Chapter Four: The Return
Enrique and Franco hurried towards their car near the bus, the sound of the slamming hatch door still fresh in their ears. Their HAZMAT suits rustled as they ran towards the light-brown station wagon. It was hard to breathe in the face masks, but they could see and smell immediately how bad the air was. It had only been a week since the bombs fell, and the ashen world around them was still burning, the sharp taste of smoke coating the backs of their throats. The car doors slammed shut on either side of them and they sat for a moment, in a daze as they stared out at the world through the dirty windows.
"Enrique? Where's Franco?" Sarah was leading him down the corridor towards the cleaning room, her voice muffled behind her mask. The others were standing well away from the doorway, mindful of the possible contamination that he might be trailing inside.
The world around them was dark, blanketed under a vast cloud of smoke and soot. In every direction, the horizon glowed a dull yellow as distant wildfires blazed and a thick, smoky haze filled the air around them. Solid black plumes of smoke stretched for miles like a wall of immense, cragged cliffs from the directions of the cities to the north. Los Angeles was still burning. In the opposite direction, the sky looked clearer, and they were hopeful about the condition of La Paz—the city where they were headed to.
Enrique's clothes were thrown into the incinerator and he could hear the warm water filling the bath. His body was covered in dark blue bruises around his stomach and ribs, and he had a recently healed cut on his side. He was washed and cleaned, his cuts stinging against the hot water, then he was dressed in new clothes. Sarah had gone back out to the corridor and was now mopping the floor with a strong smelling cleaning agent. He could hear his wife's voice calling out to him from the other room, just behind the door. He couldn't quite answer back. He didn't have the strength.
The engine started reluctantly and the headlight beams were stifled by particles of dust and ash floating in the air. They drove in silence towards the main road and headed south, the vast dark cloud of smoke in the sky above them feeling like a great, heavy ceiling that could collapse at any moment. They drove for hours down the empty road, watching the signs to La Paz as they counted down the kilometres. It would be a sixteen hour drive to get there. The box of preserved food in the back seat would last them at least a week, and the fuel containers in the back would ensure that they made it there. The trip back was another matter.
At Sarah's word, the metal door of the radio room opened, and Jolanda rushed out towards her husband, who tried to focus on her face. He was thin and pale. Sarah knew what it meant as soon as she first saw him. But now that he was washed and cleaned he was no longer contagious.
The highway was empty. Day and night were one in the same, and time had less and less meaning. They occasionally turned on the radio, knowing that if there was anything to hear, they would have heard it in the bunker. They tuned through the void of dead air before turning it off again. The sound reminded him of being stuck in that living tomb, waiting for something—anything—to happen. They followed the road south to the city, constantly aware of the plumes of smoke that they were driving towards. They already knew what they would find. It was now just a matter of inspecting the damage.
He was weak, tired, and dizzy. As soon as the others saw him through the doorway, they knew something was very wrong with him. He needed help to stand and he couldn't focus on any of them properly. Perhaps a warm meal and bed rest would do him some good.
The sun was a dull ball of light trying to force its way through the thick clouds of smoke. It made its way lower towards the ground as the evening wore on. The sound of their struggling station wagon was the only thing to be heard as they passed through the small truck stop towns. They thought they could see movement from the dark windows as they drove past, but there was no time to check for any survivors here.
The porridge he had eaten came back up that night, tinged with red. Jolanda was scared. The children didn't understand. Juanita had tears on her cheeks and was pleading that he be okay. Like the others, John was glad to see him back, but he was prepared for what his return might mean. Sarah knew this would happen, though she felt no less pity for him. It was a terrible way to go. It was too slow. Too drawn out. Through all of this, they kept asking, "where's Franco?"
The sun had set. The world was black, save for the yellow glow beyond the horizon in nearly all directions. The signs told them that they were near. The fuel was getting low, a problem that Enrique hadn't fully prepared for as he kept the revs low. There would be other cars, he thought to himself. There would be plenty of other cars.
Sleep came easily. He would recover the strength that he had lost on his journey back to them, and he would tell them what had happened. He would tell them why he came back alone when they had expected them both to return with his parents.
The city of La Paz was gone. Against their better judgement, the two of them explored the crumbled ruins around the outer edges of the vast crater, placing their trust in the thin HAZMAT suits that they were wearing. Everything was still burning. Everything was destroyed. Ash floated in the dark air and there was nobody left to ask what had happened. Enrique felt only despair. Sarah was right. He should have taken her more seriously. He should have saved his parents. There had been room for them. He looked around and knew that there was nobody coming. No aid, local or foreign, was coming. There was nobody left to care.
They helped him stand the next morning. His strength had not properly returned. His mind was better, but his body was failing. They fed him water and porridge and cleaned him with a warm cloth. There were more blood stains on his sheets than there were last night.
They now had time to spare—there was no longer any urgency to go anywhere. Now, they sought out survivors. The crumbling buildings that remained standing further out loomed over them, seeming to watch them from their dark windows and doorways. Little by little, they collected fuel from the various vehicles intact enough to hold some, and slowly made their way back.
"Enrique, where's Franco?" pleaded Sarah. "What happened to your parents?"
The sound of their station wagon attracted pockets of survivors as they explored the ruins of the outer city. They had supplies to last them for a while. They were prepared. The survivors all told the same story—after the initial blasts in the U.S., black, triangular planes were seen flying over Mexico. They were quiet. One of them flew over La Paz and dropped a single bomb. It was a nuke, smaller than the others, but enough to decimate the population in an instant. All of these people were becoming sick from the dust. They were desperate and their eyes were lingering too long on the station wagon, noticing too much how well prepared the two travellers were.
Rest. He needed more rest. The trip had taken its toll on him and he just needed more time to recover. He didn't want to tell them. Didn't want to replace their worry with grief. But he knew that he had to.
It was time to head back. Though they hadn't seen any other working vehicles as the blasts had rendered the electronics useless, they kept an eye on the mirrors to make sure they weren't being followed as they ventured north again. He thought he could see a rippling shape on the road behind him against the wildfires. He accelerated and looked ahead to the flat landscape, knowing that there would be nowhere to hide.
The nausea and dizziness were worse the next day. They fed him and cleaned him, but medically, there was only so much the others could do. He hated it in the bunker. He didn't want to stay underground like vermin. He wanted to spend the last of his days on the surface, scorched as it may be. He wanted to go out his own way.
He hadn't seen the vehicle behind them for some time, but he knew it was there, just out of view. The sun was setting again, making the permanently dark sky even darker as their fuel finally ran out. They coasted their now useless vehicle as far as they could, pulling off to the side. There was nowhere to hide it. The continued on foot with a few fuel cans, knowing that the next small town wasn't too far ahead. Lightly against their suits and safety glasses, the black rain began to fall.
His family protested. It was too dangerous to go out there. The air was too polluted, and his lungs wouldn't be able to handle it. He had been coughing up more blood each day. His very bones hurt. His stomach hurt, and his chest hurt when he breathed too deeply. That was all that he was willing to say to them for now.
It had been night for some time as they approached the small town. It was more of a truck stop service station with a few houses built around it. Every building was dark, though they were sure that there were people hidden just behind the windows. A few cars were parked nearby. As they carefully siphoned the fuel from a car that was parked in the driveway of one of the houses, they thought of the car that had been following them. It should have passed them by now. They must have found their station wagon. Fuel cans now full, and under the cover of the black rain, the two of them crept away back down the dark highway.
"Where's Franco? Is he hurt somewhere? Is he with your parents? What happened to La Paz?"
Something was wrong with their car when they returned. It had been broken into, the windows smashed, and their food, weapons, and other supplies were gone. The people who were following them had gotten what they wanted. Perhaps it was better this way. They still had their health. They emptied the fuel into the tank and started the engine. The needle of the gauge had barely lifted. They would have to return to that small town and repeat the process.
"Enrique," pleaded Jolanda. "Where is our son? Tell me!"
It was impossible to approach silently. The loud rattling of the old station wagon was now obvious to them through the broken windows as they crawled to a halt in front of the service station. All of the buildings were still dark. They crept from vehicle to vehicle, siphoning fuel from each one and filling their car little by little. It was a slow process, the gravel crunching beneath their feet and the suits rustling as they crept up the next driveway. The rain had stopped and their movements were no longer masked. They paused. They thought they heard movement from the nearby house.
Sarah knew that he didn't have long. He was bleeding quite badly now and rather than washing his clothes, she opted to incinerate the particularly dirty ones.
The front door creaked open and they hid behind the car they were siphoning as the sound of footsteps in the fresh mud moved nearby. They could see the bright circle of a flashlight beam as it swept across the ground. They saw it stop on their station wagon. The beam shrank as the footsteps moved towards it, and the stranger inspected the vehicle closely, knowing that it wasn't any of theirs. After a moment, the beam swept back and forth over the other vehicles, and the footsteps quickened as they moved towards their hiding place.
He was ready to tell them. He couldn't put it off any longer.
They were trapped. Three more men had come out, calling to each other about the station wagon with the smashed windows that wasn't there before. The men were now checking the cars, noticing the smell of fuel in the air. Enrique and Franco would be found. The gravel around them crunched with circling, hurried footsteps. A beam of light glared in their eyes and the air filled with shouts near and far. They had been found.
Everyone in the bunker was silent. They knew what he was going to say. His family were crowded around him as he lay in his bed. He looked over them and his eyes found his wife's.
They ran towards the highway, away from the shouts and gunfire. Enrique tripped in the darkness and hit the bitumen hard, sprawling out on the road, his HAZMAT suit tearing. Rushed footsteps behind him were followed by crushing blows to his ribs as steel-capped boots kicked repeatedly into him. He curled into the foetal position, coughing up blood that filled his mask, feeling the contaminated mud seeping into his suit and spreading on his wounds. Shouts from a familiar voice. Franco had tackled the man and was trying to fend him off, his mask coming off in the struggle. It ended with a flash which briefly illuminated Franco's face as a handgun fired point-blank into his head. He fell with a thud, a puddle of deep red blood forming quickly on the ground around him from his suddenly blank face.
Everyone in the bunker knew already, but they had to hear it from him. His eyes began to well with tears.
Enrique screamed and wrestled the gun out of the man's hand as the others stood in shock at how young the dead boy suddenly looked. He shot the man in the chest and he fell down, bleeding. Enrique then stood and raised the handgun at the other men, aiming at them one by one as he stepped backwards into the darkness. One of them kept his rifle pointed at him but he didn't fire. The air was silent. In less than two weeks since the bombs fell, people who would have smiled at each other as they went about their day were now staring at each other down their gun barrels. They had all displayed the fragile pretence of polite human civilisation.
Enrique told them what had happened. La Paz was destroyed, just as Sarah had said it would be. Nobody had been prepared, and now, anybody who was left was desperate and starving. Franco, his oldest son, barely seventeen, had died protecting him. He spared them the details of how on his slow journey back, he had left a trail of spilled blood as he stopped to scavenge every dwelling for food and medicine, and he made sure that he would not be followed. At the dawn of the new, empty world, only rage remained. He would take it with him to the grave.
