Stephen sat in the dark and listened to his mother breathing. Ever since they’d heard someone try to break into their bunker early that morning, his mother had been a bundle of nerves, but he’d finally convinced her to lie down and take a nap while he continued to prepare things for their escape.
They would take a couple of bikes, some sets of the hazmat gear, and as much food and water as they could haul with them. They’d carry whatever they could load onto their backs and onto the bikes and still be able to ride safely and swiftly. The plan was to take their gear and flee southward, out of the city. They both admitted that it was a crazy gambit, but what else could they do?
While inspecting the place, Stephen’s mother had discovered that the bunker had an open airway at the back of the storeroom, a small pipe that lead somewhere that they couldn’t figure. That fact made their plan to shelter there as bad as being outside, because, who knew if that airway was filtered, or—even if it was—if the filtration system even worked?
“We need to get as far away from here as we can get,” she’d said. “This place won’t do us any good against what I fear is coming. And worse, if someone with a little more sense or a better tool than a shoulder tries to break down the door, we’re sitting ducks.”
“I understand,” Stephen had said, “but why isn’t this place built better? Why would somebody go to the trouble of building a bunker that doesn’t protect you from the very thing it’s supposed to?”
“Peace of mind, Stephen. Or marketing. Back during the cold war, there were people getting rich building facilities that they sold to people based on their fears. They’d weave a swell story, tell the people how only they could fix a problem, and then they’d come in and throw up some half-designed thing that would seem to the uninformed to suit their needs. Most people just want to think they are safe. That’s always true, Stephen. It doesn’t really matter whether they are actually safe or not. The same applies to a lot of the survival industry. Companies sell cheaply made goods that wouldn’t do what they were advertised to do even if the sellers had intended them to. A lot of them simply push products to make a buck. Castles in the air.” Veronica paused. She knew her rants sometimes disturbed the boy, so she got back to the point. “Of course, we don’t know if that happened here or not. Maybe that airway has a fallout filter on it and is perfectly fine. That’s just the point, boy, we don’t know. The airflow seems to be a bit too free for me to feel safe about it. Maybe it was just a design flaw, or a contingency plan, or something that, in all those years of lying dormant, got uncovered. Either way, this place is useless to us now because we can’t trus’ it. We’ll have to leave.”
Now they were just waiting for nightfall before venturing out, and his mother had finally drifted into a fitful sleep. Stephen had unpacked and repacked their bags, putting in the things his mother had laid out for him. He hummed to himself quietly while doing so, drumming his fingers on the tops of the boxes in the storeroom. He thought of his iPod and his CDs and his video games and wished he had a guitar and had learned to play it.
He listened to his mother breathing, and wondered how long it would be before he could live, once again, in a world of music like she lived in a world of art.
The campfire crackled when the log split open and tiny embers flew up into the air, rising on a small puff of wind and lifting toward heaven before burning themselves out and disappearing into small bits of ash.
Four men sat looking into the fire and calculating how much food they had left and how far it would take them. Three of the men had set out on their journey together, and they had a bond that seemed solidified by some past history, perhaps the commission of a crime, while the fourth had joined them by happenstance. It was clear from the tenor of the conversation that, despite their journey thus far, the fourth remained the odd man out.
“Mike, we need to pick up our pace if we are going to get out of these mountains before our food runs out,” Val said. Val was a hulking brute of a man, and gave off an air of one who ought not to be trifled with.
“Relax, Val. I know what I’m doing, and listen, try to use contractions more. For example, instead of ‘ifweare going to get out of these mountains,’ you’d say, “if we’re going to get out of these mountains.’ Americans use more contractions and speak more lazily and fluidly. You sound like a robot.” Mike looked at Val and didn’t quite smile. His eyes smiled, but did so with a hint of authority and superiority. He continued.
“We don’t have much farther to go before we’ll be in an area where we can find shelter, and we have enough food to last a couple more days.” Mike was short and stocky. He was clearly the brains of the group of three men who’d initially headed out into the wilderness together. The third man, Steve, seemed to be mere window dressing. But not like in a clothing store. More like a mannequin you’d find on display in a hardware store or in outdoor gear store. The strong silent type, with a heavy emphasis on silent.
“Steve, would you like a little more stew? I think we have enough for everyone to have another bite.”
Steve nodded and held out his cup.
“Ken?” Val asked, offering him the spoon.
“Oh, for heaven’s sake! It’s Kent!” Kent was the fourth man. The outsider. He made a point of spitting the last letter off his teeth. “Kent. The ‘T’ is not silent. If we’re going to call each other by new names, the least you could do is try and get the name right,” the round-faced man said, his eyes burning with fire. It was clear that he didn’t like Val, and from the way the brute arched his back at the tone of Kent’s voice, one could tell that the feeling was mutual. Val turned to face Kent, squaring his shoulders as the smaller man sat forward on the log and seemed about to rise.
Mike smoothed their ruffled feathers. “Gentlemen! Give it a rest. We have a while still to travel, yet. Perhaps you can learn to get along better so that Steve and I,” he made a nod to the silent man to his left, “don’t have to douse the both of you.”
“I can’t help it, Mike. He burns me.” Val made a motion toward the smaller man as if he would slap him with the back of his hand if he didn’t have better self-control, and it wasn’t clear that he really did. The round-faced man didn’t flinch, and his eyes betrayed no fear. He simply sat and looked back at Val and spread his hands. He made them into fists and did a little punching motion into the air, and then, turning away, he looked with boredom into the fire. Reflexively, he reached up and removed his glasses and began to clean them.
Calvin Rhodes was born in Austin, Texas, in 1994, where his parents lived as they attended the University of Texas on student visas. His father, a Chinese pharmaceutical engineer, had come to the states to complete a graduate degree program, sponsored by the Chinese government in an ongoing effort to reform China’s national healthcare system. His mother, a musician, died giving birth to Calvin, and thus his father had to raise him alone.
When it came to being a single father and trying to maintain his course work at the university, Cal’s father was lost from the very start. In fact, he’d have simply withdrawn from the university and returned home to China to enlist his family’s help with the child, if it weren’t for the mildly aggressive way his embassy office had handled the news of his wife’s passing. Gently, but firmly, and with no room left for doubt, the consular attaché told him that he was to continue his studies. A small stipend was provided so that he could secure childcare, but nothing else was offered by way of help — certainly not understanding.