Authors: James Hunt,Roger Hayden
“What the hell is going on here?” Paul said, walking out of the darkness.
“Speak of the devil,” Rob said.
“They gunned down a group of unarmed Seventh Order members,” Jordan said.
Paul narrowed his eyes toward Rob. “Are you kidding me? Those men did not deserve that.”
“Paul, I’ll tell you the same thing I told your friend here. You can take it or leave it. If our ways are a little too harsh for you, maybe you two need to hit the road.”
Jordan stepped in and pointed his finger at Rob and Carlie. “I don’t want to see either of you shoot another unarmed person again.”
“Or what?” Rob asked.
“Just don’t do it,” Jordan said.
“Maybe he’s right. Maybe we just need to go,” Paul said.
“No one is going anywhere,” Melvin said, approaching them with Sister Bonnie in tow with her hands tied behind her back with a small piece of rope.
“Holy shit,” Rob said as his eyes lit up. “We got her. We actually got her.”
Sister Bonnie looked at the mutilated bodies of the men Rob and Carlie had just shot.
“So who’s in the mood for a public execution?” Rob asked with a laugh.
The surviving members of New Haven all gathered in the town park to observe what was going on. Their numbers totaled around twenty. No one had a clear idea yet of who had lived or survived. Melvin held Sister Bonnie at gunpoint in front of the crowd as Rob led the charge to have her executed, though Melvin hadn’t made up his mind yet. Paul and Jordan stood to the side hoping they could influence the people otherwise. Maybe they hadn’t spent enough time with the townspeople to feel the real devastation of loss. They had
fought alongside them to protect the town, which, they felt, entitled them to voice their opinion.
“Kill her!” a man shouted from their circle.
“Justice for New Haven!” a woman cheered.
Rob looked to Melvin. “You know what to do, man. And if you don’t do it, I will.”
Melvin held the barrel of his gun to the back of Sister Bonnie’s head. She closed her eyes as she felt its hot metal press against her skull. The cheers from the circle of residents grew louder. They salivated in anticipation. Melvin hesitated.
“Do it,” Rob commanded.
Melvin put his finger to the trigger.
“What in the fuck are you waiting for? Shoot her.”
A force within him drove Paul to intervene. He pushed past Jordan and the circle that had formed and walked up to Melvin.
“
Don’t
do it, Melvin. I’m warning you.”
Everyone went silent with bewilderment to Paul’s seemingly erratic behavior. Rob had heard enough. “You still here?” he asked. “I thought we told you to take a hike.”
Paul ignored Rob and continued. “You shoot this woman, and there’s no going back from it. This is not the way things work. And I don’t care what else is going on in the world, this type of mob rule is never the answer.”
Paul had Melvin’s attention. Others quieted and let Paul speak.
“Now, Melvin, you’re a decent person. Rob, you are too. Hell, you saved my life. None of us are perfect people, and we can’t make a perfect society, but the Sheriff, he wouldn’t have condoned this. He would have used the law as a guide. And you can’t have law and order coexist with anarchy. You just can’t. I know that’s what he believed, and that’s what he would say now.”
“Where is the Sheriff anyway?” Rob asked. “Why not hear it from the horse’s mouth?”
Paul looked to Melvin. Melvin looked back at him. No one answered.
“Well?” Rob asked, annoyed.
“The Sheriff is gone. He died from a fatal gunshot wound,” Paul said.
A hushed shock went over the group. Anger flushed across the faces of Rob and Carlie. Jordan stood with the rest of New Haven not believing his own ears.
“There’s no fucking way,” Rob said to Paul. “You don’t just kill the Sheriff. That dude can survive anything.”
“It’s true, Rob,” Melvin said. “His body is lying by the first barricade.”
A tear streamed from Carlie’s eye. Rob scratched his head in confusion.
“Not the Sheriff,” Carlie said.
“If that’s the case, shoot her an extra time, right through her head,” Rob said.
“The Sheriff would not have wanted this!” Paul shouted.
“Ah, what the fuck do you know?” Rob replied.
“Shoot her,” Carlie added.
Calls for her death echoed throughout.
“Do it for the Sheriff,” a man shouted.
“Melvin, I have a bad feeling about this. This is not the answer,” Paul said.
Melvin shook with emotion. Paul put a hand on his shoulder.
“Just think about it,” Paul continued releasing his hand. Sister Bonnie’s eyes remained closed the entire time. Her lips moved inaudibly as she prayed. Melvin closed his eyes and removed his finger from the trigger. He lowered the gun to the ground. Sister Bonnie felt the release of the barrel against her head and opened her eyes.
“What are you doing?” Rob asked. “Why is she still standing?”
Melvin turned his head to a visibly angered Rob.
“Paul’s right. The Sheriff would not have wanted this. We have a community here. A civil community. We shoot this woman here, without any kind of due process, and we’ll lose that part of us forever. We need to get the rest of the council together and figure out what to do with Sister Bonnie. But we’re not going to decide that ourselves, like you two did with the others.”
“The other council members are all dead,” Rob said.
“Then we vote on new council members,” Melvin said.
“This is fucked,” Rob yelled. “You talk about sticking to ideals when half of our town just got whipped out. We have nothing to be ashamed of by putting a bullet in her head.”
“Just stop, Rob,” Melvin said.
“Fuck you. Fuck all of you!” Rob shouted. He grabbed Carlie by the arm and they stormed off together.
Melvin was left to make a decision all his own. Paul looked at Melvin with concern.
“What do you want us to do?” Paul asked.
Sister Bonnie held her head down to avoid the angered glares of the townspeople. Melvin cleared his throat and began.
“First, we need to find out who’s alive and who’s dead. We need to locate our injured. We need to collect the bodies of all of those lost and bury them accordingly. We have people in the bunkers, and we have to clean this up before the children see anything. Tonight is going to be a late night, but we must rebuild. After the worst is over, then the town will vote on its new council members and we will try to get back to where we were before all of this happened. I’m not suggesting that it’s going to be easy, or that we’ll ever go back to normal. But we have to do this.”
The townspeople remained silent but seemed to agree. Paul and Jordan looked at each other, breathing sighs of relief. No one spoke out against Melvin, and there was a general mood of cooperation in the air.
“What about her?” a man from the circle asked.
“We’re going to lock her up, and when the new council is elected, we’ll have a trial. That is our way now. Not the other way. We have a lot of work to do, so let’s get moving,” Melvin said.
The people dispersed and, though exhausted, got to the task at hand. Paul approached Melvin with a smile.
“That was a little inspiring there. You’re a good man,” he said.
“No,” Melvin said. “I’m just a man trying to be good.”
Chapter Sixteen
The Day After
The thick layer of dark clouds that normally coated the sky had thinned a little, allowing sunlight to peer through. The townspeople had been hard at work, gathering the deceased and injured, and making the minimal repairs necessary to the large amount of destruction that had befallen their town the previous night. Rob and Carlie eventually came back, and lent a hand, though unwilling to talk to Paul or Jordan. Melvin had Sister Bonnie secured in a room in his own house, though he left her location undisclosed. He had put one of the women in charge of guarding her. Her name was Sally, and Melvin trusted her more than anyone to listen to him. They worked as fast as they could to remove the carnage before the children awoke from the bunkers. That was their goal, as far as Melvin was concerned. He wanted no horrific account left behind for the children to see, though many of them had lost their parents in the battle of New Haven.
Margie had stayed awake the entire night. She peeked out of the bunker after four hours of waiting and noticed scattered movement throughout the town. It was early morning, and she could see a little better than when they had originally gone inside. She saw what looked like bodies piled in the park nearly out of range. She closed the door immediately, hoping that the sight wasn’t what she thought it was. She held her kerosene lantern up and looked to the slumbering children before her, all lying in sleeping bags on the ground. Margie wasn’t going to wake them until they were ready.
Paul and Jordan stumbled into the townhouse exhausted.
“I don’t know about you, but I say it’s time to hit the road,” Jordan said.
Paul was so shaken from the night’s events that he knew sleep was not going to come easy, no matter how exhausted he felt.
“I don’t think I’ll ever sleep again,” he told Jordan.
They walked down the hallway as Paul suddenly remembered David and Julie. Paul stopped Jordan.
“Hold on,” he said slowly pushing their bedroom door open. There, in Jordan’s bed rested Julie. David was still in Paul’s bed, sleeping soundly.
“What’s he doing in here?” Jordan asked.
“I brought him here after he fell from a ladder and went unconscious.”
Jordan leaned against the hallway wall and looked as if he just stumbled upon a revelation.
“Holy shit. So you saved his life. Damn, Paul, you’re on a roll tonight,” he said.
Paul smiled and waved Jordan off. “Hardly. I just carried him here, plain and simple.”
Jordan nodded in agreement as they both looked to Julie. “So should we wake her?” he asked.
“Now’s as good a time as any,” Paul replied.
“You think they’re going to be okay?” Jordan asked.
“I mean, I need to at least see Margie before we go.”
“I hope they make it. I really do. There’s a lot of good people here. I won’t forget them.”
Paul walked over to Julie, as Jordan examined David.
“He’s still breathing,” Jordan said. “Maybe he’ll wake up soon.”
Paul sat on Jordan’s bed and nudged her. “Hey, it’s time to wake up now.”
Julie’s eyes slowly shuttered open.
“Good morning,” Paul said.
She rose up from the bed and stretched. “Where am I?” she asked.
Paul laughed. “I know how you feel.”
Julie rubbed her eyes. “We’re leaving now?” she asked.
“Yes, very soon. Thanks for watching David like I asked. I’m sure he was in good hands.”
“He woke up for a little bit,” Julie said while yawning.
“He did?” Paul asked.
“Yeah, he was kind of out of it, but then he went back to sleep,” she said.
“At least he’s okay.” Paul said.
“Are you okay?” Julie asked after gaining a closer look at Paul. She could see that he was dirty, and sweaty. He was also covered in black soot and blood.
“You look like a coal miner.”
“I’m fine, don’t worry about me. We’re all going to be fine.”
Paul leaned in and gave Julie a hug. She put one hand on his back and tried to reciprocate his affection.
“What happened out there?” she asked.
Paul let Julie go then rubbed his eyes in exhaustion.
“It’s not good, Julie. I’m not going to lie. We need to just stay on track. Stay focused. We’re going to leave.”
“When?” Julie asked.
“Five or ten minutes tops,” Paul said.
“I just need to lie down for a minute and rest before we hit the road.”
Paul fell down next to Julie. His head crashed on the pillow and he fell asleep without a sound. Julie stepped off the bed and went over to Jordan. He had already fallen asleep next to David on the bed. She was surrounded by sleeping adults, unsure of what to do, so she went back to her room. Paul woke up. More light had shone in. He looked over to see an empty bed on the other side of the room. For a moment, Paul wondered where he was. He wondered if anything he remembered from the night before had actually happened; all the blood and carnage, firing his shotgun at a crazed man and taking another life. It was all a dream. A very bad dream. He was actually back at his home in Beech Creek, waiting for Samantha to come home. It’s funny the tricks the mind can play. He had simply missed his wife while she was away on business, and while sleeping, he had concocted a crazy dream about a nuclear apocalypse and the aftermath that followed. Paul rose from his bed, ready to make Julie some breakfast and go to work.
The room looked unfamiliar, but Paul attributed it to still being a dream state. The real world would come back to him soon. Paul was feeling pretty good about himself until he felt a slight stinging in the back of his head. He moved his hand over the sore spot and felt a large bump. The bump was no figment of his imagination, neither was how he got it. Paul snapped out of his hopeful state. Nothing had been a dream. He was still in New Haven, and everything he had hoped to be fantasy had already happened. Paul walked outside to see a town trying to rebuild itself. Jordan was in range talking with Margie across the street. Julie was talking with Tommy. People walking by had solemn expressions, and the mood was quiet. Paul had no idea what time it was or even the day. He felt angry that he had fallen asleep. Samantha entered his mind, and she scolded him for forgetting about her.