2020: Emergency Exit (3 page)

Minor car wrecks were scattered throughout town—their lifeless passengers still trapped inside—ghostly faces pressed up against the windows, bodies slumped over steering wheels. More bodies were lying in the streets, with others on the sidewalks. Every last one had their mouth wide open, life apparently choked right out of them. Many were clutching their own throats, the whites of their eyes transformed into a dark dried-blood shade of red. Only Jenna was brave enough to approach and touch one of them, feeling for a pulse, but finding none. She reported their skin as leathery and cracked along the vein lines—like old clay—varyingly dark brown and gray, with spongy bruises everywhere. It was a haunting scene, and vomit-inducing for many of us. We couldn’t help it. So much death, so much shock…so much, so much. It was too much. Given the limited amount of people in the open—and that every business but the gas station and a few coffee shops had their doors closed—it definitely seemed to have happened at night. And it seemed to have happened quite suddenly.
But when? What day?

I had enough wits about me to step inside a coffee shop and grab a newspaper off the rack. It was from Monday.
Could this really have happened five or six days ago without us knowing anything about it?
There were no signs of electricity anywhere. We found no evidence of any other life around town, other than a single sickly crow. No other human survivors.
This didn’t make any sense!
There was no other destruction, no other sounds, no one passing through. Whatever had killed everyone was either invisible or gone.

Stephen King couldn’t have made it more horrific. We didn’t know what to think. Our best guess was that it had to be a chemical reaction of some sort, but accidental or intentional, we didn’t know. If it were an attack, we hadn’t seen or heard any signs of it. Then again, our cabin was a remote twenty-five miles away on a heavily wooded lake. Danny claimed he’d heard a few distant airplanes the previous morning, but nothing else. Right now, it felt like we were the last ones living in the End Times, which was equally frightening since we all thought we were Christians. If that were the case, then either God didn’t exist, or He had left us behind. No, in all likelihood, this had nothing to do with the end of the world.

The date on the newspaper suggested it had happened sometime Monday or perhaps Tuesday at the latest. We’d been at the cabin for nearly a full week, four days longer than expected, having been surprised by the boys showing up for Hayley’s tournament. They had a few extra days before they left for their first Special Ops assignment, and we figured we’d all spend it together. Hayley should have been in school and Jenna and Kate back at college, but we didn’t know when any of us might see the boys again. It was a legitimate enough excuse for everyone to play hooky from his or her responsibilities for a few days.

But how could we not have known anything about this until now?
That question kept nagging at me.
Wouldn’t we have heard about it from someone, somehow?
The only people who had left were my parents’ friends, and they had been heading home to Wisconsin. We hadn’t been expecting them to return, so we thought nothing of it when they didn’t. But they didn’t call us either.
Were they dead now too?
I shivered suddenly. As I’d been living at the cabin for years, and everyone had brought some supplies up with them, we had no reason to go into town. Call it dumb luck or whatever, but we had no idea what was going on. We had no idea what we’d missed.

As soon as we returned to the cabin from Ely, we all tried calling various people with our phones. The only cell tower for 50 miles was less than half a mile from us, but even that convenience did nothing for us now. No one answered. We turned on the computer to check our satellite Internet for further information, but it was also down. We didn’t know what we should do next. Mom put out some snacks, but no one ate. Half of us just sat around stunned, and the rest of us were asking questions no one could answer. Eventually, we all settled into a zombie-like stupor around the fireplace.
Was there even anyone else out there? There had to be!

Dad turned on the high frequency shortwave radio Danny had given me a year ago and scanned all the channels for any sound of human operations. There was no music, no conversations, nothing but static, nothing at all. He, Danny, and Cameron took turns scanning the dial throughout the night and into the morning. Finally, at 4 a.m. on the dot, on the first notch of the AM dial, Dad heard a deliberate static pattern and called for Danny and Cameron. The rest of us crawled from our sleeping bags and beds and gathered around them. Dad suspected it was military code and hoped the boys might understand it. It was, and they did. Mom handed Cameron a notepad and pen as the choppy static ended. Fifteen seconds later it started again. Danny decoded, and Cameron wrote the message out.

Run (stop) You not safe (stop) Get to Hawaii (stop) Tuesday attacked (stop) United States Canada both (stop) Chemical bombs (stop) Every city (stop) Every town (stop) No US forces (stop) No electricity (stop) Comm grid theirs (stop) Army coming (stop) Kill all Americans (stop) No hoax (stop) Save yourself (stop) Tracking you (stop) THIRST tech (stop) Leave now (stop) Trust none (stop) Run (stop)

We had the timeframe right. That was no surprise. The rest of the message, however, was nothing less than stunning. After breaking the entire message down, Danny explained THIRST technology as military grade (Thermal High-frequency Imagery Radar Sonar Technology) systems that could track any form of warm blooded movement anywhere from a yard to fifty miles, dependent on the power of the individual box. It wasn’t yet hand portable but could operate from any military vehicle or aircraft. The enemy would be able to track our movements, no matter where we were, if they were close enough. We would be at an incredible disadvantage against it, but he did know of a few ways to misdirect and/or limit it.

The coded message played through a few more times—always the same—and then it never came back on that frequency. We all sat silent around the table, listening to it repeat each time, hoping for something more, or for something different. It never changed. Only when it stopped did anyone react.

Jenna started crying. Then Mom. Then me, and I don’t even know why. Everyone I loved was right here. Kate and Hayley were huddled together, perhaps praying. I couldn’t be sure. Cameron and Danny were talking to Dad, and although I could hear them just fine, none of their words made sense. It was like a stun grenade had gone off in my head. My ears were ringing, and the room was blurry. Everyone seemed to grasp why we couldn’t reach any other family members or friends. There may not have been anyone else out there. If the message were as honest as we feared, anyone who had survived had to just be as lucky as we were.
Or as unlucky
.

 At some point I must have needed air because I walked outside barefoot, in shorts and a T-shirt, and didn’t even notice the cold. I trudged up the small hill to the bench by Sophie’s headstone overlooking the lake. I closed my eyes, put my head in my hands, and started a one-sided conference call with Sophie and God. Hayley came out a short while later and brought me my jacket. She stayed with me for a few minutes and then led me back inside. I couldn’t even tell you what was said. I just poured my heart out.

I felt better walking back into the cabin even though nothing had changed. I joined Danny and Dad at the table where they were still discussing the radio message, specifically its origin. Dad said it could have been next door or a thousand miles away. He figured someone with military experience was floating the message randomly around state by state, or region by region, hoping to help whatever survivors were still out there, but not make it too obvious. Using static was clever, but at some point the enemy was going to catch on. The messenger was, after all, using an international code. The enemy would know survivors were heading towards Hawaii. They could just sit on the West Coast and wait. But the message seemed to indicate the army would be on the move, coming from everywhere, to anywhere Americans might be. It wasn’t enough to cripple us with the chemicals. They wanted to wipe us out completely.
Why didn’t our military fight back? Or did they and it didn’t matter?
The message had emphasized we had no forces left. Maybe they were caught with their pants down like everyone else in America. If the decimation we’d seen on a small scale in Ely was what it was like nationwide—which we figured was likely the case—it wouldn’t take much to finish the country off now. In our case, it didn’t make sense to sit and wait for what might happen. We had the same chance of dying, stay or go, so we might as well go. And go now. One problem—I didn’t want to. I didn’t want to lose Sophie again.

THREE: “Last Supper”

I couldn’t imagine going back to sleep. Didn’t seem anyone else could either.  Everywhere I looked someone was busy doing something to distract from the elephant in the room. The problem was, the more we talked and thought about the many challenges we were facing, the more elephants seemed to occupy the room. The more elephants the more stress. The more stress, the shorter the nerves. Eventually there were too many elephants in the room.

“I can’t just leave,” a male voice said loudly, snapping me out of my own haze. “And I don’t understand how you can expect me to.”

It was Cameron and he was talking to Danny. Jenna and Kate were standing by them, looking back and forth between their faces.

“It’s not about that,” Danny replied. “Jeez. Don’t you get it?”

“Get what? We don’t know for sure this is real. We don’t know everyone else is dead. Just because our phones don’t work doesn’t mean anything,” Cameron retorted.

“Come on, Cam. Don’t be stupid,” Danny said, and I saw him roll his eyes.

Apparently Cameron noticed it too, and he definitely objected to Danny’s choice of words. “Oh, so I’m being stupid?” His voice got louder.

“Boys,” my dad called out to them across the room.

Cameron ignored him. “You’re willing to just jet off and assume my family is dead. What if it were your family? Oh, that’s right…but it’s not. And you wouldn’t even care if it was your dad. But what if it were Hayley?”

Ouch! That was a low blow
. I looked to Danny to see if he’d protest, and he did immediately.

“Hey!” Danny was riled up now and took a step towards Cameron. Cameron didn’t back down. Kate quickly stepped between them, and Jenna grabbed Cameron’s arm, but he shrugged her off. “I would care if it was my dad. I do care that it is your family. And I definitely would love to go down and get them.”

Cameron shook his head and laughed. Danny pointed his finger at him. “But I would understand that I don’t have a choice. I can’t risk everyone’s life by taking us all down there—”

“It’s not your call, dumbass,” Cameron fired back. “Who the hell put you in charge?”

“Boys!” Dad yelled louder, getting up from his chair and approaching them.

“Tell him, Kate. Tell him what you told me. Tell him you agree with me,” Cameron urged.

Danny was looking at Kate now. Kate glanced up at him but then looked away. “What’s he talking about?” Danny asked her.

“Nothing,” she replied quietly. “He’s not speaking for me.”

Dad was between the boys now. “Right,” Cameron muttered, shaking his head and turning away. “She’s just afraid to say it to your face. Just as much of a coward as you are.” Cameron headed towards a door leading out of the room. “Shit!” he yelled in anger, and shoved a stack of pans off the counter. As they crashed to the floor everyone jumped.

Jenna scurried to help Mom pick them up. “Sorry,” she said.

“It’s okay,” Mom replied. “Go make sure he’s okay. I can get this.” Jenna apologized again, tears pouring down her face, then stood and ran out of the room after Cameron. The rest of us were stunned.

“Kate?” Danny asked quietly, trying to see into her eyes and taking one of her hands. “What was that all about?”

She took a deep breath and looked at all of us before answering. “Cameron asked me if he was the only one who thought we needed to go down and check on our families. I told him I thought we should too. That’s what he’s talking about.” Danny sighed, but Kate wasn’t done. “Danny, of course I’d say that.” She grabbed his arm. “I don’t want to leave them.”

Hayley entered the conversation then. “We know you don’t, Kate. None of us do. Look, with everything your mom…with everything Jackie has done for me, I’m right there with you in wanting to go check on her. She’s my mom too.” Hayley had taken Kate’s other hand. I couldn’t see Kate’s face, but I saw her pull her hand away from Hayley’s and wipe her eyes. Kate’s head bobbed up and down a few times, and Hayley kept talking. “But I also heard the message and saw the town. The message said it was like this everywhere. Just like this. Can you imagine?” Danny was nodding his agreement. “You think Danny wouldn’t try to save Jackie if he thought there was any chance he could? You know he would.”

She was right, and Kate knew it. We all did. Hayley’s voice got louder as she directed her next sentence at Cameron in the other room. “You think Danny wouldn’t risk his life to save Cameron’s parents too? Seriously?”

I couldn’t remember the last time I’d seen Hayley angry. Dad had heard enough. “Okay. Everyone get back in here.” Jenna pulled Cameron back in at Dad’s command. “I don’t think anyone…anyone…should fault Danny for trying to take charge of this mess. As far as I’ve seen he hasn’t bossed anyone around, nor has he made any decisions that any of us should legitimately find fault with.” Dad took a deep breath. “Look, this is a mess…a horrible, horrible mess. I’ve never seen anything like this. Never dreamed of anything like this. But it’s all we know. As I see it we have two choices.” He held up one finger. “One, we can believe the message—that it’s like this everywhere—and there’s only one way to survive. Or…” He held up a second finger. “Two, we can ignore it.” He looked around at all of us. “Every one of you was in town. We all saw the same thing. At least here, the message was right. And wherever it was coming from, it clearly wasn’t making any of that up. So…do you think it was lying about everything else? If you do…if you honestly do…then what can I say? What can any of us say to convince you otherwise? If that’s the case then by all means, go! Heck, I’ll even go with you.”