From the Indie Side (33 page)

LOCAL CHIEF OF NEUROSURGERY LOSES WIFE WEEKS AFTER
VEHICULAR ACCIDENT

Lanie Karvan, wife of the esteemed Dr. Karvan, Chief of
Neurosurgery at the Royal General Hospital, was found dead in their
home, just weeks after being injured in a vehicular accident on the
old loop road by the school. The cause of death has been officially
recorded as a brain hemorrhage, believed to be linked to the head
injuries sustained in the accident. Mrs. Karvan is survived by her
husband and two children.

Adding the
clipping to his folder, Thomas looked up as Leila entered the room
and flung two laminated ID badges on his desk. His words came out
flat and quietly. “We could have told her, you know. She would have
chosen differently.”

Thomas’s father
picked up the badges and smiled at the pictures of his grandsons.
His reply was both mild and matter-of-fact. “She didn’t pass the
test.”

I’ve been a book nerd from the moment I first
learned to read. Some of my earliest memories involve begging my
mother to take me back to the library for the third or even fourth
time in a week. I love disappearing into another world for a few
hours, and I read prolifically—at least four novels a week, having
been blessed with the ability to speed-read—though it can be a
curse for my bank balance, and one of the many reasons I took on
professional book reviewing. I prefer a good blockbuster-style
novel over literary fiction any day, with very few exceptions, and
I’ve always admired Jackie Collins for her stance that while her
writing could never be considered a work of art, she puts bums on
seats and entertains. This has always been my goal as a writer as
well.

I grew up to work in the government sector,
but when my eldest son was born I was inspired to pick up a pen and
follow my dreams of becoming a writer. Being as obsessed with
magazines, newspapers and websites as I am books (I’d read a cereal
box if it were all that was available), I started my writing career
as a freelance journalist. Within a year of starting I had my work
published in a number of high-profile Australian magazines, and
since then I’ve had hundreds of articles published across the
globe.

My first foray into sharing my fiction
actually took place in high school, when I was sufficiently proud
of a dark piece I’d written to share it with my English teacher. I
must have got the desperation of the main character and the dark
and gloomy mood across because next thing I knew I was sitting in
the headmaster’s office with my parents and my English teacher—who
had believed my story to be a cry for help. After that, I kept
future tales within the safety of my many notebooks.

Having recently spent a lot of time sharing a
writing space with Perth-based indie writer Susan May, I decided it
was time to once again seek an audience for my darker works. “The
Greater Good” is my first published short story, and I’m already
working on the next part in the tale, due out in March 2014.

You can find out more about me and keep up to
date with my future works at
www.melhearse.com
.

Perspective is a funny thing. Sometimes
we get the feeling we’ve finally got a handle on things. We’ve seen
the world through a particular lens awhile and, even if that lens
is a relatively new one for us, we start to thinking maybe we’ve
got it all figured out.

But no single story could encapsulate
the whole of what transpired after the collapse of the
technological society. No one tale could make sense of a world
turned upside down. Every story, in every place, was wholly
different—unique to the people living in it. Sometimes all we get
are snippets, vignettes, minor episodes, rather than epic tales.
One such vignette took place in the Sangre de Christo Mountains of
New Mexico.

Phillip looked through
the scope and
watched as the three gunmen cleared the edge of the burned-out
pickup truck and peered cautiously up the mountainside.

I could kill them now,
Phillip
thought,
but I’d prefer they just go on home.

Even as a warrior, trained to fight and ready
to kill, he still had the ready understanding that death was
permanent, and should be avoided if possible. He didn’t like to
kill, and he certainly didn’t want to.

The morning was cool and brisk, and a breeze
knifed upwards from the distant valley and occasionally blew little
fits of snow off the roof, which then swirled around and reflected
the bright sunlight in shiny little bursts. Phillip was sure that
no bluer sky had ever appeared before the eyes of men than this New
Mexico sky offered on this day. Drips of pure water formed along
the bottoms of the icicles that clung doggedly to the steel roofing
of the lodge and glistened in their primitive beauty.

From here it was hard to tell that the world
was burning.

He heard the man next to him shift his
weight. “Six hundred and fifty yards to black hat.”

Phillip turned the knob on the scope two
clicks to adjust for elevation. “Six-fifty to black hat,
check.”

His spotter seemed concerned. “The wind is
swirling here, man… I don’t know what to make of it down
there.”

“I’ve got it.”

“What do you think, Phil?” the man said. The
spotter’s British accent emphasized the word
think
.

“I don’t think they have any intention of
trying again,” Phillip replied. “I bet they’ve had enough. They
just don’t know what to do now.”

Please go on home, boys,
Phillip
thought.

The three gunmen continued to stare up the
mountain, but made no attempt to move forward. They alternated
between squinting up into the distance and glaring at one another.
After a few minutes, they crept slowly back down the mountain and
disappeared around the bend in the private drive.

“That’s what I thought,” Phillip said.

The Englishman lowered his spotting scope.
“Good, I’m tired of mucking around with these wankers.”

“Give peace a chance,” Phillip said with a
smile. It was a mantra the four friends had shared every single day
since the collapse. It had originated when Goffrey Byrd, their
host, had spit out the words as a challenge to what he saw as
Phillip’s warmongering opinions. All four of the men had broken out
into uncontrollable laughter, and the phrase had since become a
rallying cry. It didn’t even really mean what it said anymore, at
least not to the four friends who were defending their redoubt in
the mountains. Now it meant “We’re all in this together, so people
should just quit being jerks.” Or something like that.

“Give peace a chance,” Nigel repeated. “Just
give it a chance, you wankers!” he shouted down the mountain.

The three remaining assailants, who’d just
abandoned their evident intention to attack again, were members of
an armed raiding group—a group which had once been quite a bit
larger than it was now. Phillip’s team had successfully thinned the
attacking herd, and the three survivors had—wisely—done a quick
cost-benefit analysis and determined that the cache of guns and
ammo they were trying to steal would be useless to them if they
were dead.

Obviously the gang had heard somewhere that
Goffrey Byrd kept guns—
lots
of guns—and ammo in his mountain
lodge.
Guns and ammo
.
The currency of the
post-apocalypse.
Most brigands were seeking arms and bullets,
because with them you could get the other needed things.

In each of the three previous attacks by the
gang, the four men defending Goffrey’s home had been able to repel
the attack without taking any losses. Phillip was convinced the
bandits wouldn’t try again, but you never know what men will do
when they’re hungry, frantic, covetous, or just plain crazy.

* *
*

Five weeks after the collapse, things were
starting to settle in to a bit of a routine on Goffrey’s
mountaintop, but there was always the threat of an assault—it could
happen at any time. Phillip didn’t allow anyone to get complacent
or lazy.

The four companions were in a good location
to hold fast against attacks. Prior to the end of the world,
Goffrey Byrd (he didn’t care how you pronounced it, but the “G” was
supposed to be a hard one) was a successful artist selling his
paintings and sculptures for exorbitant prices to flatland tourists
in Taos and Santa Fe galleries. Things had been going so well for
him, and for so long, that he’d been able to afford the most remote
home and studio he could find. He was no longer a struggling
artist. People came from all over to buy his work, and that had
translated into some pretty substantial creature comforts.

A single road ran through the gap between
Angel Fire and Taos, and access was difficult, even by vehicle, for
much of the year. In the winter, all travel was sketchy at best.
The Byrd Studio was a mile up a private road, set on a high ridge,
and backed up to the edge of a sheer cliff—with a drop of over two
hundred feet down to a rocky valley below. The buildings in the
little homestead couldn’t be approached from rear or the side: the
only way to get to the studio was from the front. This made the
site eminently defendable, but—and this was the only problem—if
anyone ever did succeed in reaching the place, there was nowhere to
hide and no escape route. Thus far, however, the four men had
managed a very successful defense, and there were a lot of bodies
down at the bottom of that road to prove it.

Months ago, before this most recent spate of
attacks, there’d been two unsuccessful attempts to rush the place
using vehicles. Since then, all had been quiet—a peaceful lull
during which Phillip took care not to allow his friends to descend
into complacency—until just days ago, when this latest criminal
gang had attempted their own vehicular assault. All of these
attempts had been thwarted thanks to carefully placed directional
claymores crafted from common chemicals found in the studio of any
artist—especially one who worked in sculpture, as Goffrey did. Bomb
efficiency and yield had been boosted with the addition of ample
amounts of saltpeter that Phillip and his friends had made by
distilling their own urine.

There was another important factor to their
success that the attacking parties might have done well to know.
Three of the four men were highly trained ex-military specialists.
Phillip’s best friend and fellow Texan, Rob Fosse, had, like
himself, received extensive Special Forces training early in his
military career before moving into Army Intelligence. Nigel Kerr
was an ex-SAS officer who’d fought alongside both Rob and Phillip
in Afghanistan. All three had left the military after becoming
disillusioned (for many of the same reasons) and they were all now
happy to be civilians.

Ostensibly, the three friends had been “on
vacation” in the mountains of New Mexico. To the outside world, it
was a skiing holiday; but in reality, even though skiing was indeed
on the agenda, Phillip and Rob were in New Mexico to recruit Nigel
into the Central Texas Militia, a group of resistance fighters that
Phillip had assembled to face the reality of what he’d known was
coming—and what had since come to pass.

Goffrey Byrd was a different story
altogether. Finding the artist and bunkering down in his
mountaintop lodge had been the result of providence or fortune, not
intent.

* *
*

The three war buddies had met Goffrey at one
of his studios in Taos as they were window-shopping in the “Old
Town” area of the city not long before the collapse. Goffrey Byrd
was one of those characters that was unique and opinionated and
willing to talk at the drop of a hat. Unlike many modern Americans,
though, his political and religious opinions were not
all
that he was, and he was capable of discussing those topics
lightheartedly and with gusto, without forgetting that his debate
opponents were also human beings and not automatically villainous
just because they disagreed with him. Thus a sharp and humorous—but
respectful—political disagreement between Goffrey, a self-avowed
socialist and “free thinker,” and Phillip, who was fairly
libertarian in his worldview, had led first to a cup of coffee at
the World Cup coffee shop, and then to an invitation to travel up
to Goffrey’s homestead and studio in the Carson National Forest
just east of Taos.

On a whim, Phillip, Rob, and Nigel rented
horses down in the valley for the trip up to Goffrey’s mountain
hideout, and the leisurely, day-long ride up the mountainside on
snow-covered roads was a nature-lover’s dream. By evening the four
men were gathered comfortably in Goffrey’s cozy lodge, enjoying a
few drinks, debating earnestly (especially Phillip and Goffrey, who
seemed to be political opposites), and swapping stories of their
lives and travels.