Day 4 already? Woooooow

Megan wrung her hands, pressed her fingers against one another in intricate arrangements that looked outright painful. Maybe it was just a distraction. Zach’s hands rested at his sides on the ground, supporting him as his back arched and he blew out a sigh.

Don was the first to speak, hands clasped, resting between his legs.

“Norwalk, Jack?”

“Yeah.”

The younger man dipped his head, forcing himself not to cry.

“I think… I think we’re alone out here. I think it’s just us.”

“Bullshit.”

They turned to Zach. He had leaves balled up in his hand, dry and cracked between his clenched fingers.

“There’s a whole fucking country out there. No way they’re all gone.”

Megan was watching him intently, now. His bottom lip was shaking.

“Well… There’s no way! It’s just not possible! Who’d do it?”

The laughter startled them – a cruel sound that rung forth from Don’s throat.

“The Russians, the Chinese, Iraqis and Cubans, just to name the most obvious ones. You really so naïve you think they wouldn’t?”

“And are you so jaded you think it matters?”

Jack brought the conversation back down from a simmer. No… No, that wasn’t quite right. He’d redirected their fire, though, brought it back around to him.

“Whoever did it was willing to kill one of the most populated areas in all of Connecticut. No… Not just willing, they wanted us dead.

“It doesn’t fucking matter who did it. The point now is to live and find out how far they went. Then, maybe, we can worry about the who.”

They finished breakfast in absolute silence, a tension settling over the group that hadn’t been there before. Afterward, they set to work with their newfound tools, reassigning the generator to an electric chain saw and bringing down a few of the healthier trees. They split these and threw together basic, makeshift dwellings: enough to keep the rain out on a dreary night, and the heat in, but only a single room with just enough space for four sleeping bags. The outsides were paneled with scrap metal and concrete, both to keep radiation at bay and provide another shield against the elements. They slept in their hovels that night and, the next day, rose late with the intent of striking out into the surrounding area once more, seeking out other survivors and hints of civilization.

Jack made it as far as Bridgeport before his car crapped out, puttering to a stop by an uneven street corner on an uneven street next to an uneven series of buildings. Here, too, he could see the effects of the strike, the city a recently exhumed corpse lounging atop the land. He was too weary to be frustrated.

Outside his car, he strode down the street with a plastic gas can, large enough to hold a gallon of fuel, enough to get his car over to the station where he would be able to fill up. If there was one upside to the whole ordeal, he thought, it was definitely the free gas. It was a strange thought that came across him as he approached the BP, but he really missed the old Amoco stations. A minor complaint, sure, and British Petroleum was as good as any other petroleum provider, but something about the red and blue sign had always stuck in his mind. He was so lost in thought on this point that it wasn’t until the bang that he turned, just in time to see the bullet glance off the column at his side and take a chunk of the structure with it.

He ducked behind the stone cylinder – the gas can bounced as it clattered to the pavement and he withdrew his gun, fumbling with the safety. Flicking the switch after far too much effort, he peeked out from his cover and cast his gaze over the office, scanning for any sort of movement. Seconds turned to minutes that felt like hours; impatience was the legacy of his generation and he did it proud, stepping from behind the column with his gun ahead of him, sighting down the barrel as he moved slowly toward the station itself. As he reached the door and his fingers stretched out to meet it, a refrigerator crashed into the glass portal, shattered crystal bursting forth and crashing into him, slicing up his arms and lacerating his face as he fell back and dropped his gun, the weapon spinning as it slid off into the distance. He tried to open his eyes and stand, but the lids wouldn’t budge as long as there was glass in his lashes and, anyway, there was a weight on his chest and something cold and cylindrical on his forehead.

“Up!”

His eyes still wouldn’t open, but he stood anyway. Rough hands, large enough to circle his arm, spun him and pushed him forward. He stumbled in his blindness, but caught his weight and continued forward, only knowing that he was still outside. His captor did not speak, but he could hear the man breathing behind him, ragged, labored breaths from his recent exertion. He couldn’t be in particularly good shape, which might have mattered to Jack if he had actually seen the inside of a gym in his lifetime.

There was no way to track the time, until the temperature dropped suddenly and he knew it was night – he caught himself wondering if the others would worry about him, be up waiting for him or, come the morning, spread out in search of him. He was hungry and tired, each step taking more from him than the last, and he was almost ready to give up and fall when his captor stopped.

“Hold.”

Something struck the ground, resounding audibly in the still, post-apocalyptic night.

“Look.”

Jack rubbed his eyelids, grimacing as stray slivers of glass bit into his palms. With no further fear of being blinded permanently, he opened his eyes. What he saw took his breath away.
There must have been at least a dozen of them, all wearing rags. It hadn’t been half a week since the bombs had hit, but all pretense of civilization had fled.

No, that wasn’t true.

Just the trappings were gone. That was all he knew so far. Anything else, any other assumptions, would have to wait. Their skin was dark, soot and dust caked and solidified, cracked again with movement. Each possessed a gun – a rifle – and their shirts bore the various symbols of their respective gas stations. The gas attendants Gestapo? Maybe.

“Um…”

“Quiet.”

Jack shut his mouth and went back to looking around, just taking in the surroundings. There were columns of stacked cars – likely through sheer manpower, no cranes or other mechanical aids – describing a small square within which they had made their home, fire burning inside melted rubber rings.

“What business do you have here, in Bridgeport?”

He swallowed, considering his words carefully.

“I… Was searching for other survivors. I ran out of gas as I came off the highway. I just need a few gallons, enough to get back to Stamford.”

The collective murmured - a verbal crescendo encrypted not by language, but by volume in both senses. It was unclear as to what they were actually discussing, even by context, but Jack wasn’t entirely sure he wanted to know. After a few minutes had crawled by, they broke apart and the one who had co-opted him stepped over.

“Very well. You shall have your gasoline and then you will leave. You will not enter Bridgeport again without… A shrubbery!”

Jack stood slack-jawed.

“… Really?”

“Nah. Just carry a flashlight or a flag. Something to let us know you’re harmless.”

“Oh… Okay.”

They smiled and laughed, gave him a few cans full of gasoline and escorted him back to his car. For a few brief minutes, talking easily with fellow humans, others who’d found solace within hardship, he felt a glimmer of before, the time prior to the nuclear fallout. The gas fed his car’s voracious appetite enough to get it back to Stamford, where Zach, Megan and Don had already retired to their hovels, apparently unable to wait up for him any longer.

He would have been hurt, but he understood the uncertainty of the world they now lived in and was willing to cut them some slack, at least this time. His sheets were the most comfortable thing he’d felt all day, swirling around him as he twisted into a cloth cocoon and felt the soft embrace of sleep take him.

He awoke suddenly, a sharp pain in his side. Before he had even a moment to consider from whence it had come, a pointed toe dug into his side and rolled him over, spinning him from his sheets to face Megan, standing teary-eyed in his hovel. Her whites were pink with irritation and pronounced veins, lips quivering as salty tears ran past them and converged on her chin, dripping from there to the ground. He propped himself against the wall of his shack, unsure as to what she wanted, but knowing he didn’t want her to kick him again, arms out in protest.

“Asshole!”

The word stung, not because of what it was or any level of vitriol, but the lack thereof. It was backed by desperation.

“Why didn’t you wake us up? You could have at least told us you were all right!”

Jack coughed, more out of surprise than pain. He looked up at her and noticed her eyes for the first time. Aside from the red and the tears, within all that, were the hazel irises, shifting browns and greens in thin rings, slivers of color. He moved his gaze from them to her mouth, lip still quavering, and swallowed, closed his eyes and turned his head, then brought it back.

“I’m sorry. I guess I just… I didn’t think.”

She nodded, not so much in understanding as out of personal necessity.

“Fine, but next time you will think. There are few enough of us as it is.”

It was Jack’s turn to nod. She left, not satisfied, but momentarily appeased. Jack lay back against the wall and tipped back his head, reveling in the shock that ran through it as it struck.