With nothing but his knife, his clothes soaking wet, John set off. After all, there wasn’t anything to do but go on.
When he’d left his apartment, he’d wanted to just do something. He hadn’t thought he’d live. He’d just wanted to take action.
In the short time span since leaving, he’d lost and regained that drive too many times to count.
Now he… just didn’t know.
So he walked.
Using the sun as his rough guide, he walked northeast.
With each step, he thought of Lawrence bleeding out on the boat. He thought of the farmhouse, the one he knew he’d never arrive at. He thought of his brother, Max, ensconced comfortably in the farmhouse, surrounded by food, water, and guns. He imagined Max having everything planned out perfectly. He imagined Max completely safe from danger.
It was funny that he was thinking about Max after all these years. Either it was because you started to think about your family when you thought you’d die soon. Or it was because Max had always been going on and on about “being prepared.”
He was somewhere outside of Southwest Philly. It was south of where the city met the suburbs, some sort of strange industrial area.
There weren’t normally many people in this area. There weren’t even any sidewalks. It was nothing but factories and warehouses.
John had only been down here once, when he’d gotten lost in a cab on the way to pick up his car from the Parking Authority impound lot. It wasn’t the sort of place that you came to unless you had a good reason.
The fact that the area was not residential was working in John’s favor now. There wasn’t anyone here. Presumably, the workers had gone home.
John walked down the middle of the street. There were some abandoned cars on the side of the road. Some were left with the driver’s door open, as if the occupant had fled rapidly.
On a whim, John hopped into one of the cars and tried to start the engine. The keys were in the ignition, after all. But nothing happened. The engine didn’t even turn over. Must have been the EMP. Some cars worked. Some didn’t. John didn’t know why, and he didn’t have the energy or interest to speculate on why.
The whole neighborhood was eerily silent. Normally, it would have been filled with the hum of the factories, and the noise of the traffic from a nearby highway.
John walked for what felt like hours. In reality, he didn’t know how much time had passed.
Eventually, he had traveled far enough east that the neighborhood had started to change. It was a soft change. Now there were a couple more houses, and even some apartment buildings. There were more trees. He was leaving the city behind.
He didn’t notice the sign that marked the official boundary of the city. But he figured he must have missed it, because the farther he walked, the more trees and houses he saw. He’d left the industrial area behind. And with that came the sounds. Sounds of animals. Birds chirped. Squirrels chased each other.
Nature would continue, thought John. The EMP had had a devastating effect on human civilization. But to the animals, nothing had changed. At least not much. Maybe they noticed that the humans were acting differently—John must have been getting exhausted, considering the strange places his mind was going.
His stomach was starting to hurt. He imagined it must have been the water he’d drunk from the Schuylkill River. He tried to ignore the increasing pain, telling himself that it wasn’t that bad, or that it was all in his imagination.
John was walking down a normal suburban street. Normal except that no one was out.
The houses had tidy, well-maintained gardens. There were bushes and trimmed hedges. John hadn’t been to the suburbs in a long, long time. And this seemed like a strange way to revisit them.
“Hey!” came an unexpected voice. It was male, gruff and weathered.
John didn’t know if it was a friendly voice. But he doubted it.
John spun around, looking frantically for the man.
His grip tightened on his kitchen knife.
“Put that down before you hurt yourself.”
“Who’s there?” said John. “I’m armed…”
“Sure you are,” said the voice.
Someone laughed. Someone else. There were multiple people there.
Finally, John saw them. They emerged from a row of dense hedges in front of a normal-looking suburban house. There were three of them. One wore some kind of military uniform. One wore civilian clothes, jeans and a t-shirt. The last wore a police uniform.
John froze. He didn’t know what to do. He couldn’t take them all on.
But he could try. If he was going to die, at least he could die trying to do something.
To John’s surprise, the men stood there and laughed at him, their mouths opening wide, their laughter deep and true, as if they hadn’t laughed in ages.
“Seriously, dude, put the knife down.”
“We’re not going to hurt you.”
“Look, we don’t even have our guns out.”
“Why should I trust you?” said John. He brandished the knife in their direction, even though it was pointless. He saw that each of them had a holstered handgun on their belts.
“Don’t tell me you don’t recognize me,” said the man in the military uniform.
“Recognize you?” said John.
His stomach was causing him great pain, and he was feeling dizzy. He wasn’t at his fullest mental faculties, to say the least. Why was this stranger asking him if he recognized him? Why had he called out to John anyway? Was it only to mock him, and watch him while he languished to a death punctuated only by confusion and pain? John’s side was hurting, the wound stinging.
“John!” said the man. “It’s me, Bill Lastring. From EPR. We worked together, remember? On that Perlman deal?”
“Bill Lastring?” said John, dumbfounded.
He remembered Lastring, a coworker that he’d paired up with for the occasional project.
“But… How? What are you doing in those clothes? I didn’t recognize you.”
“National Guard,” said Bill. “I reported for duty when the EMP hit. The rest is a long, long story.”
“I… don’t understand.” John wasn’t sure what it was that he didn’t understand. But he didn’t know what else to say.
“Come on,” said Bill. “I can tell you all about it. But not here.”
“Why not?”
“This is a dangerous area,” said Bill. “If you want to survive, you’ve got to get inside.”
“And even then, you’re not necessarily safe,” said one of Bill’s companions, the one wearing civilian clothes.
“I…” said John, stuttering, not saying anything at all.
His initial instinct was not to trust these men. Maybe because of what he’d been through. Maybe for another reason altogether. But the fact was that he knew Bill. Not really well. But they’d been casual work buddies. And Bill was a good guy, with a wife and kids.
Deep down, John knew he didn’t really have much of a choice. If these guys had wanted to harm him, they’d have already done so. Or they could do so later. John couldn’t defend himself against firearms.
While John appeared to be hesitant, his mind was already made up. His grip on his knife was relaxing.
“Come on,” said Bill. “Follow us. There’s food and water. You can’t stay here. The militia makes its rounds.”
“The militia?”
But they didn’t answer him.
Bill and the two others started walking away, heading between two of the suburban homes.
From somewhere off in the distance, there was a loud, low, rumbling noise. It sounded like a massive truck’s engine.
Bill turned around. “They’re coming,” he said loudly. “Come with us, or…”