The Event - Tales of the Triad, Book One

THE EVENT

  Tales of the Triad

  Book one

  R J Murray

  Copyright © 2011 R J Murray

  ISBN: 9781476450704

  All rights reserved.

  DEDICATION

  This book is dedicated to my Brother and Sisters. They are supportive, warm and a bit different. Of course, they think I'm a bit different and that I talk funny, Strange Uncle Bob being one of my titles. I say, who wants to be like everybody else?

  vive la difference

  DISCLAIMER

  Any resemblance between the characters in this book and any person, alive or dead, is truly amazing. It is also a coincidence, not planned or anything, like most of my writing. I just put down what the voices in my head tell me, honest!

  ALSO

  For those among you who thrill in seeking out error, either in geology, astronomy, or any of the other scientific fields I have abused in my writing, please remember that this is a work of fiction, fantasy and my wild imagination. That doesn't mean you can't find some, it just gives me a really good excuse when you do.

  Chapter 1 - The Waking

  John sat at the edge of the cliff, letting the rain wash over him; his ripped and soaked cotton pajama pants his only clothing. He was perhaps twenty years old, six two, a hundred and ninety pounds. His shoulder length hair, matted with the continuing rain, was dark auburn and his eyes mostly bright emerald green with small gold and purple flecks that shifted within as he sat lost in thought. His muscular frame shivered a bit from time to time as the cold rain continued to chill him yet he didn't move to shelter. John had a problem and he was concerned that it might just be mental.

  A quarter of a mile below his feet the Atlantic pounded the rocks at the base of the cliff, sea and sky dark gray, the low scudding clouds almost within John's reach. Behind him, beginning only a few hundred feet away were the shattered remains of a small town, including a nursing home for the elderly.

  The problem was that the small town was in the center of the state of Florida, the Atlantic should have been fifty miles to the east, the cliff could not exist in Florida and John was a resident of the nursing home, having just celebrated his eighty first birthday. Last night he had been in a wheelchair, watching the news about something happening in space. His toothless jaws had moved restlessly, his hands shaking with palsy as the attendant flipped through the channels. Not that he was paying much attention to the TV. John was wandering mentally through his life, going over the mistakes he had made, the errors in judgment, the way the world had turned out. The one overwhelming thought about his family, the world, and his life, the one clear thought he had was, “It should have been different”. It was a reoccurring theme with John, one which plagued him day and night as he grew older and closer to death.

  A few dozen of the other residents, nearly as old and decrepit as he was, had been sitting on sofas and easy chairs in the TV room with him when the power went out. At first it was just annoying, sitting in the dim light, waiting for the attendant to do something. Voices were raised, including Johns. Then Johns voice was alone, the room silent. In the light from the windows John saw everyone else slowly collapse, lying on the floor or slipping down in the chairs. Then, with a slight popping sound, which John was too deaf to hear, they all turned to dust.

  John didn't feel crazy but he didn't feel eighty one either. His hearing was sharp, his eye sight perfect and his new teeth were still being explored by his tongue. Insanity or senility seemed to be the only reasonable explanation. As he sat in the rain pondering his mental state the sky blinked, the clouds, the rain, the gray light, all seemed to ripple and John passed out, falling back away from the edge of the cliff. He lay there for another day and night, the rain stopping and starting again before he woke up. When he finally woke for the second time, he felt even stranger than the first time. He stood up, immediately got dizzy and took a few staggering steps, trying to stay away from the edge of the cliff.

  John was finally able to sit down. For a time he stared into space, not knowing where to turn or what to do. The dizziness passed after an hour and he began to feel better, physically. Emotionally, this was overwhelming and he didn't have a clue what to do until his stomach growled. He started laughing. Food was next, then maybe clothes and shoes. His body had some ideas even if his mind was blank. He got up and trotted back toward the nursing home, trying to decide if he wanted beans or ravioli for breakfast. Whether he was crazy, sane or just senile, he was hungry.

  Christine opened her eyes and took a breath. She was looking at the underside of something big and dirty. Not knowing why she was laying on her back, under a bus on the wet sidewalk confused her for a minute, but she was wet and cold so she started crawling out. Her clothes kept sliding off and she couldn't quite understand why things were like this. She gripped her pants tightly in one hand as she managed to get to her feet.

  She turned and looked at the front of the bus, reaching out to touch a piece of cloth stuck in the dented grill. It looked like a part of her raincoat. She suddenly remembered last night, the rain and the traffic going crazy, cars going everywhere. This car on the sidewalk behind her had nearly run her down. She had screamed incoherently at the driver, pounding on the passenger window. The driver gazed at her with a blank look on his face and turned to dust. Then the bus hit her, crushing her against the car, hitting hard enough to shove the car through the wall of the drugstore. She looked down, franticly searching for the ribs she had felt bursting through her chest and only found a few spots of dried blood and holes torn in her blouse.

  She turned slowly and faced the car, now half way into the drug store, the passenger side crushed and windows shattered. The light filtered through the sprinkling rain and she stood there, letting it soak her as she tried to get a grasp of what happened. She failed. She knew, she knew, she had died last night.

  She decided to get out of the rain at least and took a step toward the drugstore. She was still holding her clothing with both hands now and had to grab the car when she slipped on a piece of the rubble. Her pants promptly fell to her ankles. Embarrassed, she quickly pulled them up and looked around. She was totally alone, which made her a little less embarrassed but her clothes were huge. She looked down; pulling her pants out to see her lower body and was shocked to discover she had the skinniest little legs and no belly at all. As a matter of fact she had a six pack and the bottom half of her body had a rather cute figure. She was so surprised that she let go of her pants and pulled up her blouse. Her bra hung loose and she could see firm pointy breasts on her slender chest, making the rest of her figure totally cute too.

  Reaching up slowly and carefully touched one of her breasts and was shocked to discover it was really hers. Suddenly realizing what she was doing, Christine pulled her clothes back on and looked around once again for gawkers. She didn't know what else to do, so she went inside the drugstore and started looking for drinking water. She found that the floor was a slimy mess and her shoes were gone. The burning in her feet sent her back outside rapidly where the light rain relieved the pain right away, washing the slime from her feet. Still confused, she stood in the rain for a while, thinking.

  Seeing the car that nearly hit her, she remembered the driver and walked to the side to see if her memory was real. The empty clothes were still there, but the interior of the car was gone, pooled on the floor and dripping out the damaged passenger side, where the rain washed the goo into the gutter. The newspaper sitting on the seat was undamaged and unchanged. There was a paper machine on the next corner so she walked over to it, searching her pockets for change. The plastic window was gone, making it simple to reach in and take all the papers
. Returning to the drugstore she scattered them in front of her and made a path to the drinks.

  Refreshed, she looked for something to put the extras in, one of the canvas bags stores sold to be green. She found the paper tags from several, but the bags were melted. Woven polyester the tag read. So much for green and natural, although it was recycled plastic. The clothing rack had a few things not damaged by slime, but nothing she could use, so she took a few drinks and filled her coat pockets before leaving. Her belt was now pulled in way past the last notch and tied in a knot, but with her new slender figure it was still a fight to keep her pants up.

  Christine felt different, both physically and mentally. Her depression was almost gone and her body was young and strong. She still hadn't seen herself, but she was definitely looking for an intact mirror. In the process she found food and water as well as a real canvas bag to carry them in. Looting was easier than she had thought it would be, breaking into homes and businesses simple and painless, after the first one. She also discovered she really liked knives and blades of all kinds, the bigger and badder the better.

  Shoes were not found intact, even if they were all leather. The thread used was not natural so the pieces fell apart. She wrapped her feet in cloth stuffed with paper and it worked for a while at least. Clothing was hard to find also, more because of her sudden change in fashion tastes than her new slender figure. Her cotton clothes were still in good shape, just far too huge for her to keep.

  She realized after a while that she was looking for black, only black and leather if she could find it. She found a coat she loved, long black leather, the surface embossed with flowers and lace. Double breasted with steel buttons and pyramid studs at collar and cuffs, she went crazy over it the moment she saw it. It fit almost, just a little large but she didn't care. It was perfect as far as she was concerned and she wouldn't take it off unless it was to put on pants and blouse to match.

  Night came and Christine broke into a house to sleep, trying several on the street before settling in. Unlike the first three she tried, this one had wooden floors and only some of the furniture had melted, along with the TV and a lot of the kitchen. She moved upstairs, finding quilts and sheets in a wooden chest at the foot of the bed. The mattress stuffing had melted so the bed was unusable but the downy comforter and the quilts would make a nice bed on the floor.

  The rest of the room didn't have much she could use or wanted. The second bedroom was different. While the first looked like her grandmothers room the second was a vampires lair. Black candles, posters of vampires, jewelry and clothing made for a dark Goth girl like Christine had become.

  The full length mirror showed a new person, a total stranger. She took her hair out of the bun she had worn for the last fifteen years and let it cascade across her shoulders and back. Maybe sixteen, waist length reddish blond hair, looking like what the commercials promised but never delivered without your personal makeup artist. A slender figure, very athletic and feminine, petite to the point of looking pixie. Her eyes were now a brilliant emerald green. She was beautiful, young and absolutely confused. She didn't know why she was just accepting all this so easily, but she didn't think there was anything she could do to change it. She posed before the mirror once again, checking out her new profile. Not that she would want to change it.

  Joshua was laying in a strange and uncomfortable position, legs and arms twisted and his face half covered with dirt. He coughed up some of the dirt and grass that seemed to have found its way into his mouth as he slowly straightened out. He was wet, although it wasn't raining now and there were puddles along the street and in the grass. He sat up rubbing his face, jumping when his helmet shattered at his touch. Pulling the bits and pieces out of his hair, Joshua's hair had grown and was now almost touching his shoulders and dangling in his face. He pushed it back and looked down, seeing that his shirt and shoes were gone, leaving only his pants and underwear.

  While he was wondering how long he had been unconscious, he caught sight of his bike further up the road. He stood and walked toward the tree it was wrapped around, shaking his head sadly. It had been a good bike and he knew he couldn't afford to replace it. He would be on foot or maybe on a bicycle for a long time to come. The bike was more than just wrapped around the tree. When he got closer, Joshua could see only metal on the bike. All plastic, vinyl, rubber, even the small windshield and his saddle bags were gone.

  He had already discovered he was barefoot and his shirt was gone. His cotton slacks and his underwear were still among the living, just very loose. He looked down to pull his pants up one more time and found that his beer belly was gone. His rippling muscles from high school were back and he felt like he could do anything. It was a rush that made him dizzy and he leaned against the tree for a moment. When he caught his breath, he turned to walk back down the road to his apartment, not knowing what else to do. The road was gone, at least the asphalt was, with only gravel and dirt remaining, the asphalt puddled in small patches here and there. The rain started again and the remaining asphalt liquefied as Joshua watched, overflowing the pools and running to the storm drains with the water. Frightened and confused, he started walking on the grass, watching for any pools or streams coming from the road bed.

  Elizabeth woke up lying on the floor of her parents’ bedroom. She couldn't remember why she was there or that she had passed out after seeing her mother turn to dust. Getting up, she watched as her dress flowed across her slip and piled up at her feet, joining the blankets from her parents bed. Her shoulders and legs started to burn and she tried to wipe the slime off with her hands, but it didn't work and her hands were now burning too.

  Panicking, she ran to the bathroom and tried the sink, but nothing came out of the faucet. The shower wasn't working either and in desperation she pulled the top off the toilet. Filling the glass from the sink, she splashed the water across her shoulders until she found relief from the burning. She continued until all the slime was gone, even taking off her slip and panties.

  She didn't know what else to do, so she headed for her bedroom to find clothes. It was a mess in there, her frilly canopy bed was pooling on the hardwood floor and most of the clothes in her closet doing the same. She found a pair of cotton slacks and a silk blouse to wear, but her underwear drawer was not looking good. She finally found a white cotton pair with a cute little bear that wasn't too bad and washed them in water from her toilet. This took off all the slime but left them a little loose so she laced a pink silk ribbon through the white cotton waist band and tied them with a very neat bow.

  Fully dressed and with her modesty protected, Elizabeth moved to the kitchen to find something to drink. She hoped to find some of her mom’s imported sparkling water, but the green plastic bottles had melted away, leaving only a watery mess behind. The few things left were her dad’s canned coffees and his canned store brand soda water.

  Disappointed, Elizabeth still managed to finish off both cans of coffee and one of the cans of water before she stopped. Sitting on the tiled kitchen floor, her remaining three cans of water close beside her, Elizabeth gave in to tears, covering her face with her hands and waiting for her parents to find her, a very frightened ten year old. Outside, the sky blinked and Elizabeth passed out, to sleep another day.

  Dogg hurt badly, enough to wake him up screaming. His clothes were gone and his skin was burning and blistered, small sores forming and oozing a yellow liquid. He got up painfully, every move causing his skin to crack and more liquid to ooze out. He staggered to the bathroom and tried to find water but nothing worked. Frantic, he lifted the seat on the toilet and splashed water across the burns. He didn't care where the water was from or the fact that it was yellow.

  He ran out of water before he finished and pulled the handle down to refill the bowl, but nothing happened. The plastic tower had melted and the tank was empty. Dogg staggered out of the room and into the hall, heading for the bath upstairs. This time he checked the tank first and found it empty as well. The bowl was fu
ll and clean this time, so he continued to wash in the toilet. Relief from the pain wasn't total, but it was better and most of the burning slime was gone.

  He still had no idea what was happening and he was still hung over and in pain, both from the burns and from a bruise on his cheek, probably from when he passed out. He vaguely remembered the party and some kind of noise or explosion outside. He had been about as drunk as he could be and still conscious. It was his life, party, drink, drug and pick up whatever woman he could find. He could do it every day as far as he was concerned and it never got old. Usually he couldn't remember anything anyway and he always hurt the next day. He worried more about the sexy redhead he was hitting on the night before.

  The naked part didn't bother him and he left the house to find more water, wandering down the street in anything but a straight line. The next house was an easy mark and he found water in the tub, as though it was drawn for him. The burns hurt less now that he had soaked and he looked for something to drink. He only found water and soda so he left the house and headed for the convenience store on the corner.

  The beer was warm and the chips in the nacho tray stale but he ate and drank anyway. The cheese was dried out so he opened one of the cans of dip and continued to eat. When he was full he took a six pack of bottled beer and strode down the street, looking for clothes, food and booze. There wasn't much else on his mind. The sky blinked and he went down, face first into the sidewalk, the beer bottles breaking on impact and scattering foam across the concrete roadway.

  Maria jumped, the burning on her skin waking her from a deep sleep. She stood up and wiped at her skin, the slime sticking to her hands. She started to cry and make small jumping motions like a child, not knowing what to do. She jumped even higher when she felt a hand on her shoulder. Turning quickly she saw a small girl crawling out of Tasha's bed, her long hair covering her face. She fell out of bed, rolling on the floor and whimpering in pain.

  Maria looked at her, then at the now empty bed and wondered for a few seconds where Tasha went. Then the burning brought her mind back to the current problem.

  “We need to get to the shower! This stuff is burning! Maria, help me.”

  Maria heard Tasha but couldn't see anyone but the strange girl on the floor. The girl made it to her feet and seemed to be surprised to be standing. Maria backed up, moving closer to the door to escape from this girl, this stranger who had appeared in front of her. Then the girl moved toward her.

  “What did you do to Tasha? Who are you?”

  “I'm Tasha! What do you mean? What are you saying? We have to get to the shower.” The girl took Maria's hand and pulled her out the door and into the hall bathroom. She turned the water on and got in the shower, pulling Maria behind her. Maria was helpless in her grasp. As small as this girl was, she was very strong.

  The water felt good, even though it was icy cold and she turned under the stream to get the slime off of her back. The girl was facing her. “Who are you?”

  “Ask me that one more time and I'll turn you over my knee. What is this stuff and why can I walk again? What happened to us?”

  “Tasha? You're tiny! I don't understand.”

  “Me neither. Just keep washing and get that stuff off your skin.”

  The girls stayed under the shower until all the slime had washed off. Then they started talking again.

  “Last night, we didn't just fall asleep, did we? We fainted or passed out or something. It wasn't natural sleep. And now, I'm not like I was, I'm not bedridden, not four hundred pounds and not crippled. Why, I don't know. It's daylight so it's been at least one night, maybe more. What were you wearing?”

  “My new boots, a blouse and slacks.”

  Tasha sighed. Even at fifteen, Maria was more airhead than most, interested in texting, boys, and little else. She spent a lot of her time with Tasha because, she said, her parents didn't understand her. Tasha felt they understood her just fine and Maria didn't like it. “No, what were they made of?”

  “I don't know. Rayon or something. You didn't have to iron them or anything. My boots were vinyl so I didn't have to shine them.”

  “My sheets were cotton, but most of the rest, the mattress and things were synthetic. Your clothes were synthetic. They melted. The sheets didn't and the cotton towels didn't. Natural versus synthetic. Why, I wonder. We need to get dressed.”

  Tasha led the way to her mother’s room and started searching for clothes. They tried several things before they were dressed; picking the items that had the least slime on them. What they couldn't find were shoes. Tasha headed for the kitchen, her bare feet quiet on the wooden floors. Opening the refrigerator she pulled out the water jug and poured two glasses.

  “At least the windmills are still working. We have power to the icebox and water. That's something. I wonder what my dad used to insulate the wires.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Wire has to be insulated to keep them from shorting out. Fires start that way. The windmill is still generating electricity for the icebox so it's not shorting out. It has to be natural material for insulation, not synthetic. What else is wrong or missing and where are my parents?”

  “I don't know. Maybe they went out to take care of the animals.”

  “Before checking on me. Really? Come on, let's look around.”

  They searched the house and the out buildings but found no one, not even animals, only a white powder in some of the stalls. Melted furniture in the living room pooled across the floor and the TV was gone. Everything that was synthetic was gone.

  As the short day ended and as night fell, the two girls put quilts down on the floor in the kitchen, planning on taking a walk to Maria's home in the morning. They talked until it was dark, and then fell into a troubled sleep. Unseen in the dark the sky blinked once more and they slept through the night and into the next.

  Tiffanie opened her eyes and saw a puddle on the floor. She was having trouble focusing and the light was very bright. She squinted and managed to sit up. She was still in the coffee shop, but she was alone. She couldn't see anyone outside either so she got up and looked for her bag to get her phone. Her bag was there but her phone was a blob like some of the things in the shop. She looked but the phone in the back was melted as well. The cups, lids, stir sticks; everything that was plastic was gone, little puddles and pools across the counter and dripping slowly onto the floor.

  Tiffanie looked down at herself. Her wool suit was fine, just a little wrinkled, but her shoes had fallen apart and her pantyhose was a fine film of slime across her legs. Her legs were tingling and starting to burn a bit so she went to the back again and after taking off her skirt, poured water across everything that was tingly. It seemed to help.

  Dressed once again, she headed out of the shop for her office. She almost didn't bother once outside as cars were piled up in crashes everywhere, some burning. Windows were shattered in almost every building and some buildings were even collapsing. She moved carefully along the street, looking for another survivor and finding no one.

  Her offices were a wreck and empty of life and Tiffanie stood in the middle of the office trying to decide what to do next. Her plan for success had hit a serious roadblock and it was terribly frustrating to have this happen. From what she had seen on the street, finding her car was a waste of time, since the tires would be gone just like everything else made of synthetics. She would find food, water and a place to sleep. Weapons were not something she normally considered, but now it was more important.

  She didn't waste much thought on Trista and Joan, in spite of their being co workers and the last people she had been with. They had gone to the coffee shop after work as usual when this happened. They weren't there when she woke up, so either they were dead or they left her. Either way, they were not important to her anymore. Tiffanie was important and anything or anyone else was secondary.

  She found what she wanted, food, water, several knives and a place to stay. She wanted a gun, but she couldn't find
one that worked so she settled on knives instead. As she settled into the apartment she picked, the sky blinked and she passed out again.

  Ben woke up flat on his back in the grass. Rain was falling and he was chilled to the point of shivering. He sat up and wiped the rain from his face before reaching to pull his coat around him more tightly. He found skin instead of clothes. Looking down Ben discovered he was only wearing his cotton briefs and his socks. There were some pieces of leather on his feet that fell off as soon as he moved, but only the tongue and uppers of his shoes. He picked up the pieces and they came apart into separate sections, the thread holding them together having vanished along with his clothes.

  Ben was cold, wet, hungry and puzzled. He opened the door to get in his car and jumped back as the interior poured out across his feet. It started to burn as soon as it touched him and Ben reached down to wipe it off. He stopped before his fingers touched it and stepped into a puddle instead, to splash water across the goo. It washed off easily and dissolved in the water, leaving an oily film on the surface for a few moments before it too disappeared.

  Ben stepped back to his car and looked inside. Only bare metal was left where the rain hit while further into the interior the goo was still sticking in a thin film to every surface. His tires where gone as well, the steel bands lying naked around the rims. He backed away, suddenly afraid of his car and started running down the shoulder to the north.

  An hour later Ben saw a small store ahead and headed for it. He had stopped running after about twenty minutes, his panic gone in the chill of the rain. His panicky all out run had warmed him but he was winded after and walked for awhile. He had decided to continue running and walking until now and it carried him quite quickly. His lifelong athletic habits did him some good now, although he never imagined his college football skills would be used like this.

  The store was deserted and the front door was lying on the ground. He stepped inside to get out of the rain as much as to look for help. Things were melted here as well, but the floor was concrete and only some of the things on the shelves and a few places around the counter were dripping. He was able to step around the pools and go to the drinks. All the plastic bottles were gone but there were plenty of cans left and Ben drank several before stopping. Food was available as well, but he was full from the drinks so he looked for something to put a few cans in. There were t-shirts on a rack, so he found a couple that fit and put one on. Tying the sleeves and neck shut of a second shirt; he put as many cans into this bag as it would hold.

  Ben's thoughts raced while he moved through the store. His parents were further north, almost two hundred miles away. He sold farm equipment for his father’s business, ever since he graduated from college ten years before, and traveled a lot around the mid-west, sometimes not getting home for weeks at a time. Never the less, he was close to his family and now, without any way to contact them, he was worried.

  The rain slowed and Ben stepped outside to check the sky for any sign of it quitting. He almost ran back inside when he saw the first gap in the cloud cover. The sky was purple behind the clouds and there were two moons looking back at him. He sat down and leaned against the wall, breathing hard. He passed out like the others when the sky blinked and the next wave of change washed over the earth.

  Charlie woke up on her porch in her rocker. She stretched and stood up, stiff from sleeping in the chair and moved into the house to get coffee going. She stopped at the door and watched a puddle of goo growing under her sofa and easy chair. The picture frames on the mantle were smoldering as the photos darkened and crumbled to ash. The TV was already on the floor and joining the sofa.

  She stepped inside; made sure she avoided the goo, and got the dust pan and broom from the kitchen. Slowly she swept the thick liquid into the dust pan and put it in the coal scuttle she used for magazines. When full she emptied it outside into the metal trash can she used for cinders. The phone and a few other things including her tea cup joined the sofa outside. The world could end if it wished, but Charlie wasn't about to let her house stay messy. After she cleaned it up, she would sit with her coffee and think. She couldn't call anyone to ask what was going on without a phone anyway.

  After she ate breakfast and cleaned the dishes, she walked down the hill to her truck. After seeing it, she walked back up the hill and packed a lunch and a bottle of water before setting out for her closest neighbor. By the time she got there it was almost noon and the place looked worse than hers. She found an empty house and no sign of anyone. The car was in the drive, melted like hers. She walked to the next house, only a mile away, and then the next. All were empty and contained puddles of ooze flowing across the floor. She found no people, animals or anything alive and after the fourth house, she went home.

  It was dark when she got back, so she washed up and made a cup of tea to drink on the porch. With no way of contacting anyone, she would wait for morning before walking to town. For now she would fix a little supper and rest. She watched the moon come up, and then broke her second tea cup as another moon rose to follow the first. Once again, she passed out in the rocker as the sky blinked.

  Carl was moving down the street searching for anyone still alive. Since that night when the moons rose he had been alone and the houses along his street were not only empty, they were falling down. Empty cars and burning buildings were all that was left of his neighborhood and Carl had moved out as fast as he could. Pants were found and a t-shirt, since he woke up naked and wet from the rain but he was still barefoot. He felt strangely good. No aches or pains from sleeping on the ground and he wasn't winded even though he had to run for five or six blocks to escape the fires.

  With his renewed strength he was able to do several things he hadn't done since high school or college. He had jumped a car to escape a burning building when it collapsed beside him, clearing the roof without any difficulties. His glasses were gone, but he could see fine without them and he could hear the whisper of a birds wing. He felt good, even though he was scared half to death by the strangeness of the day.

  The purple sky was mostly clear and the sun was warm. He had water and food for several days and if he could find a pair of shoes he would be set. He found a nice double bladed ax and a good hunting knife in a house that morning and carried the knife in his belt. The ax felt good and he swung it back and forth as he walked, calling out every few minutes to see if anyone would answer. He realized later that swinging an ax and calling for people to come out was not a good combination.

  A contractor by trade, Carl had a good business but no one to pass it on to. Now in his sixties and reaching a point where he was trying to decide if he would one day retire or just work till he died, he thought an active life was almost over for him. Waking up outside on his small front yard was a shock. Finding himself naked and alone was more of a shock but he took it all in stride, doing what he needed to do to stay alive.

  He had found a few bodies earlier, burning in a car that was half buried under a fallen building. He hoped they were dead before the fire, but it was some evidence that others were still around. There were no other dead bodies anywhere and if those people died in the crash or even in the fire, they had survived the event for a short time. There had to be others, maybe trapped inside one of these buildings, unable to escape the rubble without help. Maybe walking around like he was, looking for someone or for help. FEMA should be moving by now and so should the police or fire rescue. Where were they?

  He looked up at the purple sky and watched as the two moons traversed the sky. He was watching as the sky blinked and for a moment he saw the other sky, the blue one with a single moon. Then he passed out, falling back into the grass strip on the edge of the concrete pavement, a small tree shading him.