State of Emergency

I clap my hands together as Chris watches me in silence.

“What? Aren’t you happy?” I demand.

“Yeah. But I’m not sure if you are.”

I lightly punch him in the shoulder.

“Shut up.”

Crash. Something slams against my window. I scream. The blunt force makes the entire car shake. Chris hits the gas and the whole car lurches forward. I see dark shapes and recognize human shapes ru

“Chris!”

“I see them.”

Every few seconds our headlights flashes across somebody’s face, revealing bloody skin, torn clothing and wild eyes. How long have these people been stuck out here, waiting for emergency assistance that never came? Our car is like a magnet to them.

“Hit the gas!” I yell.

Chris floors it as much as he dares, knowing that there are too many obstacles in the road to go too quickly. People keep slamming against the side of the Mustang in an attempt to grab onto the roof or trunk and hitch some kind of a ride.

Or stop us altogether.

Chris dodges freak stragglers without too much difficulty but the car pileups are getting bigger. “Chris…” I whisper, fear slithering down my spine.

There is a massive car accident in front of us. A semi truck is lying on its side, blocking half the road. Other vehicles are stacked up on the other side of it, completely barricading the freeway.

“Turn around!” I say. “We have to get out of here!”

“I’m doing the best I can,” Chris snaps.

He swings the car into a quick U-turn. The headlights illuminate the road. I stare in terror, seeing a mob of people ru

“Get your pack,” Chris warns. “Get everything you can.”

“But-”

“-Just do it!”

I strap my backpack on and grab Chris’s. Chris doesn’t stop the car but keeps moving forward just as three people throw themselves onto the trunk. They start banging on the windows, shrieking profanities. Freaked out beyond all reasonable belief, I look to Chris, hoping he’ll offer some solution. But what can he do? People are throwing themselves at the car, creating a human barrier around the entire vehicle. Pretty soon the human claw is so heavy Chris can’t move the car forward. The banging and yelling gets more intense. The windows start cracking.

I look around frantically, searching for an escape that doesn’t exist. At last somebody breaks through the passenger window. Their knuckles and arm are scratched and bloody as they rip more of the glass away with their bare hands.

“Cassidy!” Chris says.

More hands start ripping away the glass, arms reach through the window, grabbing my hair, head, shoulders, waist. Dragging me outside. I scream and scream, biting and clawing at the psychos who won’t let go. I feel Chris’s hand on my legs as he tries to yank me back inside the car, but really — what good would that do?

Pretty soon I’m caught up in a swirling mob of people, crushed in on all sides, sweaty, bloody bodies yelling and hollering like wild savages hunting hyenas. I can’t breathe, I can barely see and the mob is breaking apart more of the windows on the Mustang.

People are trying to rip my backpack off my shoulders but it’s strapped on at two places: across my chest and across my waist. I hold onto it for dear life, knowing that what I have inside is actually worth more than the car.

“Give us the pack!” a crazy woman spits in my face. She slaps me repeatedly until I finally kick her off, shoving her against the ground where she’s swallowed up by the mob. Under normal circumstances I would feel lousy for kicking somebody, but now is not the time to get on a guilt trip.

“Take it!” somebody hollers. I assume they’re talking about the Mustang. The mob surges forward, getting tighter, wilder. It’s really unbelievable just how insane these people have become. Some of them are wearing business suits or beachwear suited for Santa Monica. And now they’re acting like a bunch of maniacal zombies.

Desperation really does bring people down to the same level.

“Give me the girl!” I hear Chris shout. I spot him climbing onto the roof of the Mustang. He’s got his backpack on one shoulder — a miracle — and his gun in the other hand. The crowd doesn’t pay him any attention.

Until he fires the gun. He points it at the sky, not hurting anybody, but the sound draws everybody’s attention. It’s like an instant freeze falls over the crowd.

“Give me the girl,” Chris commands, his voice echoing over the scene of destruction. “Or will shoot as many people as I can before I’m done here.”

The crowd surrounding me parts just enough for me to work my way back to the Mustang. Chris keeps the gun in plain sight, his free hand up in the air. He jumps down on the asphalt and hooks his arm around my waist. I hang onto him for dear life as he halfway drags me through the mob, people backing off just a few feet as Chris keeps the gun in sight.

When we clear the crowd everybody stares at us before turning back and busting into the car. “Chris, my gun is in the car!” I say, feeling my empty holster. “I took it out…”

Chris grabs my hand and yanks me away.

“Move,” he commands. “Now.”

“But Chris! My car,” I moan.

We break into a jog, putting distance between us and the mob from the mouth of hell. Chris climbs up the side of the overturned semi and reaches down for me. I take his hands and he pulls me up just as another gunshot rings through the air. People in the mob start dispersing and breaking for the hills. The Mustang rolls forward. I can hear somebody gu

It’s painful to watch.

But we have to leave before we get killed. Chris drops to the ground and holds out his arms for me. I jump down, wincing from the still-painful crowbar injury. Chris catches me around the waist, his fingers lightly grazing my hip. I notice a ribbon of blood ru

“Are you okay?” I ask, knowing it’s a stupid question.

We just got attacked by a crazy mob. We’re so not okay.

Chris offers an amused smile, touching my cheek.

“Are you?”

I nod.

“Let’s move, then,” he says.

I pause, another crash breaking the silence of the night.

“But we have no car,” I say, realization setting in like a ten pound weight.

“We’ll be okay,” Chris replies. “We’ve got our packs.”

He starts walking down the freeway. I swallow thickly, surprised to feel a couple of hot tears slide down my face. Chris’s body is tensed up, determined. He’s not going to wait for me. I stumble to catch up with him, crying silently. Not because a bunch of losers just wrecked our only form of transportation, or because our gas supply was stolen, or because our water is gone. But because this is what the world has been reduced to less than forty-eight hours after the pulse hit.

It sucks. Big time.

Chapter Five

My dad always used to tell me, “Life is hard, and then you die.”

Yeah, he wasn’t the touchy feely, optimistic type.

My mom was. She was all into eastern religions. Everyday at around ten o’clock at night I could find her doing her Zen yoga routine in the middle of the living room in pink workout gear. She was very into positive thinking and Nirvana and coming back as a bug or a frog in the next life. Something she called reincarnation. I never believed in any of it, I just nodded and agreed with her whenever she said anything about the spirit world guiding her to a certain carton of milk at the grocery store.

Divine intervention? I don’t think so.

I always went along with what dad believed, which was basically try to survive while you’re here, because it’s short and tough. Maybe if I had known just how tough things were going to be I would have built a bulletproof motorhome and stocked it with artillery and food. That way I wouldn’t be in my present situation.