Dark Days of the After (Prequel): The Last Light of Day Read online

  Seeing this side of Harper for the first time was dizzying. Until today, he’d never seen her smile, laugh or yell. He hadn’t seen her fight, or kill or even show something like resolve. If she was the leader of the Resistance, how could she be so…normal?

  To her statement about the homeless, he said, “It’s all fun and games ‘til they’re shot dead and left to rot as a message to everyone else.”

  It wasn’t uncommon for the Communist police to run a firing squad then wait three or four days before cleaning up the bodies. By then the blowflies had come and gone, and the dogs and rats had gotten to them, gobbling down what chunks of meat they could. It was the worst of all their lessons because everyone got to see it.

  Past Florida St. was another canopy of dead trees, their branches barren but imposing nonetheless. They were in a run of city blocks dedicated to commercial real estate.

  This was a dangerous road they were on.

  In the beginning of the overt occupation, entire squads of Chicom police seized failing businesses to use as their private headquarters. That’s all 24th had become: commercial real estate. Pastel colored buildings with peeling and flaked off paint, faded awnings, dirty glass storefronts hidden behind the kind of iron bars you put on your entrances and first floor windows to keep the riffraff out.

  A lot of those bars had been pried off, some of them still half-attached, just twisted and pulled, like someone hooked a chain to the gate and their bumper but failed to tear them down completely.

  “This is depressing even at night,” he heard himself say.

  They crossed Bryant Street and ran right into a police checkpoint. Lights flashed on either side of them, paralyzing them. Logan couldn’t catch his breath. Harper’s mouth was a sudden flood of expletives.

  She pulled the Jeep to a stop and said, “Just be cool, let me do the talking.” She unbuttoned her shirt down to the underwire base of her bra and spread the fabric a bit.

  “Unbelievable,” he muttered as spotlights filled the cabin of the Jeep. He shielded his eyes and that’s when their doors were ripped open and guns were shoved in their faces.

  “It’s past curfew!” one of them barked.

  He hated that sound. The yelling. It was like that right before they shot you. It was like that every single time. He turned and looked at his guy who was looking past him to Harper. She was neither a treat nor an offense to the eye, but part of her being a bit overweight was that her breasts were big enough to catch the eye of any straight man. These people made it clear they hated white people, but boobs were boobs and Harper was smart enough to know it.

  “Pull them out,” Harper’s guy said.

  He jammed the nearest breast with his pistol, then flicked the barrel like they needed to come out ten seconds ago. She reached up, started to undo those last few buttons. The man beside Logan stood rapt, that look on his face like he was about to see something special.

  Logan covertly glanced up at the drooping barrel of the pistol. It was no longer pressed against his temple. His finger wasn’t even on the trigger anymore as much as it rested on the trigger guard.

  Twitching fast and hard, Logan’s hand shot up, ripping the pistol from his captor’s grip. He shot the pervert harassing Harper. But a hand grabbed the back of his collar, yanking him back. The other hand was reaching for the stolen gun. Logan drove his elbow into his captor’s throat, the crunch of his Adam’s apple telling the tale of this man’s fate.

  The Chicom soldier folded forward, reaching for his neck, eyes bulging, gagging. Logan tucked the gun under the man’s chin and fired. His head jumped, but then he flopped down dead in Logan’s lap.

  Knowing what was coming and having just been drenched in Pete’s blood, he didn’t want anymore blood on him. It was there, though. He could feel it all over his face, hand and arm. He lifted the policeman off him, shoved him out of the car. Shutting the door, cursing under his breath, he tried wiping himself off.

  Harper put the Jeep in gear and got the hell out of there.

  “Stop!” he shouted.

  She jammed on the brakes, killed the lights, then turned to him and said, “What?”

  Logan jumped out of the Jeep, jogged back to the crime scene, then gathered up their guns and checked both their person and their outposts for spare mags or loose rounds.

  He got two more mags, a box of 9mm rounds and a walkie-talkie. When he returned to the Jeep, he did so with a triumphant smile.

  “We have guns,” he said.

  Yesterday he was just a pale tech snitch, wasting away in his chair in a dark closet watching a woman he’d rather not watch do things he’d rather not be responsible for. Now he’d killed four men and was fleeing the state with a woman who may or may not be the actual head of the American Resistance to a place he didn’t know with barely a plan and enemies everywhere.

  He handed her a pistol, then stowed the two mags and the loose rounds in the center console.

  “Big brass balls,” she said with a grin.

  He turned on the stolen walkie-talkie to make sure it worked.

  It did.

  “Too loud,” she said, starting the Jeep. He lowered the volume, but remained on the same frequency.

  When they took off, they cruised slowly through more commercial blocks, seeing once brightly painted urban scenes now as faded masterpieces of a time when artistic expression didn’t earn you a dirt nap or a funeral pyre.

  Half of the urban landscape from there to the freeway was painted a drab gray, everything uniform, all of it so lifeless you wanted to kill yourself rather than see one more depressing sight.

  “Do they really want to erase every last ounce of our culture?” he asked.

  “You already know the answer to that.”

  They drove past York, by more dead trees and Hampshire, and then after a short jog, they reached the wide open sprawl of Potrero Avenue.

  “This is crazy,” he said, sweating, smelling like blood, sweat and nerves. “They could be anywhere.”

  “I know.”

  “It has been quiet though,” he said. “I guess there’s that.”

  With the headlights off, they crept down Potrero, quiet as they moved past a checkpoint without guards, and long rows of homes painted only gray.

  “I can’t wait to get out of this place,” she hissed. “Oh, thank God.”

  “What?”

  “Up there,” she pointed.

  There were the faded green overhead signs indicating the freeway entrance. This was just after 25th.

  “No, no, no!” she screamed, hitting the steering wheel.

  “Keep going,” he said.

  Up ahead, four men were blocking the freeway entrance, two of them smoking, one looking casual, another with his weapon out.

  “Kill everyone if needed,” she said, sounding nervous.

  He didn’t want to add anymore guilt to his plate, but this was scary. He was already trying to process everything else, let alone survive the night.

  “I know,” he said, sounding pissed.

  It was the nerves. He didn’t know what was next and he was halfway to crapping himself. The only thing that was keeping him from completely losing it was his training. Krav Maga taught him to stay calm in the midst of the storm. It taught him that when the moment was right, he was to become the storm.

  Harper pulled up to the four men, one of the guys being an America who’d turned his back on his country to serve with the Chicom forces.

  “You’re out past curfew,” he said, looking between them.

  He lifted a flashlight, bathed her face in the glow. Logan saw blood spatter on her from the guy he’d just shot, the one wanting the strip show. The light then flicked on him. He knew for certain he was a bloody mess.

  “This should be interesting,” he said low. “Out with it.”

  “We’re trying to get to the hospital. Someone set a grenade off in our building and my best friend, his girlfriend, was rushed off to the hospital by…a friend.”

&n
bsp; “State sanctioned?” he asked, studying her expression.

  “Not exactly,” she answered.

  He straightened up. “But you’re worried?”

  “We are,” Logan said.

  Looking at them both, he said, “There’s no hospital that way.”

  “We’re not going to Portola,” Harper said.

  Logan slid his gun on his lap, aimed it at the policeman as covertly as possible. Skylar had hers at her side.

  The freeway gatekeeper holstered his gun, then waved at one of the guys behind him. He moved his car out of the way. Harper put the Jeep in gear, but the guard said, “Wait a second.”

  From his utility belt, he took out a small sticker, pressed it into the upper corner of the windshield.

  “What’s that for?” Harper asked.

  “Gets you through the checkpoints no questions asked,” he said with a wink.

  “Thank you,” Logan and Harper said together.

  “Whatever it is you two are up to,” he leaned in and whispered, “good luck.”

  This stopped Harper.

  “Thanks,” she said, finally showing some expression. He tipped his hat and they pulled onto the 101.

  For a moment Logan wondered if he could use that sticker to get back, taking either the Golden Gate Bridge or the Bay Bridge. He didn’t want to try, though. People in the city said that was bottlenecked and people were routinely shot there for no reason at all. Maybe it was too hot outside, maybe the guard was tired, maybe he didn’t like the way you were frowning, or how you looked. The point was, there was no due process, no court of law, no First Amendment speech, so if one of these Commie pukes wanted to shoot you, on a bridge or in the street, they just did.

  Best to take the long way, he thought.

  “Do you think it’s true what they say about the highways?” Logan asked.

  “We’ll soon find out,” she said.

  “Why do you think he let us through?”

  “Maybe he’s like me, like us.”

  Rumor had it, only the Chinese military and the police had access to the highways. Arrests weren’t made but in the cities.

  He hoped that was the case.

  True to the rumor, on Hwy 5 just outside of Red Bluff, they passed a huge convoy of military metal. Tanks, jeeps, what looked like small Howitzers. They were on flatbeds being transported north. Unfortunately, they also took up most of the road.

  Harper passed the convoy, looking straight ahead and hoping they didn’t come after them, but the line of vehicles were so damn long no one dared break formation to see about a civilian Jeep.

  With each mammoth rig, Logan’s dread deepened.

  Finally he said, “How the hell are we supposed to fight all of this? These people are preparing for a world war!”

  He looked at Harper and through the light of the dashboard, she appeared wan, perhaps having the same thoughts. It was like every last drop of blood had drained out of her face and she was just a cold, bloodless victim.

  Shaking her head, taking it all in, she said, “I don’t know, but we’ll have to find a way.”

  When they passed the last vehicle, there was a lead jeep. Logan was in the driver’s seat. He waved casually as they passed, which didn’t amount to much at night, but apparently it was enough to satisfy the driver.

  Logan picked up speed and no one took chase.

  At the Oregon border near the peak of Siskiyou Summit, there was a small checkpoint with two guards. Harper was now in the passenger’s seat and the guard shack was on the right side, which was a generous shoulder on the slope of the summit.

  One of the guards yawned, causing Logan to do the same. “Be cool,” he told Harper, who was just waking up.

  One of the guards walked around the front of the Jeep, saw the sticker on the windshield and said, “Did you see the convoy?”

  “Yeah, a few hours ago,” Harper said over Logan.

  He nodded, then signaled the man in the guard shack. He nodded in return, then the mechanical arm blocking the road lifted and they drove through.

  “Boy, that was easy,” Logan said.

  “It’s not far from here,” Harper said on a deep yawn. “We’ll be there by sunset.”

  Without further incident, they skirted the small town at the base of the hill only to arrive at the address Skylar had given them and not have a way in. There was a mailbox, but no road leading up to the property.

  “Looks like we’re taking the heel/toe express,” Logan said.

  “The house could be anywhere on the hundred acres,” she said, clearly flummoxed and dead tired. With the sun coming up, she could see him now. She wiped a sleep booger out of her eye and said, “You look like hell, by the way.”

  He looked down at his arms, at his shirt. There was blood everywhere. It was all across the front of his pants, too. They looked around the front of the brush lining the entire property, tried to see through it or over it, but there was no clear road in. Finally the foliage started to move and that’s when they froze, hands on their stolen pistols, not sure what to do.

  A head popped out, a blonde woman and her shotgun.

  “Names,” she said.

  “Logan Cahill,” he said.

  “And I’m Harper Whitaker. We’re friends of Skylar.”

  The blonde lady stepped out of the brush, lowered the shotgun then turned and said, “Get out of the Jeep!”

  They did. A German Shepherd pup slinked out into the street with them. “This is Cooper,” she said without an ounce of expression. “Cooper, go sniff their balls.”

  “He’s going to be disappointed with me if he’s after nuts,” Harper warned.

  “I’m Stephani,” she said, walking up to them and extending a hand. They both shook her hand even as Cooper was sniffing them out. “You look like a pair of used tampons.”

  “I feel like one,” Harper said.

  “Logan looks like he blocked most of the flow,” Stephani said with a snicker.

  Harper looked at Logan, both of them exchanging looks. Logan shrugged his head, a grin on his face. That’s when Harper broke into a soft chuckle. Pretty soon they were all laughing. Logan, however, was thinking he was in the Twilight Zone. They drove all this way to be accused of wearing menses?

  “For real?” Harper finally said, her eyes shiny in the morning light. “That’s how you want to meet us?”

  “Mostly I work with bees,” she said. “Maybe that makes me awkward, but I hear you two are tech nerds. I figured you’d have a twisted sense of humor.”

  “He does look like a crime scene,” Harper said, pushing Cooper’s face out of her crotch. The German Shepherd pup put it back, gave a growl, nuzzled in there.

  “You on your period?” Stephani asked.

  “Maybe.”

  “He smells it,” she said.

  “Well it’s rude to keep digging in there,” she said, shoving the dog’s face away harder the second time.

  “Cooper!” Stephani said. “Bad dog! Get over here!” She slapped her hands together and the dog came running.

  “I’m Skylar’s cousin,” she said.

  “She told us,” Logan replied, readjusting himself where Cooper nasally assaulted his business before moving on to Harper.

  Stephani went to the brush, pulled it aside and said, “Take the double tracks up to the house. You’ll see them just up the ridge. It’ll be bumpy, but the drive should shake your spines back into line.”

  “We appreciate it,” Logan said, crawling back in the Jeep and hating every minute of it. He just wanted to sleep.

  Chapter Nine

  The second Logan met Connor and Orbey Madigan, he knew he was going to like them. The more they tended to him and Harper, the more he wondered where in the world Skylar came from. Orbey was Skylar’s mother’s sister, a woman who came to life the second she saw them (“Let me get you something to eat, you must be starved!”). Before they had even gotten into their chairs, Orbey had porridge in bowls in front of them.

&n
bsp; “Don’t mind her,” Connor said, gruff. “The woman is nothing if not the consummate hostess. And since it’s rare that we get company, having you both here is a real treat.”

  “For all of us,” Stephani said, scratching Cooper’s ears. The dog sat there, obedient, its observant eyes studying the interaction, happy to be in the midst of so much activity.

  “Skylar said you had a barn we should stay in,” Harper said.

  “Oh hush with that barn business,” Orbey said, her hands waving about, her expression one of disbelief. “You’ll stay here with us through the modifications.”

  “I think I’ll be heading back,” Logan said, “so it’ll just be Harper staying.”

  Harper looked at him. Was she hoping that he was going to change his mind and stay?

  “It’s not safe,” she told him.

  “For them,” he replied.

  This was the point where he should grin, just to put a stamp on his flexed masculinity, but the truth was, he was just as scared about going back home as he was in staying there with Harper. So he did not grin, he only ate his Irish oatmeal slowly, chewing every last ounce of flavor out of each and every bite.

  “Something wrong with the food?” Orbey asked, concerned.

  “It’s not like food from back home. This is real, full of flavor. I can’t wait to get to the next bite, but the closer I am to hitting the bottom of the bowl, the more I’m starting to panic.”

  “So that’s a compliment?” she asked. The lovely older woman smiled, her warmth radiating, her Scottish-Irish accent like a smooth drink of bourbon after an exceptionally long day.

  “It’s the mother of all compliments,” he said with a smile.

  “There’s more for both of you, if you’d like.”

  “After we see the barn,” Logan said, “I’d like to get some sleep. I need to get back on the road as soon as possible.”

  “I’ll take you to the barn,” Stephani offered.

  “You’re the beekeeper,” Harper said, as if Skylar had mentioned her before. “I’ve heard good things about you.”

  “People underestimate honey and a dry sense of humor.”

  “Your sense of humor is Death Valley dry,” Logan said. “But in a good way, I think.”