AFTER (7 page)

Considering the decision he had to make, he prayed that they were on the beach of Gulf Shores, hundreds of miles away from Watkins Glen.

As he entered the room, he ignored the comfort of the bed and went to the generator in the corner instead. He cranked it with his one good hand until it roared into life. Then he went to the rolltop desk and powered up his computer. He waited until Windows came up, then retrieved the file he had downloaded several days ago. Most of the information was scientific gibberish to a simple man such as himself, but he knew he could decipher it if he put his mind to it. There was no
if
about it… he had to.

Of course, none of the information was worth a hill of beans without one crucial ingredient. Cradling his arm, Sam went to the opposite corner, where cleaning utensils leaned: a broom, mop, and dust pan. Hidden behind the common items was a very uncommon one. With some effort, he dragged the heavy lead canister from its concealment.

It was a souvenir from a train derailment that had happened five miles south of Watkins Glen in 1968. A couple of days afterward, Sam had been scavenging for junk amid the ruins, when he came upon the canister. He had taken it home, sanding away its bright yellow paint and the biohazard symbol on the side, then stuck it away, just a keepsake from a local disaster.

The following day, the countryside was swarming with FBI and Secret Service agents. They never found what they were searching for… but then they never looked in the back room of Sam's Fix-It Shop.
           

The canister could only be opened by a special tool manufactured by a government contractor of the U.S. Department of Defense. Sam had bought such a tool on eBay for $4.99, plus $2.50 shipping.

Sam wrestled the heavy lead cylinder onto the surface of his workbench, the pain in his neck and shoulder burning like pure hellfire. He went over, tilted the computer monitor his way, then sat on an old bar stool and went to work. Taking a deep breath, Sam used the tool and unlocked the top of the canister.

He wondered if he was wasting his time… if its contents were still potent. When he lifted the lid, he knew for a fact that they were.

Sam Wheeler thought of the New Satan and his plans for the folks of Watkins Glen. And he knew what he was doing was right.

Reaching inside, he dipped out a small handful of Armageddon.

Clarence "Pickpocket" Jefferson stepped out of the pet shop into the gloom of early dawn. It was only five o'clock; a good hour before sunrise. He thought he might take a run before scrounging up some breakfast, like he had done in the exercise yard of the federal prison he had spent the last few years in.

Yes, breakfast. He looked around at the human carnage around him, gory garbage left by the old man's automatic scattergun. He spotted a lean arm that had been torn away at the shoulder. Pickpocket's stomach growled. At first,
Rott's
dietary eccentricities had repulsed him. But lately he knew that adapting to more primitive fare was crucial for survival. Bicep bacon with a side order of grits and toast might not be so distasteful after all.

Pickpocket was about to take off down the street for the town park, when a sound drew his attention. A wet,
phlegmy
cough, followed by a loud wheezing.

He turned and found Sam Wheeler sitting in his customary spot… in the hardwood rocker in front of the fix-it shop. But he wasn't alone. In the chair next to him sat a stainless steel trash can. One that had dozens of red, blue, and yellow wires sprouting from drilled holes in its mirror-like body.

There was something about that altered trash can that bothered Pickpocket. He took a couple of curious steps into the middle of Maple Avenue and that bothersome feeling turned to cold, gut-wrenching fear.

"
Rott
!" he yelled. "
Rott
… you'd better get out here!"

A moment later, the big bald man with the Rottweiler tattoo on his chest ambled out, looking both sleepy and pissed off. "What the hell you doing waking me up so damn early, Pickpocket?"

"Look," he said, indicating the man in the rocking chair.

Sam Wheeler looked on the point of death. His left arm was in a makeshift sling. The hand peeping out of the end of the torn bed sheet was swollen and purple. But that wasn't what concerned
Rott
and Pickpocket the most. The elderly man was terribly sick. His face was ruddy and covered in weeping blisters and most of his hair had fallen out. He seemed weak to the point of collapsing. It was willpower and that alone that kept him upright in his rocker.

"What the shit's the matter with him?"
Rott
asked.

"I… I can't say for sure," said Pickpocket, "but it looks like some accelerated form of…"

"Of what?"

"Radiation poisoning." Pickpocket took a couple of steps backward.

"He… he couldn't have. He's just an old fix-it man."

Rott
ignored Pickpocket's mumblings. "Good morning, Pops.
Whatcha
got sitting next to you there?"

"Your doom," Sam simply said. He launched into a violent fit of coughing. A spray of bloody droplets and a couple of loose teeth showered the boards beneath his feet.

"
Rott
… that thing," Pickpocket said nervously, "I think it's a…"

"I know what it is," the murderer replied. He grinned, seemingly unconcerned. "And you built it just for me? Why, I'm genuinely touched. But what about your precious town?"

"It's already dead," Sam told him. "I might as well lay it to rest." The old man stared at him with bloodshot eyes. "Tell me something,
Rott
. Why didn't you head for Florida? Why did you head north… for Watkins Glen?"

Rott
laughed and raised a seven-fingered hand. "Like I said before, I never had a choice."

Sam revealed his own sevenfold deformity. "That never stopped me from trying to do the right thing."

"Then if it feels right, do it," challenged the man with the slavering dog on his chest. "That's what I always did."

"And society suffered for it. Well, they will suffer no more."

It was at that moment that Pickpocket noticed the device Sam held in his right hand: the press switch that was wired to the shiny silver trash can.

Rott
shook his head and grinned in admiration. "I misjudged you, old man," he told him. "But then I always did. Be sure to tell Jesus and Mama I said howdy."

"And you can tell the Devil to stay the hell where he belongs," Sam replied.

Rott
laughed loudly. "Too late. He's already staked his claim."

Sam smiled, displaying a mouthful of bleeding gums and missing teeth. "Not on this piece of property he ain't."

Pickpocket turned tail and ran. He ran as fast as he possible, knowing all the while that he could never run fast or far enough.

The two men, young and old, matched rocky-steady stares, their pale pupils mirroring one another.

"Goodbye, Papa."

"Goodbye, Boy."

Then Sam Wheeler pressed the red button on the hand switch.

The sun rose and set on Watkins Glen one last time that day… along with a sizable piece of the state of Alabama.

Phyllis Pfizer wasn't accustomed to being hungry… let alone subject to the throes of starvation.

The short, silver-haired New Englander in the filthy white pantsuit and scuffed Gucci shoes had dined in the finest restaurants the world had to offer. She had partaken of
Plat de
côte
de
Boeuf
in France,
Salmone
al
Forno
in Italy, and Roast Lamb
Meshoui
with couscous in distant Morocco. Not to mention the delicacies common in her own country: Maine lobster, braised bison steak, Southern-fried catfish, and
broasted
chicken served with young potatoes.

Just thinking about them caused Phyllis's stomach to cramp. She tried to direct her thoughts away from food in general, but that was practically impossible. After all, food was both her life and her livelihood.

Phyllis Pfizer was a culinary diva in the league of Paula
Deen
,
Emeril
Lagasse
, and the late Julia Child. She had her own show on Food Network, graced countless covers on grocery store magazine racks, and had two dozen bestselling cookbooks to her credit. Her expertise was the preparation and enjoyment of meat. On her TV program,
Meat is Life
, she expounded on the love and appreciation of beef, chicken, fish, pork, and veal. Each show – filmed high atop her picturesque lighthouse located on Maine's Casco Bay – was a celebration of meat not only as an entrée, but as a dietary necessity.

Phyllis's exuberance and unashamed promotion of the consumption of meat was a sore spot among the vegetarian community. Online petitions had been started to have Phyllis banned from television and the publishing industry, and she was #1 on PETA's "Most Wanted List." But, try as they may, her enemies were unable to sabotage her following among meat-lovers world-wide.

Part of her appeal was her culinary philosophy; that the consumption of meat was not only food for the stomach, but for the mind and soul as well. The human ingestion and digestion of flesh, be it from a fowl of the air, a fish of the sea, or a beast of the earth, was merely an extension of that life form's existence. It was a spiritual experience, bonding two of God's creatures together. Some thought her ideology to be pure bullshit, while others thought it was pure genius. Either way, it sold millions of cookbooks and her program was the most watched cooking show on television.

That was, until the Burn changed it all.

Now Phyllis Pfizer was nothing more than a frightened and exhausted woman lost in the wooded wilderness of southern Virginia.

During the moment the Burn began, Phyllis had been nearly eight hundred miles from home. She had been asleep in a hotel in Charlotte, North Carolina, resting up for a big Barnes & Noble signing for her latest cookbook,
Meat is Life: Beautiful Beef and Plentiful Pork.
One moment she was sound asleep, with her portable sound machine soothing her with the lapping waves of a rolling ocean tide. Then the next there was a frantic pounding on the door and she was being hustled down the hotel corridor, hastily dressed and pulling her rolling suitcase behind her. In the street, Phyllis found complete chaos. The street was choked with cars, horns blaring, people yelling and crying. Standing on the sidewalk, Phyllis felt as though she were in some country that had undergone a sudden political upheaval or a devastating natural disaster like an earthquake. The sound of broken glass shattered the night as looters broke into stores and made away with everything they could get their hands on: stereos, big-screen plasma TVs, and household appliances. Looking back it had been both funny and ironic, in a sad way, because twenty-four hours following the start of the Burn, 95% of the electricity in the United States was off… and stayed off.

By daybreak, she had found herself marching out of the city on foot with thousands of others. She tried to call her husband, Arthur, on her cell phone, but there was no service available and, two weeks later, she still couldn't get through to him. Phyllis feared what he might think about doing. Knowing Art, he had probably piled into his Land Rover with their golden retriever, Sandy, and headed south along the coast. The very thought of her husband on the road – especially with New York City and Washington D.C. being nothing but smoking black holes full of toxic soot and radiation – scared her to death. Art was a retired fisherman. He was as at home on the sea as Neptune himself. But on dry land he was a dismal landlubber, completely out of his element.

Phyllis tried to get her mind off her husband and surveyed her surroundings. Over the past fourteen days, she had walked the length of North Carolina, keeping to isolated terrain. Several encounters with unsavory individuals – including attempted rape and robbery – made her hesitant about taking the main roads. Thinking it was better to avoid as many people as possible, she headed across rural farmland and dense forest, Maine and the lighthouse on the bay foremost in her mind. Now, due to her lack of expertise in the wild, Phyllis was terribly lost.

She found herself struggling up a wooded hill somewhere between Lynchburg and Richmond, weak and out of breath. If she reached the top, maybe she could spot a town in a valley below. She was so hungry, Phyllis was willing to risk harm – or worse – to find a bite or two of food. She had seen plenty of berries on her long trek through the timber, but she was hesitant about eating them. During the past few days, the vegetation had begun to wilt and turn yellow. Phyllis wondered if it was the radiation from the Burn causing it to happen and if the fruit the plants bore might now be poisonous.

She was climbing a steep grade, when she spotted a gray squirrel at the base of an oak tree just ahead. It startled her, for she hadn't seen very many creatures in the forest lately, only a few birds or a rabbit or two.

Phyllis paused and stood there silently. She watched as the animal with the bushy gray tail dug at the ground amid the roots of the tree. Her stomach grumbled so loudly that she was afraid it might scare the squirrel off, but apparently the animal didn't notice.