Enduring Armageddon (3 page)

Virden was the first real, functioning town that we’d seen since we left our neighborhood in Plainfield. We pushed our bikes down the road as we followed her and took in the sights. There were hand painted signs for seamstresses, a doctor’s office, a couple of restaurants and an outdoor survivalist store. I made a mental note to visit that last one as soon as I could.

“I don’t suppose anyone in town needs a financial advisor do they?” I asked half-jokingly to our guide.

“Seriously? That’s what you did before the apocalypse? Geez, that must have been boring.”

“Well, I thought it was exciting. There was a different challenge every day,” I replied.

“Nope, don’t think we’ll be doing too much investing around here. What about you, Rebecca. What skills do you have?”

“I was an elementary school teacher,” she said as we continued to follow Samantha down the street.

“That, we can use. I don’t know what happened to them, but less than half of the school’s original teachers are around. We’ve got about forty or fifty kids per class, so that will be a huge help.”

“The town is still doing school?” I asked incredulously.

“Yeah. Allan says we’ve got to continue educating our kids, so he’s made it mandatory for them to attend up until twelve years old. Then, if the parents can spare them, he recommends that they be allowed to continue. Right now, most parents are letting their kids go, but everyone knows it won’t always be that way. We’ll need more wall guards as things get worse and we’re already beginning to need more people to do the long-range scavenging… I mean gathering.”

“Gathering, scavenging, it’s the same thing, right? What difference does it make what you call it?” Becca asked.

“The scavengers are the crazies out there, so Allan doesn’t want us associated with them. He forbids anyone from calling the gathering of supplies for the town ‘scavenging’. If you end up working with one of those groups and call it scavenging, Jesse will beat your ass.”

“Well, it’s an intellectual difference at best,” Rebecca pressed.

“I don’t know what you mean by that, but just remember that we ‘gather’ we don’t ‘scavenge’ and you’ll be alright,” Sam said as she stared over her shoulder at us pointedly.

“Who’s this Jesse person?” I asked.

“He’s like the number two guy in town. He was a big football player back in the day, then was in the army and came back to Virden after his tour of duty. He’s a good guy, but you definitely don’t wanna cross him.”

“You’ll meet him soon enough,” she continued. “Look, here’s the registration office. This is as far as I go. I gotta go back up front in case anyone else comes in for the evening. I’ll see you guys around.” She waved goodbye with her free hand as she headed back towards the gate.

* * *

We walked into the registration office and stood at the end of a short line of men and women of various ages. While we waited, the décor reminded me of better days. The building must have been some type of travel agency or something since of all the posters on the walls were of far off destinations and smiling, happy people in bikinis. I tapped Becca on the shoulder and pointed at the picture of the couple on the beach in Aruba. Her eyes crinkled in a smile. In a different lifetime, Aruba is where we had our honeymoon.

Besides the posters, the rest of the past was a distant memory. The thing that stood out the most to me was the four or five men seated at a table in the corner on the same side of the counter as the unregistered people in line. The men were playing cards, but each one seemed like he was capable of violence at any moment. They were all armed with baseball bats and knives, one man even had an axe. Given the handcuffs they also wore on their belts, I assumed that they were what the town was using for police officers. Leaned against one of the walls behind the former travel agents’ desk were several white boards with lists of occupations and the number of people who were currently performing them for the community. I assumed that the boards were placed prominently for travelers to examine in order to quickly determine if their skills were of any value to the residents of Virden.

Unusable computers and monitors were stacked carefully in the back corner in the hopes that the power would one day be restored. In their place on the desks were large notebooks full of lines and lines of handwritten text. As we stood there waiting to be seen, I tried to think what I could possibly offer to the community. It was great that Rebecca would be able to get a job, but I hadn’t been unemployed since I was a kid. My expertise had earned us a lot of money, but what good was that now? We didn’t even really have any form of currency because most of what we had was tied up in stocks and mutual funds. Hell, with the collapse of the government, our power grid and banking system, we were essentially destitute. What was I going to do?

The boards stated plainly that all the non-skilled jobs were taken. Dishwashing at the restaurants? Nope, ten people were already doing that. Trash collection? Four people signed up for that. I mentally scratched my head as I scanned the list. Firemen, police, wait staff, seamstresses, cooks, weapons manufacturing…huh? I didn’t even think about that last one, but two tick marks indicated that some people had. There were five vehicle mechanics listed, but all the vehicles we’d passed on the way down from Chicago were out of fuel and dead beside the road. Without a way to deliver fuel, those guys would be out of a job soon too. I began to get nervous as I thought about the options available to me and what the men with the baseball bats would do if I was told I had to leave town.

Finally, we’d shuffled our way forward enough so that we now stood at the front of the line that continued to form behind us. Another young girl, this one probably twenty-five or so, waved us over. We sat down and waited for her to finalize a few notes about the man whom she had been working with a moment before. A quick glance at the pages revealed that they listed the names of the hopeful residents, what their pre-apocalypse occupation was, what they could offer to the community now and a note section about the candidate’s usefulness. There were also a lot of names with solid lines drawn through them. I mean more than three-quarters of the names on the page.
Crap
, I thought. My palms began to sweat. How the hell was I going to sell myself to this girl so we could stay in Virden for a couple of weeks?

“Alright,” she said. I was startled when she spoke because her mask was large enough that it covered her entire chin and it seemed like she talked without opening her mouth. “Welcome to the safe community of Virden. I’m sure either Sam or Phillip briefed you on the way over about the town’s policy. We don’t allow freeloaders or people who can’t provide for themselves, but if you’re granted residency here, we have plenty of housing available and we even have ration cards for food and other essentials. First off, what are your names?”

“I’m Charles Broussard—Chuck—and this is my wife, Rebecca,” I said as I wiped my palms across my jeans.

“Okay, Chuck and Rebecca,” the girl said as she scribbled our names into her book. “What did you do before we got nuked and the world went to shit?”

“I was a school teacher,” Rebecca blurted out. Clearly she wanted to stay as much as I did, even if it was only for a week or so.

“Oh good, we need school teachers. Excellent.” More scribbles in the book. “And you Chuck, what did you do?”

“Well, I was a financial advisor…” I faltered. The pen stopped scratching.

“Oh,” she said as she looked up from her book at me.

“But I’m a quick learner,” I countered. “I’d be willing to do just about anything for the community.”

“We don’t need anyone with your qualifications Mr. Broussard, but since Rebecca has a skill that we’re desperately in need of, I believe they’ll allow both of you to stay. We always need strong hands on our gathering squads, so I’m sure you’ll fit in with them, that’s where we send the folks who have a connection to the community, but can’t perform other tasks.”

“That means we can stay though, right?” asked Rebecca.

“Yes ma’am, of course
you
can stay. Chuck, do you agree to be a part of the gathering squad?”

I glanced at my wife and shrugged my shoulders. “Yeah, I guess,” I said. “Gathering can’t be all that hard.”

“Yeah, sure,” the woman said. She scribbled the word “Gatherer” beside my name.

She turned and retrieved another ledger from the table behind her and opened it up to the bookmarked page. “Let’s see,” she said as she slid her finger along a hand-written list of addresses. “Just the two of you right?”

“Yes. No little ones for us yet,” Rebecca stated flatly. That had been a source of contention in our marriage for years. She’d wanted to start a family and I still felt like a big kid, playing at life. Now, with the way things were, I’m not sure if I’d ever be ready.

“Okay then, we have a couple of three bedroom homes available—hold on,” she said as she raised an index finger in our direction, then turned to the other woman who was registering a single man beside us. “Hey Polly, is the house on Blair Street cleaned out yet?”

“No, I don’t think so,” she answered back. “That mess is gonna take a while to clean out. If I were Allan, I’d just burn the place to the ground and be done with it.”

“Alright, thanks,” our registrar said to her partner and turned back to us. “Looks like you guys will be moving into 321 East Holden Street. Welcome home. There’s a map of the community in the back and there are several posted throughout town for the new residents.”

“What happened on Blair Street?” I blurted out before my mind caught up to my mouth and told it to shut up.

The girl glanced from one side to the other to see if anyone was listening. Then she began speaking behind her mask where no one could see her lips move, “We had a weirdo living there. He butchered like fifty people before they found out about him and staked him outside the town through both of his hands and feet. He’s been out there for a week and somehow he’s still alive. They say that there’s blood covering every surface of that house and that he was sacrificing people to the devil and then eating the bodies raw.”

She straightened up and said in a louder voice, “Now then, 321 Holden. The notes say that the doors are unlocked. It’s your responsibility to check the building to ensure no unwanted guests are living there. Allan, our town’s mayor, has given all legal tenants the right to evict squatters by any means necessary, including deadly force. The town’s law enforcement officers,” she gestured towards the men at the table, “are available to help you if you need them to.”

She scribbled on a sheet of paper for a moment and then handed it to us along with two necklaces, each with a large washer for a pendant. “Water is still available from the town’s water tower, but its use is restricted to drinking and light bathing only. First time residents are allowed to take a shallow bath to clean the travel grime from their bodies, but after that, it’s all whore-baths with a bucket and washcloth. It’s recommended that you boil the water or decontaminate it somehow before you drink it since the tower is now being refilled by pumps running off generators. We can’t guarantee the cleanliness of the water down in the wells. If you have to use the restroom, flushing toilets are not permitted, so you’ll need to go outside or utilize the town’s outhouses over near the square. Anyone found violating the water policies will be expelled from the community, no questions asked.

“The necklace is your meal card,” she continued. “Show that at any restaurant or food station in town and you can pick up your meal. We serve twice a day: Between six and seven a.m. and between six and seven p.m. Be in line somewhere when it’s time to eat and you’ll be given food and clean water. I’ve written the locations and times for your work call on the sheet of paper, but Chuck, you’ll meet at the Virden town square at seven tomorrow morning. Rebecca, you’ll meet at the elementary school administration office at seven-thirty. Any questions?”

Becca and I looked at each other and each shook our heads. “No, I don’t think so,” I said.

“Okay, make sure you are where you’re supposed to be when you’re supposed to be and everyone will get along fine. Next!” she shouted as she lifted her hand into the air indicating to the people in line that she was ready for another registrant.

After examining the town map we determined that the house on Holden Street was only three blocks away. As we exited the building we saw that it was fully dark now and the rain had ended, but the puddles of poisonous goo left over from the deluge remained in the street. We would need to take care to avoid them so we didn’t get a chemical burn.

“Hey babe, can you get the flashlight out of my pack? Center pocket,” I said as I turned away from Rebecca and crouched in front of her so she could easily access my backpack.

I heard the Velcro tabs separate and felt the gentle tug against my shoulders as she buried her hands into the pack looking for the light. “Got it,” she said with a slap to my back. I took that as a signal to stand up and she handed me the flashlight.

“Thanks. Let’s find this house so we can turn in for the night,” I said as I powered on the light. “One of the first things we need to find is a supply of batteries for the flashlight. I’ve also been thinking about a few things we’ll need for our trip south.”

“Jesus, Chuck! We haven’t even gotten a chance to take our shoes off in our new home and you’re already talking about leaving? What is wrong with this place? It’s safe. The people are nice. We have jobs. I—”

I turned to her and held my hands up in defense. “Whoa,” I said. “Alright, you’re right. I’m sorry. We should check things out and take a few days like we agreed. I was just talking, saying it’s best to be prepared, that’s all.”

“Fine. I’m tired, let’s just find our house and get inside so I can try to clean up and get some sleep.” I hadn’t been married to this woman for almost a decade without knowing how to sidestep an argument and defuse situations rapidly.

“Sounds good to me,” I said as I lit up the nearest street sign with the flashlight. “Shit. I can’t see the sign without my glasses. Can you see what it says?”