Final Chaos: A Post-Apocalyptic EMP Survival Thriller (Surviving Book 1) Read online

  He remembered back when he’d worked at that movie theatre. He’d done his best with the crowd. He’d tried to stay calm.

  But in the end, he’d lost his cool. He’d told them all to shut up, and that they’d get their money back, and that it wasn’t his fault at all. He’d kicked a door so hard that he’d bruised his toe.

  And that’d been the last day he’d worked at the movie theatre. The last hour, actually. They’d fired him on the spot, probably to make a show for the customers.

  Rob tried taking a step forward, but people were all around the Subaru now.

  He just wanted to get inside the house.

  Jim might need his help.

  But there were a dozen people surrounding him now. And in the crowd, he recognized the man that Jim had threatened with his gun.

  A big, burly man was blocking Rob’s path, standing right in front of him.

  Someone else was trying to open the back door, but it was locked.

  “He’s kidnapped her, probably.”

  “What a monster.”

  “Someone call the police.”

  “The phones don’t work, remember?”

  “Listen,” said Rob. “It’s not what you think. She was biking in the middle of the road, and Jim didn’t see her in time… There was a cop, but Jim realized that the only way to get her to the hospital was to take her ourselves.”

  “Then why aren’t you at the hospital?”

  “It’s a long story,” said Rob. “If you’ll just let me explain.”

  “He’s lying!”

  “We’ve got to get this woman out of there!”

  The crowd was growing rowdier. It sent a chill down Rob’s back.

  This was more intense than at the movie theatre.

  Anger was starting to appear in their eyes.

  These were, or had been, normal people.

  All it took was one stressor, one minor crisis, and people started to lose their cool.

  Rob knew he was going to have to do something. He reached behind him, hit the automatic door lock, and slammed closed the passenger side door.

  Jim had the keys. This way the crowd wouldn’t be able to do anything to the car.

  Rob was a big guy.

  He made his move, pushing his way through, moving suddenly and swiftly.

  For a tense moment, it seemed like they weren’t going to let him through. A hand grasped his arm.

  But he made it, and he didn’t waste any time. He ran across the flat yard, straight to the door.

  He swung the storm door open wildly and reached for the door handle.

  He turned it, but it was locked.

  With a closed fist, he pounded on the door.

  “Jim!” he called out. “Open up! We’ve got trouble.”

  He didn’t dare turn around. Somehow, it was easier not knowing whether the crowd was coming after him. Or whether they were doing something to the car.

  “Jim!” he called out, pounding on the door as loud as he could.

  8

  Jim

  “What have you done?” cried Judy in a high-pitched voice.

  Tim lay on the floor. Blood stained his shirt. His head was tilted to the sky. His mouth was open and his eyes were lifeless and open. His hand still clutched the knife.

  Jim said nothing. His heart was pounding. His body was filled with adrenaline.

  He’d never shot anyone before. He’d never even brandished his revolver until today. He’d gone to shoot at the range, and that was about it. Sure, he’d been hunting once or twice, but that was different.

  He’d never even hit the birds he’d been aiming at.

  The revolver was still in his hand.

  He put it back in its holster and rose slowly to his feet.

  His back felt stiff, and there was pain in his lower back from falling onto the hardwood floor.

  Judy had moved to the opposite corner of the room. She cowered there, her body shaking. She stared at Jim with an expression of intense fear, as if she didn’t recognize him.

  There was a phone there on the wall, and she grabbed it, clutching it.

  Her fingers frantically moved across the buttons.

  “It doesn’t work,” said Jim, speaking calmly. “Look, Judy, I was defending myself. And you. You saw it. He attacked me with a knife. He was trying to steal your provisions. That’s as good as killing you. Now, where’s Aly?”

  Jim felt himself coming back down from the intensity of the shooting. And his mind turned immediately to his wife.

  “Aly!” he called out, pointing his mouth in the direction of the stairs. “Aly! It’s me, Jim!”

  If Aly was upstairs, wouldn’t she have heard the gunshot?

  Maybe she was upstairs, terrified.

  “Aly! It’s OK! You can come down.”

  “She’s not here,” said Judy, her voice shaking.

  “What do you mean she’s not here?”

  Judy just shook her head. Her fingers were again moving across the buttons of the phone.

  “I always knew you were no good,” she said. “But I never thought you’d come to this. Shooting a poor boy like that… It was just some cans and water… It wasn’t like he was trying to take my jewelry.”

  “Your jewelry!” said Jim, raising his voice. “This is more serious. Don’t you realize what’s going on?”

  It was a dumb question. Obviously she didn’t realize what was going on. She was still trying to contact the police.

  There was a loud knock at the door.

  Jim ignored it.

  But the knock continued.

  “Jim!” It was Rob’s voice.

  Jim crossed the distance to the door rapidly and threw the door open.

  Rob rushed in, his face sweaty, looking worried and frantic.

  “There’s a whole lot of people out there, and they’re all starting to get…” But his voice trailed off as his eyes fell on the body on the floor.

  “Self defense,” said Jim, simply.

  Rob didn’t seem to know what to say, so he did what he often did, which was ignore the situation and plow on ahead.

  “The people outside,” he continued, breathlessly. “They’ve surrounded the car. I don’t know what they’re going to do. They think we kidnapped the woman in the back of the car.”

  With the mention of a woman in the car, the terror on Judy’s face doubled. She audibly gasped, and clutched the phone even harder. Her eyes darted between Jim and Rob, and her body looked frozen, petrified.

  Jim said nothing for a moment. His mind was racing.

  There was no time to waste.

  And he needed to find his wife.

  “Judy,” said Jim, speaking in as calm of a voice as he could muster. “This was self defense. He was coming at me with a knife. And we did not kidnap anyone. We’re trying to take her to the hospital. The phones are all down and this is a very serious situation. I’m trying to find Aly so that I can help her. Can you tell me where she is?”

  Jim stared at Judy and waited. Something seemed to be happening with her, as if she was struggling between two choices. Clearly, she didn’t want to believe reality. She didn’t want to admit to herself what was happening. She wanted to stay in the safe confines of how she’d always believed the world really was.

  The room itself had never seemed so bleak. Blood from the corpse was starting to leak onto the hardwood floor, and there was a stench that meant Tim had evacuated his bowels.

  “I thought she was with you,” said Judy, in a voice so quiet Jim barely heard her.

  “She’s not with me,” said Jim. “Do you know where she might be?”

  There was no point in yelling at her or demanding that she tell him. She either would or she wouldn’t.

  Jim found himself involuntarily holding his breath.

  Rob’s ragged out-of-breath breathing seemed to fill up the otherwise quiet room.

  “He said she was arrested last night,” said Judy, gesturing to the corpse.

  “Arreste
d?” said Jim.

  Judy nodded.

  What in the world would she have been arrested for?

  But Jim knew it didn’t matter.

  He didn’t have any other leads on where she might be. The only other places he could check would be her work, and possibly a friend’s house. But those were unlikely.

  “You’re sure that he said she’d been arrested?”

  Judy nodded again.

  Jim couldn’t think of any reason that Tim would have wanted to make something like that up.

  And stranger things had happened.

  “OK,” said Jim. “We’re headed to the police station. Let’s go.”

  He stared at Judy.

  She didn’t move.

  “Come on,” he said. “You’re coming with us.”

  She shook her head, with the rest of her body frozen.

  “Judy,” said Jim. “Things are going to get really bad really quickly. With the power out, and no communication, people are going to start panicking. We need to get out of Pittsford and out of the entire area. Somewhere where we can ride this out.”

  But she wasn’t budging. And just continued to shake her head.

  What should he do?

  Part of him wanted to just grab Judy and take her in the car.

  But who knew, really, if where he was headed was any safer than her house.

  And it wasn’t his style to take people places against their will. No matter what the circumstances.

  Once he got Aly, he’d have to come back. Surely her own daughter would be able to convince Judy to leave.

  “We’ll be back,” said Jim. “I’m going to find your daughter.”

  Judy said nothing.

  “Come on, Rob.”

  He’d come back for Judy. And for the supplies.

  He took one last look at the body on the floor before walking through the front door.

  A crowd had gathered around the Subaru wagon in the driveway. Their heads turned as Jim and Rob appeared on the front steps.

  “There he is!”

  One member of the crowd didn’t turn her head. She was busy smashing a rock into the back rear window of the Subaru. Apparently she was trying to break the window.

  “They think we kidnapped that woman,” whispered Rob.

  They had to get out of there. And fast.

  Jim didn’t like the idea of Aly stuck in a holding cell at the local police station.

  He’d do what he had to do.

  Once again, Jim drew his revolver.

  He pointed it towards the sky.

  He had no intention of shooting anyone else.

  Not right now.

  But he could use it as a threat.

  The crowd fell silent when they saw the gun.

  “Back away from the car,” shouted Jim, in a loud, commanding voice.

  9

  Aly

  It felt like hours had passed. In the darkness she felt like she was losing her sense of time.

  Her watch wasn’t working.

  The only thing to count the passing of time, the only signal from the outside world, were the shouts of the deranged man locked up in the cage near her.

  His shouting was ceaseless, intense, and insane. And it all startled her to the bone.

  Sure, he’d remain quiet for a couple minutes here and there. Just long enough until she thought he was finally done.

  Then he’d scream again, and she’d feel the cold chill working its way up her back.

  “You regret me, but I won’t forget you and all those of you who have wrong me, locked me up, chained me, and left me to die and fight in nothing but darkness!”

  Aly had remained completely silent. She didn’t want to antagonize him further. She didn’t want to make herself a target.

  She kept telling herself that, behind bars, there was nothing he could do to her. He could scream all he wanted, but they were just words. Nothing but words.

  Soon enough, the lights would come back on.

  Soon enough, the police and other staff would return. They’d release her. Maybe she’d pay a fine and apologize. Maybe she’d have to do community service.

  And life would go back to normal.

  Suddenly, there was a sound off in the distance.

  Was it a door opening?

  She pressed her face close to the bars, trying to see if she could see a glimpse of light anywhere.

  But there was nothing.

  No light.

  But there were noises.

  In the silence, she heard footsteps and whispers.

  Who was there?

  If it was the police, why would they be whispering?

  Had someone broken into the station?

  “Aly?” called out a voice.

  She froze for a moment. How did they know her name?

  Then she recognized the voice and felt silly and stupid.

  It was her husband. How could she not have known it was him?

  “Jim?” she called out, just to make sure.

  “Aly!”

  “Thieves and braggarts! Rogues and swine coming to plunder in the days of the aftermath!” The crazy man’s scream erupted like a volcano of sound through the quiet.

  “What the hell was that?”

  A narrow beam of light appeared in the hallway. It must have been a flashlight.

  And Jim was on the other end of it.

  “Aly?”

  “I’m here, Jim.”

  The flashlight beam found her face, and she went momentarily blind from the intensity of the light. She closed her eyes hard.

  When she opened them, the beam was shining on Jim’s face. It looked eerie in the cold white light. The angles of his face were sharper than normal.

  But it was Jim. Her husband.

  And she’d never been so glad to see him.

  For the moment, she forgot all their problems. All their arguments. All the stress.

  Her heart leapt.

  “It’s OK, Aly,” said Jim, his voice deep and calm. “We’re going to get you out of here.”

  “Out of here? What are you talking about?”

  “I’m going to find the key and get you out. We’re getting out of the whole Rochester area.”

  Aly felt her heart starting to pound. Anxiety was taking over. The initial relief of seeing her husband instantly vanished.

  “You’re talking about breaking me out of jail? Have you gone crazy?”

  “No. But the world’s about to,” said Jim.

  “Listen,” said another voice. She recognized it as Rob’s. “I thought he was nuts too. But I think he’s right. The power’s out everywhere. Across the whole city. Phones don’t work. People are starting to lose it.”

  “You can’t break me out of jail, Jim,” said Aly, starting to use the voice that she’d used during their long arguments. “This is so like you. You don’t think things through. Look at you with that idiotic business. You jumped right in and now you’re paying the consequences. Don’t you realize what the consequences would be for breaking me out of jail? I don’t know what’s going on with the power, but I’m sure it’ll come back on.”

  “It might come back on,” said Jim. “But not for a long time. What do you think is going to happen without the shipping systems? There isn’t going to be food. Or city water.”

  “I’m sure it’s just here.”

  “There was something with the sun,” said Rob.

  “It’s all over,” said Jim. “At least as far as we know. Across the whole US. Probably the whole world. There’s no help coming in from anywhere. And we’ve got to get out of here and go somewhere where we can ride out the chaos that’s about to erupt. Rob, come on, we’ve got to find the keys.”

  “No!” said Aly.

  But it was too late.

  She watched the flashlight beam traveling down the hallway as her husband and his deadbeat friend went to look for the key.

  She tried to reason with herself. First of all, they wouldn’t be able to find the key. T
hey didn’t just leave jail cell keys lying around. And even if they did, she was sure she wouldn’t be counted as an accessory to any crime. She had no priors of any sort.

  Surely a reasonable judge would see what happened. He’d see that she’d been kidnapped against her will.

  “Archbishops recant and bow before the will of the great Lord of Darkness!” came the deafening scream of the crazed man. “Vague consultation with criminals can’t commence without complete consent!”

  “What the hell was that?” came Rob’s voice, drifting down from some other section of the station.

  Then the station fell silent again.

  And she waited in the darkness, worrying about what her husband was going to do.

  As soon as she could arrange it, he’d soon be her ex-husband.

  She couldn’t support this sort of behavior any longer. He’d always been impulsive, but when they’d gotten married, it’d been a sexy, interesting trait. She’d liked that he was a take-charge sort of man who didn’t back down. Now, it was tiresome. She had to live with the consequences of his decisions day in and day out. To survive in the modern world, a man couldn’t be totally a man. And Jim didn’t get that. And he never would.

  In a way, it as if Jim wasn’t made for this modern world. He would have done well in the old West, in the gun slinging times, if those weren’t just a modern creation by the film industry.

  He would have done well as a caveman. He would have been able to turn on that semi-savage survival instinct. He would have been able to do what was necessary.

  But now, in the modern world, he couldn’t accept that he was just a cog in the machine. He couldn’t make that mental leap that was required by the modern man.

  He always wanted to do things his own way. He always wanted to do what made sense to him, even if it clashed with the way things were supposed to be done.

  Aly took a couple deep breaths and concentrated on exhaling slowly. She felt herself start to calm down a little.

  There was nothing she could do.

  She’d just have to go along with it.

  Let Jim take her in the car.

  She’d be able to explain everything later to the police, to the judge, to her lawyer, and whoever was involved.