They were locked in a battle for the rifle. Both of them held it. It swayed this way and that, like two arms locked in an arm wrestling match. Neither would give up. Their eyes were locked.
A silence hung in the air. Neither of them spoke a word. Mandy heard only her own breathing, as well as the stranger’s.
The stranger, despite being starving, had an incredible strength to her. It was strength that frightened Mandy.
Mandy remembered the knife in its plastic sheath. It might be her only hope. If she lost control of the rifle, she would certainly be shot.
Killing Mandy would only give the stranger the belongings she had on her. And she didn’t have any food with her. But it wasn’t about logic. It was about the instinct for survival, an instinct that could drive nearly anyone to do things they’d normally shudder to think about. It was an instinct that could cause horrible violence and pain, and not even necessarily for any reason, except that the instincts had become too strong…
Mandy could already feel her arms getting weak. Their legs were somehow locked together, as Mandy held the stranger’s knee between her thighs, which she pressed tightly together.
It was a stalemate.
And there was only way out.
Mandy knew what she had to do. But she needed one hand free. That meant letting go of the gun. It was a dangerous plan. But it was the only one she had.
Mandy let go of the rifle with her right hand.
Doing so swung the balance of power towards the stranger. The stranger almost had the rifle now. Mandy couldn’t hang onto it long with just one hand.
Her right hand found the plastic handle of the knife with the four-inch blade. It came out of the sheath easily.
Mandy didn’t waste any time. She drove the knife forward with all her strength. It penetrated the woman’s abdomen.
The stranger screamed. But she still clung to the rifle.
Mandy pulled the knife out, and stabbed again.
And again, and again.
Finally, the stranger collapsed to the ground. Blood covered her already stained and dirty shirt.
But the stranger wasn’t dead.
Mandy acted quickly, while she knew she still had it in her. She didn’t want the stranger to suffer more than she had to.
Mandy bent down and with a single motion, slit the woman’s throat.
Mandy grabbed the rifle with one hand. Her knife, covered with blood, was in the other.
Mandy turned around, walked about four feet, and then bent over and vomited the little food she had in her stomach.
The world was a blur to Mandy. Without thinking, she moved automatically. With blood on her, she started trudging towards the farmhouse. She was in shock, horrified with what she’d done, and wasn’t thinking about the gunshots she’d heard earlier.
The sun in the sky was setting, but Mandy didn’t even notice.
8
Somehow, John had made it down four flights of stairs. He figured he was at the ground floor now. He’d done it on his butt, with his hand on the guardrail, moving blindly. The entire time, he could only hope that there wasn’t anyone in there with him. The screams he’d heard over the last two weeks were still fresh in his mind.
His briefcase was now slung over one shoulder, and the thin leather strap dug painfully into him. His kitchen knife was in his free hand.
He was still in the pitch-black darkness, but within minutes he’d found a door.
His hands gripped the solid steel metal bar of the door and he pushed.
Light came bursting in, shocking his darkness-adapted eyes.
John looked outside cautiously, sticking only his head out.
Shit, he’d found the wrong door. Maybe he’d lost count as he made his way down the flights of stairs. The truth was that John couldn’t remember the last time he’d taken the stairs, if he ever had at all. He was an elevator man, as were most of the building’s upscale occupants.
Well, it was the wrong door. But it was a door.
John shuddered at the thought of heading back into the darkness.
He stepped out the door and found himself behind the building in an alley.
John was already exhausted from the trip down the stairs. Maybe it was because of the hunger he felt like a pit in his stomach. Or maybe it was because he’d never worked out those muscles before. Not that he worked out much at all. His brother, Max, had always been the physically fit one, while John was more content to save his energy for his investment schemes.
Despite his fatigue, John started off down the alley. So far, everything looked normal.
Rounding the alley’s exit, John found himself on Broad Street, which some called the pulse of Center City Philadelphia.
His jaw dropped as he gazed down the once-bustling city street.
Then again, he probably shouldn’t have been surprised.
There were cars parked everywhere, abandoned, some with their doors open, as if people had fled quickly. Most of the cars were in the lanes, but some had been driven up onto the sidewalks before being abandoned.
The entire street was packed full of cars. There must have been a huge traffic jam to get out of the city. By the looks of it, most people had been stuck and never gotten out.
There wasn’t a human in sight.
The street was desolate.
Except for a dog barking somewhere in the distance, there wasn’t a single sound.
This wasn’t what John had expected to find. He’d heard the noises, the screams. He’d heard it all. It had sounded like a complete madhouse, complete violent chaos. It had sounded like humanity turned completely savage and ruthless.
Maybe the flame of violence had burned bright, and then burned itself out. Maybe people had taken shelter in apartments and business buildings, waiting to starve together, too terrified to leave.
John didn’t know what to do, so he started walking.
He walked along the sidewalk slowly. His mind was a tumbling mess of stupefaction. He was too hungry and shocked to have many thoughts.
The shop windows he passed were shattered. There was nothing inside the shops, when he looked.
It turned out John’s first impression, that there were no people here, was wrong.
He saw his first body on the sidewalk. It was a young man, with his skull caved in. A bloody brick lay nearby.
John had no reaction. He was already too numb. He just stepped over the body and continued walking.
John headed west, towards the Schuylkill River that ran through the city.
In the first fifteen minutes, he saw many more bodies. He looked at them all. Afterwards, he didn’t give them so much as a glance. Gradually, he stopped even noticing them. Call it shell shock or numbness, but John certainly wasn’t himself. He’d been changed, perhaps permanently.
John wasn’t even paying attention to where he was. He knew that he was walking west, and that was all that he cared about.
“Whoa, whoa, what the hell are you doing out here?”
The voice came out of nowhere.
John felt so out of it, so numb, that he didn’t even look to see where the voice was coming from. His brain only half registered the sound.
The kitchen knife was still in his hand, but he had no intention of using it, even if the voice came from a threat.
“Hey there,” said the voice again.
It came from a man, who scurried to catch up to John.
The man wore khaki pants and a button-down striped shirt. His hair was disarranged, and his once-respectable clothes were torn in various places.
“Hey, I’m talking to you. Can you hear me?”
Finally, John looked at the man. But he didn’t stop walking.
“What do you want?” said John.
“I just want to help you,” said the man. “I’m Lawrence J. Hekels. I was a social worker, a therapist, before this all started… all this chaos… I figure I’m still alive for a reason. And that reason is that I might just be able to help someone… What are you doing out walking around?”