Earthfall (Novella): The Remains of Yesterday by Stephen Knight

Author:Stephen Knight
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Tags: Post-Apocalyptic | Dystopian
Published: 2018-03-26T04:00:00+00:00

4

MULLIGAN LED THE way toward the lopsided house, his advance straight and unwavering. He carried with him a shovel and three plastic body bags. He realized there was a chance there might be more bodies in the structure, but he was only interested in three. Anyone else who might have expired inside the residence had come in after the nuclear detonation and were not his concern. He was aware that Benchley was right behind him, and wouldn’t have been surprised if the Old Man was marching in step with him. Mulligan was of two minds about the unexpected company. He had intended this to be a solo venture, but it was somehow fitting that Benchley attended; he knew the general had lost his son and grandkids in San Francisco. He would never be able to lay them to rest, so perhaps the chance to help Mulligan finally complete his last mission was a reasonable trade-off. No matter what his motives were, Mulligan was suddenly grateful for the companionship.

The house was a mess. All the glass had been blasted inward, and the kitchen floor was covered with it, including shards from the storm door that had apparently offered only a token defense against the shockwave that had hammered the dwelling. The wallpaper, what little of it remained, was blackened and scored by the intense heat the nearby nuclear blast had generated. The kitchen table and its attendant chairs had been flung against the far wall with enough force to perforate the sagging drywall. Even the refrigerator door hung open, canted at a crazy angle. Along with the sharp pieces of glass, the floor was coated with a generous amount of dust. There were even dead cockroaches there, their desiccated husks plainly visible beneath the patina of chalk-like dust.

“Sir, watch out for the glass,” Mulligan said. The voice emitter in his facemask augmented his words, so that they were audible even while he wore the full-face component.

“Roger that. You do the same,” Benchley responded.

Mulligan pressed on through the kitchen, walking slowly, choosing his steps carefully. He regarded the shattered remains of the table from behind his mask’s visor. He remembered many a happy meal at that table. Now, it was just a collection of splintered wood. A fitting reflection of his history.

The living room was in a similar state of disrepair. The furnishings had been flung about, pillows slightly charred. All the art on the walls had been ripped down, torn right off their mounts. The expensive 3D television the girls had adored was cracked and crazed, its sensitive electronics fried by the electromagnetic pulse that had arrived a microsecond after the nuke had detonated. The windows had been blown out, and only ragged curtains remained, fluttering in the cold breeze. There was a credenza against the wall opposite the kitchen. In his memory, it had been the resting place of a battalion of framed photos—the Mulligans when they were first married, the birth of Chastity, and then Erica. He and Tess with Tess’s parents in Ohio, the two of them and the girls with his folks down in Texas.

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