Primal Shift: Volume 1 (A Post Apocalyptic Thriller) Read online

  The fear was still tingling in his belly when Finn noticed the set of headlights coming up behind him.

  Dana Hatfield

  Bernal Heights, CA

  Jeffereys was stumbling toward her now, scowling. His steps were awkward and unsteady, and it was clear that he’d stood up too fast, and all the alcohol had gone straight to his head. He reached her a second later and stretched out a hand to cup Dana’s breast, a slightly glazed and leering look on his face. She was going to enjoy this was what that look said. He didn’t see the fork Dana was clutching until it was too late. In one swift motion, she sank the tin spokes into the top of Jeffereys’ hand, causing his eyes to bulge with shock and his mouth to crane opened in a whelp of pain.

  Dana rose and punched Jeffereys square in the face. He stumbled back three feet, tripping over the coffee table behind him and knocking his head against the sofa arm rest. His body went limp. The hand with the fork protruding from the top of it slumped to the floor beside him.

  Out in the back yard, Dana could hear Head-banger and Goatee smoking cigarettes and laughing their asses off at some stupid joke. She took a second to search Jeffereys but couldn’t find a weapon. He was starting to moan and stir, as though he were coming to. Dana sprinted to the bathroom, grabbed her Coast Guard uniform and boots that she’d folded and left on top of the toilet seat cover and tore from the house.

  It was dark outside, the only source of illumination coming from the full moon and the strange lights that were still dancing in the sky above her. The streets were deathly quiet. The faint echo from Goatee and Head-banger’s ridiculous conversation told her they still didn’t know she was gone.

  She ducked into a shadow between two houses and quickly changed. Punching Jeffereys in the face and knocking him on his ass had nearly been a religious experience. If he thought she was going to just roll over and do as she was told, then he had another thing coming. Dana was struggling to get her boots on when she remembered all those women tied up in the basement. Slaves, Jeffereys had called them. At least one had already died and more were sure to follow. But without a weapon, there wasn’t much she could do.

  Would you have been able to kill those men in cold blood, even to save those women?

  Frankly, she didn’t know the answer to that question. It was one thing to imagine doing it and another thing altogether to pull a trigger and know that you’ve just killed a man. Maybe that was why she’d let Alvarez live.

  Once dressed, Dana knew there wasn’t any time to lose. She needed to get to the Nissan she’d parked nearby and then to the MLB, all while evading capture from Jeffereys and his men.

  She was running through the street, trying to get her bearings in the dark. If it hadn’t been for the full moon, she wouldn’t have been able to see five feet in front of her.

  Then she heard shouting in the distance. They were voices she knew, and they were angry.

  Fear ratcheted through her body, quickening her already pounding heart. Before all this, they might only have raped her; now, after sticking a fork in Jeffereys’ hand and knocking him out, they’d undoubtedly torture and kill her.

  Holly Park was on her left, so she knew her house was only a few blocks away, the Nissan Cube she used to get here not far beyond that.

  A pair of high beams rounded the corner behind her, and Dana ran up the stairs of a nearby house, crouching inside a covered entrance. A waist-high wall led up the stairs and faced onto the opposite street. As long as the car continued straight ahead, she would remain out of sight.

  The white Chevy pickup truck rolled by slowly. Beams from handheld flashlights flickered over her position.

  A bang from inside the house startled her. Someone was fiddling with the doorknob, trying to open up. On the street, the pickup pulled to a stop, and Dana heard one of the men say, “You guys hear that?”

  Please, oh please, don’t make another sound.

  Seconds ticked by like hours.

  The pickup rolled on and out of sight.

  Dana breathed a sigh of relief. Then came another noise at the door behind her. She turned and saw a man, maybe 20 years old, red hair, 5 o’clock shadow, staring back at her with sunken eyes. It was hard to tell by looking at him whether he was all there or not.

  “Those men are after me,” she said.

  Red Hair tilted his head.

  He didn’t understand. “Thanks for keeping quiet. You speak English?”

  His expression didn’t change. He could hear her, that much was clear, but like most everybody else, he didn’t have a clue what she was saying.

  She waved goodbye anyway, and much to her surprise, he returned the gesture. Dana crept down the stairs and back into the street, surprised and thankful that he hadn’t attacked her. Maybe not all of them were animals.

  She found the Nissan in less than five minutes. When she’d first picked it up, the car was already low on gas. She could only pray there was still enough in the tank to get her back to Pier 42. She’d left the keys dangling in the ignition, since in a world practically devoid of people there wasn’t much chance of anyone stealing your wheels. She slid into the driver’s seat and started the engine. She would need the headlights to see where she was going, but that also meant Jeffereys might spot her a mile away. Speed would be the key.

  Dana had just turned onto Cesar Chavez, heading south, back toward Pier 42 and the MLB that was docked there, when those same high beams came up behind her. A shot rang out. They were only a dozen car lengths behind and catching up quickly. Dana clutched the steering wheel and punched the gas pedal, weaving between abandoned cars. She came to a school bus tipped onto its side, blocking the road and she jumped the curb, bouncing in the seat as she struggled to keep control. An accident now would mean certain death.

  The white pickup truck roared behind her and caught up quickly. When it pulled up alongside her, all Dana could see was Head-banger, standing in the back with a shotgun, aiming it right at her. She slammed the brakes, kicking up a high squeal and a cloud of burned rubber.

  She threw the Nissan into reverse and flung her arm around the passenger headrest as she backed the car up. The pickup, however, was faster and far better suited to off-roading than her Nissan Cube. It took only a few moments for the white truck to catch up. They’d spun around on squealing tires and were barreling toward her at full speed. Dana’s gas light was on, probably had been since she started the car, and now she was growing more and more certain she didn’t have a chance. She leaned into the brake and prepared to kick it back into drive, when she heard the shotgun rack outside her window. It was Head-banger. She was too late, and he shouted for her to get the fuck out of the car or else he was going to blow her head off.

  He repeated the request, and when she didn’t move, he smashed the driver’s side window with the stock of his shotgun. Glass sprayed her face, and her hands rose up to shield her eyes.

  Head-banger’s one free hand was reaching in a second later, grabbing Dana’s left forearm.

  “I thought I told you to get outta the fucking car!” he bellowed. “Can’t wait to see the look your face when you hear what Jeffereys has got planned for you.”

  Carole Cartright

  Salt Lake City, UT

  For 30 minutes, Carole and Nikki battled through high winds that lashed against the SUV as they tried to make their way home. Nikki was curled into a ball on the passenger seat, weeping. She had been through so much in such a short time. Escaping the fiery maw of a crashed plane only to end up in an airport filled with homicidal maniacs, not to mention that bastard who’d tried forcing himself on her. But Nikki wasn’t the only one scarred by what she’d seen and more importantly, what she’d done. Hawaiian Shirt, Mechanic’s Overalls, and then the pilot and his girlfriend on the leash. Maybe not all of them were dead, but Carole had taken at least one life, and that wasn’t right, no matter how you sliced it, even if it had been to protect her family.

  And what choice did you have, Carole? Should you have stood by
and let them rape her? Or maybe if you’d tried to reason with them ...

  “We’d both be dead,” she said out loud, only half aware she was talking to herself. She looked down at her hands on the steering wheel. They were shaking. She felt cold, and it wasn’t just because of the large T-shirt she was wearing. The one she’d fished out of the dead man’s suitcase in the parking lot, after her own had been torn nearly to shreds.

  “Who’s dead?” Nikki asked, her eyes looking like she’d gone three rounds against a middleweight.

  Carole put a hand on her daughter’s knee. “Oh, no one. I was just talking to myself.”

  Nikki looked down and saw how unsteady Carole’s hand was and put her own on top of it. Carole glanced over, smiling, but suddenly slammed the brakes.

  Nikki flew forward until her seatbelt went taught.

  “Ouch, my neck.”

  Carole’s attention was still locked outside the passenger window. Across the street was Sprucewood Elementary School. The one both Aiden and Nikki had attended when they were younger. An old-fashioned, three-story, red brick building, covered in newly broken windows. But it wasn’t the damage done by the earthquake, nor the western wing, where part of the roof had collapsed, that had caught Carole’s attention. It was the small child staring out at her from the entrance window. From her vantage point, his red, white, and blue T-shirt was barely visible, although she knew well enough why he was wearing it. The school had started a tradition of inviting students and parents for a day of sports in the gym on July the Fourth, followed by hot dogs and fireworks on the football field. Carole, Jim, and the kids had gone to a few in past years. A yearly ritual started for some of the poorer kids in the neighborhood, by the wonderful and bigbellied principal, Samuel Hen.

  And now Carole realized, in horror, that at least some of those children had been at Sprucewood when everything in the world had been turned upside down.

  “What do you see?” Nikki asked, frightened.

  The flag rippled stiffly in the wind. The gale outside was still heavy, but nowhere near as dangerous as it had been at the airport.

  “There’s a child in there,” Carole said.

  Nikki pointed around her. “I’m sure there are kids all over. Aren’t we supposed to be looking for ... ” She paused, snapping her fingers in frustration.

  “Aiden. Your brother. Yes, you’re right.”

  A handful of abandoned cars had turned off the road in front of the school, their driver’s side doors left ajar. Carole took her foot off the brake and began rolling past them. A final glance back at Sprucewood revealed that the child’s face had disappeared. Carole stopped again, yanked the keys out, undid her seatbelt, and opened the door. The idea of leaving a helpless child all alone was just more than she could bear.

  “Stay in the car,” she shouted.

  Nikki shot up in her seat. “Please, tell me you’re not going in there.”

  I’ve already got too much blood on my hands for you to understand.

  The thought was still crystallizing in her mind, but Carole knew, even before it was fully formed, that there was no need to explain. It wouldn’t have made any difference anyway, would it? And not only on account of Nikki’s age. Her daughter was still breathing largely because of the lives Carole had snuffed out back at the airport. She had been the one to assume that heavy burden, regardless of the circumstances that put them in this position in the first place. If you take a life, you save a life. That’s what she believed. It was the only thing that made any sense in this new chaos. If bringing this child to safety in Uintah could help bring her even one step closer to paying that debt, then it would be well worth the detour.

  Carole was across the street, stuffing the keys into her pocket, when she heard the car door slam. Nikki came running to her side.

  This wasn’t going to take more than a few minutes. Find the kid, take a moment to gain his trust, and determine how badly he’d been affected by the event, then lead him back to the car.

  When Carole opened one of the double entrance doors to Sprucewood, water gushed out past her ankles.

  “Eww,” Nikki said. “I don’t like this.”

  “I didn’t force you to follow me. I told you I’ll only be a second.”

  Nikki didn’t respond. If anything, the insinuation that she go back to the car and wait by herself almost made her stick closer to Carole’s elbow.

  They sloshed over a wet floor that must have flooded when water pipes in the building were torn apart by the quake. From outside, the structure didn’t appear to be listing, which meant the roof shouldn’t come crashing down on their heads. The school had been built in the 50s, back when things were made to outlast the warranty.

  “Hello?” Carole called out, tentatively. “Don’t be afraid, we’re not going to hurt you.”

  They were heading down a long hallway, dotted with lockers and a handful of classrooms. On her left was a mural, showing smiling children of all nationalities. The first classroom Carole ducked her head into was a mess. Desks knocked over. The blackboard was on the floor, leaning against a jumble of tiny chairs. Drop ceiling tiles were everywhere, and looking up, Carole spotted a broken water pipe and saw she’d been right about the cause of the flooding. A trickle of water continued to drip from the broken pipe. Paper snowflakes hung from the ceiling from bits of string. Motes of plaster dust still floated in the air like particles in the deep ocean. This was no place for an adult, let alone a child.

  The sound of tiny feet slapping against a wet floor came from the end of the hallway. Carole poked her head out and saw muddy footprints in the distance.

  “This way.”

  “Why is he hiding?” Nikki asked. She sounded annoyed, but Carole knew full well why. She was frightened.

  “If Alice is right,” Carole answered, “then most everyone out there doesn’t remember a thing about the civilized world. They’re almost like ... cavemen.”

  “Or in this case, caveboy.”

  A smile grew on Carole’s face, which slowly grew into a chuckle and then a fully-fledged gale of laughter, which she stifled with the palm of her hand. Nikki was right there with her, and it seemed to neutralize all the tension in the air. There hadn’t been many opportunities for laughter lately, and it sure felt good to know that even after the worst the world could throw at them, they still hadn’t lost everything.

  Nervous giggles continued to sputter out as they made their way to the end of the hallway and the cafeteria beyond.

  “Holy cow,” Nikki said, her face dropping into an equal measure of shock and fear.

  Empty cartons of milk and food wrappers were everywhere. A lot of it was cling wrap, and right away Carole knew what that meant. Someone, or a lot of someones, had gotten into the fridges and pantries inside the kitchen and devoured whatever they could find.

  The place looked as though it had been ransacked by wild animals, which was a distinct possibility she couldn’t deny. Now that humans weren’t there to keep them at bay, rats, squirrels, raccoons, and eventually dogs would begin to search out sources of food. Was it still too early for all of that yet? Carole wasn’t certain. In the long run, though, wild dogs would become the biggest issue, since they hunted in packs, but it wasn’t as though people had simply disappeared. They were there for the most part, it was only their memories that were gone. But how long would it be before hunger would drive a pet owner lacking in memory to decide that Spot might make a mighty tasty snack?

  Nudging through the cafeteria with still no sign of the boy, Carole and Nikki found the double doors that led into the gymnasium. On the doors, stenciled in yellow and gold, was a picture of a roman helmet with the words Home of the Sprucewood Gladiators curled around it.

  Carole opened one of the heavy doors, and Nikki screamed. There was a man hung upside down from the basketball net, his half-shadowed body suspended by what looked like a skipping rope. His belly was noticeably large and from there, it appeared that someone had cut it open. A length of inte
stine dangled from the wound.

  Oh God, please tell me this is all an illusion.

  The body belonged to Principal Hen. She had guessed it, almost at once, from the protruding shape of his stomach and the tweed suit jacket he always wore.

  A child appeared before them and growled, his mouth and hands covered in blood.

  And a sudden thought flashed before Carole’s eyes. She knew what was happening to Principal Hen.

  They were eating him.

  Other children emerged from the shadows. They’d been there all along, hiding, waiting. There, too, was the little boy in the red, white, and blue shirt; except Carole could see now that the red there had nothing to do with the nation’s flag. It was Mr. Hen’s blood.

  A few of the kids had hockey sticks, and were wearing torn shirts, some of them dressed for the festivities that never had a chance to get underway.

  They didn’t seem to be in a hurry as they approached, as if somehow they knew Carole and Nikki didn’t stand of chance of making it out alive. As the two of them stepped back from the gym entrance, Carole saw why. Another group was closing in behind them from the cafeteria, blocking their escape. The children began banging their sticks on the floor, whooping and hollering, as though the hunt was about to begin.

  Larry Nowak

  Somewhere outside Chicago, IL

  No sooner had Larry asked Bud about Brookhaven, than his new travelling companion had told him he was tired and wanted to hit the sack. Larry nodded, feeling like this guy with the doctor’s coat and the strange tattoo on his left wrist had dodged the question, but he figured it would be wise not to push the issue. Adaptability was key for Larry. If Bud didn’t want to tell his side of the story, who the hell was he to say anything? He wasn’t about to rock the boat and risk Bud kicking him out in the middle of nowhere.

  They started out early the next morning, driving in silence for well over an hour, the sun still only a speck of gold on the eastern horizon. Whenever they came upon a wreck on the highway, Bud slowed and maneuvered deftly around it. The blizzard that had pummeled their Escalade the night before, as they struggled past Chicago, was far behind them. Still, it was one of many freak occurrences of nature for which they had no clear explanation.