Chapter Two:
The Unrelenting Cycle
From Aftermath to genesis, everything began to take meaning, even though it made no sense at the time.
I had regained the slightest control. The water was long gone and I had almost forgotten about the void that once periled my blue sky. An entire subsistence was disintegrating, but somehow for some reason the threat all stopped.
As the world rebalanced itself, the people on it tried to tip it once again. Looting and reckless violence, the kind that only the end of the world could bring ensued. Thinking that this state was perhaps just the eye of the storm, they all seemed credible in their actions. I waited, and I watched. Choosing the path of the quite observer, I let what seemed like days pass as my mind wandered aimlessly. As the veracity of our plight, my plight slowly struck me, my isolation from my fellow man’s rage simultaneously seized some of the authenticity away from them.
Time is simply a teaspoon of the ocean in which we all are plankton, floating helplessly along the tide. But to try, to chance. An endless struggle awaits, with only a purpose short of success. Vain. Vain it seems.
Nature took its course, and a rudimentary society formed out of the chaos and ash. A colleague of mine, Ryan, became a close friend as we weathered the time together and eventually stumbled upon an abandoned grocery market. It had a huge parking lot, and a high brink wall that surrounding the cement desert. It had not been looted because it was barely visible from the street. Only the local community had used it and those who knew of it, or at least those of them falling victim to the virus of bedlam and not the mercy of demise were discouraged by the heavily locked front and back doors.
Ryan and I managed to get onto the roof. It took a bit of crude ingenuity as he stood on a rusty dumpster and I stood upon his shoulders to reach the top but in our own corny way we proved the benefits of collaboration. The methodology was in no way safe, but safety was all together disregarded for the hope of finding basic necessities.
Someone threw a refugee child into a chocolate factory, and I slid down an air vent into a wonderland of preserved foods.
After we were both inside, we had a monopoly on all the food. I suggested we keep it a secret for as long as we could, but Ryan said that wouldn’t be at all fair, and once the secret got out we would be marked men. We planned to ration out food to those still living with civility. Civility was to be judged loosely. In other words, if you didn’t carry guns or knives or intend to attack the store then we would help you out. Surprisingly it worked great.
We started giving food to those we knew still alive. Handing out the perishable foods first and then moving on to the canned and packaged foods, Ryan and I were pretty well organized for what we had. They, our dependents, then relayed the message to trusted others and for a while we had our own little working community. Surviving of this one grocery store, everything was moving smoothly until one morning.
The food isles and back storage room had enough food to last us for more time than we really needed. The food in there would only be done when we ourselves were. I woke up at about eight, although I never remembered going to sleep. A quick walk around the store to check for anything unusual had become my morning routine. There had been a growing emergence of gangs in the area. Two especially well supplied gangs arose as rivals. I liked to call the two groups the punks and the blondes, because I never could remember the tribal names they dubbed upon themselves.
The mind seeks to be recognized, but its techniques often produce masks which only hinder its attempts. A mask can not be respected, it is merely the false spectacle of a failing self.
The two gangs were relatively the same in numbers and in the threat they posed if our compound was ever discovered. They both were well stocked in guns, knives, and whatever other sharp and deadly objects they could muster. The only real difference was the look, and the fact that each despised the opposing group.
The punks wore black leather and rags with spikes and collars. Their hair was often wild colors and sometimes spiked as well. They drove stripped down Volkswagen beetles and other dune buggy looking contraptions. Each vehicle had been customized with pieces of scrap metal welded on for uses such as shielding, ramming, and even intimidating.
On the other hand, the blondes only traveled in suits and sports cars. Ryan and I would make jokes about how their hideout must be in an abandoned Men’s Wharehouse or three day suit broker.
“What color tie should I wear today?” Ryan would jest.
In reality the existence and everyday happenings of the gangs was not so funny. Our humor was a mask in itself. If we didn't laugh we probably would be crying or shaking. It was similar to what I imagined all out war to be. However the characters, or should I say armies were wearing very interesting costumes.
Admittedly I had picked a side to secretly root for. I had the last remaining twinkie in the store, possible the last one on earth, bet on the fact that the blondes would win out in the end. Ryan took the punks. I supposed it was possible that there feud was one of those never-ending rivalries like old fashion street gangs. But things were sped up severely by the fact that there were no limitations. No cops, no army, nothing to stop every member of every gang from killing each other within a few weeks. On a good day, a few would die where we could see them. On a bad day, hundreds would be left dying only a few blocks away and no-one could really do anything for them. If you tried to help the wounded you would likely be shot trying.
It was almost nine now, and it had just occurred to me that I had not even attempted to rescue or at least ascertain the fate of my friends and loved ones outside of my little community. There was my girlfriend Sara, my brother Ian, and a few others I hoped to find with my new found plan. From the start I knew it may be the stupidest thing I had ever done, but then I thought about all the time wasted and memories I had from before the apocalypse and I decided it was probably only in the top ten if not top twenty dumbest things I had ever done.
Ryan and I would leave the compound well secured and under the watch of one of our most trusted friends. Ryan had taught me to hot wire a car in our spare time, so we were able to commandeer an old chevy from the parking lot.
The mind is fickle when we ask of it to guide us.
I checked the outside of the gates to make sure nobody saw us leaving. The coast was clear after a punk wagon flew by, thankfully not noticing my head protruding from the hedge. I decided first to return to my house where I had first opened my eyes to this twisted world. The floor was wet, and all the furniture had floated to one side of the room when the water had covered the house. Other than a mutilated TV and Kitchen the only other aspect of the house that wasn’t relative intact was the roof. From the first floor I could see rays of light protruding from massive holes in the crumbling house fedora.
I checked each room quickly, but somehow I already knew that I wasn’t going to find anything or anyone.
Only when we are free from realities grasp does the mind choose to place upon us its own limitations.
After I had made my rounds I wanted to leave. I hate nostalgia. Even in this post-apocalyptic vision I spared no time for it. Longing for the past is as futile a desire as hoping for the future had become. Eventually even the deepest holes in the sand are smoothed by the caress of the persistent tide.
It took us forty-five minutes to get to Sara’s house. The trip used to take fifteen minutes. However, we were forced to take surface streets, cautiously approaching every intersection in fear of getting tangled with some unpleasant blondes, punks, or both. The freeways were out of the question. Rumor had spread that the concrete monsters and tall tentacles extending from them had become key strategic points in the war for dominance. Whichever gang controlled the roads above controlled quick access to every part of the city. Needless to say, the punks and blondes had their hands full protecting their claims from smaller growing groups. Nevertheless it was said that the blondes and punks still maintained control over most major freeways and often fought for the most valuable points such as freeway crossings which constantly changed hands. These roads were a battlefield and castle to whomever had the foolish corpulence to rule them.
We pulled up to the one story cottage style home I had visited many times before. It looked empty, and even more torn up than the stucco creation I once called home. Ryan waited in the car. He would circle the block to avoid being ambushed until he saw me waiting. I went around back. Her car was in the driveway but still I saw no signs of her. I knocked on the back door. No response came. I slowly pushed the screen door from the back yard open. In my head I knew going into the house unarmed and alone was not the smartest idea. At the compound we had heard stories of people looking for their loved ones, only to find savage squatters held up inside. Each home had become a fort, and rarely did the owner hold their own thrown.
“Hello?” I timidly announced my presence. A humble jester requesting the kings audience, pray the queen is present and a king not yet crown. I heard a creek in the floorboards from another room. It was quiet so I assumed it was just my own doing. “I’m just looking for my girlfriend, nothing more.”, humans are perhaps the most hilarious when they are not sure if their actions have an audience. To me, if someone was indeed present they would hear my warning and in theory tell me to leave; if not, then at least no one would be around to hear me whispering to myself in the shadows of this abandoned home. I laughed under my breath, the first time I had done so without Ryan instigating it in a long while. Even as I suppressed the thought I could hear the nervously shaking in my subtle deride.
The mind never forgets. Monster from our childhoods are our secret demons in the dark. Age holds no bearing in thoughts unrestrained.
I heard another creek from within the bedroom. This time it couldn’t have possibly been me for I had not moved. Please tell me I did not miss the coronation? I beseech you, for my sake and for hers. I slowly backed away, when suddenly the creeks became distinct footsteps which rapidly increase in frequency. Whatever it was, it was charging me, and only a slightly cracked door stood between it and me. I would have run but I froze, once again my legs felt bound. From genesis to aftermath, only a fool would leave the garden’s locked gate. Eden was dream, not to last. No dreams ever do.
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