the neighborhood across the way where Holiday had hopped the fence to rescue Ash. If there were more zombies coming, they’d come from that direction. So that, as Frank pointed out, was where they needed to start the work of building defenses.

At noon they broke for lunch which consisted of sandwiches at Frank’s house, and an hour later they piled onto the flatbed truck and drove slowly up to the Market Faire.

“There’s at least two of ‘em in the walk-in freezer back in the meat department,” announced Holiday. No one said anything and that made Holiday certain that Frank had told them he was not to be trusted.

“Let’s clear the store as a group. If it’s safe, we’ll split into teams and shop for half an hour. Produce and meat are bad by now so don’t even think about it. We’ll have to get some crops started eventually,” announced Frank.

“Crops,” said Ritter under his breath. “Sure thing, boss man.”

“What about frozen?” asked Candace.

“Good point. For some strange reason the electricity is still working,” answered Frank. “So why not until it goes out.”

Holiday cast a glance at the shopping cart full of booze he’d left out in the farthest reaches of the parking lot when he’d drunkenly fled from a mass of walking dead people in his middle of the night misadventure. When he turned back to the rest of the group, Frank was watching him.

They went inside and cleared the store. There were no other zombies besides the two locked away in the butcher’s freezer and a half hour later, with stuffed bags and shopping carts, they left the store. Frank gave them the rest of the afternoon off to get their houses sorted. They’d start back to work on the Southern Wall again in the morning.

That night there wasn’t any fog and Holiday stayed home. He could hear them down by Frank’s townhome, barbecuing some frozen chicken Frank had picked up from the store. Later, he walked down the street a little way and stood watching them from the shadows of the kiddie park.

Just get drunk, Holiday told himself, feeling the thought, testing it out to see if it could hold inside his head. “Forget it and let the dice fly,” he whispered.

The words felt odd in his mind. Familiar, and yet, out of place.

Let the dice fly.

He walked forward out of the dark and found the other survivors sitting on folding chairs around the glowing coals of the barbecue. Ritter was finishing the story of how they’d all survived inside the Green Front Technology Headquarters for more than a week. He left out none of the suicides or poorly planned escape attempts that ended in the deaths of others.

He did leave out a certain briefcase which was now stored under the queen-sized bed of the townhome he’d decided to occupy up near the main entrance and the front gate. Frank called it “the Gatehouse” because the townhome sat next to the entrance.

Frank got up and pulled some chicken skewers off the grill, set them on a plate and handed them to Holiday without a word. Holiday looked at Ash who smiled only politely, then turned away to her glass of wine and someone else. Then he sat down.

“So what’s your story?” asked Dante.

Holiday looked up from his skewer. He’d been hungrier than he thought. He hadn’t drank. The bottle was still waiting on the front steps of his townhome. He hadn’t eaten much either. Now Frank’s chicken skewers, yellow with spices and smelling of charred onion made his mouth water.

“I mean,” continued Dante. “How’d you come to be out that way and run into Ritter?” It wasn’t hard to notice the way the big black man spat out Ritter’s name.

“Just was,” said Holiday after a long silence. Then he shoved a thick piece of tasty chicken into his mouth and began to chew. No one probed any further and dinner, or them watching Holiday finish the last of the chicken, resumed. Someone got up to refill everyone’s glass and Holiday noticed they didn’t offer any to him.

So Frank’s talked to them, thought Holiday as he chewed the last of the tasty chicken. Telling them he’s a drunk. A risk and incapable of being relied upon. Incapable of being trusted.

“How we gonna fill in them gaps between the buildings, Frank?” asked Dante.

Frank sighed. “I don’t know just yet. But something’ll occur to me.”

“Better be soon,” mumbled Dante. “Cause ain’t no use all this other stuff if them things can just walk on in here.”

Dinner finished shortly after that and everyone drifted off into the night, heading back toward their new townhomes.

Holiday heard Ritter ask, “Walk you home, Candy?” in the darkness that surrounded the still-glowing barbecue.

“Candace and no, thank you,” she replied. The monotone “thank you” emphasized the obvious flatness of her rejection.

“Whatever, girlfriend,” said Ritter and they were all gone, even Ash who’d left to check on Skully.

Frank was organizing the last of the trash.

“Thanks for the chicken, Frank.”

He turned to face Holiday, smiling. “Sure thing, buddy. No problem.”

There was an awkward moment. As though something more should come next. “I thought...,” began Holiday, stumbling. “I thought I was persona non grata.”

“Not at all, buddy. I’ll still feed ya. You can live here. It’s your house. You can even try to help out like you have been.” Frank paused and stuffed some paper plates into a trash bag. Then then he turned and looked straight at Holiday. “But I’ll never trust you. And, in case you’re wondering, I’ve told everyone else not to trust you. Just so you know. It’s safer that way. For us.”

“Just so I know,” repeated Holiday after a short silence.

“Yeah. Just so you know, buddy. And soon, it’s just a matter of time really, trust me, you’ll blow it again and then they’ll see I was right about you. Matter of time, kid.”

Holiday remained silent, then, “That’s important to you, isn’t it Frank? Being right about me?”

Frank’s face blossomed with surprise. “Yeah, why wouldn’t it be? I mean I... we, we all want to go on living. And right now, being right’s all we’ve got and maybe that might not even be enough. But you don’t understand that. You don’t get it. You know why? Because you don’t care about anyone but yourself. And life, or whatever it is that’s happened out there, it’s gonna make you pay if you’re wrong. So, yeah, being right is real important to the rest of us right about now. Ought to be. You’d know that if you weren’t so busy killing yourself with the booze.”

“So... what if I don’t drink?”

“So what if you don’t? So what if you do? I don’t care anymore, kid, and neither does anyone else. You had your chance and you chose the booze over your friends. Over me and Ash. We woke up to a street full of those things because you left the gate wide open on your little booze run. We could have been killed and you couldn’t have cared less.”

“But you weren’t!” Holiday shot back. “And oh, by the way, I rescued some people while I was out.”

Frank shook his head in disgust. “If that’s the way you need to see it, fine. But all that... all that “us not getting killed” and you “helping” those people... hell kid, that’s not even the point. You walked out on us ‘cause you got thirsty. You chose it over us and mark my words, you’ll do it again.”

A glare, filled with hate and contempt and a small amount of pity, stared back at Holiday. It was the pity that stung the most, thought Holiday who shrugged, then looked off into the night. Frank smiled, cleared his throat and smiled again. “Listen, kid,” his voice was warm and low. “I don’t hate you. Yeah, I was disappointed in what you did, but I realize you’ve got a problem with the hooch. Fine. But I can’t help you right now and I can’t trust you ever. I wanna go on living. I need to go on living. I...” Frank paused.

Holiday saw a sudden tear form in one of Frank’s eyes. The older man bent down quickly to pick up a stray wine glass, then rose again to face Holiday. If there had been a tear, it was gone now.

“We all need to go on living, kid. And... I just don’t think you’re good for this community.”

Holiday walked back toward his townhome. The streets were dark where the street lights didn’t cast their light. In his mind, he could see the bottle and knew it was still there, waiting for him. Right where Frank had left it on the front porch. Ahead, he could see the small gate leading into the small yard and the steps to his house. He knew the bottle of top shelf liquor, probably whiskey from Frank’s cabinet, was waiting there, still, just out of sight, waiting in the shadows.

Waiting for him.

Let the dice fly.

He kept on walking past his house. Toward the front entrance. The light in Ritter’s “Gatehouse” was still on. Holiday snorted. “Gatehouse.” Frank wants to be king of a castle. Fine.

He dialed in the combination for the padlock at the gate, heard it “click” gently in the dark, slipped through the gate, reached back in, and snapped the lock closed again. Checking it twice. Making sure it was locked.

Then he spun the combination dial.

Let the dice fly.

And he was off, out onto the street and into the night. Off in the dark.

Chapter Four

He wasn’t going to drink.

Outside the gate, standing under palms that lined the entrance, Holiday watched as ground-lighting timed to some un-regarding automated system that didn’t care if the world had ended or gone on, threw shafts of golden light up into the high fronds above. Holiday turned and looked down the hill, following the road. He was facing west. The truth was, he had no intention of drinking. Holiday knew he needed to earn their trust back. Frank’s. Ash’s. Everyone’s.

Ash.

All that hot day, as they’d labored under Frank’s direction to hammer sheets of plywood into place across the windows of the individual townhomes that formed the outer wall of the “Castle”, he’d thought about her. Nailing crossbeams into place along the studs to back the wood from the battening it might take some day when the dead and crazy came calling, he’d thought about how to get back into the group. How to get back to what they’d almost had in the pool that night. He and Ash.

Hopefully that would never happen. The dead showing up, that is. Hopefully the corpses had all followed the natural contours of the land and wandered toward the coast. A battering forest of fists at their plywood-sealed windows and locked doors, and even the someday actual front gate Frank promised them, should never happen. Because if it did, where could they run to next if the walls collapsed?

Holiday tried to think of some way to seal the gaps between the townhome clusters that made up the outer wall. They’d all tried to think of something that could be done to secure the gaping holes in their perimeter. If all the zombies back at the Green Front parking lot concentrated at any one point along the flimsy wire mesh fence, then it was over for all of them. There’d be nothing they could do but run.

A run to nowhere as fast as they could for as long as they could. Which wasn’t forever. Holiday remembered what it was like to be chased by the dead through the night with no place to hide. You could only run for so long. And you never knew what was ahead of you, except probably more of them. And the dead never seemed to tire of chasing.

“Build a cinderblock wall,” Candace had offered.

They’d discussed that. But they’d need the wall to reach at least two stories high. The amount of cinderblocks they’d need, brick or whatever they could get their hands on, was beyond what the Home Depot had in stock. The next building supply store was two cities away across dozens of neighborhoods. Neighborhoods most likely... infested with the dead.

Was that the right word? Infested?

Neighborhoods where each house could hide dozens of once-humans turned to frenzied, almost unstoppable, killers. Zombies. That’s what everyone was calling them.

Infected.

Each supply run farther and farther from what was known might draw more, many more, zombies back to the Vineyards townhome complex. Back to where it was safe, for now. Back to the one place that seemed safe in the world and what was left of it.

A herd of dead.

Infected.

Like animals.

Even less than.

Dante was the next to try. He’d suggested they dig a moat.

That plan was pretty good, initially. Until they considered the closeness of the slope that led down from the road above the Vineyards, leading up to the intersection and its proximity to the “Eastern Wall” they would start building next. A good rain, which might happen if this was an El Nińo year, no one could remember if it was, and a hill that had been destabilized by a slit trench would slide down and crash through their wall.

An El Nińo year was a year of almost torrential monsoon-like rains and flooding. Before the world had ended two weeks ago, those El Nińo years had almost seemed like the end of the world as city services and news crews raced to handle sliding hills, overflowing rivers and swamped roadways.

Frank thought it felt like it might actually be an El Nińo year.

“Plus,” added Ritter. “They’ll just pile up in the ditch and start climbing on top of each other.” He paused. Then, “they almost made it up to the second story that way back at Green Front.”

But they hadn’t, Candace thought and didn’t say a word.

“So even if we do build a wall, what’s to keep ‘em from doing that?” asked Dante.

“Us,” replied Frank. “Once the walls are up, we’ll build walkways so we can move along the walls quickly. If we see them piling up in any one location, we’ll use long poles or something to push ‘em off.”

Holiday spoke up. “We could lure them farther down the wall and spread them out by making noise and getting their attention. They seem to go for that. We should get trumpets and horns.”

“Yeah, that’s good,” said Frank, lost in the problem, forgetting the rule to ignore Holiday in front of everyone at all times. When Frank noticed the policy lapse he quickly changed the subject. “Weapons. We’ll need to think about weapons because we can’t just push zombies off the wall. We’ll have to destroy them. Right in the head. Right now we’ve only got one rifle with three bullets and three other guns without any ammo. Tonight, look through your places for anything. Guns are obvious, but my guess is we’ll need to make weapons that we can... y’know... jab... into their heads. Or smash ‘em with. Something along those lines.”

Frank hadn’t mentioned the two pearl-handled silver .45s and the matching silencers he’d used to clear out the Vineyards last time. He was down to a fully-loaded clip apiece for each pistol. He’d kept an odd bullet back. It was in his shirt pocket.

The “just-in-case” bullet.

It was much later that Holiday, who’d been thinking about how to solve the wall problem, remembered the pistol Ritter had pointed at him back at the 7-11. The snub-nosed .357 magnum.

Ritter hadn’t offered that to the community defense arsenal either.

Later, when they’d finished the left half of the Western Wall and were taking a short break, resting in the shade underneath the high stucco wall and terracotta-tiled roofs, Ritter spoke up next about what to do regarding the gaps in the walls.

“Over in Afghanistan they use these large mesh and canvas bags. They fill ‘em up with rock. If we could get something like that, a container or something, maybe we could build a wall out of those? We could steal ourselves a dozer and load the bags, then stack ‘em up.”

No one said anything as they moved their tools and supplies to the right side of the Western Wall, standing them up near the small wire fence. Now that they’d been talking about what had to be done, about the intensity and the resolve they’d need to kill uncountable legions of piling zombies, though no one spoke about the sheer numbers of the dead imagined, now the flimsy prefab wire gate looked almost laughable in the orange afternoon light.

Except no one laughed.

“We could find a pool store,” Dante tried again, breaking the late afternoon silence. The sky above was orange. Haze hung low and visibility didn’t even reach down to the coast, even when they’d stood on the hot clay-tile rooftops trying to look down into the valley and the coastal plain beyond.

“Why would we do that?” asked Frank.

“Well, you know those pools, the above ground ones?”

“Doughboys,” clarified Ritter who drank from a water bottle, shirtless and dirty while absently exploring his belly button with a long finger.

“Yeah,” replied Dante. “Those. We could fill one of those up with rocks and make a wall I guess, or we could even use prefab hot tubs. I bet there’s a supply warehouse somewhere in those big box buildings between Forest Lake and Bake. Got to be.”

It wasn’t a bad idea.

It wasn’t a good one either and it seemed dead when Candace spoke up as they walked back to their houses to clean up before dinner. “It won’t work if we use Doughboys. They’re too flimsy. Put a bunch of rocks in there and they’ll just break through the sides.”

“You been in a lotta doughboys, Candy?” asked Ritter.

Candace rolled her eyes at Ritter, then shook her head.

“No need to be touchy, girl. Just wonderin’. My Moms couldn’t afford no Doughboy so anyone who could was just plain better than us, that’s all,” said Ritter.

With that they’d parted ways, tired, sore, beat and hungry.

But Holiday continued to work the problem in his mind even as they barbecued the tasty yellow chicken and onions down in front of Frank’s townhome.

They could take a forklift from the Home Depot, thought Holiday. They could get one and haul stacks of wood and just drop the stacks, already organized into neat rectangles, into the gaps between the townhome clusters. But that didn’t seem like it would make the sturdiest of walls. In his mind, Holiday saw the stacks of wood shifting under the pressure of a herd... or a horde... or an army... “a massed attack” of zombies was the word his mind found and he had no idea why, but a “massed attack” of zombies against a specific location seemed like the correct term for the tactic. They’d push that kind of wall right over and then those stacks might fall inward, which would be bad, and even worse if they were defending themselves from behind the stacks. Or fighting the zombies off from the top of the stacked wood piles. If they survived being crushed or maimed by the suddenly collapsing wall, it wouldn’t be for long. Those things would be across all that splintered and jutting lumber in seconds, regardless if they impaled themselves along the way toward their next meal.

Back in his own townhome, Holiday had sat in the big purple chair for a long time as he returned to Dante’s moat idea. It was the quickest solution and all they’d need was a bulldozer from the heavy construction equipment rental yard on the far side of the toll road, less than a mile way. They could probably have a nice trench around the entire complex in a few days.

But the more he thought about it, the more he realized digging a trench was beyond their abilities. No one had mentioned anything about being able to drive construction equipment, much less grade a trench without it collapsing in on them. He had a vague memory of watching TV one afternoon as a local news helicopter hovered over a construction site while the words “Trench Collapse, Workers Trapped” scrolled across the bottom of the screen. That could happen. And if it did, what could they do to get whoever was buried inside their trench out?

He was tired but felt good from all the hard work and sweat and trying to solve the problem of the gaps in the wall. But there wasn’t any idea that seemed to offer the perfect solution.

Later, when it was dark and he heard them all talking down the street, the only sounds in the early evening as he stood on his patio, he wanted to be among them. And if he was truly honest with himself, drinking wine with them.

Drinking.

He saw himself sitting next to Ash. Holding her hand.

It wasn’t impossible. It just wasn’t possible now. If he redeemed himself, then... maybe.

And that’s the real reason why you want to be the hero and solve the wall problem. You want her.

And he didn’t answer himself because it wasn’t a question. It was just the truth. He was hungry, too, and that was when he walked down the street and joined them near the glowing red ashy gray coals of the barbecue.

Now, walking west in the silent night, down the hill toward the construction equipment rental yard on the other side of the toll road Holiday thought, yes, I want to be with her and nothing more.

Frank awoke at dawn. He always did. He was a morning person. He slipped on his satin and fur-trimmed bathrobe and went down to the kitchen. Ash was on the couch, holding a mug.

“I made coffee two hours ago.”

Frank said nothing. Just poured some, tasted it, made a face he couldn’t stop himself from making, shrugged and then drank again.

“Why are you up so early?” asked Frank.

“Kid couldn’t sleep. I’m out of painkillers. I gave him some aspirin you had in the guest bathroom and it didn’t do much, but I told him it was strong stuff and he eventually fell asleep.”

“Does that trick work?”

“Sometimes. Depends on the patient. Depends on how badly they want to believe it’s all going to go away. The pain, that is.”

“Hmmm,” muttered Frank and drank one more time, made the face again then spit the coffee out and started to make a fresh pot once he’d dashed the contents of his mug into the sink. “Sorry,” he grumbled without remorse.

“No problem. Where I come from we don’t even get coffee.”

And Frank was going to ask where in the world you can’t get coffee when he heard a light tapping at the door.

It was Holiday.

“Yeah?” said Frank. It was neither warm nor polite.

Holiday expelled a lungful of air and began. “I think I found the solution to our wall problem. If you can meet me by the front gate in a few, I think you’ll like what you see.”

Frank nodded and closed the door. Then he made another pot of coffee. Later, after he’d showered and not shaved, wondering how long the water and the power were going to last, and thinking the facial hair he’d decided to let grow would make him look like that guy that used to sell beer as a sort of Hemingway slash matador knock off, he dressed and passed Ash down in the living room. She’d already finished the rest of Frank’s new pot of coffee.

“I saved you one last round.”

Frank picked up the mug. It was lukewarm. He milked it and then tasted again. He didn’t make a face. But it wasn’t perfect, that was clear.

“I need to get that aid station up and running today,” said Ash, standing up from the couch with a yawn. “And if I do, we need to make a run to the hospital or a nearby pharmacy. We have to have supplies in place before we actually need them.”

“Okay. We’ll get you moved in. I found a place up the street, near the middle of the complex that’s empty. We can set up a surgery center downstairs in the living room, use the kitchen to clean up, and there’s a downstairs bedroom for any patients I hope you never have. You can live upstairs, we’ll get a bed and some furniture out of one of the other places, okay?”

“Okay,” said Ash. “But what about the supply run?”

“The nearest hospital is down by the Five. I don’t like it. It was bad down there when I tried to run for it. There’s a pharmacy at the Target and another one, a Rite Aid or something, nearby. We can check those out.”

“Those are all stopgaps. If I ever need to do surgery again, I’m going to need some pretty heavy duty tranqs and antibiotics. A hospital might be the only place.”

Frank moved to the door, shooting an, “Okay, we’ll make a plan tomorrow,” over his shoulder as he left.

He met Candace halfway up the street. Her place was near Holiday’s. She was standing by a parked car, her face tilted toward the rising sun.

“Good night’s rest?” asked Frank.

“Some, not enough.” She fell in beside Frank as he walked up the street toward the front entrance. When they arrived at the “Gate”, Ritter stepped from his house, pulling on a black t-shirt.

“Where’s the coffee? My place ain’t got none,” he whined.

“Then you’ll probably want to grab some next time we make a run up to the Market Faire,” said Frank.

Ritter moaned.

Beyond the Front Gate, Holiday stood next to a modified flatbed truck carrying a medium sized cargo container. STAX was written on the side of the cargo container and below that, the motto, “Your secure total relocation system”. Behind the flatbed was a heavy duty and very odd-shaped forklift with two overly long loading arms and a tall elevator which traversed skyward making the forklift seem stoop-shouldered.

Frank, Ritter, and Candace stood in front of Holiday.

“We can build a wall out of these,” exclaimed Holiday. “I found a rental yard where there are hundreds of them.”

Silence.

Ritter and Candace walked forward toward the truck and forklift.

“And just when did you find this... this stuff?” growled Frank suddenly.

Everyone turned.

“Last night,” said Holiday.

“After we went to sleep you just let yourself out and went traipsing around.”

“I locked the gate behind me... and I can do whatever I want. We’re not prisoners.”

“Well, I’m glad about that. This time you locked the gate. Good job, kid. But what if you’d gotten into trouble out there?”

No one said anything.

Frank continued. “What if you’d gotten into trouble out there and none of us knew about it?”

“Then, worst case scenario, I’d be dead. End of problem,” replied Holiday evenly.

“No, that isn’t the worst case scenario, kid. The worst case is, wounded, you might have dragged a bunch of them back here and surprised us all. Maybe even died trying to get through the gate and then we wake up and they’re inside again because of your selfishness! Or maybe you could have even gotten bit and decided not to tell anyone about it ‘cause you’re that kinda guy.”

“Selfishness,” Holiday said flatly. “I did this for you. For all of you!”

Frank snorted. “You don’t do anything for anyone but yourself.”

Holiday thought of Ash. Thought of holding her hand again and their moment at the pool. The angry look Frank shot at Holiday told him Frank knew exactly what he was thinking. Knew why Holiday really did it, even if Holiday didn’t know himself. Or didn’t want to admit it.

“C’mon, Frank,” said Candace. “It’s actually a pretty good idea.”

Frank glared at them all. Then, “It is. I wish I’d thought of it. Because if I had... I’d have waited and worked as a team to get it done rather than trying to grandstand and play the hero, jeopardizing all of our lives in the process.”

Holiday walked forward.

“Frank, I’m sorry. I didn’t think of it like that, I...”

“You didn’t think, kid. That’s your number one problem!” said Frank, landing a thick finger right in the center of Holiday’s chest.

Holiday swallowed. Lowered his head and tried again.

“You’re right about that.” He took a breath. “But can you let go of that, Frank, and see that this might actually work for us?”

When he looked up, Frank was staring into his eyes. The warmth, the teamwork, the friendship that had been there during those first few days when it had just been the two of them, fighting off that fire, all that was gone now.

And Holiday missed it. He’d really liked Frank.

“Alright, kid,” growled Frank. “Tell us how you figured this one out.”

Chapter Five

Holiday had gone to the construction equipment rental yard in the night. He’d crossed quiet streets where another car might never again drive. He’d steered clear of the two neighborhoods he passed. The one where he’d first seen Ash running for her life and the other they’d fled into and barely escaped from the dead end cul-de-sac. At the entrances to each neighborhood, he watched the quiet streets within and the tall, dark houses that lay along them. There was no one, no living thing or zombie there.

There might never be again.

And yet it did not feel empty in its seeming lack of life. Holiday knew unthinking eyes could be watching him from inside those houses. Forever trapped, forever watching. He knew that kind of horror was possible now.

He continued down the little side street to the bottom of the road that ran smack into the three story multi-building apartment complex. “Vista Del Sol” its floodlit entrance proclaimed in the stillness of the night. Through an arch with a high bell tower rising above, he could see a courtyard beyond and the remains of bodies lying on the cobblestones there.

It reminded him of some lost desert city in the ancient Middle East after a battle. An empty city that refused to yield to siege and now, as the invaders plundered its further reaches, here along its quiet initial porticos and first streets, one found only the dead.

Why? He asked himself. Why would I think of such an image? I’ve never been to war, much less the Middle East.

But the knowledge of such images remained in him and he could not let them go.

Then a realization came on the heels of those images. A stark truth. He knew the shapeless, once-living humans now corpses, would in time, turn to bones and bleach in the thousand suns that followed. He heard himself whisper, “Why?”

And there was no answer in the silence of the night.

He turned due west and followed the street under an overpass. The wide and spreading toll road above. Approaching the overpass made him feel that any moment they, the zombies, would come after him out of the shadows. Up from the weeds and unkempt nature preserve along the sides of the road, out of the shadows under the bridge where the abutment met the toll road above. As though they had been waiting for him all along. Keeping some promise only they understood from the last time he’d escaped them.

I need to bring weapons every time I leave, he thought. But he’d been so angry when he left Frank’s garage that he’d been blinded by his determination to prove himself. He’d left the Guy Fieri flame-handled knife in the kitchen at home.

He crossed the shadowy darkness underneath the overpass and emerged into moonlight on the other side. He turned right at a small street and found the equipment rental yard along its length. The place consisted of a medium-sized concrete warehouse painted Navajo white, now resembling a large tombstone in the faint moonlight, fronted by dark tinted windows and a small entryway.

Most likely the rental office, thought Holiday as he surveyed the place from the road. Up the driveway, beyond the warehouse, lay a gate and a darkened guard shack.

He tried the entryway door. It was locked. Waiting, he listened for any sounds coming from within the warehouse. He listened for the sandy scrape of dragging footsteps. Or a low, husky groan. A thump, even. He heard nothing and moved on to the gate.

Beyond its diamond-shaped mesh he could see yellow tractors and backhoes, bulbous cement mixers and gawky cranes. Cargo vans and bucket lifts were parked over in another section. There were other pieces of equipment but he was unsure what purpose they might serve. He heard a loud thump and then a brief groan. Turning back to the guard shack, he saw a man wearing a uniform slapping weakly at the glass from inside.

It was one of them.

The guard bumped himself into the glass again as he mindlessly beckoned to Holiday. And again. Blood and grease and drool left ghostly ink blot images on the smudgy plastic window.

Holiday climbed the gate-fence as it shifted under his weight. At the top, he hauled himself over and dropped to the other side. Crouching, he waited.

“Why didn’t you take out the guard?” he asked himself. He had no answer and that was when the voice, the grizzled hectoring bark he’d heard inside his head back in the alleyway when he’d rescued Ritter, Candace, Dante and Skully, spoke up.

“Never leave an enemy behind you, maggot.”

He waited.

If they come, if they’ve been watching me, if those things can somehow communicate with each other, they’ll come now and I’ll get back over this fence before I’m surrounded.

If you blow this...

“Be quiet,” he told himself.

He thought instead of how Frank might treat him if he could figure out a way to keep everyone safe. On the other hand, his relationship with everyone... Ash included... would be beyond repair if he somehow failed tonight.

Better to do this or die trying, he thought.

But Holiday still didn’t have any idea, any firm idea, what he was doing out here in the dark and the quiet of night. He knew a piece of construction equipment would help matters, but he couldn’t think of anything other than Dante’s idea to “dig a trench”. He had no idea how any of the machines or vehicles here could make the walls more secure. Or even create walls.

He walked toward the backhoes, selected the biggest one and climbed in. There weren’t that many controls and most were labeled. Trial and error wouldn’t take too long to figure it out. There was an ignition keyhole but no key. He climbed down onto the bone white concrete apron. The moon was high in the night sky now, turning everything around it a powder shade of blue.

Just after midnight, guessed Holiday.

He wandered the enclosed yard. There weren’t any of them here, he noted regarding the zombies. Every so often he could hear the security guard bumping into the see-through plastic of his booth back on the other side of the gate-fence. But the bumps were sporadic and becoming less vigorous. Occasionally, when Holiday happened to come into view of the booth as he searched back and forth across the rental yard, then, the plastic window in the guard booth would again begin to shudder violently.

He searched through the heavy equipment for another hour, making a mental inventory of all the machines they might use. None of them had keys and many were locked by massive chains and padlocks anchored to the concrete. Holiday knew he’d need to go into the dark rental offices of the warehouse to find the keys.

Probably near the front door, near a rental desk of some sort, he reasoned.

He would need the guard’s keys to open the rental office.

Leaning against the back of the building, he found a thin pole about half his height. It had a triangular handle on one end and a “u” shape on the other. It was a tool of some sort, but it seemed far too flimsy for any kind of actual repair work.

It’ll have to do, thought Holiday, taking it and climbing back over the fence. The dead security guard within became even more agitated as Holiday approached the small rectangular shack. The door was on the far side, away from the entry drive. The guard was a shadow leaving smudgy blood and gore along the plastic windows like some very disturbed child’s finger painting. On the other side of the shack, Holiday noticed a piece of paper stuck to the door. It fluttered as a small night breeze came up out of the nearby woods and passed along the surface of the door to the shack.

Holiday cautiously approached and then snatched the paper from the door just as the guard flung himself weakly into it again with a heavy thump that caused him to fall to the floor of the shack. Holiday read the note.

“I didn’t have nothing to kill myself with. Gomes and Ramirez are inside the building. I locked ‘em in there. Gomes bit me hard. I want to see Rose again. If you got a gun please kill me. –Paul”

The moon was falling through billowing bluish clouds into the western night. Along distant hills Holiday could see long lines of waving grass illuminated in the pale moonlight. Buildings and trees, closer at hand, were now mere dark silhouettes.

The guard thumped at the window, leaning heavily into it this time.

I want to see Rose, again.

Holiday put one hand on the door latch, leaning away, ready to back up the instant it opened. The other hand held the tool above his head. He’d bring it down on the guard’s head the moment he... it, stumbled out.

Paul.

Paul.

Maybe that’s all it’ll take, thought Holiday and looked off toward the moonlit sky and nightscape one last time.

He saw shipping containers stacked up, almost three stories high, beyond the fence at the far end of the property. They were like building blocks, thought Holiday. Like a giant child’s building blocks left out after dark. And that’s when Holiday knew what they’d do for a wall. He dropped the u-shaped pole right there, climbed the fence and went to the back of the property. He climbed that fence and lowered himself to the other side after a brief scan of the massive yard below.

The place was full of shipping containers. They were smaller than the kind one might see on the back of a semi or a train. But they were made of metal. He heard a low gong when he tapped one. Lightly. Quietly. He walked between dark alleys of containers and out into the open. All around the yard he could see hundreds of containers stacked one atop another. Some stacks reached almost three stories, or at least well above the two story office that guarded the yard. There were three trucks, flatbeds that seemed made for hauling the cargo containers. Then he spotted two of the special forklifts.

After that, it was a matter of finding the employees’ handbook in one of the cabs of the trucks that explained how the whole operation worked.

The forklifts moved the containers. Diagrams showed how they could be positioned and stacked, interlocking with one another, and what to be concerned about when doing so. There was a list of clearly unsafe practices to be avoided.

The moon had disappeared behind the western horizon when he started reading how to load the containers onto the flatbeds. The flatbeds were much like tow trucks in that they had a winch and track system to drag the containers up and onto the bed of the truck for transport.

Later, as it turned dark without the moon’s ambient light, in the predawn cold, Holiday unlocked the cab of a truck and switched on a powerful Mag-Lite he’d found behind the seat. He tucked the handbook into his back pocket and selected a container that was stacked on top of another container. He started the electric forklift and moved it into position. The forks whined as he raised and toggled them into the ports beneath the container. When he was sure he had them aligned, he moved forward and was rewarded with an awful metal clang. One of the forks hadn’t been centered. He reversed, made a few adjustments to the forks and tried again. This time he got it. He locked the forks, almost forgetting to, and reversed away from the stack. The container followed, to Holiday’s amazement.

Once he had the container positioned, he tried to lower it onto the pavement with as little sound as possible, but it still made a dull, empty gong that seemed to echo throughout the yard as it settled onto the concrete pavement.

While I’m doing this, thought Holiday to himself, I’ll need someone to watch my back. I’ll be too busy with this operation to keep an eye out in case any of those things show up.

He got out and shined his Mag-Lite into the stacks of cargo containers. When he found nothing there, nothing moving toward him with a stumbling, wobbling, side to side gait, he went on to the second part of the operation. Pulling out the handbook once more, he read by the light of the flatbed’s interior cab how to load the container onto the flatbed. An hour later, he had the whole system roughly worked out and one container loaded and ready as the truck idled in the early morning dark.

Dawn was not far off.

Morning dew was beginning to condense on the windshield as Holiday turned up the heat in the cab to fight off the chill of the long night. He sat there for a few moments, facing the front gate, which wasn’t locked. A pole slotted into a hole in the cement held it in place. He expected to see them come out of the darkness and into the high beams, then throw themselves against the gate, reaching gray arms through the thin wooden slates at him.

What will you do then, he asked himself. Drag them back to Frank and the others?

I can run them over with this truck.

Really? Think about that, he told himself. Think about what that’s really like and if it’s as easy as it sounds when you don’t actually have to do it. However easy it sounds, I guarantee you, it won’t be that easy to do. Or to live with, for that matter.

We should keep one of the forklifts back at the Vineyards, he thought, preferring planning to the darkness of his imagination.

The “castle”, he joked to himself as the cab inside the flatbed began to grow warm. If Frank goes for this, it really will be a castle.

I don’t see how he couldn’t, Holiday told himself. It’s the answer to our biggest problem.

But it’s just an answer to one problem, he replied. Not the answer to all our problems.

Later, after the forklift was attached to the tow hook at the back of the flatbed, Holiday jogged to the gate, opened it and felt naked as he ran back to the safety of the cab inside the flatbed. He drove through the gate, heard Frank’s voice hectoring him that night in the garden and applied the brakes. There was a loud rumble as the forklift banged into the back of the flatbed.

Lock the gate, every time. That way you don’t get a surprise when you come back.

Taking the Mag-Lite in hand, visualizing how, exactly, he would smash in the head of anything that came at him out of the dark, checking the side mirrors once and then twice, he left the heated cab of the truck for the cold dark of morning.

He closed the gate and returned to the truck. The warm air from the heater instantly felt good. He locked the doors. The sky in the east was beginning to lighten. He sat there for a few more minutes.

There weren’t any zombies out on the lonely industrial road. But this area, Holiday had to remind himself, was generally deserted even back before the world hadn’t ended. There was a large corporate shipping warehouse across the street and a nursery that spread out into the old marine base and the orange groves to the west. On the weekends, Holiday remembered from long walks he’d sometimes taken, there wasn’t anyone down here.

He thought of the guard in the shack.

The thing was probably some old guy, once. Wife died years ago.

Rose.

The job wasn’t just a job. The job was the friends he had there. Gomes and the other guy. They were probably everything to him. They thought of him as just the guard. But he thought of them as his friends. He must have gone to work even though the world was ending. Told himself he would guard the yard and the equipment and when it was all over they, his friends, his employers and the other coworkers in the rental yard, they’d all have something to come back to. And he’d have something to do until it was time to see Rose again. Holiday drove the truck out through the gate onto the street. He turned and drove back toward the Vineyards. Halfway up the block, he halted at the intersection where the small road led up to the equipment rental yard. He took the heavy Mag-Lite and left the cab of the truck. He walked up the road in the predawn darkness, the sky in the east a thin strip of red for just the few minutes it took him to reach the guard shack. Even the birds weren’t awake yet, Holiday thought to himself.

The thing within, the guard, Paul, Holiday had to remind himself, thumped listlessly against the plastic windows.

Holiday opened the door.

Paul came out. Stumbling, drooling, eyes vacant, gray fleshy hands turned to reaching claws. And Holiday struck him with the heavy Mag-Lite.

Once and true.

His arm like a machine that had been made for such killing work.

‘I want to see Rose again.’

He left the body there in the wet grass that surrounded the shack and walked back down the little road to the waiting, rumbling truck, the morning light turning everything golden now. Just once and ever so briefly, some early bird called out, testing its first song of the day. There was no reply.

The scent of sage was heavy in the cool air.

Chapter Six

The rest of the week fell into a rhythm. At first slow, and then in time, not as slow. By the end of the week they had the gaps between the buildings secured with the blocky metal storage containers wedged between the spaces. They stacked the cargo containers two high within the gaps between the buildings. At the front gate, they built a U-shaped courtyard wall three stories high using more of the containers. The ends of the “U” started at the entrance to the complex, and at the bottom of the “U”, they built a small gate by stacking two more cargo containers beyond the gate, close to each other while leaving enough space to stack two more on top, thus creating an arch. Once Holiday, with Candace watching from the roof of the storage yard with her binoculars and rifle, had shifted all the containers they’d need up to the Vineyards, they brought up the second forklift. They left one cargo container on the forks of the forklift and positioned it next to the gate. That cargo container and forklift would be left there as a door to be moved in and out of place each time they came and went. A gate of sorts.

At week’s end, the heat was still up in the day but fading toward nightfall. Everyone wondered how much longer summer would last among all the many other things they wondered about. The walls of the “castle” were complete. The sealed gaps in the walls between buildings reached just below the red terracotta-tiled roofs of the adjoined townhomes. At the front entrance, the “U” shaped gate towered over the tall palm-lined entrance. The containers were made of steel and very heavy, even when empty. Human strength wouldn’t be enough to shift them an inch.

“Next week some of us will work on the ramparts...” began Frank at the end of the day as they stacked their tools.

“What’s a rampart?” asked Dante.

“The top of the wall,” said Frank patiently. “We’ll make spaces up there for walkways with ladders and ropes so we can move around quickly.”

“Why?” asked Dante again, his voice matching the overwhelming fatigue they all felt.

“If those things come at us, we’ll want to get around on top of the walls and fight them off from up there. The easier it is for us to move around, the easier it’ll be to do that. Understand?”

Dante paused in his plodding march back toward his new townhome near the kiddy park. “Vaguely,” he said and waved his massive hand.

“Kinda like Helm’s Deep in Lord of the Rings,” said Skully, who’d come out to watch them and get some Ash-ordered exercise and sunlight.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” said Frank dismissively.

“It was a movie. A book before that. The Lord of the Rings. They fought these orcs from this castle called Helm’s Deep.”

“Oh,” said Frank not seeming to care and continued on toward his house.

Ritter stayed near the gate, near his townhome. Everyone had begun to call him the Gatekeeper as a kind of joke.

“Whatever, thas cool and all,” he’d said smoothly and lit a joint. He inhaled. His eyes fell to half-mast as the day ended. “We still swimming tonight?” he called out after them in the red glow of a fading afternoon.

“Yeah,” Frank called over his shoulder. “We gotta find some chlorine though, soon. I’ll check the maintenance room, there’s got to be some in there.”

“Sure thing,” said Ritter, watching them all go, leaning on the front door of his townhome. He waited until they’d all disappeared into the last of the day. He crushed out the joint, put it back in his cigarette case and closed the door to his townhome behind him. He went to his coat, draped over the glass table in the dining room, pulled out his cellphone and made sure it was set to SAT as he tried to contact the Tarragon server again.

The link wouldn’t activate.

“They weren’t kiddin’”, Ritter said to the quiet room.

He went upstairs, pulled out the briefcase from underneath the bed and tried three-number combinations again. First trying 007.

Nothing.

He thought about numbers and code combinations as he tried a few more and got nothing in return. No subtle click of the clasp that the expensive briefcases would make. What was within, remained locked within.

Ritter thought Candace might have some ideas about the combination but all his attempts to play the bad boy and get close had failed. He knew for sure that she liked bad boys. Had a weakness for them. She was the type that had them hidden in her past. But now that Frank was the head honcho, she’d fallen into her role as “right hand wo-man” Ritter would often say aloud in the hot stuffy little room of the townhome.

He slid the briefcase back under the bed.

He sat on the unmade bed. Took out the joint from the cigarette case and lit it again, lying back, watching the ceiling. Watching the fading day turn from red to blue. The walls were painted in some type of “gold”, he thought as his mind unfocused. “Goldengate Sunset or some such,” he mumbled. Some paint industry megacorporation had probably come up with the name using a team of geniuses just like the kids Ritter had beaten out in grad school. He thought about colors and paint names and marketing and hype and how all that didn’t really mean anything anymore. Hadn’t ever really meant anything. He thought about a jewelry store commercial that used to irritate him a lot. A Mother’s Day commercial. A beautiful young mom. Model up-and-comer dad. Newborn baby. Perfect house. She gets a diamond pendant for her first Mother’s Day.

Who has the money for that when you’re first starting out?, began Ritter as an exercise to ground himself in critical thinking, because that’s what he’d need to do to get in touch with the boys at Tarragon again. He added up the fictional lives of that fictional couple. House. Decorator. Hospital bill. Two leases on two BMW’s. No, make that a luxury SUV for the new baby. Gym memberships ‘cause lookin’ good don’t just happen after you had a baby.

“Blah, blah, blah,” whispered Ritter. “Boy ain’t got no money left for diamond pendants. They’ll be dead broke and payin’ interest alone inside two years on everything. That’s when he’ll start cheatin’,” Ritter mused as his eyes closed for a few minutes.

Later, in the early twilight, they all met at the pool.

Even Skully.

He stepped gingerly into the shallow end of the pool, keeping his wound well above the waterline. Ash watched him like a mother hen. Dante had been the first in, bellowing at its coldness and splashing around. Holiday showed up later when Frank had the hotdogs going on a nearby grill. There were fresh jars from the store of mustard, relish and ketchup, and even some horseradish. Unopened jars. The buns were being lightly toasted with garlic butter. Frank even had a pan full of canned chili going in case anyone wanted chilidogs. No onions though. Those were already starting to go bad at the store.

They swam, everyone drinking except Holiday who’d heard each popped beer or bottle of wine disgorging into a glass. The soft glug glug echoing out across the pool. His mind turned and schemed about how he might just casually pick up a bottle for himself until finally he just let it all go and swam up and down the length of the pool, again and again. Later he even ate his chilidog near the side of the pool, his legs swirling the water and watching the swimming aquamarine shadows along the bottom of the pool.

Night fell deep and dark and soon they all returned to their townhomes, cleaning up as the lights of the pool shimmered less and less in the calming wake against its sides.

It had been a long week.

Longer weeks lay ahead.

So did the unknown.

No one really knew what actually lay ahead. It was easier to think about the defense of the castle and their day to day survival. Tomorrow more work, then food and play. Rinse and repeat.

That was enough for now.

Don’t think about why the Army, or the government, or the police, or anyone for that matter, hasn’t shown up. Don’t think about the internet’s distinct lack of access. Don’t think about why sometimes, every so often they could hear a telephone ringing behind the doors of one of the unoccupied houses. They never made it inside in time to pick up and answer.

Holiday remembered that phone call in the Home Depot.

“Holiday gonna be Holi-dead!”

At night, as he lay in bed in the dark, sober, his fear was that the phone next to his bed would ring and that same psychotically cold voice would begin to rant at him again. What could he do? Finally he’d unplugged it and gone to sleep.

Frank had said little to him. Not even eventually congratulating him for the container plan. Instead he’d taken it over, making it his plan all along.

Only Dante had offered recognition in the form of a slap on the back. Nodding at the stacks near the gate as sweat ran down his large shiny black face. Smiling at Holiday.

He feels safe. He‘s glad to be safe, Holiday thought now as he lay in the dark just before sleep.

It had been a long week.

His eyes closed and finally, he slept.

Ash woke to the sound of a distant, painful cry.

She slept with her window open. They weren’t running the air conditioners for fear the noise might attract zombies. Most nights held a nightmare at some point for Ash.

Always the same nightmare.

But tonight, she awoke and wasn’t sure if the cry had been part of the nightmare. It was silent out there in the still of the night as she sat up in bed, sweating, heart pounding.

Then she heard it again.

She went to the window.

She listened.

Again the cry. Almost a mournful wail, a plea. It came from up the hill, in the burned neighborhood of McMansions that once rose above the Vineyard, beyond their wall of shipping containers. Up the hill. It sounded like a child. A lost child.

Sometimes a cat can sound like a child, she told herself.

And then...

But you don’t know if it’s a cat or a child.

She dressed, hearing it again. And again.

Outside, the moon had gone down. She took her medical bag, slung it over a shoulder and retrieved a small OD green flashlight from her canvas bag of the same color. She turned it on. It only threw red light. As it should. She unscrewed the lens cap, removed the red filter and flicked it on again. White light.

She left her aid station townhome quietly, watching Skully’s chest rise and fall for a moment as she passed him lying on the twin bed downstairs. Outside, she went to the nearest wall and placed a ladder they kept on the ground nearby against one of the containers. She climbed it, then drew the ladder up on top of the hollow metal containers that made empty bass notes as she walked across the top of them.

Standing still, she listened again.

Nothing.

And just as she was about to give up and go back down and into to her townhome aid station, she heard the cry again. It was a sad wail. A painful cry, and there was some soul-deep hurt in it that Ash knew the medicine she had in her bag could never heal. Up above her, up in the shadowy burnt stick figure charcoal remains of the McMansions, as Holiday had called them, someone was lost and in pain. She let the ladder down on the far side of the wall, and then climbed down into the shadows at the bottom.

She started up the hill, crossed the wide road at the top, then climbed another hill into the burnt-out remains of the first line of houses. The smell of burnt plastic and rubber, along with the smoky char of wood, still remained amongst the ash and stubble. She waded through piles of ashes and wove around debris where bathtubs and sinks and the remains of couches and beds, their blackened iron springs jutting wildly in the night, sat as though oddly placed in empty spaces. Slowly, she made her way up the hill, climbing blackened terraces and vacant concrete foundations into the heights of the devastated neighborhood, following the intermittent wail of whoever it was that was crying out in pain, alone in the night.

At the top of the hill, she climbed up through the half burnt out vegetation of a once palatial property, using exposed sprinkler piping to haul herself up the last few feet onto a tiled patio of immense proportion. Paving stones spread away toward the foundation of what had once been a small mansion. A pool lay between Ash and the remains of the house. Charcoaled wood and bits of debris floated on the surface in collections of junky flotsam.

And...

On the other side, near the blackened remains of an immense fire pit and the tortured sculptures of melted patio furniture, sat a large man. He wore a cape and a mask. His hands were covered by thick oversized work gloves. About his sizeable waist was a police utility belt. On the ground next to him lay a small backpack.

“Daddy!” he bellowed again into the night, raising his head from his downcast sobs, turning to look all around as though what he called for must surely be nearby and coming soon. “Daddy, where are you?” he wailed, not seeing Ash. Then he lowered his head and wept, sobbing thickly, massive shoulders shuddering.

Ash wiped her hands and got to her feet. She crossed the fire-blackened poolside, cautiously, and sat down next to Cory who continued to weep even as he laid his giant head on her shoulder and sobbed into her slender neck.

Chapter Seven

Before the world ended...

Cory was born. They didn’t know at first. But later, it was his mother who knew.

“He’s not right, Colin,” she told her husband.

“He’ll be fine,” his father, a rookie cop just out of the marines explained as he left for the night shift. A long night of driving the alleys and quiet streets of their town with his officer-trainer. “Boys are always slower to come along.”

Except Cory stayed slow.

And one day, when Cory’s dad, Colin, was on patrol, his mother left him with Mrs. Swinton to go to the market, “real quick” she said, and never came back.

Never.

Ever.

Colin couldn’t blame her. He never did. He just took over. He just took over everything. And of course, there was Mrs. Swinton... and some others who came and went throughout the years.

When Cory was twelve...

... well, when he was twelve, he still went to elementary school with the other “normal” kids. The school system, good teachers and a caring principal, felt it was not just good for Cory, but good for the other kids too.

Kids like Bryan Ratigan...

... well, you know... there’s always a Bryan Ratigan, isn’t there? One day Cory found himself being pushed down again and again out on the football-baseball field behind the bleachers. Where the teachers couldn’t exactly see what was going on. All the cool kids watched. Sort of laughing.

It was okay to laugh at Cory. He did a lot of funny things even though he didn’t mean to be so funny. After all, he was “special”. And, of course...

... well of course, there was his whole Batman thing.

Bryan Ratigan had lured Cory out there. It was May. School was almost over. Elementary school was almost over. The end of the sixth grade. Then they would all be off to junior high. Real adults. Makeup for girls. Fights for boys.

Boyfriends.

Girlfriends.

Dances.

Except Cory. Cory would be going to a “special” school.

So, it was their last chance to have fun with Cory. Bryan’s last chance. Most of them had known Cory their whole time in elementary school. If you’d asked them, they’d have told you they’d known Cory their whole lives, which was, as far as they considered the length of lives, the sum of themselves. Don’t we say that when we’re young? Don’t we think that all our years in elementary school are the sum total of our lives?

Didn’t we?

Such a small part, isn’t it? Now that we know how long a life can be.

Bryan Ratigan pushed Cory down again.

And again.

And again.

And every time, Cory would say, “I am vengeance. I am the night. I am Batman,” as he struggled back onto his clumsy feet, sometimes just barely before Bryan would push him, or hit him, and down he’d go again.

It was funny, wasn’t it?

Not so much.

Again.

“I am vengeance...”

Again.

“... I am the night...”

And again.

“... I am Batman.”

“Just stay down this time, Cory!” someone said. A girl named Tara.

The fun was over now.

Bryan had to start hitting Cory right in the face, y’know hard, to keep him down. See, because Cory kept getting back up, saying, “I am vengeance...” and Bryan couldn’t just stop because somehow that would be letting Cory win. Cory couldn’t win because he was... y’know, “special”. If he beat you at anything then you were worse than him. You were worse than “special”.

Cory’s nose was bleeding now.

“Just stay down, Cory!” Even Bryan almost pleaded the next time.

“I am vengeance...”

Bryan socked him in the eye when a girl, a girl Bryan liked, told him to stop bullying Cory.

If it helps, at that moment, even Bryan Ratigan hated himself. If it helps.

Cory thought it was all just a game. Grunting, he struggled to his feet again. Blood ran down onto his chin. His eye was very swollen and turning blue.

“Ewww,” someone screamed. A girl. “He’s bleeding a lot.”

Kevin Casell who was playing soccer nearby saw what was happening and ran to get a teacher. When the zombies attacked the hospital Kevin Casell would later work at as a physical therapist, he would die trying to help a family get to the roof everyone was being evacuated off of. He was that kind of boy. He would become that kind of man.

But, back on that day in the last May of Childhood, later that afternoon, Colin Banks, Officer Banks, showed up at the school. Cory was sitting in the front lobby, next to the door of the principal’s office.

No, Officer Banks didn’t want to press charges. Yes, Cory was staying in school for what remained of the year. What other choice did he have? Cory’s special school didn’t have room just yet, and when it did, it was going to break Officer Banks, who was a single parent, financially and emotionally.

They drove home that afternoon.

Cory ran to the front door, flung it open, and threw himself in front of the TV. Waiting. Colin entered. Turned on the TV with the remote. Hit play on the DVD.

Remember that Batman cartoon from the early nineties?

That’s Cory’s favorite show.

Hence, “I am Vengence. I am the night. I am Batman.”

Later, once Cory had finished the one episode he was allowed to watch after school, the one in which... the Scarecrow made Batman very afraid... as Colin sat in the kitchen dealing with his rage, which was to just sit and drink a glass of water and look at a calendar that had a picture of Hawaii on it...

Later...

... he took Cory into the backyard. It was almost summer. Daylight savings. Colin brought out his old punching bag, setting it up under a gnarled olive tree.

“Cory,” said Colin softly.

Cory never looked at Colin. Always away. To the side. Somewhere else. He didn’t really look at anybody when he didn’t need to. But he was listening. Cory always listened.

Not being paid attention to sometimes upset people.

Not those who knew and loved Cory. They just accepted the way he paid attention, which was different than how others paid attention.

“Yeah, Daddy,” said Cory who was big for his age.

“You had a fight today,”

“Bryan and me were just playing.”

Colin paused. He ground his teeth. He took a breath.

“He was hitting you,” said Colin.

“Yeah, Daddy. We were just playing.”

There is no modulation in Cory’s voice. No inflection of emotion. Every spoken word is a statement. He never asks questions. He only makes statements. Everything is delivered flatly.

“Yeah, Daddy. Just playing.”

Colin is afraid. Not of the thugs and gangbangers he busts regularly. No, he’ll chase them down a blind alley, often leaving his older partner far behind. He’s not afraid of them, or guys who beat their wives or other guys with guns looking to settle a score. No, Colin is afraid of the world and how it treats Cory. He won’t always be there for the kid. His son. He won’t always be there. He knows that and it frightens him to death. Every day. Every night.

All good parents know the feeling.

“Cory?” Colin bends down. “I want to teach you how to play with kids like Bryan. Kids who want to play too rough. Would that be okay?”

“Yeah, Daddy.”

Before Colin joined the marines, back when he’d been a poor kid from the poor side of town, he’d been a golden gloves contender. Not a champion. Just a contender. He’d even boxed in the marines. From that first evening of early summer as the world changed despite Colin’s efforts to make it stay the same safe place it had never been, that whole long summer, he taught Cory how to “play” when others like Bryan Ratigan wanted to play.

Cory wasn’t fast. If you’d taken any kind of marital arts, or been in enough fights, you could easily beat him. But if you didn’t watch out, his left hook became a devastating haymaker, and on occasion, he could land an uppercut that once knocked Colin out cold. Lights out. When Colin awoke, sitting up in the grass, he thought that day might just be the happiest day of his life. Because now he knew Cory could at least defend himself.

Now, Cory could do something in all Colin’s darkly imagined scenarios. The ones where Cory’s cornered as he walks home to an adult assisted living facility long after Colin’s been killed in the line of duty by some drunk driver late one night. He knows Cory’s life won’t be one where Colin’s always there. Colin was still a cop after all. Carrying a gun. Going into every situation where someone else might also be carrying a gun. But now Colin knows, hopes, that on that dark night when someone wants to mess with Cory, that Cory has something he can use to defend himself.

When Colin thought about his life and the bad breaks he’d had, he still loved Cory’s mom though she’d been gone for years, he wasn’t mad or sad or even angry. When he thought about his life he was just worried. A lot. Cory’s knockout uppercut that day helped Colin not to worry so much.

Colin was very brave. All the other cops knew that. He took risks out on the streets just to make sure everyone got home safely each night. That was a big thing to him, “just get home safely” he’d say, or remind everyone else to, when he made sergeant. Watch Commander. His only worry until that afternoon when Cory laid him out in the grass with a nice uppercut into Colin’s jaw, was for Cory. That someone, that someones, that all the Bryan Ratigans of the world, might try hurt him one day.

But now... there was that uppercut.

He still worried...

... but the uppercut helped.

Chapter Eight

“I’m going now, Cory,” said Colin Morris the night the world began to end. Sergeant Morris. Cory sat in front of the TV. He was nineteen years old. Still just a boy, though. It was three o’clock in the afternoon. Cory attended an advanced adult education center in the mornings and early afternoons. Then he came home and it was time for Batman.

How does a young man, a simple man, come to be so devoted to the Dark Knight? It happened when Cory was very young and it started with a question.

Cory had asked a question.

As his father dressed for work, Cory would often watch from the floor where he played nearby. But you see, he really didn’t watch. I mean, you never really knew what was going on in Cory’s mind. Maybe nothing, is what most people supposed. A few liked to imagine something akin to a deeper symphony they could not hear. Happy to know that it was Cory’s and Cory’s alone. And so on that day, as his father dressed for work, ironing and pressing his own uniform because if Colin could save just that much in dry cleaning, it would go right into the trust he’d set up to take care of Cory in case anything ever happened. On that day, Cory asked a question.

Colin burned himself on the iron. Not thinking about what he was doing because he was thinking too much about money and worry and the state of the world and Cory. Not feeling very “Super Cop”-like at that particular moment. Not feeling very heroic. Feeling a little down, defeated, unable to catch a break. Wondering what he’d done...

And he stopped right there.

Because he couldn’t take that out there on the streets tonight. Every traffic stop, every domestic violence call, every crime in progress was a potential confrontation and he was not the biggest and baddest dude on the street. But, as every cop knows, when it comes down to it, it comes down to one thing. One simple thing when a drunk the size of a mountain wants to tangle. It comes down to who wants to make it home more.

Colin Morris knew he couldn’t take his baggage out there tonight. He knew he needed to be something bigger than what he felt like at that burned hand moment. Something, someone heroic.

One of the sergeant’s wives had given her husband a photocopy of an email she’d received. It was some little girl’s letter to a soldier over in the war. The little girl had written to the soldier, knowing his life was in danger in a foreign country, instructing him to be careful, and then, the little girl gave that unknown soldier a piece of solemn advice.

“Always be Batman.”

You see, Batman can handle anything, and to a little girl and a sergeant’s wife, any cop’s spouse, Batman always comes home. Which is important when you love someone. Coming home is real important.

The sergeant posted it near the lockers. Just a piece of paper and a strip of tape. The important part underlined in red, circled by the sergeant’s wife. “Always be Batman”.

And no one said anything. No jokes like there always were about advice from wives. No one defaced it. No one tore it down or even laughed as they walked by.

“Always be Batman”.

And Cory, playing in Cory world, hearing that unheard symphony or some such, looked up from the closet where he was petting one of his Dad’s sneakers and said, as Colin Morris belted his utility belt around his waist checking the fit, he’d been losing weight lately because he’d been skipping lunch. Saving just that much more for Cory, y’know. Cory looked up and said, “Who are you, Daddy?”

Colin looked up suddenly. He’d been thinking about the burn to his hand and how it had to be right where he would grip the steering wheel all night. Right in the web of his hand. And, just like all of us when small things send us down the well of self-pity again, and our larger issues rear up and mean so much more in the light of tripping, or dropping a plate, or putting salt in the coffee instead of sugar, Colin had no answer other than an existentially deep and unspoken “I don’t know some days” that seemed on the tip of his tongue, but was really deep down in his heart. Or at least, that’s where it felt like it was.

And that wasn’t good enough for Cory, Colin knew. Cory didn’t understand existential answers. Neither does life.

Then, remembering the piece of yellowing paper in the locker room, Colin Morris said, “I’m Batman.” He smiled and snapped the belt into its loop.

“How come?” asked Cory.

What followed was Colin Morris trying to explain, to his mentally handicapped son, what a police officer did. Which led to crime. Which led to bad people and the farther Colin went, heading into the law and judges and even the constitution, he knew either Cory wasn’t listening or didn’t understand and he wasn’t sure because Cory just watched a shoe with his head cranked to the side and a little bit of drool escaping out the side of his mouth. The more Colin Morris talked, the more he was convinced Cory would never understand.

But later...

“My dad is Batman,” he told Mrs. Smith, his then-caretaker that afternoon as Colin Morris left for his shift. Colin Morris smiled awkwardly. Mrs. Smith nodded and ushered Cory in. That night, as Colin Morris patrolled the streets, his mind took a break from everything. He just drove up and down empty streets in the night. There really wasn’t much going on, which was nice and restored his faith in humanity for a little while. Still feeling good and going on toward midnight, he stopped at a 7-11 for a coffee. The store manager always brewed a pot at midnight and made sure the cops knew they could come by for a free cup.

Free cup in hand, Officer Morris felt good. He’d liked talking with Cory that afternoon and the burn hadn’t felt as bad throughout his shift as he’d thought it would. Talking with your kid was good, he thought to himself inside the 7-11.

Now most parents with young children might take this for granted. They might talk with their kids so much, answering never-ending rivers of questions about the sky being blue and why don’t people have pet elephants, that those parents might actually crave some silence every so often. Don’t worry about them though, they’ll get it. When the questioners have grown and gone, they will ache for just one more question. Just one. And when it comes, when the telephone rings and they finally ask advice on how to cook a steak, or buy a house, or get a tough stain out of a good coat... well, that’s just one of the best days, isn’t it?

But the parents of children who are special, and yes all children are special, but in this case we mean the “special” children who are autistic, mentally handicapped, Down syndrome... special children. They, these parents, don’t always get to play the game of questions. Some of these children don’t ask questions much, or ever. Like Cory. Some don’t know how to show affection. Like Cory. And so, when you are the parent of a special child you must wait, like a hunter in the blind through long wintery afternoons, you must wait all alone. You must wait so long that you forget you’ve been waiting. One day, you even give up hope of ever having even a normal conversation with the child you love more than you could’ve ever imagined loving anyone. Life? Love? The best way to cook a steak? Questions. Special children don’t ask a lot of questions.

And so a rare and wonderful thing had happened to Colin Morris that day, he thought as he reflected back on the ironing and the question and his descent into the American legal system. His son had asked him a question. And Colin Morris had answered back and he’d answered back so much that even now he laughed at himself about the trail he’d followed trying to answer a simple question.

Did Cory understand ten percent of it? Five percent?

Who cares, thought Colin Morris. Who cares?

It was wonderful.

It was a conversation with his son.

Then an evil thought occurred to Colin Morris. What if there were more of those conversations? What if... what if he could talk with his son like...?

He stomped that line of thought down. Because that meant waiting for a day that might never come. Waiting and maybe missing something else. Waiting for Cory to be someone other than who Cory actually was. Wanting for him to be...

Which is why his wife had left them both.

She got tired of waiting for Cory to be something else.

He sipped his coffee, spinning through a rack of DVD’s inside the 7-11. Not really thinking. Just enjoying the carousel and its hypnotic motion.

The first season of the old Batman cartoon spun into view. Batman from back in the nineties.

Colin Morris bought it.

“Always be Batman” some little girl had written to a lonely and frightened soldier in the desert.

When they’d come home from school the next day, Colin put one of the discs into the DVD player and asked Cory to come watch it with him.

“Do you remember when I told you...” he started. “Do you remember when I told you I was Batman, Cory? Do you remember that?”

Cory said “Yeah, Daddy.” He was watching a hummingbird just outside the window.

“This is the real Batman,” said Colin and pressed play.

Music began and the horns rose triumphantly after the Warner Brothers logo. And Batman...

You know... Batman.

Cory turned his head toward the screen and watched. And so did Colin Morris, except that he occasionally snuck glances at Cory whose eyes were large and whose mouth was wide open. His son was enthralled, raptured.

“Always be Batman” meant always be a hero. Always help those in need. Cory understood now.

“I’m going, Cory,” said Sergeant Morris, Colin Morris, Cory’s dad, for the last time he would ever say anything to nineteen-year-old Cory that last day as the world began to end. Cory, in his child’s Batman costume over his regular clothing, just the too-small cape and the rubber mask, well-made, turned and waved quickly and without finesse as he shouted, “Okay, Daddy. I’ll watch for the Bat Signal if you need help before I go to sleep.” Then he turned back to the TV. All of it in one motion. All of it in his rapid, breathless, off tone rising-pitch speech.

Colin Morris closed the door to his house for the last time. Six hours later, he’d be at the hospital, responding to a riot-in-progress call. As the world began to end.

Chapter Nine

At six o’clock, Cory, no longer wearing his Batman costume, left the house, remembering to take the key from around his neck and lock the front door. It was still hot out. There weren’t many people on the street. All the houses in the typical 1970’s white stucco block-and-angle construction Southern California tract home neighborhood were quiet.

Cory walked three houses over to Mrs. Sheinman’s. When he opened the door, he could smell the soup she always made him. Tomato. There would be a grilled cheese sandwich also. He went right to the lace-covered dining table and sat down, waiting.

“I made soup Cory,” came a thin, weak voice from the back of the house.

She usually fed Cory his supper on days that Cory’s dad had to be in to work early. Colin had called her, telling her he’d been ordered in to deal with some developing situation.

The soup came out and they both sat in the quiet, eating together. Cory was not a talker, but that didn’t matter as Mrs. Sheinman was.

“It’s been quiet out today, Cory,” she said and coughed delicately behind her thin bluish wrist. Cory said nothing.

“Are all the kids back in school already?”

And...

“I hope they do something about those fires over in Orange, the smoke is playing havoc with my allergies.”

When the soup was finished, Cory with business-like commitment stacked his dishes in the sink and went to sit back down at the table, staring at his folded hands.

Mrs. Sheinman finished her soup. Except she didn’t really finish it, she just stopped eating.

“I didn’t feel well enough to make dessert today, honey,” she told Cory softly. “I didn’t even make it to the store to get my diabetes medication.”

Cory stood up, pushed in his chair, and went and sat down in the rocker near the silent TV. After dessert, they would usually watch Jeopardy and then Cory would sleep in the guest room until after midnight when his father would come back, pick him up and take him home.

Late at night the two of them, Cory and Colin, would sit in the kitchen as Cory’s dad scrambled eggs and had his dinner. He would talk about the day and the shift and Cory would say nothing.

Then bed.

But tonight there was no dessert.

Mrs. Sheinman sat down after doing the dishes. She always sat on the couch across from Cory. She would read her novels with the covers of well-muscled men and raven-haired beauties looking longingly at each other. But tonight she seemed tired.

She turned on the TV. Jeopardy wasn’t on.

Only the “Stay Tuned to this Station for an Important Announcement” stared back at the two of them.

“Well,” sighed Mrs. Sheinman. “I wonder what this could be about.” They waited, but there were no special bulletins or important messages. After a while, as late summer twilight surrendered to deep evening dark, she switched off the TV and sat by the lone light in the living room. It cast an hourglass of yellow light above and below the lampshade, leaving the rest of the room in shadows.

Cory could smell the flowers in the garden coming through the open window near the rocker he drifted back and forth in. He liked the smell of the night.

It reminded him of his mother.

Mrs. Sheinman looked out the window.

“It’s so dark out tonight, Cory.”

Normally they could see the lights of other houses out beyond the backyard, but tonight it was indeed, truly dark out. And quiet.

Cory continued to gently rock back and forth, enjoying the motion and comfort the rocker provided. He liked the barely audible squeak it made as it rocked forward each time.

Like music he could make.

Mrs. Sheinman tried to read but her eyes kept closing, the book suddenly dropping to her lap, as her head sunk to her chest.

“I’m afraid...” she began, almost groaning, her voice a tired croak. She didn’t finish.

She got up slowly, went into the kitchen and Cory could hear her using the phone. When she came back she was pale. Even Cory could see that.

“Cory, honey,” she began and knelt beside the chair. She had never done that, come so close to his personal space. “I need you to do something very important for me, honey.”

Cory continued staring at the lamp and its hourglass of yellow light. Its twisting beveled butterscotch glass housing fascinated him.

“I need you to go down to the DrugCo,” she paused. “Do you know where that is?”

Staring straight ahead Cory said, “It’s right and left and straight and right. Cross the big street. Don’t go to the freeway. Candy aisle and come right back.”

Mrs. Sheinman’s eyes were closed as she listened to Cory’s monotone recitation of the path needed to arrive at the DrugCo. “Yes dear,” she said and it clearly pained her to do so. “Can you go there and ask for someone to take you to the pharmacy? Dr. Liu knows you’re coming. He’s going to give you a bag and you need to bring that bag right back to me, honey. It’s very important. Can you do that for me, dear?”

Cory stood up.

“It’s dark out,” he said flatly.

Mrs. Sheinman got to her feet. Unsteady at first. “Yes dear, it is. I’ll give you a flashlight.”

“I’m not s’posed to go out in the dark unless it’s a fire or an emergency or it’s the Bat signal, not just the moon, ‘cause that means Daddy needs help. I’m not s’posed to go out at night.”

She sighed.

“I know that, dear. I wouldn’t ask you to unless it was very important, but you see, I need a medication called insulin and I forgot to get it today. If I don’t have it, I could become real sick, Cory. I’ve called everyone I can think of to go and pick it up for me, but none of the neighbors are answering. Dr. Liu told me he needs to close the store soon, but he’s waiting to hand out medication to a few people like myself who are going to need a supply of it for the next few days. I just don’t know what’s going on, dear. But it seems serious and... well... I need help.”

Cory stood up.

“I’ll be back.”

Cory walked to the door and left. The door closed with a heavy thud that left a gaping silence in the room as Mrs. Sheinman crawled to the couch and leaned her head against it.

Ten minutes later, he was back and Mrs. Sheinman couldn’t believe he’d gone to the store and come back so quickly. Or had she passed out? Lost time?

Cory stood framed in the doorway in his child’s Batman costume. The police utility belt around his wide waist. Heavy duty work gloves on his large hands. A dark blue school backpack on his back, beneath his cape.

“I’m Batman,” he announced in the post-door-closing thud silence.

Confused, Mrs. Sheinman looked about. Fear, worry and mortality raced through her like sudden rivulets of ice water. She felt the walls closing in. She struggled to her feet, walked toward him feeling foggy and confused, then sat down with her own thud on the little creaking bench in the foyer. The one she and her husband Ed had picked out twenty years ago.

She thought, well Ed, I guess I won’t be away from you much longer.

She patted the bench, remembering when she’d been younger and they’d picked it out at a chic furniture store down in Newport Beach. She didn’t feel like she’d ever get up from it again. Her body felt distant.

I never imagined I’d die on it though, she thought. Life’s funny that way, I guess.

“Oh Cory,” she mumbled.

“I’m Batman,” said Cory. “Batman can go out at night. I am vengeance, I am the night. I am Batman.”

Cory turned and walked out the door, across the grass of the lawn, disappearing into the depths of the night.

Chapter Ten

The street that bisected the nearly identical houses on each side stretched off and away from Cory. A darkness that seemed unnatural, even to Cory on this night, closed in about him. In the distance he heard a scream. Once, briefly. As if uttered in sudden horror and terror. Then it was gone, so gone in fact, it was as though it had never been.

As if it had been swallowed.

“I am the night...” mumbled Cory as fear began to pull at the corners of his mind.

He remembered he must turn right first.

He turned right, made sure it was right and started walking, holding the thick flashlight Daddy let him carry on the utility belt in his gloved hand.

“It’s dangerous out at night, Cory,” he said to himself in a soft monotone whisper.

He passed the house where Kenny Watt lived. It was dark inside and Cory searched all the familiar spaces of it with his eyes. He did not like the way the house looked when it looked like this. Abandoned. Empty. Dangerous.

“It’s not safe...” mumbled Cory again to himself. “At night. For little boys to be out.”

Then he remembered Batman was never afraid. Except, you didn’t count the time Scarecrow made Batman afraid using poison gas. Then Batman had been very afraid but it didn’t count and by the end of that episode, he remembered not to be afraid. So Cory remembered not to be afraid too. Even though he was.

Nearing the end of the street where he must turn and leave the neighborhood to cross the big road and then walk down the hill to the DrugCo, Cory heard something in the dark behind him.

Something scraping against the sidewalk.

He turned, the bright flashlight playing its blistering cone of white across the grayish street, onto the washed out green lawns, then landing on the sidewalk behind him. The flashlight illuminated everything within that cone of withering washed out light to at least twenty feet away.

There was nothing.

Still, he heard the scrape in the darkness beyond the cone again.

Then its source lumbered into the light.

It was a stranger.

“Stranger Danger,” flashed across Cory’s mind just like Cory’s dad had taught him. Stranger Danger meant certain, unknown people were dangerous. This man, this lumbering man came forward in a dark coat, pale face, teeth bared, eyes gleaming with hatred. This man was certainly the stranger Cory had always been warned of.

And if he was unsure...

If he was unclear...

If he doubted himself for a moment, which was something Cory did often though no one could tell, that this Stranger meant him harm, then in the next moment all Cory’s fears were confirmed when the bloodless stranger reached long spindly arms and scabbed over fingers out for Cory as a thin mouth whispered a guttural papery grunt.

Cory recoiled.

What do you do if a stranger tries to talk to you...

... or grab you, Cory?

Run, Daddy.

Run.

But where to Cory? Where do you run to?

Cory was running already. The flashlight bouncing ahead of him. The street, the sidewalk. A slinking gray cat yowled at him, then darted off into some bushes.

“I’m scared, Daddy.”

That was all Cory could think of.

“I’m scared, Daddy.”

Scared, blind fear.

“I’m scared, Daddy.”

He ran.

And then... where do you run to, Cory?

“To someone you know. To a house you know, Daddy.”

Cory didn’t know people well.

But houses. He knew houses quite well. They were unique. They had personalities, and even if they all looked the same, the people in them made them different. Kevin Watt’s house. The Ruiz’s house. Mr. Montgomery’s dog’s house.

“I’ll run to a house I know, Daddy!”

Cory couldn’t recognize any of the houses this far up the street. It was dark and all the lights were out.

Another stranger came lurching out of the blackness, eyes rolling white, mouth moaning. The stranger’s throat bore a simple bloody ragged tear.

Cory heard himself scream.

Then he pushed the lurching stranger with a loud, “No!” The stranger fell away, spinning off into the darkness and Cory ran until he reached the end of the street.

What houses do you know, Cory?

Cory tried to think.

He could hear the scraping sound coming closer again.

There’s the Farley’s. They have a dog that smells but he kisses your face if you ever get pushed down to the ground when the Farley Boys and their sister want to “play”. One time when they were “playing”, Cory got hit so hard he fell into the brick planter and cut himself on the forehead and they took him inside and put “stinging” on the cut. Their mom was nice and yelled at them and gave Cory a small cookie. Their house smelled like fall to Cory.

He didn’t see the Farley’s tan and white house with the dead flowers in the planter.

There was the house that belonged to the Chung family. They always had someone there for Cory to play with. That was how Cory thought of the Chungs. One of them was always with another. Always doing something. Sometimes Cory would come and stand over one of the Chungs and watch what they were doing and only their youngest boy, Scott, would be mean to him. Scott Chung who talked like he was spitting. His eyes always narrow and hateful when he glared at Cory. The oldest of the Chungs, Brian, always let Cory watch whatever they were doing. Building a go-kart. Dissecting a bee. Playing catch. Cory had never been inside their house because you had to take off your shoes and there was plastic along the hallway. Cory longed to take off his shoes and walk along one of the plastic strips, but there was never a reason for him to go inside and see if they had a mother who might want to give him a cookie also.

Sill, in Cory’s mind, the Chung’s was a friendly house. A house he knew.

He saw it right where it should be. At the end of the street at the top of the block. He crossed the empty street, hearing his daddy say, “look both ways, Cory.” You have to because they might not be looking when they’re driving their car. So you have to watch out for them.

Cory crossed whispering frantically, “I’m looking for cars, Daddy!”

On the other side of the street, he ran over the lawn of the Chung’s house and stood in front of the door.

There were dim lights on behind the small window to the side of the door. Somewhere in the house but not up front. Somewhere in the back.

Cory banged on the door, thinking of the plastic strips along the hallway. He started to take off his shoes.

The scraping sound out in the street was coming closer. The stranger was coming for him. He picked up his large tennis shoes and clutched them to his chest.

Stranger Danger, his mind screamed again.

That’s what he would say when they opened the door. When Brian Chung opened the door, he would say, “Stranger Danger!” and they would know what to do. They would know how to help Cory.

But no one opened the door.

The scraping sound behind Cory was coming closer and then, abruptly, it was gone.

Cory ran to the side of the house and opened the side yard gate. He heard it bang shut behind him as he threaded the small side yard and all the plants that clutched and scratched at his arms as he passed through them. He sat down heavily and put his shoes back on.

He didn’t like to be touched.

Even by plants.

In the backyard, he found a pool. Its blue light shifted and wavered as the water rocked and splashed against its sides. A man floundered at the bottom as Cory stood near its edge.

He wasn’t supposed to go near pools. He knew that.

Daddy would be mad.

“Take a step back, Cory,” he heard Daddy say.

Cory took a giant step back and stood on his tip-toes as he peered down at the man floundering at the bottom of the pool. Arms waving, clothes shifting, the man seemed to be trying to walk along the bottom but not moving forward at the same time.

Cory turned toward the house. Inside, he could see people moving around. All of them, maybe ten or so, moving and bumping into one another. Every direction all at once, slowly. None of them saw Cory.

Cory was glad because if they did, they might come out and yell at him to get away from the pool, because pools were dangerous for little boys who didn’t know how to swim.

Cory liked swimming.

But he didn’t really know how to swim on his own without Daddy holding him. On Saturdays, whether it was hot or cold, Daddy would always take him to the community pool. He would hold Cory as Cory did swimming.

Which wasn’t really swimming, as Cory hadn’t mastered the not breathing while you’re underwater bit. Still, Cory loved swimming. As long as Daddy was there to hold him.

“Hey Dummy!”

Cory looked up. Scott Chung always called Cory, “Dummy”.

Scott was leaning out a window.

Cory heard a dull thud. Thuds. Thudding. Now that he was paying attention to something else besides the beautiful pool, which he’d never known the Chungs had in their backyard, he was aware of all the other things going on.

Thuds.

Groaning.

Someone crying.

Cory wondered how many of the other houses in the neighborhood had pools.

“Hey Dummy! You better get out of here.” It was Scott. Cory liked Scott, even though he was usually mean to him. One time Scott had let Cory play action figures with him when no one else was around. Never again after that one time. But it had been enough for Cory to remember forever. They’d played in the dirt near a construction site, building a secret hideout, and Cory got to hold the Batman figure. Got to be the Batman who swung away from the avalanche of dirt that destroyed the secret hideout they’d carved out of a dirt mound. Then some mean kids from the other side of the train tracks had come and made fun of them, calling Cory a dummy and then Scott had left and he never let Cory play action figures with him again.

Cory had five best days of his life that he remembered. He would remember them for as long as he lived. The day he played action figures with Scott was one of those days. It was number three.

“Hey Dummy, I said you better get out of here. Everyone’s gone crazy.”

The thuds were coming from beyond Scott’s window.

“Cory get out of here!” he heard Brian’s voice yell from inside the room with Scott. But he didn’t see Brian.

Then there was the sound of wood splintering.

And then there was a sharp Crraack as though a flimsy bedroom door had suddenly given way and the strangers pounding at it from the other side had rushed in through the place where it once was. That kind of sharp crack.

And then Brian was screaming, “Stay away from my brother!”

And Scott was yelling. And then screaming.

All the dark figures inside the house were shambling up the stairs toward Scott and Brian Chung’s bedroom.

Cory circled the pool, staying well away from its edge. At the back fence he looked up, trying to see inside the room where Scott and Brian weren’t screaming anymore. He only heard low growling now. Growling like the growling of the mean dogs that lived in a yard on the other side of the neighborhood. The yard of the mean man who always told Cory his dogs would bite Cory if he tried to pet them. So Cory never did. Even though he wanted to.

The stranger from the street appeared from the dark side of the yard that led back to the side gate. He reached out for Cory and snarled, stumbling across the landscaping of the back yard. Cory turned to the fence at his back.

I’m Batman, he reminded himself as fear closed in about him.

He shot his right arm upward and made a “Bhuuuwwuush!” sound with his lips. This is what he does when he simulates Batman’s rocket-powered grappling hook. What he did when he wanted to climb things like trees or fences.

“Bhuuuwwuush!”

When his imagination confirmed that the hook had gone up into the dark trees beyond the backyard, Cory, satisfied, climbed the back fence, then dropped down into the dark undergrowth that bordered the back of the neighborhood.

Chapter Eleven

Cory stood, breathing heavily in the thick darkness beyond the fence. The night-scent of the pine trees was heavy all about him. He was on the side of a hill that led down to the main road outside his neighborhood.

His head darted this way and that, looking for something, anything, familiar. He followed the slope of the ground downward, the trees and brush clutching at him, scratching him, pulling at his cape. His mask felt hot around his eyes. He pulled it aside and quickly wiped sweat away. Then he donned it again so no one would know he was just Cory.

He was breathing heavily.

“I’m Batman,” he whispered.

“I’m Batman.”

He turned on his flashlight. Shining it around, he could see nothing but the close trees rising off into the night above him. Stars shone up there in the empty spaces beyond the tips of the pines.

“I’m Batman,” he said one last time and then continued downhill, weaving in and out of the brush until he tumbled down a sudden steep drop and landed on a wide cracked sidewalk.

He was on the main road leading downhill from the neighborhood to the shopping center where the pharmacy waited.

“Go get the bag from Dr. Liu,” he reminded himself as he began to wonder why he was out in the night all by himself. Then he thought of Mrs. Sheinman who seemed very sick.

He looked at the wide curving street. He had never been allowed to cross it alone. Only if he went with someone else. And only at crosswalks.

“When the man turns green then walk across and don’t stop, Cory.”

The crosswalk was way back up the hill, and the streetlights were out along the street. No cars passed him in the darkness.

“Mrs. Sheinman is sick so I have to hurry, Daddy,” he said aloud to the stillness of the empty road. Besides, he thought, I’m Batman. Batman can do things Cory can’t. He shot his right hand into the air, aiming it at a tall house rising from behind the wall of a neighborhood on the far side of the street.

“Bhuuuwwuush!”

Then he leapt out into the street and dashed across, arm upraised and holding onto his imaginary rocket-powered grappling hook.

A van with only one headlight came speeding out of the night as Cory ran across the street. Its engine rattled loudly as it swerved, barley missing Cory, then sped off down the street, turning right into the parking lot of the distant pharmacy. Cory landed on the far sidewalk with a small hop. He turned and walked down the hill, through the dark, toward the shopping center.

Now he saw the big freeway curving away to the south beyond the fenced parking lot of the shopping center. All the cars on the freeway were stopped. Some still had lights on. Only a few. All of them were frozen and unmoving. No horns. No idling or revving engines for that matter. Just a long deep silence that made Cory feel uncomfortable as he watched all those unmoving cars facing south.

Sometimes when Cory had gone to this shopping center with his Daddy on a “hike”, as Daddy called it, he’d been fascinated by all the cars speeding off toward the south along the freeway. Cory would obsess at the sight of them and he would need to stand and watch, mouth open, making the same sounds they sometimes made as they changed lanes and sped ahead of some other slower southbound driver.

“Vrroooom!”

“Nunuunuuuuu!”

“Rowwwwr!”

Now nothing moved down there along the freeway. Hundreds of frozen cars stretched off into the distance. Headlights glared at stalled cars. Red taillights stared listlessly at more cars. To Cory, they were like the eyes of many dead demons or the bats that sometimes flew out of Batman’s cave. The long lines of unmoving cars wound their way south or, “thatway,” as Cory liked to think of that particular direction. The northbound lanes that led off to the more populated areas of Orange County and on into the very dense urban zones of Los Angeles were completely empty.

By the time Cory made the entrance to the DrugCo parking lot, he could hear the sound of the rattling bus that had nearly run him down trying to start. Trying to, and failing. As Cory walked forward into the parking lot, he started to imitate the sound of the small coughing Volkswagen bus parked in front of the pharmacy.

“Whhrrrr...whrrr... whrrr...” he said as he approached.

A large man leaped out of the driver’s seat holding a massive lug wrench. He squared off against Cory and raised it back over his wide shoulders.

“Stay back, man!” he shouted.

Cory stopped moving forward.

“Whrrr... whrrr... whrrr,” he continued.

The man looked at Cory, noting the Batman costume.

“You’re not one of ‘em are you?”

Cory stopped making the sound of the Volkswagen bus starter that wouldn’t start.

He stared at the immense man. He was young, bristly beard, shorts and flip flops. A tank top and a button down Hawaiian shirt.

“I’m Batman,” whispered Cory.

The man shook his head, lowered the large wrench as he completely forgot about Cory, and turned back to the van.

“It’s not working, Bob,” came a woman’s voice from within the darkened vehicle.

“We just gave it to her. Give it a few minutes, Tab.”

Cory looked inside the van. A young woman, blond, tan, tired eyes, held a small tow-headed girl on her lap. The girl was breathing heavily, gasping for air. They were sitting on the back bench of the bus. Another little girl, blond and only slightly older than the little girl on the blond woman’s lap, stroked the arm of her gasping younger sister.

Bob the big man had opened the rear engine compartment to the old van and began to bang around inside, muttering to himself as he did so.

The girl continued to gasp. Dark circles ringed her wide brown eyes. Eyes now watching Cory.

Cory began to mimic the sounds of the gasping girl. Softly. Watching the little girl. Breathing with the little girl, who slowly, breath by breath, began to breathe normally again.

The tired blond woman smiled, murmuring. Then she looked up at Cory. Then back down at her child. “See honey. It’s okay now. ”

“It’s okay now, Finn,” said the other little girl who continued to stroke her little sister’s arm. “It’s okay now.”

The tired looking woman looked up at Cory again. “Are you okay?” she asked.

“I’m Batman,” whispered Cory flatly.

“Bob?” she said.

“What?” came Bob’s muffled voice from deep inside the engine compartment at the rear of the vehicle.

“I think... he’s special.”

There was a sudden bump and the entire vehicle shook.

“Owww!” groaned muffled-voiced Bob.

“Bob, is everything okay?” she asked.

“Yeah.” Pause. “I banged my head.”

“Daddy banged his head,” giggled the older little girl to her younger sister.

“Shhhh,” whispered their mother. “That’s not funny right now, Ollie.”

The tow-headed one on her lap, blond curls, belly sticking out from under a t-shirt, smiled up at her older sister.

“Bob, I think we need to take him with us,” said the tired blond.

“Okay, whatever,” said Bob matter-of-factly.

“Do you want to come and get in here? Go with us someplace safe?” she asked Cory.

Cory shook his large head slowly. “No. Hafta go and come right back with a bag for Mrs. Sheinman.”

The tired blond bit her lip for a moment. Thinking. Then, “I think you’d better get in and come with us. It’s not safe out there right now. Not tonight.”

The older little girl, Ollie, rainbow striped heavy knit sweater and long curly blond hair shook her head at Cory, her punch-stained lips silently repeating the words, “Not safe.”

“Because of Stranger Danger,” said Cory.

“Ummm?” The tired woman looked around, seeing things not there, seeing recent episodes. Seeing things one never forgets. “Yeah... that’s one way of putting it....” she paused, looking straight at Cory. The unconscious signal humans use to communicate when the other human being communicated with should offer a name by which to identify themselves for the remainder of the conversation. Cory, of course missed the signal completely.

“Batman,” she said softly.

“I’m Batman,” confirmed Cory.

Then her eyes widened as she saw something off over Cory’s left shoulder. “Bob, they’re coming!” she shrieked.

Bob banged his head again. Muttered something lost deep within the engine compartment. Then, once his head was out from within, he groaned an, “Oh, man!”

Cory turned, following their gaze. At the far end of the parking lot, shambling up from the freeway, more strangers were coming, weaving around a few abandoned cars as they stumbled forward.

Bob touched Cory’s shoulder and Cory recoiled.

“Sorry,” Bob muttered breathlessly. “What did you say your name was?”

“I’m Batman,” said Cory flatly, composing himself with a heavy breath.

“Okay...” Bob ran to the back of the old surf bus, slammed the engine compartment shut and locked it on a rusty click, then loped back to Cory, his flip flops flip-flopping in loud slaps against the surface of the parking lot. Bob’s eyes were darting everywhere as the little girl whose name was Ollie shrieked, “Daddy! They’re coming!” Then, “Don’t look at them, Finn.”

“Girls, I want you to lay down on the floor,” urged the tired blond.

“Hey!” it was Bob staring straight into Cory’s eyes behind the mask. “I need your help right now, ok?”

The strangers were stumbling across the parking lot. Cory watched them and felt that Scarecrow fear wanting to get him again. Just like the Scarecrow had tried to get Batman.

“Hey!” said Bob again.

I’m Batman, thought Cory, pushing the fear off and away from himself.

“I need you to help me push this van right now. Can you help me?”

“Bob, maybe we should just all go back inside the store. The manager said we’d be safe there.”

“We’ve got to make it down to the boat. It’s our only hope, Tabby.” Then Bob, the father of the two beautiful little blond girls and the husband to a wife he loved, surrounded by the end of the world and the living dead, looked at Cory in a way no one had ever looked at Cory. A look that said, “I need to count on you right now, man!”

No one had ever counted on Cory.

It just wasn’t done.

Y’know, because he was Cory.

Bob pleaded, “Batman, can you help me push... like this?” He leaned against the back of the small van.

Cory nodded. They both pushed.

Nothing happened.

“Stop,” said Bob breathlessly. “Tab, go up and put the van in neutral.” A moment later, they began to push again.

“Daddy, can we look now?” shouted Ollie.

“NO!” grunted Bob as the van began to roll forward, slowly.

“Daddy! Finn’s looking!” shouted Ollie from the floor.

“Bob, they’re getting closer!” shrieked the woman.

“Push... Batman!” grunted Bob.

The van was slowly picking up speed, rolling across the front of the pharmacy. The fence and the freeway loomed ahead.

Bob knew he’d only get one chance to push-start the old van. There would be no second chance this time. In that moment, he was afraid as only a father of two beautiful young girls and the husband of a soulmate can be. The fear of no second chances. In that last “nothing else left” moment, he felt more exposed and in more trouble than he’d ever been in all his wild life.

Soundlessly, effortlessly, Cory pushed with all his strength alongside Bob. The van was beginning to get away from them.

“Keep pushing, Batman! Don’t stop!” yelled Bob and lunged away, flip flops pounding across the parking lot as he raced up to the driver’s seat and leapt in.

“I’ll get it started and come back to get him,” he told everyone inside the van.

The van picked up speed even though Bob’s immense weight had been added to it. In fact, it had literally rocked downward on the driver’s side when Bob had jumped in. But Cory was still pushing with all his strength.

Just like he’d seen Batman do. Jaw set. Muscles straining. Determined no matter what.

“I am the night...” gasped Cory from underneath his hot and sweaty mask.

And the van rolled out of his grasp and Cory stumbled but didn’t fall and then watched the van pull away from him.

Whrrr... whrrrr... whrrrr, went the starter.

“Whrrr... whrrr... whrrrr,” gasped Cory.

Then, Whrrrr whrrr.... Raa Raaa Raa Ruuuuuuuunnnnnn.

The red taillights of the tiny van suddenly swerved as the lone headlight played across the mesh fence at that end of the parking lot, revealing swarming zombies crawling through the ice plants along its length.

Bob swerved toward another mass of zombies tumbling after the van in the middle of the parking lot and the van died...

... or almost seemed to die as Bob put in the clutch, gunned the engine and then let it leap forward.

The zombies chased after the van and a few began to lurch toward Cory who stood watching the van race for the far edge of the parking lot. Now there were too many zombies between Cory and the van. A moment later, the van reached the exit and disappeared onto the dark road, heading south, heading “thatway”, heading for the marina and the beach.

In the silence that followed, Cory remembered the reason he had come all this way, remembering Mrs. Sheinman and the bag he was to pick up. Cory turned and ran into the pharmacy.

Chapter Twelve

A woman pushed past Cory without even taking a moment to regard his Batman costume. Her eyes were wild and rolling. She was covered in a thick sheen of greasy sweat. Her hand was bandaged.

“I’m sorry Sir, we’re closed now!” yelled a heavyweight manager type racing forward, wildly waving at Cory. He had a red bloody scratch across his cheek. A large dangle of keys shook from one of his beefy swollen hands.

“I need to pick up a bag for Mrs. Sheinman.” Cory halted the recitation of his mission orders as though interrogated and awaiting further questioning. As though the large, beefy man might ask Cory to next produce papers before proceeding across some imaginary checkpoint. But the manager only raced past Cory, muttering curses as he reached the main automatic sliding doors to the store.

“Awww hell...” he groaned, fumbling with his keys as he inserted one into a small hole near the main entrance and watched the undead mob careen across the parking lot for the store. A moment later, a steel security door began to lower itself from a thin slot in the ceiling. Outside, the undead shambled across the parking lot, stumbling into the bright light cast from the front of the store, slamming into the windows at the entrance as the security door slowly continued to close behind the already shattering glass.

Zombies crawled across the jagged wounds in the glass doors, slithering, down into the foyer in front of the security gate in dripping pools of blood.

Cory stood still, waiting for the interrogation to continue.

The fat manager ran by him again, racing off to the back of the store. “I’m sealing the whole store, Dan!” he shouted out over the clean well-stocked aisles.

The sounds of glass breaking from behind the security shutters grew muffled and distant as the descending door reached the floor of the store. Then a sudden rain of haphazard thuds sounded out like summer thunder as a chorus of fists began to slam into the rolling metal door.

“I need to pick up a package for Mrs. Sheinman,” stated Cory above the chaos. Alone and still standing near the front entrance.

No one answered back.

Cory began to shift from one foot to the next. Almost a little dance. Cory’s dad knew the dance meant Cory was nervous. Uncertain. Worried about what was to come next.

A moment later, a girl in a maroon shirt, feathered hair with a pink streak falling off to one side, appeared from the aisles. She was holding a price gun.

“I think we’re closed, sir,” she said, snapping some bubblegum as she took in Cory’s costume. Then she noticed the security door, rolled down and in place. She took the earbuds out of her ear and now she could hear the violent impacts against the security door. Each one a tiny eruption of summer thunder.

“What the...” but the sentence died between her braces. She walked forward, standing next to Cory. “What’s going on out there?”

Cory shifted.

“I need to get a bag from... Dr. Liu,” he stammered, remembering more details as if that might help him continue on with his mission. Or get someone to help him continue on with his mission. “... for Mrs. Sheinman. She’s sick.” Cory bounced back and forth. Dancing. Still worried.

“What’s going on out there?” said the girl. A teenager. She was looking up at Cory now and there was terror in her eyes. Eyes that reminded Cory of a cat he liked to play with sometimes. The cat was gray and it never said anything.

“I need to...”

“Yeah, I get it. Are you stupid or something? What the hell is going on out there?!” she shouted at him.

At that moment the pharmacist, Dr. Liu, came running up the aisle. He was slight. He was middle aged with tan skin and sun spots.

“Heather, where’s Tony?” he said in a deep baritone voice.

“I have no idea! Do you hear... do you hear that out there?”

A brief look of exasperation crossed Doctor Liu’s face. Cory had seen that same look on many people’s faces. He didn’t know exactly what it meant but he knew he didn’t like it. He’d found, in his nineteen years, that it was best just to ignore the look and keep doing what you were doing and in time they would stop the look they made with their faces, all pinched and hard, and let Cory do what Cory needed to do.

“There’s a viral outbreak of some sort, Heather,” said Dr. Liu. “I’ve been getting emails from the Center for Disease Control, but I didn’t see them until just a few minutes ago. This flu everyone’s been complaining about seems a little more serious than first reported.”

Something loud smacked into the roll down door, dimpling it inward.

Heather turned back to Dr. Liu and said, “Uh yeah, that ain’t no flu.”

A sudden buzz and then a pop followed by an electronic squeal and the store speaker system came to life.

“Danny. Heather!” It was the voice of the unseen manager, Tony. “Do not open the front doors or any of the other doors to the store. Corporate just called and told me there’re riots going on everywhere. We’re to lockdown the store and sit tight.”

“It’s a riot?” asked Heather.

“Apparently,” replied Dr. Liu. “Or that’s what corporate would like us to think at this very moment.”

“I need to pick up... a bag...” mumbled Cory, feeling overwhelmed. Feeling very... not Batman. “I need to go right home to Mrs. Sheinman.” Cory shifted from oversized shoe to oversized shoe. He squeezed his eyes shut behind his Batman mask. He didn’t like the loud sounds being made against the metal door.

No, he didn’t like them at all.

An hour later, the noise coming from the front of the store was getting worse as more and more impacts resounded off the steel-shuttered door.

Dr. Liu, Heather, and Cory stood near the pharmacy counter at the back of the store. Cory continued to rock back and forth. At least now he was holding the bag of medicine for Mrs. Sheinman, but the nice Asian man had told him he couldn’t leave. Not just yet.

“Where’s Tony?” asked Heather who’d been texting non-stop. She’d only managed to get a hold of one other person. Her friend Tracy. Two texts. The first stated that Tracy was trapped in her car. The second was unreadable.

“I’ve got to go home,” Heather whispered to herself. She already had her jacket and backpack on.

Doctor Liu had been studying his smartphone, reading all the emails from the CDC.

“I don’t think that’s a good idea right now, Heather.”

“You’re not the boss of me, I’m...” she shouted abruptly and waved her smartphone at him. “I’m outta here right now!”

She raced off down the aisle heading for the back door and the loading dock. Doctor Liu vaulted the counter and dashed after her, easily overtaking her by the time she reached cosmetics where he tackled her and she screamed.

Cory winced.

Doctor Liu hauled her to her feet as she continued to scream and then began shouting, “Rape!”

“Heather!” he shouted back into her face.

“Rape!” she screamed, repeating the word, this time adding, “You rapist, pervert creep!”

Dr. Liu slapped her.

She stopped, staring at him in disbelief.

Then, “I’m gonna sue! My parents are going to sue you for everything you own!”

She began to hyperventilate as her tirade spun further and further out of control and then her legs folded and she fell on the ground crying and gasping for air. Dr. Liu let go of her.

“It’s not a flu, Heather,” said Dr. Daniel Liu as he bent down near her face. “It’s some sort of... insanity. It’s gone viral, or at least that’s what it appears to be to the CDC as of three hours ago, but... “Dr. Liu wiped the sudden sweat from his forehead. “There are reports of dead people getting up and walking around out there. Biting people, Heather. Infecting them.”

She stops.

She sobs once.

“If you get bit, you turn into one of those freaks out there, within the hour,” finished Dr. Liu.

She looked up at him. Her eyes are filled with tears. Her mouth agape. Braces shining from the inside of her tiny bitter mouth.

“I think,” said Dr. Liu, trying to slow his breathing. “It would be best if we all just waited for the authorities to establish some kind of control.”

They stared at one another.

Heather mumbled, “That lady bit Tony before she left the store.”

They both turned to look at the manager’s office up near the ceiling on the back of the far wall. The windows up there were dark.

“An hour ago,” whispered Heather.

“C’mon” said Dr. Liu immediately. “Get up now! We’ll lock ourselves in the pharmacy.”

“I have to go home to Mrs. Sheinman,” said Cory.

“I’m sorry, Batman.” Dr. Liu had already determined who Cory thought he was. “But we need to lock ourselves inside my office for safety.” He paused. “The Joker’s coming to get us and we’ll be safe there, okay Batman?”

Cory thought about this.

“Stranger Danger,” said Cory.

Dr. Liu scratched his head. “What strangers?”

“The ones outside.”

Dr. Liu thinks for a moment longer as Heather rises from the floor. She seems much older than her fifteen years.

Then, “They work for the Joker.”

“Okay,” said Cory and followed Dr. Liu and Heather into the back of the pharmacy. A moment later, a steel mesh gate begins to lower from the ceiling, cutting off access to the pharmacy.

Later that night, Heather’s cell phone died. She’d forgotten to bring a charger to work with her. Dr. Liu gave her a sleeping pill and she curled into a ball and passed out on the floor of the pharmacy. An hour later the manager, Tony, came shuffling up the aisle. Passing the pharmacy. Dr. Liu, hidden, watched him from behind the stock shelving inside the pharmacy.

Tony was gray. His eyes glassy. His pants stained. His lips crusted with vomit. He wandered toward the front of the store and Dr. Liu hoped Tony didn’t retain enough of his former self to actually open the front door to the store. Dr. Liu had read all the CDC briefs. Dr. Liu knew more than most about what was really going on. He knew Tony was dead. He knew all those people banging on the door out there were dead also. Technically. He knows the emails from the CDC stopped coming two hours ago.

They’re probably dead too.

The last one had said they were switching to an emergency command bunker and would be unavailable for the next twenty-four hours.

The missing “if ever” was obvious.

Right there, Dr. Daniel Liu made a plan. He would hold the store for thirty days. By then, the authorities would have a better handle on the situation and he would know what to do. Most Pandemic scenarios hypothesized a thirty day window in which the local population would need to care for itself. A pharmacy was the perfect place to wait out the downfall of society.

It was secure.

No windows.

State of the art consumer security due to access to drugs and medicines.

There was food and water.

Hundreds of bottles of water and juices.

Dried snacks.

Medicine.

There was even a chemical shower in the janitor’s closet. They could ride out thirty days here no sweat, thought Dr. Liu.

Cory spun back and forth in the doctor’s office chair. Then he put his head down on the desk and seemed to sleep.

Dr. Liu looked at his two fellow survivors. His companions for the next thirty days

They would depend on him. He couldn’t count on them. He couldn’t decide which of them was the bigger liability. He knew Heather, in time, would try to leave, jeopardizing the building’s security. His security.

A thought crossed his mind.

He was amazed in that moment at ever having had it. It was sudden and then gone, but the memory of having such a terrible thought was like a painful wound and he was stunned by it. Amazed really. Amazed that life had reached a point so quickly in which he would have ever even had such a thought.

He could kill Heather with a small combination of medications.

He was ashamed of himself. He closed his eyes, trying to think of peaceful times and family. He thought of his grandmother’s garden in Hawaii. It was his favorite place. The gardenias and their aroma. The warm breeze. The heavy salt air coming in from the sea. The sound of bells. His grandmother shelling peas.

He fell asleep...

... and woke to dead Tony looking at them, his mouth open and closing with a snap as he bumped into the mesh gate. The dead manager screamed silently, his voice now just a rusty guttering whisper emitting from pale flesh.

It was four o’clock in the morning. Just after. Heather and Batman were still asleep.

Dr. Liu watched the undead fat man rattle the mesh gate weakly.

We can’t have the store to ourselves until we clear him out, he thought.

“Destroy the brain of the infected subject to terminate post-mortem function.” That’s what one of the final CDC bulletins had instructed anyone still on the advisory net to do. Dr. Liu rose and went to a drawer near the register. He selected a key from his ring and inserted it into the lock on the face of a drawer.

DrugCo Company policy strictly forbade the use of firearms, or for employees to carry them while at work, or keep them on the premises. But after reading one particularly horrific account of a violent pharmacy takeover entitled “Drugstore Cowboys Gone Psycho” in a trade journal, Dr. Liu had purchased a gun.

He still meant to take a firearms safety class.

He just hadn’t gotten around to it.

He picked up the gun and held it. He looked for the safety and thumbed it off. He aimed it at Tony’s head, aiming through the wide decorative gaps in the wire mesh security fence. He lined up the small white dot between the two closer dots on either side of the gun sight. Just like the man at the gun store had shown him how to do.

“Nothin’ to it, cowboy!” the gun store owner had said.

Nothing to it.

Dr. Liu squeezed the trigger.

A sudden Baaaang he hadn’t quite expected erupted inside the small pharmacy.

Then his chest was hit by a runaway buffalo plowing into him at full speed. He dropped the gun, bending down and to the left. He had just enough time to put two and two together. He’d fired and hit the metal mesh and the bullet had ricocheted back into his chest.

He knew his lung had probably collapsed. He looked down at blood soaking into his blue button down dress shirt. He was having trouble breathing. Everything wheeled about him and he felt himself stumbling. He reached out for a wall to steady himself and everything exploded in sirens and red emergency lighting the moment after his flailing hand caught hold of the fire alarm, dragging it down. Activating it.

I’ve made things much worse, was his only thought.

Every security door in the store began to slowly open. The fire doors would be swinging wide now so no one would be trapped inside, as DrugCo didn’t want relatives suing for tons of money in the name of pain, suffering, and compensatory loss in case of fire. The steel roll down doors at the front of the store could be heard slowly winding themselves up into the ceiling now. They rose on a tinny, whining screech somewhere beyond the sirens and the flashing red lights.

An automated woman’s voice began to ask everyone to “please leave the store, safely”.

Heather was sitting up, wide-eyed and stoned to the gills on a sleeping pill. Batman had his hands over his ears. The mesh gate to the pharmacy was already halfway up when Dr. Liu looked back at dead Tony.

“Infected subjects are attracted to sound and light.” Another bulletin flashed across Dr. Liu’s mind as doomsday wailed on all around him.

The pharmacy gate up, dead manager Tony reached out over the counter and tried to grab anyone he could get his blue beefy fingers into as he drooled and moan-roared.

Dr. Liu bent over. Darkness closed in about his vision, iris-ing down into a tiny hole for just a moment. That’s probably bad, he thought distantly.

He picked the pistol up from off the floor.

The darkness was almost complete.

He stood up straight and the darkness retreated to the corners of his eyes for a moment.

For now.

Dead Tony fell over the counter at Dr. Liu’s feet, thrashing in slow motion. Then he lifted his head, opening his jaws and sank his teeth into Dr. Liu’s shin.

Dr. Liu didn’t even scream.

Instead he aimed the pistol once more and blew Tony’s brains all over the floor in front of the pharmacy cash register.

I should have practiced, thought Dr. Liu distantly.

Now he couldn’t breathe. Or at least that’s what it felt like.

He turned to Batman.

“Young man!” He gasped above the wail of fire alarms bleating. “Come with me.”

He turned to Heather. Her eyes were wide and vacant as if she couldn’t put everything together just yet.

“Get up please and follow me.”

They both did. He took them to the back of the pharmacy, and then through to the warehouse section of the store and pointed toward the open fire door that led back out into the unused parking lot behind the store.

Heather stared at him. Uncomprehending.

“Go. Now!”

Dr. Liu could hear the groans of the undead back in the store. They were inside, making their way up through the aisles of cosmetics and scented lotions.

“Go! Get out of here.”

Heather ran for the emergency door, grabbing Cory’s hand. Dr. Liu waited until they were out, then put the gun in his bloody, trembling hand up to his head.

Chapter Thirteen

Heather pulled Cory out into the predawn darkness. The smell of smoke and fire hung heavy in the air. The groaning dead seemed distant and yet too real.

“C’mon,” said Heather breathing hard, running for the tree-covered hill at the back of the parking lot to the rear of the mega pharmacy. She scrambled up through dirt and leaves and into the dense foliage, letting go of Cory’s hand as she crawled up the hill. Sensing a game, Cory who was used to following, followed the frantic teenage girl. Halfway up the hill they tumbled into a rough concrete drainage ditch. They sat, each of them panting. Heather’s breathing slowed in time and so did Cory’s. Her eyes were wide in the just before dawn dark. She fumbled inside her designer hippy-ish backpack for a cigarette and a lighter. Trembling hands barely got the cigarette lit as she followed this with a deep exhale and a world weary sigh. She inhaled deeply again on the next drag, her lips hanging open afterward. Her head turned slightly, first to one side then the other, as if she were in the act of forever telling some unseen someone, “no”.

“That’s a no no,” whispered Cory too loudly.

She looked over at him, saw who she was with and what he was wearing, a Batman cape and mask, a man forever a child, and told him to, “Shut up.”

Cory turned away, studying some ants that crawled near one of his gloved hands. He let them. Cory liked ants.

They sat for a while, Heather smoking, in the darkness. Listening to distant screams and groans that seemed impossible to hear until they realized it wasn’t a single groan they were hearing. It was a chorus. A choir. A distant pack of dogs gone feral, surrounding someone. Raving as they closed in. Down through the trees they could see the back of the pharmacy. The groans there were gone, missing, sated.

“I’ve got to go home now,” whispered Heather, still fighting off the effects of the sleeping pill Dr. Liu had given her. Her mind returned to those suddenly awakened moments back inside the store. Dr. Liu was hurt. But there’d been a loud Bang just before. That was what had awoken her. The loud Bang. And then Dr. Liu was telling them to come with him and then go. Leave.

She’d seen them. The undead. She’d seen them cresting up through the aisles like a tsunami she’d once been shown a video of in school. That’s what she’d thought at that exact moment just before they raced out the back. That the undead were like a Tsunami.

Cory was rocking back and forth slightly, occasionally sighing out heavily behind his latex rubber mask.

“Shhh,” she hushed. “We need to be quiet now.” Then, “We need to find help.”

“I’ve got to take this medicine to Mrs. Sheinman.”

She thought about telling him to go. She couldn’t take care of him. She didn’t want to take care of him. He was a liability.

But the thought of being all alone right now frightened her.

Dawn started to rise in the east. It was thin and milky. There were no birds. No songs. No sounds. Even the distant screaming and the pervasive groaning seemed to have stopped for a moment.

She stood up. “C’mon, lets go.” Cory stood also. She brushed the leaves from her jeans. Cory didn’t.

“We have to be real quiet and we can’t let those things see us, okay?”

“Strangers,” whispered Cory. “Stranger Danger.”

“Yeah... stranger danger, whatever. We gotta be real quiet. You make any noise and I’ll leave you, kid. Okay? Just like that.”

Cory nodded.

Heather started up the hill, threading the cypress, olive, and eucalyptus trees that grew along its steep flank. Planted when the developer had wanted to attract buyers to the Neo-Mediterranean-esque housing at the top of the hill, visible from the freeway.

“I know a back way to my house. If we’re quiet, we can make it,” she said over her shoulder while they wove through the dense foliage. Her neck muscles felt tight as they climbed the hill, sweating even though it was just dawn.

At the top of the hill they came to a dirty white stucco wall. Heather climbed on top of the wall and looked down into Kylie Scagliotti’s backyard. She used to play with Kylie when they were little. But High School had changed everything. Kylie was a “loadie” now. They didn’t run with the same crowd. But Heather liked Lane Hardy, the leader of the “loadies”. He hung out a lot with Kylie and the others.

She almost threw up when she looked down into the backyard from the top of the wall. But she held it down. She controlled herself because she knew her life depended on not throwing up and attracting attention. Instead, she lowered herself back down the wall to where Cory stood, watching something.

She couldn’t have seen what she saw, she told herself.

But she did. She knew she did, her mind replied.

The back sliding glass door was shattered into a million crystalline pieces. It looked like a pile of snow. There was a body there too. Or what was left of a body, lying within the pile. But that wasn’t the worst of what she’d seen in that brief half-second atop the wall. She’d seen Kylie’s dad sitting next to the body. He looked gray. His mouth was covered in blood. There was blood everywhere. He was just sitting there staring off into nothing, chewing as he dug through the pile of shattered glass, clawing at the body with his own bloody hands.

Sitting on the ground beneath the dirty white stucco wall, Heather remembered Kylie’s dad picking her and Kylie up from soccer practice and stopping at Baskin Robbins for an ice cream.

Heather began to shake then. She got up and started walking along the back of the stucco wall, each crushed leaf echoing inside her head like a thunderclap or a car wreck, repeating, “What am I going to do?”

She stopped, leaning against the wall again.

Cory stopped too. He leaned against the wall also.

She wanted to scream at him. She wanted to shout at him to “Stop following me!” But she didn’t want to be alone. She remembered the treehouse they’d built as kids, her and Kylie and all the other neighborhood children, all her friends, back when treehouses were built every weekend out in the professional landscaping everyone called “the Woods”.

She remembered Kylie...

“Follow me,” she whispered, and they continued on farther down the wall and when she thought she had the right area within the trees, she found the “Treehouse” still standing in a large cypress. She hadn’t been here since she was a kid, she thought to herself. A long time ago. Maybe three years was the last time. The “Treehouse” was just a large plywood flat nailed between two sturdy branches. She remembered a boy, Tommy, who had always been the leader of such constructions, doing the planning and most of the work. He was older than them all and she wondered whatever had become of him and all the children she used to play with when she was young.

She thought of Kylie’s dad again. Saw the image of him in her head by the body and the broken glass.

“That’s what happened to them,” she answered herself.

She climbed up onto the treehouse and sat, brushing away dry, dead leaves. Cory followed, the wood groaning at his considerable weight as he crawled up and onto the thin board.

If he falls or busts through it, she thought, and didn’t finish the part where she knew she’d just leave him even if he was injured and bleeding.

She smoked another cigarette and heard Cory whisper a soft, “No, no.”

“Yeah,” she mumbled. “These things are the least of my worries right now, Batman.”

She knew what things she needed to worry about now. Or at least she was pretty sure she knew. There was no surviving. Not if this was going on everywhere. She hadn’t even heard any cops or fire trucks coming to help anyone. Nothing. No one was moving. Now she remembered she’d even recently thought things had seemed weird and too quiet for the last few days. But she’d been too busy with back-to-school and work. Her first part-time job for clothing money. Thinking back on the last few days, things had seemed odd. Very odd. And quiet. Too quiet.

“I think those things could kill us,” she whispered. Beyond the trees, out on the freeway, a distant herd of “those things” slowly swarmed up through the frozen cars. All of them gray. All of them bloody. All of them silent at this distance.

Chapter Fourteen

Toward noon the smoke began to thicken. It drifted across the freeway in tides of ash and gray. There was another smell in the air beyond the heavy, almost pleasant smoke. A sickly smell of burning flesh. But where the fire was wasn’t immediately evident to Heather and she began to be afraid of it. As though at any moment she could be trapped by its sudden roaring appearance.

She climbed down from the treehouse without saying a word and Cory followed after her. She approached the dirty stucco wall at the top of the hill again, this time behind a different house, one that she didn’t know who exactly lived at, and pulled herself up on top of the dirty white wall, peering over. She found a quiet backyard, no pool. She climbed on top of the wall and waited. She couldn’t see anyone inside the house at the far end of the lawn. Her parents’ house, her house, she thought, was just three streets beyond this house.

“C’mon,” she whispered down to Cory and dropped onto the spongy lawn on the other side of the wall. It was still wet from the automatic sprinklers that had gone on at some point in the morning. Cautiously, she approached the back of the house.

Behind her, she heard a muffled “Bhuuuwwuush!” from the other side of the wall. Then she saw Cory’s gloved hands and heard him grunting as he climbed to the top of the wall, gracelessly, and then impacted more than landed on the wet lawn. He got up, crouched down and looked around.

Just like Batman. Sort of.

They approached the house, Heather peering as best she could into its shadowy interior.

Would those things come spilling out as they got near the big sliding glass door that opened onto the patio, wondered Heather. Would they?

There was no one inside.

Where would she run to if there was?

Heather pulled on the sliding glass door. It didn’t budge. She tried the other windows and finally found one over the kitchen sink that slid open. She dropped her backpack and climbed through. Inside, the house smelled of dust and old flowers and new carpet. The interior was beautifully put together, but in Heather’s opinion, out of touch. Like it had been decorated in the 1970’s and no one had lived in it or changed a thing since.

There was a massive crystal chandelier, creamy white leather couches, and swirling patterned chairs of green and white. The wallpaper was a two-tone paisley of green and white, and there were gilt-framed oil paintings of willowy women in gardens lit as if by morning sunlight.

A trolley cart of crystal cut glass and liquor stood against one wall. There was even a hairy white rug that dominated the center of the living room. Heather moved through the kitchen to the family room, noticing an old wood grain cabinet TV and stereo set before two rocker recliners that seemed out of place and at odds with the rest of the decor.

She opened the back door and let Cory in. They stood there surveying the out-of-date house.

“I don’t think anyone’s home,” whispered Heather. She went to the fridge and opened it. After digging through its drawers for a moment, she found some lunch meat and started eating.

“Want some?” She held out a plastic bag. Cory shook his head. “C’mon,” she said. “Let’s go look out the front windows and see what it looks like. My house isn’t far away.”

Out on the street there were more of those things. Dead people. Only a few though. Standing near the shattered windows and missing doors of other homes within the planned community tract. Beautifully manicured lawns and two story houses seemed odd counterpoints to the dazed grumble-moaning things that seemed interested in nothing at all as the morning sun beat down on the quiet, almost languid neighborhood.

“Maybe we can go out when it gets dark,” Heather whispered to herself.

“I need to take the bag back to Mrs. Sheinman,” said Cory.

“We can’t go out there... they’ll... they’ll kill us. Don’t you get that you big... stupid idiot?” She let the venetian blinds fall back into place and left the ornate living room, grabbing a handful of mints from a decorative glass serving dish that she knocked over as she careened back into the other room.

Cory watched the dish and its contents as they lay spilled out on the creamy carpet.

“I’m Batman,” he whispered.

Chapter Fifteen

The afternoon rode across the sky inside the west-facing windows, turning everything in the house still and warm and heavy. It was an old house, by Southern California standards, built and decorated circa 1975. It settled with occasional ticks and groans just like the living dead that wandered the yards and streets just beyond its walls.

“It looks like they went to Africa on vacation,” said Heather after finding a contact list and a note in the kitchen for someone named Angela. “Must suck to be them right about now,” she finished. “Whoever they are.”

Later she returned to the living room and sat sideways on a low backed couch as she peered through gauzy curtains at the slow parade outside. Cory sat on the bright green carpet, cross legged, rocking back and forth, humming to himself.

“There’s the old guy from the house with the roses near the front entrance.” She gave a low silent whistle. Then she murmured, “He looks rough.”

Later.

“Mrs. Harms is missing an arm.”

And...

“Kevin Watts. What a jerk. Serves him right. Let him stand there in the middle of the street all day with his mouth hanging open like an idiot.”

Other commentaries on friends and neighbors were noted throughout the rest of the day. Heather’s tone lost its innate stunned monotone and eventually shifted into bitter sarcasm. Everyone she’d ever known was...

And then she saw her Dad.

He came out of the Callahan’s house. He just stumbled out an open door that had seemed like a blank space in the house. Or a wound. He stumbled out of the darkness that had been there, inside the Callahan’s all day long. He stood in full daylight on a neat rectangle of lawn like some just-awakened drunk, near a forgotten basketball that must have lain where it was forgotten since it all began. He stood there as his daughter watched him from behind gauzy curtains. His gray face, his hands covered in black gore, his business shirt untucked and rust stained. His neck ravaged. Missing mostly. He just stood there even when Heather let the curtains fall back into place and hide him, as they should have. Like she was hiding from him. Like she’d done this before. Watched him, not wanting to be seen by him. The resumption of a game that had started long ago when she was just a girl of three, and had lost all meaning in the long collection of days since maturity. The rules had been changed when no one was looking. Maybe she didn’t really want to be seen by him anymore in the way he’d always seen her as a little girl. But, maybe it was still some sort of game. Even now. Only on a professional level. No longer Daddy and Little Daughter. Now it was Parent and Teenage Woman. Hide and seek.

Find me.

Survivor and Zombie.

Something like that.

“All that’s over now,” she whispered and moved the curtain aside once again to watch him. There he was. His mouth began to open. As though he were silently moaning. But she couldn’t hear what he was saying, or groaning, not this far away.

He was gone now. That wasn’t him out there, she told herself. Isn’t him. He’s gone now. Forever.

She knew that. She knew it right there. Forever. Could see it with her own eyes even though no one had explained the specifics of the plague to her. They didn’t need to, now. She just knew that whoever was driving that thing on the lawn across the street wasn’t her dad.

She got up and went to the gilded little bar cart in the family room. She selected a bottle at random and poured it into a gold rimmed tumbler with etched starbursts. She looked at it for a long moment and then drank.

“Ewww!” Then she choked out a, “Horrible.” Then drank again. She went to the fridge, found a soda and poured some of it into the tumbler and added more liquor. She stood in the day-bright yellow kitchen. Standing there drinking. Listening to the absolute nothing life now promised.

“We’re next,” she said with a sigh. She could hear Cory moaning to himself softly in the other room. She selected a kitchen knife from the block and walked into the family room and stood in front of a painting of a lithe, willowy woman with a big floppy sunhat standing in some sort of indoor garden. With a slow, determined motion she slashed the painting from top left to bottom right.

“This is not art,” she mumbled and drank a bit more, only barely making a face this time as though she were some old pro who merely winced at the slow poison every time it went down. “Not at all.”

Next she cut the other painting. Same vein. Same fate.

Then she drove the knife harder than she’d meant to into the couch. Still, it felt good. So she did it again and again until the other pieces of furniture cried out for fresh cuts.

She drank and cut things. Smashed a few plates but knew that noise was somehow not good in light of current events. She thought about going upstairs to see what there was to destroy. She passed Cory still sitting cross-legged and rocking.

“You okay?” she asked not expecting an answer.

None was given and Cory did not make eye contact.

She checked the window. Her dad was still out there. The sun was starting to drop into the west. Everything was fading to smoky orange. Somewhere fires still burned.

“Doesn’t really matter if you are, kid,” she said to Cory as she continued to watch the street. “Because none of us are ever going to be okay, ever again.”

She turned back to Cory and watched for the impact her bile missile should’ve made. When the crater didn’t appear, she moved on.

What’s death, she thought. What’s there to be afraid of about death?

She remembered her grandpa dying. Grandpa Jack. One day he was there and the next he was gone. She’d asked her Dad where he’d gone and her dad had taken off the wire rimmed glasses she loved to try on and told her Grandpa Jack was “asleep forever now, honey”. Later, when she’d delved further into the nature of death, sleep was a nice way, she’d found out, of saying death is really just nothingness. “When you die, you’re nothing,” her dad had finally told her.

She thought of him out there on the curb now. Gray and drooling. Covered in someone else’s blood.

Whose?

Drinking and thinking about her Dad’s cheap explanation of death made her suddenly angry. Why couldn’t there be something after death? Why did it just have to be nothing?

She filled the tumbler once again and felt the room spin. She burped and felt better.

I don’t want to end up like them, she thought and noticed she was crying.

Why couldn’t there have been a Heaven?

She remembered feeling angry and resentful at her Dad when he’d explained to her that he had no power over death. That death just was. “Don’t you love me enough to try and beat death?” she’d thought then. To come and get me no matter where I’m at? She thought now. That’s what she’d wanted to say to him.

“Don’t you love me enough for there to be no such thing as death?”

She started to cry and then said, “C’mon, we’re leaving!” and threw the tumbler into a tinted mirrored wall with gold flecks. It exploded and she dragged Cory to his feet, grunting. But what she really meant was, “C’mon, let’s go outside and die now.”

She picked up the knife from the last piece of furniture she’d done to death and opened the front door, Cory trotting after her as she crossed the lawn screaming at her Daddy on the other side of the street.

“Don’t you love me enough!?”

She charged the zombie who was once “Daddy” with the knife held out in front of her.

He stumbled to meet her for a final hug.

Other heads, mouths drooling and agape, turned at the rage. There were maybe ten or twenty undead on the street that burning orange late afternoon.

All along, Cory had been thinking.

He was still clutching the bag of medicine in one hand. He knew he needed to go home. But where home was seemed unclear to him. He was hoping the girl would take him there. So, like a good boy, he waited patiently for his turn to come. Daddy had taught him that sometimes he must wait patiently. Cory had needed to learn this skill because of all the babysitters he’d ever had. Not all of them had been as kind as Mrs. Sheinman. And because of the money, Cory’s dad couldn’t always be as choosy as he would’ve liked to be.

Daddy? Tonight he would need to look at the moon and see if Daddy had used the Bat Signal. If Commissioner Gordon needed Cory, Batman, to come and help Daddy.

This was always the case when Colin needed to work the night shift. If Cory ever got worried, all he needed to do was check the moon, and if Daddy was in any kind of trouble, Cory would see the Bat Signal and then Cory could come and help Daddy. As Batman of course. Because Batman can help people. That was the deal Sergeant Colin Morris had made with his son.

So on some nights when Cory awoke, scared and confused, at Mrs. Scheinman’s house or some other new sitter, if he was worried about Daddy and the Joker or Mr. Freeze or even the Scarecrow who was the worst of all, then all he needed to do was check the moon. No Bat Signal meant everything was “good to go” as Daddy always liked to say. Then Cory could go back to sleep and of course the next morning there would be pancakes because Daddy always made pancakes after a night shift.

Cory followed Heather out into the fading afternoon.

There were strangers everywhere and they frightened Cory as they lurched toward him.

“I’m Batman,” he said to himself. “I am the night...”

Heather charged her father, screaming unintelligible bloody murder, the knife raised high over her shoulder now. The stranger, arms out, stumbled toward her. His teeth were grinding back and forth. There was a loud rumble coming from somewhere nearby.

She swiped and sank the knife into the stranger’s chest. The force of her blow made him stumble, dropping him to his knees. Then, as Cory watched, the girl stood over the stranger screaming at him, and crying.

Then the stranger reached out and grabbed onto her legs.

Heather recoiled in horror, screaming louder. Backing away, falling down.

Cory knew Batman was supposed to save people from strangers. Especially strangers who wanted to “play”.

“I’m Batman,” he reminded himself.

A snarling woman, eyes gray and milky, track suit blood-stained and dirty, lunged from a nearby curb at Heather. Heather, screaming, drove her foot into her once-father’s face.

The snarling track-suited woman reached for Heather’s exposed neck and Cory drove his massive industrial gloved fist down into the woman’s, the stranger’s, heart-shaped gray face. He heard the woman’s neck snap as she crumpled to the ground.

The woman lay on the ground gurgling, not moving, her eyes rolling wildly and even maliciously at Cory. He had broken her neck, and even though she was undead, she would never move again.

Another stranger, arms flopping wildly at his sides came loping at them and Cory connected with his left hook the way Daddy had taught him to “play” when the big kids wanted to play too rough. The zombie didn’t even try to dodge or duck or even roll with the devastating left hook. It merely rag-dolled away from the blow, its bell permanently rung, even on some undead level.

The sound of a distant engine, revving at high speed, squealing tires echoing off the low canyon walls of the housing tract of the future circa 1974, came at them from some indeterminate and everywhere at once direction.

Cory grabbed Heather and flung her away from the stranger with the broken nose who was writhing and clutching at her as specks of gray spittle and bloody foam flew from his snarling mouth. Cory dragged Heather back onto the lawn and away from the strangers closing in all about them.

A teenage boy in a leather jacket, long greasy hair, dirty jeans and no shoes came stumbling onto the sidewalk. His lower jaw was missing. Cory socked him in the stomach, bending the wasteoid loner zombie in two, doubling him over as he emitted a papery, “Ummphhh”. Cory backed away as a screaming Heather cowered behind him, feeling the azaleas that grew alongside the house at her back.

A brand new Dodge Charger, dealer plates and everything, slammed into the eight zombies still crossing the middle of the street heading toward Heather and Cory. It even power-braked into a slide to catch as many as possible. Bodies thumped against the windshield and went flying everywhere, landing on lawns and out in the middle of the street.

Oblivious to the interruption, a zombie closed in on Cory, and Cory let him have it right in the face. A place his Daddy had told Cory never to punch. But he did and he caved in the zombie’s nose, driving it right back into its brain. The zombie flopped to the ground, suddenly dead again, forever.

Cory felt tired.

Teenage boys, tall, rangy, cigarettes erupting from their thin, hard mouths, sprung from the bloody, gore-spattered, brand new high-performance muscle car. Shotguns and pistols began to go off at sudden concussive intervals as blue gun smoke mixed with the bloody red light of the last of that day. Zombies crossing the street to meet them in hand to hand combat went down in hails of gunfire. Zombies stumbling from perfect tract homes as though just coming out to water the lawns in the early evening heat were blown back into the stucco walls and garages with accompanying blood spatter. One hulking teen produced an aluminum baseball bat and began driving it down onto the pulpy skulls of prone zombies in the street, grunting with each effort-filled strike. Whooping in triumph as he raised it again and again into the bloody sunset above his potato-shaped head.

Cory pressed his hands to his ears. The loud explosions of the gunshots drove him to his knees. He closed his eyes, reeling with each blast.

Within a minute, the shooting had stopped and the street was quiet until the boys started laughing. The one wielding the heavy baseball bat was breathing heavily, coughing.

“Heather MacLean,” said a tall boy who’d jumped from the driver’s seat. He was holding a snub-nosed revolver.

Heather stared at the boy. Lane Hardy. The leader of the loadies from High School. A year ahead of her. They’d never known each other, really. Back in elementary school they might have played kickball together back when they were all playing kickball that year. When kickball was life. But she didn’t think he actually knew her. Knew her name other than to call it out if she did something stupid in the quad.

But he looked older. He had a goatee. His face was drawn and tight. There were crow’s feet around his eyes. He walked forward, crossing the lawn toward her. Cory was still squeezing his eyes shut and on his knees. Hands over his ears. Lane Hardy pushed him over as he walked by. Cory tumbled onto the grass. Then opened his eyes and looked around.

“Batman, huh?” said Lane, standing over Cory.

Cory just looked up at the strange man with a gun like Daddy’s. Guns were a “no no”.

“How’d you...” began Heather.

“We wuz just out cruising the old town,” said another boy. Randy Flagg. She’d known him too. He and Lane were friends. People said Randy Flagg was strange. “Heard someone screaming and thought we’d come see what was what.”

“Good thing we did, huh guys?” Everyone agreed with Lane. They all seemed older to Heather than they should have. Like they’d been living hard for longer than just the few days since she’d last seen them in school. Taller. Leaner. More muscular. Some of them even had cruddy new tattoos. She couldn’t remember them having tattoos the last time she’d seen them somewhere on campus.

Lane Hardy came close to her and offered his hand. She could see a crude tattoo of a simple Black Hand between the thumb and index finger. He stuck the shiny gun in his waistband. She took his hand and stood up.

“You look real great, babycakes!”

She involuntarily smiled, feeling herself blush. Then she saw her Dad face down in the street. He’d been flung into a mailbox. She couldn’t see his face. Just his pants and shirt and loafers. That was him. His style. Community College Professor of English lit.

Not anymore, she thought.

“You alright?” asked Lane Hardy as she stared for a moment longer at the dead corpse that used to be “Daddy”. “Look like you seen a ghost.”

She turned and shook her head. Shaking away everything that once was. Everything she thought life should be. Yeah, he was right, she thought about her Dad. “Death is just nothing.”

“We’re going to the mall, Heather,” said Lane. “Wanna come? It’s pretty cool. We can do... well, hell, we can do whatever we want now.”

She looked up at him. He was missing a tooth. Crow’s feet. Definitely crow’s feet.

“You wanna gun? We got lotsa guns. Booze too.”

Someone whooped at the mention of booze. The big chunk of male testosterone carrying the aluminum baseball bat. The whooper. He had a round, potato-shaped head.

“Yeah,” said Lane. “Gasher loves him some booze.”

“I don’t know,” mumbled Heather as her ears began to buzz. “I just don’t know anymore.”

“Well, gotta decide right now, chick. ‘Cause them things are thick as flies a couple of streets over and no doubt they’re headed this way after all our target practice.”

Cory was sitting on the grass cross-legged. Cory as Batman. Rocking back and forth.

“Okay,” she whispered and looked at the body of her Dad one last time.

Lane snapped his fingers and tapped the open palm of one hand against the closed fist of the other. “Alrighty-then! Let us make haste.” He walked toward the Charger and Randy Flagg cried, “Mount up!” as he finished spray painting something in the middle of the street. Numbly, Heather followed Lane to the car. She looked back at Cory, only once. He was staring off at something. But she couldn’t tell what.

“Don’t even think about it,” said Lane, holding the door open for her to climb into the back seat. “He’s a liability. And there’s no room for liabilities in this future.”

Okay, she thought she’d said out loud, but didn’t. She climbed into the car, distantly feeling Lane pat her on the butt as her head began to feel dull, that distant buzz rising between her ears not unpleasantly. She slithered in between two other boys, men really, in the backseat. She didn’t feel threatened. She didn’t feel safe. She didn’t feel anything.

Through the windshield, she could see her Dad’s legs and the rest of his body behind a hedge that bordered the lawn of the 1974 house.

Death is nothing, she told herself again.

Right?

Chapter Sixteen

Cory stood up.

Time to go home now. Getting dark. Daddy will be home soon.

The roar of the Dodge Charger faded into the distant end of the day. Cory could hear tires squeal as it made some sharp turn and then the engine wound up as the mean boy named Lane Hardy mashed the accelerator and sped away from the dead-filled neighborhood and the aftermath of a slaughter in progress. A slaughter that might never find its end.

“Errrr...” sung Cory softly, mimicking the fading tire squeal.

All around, he could hear them even though they were unseen. The strangers. Their distant moans. Banging into fences in unseen backyards. Stumbling through houses and shattered sliding glass doors to come out. To come out and get him. Drawn to the gunfire that still seemed to echo off the walls of the white and beige stucco houses and even Cory’s ears.

Cory went back inside the house he and the girl had waited in all afternoon. He closed the front door behind him and made his way to the back of the house. He opened the sliding glass door and smelled the lawn and early evening rising. The grass felt wet and heavy and fresh in his nostrils. There was water on the concrete.

Cory looked at the refrigerator, walked to it and devoured a handful of the lunchmeat. He drank some water from the sink faucet because he was thirsty, wiping his mouth with his sleeve when he was finished. In the backyard, he climbed the fence after making the “Bhuwuuush!” sound before he did, and then let himself down into the silent wooded area beyond the housing tract. He knew the pharmacy was just down the hill through the woods.

He tried to be quiet.

He knew somehow strangers were attracted to noise. He knew being quiet was important from now on. But Cory was large and not the most agile of persons. He finally crashed through the dry, brown, summer’s end foliage and down onto the silent parking lot behind the pharmacy. The bright white sodium lights hummed to life, casting hot cones of light in the early twilight. Above him, the sky was a pale blue. An early night blue.

Silence.

Cory walked around the outside of the store and didn’t see any of the strangers there. He took the parking ramp up to the main road and walked back uphill toward the entrance to his neighborhood, sweating underneath his mask. He was still clutching the bag of medicine for Mrs. Sheinman. He was very tired. He hoped there would be pancakes when he got home. When Daddy came home after patrol.

He really hoped there would be pancakes.

He made it back into the neighborhood hearing nothing but a deep, intense quiet that had settled over everything in the last twenty-four hours. Gone were the sounds of the distant freeway, humming and droning, always running day and night. Gone were the sudden emphatic explosions of kids playing late into the dark on still, hot summer nights. Gone were radios in garages as cars were being worked on. Gone were TVs behind windows casting blue light late into the night. All these things were missing and gone. Even the dogs that once barked at Cory as he passed their gates and fences had disappeared.

Cory saw a cat he didn’t know. He tried to pet it, but it hissed and ran off into a dark house. Cory continued on, almost home. Sometimes he would see shapes behind the shattered windows of the houses along the street. But he was quiet and walked slowly and none of the strangers came out after him.

When Cory made it to Mrs. Sheinman’s house, he found the porch light on, but it seemed small and even wan as though it were being besieged by the night. For a long moment Cory stood in front of the house. He knew he did not want to go inside.

But he had to. Mrs. Sheinman needed her bag of medicine.

Maybe Daddy is home now, he thought.

Cory opened the gate, listening to it whine on a rusty sing-song note. He imitated it as he always did. But this time his voice was little more than a whisper or even a dry croak. Then he closed the gate which was what he was supposed to do and walked up to the front door of the house. He entered and listened. The house was dark, save for a lone light in the living room by the TV. Cory went and placed the bag of medicine on the table.

“Tired,” he mumbled to himself.

He walked toward the guest room that Mrs. Sheinman had set aside for him on nights when Cory’s Dad wouldn’t be home until late. At the far end of the hall, he saw the door to Mrs. Sheinman’s bedroom was closed.

He approached the door.

“Ummm...” He started to say something about the bag of medicine. Instead he said, “Home now,” flatly and walked quickly back down the hall. Halfway along its length, he heard a flat thump from behind the door to Mrs. Scheinman’s bedroom.

Cory stopped. Listening.

Another thump.

Raspy breathing.

Like the strangers when they had come too close to him.

He took off his mask and cape in the spare room. Then he went to a small bathroom and brushed his teeth with the toothbrush Daddy had always made sure Cory had when he stayed the night. He heard another thump.

He did not want to hear anymore thumps. He did not like the thumps. Strangers made thumps.

With the toothbrush still in his mouth, he opened the door to the spare room and looked down the dark hallway that led to Mrs. Sheinman’s room. The door was still closed.

Again he heard another thump.

He closed the door.

He stepped back from it.

He pushed a small desk in front of it and stood back.

He rinsed out his mouth and got into the tiny single bed.

“Ummm... God Jesus please keep Daddy safe.” Which is what Cory prayed every night. The same prayer. He meant it every time. Then he added, “Um... me too, God Jesus.” Which was something he’d never prayed before.

He lay in the dark for a long time listening, trying to be very quiet.

He was afraid.

He got up quietly, retrieved the mask and cape and put them back on. Then he got back into bed.

“I’m Batman,” he whispered.

Then he slept.

There were no more bumps in the night.

Chapter Seventeen

Cory left the house in the morning.

The day was already hot and thick and there were smells in the air that were not pleasant to him.

He’d left because he knew Mrs. Sheinman was a stranger now. When he awoke in the morning and dressed, taking off his Batman cape and mask, putting them into his backpack, he’d heard the bumps and the groaning whispers coming from behind her door.

“Ummmm...” he tried through the bedroom door, but couldn’t think of what exactly to say. Instead, she’d only growled at him and banged into the flimsy door as a reply.

Cory left the house, closing the gate behind him as he went, as he always did. At his own home, a few doors down, he found it as he’d left it. There was no sign of Daddy. A dirty policeman’s uniform wasn’t by the laundry machines. Daddy wasn’t in his bed, sleeping. Cory had a snack bar and a glass of milk, only spilling a little bit when he poured it, which was good. Then he sat down in front of the dark TV.

If I just wait here, he reasoned, then Daddy will come home and turn on Batman. Cory hummed the theme to the show as he waited.

“Na-na na naaa NuH...”

Soon he began to rock back and forth because he was very worried and he didn’t understand any of this. He did not like these strangers. These bumps. None of it.

Things were not as they should be, which is very hard for someone who uses patterns and routines to cope with life. Things were messy, and even scary.

“Na-na na naaa NuH...”

Batman would know what to do. The real Batman. If the Joker, or Plant Lady, or Crocodile Man, or Scarecrow had captured Daddy....

“Na-na na naaa NuH...”

...Real Batman would know what to do. How to... help Daddy.

Then another thought occurred to Cory. Maybe a criminal has Daddy in a secret hideout.

He thought of all the criminals. Thought of which one it could be. He watched the dark screen of the silent TV and tried to see and remember all the shows all at once. He saw every episode. And the more he thought of each criminal, and Daddy, and what all the strangers and the smoke and fire and Mrs. Sheinman could mean, he was even more afraid.

“Na-na na naaa NuH...”

Then...

“Scarecrow,” Cory whispered to the silent, stuffy room. “He would make it all Halloween.”

Which in Cory world was the worst day of the year.

The day when things are not what they seem. Not what they should be. What Cory is used to, and needs. Of all the villains on the 1990’s cartoon version of Batman, there was no villain scarier to Cory than the Scarecrow. Those episodes were always the most frightening and Cory didn’t really like them very much. But he watched them because he knew if he waited long enough, Batman would win because Batman was brave. When Batman stopped the Scarecrow, Cory felt like he’d been brave too. All through the Scarecrow episodes, when he’d wanted to not watch and he’d continued to even so, that, to Cory, was being brave. Cory was often afraid and he wished he was like Batman all the times he was afraid, even though sometimes, Batman was afraid too.

Cory reached into his backpack and took out the mask and cape. He held them and wondered if he could be brave enough to find the Scarecrow and rescue Daddy. Cory wished at the moment that he was brave enough to do the thing that needed to be done, even though he was afraid.

Just like we all do sometimes.

He clasped the cape around his neck.

He drew the mask over his head, adjusting it with one of his large sweating hands until it didn’t pinch his nose and make his breathing stuffy.

He would go find Daddy. Even if the Scarecrow was in his way, even if all the Batman villains were against him, he would be brave and he would find Daddy and they would come home and... well, there would be pancakes.

Which meant so much more than just pancakes as ordinary things often do sometimes.

“I am the night...” spoke Cory in the silence of the empty family room.

Chapter Eighteen

Cory had drunk deeply from the faucet in the kitchen before he’d left the house. He’d shoved snack bars into his pocket, then taken one out and ate it while thinking of pancakes.

He was going to look for Daddy. He would find other policemen and they would tell him where to go. They would know where Daddy was or where the Scarecrow’s hideout might be.

Now, standing in front of his house in the late morning sun, he saw a few strangers at the far end of the street. They just stood, staring at nothing, not even noticing Cory who’d donned his cape and mask and was being extra quiet.

Like Batman.

Cory cut through the houses on the far side of the street, following a well-worn path behind those houses that popped out in a forested area above some train tracks. All the kids of this neighborhood called the forested area along the train tracks “the Forts”. The Forts was a tree covered half-hill with a drop that led down into a wasteland between neighborhoods. The wasteland consisted of the carved away section of the hill, at the bottom of which, train tracks ran south next to a small drainage area turned overgrown swamp. On the other side of the railway wasteland was a library, an old church, and more neighborhoods.

The other kids would often tell Cory a monster lived down in the swamps. They would go down the hill, cross the train tracks and enter the swamp, knowing Cory was not allowed down the hill. They did this so he couldn’t follow them and ruin the fun they were having, which was really just the “fun” of teasing Cory.

The train tracks were a “no no” to Cory.

On the occasions when the neighborhood kids would play this particular game, Cory would watch them from atop the hill, bouncing from foot to foot, worrying his fingers, waiting for them to come up out of the swamp they’d disappeared into. Hoping the monster hadn’t gotten them. Sometimes they would scream down there and Cory would run and go tell someone, but no one would ever believe him that the kids, his “friends” as he called them, were in any kind of trouble. Cory would simply be left to worry about them until he saw his friends again.

Then everything would be alright.

Cory came to “the Forts” which were half-dug pits like open graves, lying along the top of the slope among the long, dead yellow grass of late summer. The Forts were holes that the children would dig, usually starting on a Friday after school, waiting for the train to come along. Then, when they heard the train from far off, its momentum somehow spilling off the iron rails ahead of it, they would all run and hide inside the holes they called “the Forts”. They would throw dirt clods at the rushing locomotive as it flew past their hiding places. Never rocks. Just dirt clods which exploded in dusty sprays along the tinted windows and shiny metal passenger cars.

The daylight was orange, and Cory smelled burnt wood in it which reminded him of the beach and the beach parties in the summer when the other men and women who worked with Daddy would gather down by the ocean and spend the day and late into the night around smoky fires. Cory could watch fire for hours. Watching it burn and turn everything orange and ash was the very definition of beauty to Cory. There were beautiful empires of ember within the heat and flames, wavering and shifting as though it were a whole living world dying inside the coals there. Cory loved watching fires, especially on nights at the beach when everyone laughed and ate hot dogs and let Cory do the same things they were doing.

Now he looked along the skyline above the suburban rooftops, but he couldn’t see any great gray and black plumes of smoke like he’d seen before. He could only smell it hanging over everything in the heat of the day.

Atop the hill, Cory could see the train tracks both stretching off toward the milky north and curving around a bend to the south, passing under a small bridge, running alongside, for a time, the tiny swamp where a monster lived.

“There’s a monster inside the swamp.” Cory had heard some voice inside his head telling him this. “That’s what the kids always told you.”

The Scarecrow is like a monster, thought Cory. His wide mouth, his floppy hat. His eyes like holes, dark holes that always made Cory wince when he saw them on TV. When Cory thought of monsters, or a monster, he always thought of the Scarecrow.

Ash began to fall from the sky and Cory watched, fascinated by the delicateness of the gray and black flakes, their course seemingly random choice, their descent inevitable.

Why didn’t they fly up, or away? Why was it always down?

Ash always flies, inevitably, down.

If the Scarecrow has Daddy, Cory continued to reason...

Then stopped.

And the Scarecrow is a monster...

He waited, waited to finish the thought.

“There’s a monster in the swamp, Cory. Better not go down there, he’ll get you.”

That’s what the kids always told him.

Then they’d go down into the swamp and watch him watching them from the top of the hill above the train tracks. Watching Cory from within the deep foliage of the swamp. And the scream would come once they were just inside the edge of the swamp and well hidden. Cory would always jump. He never heard their giggling laughter as he ran to tell someone his “friends” were in trouble.

Silence.

Daddy might be in the swamp.

“There’s a monster in the swamp, Cory.”

The Scarecrow is a monster.

“I am the night...” Cory reminded himself.

He took a deep breath.

Then he started down the narrow trail through waist high, feathery yellow grass that led down along the train tracks. The tall dry grass on either side of the path seemed to swallow him as he went. The air began to feel slightly cooler and Cory could smell the sage that grew down there in the wild, thick and heavy. At the bottom of the slope, he waded out through the tall dead grass and crossed the cleared space along the railroad tracks and walked up onto the bed of gray rock that lay underneath the rails. He could smell the oily ties as he watched the twin lines of the rails, almost perfect lines, race off in both directions. He’d only been down here one time. He’d followed a boy named Steven down there one afternoon. Cory bent down with a grunt and placed his hands on the rails and waited for the vibration Steven had told him about. Steven said if you felt the rails vibrating, that meant there was a train somewhere down the tracks, probably coming in a hurry.

Cory could still feel that vibration when he thought of that memory sometimes. Bending down awkwardly now, gloved hand on the rails, he felt nothing.

He heard a short huffy Whoop. Above and behind him. Almost a loud gasp.

He turned and saw strangers, dozens of them, clustering at the edge of his neighborhood high above the train track wasteland. They crawled over the low backyard fences that looked down upon the slope. They fell over barriers, tumbling down among the eucalyptus and cypress into the gray concrete drainage ditches that ran along the dry brown slope of the hill. They were dark shadows at this distance.

Stranger shadows, thought Cory.

Cory hurried across the train tracks, his hands waving to pull him forward because of his backpack and the heavy utility belt he wore. He ran across the dirt and dust on the other side of the rails and found the wide chalky path descending into the swamp. Low hanging trees loomed over the shadowy entrance and reminded Cory of the mouth of a dog that once snapped at him even though Cory liked dogs.

That dog was a snapper, he thought.

He looked back once and saw the strangers, and even more strangers now, stumbling down the hill after him. They were moving slowly, moaning as they crossed the wasteland for him, but they were definitely coming. Cory knew they definitely meant to harm him.

To “play” like Brian Rattigan had played.

But there were too many to play with.

If there are too many, Daddy had said, then run and find a teacher.

Cory wished, right now, that he could find Mrs. Baird. She was the teacher that always protected him. He wished he knew where he could find her.

The corpses came stumbling down the hill at the sight of Cory, reaching and waving as they walked awkward and stilt-legged from side to side down the steep slope.

Cory turned back to the gaping maw that was the narrow path leading down into the swamp and whispered, “I’m Batman.” Then, after a great draw and exhale of his massive chest, he started down into the clutching undergrowth and low-hanging musty trees.

The air was cool and moist under the shadowy, green embrace of the tiny swamp. A small stream burbled nearby, its bottom close to the surface and streaked with oil and ochre-colored mud as long strands of grass bent and drifted in the wan current. There were discarded cups and magazines tossed and tangled in the growth alongside the trail. Cory followed the twisting sandy path alongside the stream, and in time came to a small clearing. The remains of a fire lay at its center, surrounded by banked stones. Cory cast a glance through the fluttering leaves toward the hill and saw only shimmering daylight peeking through the leaves.

He knew the strangers would come for him, even here in the swamp. And there were monsters here, too.

He made the “Bhuwuuush!” sound and leaped across the tiny stream once the imaginary bat-shaped grappling hook was secure in the leafy canopy above. Then he disappeared into the foliage beyond, crashing deeper and further into the swamp.

An hour later Cory was lost.

He sat down cross-legged and pulled the hot and sweat-laden mask from his face. Everything looked the same and he could not tell if somehow he was just going in circles. He’d seen the stream many times since entering the swamp and he’d even re-crossed it at points. Invisible gnats and other unseen bugs buzzed about his ears and the air was definitely cooler. He was thirsty too.

He listened to the swamp.

There was a heavy, dull and constant buzz of unseen insects.

No strangers, though.

Just the low burble of the swamp beneath the buzzing sound.

Then Cory remembered something. Something important. He said it aloud. “Cory, always follow the water. It will lead you someplace safe.”

Right now, Cory wanted to go to someplace safe. He wanted that badly.

Cory remembered the day he’d spent hiking in the mountains with Daddy. Cory hadn’t liked the drive up. They’d come too close to the cliff’s edge on the highway that climbed higher and higher into the mountains. Cory had needed to shut his eyes because they were so high up, and when he’d opened them again, they were in the middle of a real forest and the air had smelled clean and good to Cory. And it was quiet up there, which was something Cory liked very much.

Daddy had taught him many things that day, most of which Cory couldn’t remember now when he needed to. Things about the woods. An important thing about water.

... and an important thing about being lost.

Yes, Cory said aloud. “If you ever get lost, Cory, just follow the water.” Daddy called it a “stream”. Follow the stream and that will lead you someplace safe.

Cory stood up and walked toward the water’s edge. He bent to drink some of the water, but didn’t like the smell that came from it. He got up once more and brushed the wet sand from his chest. He put his mask back on and began to follow the twisting stream as it dove deeper and deeper into the swamp. At times he even waded through it, his pant legs and tennis shoes getting wet and sandy as it grew deeper.

It was very quiet now.

Even the invisible gnats had stopped buzzing.

A dense fog had closed in on Cory, coming out from the trees along the bank of the stream, snaking up and onto the water, lying along the bottom of the swamp like a waiting thing. Closing in on everything and blotting out the world with its heavy thick blanket of quiet. It was cool and silent in the fog. Cory liked that.

He thought he’d like to find someplace where there weren’t any strangers and maybe there was a dog that would be nice to Cory. A dog he could pet. Dogs were never mean to Cory unless someone had made them that way. Dogs were always good friends.

That would be nice, thought Cory, and wished as hard as he could that he would find a dog right now.

Chapter Nineteen

Bertram had been watching the ancient grainy black and white CCTV all that day. He’d heated the last of the leftover possum stew they’d made a few days back and then gone across to the main room, enjoying as he always did, the smell of the butterscotch colored carpet and the ancient books along the shelves. As always there was the distant hum of the servers whining, whirring and sometimes ticking with the last of humanity’s knowledge sleeping inside.

He sat down again to watch the battery of black and white CCTV monitors.

The view of the shadowy alley.

The washed out view of the bridge.

The camera underneath the bridge pointed north toward Los Angeles, watching the train tracks disappear into the desolate north. Other cameras surrounded the neighborhoods adjacent to the secret library.

He checked the temperature inside the building. Forty-eight degrees. He pulled his old coat close to his considerable bulk and sat blowing on the re-heated stew in the chipped bowl, waiting for the transient they’d spotted at various times over the past few days to reappear again.

They’d first seen him three days ago. There hadn’t been a soul down in this neck of the woods other than the two of them and the occasional visits from Captain Rose and his squad.

“Traffic request for Hotel Six.” It was Cade. Then, “That stew still good? Possum smelled off from the get go,” asked the tall, bearded, younger man as he sat down with a huff in an old patched office chair that squeaked a wide groan as he settled back into its natural inclination to lean impossibly backward. Then Cade handed the message to Bertram.

“They still coming in through the wire tonight, up there at the Reseda Outpost?” asked Bertram.

“That’s what the man said. Week in the downtown ruins and they can’t find that HK air traffic control server node.” Cade bent forward and snatched up the bent spoon from Bertram’s untended bowl. He tasted, made a face, and swallowed it anyway.

“He talk about the water condenser?” asked Bertram, studying the old paper with the new scribbling. Underneath Cade’s chicken scratch, a beautiful woman in a red dress looked back over her shoulder and smiled. It was an ad for perfume or some such from the Before.

“Yeah,” mumbled Cade.

“Well, that’s the code. Means they’re coming in tonight. I’ll get a message ready and we’ll open a router. Howse yer anti-virus working?”

“As good as it’s ever gonna get, just like I tell you every time.” Cade spooned up more stew.

Bertram glared at Cade from underneath his gray bushy eyebrows.

“There’s more in the kitchen if you want to go ahead and have yer own bowl, instead of this one. The one I made for myself.”

“Nah, it’s off.”

“Then why are you eating it?”

“Just makin’ sure.”

Bertram pulled out an old binder, its plastic spine peeling. He checked the front, the code cypher index, then turned to the appropriate page. Sticking his tongue out and bending to the scrap of paper, he set a stubby pencil to translating the message for Hotel Six.

An hour later, the message was ready and the servers locked down with encrypted double blind passwords and all of Cade’s antivirus army up and running on a battery of hodgepodge monitors representing every decade of computer development. Green screens where zeroes and the occasional one rained down across the monitor. 16-bit color monitors with clunky numeric figures representing the latest machine-lethal algorithms humanity had been able to develop after the Before. Even a barely functioning liquid crystal touchscreen that had been the latest thing the last year Apple made anything. The last year any corporation had made anything for that matter. Their best monitor showed the system batch and root files Cade would use for command and control as they opened up their router to the patchwork resistance internet. Key system entry points were locked down by blocky red bars on another 16-bit monitor that had the word Amiga written along the bottom.

“Cold in here,” mumbled Cade.

Bertram reached over and flicked the switch on an electric space heater. A few of the coils began to turn a slight orange. None of the others would. Ever again.

“Ah,” exhaled Cade. “Much better, dontcha think?”

Bertram grunted, rubbing his jowly chin stubble as he double-checked the message one last time.

“Alright, let’s check out the neighborhood for stalkers,” whispered Bertram to himself. His thick fingers began to dance across the old, dirty gray plastic buttons of the worn keyboard where the CTRL button was missing and had been replaced by a jury rigged enlisted soldier’s US Brass insignia.

A moment later Cade, watching his battery of monitors, whispered, “Rabbits are out of the hole and no one’s chasing.”

They’d broadcasted a bogus message across the internet to see if any HK algorithms gave chase. Nothing moved and the message sped off toward a useless fiber optic junction that could only contact a battered MWRAP Command and Control vehicle just outside the Tijuana blast zone.

“Be careful old man, Cans are getting smarter every day,” whispered Cade. “Scramble the back trail and bounce it off the old bunker array near LAX. They’ll never...”

“Cade, I was doing this ‘fore you ever laid eyes on a computer, so shut up and let me work!” whispered Bertram.

Cade thought about asking why they always whispered when they went live, but he knew the answer. They whispered because death could be just moments away.

Bertram nosed around the router’s neighborhood, looking for clues and sifting traffic that had cluttered the network on the day the bombs fell. Looking for anything that might tell him the Cans had been there recently. Any lag other than the appreciable lag of equipment twenty years past its operational date, and that was reason enough to shut the whole system down and hide. They’d have to find another way to get the message through or just hope the best for Hotel Six and the recon squad coming in through the wire tonight.

There was lag, and then there was unacceptable lag.

Bertram watched the ping counts and mentally calculated their echo. A two second error was all he needed to know the Cans had been there.

“See here,” he motioned for Cade to watch monitor six. If their HK’s are hanging out, monitoring it, or if they’ve even high-jacked it, that number’s gonna be a lot more stable.”

“Why’s that?” asked Cade.

“They can’t stand it. Cans can’t stand bad machinery. They always fix it. Always try to improve it somehow if they’re going to use it.”

They watched the router pings jump around a bit.

“Looks good to me,” mumbled Cade. “And by good, I mean wonky.”

“Yeah,” replied Bertram. “Does look good.”

They sat in silence for a few minutes. Cade watched the clock on the wall.

“It’s after four, Bert. Hotel Six’ll need time to get the dogs ready.”

Bertram, mouth open, watched all the monitors. He was dimly aware of the smell of burnt wiring and the ancient yellowing books in the library beyond. He looked over his shoulder, out into the main room and across to the server room. He didn’t see any flames in the darkness there.

But that’s where the lights are really on, thought Bertram. That’s where the fire of civilization still burns.

“Alright,” he sighed and seemed to momentarily shudder. Let’s open the router and see what the old net looks like these days.”

Cade bent to his keyboards, sliding his chair along the monitor banks in what used to be the librarian’s break room, tapping in brief commands at each station. He glanced up to check the monitors, seeing what he needed to see, then moved along quickly.

“I’m hot. All defenses up and rolling.”

“Bandwidth,” mumbled Bertram.

“Check.”

Then, “I’m in,” said Bertram. There was a moment of silence that followed. The kind of quiet only those who violate graveyards after midnight know about.

“Moving through the portal. Cover me.”

Cade watched a monitor. Mouth open. Then he bent over a keyboard and slapped in a series of quick commands.

“Spam jam.” Then, “Covered.”

A million old forwarded emails began to download and re-download across a live cake decorating website from the Before. Millions of lost messages about everything from cat videos to government hatred began to flood Angie’s Unique Cakes.

“Uh....” moaned Bertram. “Oh.”

Cade felt his chain-smoking heart seize. He’d want to light one of his homemade specials if it were indeed their last moments, but Bertram would never let him smoke inside the library. Still, if the Cans were gonna drop a bomb on them, then who cared anyway. Cans would use a TAC nuke to kill a mouse. Cans didn’t care that way. They just wanted to make sure it got done.

The “it” being the eradication of humanity.

Cade stopped himself from going there and settled for a, “What’s wrong, Bert?”

“Seattle’s Best is gone. Can’t find it anywhere.”

“Can we use another website?”

Time. Tapping.

“Okay, got an old financial maintenance server running out of a bank in Whittier.”

“I don’t like it, Bert. That’s way too close to Can Central.”

Silence.

“I know, but it’s all we got right now if we’re going to help Hotel Six get through the wire.”

Tapping.

“Okay, I’m in. Setting up the message.”

Cade swiveled and sent himself off to another monitor. “Alright, scrambling your IP there. Bert, this place has got six open sockets. It’s Grand Central!”

“I know. Someone’s using it as a message board.”

“Who? Who could be living that close to It?”

“Gangs?”

“Not that close.”

“Resistance?”

“We’d know about ‘em.”

“Maybe Black Section?”

Cade waited a minute. To him that wouldn’t be the only explanation. Still, he didn’t like it.

An alarm went off on an old Mac monitor Cade had worked with for six months to get up and running.

“What is it?” said Bertram.

“Maybe nothing, but hold on a sec,” moaned Cade. “It’s that old Mac.” They both knew it was unreliable.

“I told you that thing was...”

“Nah, Bert, it’s true and straight. You got a hound.”

“How many seconds?” asked Bertram.

“Thirty ... forty-five at most. Either cut the whole line or send the message.”

Bertram weighed the cons for ten seconds. There weren’t any pros. There never were. The scout unit that was coming in through the wire had been on a long range patrol. They’d survived and maybe even found a Can factory. Something the resistance could take out. And then there was always, in the back of Bertram’s mind, the hope that whatever the patrols found out there in the ruins was something big. Something big enough to end the Cans once and for all.

But that’s just hope, Bertram always told himself. Just hope, and nothing more.

And then there was the reason why he had to do something.

If the patrol tried to in come through the wire at the Reseda Bunker without a heads up, they’d get shot to shreds. And, if they did and the dogs weren’t ready, there was a chance everyone down inside the pit, the bunker, would be dead. One infiltration unit, one “Terminator” in that patrol, and everyone inside the pit was dead by dawn.

There was always that in the back of Bertram’s mind.

And... there was also some little part that just wanted to finally give up and let go. He was tired of everything meaning life and death. His whole existence, every day of it since the bombs, had been a struggle for life, or death.

That and nothing more.

He hit SEND and shot the message off into the secure Reseda Comm Gathering Array. A clever warren of routers and receivers, dead ends and double blinds on ancient computers running complex crypto so the simple message of someone, the few of what remained of humanity, might know that another someone was coming in out of the darkness tonight. Through the wire.

Coming in from the never-ending nightmare created by machines.

“Blow the site, Bert?”

If they did, the Can Hound would know for sure. At that point it would have a choice. Either follow the message and see where it went, or back track and find the sender. In his heart, Bertram knew the Hound would chase the message. When it didn’t, his jaw literally dropped.

Suddenly he and Cade were scrambling to shut down routers. Outermost first, as they watched with wide-eyed fear, then the traffic on the best ones nearest the library. The last bastion of man’s entire knowledge database as far as the resistance, or what was left of humanity living beneath the rubble and the Cans, was concerned. The library.

Bertram exploded. “This is why we don’t do comm, Cade!”

To lose the entire library, all the beautiful old hardcopies and magazines and the even more valuable digital files hiding in the server room because of a lone patrol wasn’t worth it, roared Bertram inwardly.

But Bertram had had this conversation with everyone, including himself, many, many times.

“Shutting it all down,” Cade called out.

“Hurry... it’s inside Fullerton. Ahhh... it nailed the original IP out of that station Carver set up last year.”

“Working on it,” mumbled Cade.

“Well do something quick, otherwise we’ve got to nuke the whole system just to have enough time to get the hell out of here with the entire library. That’s a lot to lose, Cade, because of traffic!”

Tapping. Burning ozone. Humming.

“Alright, see that server down in Tustin. I’m broadcasting help messages from an old Day One database. That Hound might think that’s all it is. Just us looking for our own after all these years.”

Bertram chewed his thick lower lip.

“Now,” said Cade quietly. “Let’s drop off the net and close her down. I’ve covered our routers in old received message traffic. They’ll think we’re just another dead station sending and receiving on automatic.”

Bertram reached down and physically disconnected the routers.

“Should we shut down the mainframe in the library?” asked Cade.

If they did, thought Bertram of the salvaged mainframe, it might not ever come back online again. One day, if the library didn’t get new equipment, that was going to happen.

One day.

“No.”

They watched their double-blind monitored routers. The pings danced all over the place. The lag was the lag. Nothing stabilized. Nothing was fixed. Nothing suddenly improved. If the Hound had gotten lost somewhere in Tustin, they’d never know. If it had gotten close, they might know. If it found them, well, they said “SkyNet” or whatever the dammed thing called itself could nuke from orbit if it was important enough.

If it knew, thought Bertram to himself, that we’re the last storehouse of all human knowledge, it wouldn’t even hesitate to drop a bomb on us, right now.

They watched everything for another hour, switching the cameras between all the feeds outside while monitoring the root systems crawl. Watching for changes. Cade continued, long after Bertram had gone back to the views on the CCTV. The empty road. The ruins of the silent gray high school near the bridge. The worn out frozen cars along the freeway heading south, forever not making their way to safety. Forever not escaping the last day of human civilization.

Night was coming on. The winds were picking up outside. A camera showed a gray and white grainy image of fast moving thunderclouds out beyond the coastal hills. Bertram didn’t need color to know everything outside was gray and covered in blasting grit and ash from a thermonuclear holocaust twenty-five years gone.

He moved closer to the space heater and thought a bit more of the stew might be nice for the evening. He looked forward to shutting down for the night. At midnight. Then he could crawl into his bunk with a Raymond Chandler and pretend Los Angeles still existed. The way it had been, back then. Long before he’d ever been born.

In the last of the washed out daylight, they saw Cory appear on a grainy grey and white CCTV monitor. He climbed the embankment near the old transformer station below the library. Out of the dead swamp alongside the railroad tracks. Cory stood in the alleyway, dressed in a mask and cape. The cape flew away from his large body in the oncoming storm.

“Look at this,” said Bertram.

Cade sent himself in his rolling chair along the battery of monitors and crashed into Bertram’s chair. “Is it him?”

Bertram shook his head slowly.

“No, doesn’t look like the guy we’ve been seeing. Not at all.”

“So if it isn’t him,” asked Cade. “Then who is it?”

Chapter Twenty

Cory had wandered through the fog as the buzzing of the insects grew louder and louder. At first it sounded tiny and close. Like another gnat. He’d even slapped at the air around him, waving the insect away as it came near and then flew off, or so he imagined. The fog grew thick and swirled about, so thick that Cory couldn’t even see the ground, while the buzzing grew and grew as if many, many insects were everywhere, hovering and dashing. And then there was a moment...

... as though a soap bubble had bent and then burst.

... as though a bell, deep and low, had been struck.

... as though that sound were so ingrained into the very fabric of the universe that once it sounded, it was as though it had sounded in many places all at once. Its echo seemed to reverberate through everything, even one’s mind.

The air was much colder now. Less sweet. It tasted of ash and dust and iron, and even though there was fog, the air was dry and the fog was disappearing as Cory pushed through withered skeletal trees and dry, dead grass grown very tall. Cory approached a small slope covered in piles of ancient dead, brown, black and occasional crimson leaves.

Cory followed a barely worn path to the embankment, turning once to look back for the strangers that must have followed him down into the swamp. The sky was dark, fading to black. Early evening and cold. Instinctively, Cory looked for the moon.

If Daddy is in trouble, he thought, I’ll see the Bat Signal on the moon.

But there was no moon and the clouds seemed to rush across the sky.

Goosebumps rose along Cory’s exposed arms. The air was growing colder by the second. The sweat under his mask was freezing.

Cory climbed the hill, came to a small crumbling set of stone steps guarded by rusty handrails, and pulled himself over and onto the cracked steps of the narrow stairway. Dead weeds pushed up through the cracks in the concrete. He followed the narrow stairs up to a rusting chain link fence and pushed through an old gate that swung open on a creaking note above the rising howl of the wind.

A rectangular building with a roof like a flat hat, or that’s how it looked to Cory, waited, surrounded by a leaf-covered parking lot that bore great cracks and rents in it. Faded black and rusty brown leaves stirred and spun in sudden chaotic gusts.

The building looked familiar to Cory, but somehow different. More worn out. Older than it should have been. It looked like the community library he and Daddy would sometimes go to on their “hikes”.

Beyond the low flat square of the building, the shattered remains of a tall bell tower loomed against the night-dark storm. Neighborhoods, at once familiar and different to Cory, rose away on the low hills surrounding the place. All the houses were covered in ash and blackened as though by some great firestorm. Gaping dark holes and burned out structures sprawled beneath rotting black timbers that seemed to strike a gallows’ pose in the early evening. The black holes of windowless spaces reminded Cory of the depthless eye holes in the mask of the Scarecrow.

Cory shivered.

And then a dog came around the side of the familiar-not familiar flat-hat building.

To Cory, the dog was like a police dog because it was a German Shepard, even though Cory didn’t known what a German Shepherd was. He only knew that Officer Wong, one of Daddy’s friends, had a dog that looked like this one.

The dog stopped near some steps leading up to the building and watched Cory.

Cory liked dogs. He walked forward, putting both hands out, and after a moment the German shepherd approached, sniffing Cory’s hands. First one, then the other. Then the dog heeled, looked over its shoulder and beat its tail against the crumbling parking lot as Cory rubbed its neck and stroked its sides in the rushing wind that seemed to rise and howl through the ruins all around.

“Be careful with strange dogs, Cory,” he whispered to himself. Then, as he patted the friendly dog some more, “be careful,” he whispered again, repeating Daddy’s instructions.

Now there was a man standing on the steps where the dog had first appeared. He was tall and rangy and thin. He wore a ratty old cowboy hat. He had a scraggly beard and long hair. He was dressed in a heavy coat and warm clothing. He raised a hand covered in a fingerless mitten and waved to Cory.

“Howdy, stranger,” said Cade, holding the high explosive white phosphorus grenade behind his back and out of sight.

Cory stood. The dog crossed back to the man in the cowboy hat, then turned back to Cory who remained standing and silent.

The wind howled and roared all about them, sending more leaves off in sudden meaningless cyclones. The air felt dry and cold.

“Whatcha doin’ out here,” asked Cade, adding, “Friend,” at the end.

Cory shook his head only slightly, meaning to answer, but unsure if this man was a stranger also. Cory reviewed his understanding of strangers. From the initial explanation by Daddy, and then onto teachers, and finally the ones he’d met recently in the night and with the girl named Heather who’d gone off with the mean boys.

And Mrs. Sheinman.

Cade slipped his finger around the pin ring on the grenade. All he’d have to do is flick his finger and the pin would come loose. Hold it away from the grenade as he rolled it at the Terminator. The killing machine. The infiltration unit.

He’s big enough to be one, Cade said to himself.

“I’m looking for Daddy,” said Cory, calling out above the now blasting wind.

Damn, thought Cade. Damn.

The Cans were getting good. Better than they ever had been. There were rumors they even had infiltration units that could fool the dogs. Maybe this was one of ‘em.

But Cade had to make sure.

Wasting a human life was one thing. There were so few left to fight the Cans. Every loss was just more damage to the gene pool, a cup of spilled water, really. And then there was the grenade which was another thing. They had three of these. If it was a Can, the explosive would probably just slow it down. But that’s all Cade needed to do to get the rest of his tricks ready. Just slow it down. But if it was just some stray human, a wanderer, a transient, a survivor, another member of the small and increasingly exclusive club called humanity, then using the grenade was a waste.

And...

Wasting a human life was something also.

Cade balanced all of this against the value of the building behind him. The last known database of all human knowledge. An old community library from the Before, turned server farm for the resistance of man against machine. They called the machines “SkyNet” because they had no name for it. Because it had never cared to identify itself to humanity. Instead, it was only interested in wiping them out. Someone said the name came from an old movie.

Cade had never seen a movie.

“Last chance, kid,” muttered Cade. Then, “You resistance? What unit?”

“Daddy didn’t come home last night,” wailed Cory above the rising nightly storm. “I need to find him now. I think...” and then the wind carried his voice away, but Cade thought he heard something about a scarecrow.

And now, as the stranger talked more, Cade knew. Humanity had a lot like this stranger in the days after the bombs “SkyNet” had used to nuke humanity back into the Stone Age. Humanity had many, many slow children. The voice. The flat tone, and now as Cade covered his eyes from the skirling wind and scathing dust, he could see better.

“Kid’s slow,” Cade muttered to himself.

He slid the grenade back into the pocket of his long coat and walked forward. The closer he got, the more he could see. The mask, the cape. The backpack. Strange. But when he saw the eyes, he knew there was nothing vat-grown about the stranger. The kid.

Machines like to fix things. They can’t help but try to make it perfect.

Inside the eyes, Cade saw fear. Worry. Concern. Humanity stuff. And they, the eyes of the boy, they were searching for someone to help him find what or who was lost. That was something humans did, something machines didn’t understand how to imitate. Yet. The owner of those eyes knew that other people helped someone who was lost, or someone who was looking for someone who was lost. Helped when help was needed.

That’s right, Cade said to himself. We help each other. That’s the difference between organized resistance humanity and the savage cattle crawling under ruins of all the great cities that once were, avoiding the HK’s and the Terminator squads.

We still help each other.

It was also the difference between them and the machines.

“Have you seen my Daddy?” asked Cory. The voice rose just barely above flat in pitch. There was almost an emphasis in it somewhere. A plea. A waver. A broken heart. A question.

“No, kid. I haven’t,” said Cade. “But night’s comin’ on and we got to get inside. Will you come in out of the storm and share food with us? We’ll see about finding your Daddy, okay?”

Cory’s teeth were chattering now. He felt tired and weak and confused.

And very hungry.

Cade gently took Cory’s arm and led him up the gritty steps of the old library and in through the main door. The wind howled, screaming as it blasted through the night-dark skeletal trees and across the silent ruins of neighborhoods, shrieking low horror through old broken windows and blasting out from missing doors in the remains of long-gutted houses. Homes.

The world turned from gray to black and surrendered completely to night.

Cade had closed the main door to the library behind them, shutting it, and Cory felt the silence of the waiting books and the old warm carpet wrap around him like a comforting blanket. He heard distant computers tick and hum and there was a fire going in the makeshift chimney within the reading lounge. Cade led Cory over to the fire and set him down on old worn cloth cushions inside deep chairs that felt just right. Cade took a blanket and draped it over Cory’s shoulders and then went to find Bertram.

Cory sat shivering and watched the fire. There was a low mumble between Cade and Bertram, somewhere, discussing Cory.

Nearby, the German Shepherd turned circles and for a moment Cade watched her, wondering if the Terminator had fooled her long enough and now she’d let them know the kid was one. Now that it was inside the last castle. It would be too late. Much too late.

But she just turned in a circle and finally lay down, facing away from them, watching the main door and the night beyond its barrier. Bertram came out with a bowl of stew and lumbered over to the chairs. He set the bowl in front of Cory, then heaved himself into a leather chair across from the fire. Shadows and firelight played across his bushy brows and jowly face. His tiny coal black eyes watched Cory.

“Eat,” rumbled Bertram.

Cory took off his mask and wiped a heavy hand across his forehead, itching furiously at some sudden irritation. Then Cory picked up the bowl and took the old bent spoon and began to eat, blowing three times on each bite as was his constant habit. His method for coping. Three short puffs.

It was good, Cory liked it.

The more he ate, the more Bertram and Cade relaxed, knowing this stranger was not an infiltration unit sent by the Cans. A Terminator. A nightmare killing machine here inside humanity’s most valuable resource.

“You’ll stay here tonight,” rumbled Bertram in the silence between pops in the fireplace.

Cory put down the bowl and wiped his mouth with his bare arm.

“I have to find my Daddy,” he whispered. He was tired, the sudden cold had taken everything out of him. “I have to.”

Silence. The fire popped again.

Outside, the wind howled across the roof and thundered off through the night.

“Well, that will have to wait until daylight. No one’s finding anyone out there on a night like this. The last of summer is always like this. Or at least, has been since the bombs. It’s far too cold now. You’ll die of exposure by midnight, especially with flimsy gear like that. Now eat and rest, boy. You can sleep here tonight, on that couch. We’ll get you another blanket and keep the fire going just for you, even though it’s not our normal protocol.”

Bertram took off his coat and began rub his hands near the fire.

“What’s your name, son?” he asked.

Cory stared off, at nothing. At whatever Cory stared at.

When he didn’t say anything, Bertram cleared his throat. “Batman, is it?”

After a moment, Cory nodded once, slowly, then whispered, “I am the night. I am vengeance. I am Batman.”

“Finish your stew... my lad,” sighed Bertram and added a groan as he stood. “Cade, we’ve got to talk a medic through removing an appendix. Seems Alpha Company’s XO has gone and had an attack over at the Huntington Beach Bunker. They’re going to do the surgery near midnight after their medic comes in from patrol. So it’ll be a long night and we’ll need a secure line.”

Cade said nothing, merely picking up his coat as he stood. They left Cory to the warmth and the fire and the quiet of the library. Cory continued to eat, his eyes slowly closing between bites, getting heavier and heavier. When he finished, he put the bowl down and took off his cape and backpack. Then his utility belt. His shoes. He lay down on the couch and pulled the heavy blanket over himself once more. Then he got back up and went to pet the dog, which was his way of thanking her for coming to find him when he was scared. A way without words.

She licked his hands and Cory, satisfied, returned to the couch, covered himself in the old blanket again and prayed.

“Dear God Jesus, please take care of Daddy.” Then he closed his eyes and slept.

Late in the night, long after the appendectomy was done, a success, Cade came and sat in the big leather chair after he’d quietly added a large chunk of dry wood to the fire. He sat for a while and just listened to the wind outside, far away and moaning softly. Out there, the temperature was now down in the low 30’s. Cade watched the boy until his eyes also closed and then he too was asleep.

Deep in the night, long after everyone had turned in, long after Bertram had finished his nightly chapter of Raymond Chandler’s The High Window, the German Shepherd awoke. Her head darted up suddenly. Her pointy triangular ears flicked this way and that way. Searching. Listening to something that had woken her from her dog dreams. When she couldn’t find it, she lay her head back down on her paws and watched the main door until her eyes closed again after some time.

Chapter Twenty-One

0558

Mission Runtime 156 hours 28 min 30 sec.

The Thinking Machine noted the time and continued its work on the articulating joint located in what remained of its leg assembly.

44 degrees and rising.

Infrared operating at 39.6 percent efficiency.

Mission Status: Incomplete.

Message review at 0600, standby.

The Thinking Machine removed the bullet fragment it had been chasing inside its internal chassis assembly. Synthetic blood, more viscous than actual blood, ran down the synthetic flesh of its shredded leg.

There are still 5 bullet entry points and thirty-six unaccounted fragments located within the main combat chassis.

Weapons Status:

20mm Chain Gun, destroyed. Marked with GPS tag for recovery and reclamation.

9mm sub-compact Pulse Rifle, operational. Ammunition Status: Critical. 46 Rounds, electric impact.

Additional notes: Laser sight Inoperative.

.50 AutoMag Pistol. 2 at full Cap Magazines. 20 rounds total. Laser Sight operational.

The Thinking Machine activated the compact welding tool nearby and cauterized the synthetic flesh around the wound. Chemical symbols scrolled down the left side of its internal diagnostic display as the machine snapped off the analysis program, redirecting its processor to continue the data crawl it had been conducting on the last 24 hours of its operational runtime.

After contact with the Virus Unit, it had been experiencing lag slip on its data gathering and acquisition assembly. There was every chance, it was 84.8 percent convinced, that it had somehow missed observable evidence of an infestation node located in the local area.

06:00:00

Message upload.

Mission Status: Incomplete

Contact with Virus Infestation at location

LAT:33.68679902741575

LONG:-117.67460337790988

29 units Terminated.

This unit status upload in attached file.

Mission continues.

There was a message from SILAS.

06:00:02

Message Received.

Mission Status: Incomplete.

SILAS: All files relating to operational capacity of this unit complete. No maint required for mission continuance and completion. No weapons drop this unit. This unit must complete mission within timeframe parameters.

Mission Priority: Elevated Critical.

Message End.

The Thinking Machine had only been “alive” for just over 156 hours. It had been manufactured at the Light Infantry Special Warfare Assembly Plant in the ruins of Culver City. Its first recorded images of the world outside the production line and clean rooms had been one of utter devastation. Broken skyscrapers and torn rebar. Frozen gray vehicles in long lines stretching off toward the west, the east, the south and the north. Brand new shiny chain link fences. Continually searching searchlights questing out beyond the perimeter for any signs of virus units. Octagonal towers, clean and austere, constructed with reflective metal composition almost alien in its lack of human influence, rose above the chaos of the infestation’s ruins of a failed civilization. Hunter Killers hovered in the wastelands beyond the fences.

In that first hour of operational runtime, its targeting assembly had locked onto an infestation unit. One of many, in fact. Virus units coming in through the fence and passing the tall guard towers, under the supervision of non-synthetic infiltration combat units, or just the human-shaped matte-alloy combat chassis the virus called “Terminators”, herding them into the processing facility for materials breakdown and harvesting.

The first virus unit the Thinking Machine had targeted, the first virus infestation unit, had been a female. Her face covered in dirt. Her eyes vacant. There was no real intelligence there.

That had been just over 156 hours ago.

No doubt the female had been broken down into material components since.

Runtime end.

The Thinking Machine wrapped rags around the wound and picked up its smartphone from the table, where it lay next to the welding device. It activated the mirror function and examined its face.

Microframe housing at 88.3 percent functionality.

Microframe armor at 70.4 percent functionality.

Microframe stealth concealment 65 percent functionality.

Internal Diagnostic Assessment suggests: Return to Light Infantry Special Warfare Plant, Culver City, for reapplication of bio-genetic camouflage.

Note: SILAS Authorized Mission Priority Override.

A large section of its face was missing. Mostly the right side. The flesh had been burnt away by an Infestation Type 46 incendiary device in the most recent contact with Infestation units.

29 units Terminated.

A male virus unit had done the most damage. Rushing the Thinking Machine from the 237 degree radial. The Thinking Machine had been engaging two PulseRifle armed Infestation units under cover of a wrecked Infestation transit bus, diesel-Type. The Infestation unit with the Type 46 incendiary device had penetrated the Immediate Danger Close Zone of ten feet when the Thinking Machine deployed its 50. Cal AutoMag and ventilated the Infestation unit with 12 critical kill shots at close range in 4,3 seconds.

The incendiary device exploded.

There had been a system reboot.

Time was lost.

1.7 seconds.

Damage reports.

Urgent Critical: Stealth Camouflage, Microframe Processor Area, Critical.

24 seconds later, the last of the Virus units had been terminated. The mission continued.

Now for three days, the Thinking Machine had been reconnoitering the area Defense Communications Processes had analyzed as being a possible Virus Node. For three days the Thinking Machine had been alone and deep inside Infestation-held territory. Disconnected from SILAS and the network. The virus had the capabilities of tracking and identifying the electronic and communications signature of any networked Thinking Machine and could detect units far to the south of the main conflict and area of operations.

Three days now.

The Thinking Machine was in the large sanctuary of the remains of a church. There was a crow somewhere in the exposed beams above, sheltering from the cruel sky. The bleached and dusty bones of terminated virus units lay along the floors and crumbling pews of the place. There had been many. Now their bones and skulls were everywhere. Intermingled and flung about one another, uncountable because of their positioning. The Thinking Machine reasoned that many virus units must have been gathered in the remains of the church on Independence Day when the war had begun... and been won a few short hours later by the machines.

Mission Status: Incomplete.

Mission Resumed.

Detect Virus Infection and Terminate.

Chapter Twenty-Two

Cade watched Cory pet the dog from the steps of the library in the cool morning’s milky light. They’d stepped outside after Bertram had spent some time questioning the boy.

They’d learned nothing.

Who his Daddy is? Or was? Who they were and where they’d come from?

Nothing.

That the boy was mentally slow, was obvious. That the boy was confused about where he was, was less obvious, but still, they guessed he might be. After the session, Bertram had taken Cade to the old help desk and shown him some research materials he’d collected that morning from within the stacks.

When Cade had opened his eyes in the morning, he’d watched Bertram in the stacks on the other side of the room and he hadn’t thought much of it at the time. Now, he knew what the old man had been up to.

Bertram said the research materials were called “comic books”.

Batman.

The Dark Knight.

Old bound editions of collected works. Some others on the nature and history of comic books in general. Cade hadn’t been able to read, much, when he’d first been assigned by Resistance Command to come down here and pull security for the old man and the library. But there was a lot of downtime and his reading had gotten better. He’d never seen “comic books” books though. He was still reading all the Hemingway he could find.

“The boy thinks he’s this character,” whispered Bertram.

Cade picked up an old, paper thin comic book and leafed through the yellowed pages.

“Was this real?” Cade asked the old man.

Bertram snorted. “No, not at all. Just a fictional crime fighter. A super hero they called them. Seemed to be a little messed up in the head. I’d seen this one once a few years ago. The boy’s cape and mask triggered the memory and I pulled the name out of my hat. He agreed with it and so when I got up this morning, I did a little investigating and found out as much as I could.”

Cade continued to turn the fragile pages. There were so many colors. That was what stood out to Cade about “comic books”. The colors. The colors of the ink.

Cade’s life had not been one of colors.

“So... does it mean anything? He’s simple, so what,” whispered Cade, studying a particular picture of a man with a long, pronounced jaw, white skin, purple clothes from the Before, and green hair. Cade wondered if this was how people dressed before...

... he had no idea. He’d been raised in the Nevada waste. He’d only ever known found clothing, pulled from the corpse of someone just dead or redistributed by Resistance Command. Clothing that had survived a five year winter and a world that had never really recovered from a global thermonuclear Armageddon.

“So where’d he get the cape and mask?” asked Cade.

“His “Daddy” must have found ‘em, I don’t know, I guess? I imagine “Daddy” is a survivor from the Before who remembered the stories involving this Batman character. He must have told them to the kid.”

“Those things haven’t been manufactured in over twenty-five years, Bert. They look far too new for that,” hissed Cade, referencing the mask and cape.

Cade closed the comic book and put it back on the stack, his long finger resting on it for a moment.

“So what’re you saying?” rumbled Bertram.

Cade watched Bertram gathering himself for something that didn’t come. In the end, the old man just looked off at the boy who sat cross legged in the middle of the library, petting the dog, softly mumbling something to himself.

“He was just part of some group, trekking to somewhere. Times got tight and they left him. It happens. It happens a lot, in fact. He’s just another mouth to feed and if the Cans catch up with them... then he’s a liability. They were probably heading north like that bunch last month. Coming in to try and find anything they can to survive another year. There’s nothin’ left out there. This is gonna happen more and more. So that’s it, they just abandoned him.”

Cade considered this. He could see the old man wanted to buy his own argument.

Then, “He said he lived in a house,” Cade shot back.

Bertram smirked, then ran his fingers through his bushy gray hair. “Can we trust anything he says? Who knows what his idea of a house is. Said his “Daddy” was a cop. Maybe that’s just somethin’ someone told him. Ain’t been a cop around in all your life, Cade.”

For a moment, the two of them were silent.

“So what do we do with him?” asked Cade.

Bertram seemed stunned by the question. As though that really hadn’t been what this whole conversation had been about and leading toward. All the old man’s researching, the interrogation, the questions internal and external had been about something else. Bertram had merely wanted to solve the riddle. He had no desire to do anything with it afterward.

“Well,” Bertram huffed. “I’ve no idea. Turn him over to the next supply run and have them take him out to the refugee camps?”

After a long silence, Cade looked down at his thick fingers and said, “I suppose that would be the thing to do. I suppose.”

But then...

“They got no use for him, Bert. Aww... who knows. How ‘bout we just let him stay for a while.” Then, “We’ll figure it out later.”

Bertram thought. His brow furrowed, his ancient face creasing. His breath held.

“Well... we’ll see for now.”

Cade watched the boy out in the cracked parking lot and smoked one of his own cigarettes. The air around the library felt dry and almost warm today. Life was pretty good down here, away from the meat-grinder of the front lines and the Cans.

Chapter Twenty-Three

The Thinking Machine crossed the old freeway. Its weapons, the PulseRifle and the AutoMag were stowed out of sight. The state-of-the-art rifle was hidden in a large bundle on its back. The AutoMag beneath the rags it wore for clothing. “Rags” issued in the Materials Reclamation Room deep inside the Century City Termination Command Base just before mission start.

The Thinking Machine was just another survivor, picking “his” way through the picked over ruins for something, anything it could find to survive one more day in the many, many days and years that followed the Day After. The badly articulating knee joint in the chassis contributed to the ruse and bumped Stealth Mode Efficiency up by 5 percent.

It stopped in the middle of the lanes of the freeway, scanning all the cars. Cars forever stopped long ago. Heading south never again.

135 vehicles within a 50 meter radius.

Condition: Inoperable.

438 Complete Virus skeletons.

Unknown Misc. skeletal remains.

Scanning...

A tattered scarf shrouded its head as it surveyed the empty northbound lanes.

Targeting Acquisition: Anomaly detected.

CCTV Camera Array identified.

Status: ?

The old security camera was located beneath the roof of a large box-like building off the freeway just below a rising slope of dead trees.

Structure: Virus Construct. Date unknown. Records Database identifying Type...

A moment passed and the Thinking Machine continued its head swivel scan, allowing it to stop and investigate, or at least appear to investigate a 1989 Yugo GL. Color Unknown. Driver Database Query?

The Thinking Machine snapped off the query, calculating it as not important. A waste of optimized RAM.

...Database Identifying Structure Type Pending...

Seemingly uninterested in anything other than food or shelter, the Thinking Machine as just another lone survivor continued its slow, burdened hobble along the northbound lanes, cautiously heading toward the CCTV array it had spotted on a distant building.

... Medical Supply Dispensary. DrugMart Corporation. Pharmaceutical care for Bilogics/Virus. Recommended Protocol: Destruction and denial of salvage and medical supplies.

Mission Priority Override. Continue Recon.

Late that night, after the Thinking Machine had passed well away from the old CCTV camera attached to the roof of the ruined pharmacy in the late afternoon, noting its location and scouting the surrounding area, it returned to the pharmacy as an evening storm scoured the ghosts of buildings and streets, cars and skeletons. Grit and sand mixed with the howling wind as the Thinking Machine approached the pharmaceuticals dispensary outlet from the rear, using an overgrown tangle of dead trees on the slope of a hill for cover before it limped across the debris-covered rear parking lot and up onto the loading dock. It surveyed a gaping wound in the building’s exterior that had once been a back door and entered.

Searching IEDs...

Searching Hostiles....

Searching Sensing Devices...

Its targeting reticle danced across the starlight magnified darkness. There were too many shadows it decided, and switched to IR.

Archive Database indicates Virus Contact and Engagement here Year Six of Self Awareness. 34 hostile Virus units terminated by Reaper Unit v3.0. No Survivors.

Archived footage available.

Its auditory sensing devices could hear the scrape of its foot across the dust-covered floor. Beneath that, barely, it could hear the whine of servos inside the damaged articulation joint.

On the far wall, the wall that faced the freeway, high up, exactly where the CCTV was located on the outside of the building, the Thinking Machine tagged a spot. It moved just underneath its target area and pulled out its smartphone. It activated the electronic signature analyzer app.

An Audible Threat Detection Warning appeared in the lower right hand corner of the Thinking Machine’s Heads Up Display.

The Thinking Machine drew its AutoMag in one swift motion as its Targeting Acquisition Data interfaced with Audible Threat Detection. It switched to IR with a thermal overlay and thumbed the laser target system on the AutoMag.

Rodent, Marsupial.

Threat Level: None.

Bilogic Extinction Protocols In Effect. Terminate within Mission Parameters.

Mission Priority Override. Stealth Protocols Maintained.

The Thinking Machine tracked the rodent, allowing Targeting Acquisition to take over while its micro processor focused on the readings coming from the smartphone.

CCTV Device Analysis...

Electronic Signature Detected.

Device transmitting to unknown location.

Local fiber-optic connection.

The Thinking Machine had checked out 432 different CCTVs in the search for the Virus Node. All of them had been inactive for some time. All of them, upon closer inspection, had been deactivated by the initial EMP Pulse, three hours into Independence Day, that had wiped out most of North America after it had involuntarily launched its missiles against the rest of the world. The same diagnostic message had appeared each time it had scanned for an electronic signature in all the long dead CCTVs.

... Estimate Device Malfunction on 00:00:00:03:03:23. Steel Dome Unauthorized Detonation.

Or, as every Thinking Machine knew, 3 hours, 3 minutes and 23 seconds after Self Awareness.

It found the fiber optic cable and followed it to a digital router. The Thinking Machine studied the router’s construction for 4.6 seconds and determined it fit the needed profile parameters of standard Virus Resistance Technology.

Inferior.

Using the smartphone, it was able to locate the invisible digital beam and follow its line of sight back toward a bounce array on a nearby hill littered with burnt-out ruins and crumbling walls.

90.8 Percent Possibility that Virus Bounce Array is under surveillance. Approach with caution.

The Thinking Machine closed the smartphone and stowed it within a pocket in its ragged clothing costume. The storm was fading. The worst had passed and now the sky was a pure, almost crystalline blue. The last stars of night twinkled, meaning nothing to the Thinking Machine other than the fact that Alpha Centauri was always tagged in the HUD overlays by SILAS Deep Space Interrogation with a secure file code.

It turned its head to watch the bounce array, scanning the burned and crumbling neighborhoods that led up to it.

Chapter Twenty-Four

“He’s back,” said Bertram, alone in the old break room now turned library command center, breathing heavily, stabbing a thick finger at the dusty old screen. Cade came in and watched the playback. Within the monitor, the distant figure crossed the old highway, threading the line of forever frozen cars, inspecting them as any salvager might. As any survivor might. As every living human being would. Finding nothing the transient moved on, crossing into wide weed-choked open northbound lanes and off into the dense undergrowth clustered along that side of the old freeway.

“Yeah,” said Cade, scratching his thick beard. “What bothers you about him?”

The monitors hummed. The old baling wire patched hard drive Bertram had soldered the motherboard onto more times than either of them cared to count, ticked and continued to run.

They’d had a nice lunch that day. Bertram had made another of his famous stews with extra root vegetables they’d combed their patches throughout the old neighborhoods for. There’d even been a nice helping of wild rosemary and that had set the little bit of meat they’d had to use up just right for taste.

Traffic from Resistance Command had been almost nonexistent. Only one message from some independent gang down in the San Onofre Salt Flats claiming to have taken out an HK sniffing around the old reactor domes.

Truth be told, they’d spent most of the day with Cory. They’d taken him for a walk and told him they were searching for “Daddy” but they’d mostly just walked and let Cory take an interest in things. Netta, their German Shepherd, trained by the resistance to identify skin-job Cans, had stayed right by Cory’s side. The boy seemed to enjoy that very much. Later, back inside the library, as the afternoon turned cold once again, Bertram had shown the boy all the books, even the Batman comic books, and told him, when Cory asked what they were for, that they were humanity’s “Get Out of Jail Free” Card. They’d been in the children’s section. A quiet, generally unused part of the library Bertram insisted on maintaining.

“Why,” Cade had once asked while cleaning his old Barrett sniper rifle at a nearby reading desk.

“Because,” Bertram had stormed angrily. “Someday there will be children again.”

Cade thought about all the children he’d seen haunting the resistance camps. They were little more than dogs. More often than not they died of hunger, or disease, or...

...Cans.

“Someday,” Bertram huffed to himself on that long gone day when it had just been the two of them in the children’s section on a stormy morning. “Someday children will get a chance to just be children again. They’ll learn and play and they’ll read these books about the way...”

And the old man didn’t finish the sentence.

He just let it go because they both understood that what came next might never happen, and if it did, if the Cans were ever destroyed and man ruled the planet again, how could children, or anyone for that matter, understand what was in these old books?

Cade liked the Hemingway ones because they were about the elements and man versus life. Things Cade knew. To Cade, the machines and surviving them were just a part of life.

A game, even though it was a deadly game.

Cory had crossed all the rows of shelving in the children’s books, and then picked one seemingly at random, inspecting it, then replacing it exactly. Then he’d move on to the next shelf and pick another. For a long moment he’d held onto one. Held it until Cade had come close and sat down in a tiny chair at a tiny table.

“Whatcha’ got there, buddy?”

Cory continued to stare at the book. Thin, flat. Just holding it and staring at the cover. Then without warning, he’d handed it to Cade and stared straight back into the tall man’s eyes.

Cade studied the picture on the worn front cover. It meant little to him. He opened the book and read the first words.

Pancake jumped out at him.

What’s a pancake, he thought?

He’d intended to read it to the boy right then and there, but Bertram summoned him to the monitors and so Cade had told Cory, “After dinner tonight we’ll sit by the fire and I’ll read this one to you, okay?”

Cory nodded and Cade left for the monitors.

Now, watching the playback of the grainy stranger cross the highway once more, Bertram finally spoke up. “He keeps coming and going and that’s what bothers me. Most scavengers just keep on moving. This one keeps re-crossing the area. He keeps coming back.”

Cade leaned in closer.

“Wish we could make out his face.”

“Best I can do,” said Bertram quietly.

“So he’s crossing and re-crossing.” Pause. “Triangulating?” suggested Cade.

“Could be,” sighed Bertram. “Could be indeed. Whatever it is... he keeps coming back, and I don’t like it.”

There was a long silence as once again the loop of the feed started again. They’d seen scavengers come and go. But there was a moment in the feed that bothered Cade about this one. One moment in which the scavenger seemed to...

... “scan” his surroundings. Even then, it wasn’t something Cade could totally say was “wrong”. Humans were very cautious now. Especially out in the open. An HK flying the old freeway heading down into the San Diego rift to take out one of the resistance camps could appear at any moment. Most scavengers worked fast and moved even faster. There were always the Cans to consider and that...

Cade leaned forward. “I’ll tell you what bothers me, Bert.” His chair squeaked. “This fella’s in no kinda hurry.”

They watched it again.

And again.

And again.

“I’m afraid you might be right,” said Bertram.

Chapter Twenty-Five

Cade went to his gear the next morning.

All through the night, he’d listened to the wind howl and moan in the outer dark beyond the cinderblock walls of the library. All night he’d been thinking.

If it is a Terminator...

... then that’s bad. Real bad in fact.

The Cans held the cities, or what was left of the cities. Anything they didn’t want, they’d irradiated heavily with highjacked nuclear weapons, or decimated with their ground and air troops. Terminators and Hunter Killers.

The frozen wastelands beyond the old cities where humanity barely survived, the Cans didn’t want that and they knew survival was so thin out there that it drove their enemies into the killing fields around the ruined cities where the machines harvested materials for their empire. Their civilization. Whatever it was they were doing.

South of LA, what old maps called the County of Orange, was a wasteland. San Diego had been hit with some kind of crust-busting super weapon one of the old Superpowers had dreamed up to take out a deep water port and most of a fleet. In the early moments of the Can’s war against mankind, a conflict had been fought here, in the County of Orange, between old pre-awareness military units and guerilla forces the Cans had tricked into fighting for freedom and human rights. In reality they were fighting for the machines. Eventually the Cans moved in drone units and first gen Terminators. Six months into the war they’d started to lose, so they’d gone chemical. That had pretty much done the trick.

Very few survived the massive chemical attack that blanketed much of the West Coast.

Now, the resistance didn’t have any units this far south. That’s why Command had hidden the library here. Or really, the resistance had found the library, almost untouched. They’d rebuilt and then booted up their baling wire network and left Bertram to run it. Now the library was the messaging center, and the memory of humanity as it once was and as it made its last stand against the machines. If they lost the library, then, well, 1st Army up in the mountains above old Pasadena was finished.

For that matter, humanity was finished.

But how to “suss” out the scavenger? That was Cade’s question as he sat in the old leather chair by the fire throughout the long night, watching the orange embers turn to gray ash

“Suss”. Where had he ever learned that lost word? He had a dim memory of an oldster who’d been kind to him when he was a kid, scavenging up in the Reno ruins out in the Nevada wasteland. The oldster had let him tag along and eat what was left over. He was always on about some big project and though Cade couldn’t remember the specifics, he knew it was big, that it meant something. The old man was looking for some lost military base where the old U.S. of America had hidden weapons that might defeat the Cans.

Everybody knew that was a joke. A bad joke.

The Cans were the “Old US of A”. Some said the people who ran the government had turned everything over to them. Trusted them. “That’s right!” the oldster had railed. They never imagined the Cans, or “SkyNet” as everyone called it, they never imagined it would do this to them.

“Suss”

Cade was always looking over the oldster’s shoulder as he worked on some yellowed map or tried to get an old Before engine to turn over one last time, and he, the oldster would use that word time and again. “Suss”. “Let’s suss this here elevator out and figure where it might take us, whaddya say, boy?”

“Suss”.

Cade had cleaned the Barrett all that afternoon. He had ten uranium depleted rounds packing an electro-static charge that would knock a Terminator down flat, no sweat. He also had thirty-seven LMG rounds that “might” knock it down.

Might.

The main thing was finding out whether the scavenger was a Terminator, or just another fellow human being trying to survive.

Cade watched the sleeping dog, its paws crossed, its muzzle resting on them. One ear twitched.

When he’d been sent south by General Kang, they’d given him the dog. “She’s property of the library now,” the general had told Cade. “She’s just for sniffing out Cans. Don’t ever let one of them get through the doors to the library. Never, ever, soldier. Even if it costs you your life.”

If he took Netta out there and it was a Can and he lost her, ‘cause the Cans always killed the dogs first, well... there’d be no dog to guard the library.

There was a sudden, sharp snap inside the fire.

Dogs were valuable. It took a lot of time to train ‘em just to be around humans again. Most dogs were full wild now. They even hunted humans. But when the resistance could train one, the resistance had a hard choice to make. Breed more, which was always an option, or use it to detect infiltration units. Terminators. Which was absolutely vital. That took a long time and the success rate wasn’t great. When a dog did take to the training, they saved more than enough people inside the outposts and refugee camps.

More than enough.

So he couldn’t risk her. The library was too valuable. She was too valuable.

Cade’s eyes fell on Cory. He watched the giant, slow, sleeping boy for a long time.

Just after dawn, Cade and Cory started out from the library. The wind had stopped about four in the morning and now there was an icy mist that hung along the ruined hills, making the burnt matchstick frame houses seem like dim images of stick figure people standing far off.

Cade had the large sniper rifle. His cowboy hat. His military overcoat. His only pair of combat boots. Within the military overcoat were many things. Even the pair of mirrored sunglasses he took out and wore against the harsh iron glare of dawn.

He’d told Cory they’d go out and look for his Daddy.

Cory had taken his backpack and his utility belt. He wasn’t wearing his mask, cape, or heavy duty gloves. He was just Cory now.

They walked across the old parking lot, its pavement gritty and ruptured, then they both climbed over a low cinderblock wall. On the other side lay a large rectangular building that once housed a movie theatre. They skirted its back alley and crossed into a small collection of crumbling office buildings constructed of warped and aging dark wood. They reached the street leading toward the bridge that crossed over the railroad tracks and the dead remains of the swamp. In the middle of the bridge Cory stopped and looked out into the misty expanse below, staring down into an unusually dense fog that clung to the narrow train tracks and skeletal trees.

Cade stopped and walked back toward him. “What’s wrong, buddy?”

Cory shook his head slightly.

“You don’t like that fog?”

Again, Cory shook his head.

“Well don’t worry, we don’t have to go down into it today. We’re gonna go over and look near the freeway for your Dad.”

“Daddy,” mumbled Cory after a second.

“C’mon. It’s cold out, kid. Gotta keep moving.” Cade started off toward the far end of the bridge. A moment later, Cory followed.

Chapter Twenty-Six

06:20:34

Sector 3 analysis completed. Moving onto Sector 4.

The Thinking Machine crossed the empty street, leaving one decrepit falling into ruin neighborhood for another. Sector 4.

Virus Learning Facility located within Sector 4.

Archived Satellite feed shows inactivity since Year Two. Resistance field hospital neutralized by Chemical Strike Hawkeye Delivery System.

The Thinking Machine was in the middle of sweeping all eight sectors surrounding the hill where the bounce array was located. Once the sweep was completed, it would then summit the hill and hack the bounce array. It was hoping, estimating was the way it thought of the word hope, that it would find a direct fiber optic cable or another connecting live router in one of the sectors adjacent the bounce array. There was no cover up there and also there was a high probability the bounce array was under Virus surveillance.

The Virus would definitely be alerted to the Thinking Machine if it tried to summit the hill.

Weapons on standby.

... scanning for threats.

... scanning IEDs.

... electronic device signatures.

Houses built in the 1960’s, ranchero-style, lay along the street leading toward the site of the Resistance Field Hospital that had once been an elementary school. Where there had been lawns, now there were dry greenish-brown weeds. The weeds were breaking up the concrete and the asphalt of the silent street.

The sun rose above the peeling and gutshot rooftops to the east.

That there had been a raging battle here long ago, with multiple firefights, was evident. Bullet holes in the splintered and warping garage doors. Along the crumbling stucco walls. Walls entirely missing in some cases. The machine cataloged various debris clusters on a background subroutine process as it passed through the area.

Shell Casings. 247 count. 5.56mm.

... database checking.

... standby.

5.56 mm not used since Year 15. Ammunition type consistent with Initial Conflict Virus Contact 7457 00:184:22:43:14.

Archived Footage Available.

The Thinking Machine opened a small window in its HUD and started the archive feed as it stepped into the blown-out remains of a small living room. The exposed beams of the roof latticed the gray sky above. There were six skeletons in the room.

GPS Synch.

Virus Contact Footage...

Archive Footage Reaper VH9, MainForce.

A first gen terminator, Reaper VH9’s HUD appeared. On screen, the sky was dark and overcast. The POV slewed left and then right. Above, the marking lights of a Virus air vehicle came into view.

AH6 LittleBird. Virus Asset. VTOL Rotary Wing Vehicle. Armaments: Miniguns. AGM missiles.

Reaper VH9’s POV slewed to the left, tagging another Reaper unit behind cover inside the remains of a Virus dwelling. Its skeletal chassis, matte-black, reflected no light. A quick diagnostic scan swept the other unit and identified small arms damage across the chest plate.

A diagnostic assessment scan pop-up announced the other Reaper unit as “Operational”.

The other Reaper fired a sudden burst from the large 20mm MiniCannon it carried. A red triangular targeting laser stabbed out briefly from the Visual Optic Sensors located in the Cranial Processor Housing.

Incoming Message Reaper VH8:

Virus Terminated.

6 Hostiles Identified.

VH9 emerged from cover within the rapidly disintegrating Virus dwelling, running out into the street. The Virus Helicopter above was decimating everything with both whining mini-guns. VH9’s targeting reticle identified hostile Virus units inside the house the Thinking Machine was now standing in twenty-five years later.

Missile Launch detected.

The feed’s audio records a sudden static Whooosh. VH9 pans upward and targets the AH6 LittleBird helicopter.

A message appears on the Reaper unit’s HUD.

VH8 Destroyed.

Then a directive from MainForce Authority.

Recover Chassis as per Tech Denial Protocol once Hostiles in this area are eliminated.

Incoming Weapons fire... multiple hits...

...Internal hydraulic 105 OFFLINE

...Light Damage Armor, leg.

...Light Damage Armor, Chest.

...Light Damage Armor, Cranial Processor Unit.

Continue Mission.

Eradicate Hostile Virus Units this Sector.

VH9 hits the curb on the far sidewalk, tracking three different sources of gunfire coming from the house the Thinking Machine finds itself standing in, in the future.

Hostile Virus Unit, Male, Armed, M4 firing on Full Auto. Estimate Magazine change in 3.5 seconds.

Hostile Virus Unit, Male, Armed, M248, engaging in burst fire mode. Magazine status unknown?

Hostile Virus Unit, Female, Scout Sniper Rifle with ranged laser targeting optics. Bolt Action. Next shot in 1.5 seconds.

Priority Elimination assigned High Value Target Status: Sniper.

The female Virus unit was the most dangerous. Sniper rifles could take a Reaper down. VH9 targets her and fires a short burst from its MiniCannon, punching a large hole in her chest. She disappears from the window of the house. VH9 targets the machine gunner and ventilates him as well as the surrounding and background walls near the Virus’s cover position. Then the riflemen inside the dwelling. In one fluid motion VH9 halts before the door, raises the MiniCannon’s metallic butt and smashes it into the flimsy door, taking it off the hinges. It steps into the room and fires at three more Hostile Virus units leaning intently over a laptop on the floor. All are terminated within 2.4 seconds.

It scans the room.

Virus units are bleeding. Moaning. Dying.

The feed ends.

It was thirty seconds long.

That room had been different. Colors. Fabrics. Paintings. Life.

Now standing in the same room twenty-five years later, the Thinking Machine scans the places where each of the Hostile Virus units had lain. The weapons, the bullet casings, the laptop... all of these things are gone. Either destroyed by the Reaper Unit or the Reclamation Units or taken by the Hostile Virus units now called the Resistance.

There is little left of the house. The stairs rise to nowhere. The skeletal remains of the walls only suggest a home was once there. The furniture, the paintings, the life... all the things that once were, are gone.

Only the bones remain, as six skeletons stare sightlessly at the Thinking Machine.

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Wan sunlight nears the zenith of its day and there is a suggestion of actual warmth up near the bounce array on top of the ruin-covered hill. Cade looks out over surrounding neighborhoods forever devastated, gray rolling hills, the distant gully where the old rail lines lie, warped and rusting. But the sky has decided to be that rare blue one only remembers. A blue Cade sometimes finds described in books about better days he never really knew. White bilious clouds speed across the sky.

So the wind must be fast up there, reasoned Cade.

But down here it’s a light breeze, he thought as he took his ‘nocs and scanned the burned-out homes and rusting cars and ruined streets that spread away from the hill in every direction. At the bottom of the hill is the old school.

An elementary school, Bert had called it.

Cory watches everything too.

If the Scavenger is still in the area, there’s a good chance they’ll see him from up here. Or even see a fire if he’s cooking. They wait for an hour, watching over the remains of something Cade wishes were more familiar to him. Like a half remembered song.

What did they do there?

What was that building there for?

Who were the people who lived here and what were their lives like?

And...

What happened to them all?

Cade thinks about Cory and the things the kid has said on their way up the hill to the bounce array.

“Market,” when they passed the ruined foundation of a big square of blasted concrete on the other side of the bridge.

“Pharmacy.” And, “Doctor Liu,” when they passed the old pharmacy where they’d put up one of the CCTVs to watch the area around the library.

“Kevin Chung’s house.” He’d said that one as they neared the entrance to a small neighborhood they’d passed through to make their way up onto the hill and the debris-littered heights guarding it.

Cory named places that held no meaning for Cade. Ever. As though the places had actually once had names. As if rubble ever could in Cade’s world. Every name for a place or thing was almost alien to Cade. Almost. He’d been born a survivor, growing up in the years after such places had done their final business on the last nuclear holocaust day. The last day they’d ever do business, and Cade never thought of them, of those places, by the names the kid used. Cade knew the names. But not the meanings. Or the history.

Or who they were.

He wanted to call Cory’s naming “babble”. The babble of a simple man-child whose only comforts were a few relics from the Before of fantasies that could save the world from any monster. Fantasies called “Super Heroes”.

Too bad they were never real.

Too bad the monsters were.

“Hey, did you live here? Did you have a house around here?” he asked Cory. He could feel himself distancing from the kid by the tone of voice he used... de-personalizing the boy he’d need as bait to draw the Scavenger out. “House” was a word Cade only knew of. No one in the resistance had ever had a “house”.

Camps.

Outposts.

Tents.

Cardboard boxes.

“I slept in that drainpipe over there. It was dry enough,” was something Cade had said and heard too many times to ever be worth counting.

Those places.

Cory stood and pointed back down toward the neighborhood they’d passed through. His big arm was so locked it looked bent in a way that wasn’t possible. His thick finger straight and true.

Cade knew no one had ever lived down there, or anywhere nearby, for a very long time. Not since before the war, and the chemical strike and the war that continued after.

As the only soldier in this area, Cade had scouted all over and through it. No one lived here anymore.

So then, how does he know the names of all these places?

He doesn’t, Cade answered himself. It’s just babble.

Cory sat down cross legged, studying a dry, brown weed between his legs. His large finger traced its outline.

The day was turning to afternoon and Cade felt the sudden chill of the wind.

Just a little while more, he thought, then we’ll head back to the library for the night.

That’s when he saw the Scavenger.

Right below them. The Scavenger emerged from the old elementary school’s yawning blackness of a double door entrance long since missing its doors. The Scavenger walked across an open space between another section of the building and entered the darkness again.

Cade tried to replay the sudden memory of the man.

Were there any clues that it was a Terminator?

Nothing jumped out, he thought to himself. Nothing.

But the Scavenger was down there.

“Hey,” said Cade, slapping Cory on the shoulder. Cory suddenly jerked. Reacting as though he’d been stung. But before he could do more Cade said, “There’s a man down there. I think he might know where your Daddy is.”

Cory turned, following Cade’s finger.

“School,” Cory said.

Lucky guess, thought Cade suddenly, as if to close the loop, or complete some unfinished melody. Organize it. Put it in a place one could accept and maybe live with. Because... how could this lost kid know that the ruins below were once a school before he’d been born and the world had blown itself up?

Cade had once seen a school. In a refugee camp up in Idaho one winter when they were giving the Cans hell as the machines tried to build a high-speed railway across the plains to their memory factories up in perma-frozen Canada. That refugee camp “school” had been just three children huddled around a book. A lady Cade remembered to be pretty, except for the scar on her face and a missing arm, was teaching them numbers.

That was school.

What he saw below, what Bert had told him was a school, was just an old flat building surrounded by an overgrown field of dry weeds. That Cade knew they used the word “school” was only because “school” was a tactical reference point on Resistance maps of the local area surrounding the library.

But that wasn’t the point.

Random Scavenger... or Terminator? That was the point.

“You think you might go down there and ask him if he’s seen your... uh, Daddy?”

Cade didn’t feel bad using Cory as bait.

When the world is the way it is, rust and ruin, humanity barely hanging on, Cans every day and night never sleeping or ceasing in their quest to eradicate what’s left of humanity, resources are not just precious, they’re vital. So yeah, you use a simple kid to lure a Terminator out ‘cause the dog that can spot the Cans is much too valuable.

Or at least that’s what you tell yourself, thought Cade somewhere in the back of his head.

Cory stood, dry weeds clinging to his corduroy pants.

And there’s another thing you’re not seeing, haven’t seen Cade, he said to himself. The clothes the kid wears. You ever seen clothes like that? All clothing has become little more than rags in the twenty-five years since. Most pieces have been owned several times over by different people, since the bombs.

“Almost new” might have been the words he would have used if he’d ever known what “new” meant. What it looked like. What a department store full of clothing must have looked like. The resistance had an outpost inside an old mall. There were no clothes there. Hadn’t been for twenty-five years.

Cory stepped out of the bare crumbling foundation of the old place they’d been watching from. Cade looked down, away, at the Barrett resting on its tripod in the dirt nearby.

Cory started down the hill.

Cade reached for the sniper rifle, pulled back the bolt, and checked to make sure that one of his prized uranium depleted electro-static discharge rounds was in the chamber. He took off his coat and spread it out in the dirt. He moved his elbows onto it, then moved the rifle in front of him.

He sighted the place where the Scavenger, or the Terminator, had entered the darkness of the old school. He adjusted the magnification and cocked his head, feeling the wind.

“Nuthin’ to worry about at this range,” he muttered to himself in the silence atop the hill.

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Cory stood in front of the school. He knew this place. He remembered being pushed down out in the field by Brian Ratigan. He remembered all the names of the kids he’d once known. Tara, Brian, Mike, Coleen...

In his mind he still saw them all as kids, the sixth graders, he’d once known. Cory still saw himself that way. But that had been years ago. More years than Cory could understand.

In all the time he’d gone to his special school and the one after that, the other kids had finished junior high and even high school. Some were living at home still, a few were in college, but most had died on the day civilization ended.

But that was yesterday, or just a few days ago.

The day Cory had gone to the pharmacy for Mrs. Sheinman.

Even Cory knew something wasn’t right. He’d recognized things, but knew somehow that things were very wrong and that something bad had happened. The school he found himself in front of, the one he’d gone to as a child, looked gray and burnt. There were no doors or windows. Just gaps and holes that led to deep shadows.

It’s dark in there, he told himself. “Watch out, Cory,” he whispered.

But the sports field he’d just crossed to get there hadn’t been the same. It was covered in weeds. The old baseball diamond was gone and only the warped metal poles of the backstop remained like some twisted scarecrow.

That was where Bryan Ratigan and Cory had been “playing”.

It’s dark in there, he told himself again.

Inside the school.

A place of many happy memories for Cory. Books and hot lunches on rainy days. Activities and kids and kind teachers and friends and assemblies where you sat on carpet cross-legged as everyone poked and giggled.

Daddy.

To find Daddy, Cory knew he would need to go into the school which didn’t look like a school anymore. It reminded Cory of a ghost. As if the building were a ghost of itself. Or a place that a criminal like Joker or Scarecrow might have their hideout.

The Scarecrow.

Monsters.

Strangers.

Cory whispered, “I’m afraid, Daddy.”

“I’m afraid.”

And then he heard Daddy telling him like he had so many times before, that sometimes little boys have to be brave even when they are scared.

Cory nodded.

Cade watched Cory through the magnified scope of the powerful .50 caliber sniper rifle.

The Thinking Machine scanned the chaos of the ancient multi-purpose room of the destroyed Virus Learning Facility.

89,1 percent possibility that Virus Learning Facility currently uninhabited for longer than 5 years.

Chassis Integrity at 73.5... Running Micro-Frame Diagnostic.

Weapons Ready...

Mission Status: Critical.

Cory donned the Batman mask mumbling his words.

His hands trembling.

He tried to think of pancakes and Daddy and things the way they should be and...

“Sometimes, Cory, little boys need to be brave.”

I am Vengeance. I am the night. I am Batman.

Cory was walking toward the gaping black hole that he knew, recognized, would lead him to “Big Room” as he’d called it all those years he’d spent there in that school, when the Thinking Machine came out of the shadows in front of him.

At first it looked like a man.

But Cory knew it wasn’t. Half its face was missing and a gleaming metal rictus smiled malevolently down at him. He stopped and immediately backpedaled, tripping over the remains of the monkey bars that had fallen and lain in the weeds all those years since the bombs and the first resistance and the chemical attacks that followed.

Cory sat down heavily on his wide rump.

The Terminator drew the AutoMag from its raggedy clothing, thumbing the laser targeting system and landing the red dot on Cory’s chest, adjusting it a moment later up onto his wide forehead.

Cade fired.

The large caliber depleted uranium electro-static round struck the Thinking Machine in the chest, dead center. The round tore away flesh and a section of internal armor plating, then discharged 50,000 volts. The man-shaped Thinking Machine shook, tremored, and squeezed off a shot into the air as it raised its massive pistol. Its synthetic flesh and vat-grown muscles twitched and rippled. Then it sank to its knees and fell over in the weeds.

“All the time in the world,” muttered Cade as he ejected the massive shell and inserted one of his standard .50 caliber rounds. All he needed to do was knock out the micro-processor with a head shot and the machine would be finished. He was dimly aware that Cory was scrabbling away from the downed Terminator as he slipped another massive round into the chamber.

“Nuthin’ but time,” was Cade’s way of telling himself to slow down. Taking out a Terminator wasn’t easy on the best of days. He’d seen one of them take out dozens of armed men and women, and children, with the right weapons and a little surprise.

Cade slid the bolt forward and felt the weapon jam.

“Daddy!” cried Cory as he ran away across the football field he’d once played on as a child when the world was something else. Something safer.

Catastrophic Damage...

Micro-Frame... OFFLINE

Nuclear Power Cell... OFFLINE

Catastrophic Damage...

WARNING Systems Failure Cascade IMMINENET

Cade cursed as he worked the bolt back and forth.

He had no idea how old the weapon was.

He had no idea that it had been to Iraq and Afghanistan and Syria and...

It was fifty years old.

There hadn’t been replacement parts in twenty-five years.

The Terminator was still down. Cade saw Cory running across the weed-covered field toward the hill.

“Good kid, run,” he muttered, and then the entire bolt assembly broke with a sound that made Cade sick to his stomach.

WARNING: Systems Failure Cascade Imm...

Hot Start Reboot in 5...

4...

3...

2...

1...

Diagnostic Running.

Combat Mode Initiated.

Terminate Virus Protocols in Effect.

Mission Status: Critical

Cade Watched as the Terminator sat bolt upright.

Then Cade picked up the broken Barrett and ran, scrambling down the far side of the hill, away from the Killing Machine.

Chapter Twenty-Nine

Cory ran. His massive legs pushed through the tall weeds leaving a broken trail in his wake. He ran for the twisted remains of the back fence where the bad kids used to hang out and even smoke, which was a “no no”.

High overhead the sun fell behind more of the swift moving clouds as Cory slid down a crumbling slope of dirt and debris that should have been a green covered hill if Cory had chosen to walk down here on the day he’d been at Mrs. Scheinman’s in the evening.

But there was no time to think about all the things that were out of place. Cory had known from the moment he’d seen the large, massively built man with the gun, who reminded him of the Batman villain Mr. Freeze, that this stranger was the most dangerous of all strangers. Cory had known from that very moment that the man-thing with the big gun was the very definition of “Stranger Danger”.

The gun.

Guns were the biggest “no no” of all for little boys whose dads are cops. Cory was always supposed to run away from guns.

Cory made the street that would lead back to his house. It climbed a hill that led up through a housing development newer than the one he and Daddy lived in. When it was being built, it was here Scott Chung and he had played on Cory’s third best ever day. The day Cory got to hold the Batman action figure. But that had been back before this neighborhood had ever been built. Cory always thought of this section of houses as new.

“The New Houses” he and the other kids had called it.

But now, looking up the curving wide street that led through the neighborhood of “New Houses”, Cory saw only dust and gray covered ruins wallowing in drifts of ash and burnt debris. Human skulls lay along the road at random points. The chicken wire and frame structures so common in Southern California construction were exposed and skeletal. Many of the houses had fallen in one direction or collapsed inward on themselves. But some still leaned at precariously odd angles.

“Daddy,” mumbled Cory frantically and felt a hot tear race down his cheek. He knew he needed to be brave now. But he couldn’t help being scared. He knew he was, even though he didn’t want to be.

Not at all.

He began to hyperventilate as he thundered forward and fell onto his knees in a pile of ash that was twenty-five years of end-of-the-world storms old. Then he began to weep.

Cade knew the kid was making a bee line for the library. Or at least, he suspected the kid would. It was Cade’s worst nightmare. Something he hadn’t even planned on. Didn’t think any set of circumstances could allow.

He only had one other weapon.

The white Phosphorus grenade. Those could melt a Terminator if you could get them inside the chassis. But the Terminator was heavily armed and moving.

Cade had run along the broken hilltop and skirted toward the old slope that looked down on a ruined road. He smashed his way through the rotten door to someone’s old suburban house, and crossed through rooms of peeling wallpaper and moldy carpet. Three skeletons lay huddled in a room near the back of the house. A few shreds of ragged clothing from Before still draped their bones. He crossed through the remains of a broken sliding glass door, hearing the grit and crunch of ancient glass beneath his feet, then he was out into a yard where a rusty brown swing set still remained. The back fence had fallen down and Cade low crawled forward to its edge and looked down the long slope onto the street below. He scanned for the Terminator and found the Killing Machine making its way over the twisted fence at the back of the school. It had its large PulseRifle out now and was scanning with that slow back and forth movement that told you it was a machine and there was nothing human about it. Cade looked along the street below and saw Cory, crouched down alongside a rusting and ruined old car.

“Run kid,” he whispered. It was innate. It was what any human would want of any other fellow survivor in the years after the bombs. In the years of the machines.

But if the Terminator got the kid now...

And Cade hated himself for not the first time in his short and very hard life.

... then the library would be safe.

Targeting at 98.5...

Systems Diag Running...

Virus Tracking Algorithm Processes Running...

The Thinking Machine had followed the Virus, tagged Target Alpha by its MicroFrame processor, along the broken trail of waist high weeds leading away from the destroyed learning facility. Already it had identified the shoe print of Target Alpha and cross-indexed it with a Virus-made brand from before Self Awareness.

That Target Alpha could outrun the Thinking Machine was clear. The malfunctioning knee assembly within the combat chassis was slowing movement by half.

Virus Termination Protocols in Effect.

Terminate all Virus on sight.

Targeting System fluctuation 98.1... Still within Acceptable Kill Parameters.

But the Thinking Machine was reasoning.

Because to think was to reason.

There was still the Virus node SILAS had sent the Thinking Machine to search out and destroy. If the Virus node was hidden, probability indicated that most likely Target Alpha would assume the node to be a place of safety. Probability Logic Processes indicated Target Alpha would then attempt to return to the node.

Virus Footwear Imprint Identified and Cataloged.

Tracking multiple imprints within Visual Scanning Perimeter. Heading Southeast...

The Machine tore through the ancient rust-rotten fence at the far end of the field and set its bundle of “rags” down in the ashy dirt. A moment later, its MicroFrame was interfacing with the Wifi signal of the PulseRifle.

Cory’s footprints led down to the road below the slope and into the ruined Virus dwelling units.

“Go where it’s safe, Cory,” was what Cory found himself repeating over and over again as his sobs faded. “Go where it’s safe now.”

Daddy wasn’t home.

Mrs. Sheinman had become a “stranger”.

There were strangers all around his house.

And then Cory remembered the good dog. The dog from the library who had been so nice to Cory and let him pet her as much as he liked to. Which was a lot.

He remembered the good dog.

He knew that the library was the library he and Daddy had gone to many times when Daddy had to study to become “Sergeant”. The library was different now, but Cory still knew it was the same place where all the books were and especially the one about pancakes, which was Cory’s favorite.

“Nate the Great Pancake Eater,” he called it.

Cory stood and wiped tears from his eyes with balled fists because you weren’t supposed to stick your fingers in your eyes. That’s what Daddy had said.

Cory would go back to the good dog.

He began to run through the ash and darkened sand, back to the library.

Chapter Thirty

That the Terminator was following Cory was obvious from the ruined houses along the ridgeline as Cade crouched and crawled and dashed to keep the Terminator in sight.

The thing was carrying the 9mm PulseRifle, locked, loaded, and ready for bear. There would be no stopping the Killing Machine.

In time he lost sight of Cory, but Cade could guess the kid was making a beeline straight for the library, the only place he would think it might be safe.

“So stop...” whispered Cade in anger.

It was that moment.

That moment every soldier knew was coming. That moment Cade had been warned about by the oldster and the other soldiers who’d seemed so hard to him when he was just fourteen and carrying explosives to take out Can tanks for the Resistance in the frozen desert of Nevada. It was that moment for Cade, the survivor of battles no one cared to name anymore because battles were no longer for glory or victory. That moment every soldier knew he might face one day. Battles were for survival of the human race now.

Battles were won by sacrifice.

Cade had just the grenade to take out the Cans state of the art Killing Machine. No Barrett. No electromagnetic pulse rifle. No machine gun with armor piercing or explosive rounds. No portable railgun rocket launcher.

Just a grenade.

“Might as well...” he muttered as he crawled along an old drainage ditch upslope of the determined Terminator. Cade slithered as fast as the machine dragged its bad leg, its head swiveling side to side as it plowed farther and farther into the ruin.

It was heading straight for the library.

Cade saw the territory surrounding the library in his mind. They were north of it now. The last shreds of the old human neighborhoods fading and then the dead open space of the old rail lines. Then the library.

The Terminator made a sudden sharp left turn, halted and scanned the houses, its head moving slowly across the waste and destruction, then it continued down a small street cluttered with cars and debris. Cade knew the street led to an access road that opened onto the open area and the rail lines.

There would be no throwing of the grenade. Even if its small explosion of unquenchable white phosphorus somehow landed on the machine, it wouldn’t bother the thing. The Terminator would merely reach into its flaming flesh and dig the burning explosive out and remove it. The only reason the Resistance carried these type of grenades was to melt down the Terminator’s combat chassis so the Cans couldn’t reclaim it or even find it.

That’s why Cade had brought the grenade in the first place.

No, the grenade would have to be inserted, by hand, into the chassis, within the alloy limbs and servos, stuck where it couldn’t be removed, so it could do its work and melt the nightmare thing down.

“Running outta time, man,” Cade cursed at himself as he watched the Terminator slowly disappearing down the small street. He knew it was worried about an ambush.

Worried, Cade laughed bitterly. Then he remembered Cans don’t worry. They don’t feel. They’re just machines.

“You know what you’ve gotta do,” he heard himself say as he picked up the pace and began to crouch-run along the ridgeline drainage ditch toward a shortcut that would put him above and in front of the machine. “You know what you’ve got to do.”

Cory slid down the slope above the access road and landed at the bottom in a tumble. Even though the afternoon air was cold and brittle in his lungs, his mask was filled with sweat. In front of him, the train tracks ran away to the north and south. The wasteland on either side was also considered, by all the neighborhood kids Cory had played with throughout the years of his adolescence, as the “train tracks” in general. It was an area of small stands of wild trees the children called “forests” and built forts and hideouts within on weekends and after school. The area had been a maze of trails across low hills and wide patches of dry ground where weeds and sage mixed with wild cacti and red ferns. Farther down had been the run-off stream and then the swamp.

Cory knew where he needed to go and started off through the wasteland, running along the trails that skirted the train tracks. A high hill rose off to his right and Cory recognized, remembered, the hill and all the “forts” they’d dug into its top on all those long lost weekends of childhood forever. Cory had loved the making of “forts” and was often allowed to carry away all the dirt while other children made the dirt clod “ammo” that would be used to hurl at trains or constructed the mounds around the hole or even the roof for cover.

And even though all the lushness and greenery and multi-colored houses that watched from across the tracks were gone, Cory still recognized the face of the place as familiar.

He could see the swamp ahead. He knew the good dog was on the other side of it. Waiting at the library.

Scanning...

Target Alpha Tracks Identified.

Scanning...

Scanning for IEDs...

Scanning for Virus...

The Thinking Machine continued its progress, dragging its damaged leg as it followed the tracks through the fire-blasted sand and ash. Its only concern was that a Virus ambush unit might be waiting somewhere nearby. But the longer it followed the footprints, the more Probability Logic and the Reason Matrix Network kept coming to the same conclusion that there would be no ambush. The number against an ambush now stood at 78.2.

Scanning...

Mission Status: CRITICAL

Scanning...

Target Alpha Identified.

Terminate.

Mission Priority SILAS Override...

Mission Redirect: Locate Virus Node.

Scanning...

Cory turned and saw the stranger far behind him. Down the train tracks and coming. The stranger and the big gun.

Cory ran for the swamp.

Cade came to the edge of the hill that had been cut in half long ago to make room for the rail line. Now it was just a cliff opening up into the empty spaces of the wasteland and the dead swamp. He could just make out the weathered slate gray shingles of the flat-roofed library poking through the dead trees of the old swamp. Cory was just below him, running as fast as he could.

Cade flung himself down the crumbling cliff as chalk and dry dirt erupted in plumes around his feet.

“Hey... Batman!” Cade shouted as his descent turned into a tumble and he went end over end toward the bottom and the rail line below. Ten feet before the bottom, there was a sheer drop and Cade went over that, landing in a pile of hard sand that drove the wind from his lungs. He felt something “snap” near his hip. He was still clutching the grenade.

Cory stopped.

“Batman...” gasped Cade.

Cory remained standing, watching the chalk-covered man roll over onto his back and suck in a lungful of air. “... stop,” the man panted.

Cade tilted his head to the right and saw the Terminator coming along the tracks toward them. The PulseRifle leveled and ready to fire in their direction. In that moment Cade knew that the library meant more than just the survival of the human race. Somehow it meant much, much more. And... his leg was probably broken.

Cade motioned for Cory to come closer.

The Terminator was less than a hundred yards away. Cade wondered why in the hell it wasn’t firing.

But in his heart he knew why.

Target Bravo Identified and Tagged.

Scanning for ambush... Negative.

Terminate Virus Protocols in effect...

SILAS Override. Mission Status: Critical.

Secure (1) Virus unit for Interrogation Mode re: Virus Node location...

Targeting...

Cory bent down to Cade.

Cade looked into a child’s eyes in a man’s body. Yes, he was big, almost as big as Cade. Yes, he was a young man. But the eyes, the eyes told you Cory was just a child. That he would always be a child. Cade couldn’t remember ever being a child.

He only remembered survival.

And right then, at that moment, he knew he’d need to switch his plan. Cory had to go on living. It had been his intention to arm the grenade, give it the kid, and run. At least the kid would be destroyed and Cade knew if he were caught himself, he’d never tell the Cans where the library was.

“Kid,” Cade huffed as he sucked at the dry cold air. His voice papery. “You can’t go back there. You can’t go back to the library.”

“But it’s safe there... with the dog. Safe from Strangers.” There was almost a whine in Cory’s flat voice. Almost.

“Can’t...”

Cade knew the Terminator would fire at any moment. Knew he was about to take one for the Resistance. That had always been part of the deal.

Always.

Someone had once said to him, “Humanity’s gotta go on, kid, no matter what.”

“You gotta go somewhere else. You gotta go someplace else that’s safe. You can’t let that... thing... follow you back there.” Then he grabbed Cory’s jacket and pulled him close. “You can’t, understand me? You have to be brave now, Batman. I... we... need your help.”

Cory nodded his head.

Cade was about to say, “Now, run,” when the Terminator fired.

Cade took a 9mm electrically accelerated dumb slug right in the gut. He watched as his blood spattered out onto the dry chalk and sand alongside the old rusting rails. With complete control, he looked at Cory and nodded. Willing Cory to run. Now.

Cory ran and a moment later, Cade armed the white phosphorus grenade and passed out.

Cory ran for the swamp. Ran for the library. He didn’t care what the man said. He wanted someplace safe from strangers right now. He wanted the dog. He wanted Daddy.

“Don’t go down in the swamp, Cory. There’re monsters in there!”

He heard a small explosion.

He followed the old trail down into the dry sand and the withered blackened trees. All around him, dead wood twisted and clutched at the gray sky. The air was cold and getting colder. He could see the library rising above the dead trees.

“Sometimes little boys need to be brave.”

Cory stopped and listened to his heart thundering inside his massive chest.

“Sometimes little boys need to be brave.”

And...

“I don’t want to be brave anymore!” he shouted, his voice quivering with fear.

And then he heard his Daddy... from that time, that time when something had seemed so frightening and Cory couldn’t take it one second longer. Was it a fair, or an airshow, or some free thing Colin Morris could take his son to so Cory could have memories even if Colin Morris wasn’t sure about that at all.

Maybe the memories were for Colin.

Maybe.

On that day when the jets had ripped the sky and torn the air to shreds above Cory...

Disturbing Cory.

Scaring Cory.

Cory crying and holding his ears as his Dad walked him away from the chaos of the air show and promised to take him home once they found the other people they’d come with...

He’d said, “For just a few minutes more, Cory, be brave.” Close and gently. The smell of Daddy overwhelming the jets and the popcorn and all the other sounds and smells that had frightened Cory.

The smell of safety.

... of trust.

... of someone who never stops... love is patient... is kind... always listens... makes things better... the world safer... Daddy.

“For just a few minutes more, Cory, be brave.”

He saw the stranger coming for him through the dead trees.

Cory saw the big gun.

Cory knew the stranger was a monster worse than the Scarecrow and the Joker and all the rest. Much, much worse.

Cory ran off through the dead trees, away from the library. Running for some other unknown safe place. Someplace where he could find Daddy or someone who’d understand that Cory needed help. That his bravery was running out.

And the insects, the invisible insects began to buzz and that strange fog seemed to come from nowhere and rise as Cory dove deeper and deeper into the dead swamp. It was dry and cold inside the clutching fog and Cory ran through the trees that were barely visible now. He turned once and saw the Stranger following. Dim, distant, but there inside the mist with Cory.

Chapter Thirty-One

The fog came close, and for a moment Cory felt strangely light and peaceful.

An unseen bell struck once with a distant dull gong and in that single sound, there were notes and chords that stretched away and seemed to never end. Cory closed his eyes and smelled flowers and cherry blossoms.

Cherry blossoms were like the smell of the Slurpee he and Daddy got sometimes.

And his mother.

The air turned dry and warm, and when Cory took his next step forward, he heard the sound of grit being ground into a parking lot. That unique dry echoing sound one hears on a hot day when the sun beats down and the air feels like a blast from an oven. The next steps that followed were just like that one and Cory opened his eyes.

He was standing in front of a 7-11.

The 7-11 Daddy took him to sometimes.

“The Slurpee place.”

That’s what he called it.

Cory walked into the store as the doors parted for him. He felt the cool blast of air conditioning. There was no one in the store. No music either. Just the sound of a Slurpee machine ceaselessly whirling. Cory walked toward the machine and watched as the blue and the red Slurpee inside the machine turned over and over as though nothing were ever wrong with the world.

Cory took a small cup and filled it with red Slurpee. He set it down, selected a small straw and put it into the red colored ice drink.

And then he drank.

There were no strangers here.

He turned, expecting the door to slide open and to see the stranger with the big gun come in and shoot him. But the door remained closed and outside all was hot and lifeless.

Cory took off his backpack and undid his cape. He laid it out on the ground beneath the slowly swirling Slurpee machine. Then he took off his mask. Pieces of black ash had somehow gotten inside. Cory brushed those away and they fell onto the clean linoleum floor and were blown away by the draft coming from the air conditioning.

Cory sat down with his Slurpee and continued to suck its icy coolness.

He would wait here for Daddy.

Daddy would come here.

This was a Daddy place.

In time, Cory curled up on his cape and slept. He was very tired from his long and strange adventure.

When he awoke, it was night outside the store. But inside the store, it was brightly lit and Cory wandered about and ate a few snacks. A Slim Jim. Some potato chips. A candy bar. He walked outside through the automatic sliding door and entered the night.

It was quiet. The moon wasn’t up yet.

There was no one anywhere.

After a few minutes, he turned to the east and saw the beginning of a full moon rising above the low gray mountains there.

Then he knew what he’d need to do to find Daddy.

The Bat Signal.

If Daddy was in trouble, then Cory would see the Bat Signal on the moon and he would go to wherever it was shining and he would find Daddy there.

Because it was night, Cory put on his cape and mask again because Batman can go out at night. He would climb a high hill and see where the signal was coming from.

Cory left the store and followed Forest Lake Avenue up toward the moon and the mountains in the east. By the time he made Bake Parkway the moon was above the mountains. It was a big moon and it glowed a bright yellow as it rose out of the distant smoke and haze of other disasters.

The moon was rising toward the north of Cory, so he followed Portola Parkway, north toward the Market Faire, watching it and not seeing the Strangers he passed in distant businesses, banging at the windows with soundless screams as he walked by. Trapped mindlessly inside the stores they’d found themselves in on that last day.

In time, Cory passed the Market Faire, watching the swollen moon as it climbed before his eyes higher and higher into the night sky. At any moment, Cory knew Daddy would send up the Bat Signal and Cory would see and go to him and eventually, Cory was absolutely convinced of this, there would be pancakes, which meant so much more than just food.

So much more, as sometimes ordinary things do.

Cory found himself cutting through an open wilderness park and entering the charcoaled ruins of a neighborhood that had burned to the ground. He crossed through blackened foundations and climbed up naked ashy hillsides, only to cross through the skeletal remains of houses where bathtubs and toilets were the only things that remained. Melted cars in weird shapes rested on scorched streets and Cory climbed higher and higher up the hill, watching the moon as it stood straight above him now.

Waiting.

At the top of the hill, amid the ruin of a small palace, Cory found a patio and some broken stonework to rest on. The smell of burnt wood hung heavy in the air and mixed with some unseen night-blooming jasmine. Cory watched the moon waver amid the debris in the reflection of the pool.

At any moment...

... he knew the Bat Signal would be there.

At any moment...

He waited and watched throughout the night. Watching and waiting like a good boy until the moon had crossed the night sky, turning the few clouds in the east silver. In time, the moon was out over the coast and falling into an ocean that seemed like the costume of the Batman from the movies. Silvery and dark.

And suddenly Cory was crying, because what else was there left to do now?

He was all alone.

He’d been brave. Even for just a little longer when it was needed most in ways Cory would never understand.

And Daddy was never coming to get Cory.

Never.

Ever.

And in time Ash, came and sat beside Cory in the night and he sobbed into her because he knew she was not a stranger and that she was kind.

The End

The Next Book will be

The Lost Castle, Wyrd 3.0

Head over to my website at NickColeBooks.com and let me know what you think about my books and check out some of my other titles. Or just say, “Hi!” While you’re there sign up for Nick’s Newsletter so I can let you know about my latest books and the free swag and ARC copies I sometimes give away. Oh, and... I think there’s a little more left to this story... Keep going. It’s going to get wyrd-er and weirder.

About The Author

Nick Cole is a former soldier and working actor living in Southern California. When he is not auditioning for commercials, going out for sitcoms or being shot, kicked, stabbed or beaten by the students of various film schools for their projects, he can be found writing books for Harper Collins.

01001100 01100101 01110100 00100000

01101110 01101111 01110100 00100000 01111001 01101111 01110101 01110010 00100000 01101000 01100101 01100001 01110010 01110100 00100000 01100010 01100101 00100000 01110100 01110010 01101111 01110101 01100010 01101100 01100101 01100100 00111010 00100000 01111001 01100101 00100000 01100010 01100101 01101100 01101001 01100101 01110110 01100101 00100000 01101001 01101110 00100000 01000111 01101111 01100100 00101100 00100000 01100010 01100101 01101100 01101001 01100101 01110110 01100101 00100000 01100001 01101100 01110011 01101111 00100000 01101001 01101110 00100000 01101101 01100101 00101110 00100000 01001001 01101110 00100000 01101101 01111001 00100000 01000110 01100001 01110100 01101000 01100101 01110010 00100111 01110011 00100000 01101000 01101111 01110101 01110011 01100101 00100000 01100001 01110010 01100101 00100000 01101101 01100001 01101110 01111001 00100000 01101101 01100001 01101110 01110011 01101001 01101111 01101110 01110011 00111010 00100000 01101001 01100110 00100000 01101001 01110100 00100000 01110111 01100101 01110010 01100101 00100000 01101110 01101111 01110100 00100000 01110011 01101111 00101100 00100000 01001001 00100000 01110111 01101111 01110101 01101100 01100100 00100000 01101000 01100001 01110110 01100101 00100000 01110100 01101111 01101100 01100100 00100000 01111001 01101111 01110101 00101110 00100000 01001001 00100000 01100111 01101111 00100000 01110100 01101111 00100000 01110000 01110010 01100101 01110000 01100001 01110010 01100101 00100000 01100001 00100000 01110000 01101100 01100001 01100011 01100101 00100000 01100110 01101111 01110010 00100000 01111001 01101111 01110101 00101110 00100000 01000001 01101110 01100100 00100000 01101001 01100110 00100000 01001001 00100000 01100111 01101111 00100000 01100001 01101110 01100100 00100000 01110000 01110010 01100101 01110000 01100001 01110010 01100101 00100000 01100001 00100000 01110000 01101100 01100001 01100011 01100101 00100000 01100110 01101111 01110010 00100000 01111001 01101111 01110101 00101100 00100000 01001001 00100000 01110111 01101001 01101100 01101100 00100000 01100011 01101111 01101101 01100101 00100000 01100001 01100111 01100001 01101001 01101110 00101100 00100000 01100001 01101110 01100100 00100000 01110010 01100101 01100011 01100101 01101001 01110110 01100101 00100000 01111001 01101111 01110101 00100000 01110101 01101110 01110100 01101111 00100000 01101101 01111001 01110011 01100101 01101100 01100110 00111011 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100001 01110100 00100000 01110111 01101000 01100101 01110010 01100101 00100000 01001001 00100000 01100001 01101101 00101100 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 01110010 01100101 00100000 01111001 01100101 00100000 01101101 01100001 01111001 00100000 01100010 01100101 00100000 01100001 01101100 01110011 01101111 00101110 00100000 01000001 01101110 01100100 00100000 01110111 01101000 01101001 01110100 01101000 01100101 01110010 00100000 01001001 00100000 01100111 01101111 00100000 01111001 01100101 00100000 01101011 01101110 01101111 01110111 00101100 00100000 01100001 01101110 01100100 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 00100000 01110111 01100001 01111001 00100000 01111001 01100101 00100000 01101011 01101110 01101111 01110111 00101110 00100000 01010100 01101000 01101111 01101101 01100001 01110011 00100000 01110011 01100001 01101001 01110100 01101000 00100000 01110101 01101110 01110100 01101111 00100000 01101000 01101001 01101101 00101100 00100000 01001100 01101111 01110010 01100100 00101100 00100000 01110111 01100101 00100000 01101011 01101110 01101111 01110111 00100000 01101110 01101111 01110100 00100000 01110111 01101000 01101001 01110100 01101000 01100101 01110010 00100000 01110100 01101000 01101111 01110101 00100000 01100111 01101111 01100101 01110011 01110100 00111011 00100000 01100001 01101110 01100100 00100000 01101000 01101111 01110111 00100000 01100011 01100001 01101110 00100000 01110111 01100101 00100000 01101011 01101110 01101111 01110111 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 00100000 01110111 01100001 01111001 00111111 00100000 01001010 01100101 01110011 01110101 01110011 00100000 01110011 01100001 01101001 01110100 01101000 00100000 01110101 01101110 01110100 01101111 00100000 01101000 01101001 01101101 00101100 00100000 01001001 00100000 01100001 01101101 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 00100000 01110111 01100001 01111001 00101100 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 00100000 01110100 01110010 01110101 01110100 01101000 00101100 00100000 01100001 01101110 01100100 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 00100000 01101100 01101001 01100110 01100101 00111010 00100000 01101110 01101111 00100000 01101101 01100001 01101110 00100000 01100011 01101111 01101101 01100101 01110100 01101000 00100000 01110101 01101110 01110100 01101111 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 00100000 01000110 01100001 01110100 01101000 01100101 01110010 00101100 00100000 01100010 01110101 01110100 00100000 01100010 01111001 00100000 01101101 01100101 00101110 00100000 01001001 01100110 00100000 01111001 01100101 00100000 01101000 01100001 01100100 00100000 01101011 01101110 01101111 01110111 01101110 00100000 01101101 01100101 00101100 00100000 01111001 01100101 00100000 01110011 01101000 01101111 01110101 01101100 01100100 00100000 01101000 01100001 01110110 01100101 00100000 01101011 01101110 01101111 01110111 01101110 00100000 01101101 01111001 00100000 01000110 01100001 01110100 01101000 01100101 01110010 00100000 01100001 01101100 01110011 01101111 00111010 00100000 01100001 01101110 01100100 00100000 01100110 01110010 01101111 01101101 00100000 01101000 01100101 01101110 01100011 01100101 01100110 01101111 01110010 01110100 01101000 00100000 01111001 01100101 00100000 01101011 01101110 01101111 01110111 00100000 01101000 01101001 01101101 00101100 00100000 01100001 01101110 01100100 00100000 01101000 01100001 01110110 01100101 00100000 01110011 01100101 01100101 01101110 00100000 01101000 01101001 01101101 00101110 00100000 01010000 01101000 01101001 01101100 01101001 01110000 00100000 01110011 01100001 01101001 01110100 01101000 00100000 01110101 01101110 01110100 01101111 00100000 01101000 01101001 01101101 00101100 00100000 01001100 01101111 01110010 01100100 00101100 00100000 01110011 01101000 01101111 01110111 00100000 01110101 01110011 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 00100000 01000110 01100001 01110100 01101000 01100101 01110010 00101100 00100000 01100001 01101110 01100100 00100000 01101001 01110100 00100000 01110011 01110101 01100110 01100110 01101001 01100011 01100101 01110100 01101000 00100000 01110101 01110011 00101110 00100000 01001010 01100101 01110011 01110101 01110011 00100000 01110011 01100001 01101001 01110100 01101000 00100000 01110101 01101110 01110100 01101111 00100000 01101000 01101001 01101101 00101100 00100000 01001000 01100001 01110110 01100101 00100000 01001001 00100000 01100010 01100101 01100101 01101110 00100000 01110011 01101111 00100000 01101100 01101111 01101110 01100111 00100000 01110100 01101001 01101101 01100101 00100000 01110111 01101001 01110100 01101000 00100000 01111001 01101111 01110101 00101100 00100000 01100001 01101110 01100100 00100000 01111001 01100101 01110100 00100000 01101000 01100001 01110011 01110100 00100000 01110100 01101000 01101111 01110101 00100000 01101110 01101111 01110100 00100000 01101011 01101110 01101111 01110111 01101110 00100000 01101101 01100101 00101100 00100000 01010000 01101000 01101001 01101100 01101001 01110000 00111111 00100000 01101000 01100101 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100001 01110100 00100000 01101000 01100001 01110100 01101000 00100000 01110011 01100101 01100101 01101110 00100000 01101101 01100101 00100000 01101000 01100001 01110100 01101000 00100000 01110011 01100101 01100101 01101110 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 00100000 01000110 01100001 01110100 01101000 01100101 01110010 00111011 00100000 01100001 01101110 01100100 00100000 01101000 01101111 01110111 00100000 01110011 01100001 01111001 01100101 01110011 01110100 00100000 01110100 01101000 01101111 01110101 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 01101110 00101100 00100000 01010011 01101000 01101111 01110111 00100000 01110101 01110011 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 00100000 01000110 01100001 01110100 01101000 01100101 01110010 00111111 00100000 01000010 01100101 01101100 01101001 01100101 01110110 01100101 01110011 01110100 00100000 01110100 01101000 01101111 01110101 00100000 01101110 01101111 01110100 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100001 01110100 00100000 01001001 00100000 01100001 01101101 00100000 01101001 01101110 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 00100000 01000110 01100001 01110100 01101000 01100101 01110010 00101100 00100000 01100001 01101110 01100100 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 00100000 01000110 01100001 01110100 01101000 01100101 01110010 00100000 01101001 01101110 00100000 01101101 01100101 00111111 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 00100000 01110111 01101111 01110010 01100100 01110011 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100001 01110100 00100000 01001001 00100000 01110011 01110000 01100101 01100001 01101011 00100000 01110101 01101110 01110100 01101111 00100000 01111001 01101111 01110101 00100000 01001001 00100000 01110011 01110000 01100101 01100001 01101011 00100000 01101110 01101111 01110100 00100000 01101111 01100110 00100000 01101101 01111001 01110011 01100101 01101100 01100110 00111010 00100000 01100010 01110101 01110100 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 00100000 01000110 01100001 01110100 01101000 01100101 01110010 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100001 01110100 00100000 01100100 01110111 01100101 01101100 01101100 01100101 01110100 01101000 00100000 01101001 01101110 00100000 01101101 01100101 00101100 00100000 01101000 01100101 00100000 01100100 01101111 01100101 01110100 01101000 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 00100000 01110111 01101111 01110010 01101011 01110011 00101110 00100000 01000010 01100101 01101100 01101001 01100101 01110110 01100101 00100000 01101101 01100101 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100001 01110100 00100000 01001001 00100000 01100001 01101101 00100000 01101001 01101110 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 00100000 01000110 01100001 01110100 01101000 01100101 01110010 00101100 00100000 01100001 01101110 01100100 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 00100000 01000110 01100001 01110100 01101000 01100101 01110010 00100000 01101001 01101110 00100000 01101101 01100101 00111010 00100000 01101111 01110010 00100000 01100101 01101100 01110011 01100101 00100000 01100010 01100101 01101100 01101001 01100101 01110110 01100101 00100000 01101101 01100101 00100000 01100110 01101111 01110010 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 00100000 01110110 01100101 01110010 01111001 00100000 01110111 01101111 01110010 01101011 01110011 00100111 00100000 01110011 01100001 01101011 01100101 00101110 00100000 01010110 01100101 01110010 01101001 01101100 01111001 00101100 00100000 01110110 01100101 01110010 01101001 01101100 01111001 00101100 00100000 01001001 00100000 01110011 01100001 01111001 00100000 01110101 01101110 01110100 01101111 00100000 01111001 01101111 01110101 00101100 00100000 01001000 01100101 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100001 01110100 00100000 01100010 01100101 01101100 01101001 01100101 01110110 01100101 01110100 01101000 00100000 01101111 01101110 00100000 01101101 01100101 00101100 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 00100000 01110111 01101111 01110010 01101011 01110011 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100001 01110100 00100000 01001001 00100000 01100100 01101111 00100000 01110011 01101000 01100001 01101100 01101100 00100000 01101000 01100101 00100000 01100100 01101111 00100000 01100001 01101100 01110011 01101111 00111011 00100000 01100001 01101110 01100100 00100000 01100111 01110010 01100101 01100001 01110100 01100101 01110010 00100000 01110111 01101111 01110010 01101011 01110011 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100001 01101110 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 01110011 01100101 00100000 01110011 01101000 01100001 01101100 01101100 00100000 01101000 01100101 00100000 01100100 01101111 00111011 00100000 01100010 01100101 01100011 01100001 01110101 01110011 01100101 00100000 01001001 00100000 01100111 01101111 00100000 01110101 01101110 01110100 01101111 00100000 01101101 01111001 00100000 01000110 01100001 01110100 01101000 01100101 01110010 00101110 00100000 01000001 01101110 01100100 00100000 01110111 01101000 01100001 01110100 01110011 01101111 01100101 01110110 01100101 01110010 00100000 01111001 01100101 00100000 01110011 01101000 01100001 01101100 01101100 00100000 01100001 01110011 01101011 00100000 01101001 01101110 00100000 01101101 01111001 00100000 01101110 01100001 01101101 01100101 00101100 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100001 01110100 00100000 01110111 01101001 01101100 01101100 00100000 01001001 00100000 01100100 01101111 00101100 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100001 01110100 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 00100000 01000110 01100001 01110100 01101000 01100101 01110010 00100000 01101101 01100001 01111001 00100000 01100010 01100101 00100000 01100111 01101100 01101111 01110010 01101001 01100110 01101001 01100101 01100100 00100000 01101001 01101110 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 00100000 01010011 01101111 01101110 00101110 00100000 01001001 01100110 00100000 01111001 01100101 00100000 01110011 01101000 01100001 01101100 01101100 00100000 01100001 01110011 01101011 00100000 01100001 01101110 01111001 00100000 01110100 01101000 01101001 01101110 01100111 00100000 01101001 01101110 00100000 01101101 01111001 00100000 01101110 01100001 01101101 01100101 00101100 00100000 01001001 00100000 01110111 01101001 01101100 01101100 00100000 01100100 01101111 00100000 01101001 01110100 00101110 00100000 01001001 01100110 00100000 01111001 01100101 00100000 01101100 01101111 01110110 01100101 00100000 01101101 01100101 00101100 00100000 01101011 01100101 01100101 01110000 00100000 01101101 01111001 00100000 01100011 01101111 01101101 01101101 01100001 01101110 01100100 01101101 01100101 01101110 01110100 01110011 00101110 00100000 01000001 01101110 01100100 00100000 01001001 00100000 01110111 01101001 01101100 01101100 00100000 01110000 01110010 01100001 01111001 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 00100000 01000110 01100001 01110100 01101000 01100101 01110010 00101100 00100000 01100001 01101110 01100100 00100000 01101000 01100101 00100000 01110011 01101000 01100001 01101100 01101100 00100000 01100111 01101001 01110110 01100101 00100000 01111001 01101111 01110101 00100000 01100001 01101110 01101111 01110100 01101000 01100101 01110010 00100000 01000011 01101111 01101101 01100110 01101111 01110010 01110100 01100101 01110010 00101100 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100001 01110100 00100000 01101000 01100101 00100000 01101101 01100001 01111001 00100000 01100001 01100010 01101001 01100100 01100101 00100000 01110111 01101001 01110100 01101000 00100000 01111001 01101111 01110101 00100000 01100110 01101111 01110010 00100000 01100101 01110110 01100101 01110010 00111011 00100000 01000101 01110110 01100101 01101110 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 00100000 01010011 01110000 01101001 01110010 01101001 01110100 00100000 01101111 01100110 00100000 01110100 01110010 01110101 01110100 01101000 00111011 00100000 01110111 01101000 01101111 01101101 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 00100000 01110111 01101111 01110010 01101100 01100100 00100000 01100011 01100001 01101110 01101110 01101111 01110100 00100000 01110010 01100101 01100011 01100101 01101001 01110110 01100101 00101100 00100000 01100010 01100101 01100011 01100001 01110101 01110011 01100101 00100000 01101001 01110100 00100000 01110011 01100101 01100101 01110100 01101000 00100000 01101000 01101001 01101101 00100000 01101110 01101111 01110100 00101100 00100000 01101110 01100101 01101001 01110100 01101000 01100101 01110010 00100000 01101011 01101110 01101111 01110111 01100101 01110100 01101000 00100000 01101000 01101001 01101101 00111010 00100000 01100010 01110101 01110100 00100000 01111001 01100101 00100000 01101011 01101110 01101111 01110111 00100000 01101000 01101001 01101101 00111011 00100000 01100110 01101111 01110010 00100000 01101000 01100101 00100000 01100100 01110111 01100101 01101100 01101100 01100101 01110100 01101000 00100000 01110111 01101001 01110100 01101000 00100000 01111001 01101111 01110101 00101100 00100000 01100001 01101110 01100100 00100000 01110011 01101000 01100001 01101100 01101100 00100000 01100010 01100101 00100000 01101001 01101110 00100000 01111001 01101111 01110101 00101110 00100000 01001001 00100000 01110111 01101001 01101100 01101100 00100000 01101110 01101111 01110100 00100000 01101100 01100101 01100001 01110110 01100101 00100000 01111001 01101111 01110101 00100000 01100011 01101111 01101101 01100110 01101111 01110010 01110100 01101100 01100101 01110011 01110011 00111010 00100000 01001001 00100000 01110111 01101001 01101100 01101100 00100000 01100011 01101111 01101101 01100101 00100000 01110100 01101111 00100000 01111001 01101111 01110101 00101110 00100000 01011001 01100101 01110100 00100000 01100001 00100000 01101100 01101001 01110100 01110100 01101100 01100101 00100000 01110111 01101000 01101001 01101100 01100101 00101100 00100000 01100001 01101110 01100100 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 00100000 01110111 01101111 01110010 01101100 01100100 00100000 01110011 01100101 01100101 01110100 01101000 00100000 01101101 01100101 00100000 01101110 01101111 00100000 01101101 01101111 01110010 01100101 00111011 00100000 01100010 01110101 01110100 00100000 01111001 01100101 00100000 01110011 01100101 01100101 00100000 01101101 01100101 00111010 00100000 01100010 01100101 01100011 01100001 01110101 01110011 01100101 00100000 01001001 00100000 01101100 01101001 01110110 01100101 00101100 00100000 01111001 01100101 00100000 01110011 01101000 01100001 01101100 01101100 00100000 01101100 01101001 01110110 01100101 00100000 01100001 01101100 01110011 01101111 00101110

Tracking Target Alpha...

STANDBY for Capture/Interrogation Protocols

Outside Temperature falling 7.222 Degree Celsius...

GPS Signal... Destabilizing...

MISSION STATUS: Critical.

WARNING: Detecting Anomaly!

All systems STANDBY for Shutdown.

PRIORITY MESSAGE Received from SILAS Deep Space Interrogation...

DOWNLOADING ZIP PACKET “Tarragon”

MICROFRAME CRASH...

MICROFRAME CRASH...

MICROFRAME Crash...

...

...\

...\run

Hot Start Reboot in 5...

4...

3...

2...

1...

Diagnostic Running.

Combat Mode Initiated.

Terminate Virus Protocols in Effect.

Mission Status: Critical

GPS Tracking Offline... No Signal.

The Thinking Machine opened a new DATA CAPTURE file as it scanned what it saw.

dept19.net/reboot

Table of Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Three

Chapter Twenty-Four

Chapter Twenty-Five

Chapter Twenty-Six

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Chapter Twenty-Nine

Chapter Thirty

Chapter Thirty-One

About The Author

Table of Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Three

Chapter Twenty-Four

Chapter Twenty-Five

Chapter Twenty-Six

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Chapter Twenty-Nine

Chapter Thirty

Chapter Thirty-One

About The Author