The Darkest Day by Robert J. Walker

Author:Robert J. Walker [Walker, Robert J.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2020-08-31T04:00:00+00:00

18

After driving for around half an hour, everyone had the chance to wind down from the madness they had just escaped from. Mary made good progress, driving at high speed along the shoulder of the freeway, where there was a clear and open path, unobstructed by abandoned cars. But when they got off the highway and began to enter mountain territory, the roads started clearing up, with fewer stopped vehicles blocking their path.

The last of the day’s light was shining on the city in the distance behind them, and the sight they saw was a surreal and nightmarish one. Huge fires burned through the town, and the horizon was black with smoke. They were too far away to hear any explosions or gunfire, but they could see bright flashes lighting up the gloom all over the city. The black-clad terrorists and the US Army were still fighting fiercely in the streets, it seemed. Everyone in the vehicle was thankful that they had escaped the madness. It would surely be hell on earth in the city throughout the coming night.

James finally spoke, breaking the silence. “Where exactly are we going, Aunt Mary? I mean, you told me you knew of a safe place deep in the mountains, but you didn’t even tell me exactly what kind of place it was.”

“It’s a really simple place,” Mary answered.

James’s question had prompted a flood of memories of a completely different life, one so alien to the one she had lived in the city that it almost felt unreal as if it had never happened.

“Life’s very different there. Don’t expect much. It’s little more than a log cabin; I’m talking really basic stuff. It’s very rustic, and there’s nothing but the bare necessities, but in times like these, we should be thankful that we’ve got a place to go to where we actually do have access to those bare necessities. In a few days all the water in the city is gonna run out, and then what are people going to do? Drink the water from the polluted river? They’d be better off draining car radiators and drinking that. Make no mistake, as crude and simple as the place we’re going is, we’ll be better off than anyone stuck in that hellhole back there.”

“That’s all good, Mom,” Anna said, “but you didn’t really answer James’s question. What is this place? A camp, a farm, a hunting shack? Does anyone live there? Is it your place, like, some sort of second home you never told me about?”

Mary sighed. She had never told her daughter—or anyone in her post-runaway life, really—about the place she’d grown up, or her father, who was the only living member of her family. The memories had always been too painful, not because of any abuse or trauma she had suffered as a child, but rather because of her own guilt at the pain, she’d caused by the selfish act of running away. Mary had been a strong-willed and stubborn teen and had butted heads one too many times with her father over the way he chose to live.

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