The Survivor Chronicles: Book 1, The Upheaval (2 page)

A blue jay suddenly plummeted from the sky, diving head first rapidly. It didn’t hesitate, didn’t even attempt to pull itself up as it smashed into the ground with a sickening crunch of bone. A plume of feathers shot up around it but John didn’t have time to ponder what had just happened before a seagull nose-dived directly behind it.

His mouth dropped, he took a startled step back as yet another, and then another bird slammed into the field. It took him a few seconds before he realized that the formerly harmless, feathered creatures were turning themselves into dangerous – and quite possibly deadly – missiles.

Finally breaking free of the half paralysis that had been clinging to him, John took a few more steps back before spinning and lunging for the work truck. Carl was still clinging to the side of it, his mouth gaping, and the weed whacker forgotten as he gawked at the scene unfolding before him.

“Get in the truck!” John screamed.

Carl’s eyes were glazed and dull as he looked toward John. John wasn’t sure that Carl had heard a word he’d just said, even though he’d bellowed it at him. “Carl! GET IN THE TRUCK!”

Carl shook his head, finally seeming to come to his senses as he tossed his cigarette away and jumped into the open passenger side door of the truck. He fell across the seat, pulling the handle to shove the driver’s door open. John dove inside, struggling to shut the door behind him as birds continued to plummet from the sky. His mouth gaped as he watched from behind the safety of the glass as an assortment of feathered friends plunged into the ground. Not a single one of them hesitated before diving to their deaths. Outside the truck, random feathers began to litter the air. They floated about slowly, in a way that might have been captivating, maybe even peaceful, if it hadn’t been so damn disturbing.

A crow smashed off of the truck roof with a loud crash that caused them both to jump, and John to release a sound that normally would have embarrassed him, but seemed entirely appropriate in this situation. To his left another squirrel barreled out of the woods, followed by two chipmunks and a rabbit that was moving far faster than John had ever thought possible for the fluffy creature. John didn’t watch the squirrel – he couldn’t bring himself to see that nightmare unfold again – but he couldn‘t tear his eyes away from the frantic hopping of the bunny. He was certain that Thumper was about to bash itself against the tire of the truck when a plummeting heron managed to take him out first in a grotesque puff of blood, feathers and fur.

Carl cursed under his breath. “Drive,” he commanded.

“What? Where!?” John demanded, fighting against the panic trying to consume him.

“I don’t care! To the shop! Anywhere! Just get us outta here!”

John nodded; his hand shook as he turned the key. AC blasted into the vehicle on a rush of cold air that normally would have felt refreshing if he hadn’t been so horribly and unreasonably chilled. His bones felt brittle, his blood was like ice in his veins. His heart lumbered in his chest. Carl grabbed his cigarettes off the dash and lit one with a trembling hand.

For the first time in his life John desperately wished that he smoked too, if only to have something to take his mind off of the disaster unfurling around him. He hadn’t made it two feet when he realized that something about the truck was off, something was... wrong. A loud grating sound set his teeth on edge as two more birds bashed off of the truck’s hood. The vehicle was brand new, just purchased at the start of the season. Now it was going to look like a demo car by the time all of this was over.

“Crap. The gate’s still down,” Carl groaned.

John was frozen, uncertain what to do. A part of him was tempted to say “screw it” and pull out of there at a hundred miles an hour. The other part – the one that had been trained on safety and procedures for the past two years – protested loudly against allowing that to happen. The trailer would be ruined, or someone could get injured if they left it down as they drove. Not to mention the fact that he really didn’t care to draw any more attention to themselves than necessary, and a metal gate dragging loudly across the road would do exactly that. Plus, it would slow them down, and he had a sneaky feeling they were going to require as much speed as they could get.

“We have to get it,” John said.

Carl was silent as he chewed on the filter of his cigarette in quiet contemplation. Finally he turned to John, his gray eyes dark as he nodded firmly. “We do,” Carl agreed.

John swallowed heavily; a part of him had been hoping that Carl would be able to come up with some reason to just leave it, to just go anyway. To get out of here as fast as possible. But “fast” wasn’t really an option if it remained down. “Count of three?” he asked.

Carl nodded, his eyes troubled, but his hand resting on the door handle as he watched John. “One.”

“Two.”

“Three!”

They both swung their doors open and plunged back into the hot July air. Carl hadn’t taken five steps before a small catbird crashed into his shoulder. Carl grunted from the impact, but continued to run toward the lowered gate. John beat him to it and threw the heavy metal up and dropped the pin in place in one fluid motion. He didn’t even spare a glance for the mower, still sitting in the field. At this point he didn’t care if it cost him his job, he was not going to take the time to put it back on the trailer.

He turned and dashed back to the truck, his hands over his head as he darted back and forth in an attempt to evade the feathered missiles. He tumbled back into the truck, breathing heavily as Carl hopped in and slammed the door. “Go! Go!” Carl ordered briskly.

John nodded as he shoved the truck into drive and stomped on the gas. The trailer bounced over the rutted drive of the field as he sped toward the road. Dead animals crunched sickeningly beneath the tires. John barely hesitated before turning onto the main road and back toward the center of town. He sped down the street, trying to evade the suicidal animals, as well as the other crazed and dazed drivers on the road.

He was almost to the center of town when he realized that what they had experienced in the field had been nothing. It was there, amongst the busy shops and invading tourists that all hell had broken loose.

CHAPTER 2

Mary Ellen

Newport, RI.

7:15 am

It was the whistling that set her teeth on edge. That incessant, infernal whistling. Fifteen years ago, when she’d first been in love, and young, and dumb, she had found the whistling endearing. Almost charming. Today? Today it made her feel like ripping her hair out, screaming at the sky, and jumping over the edge of the balcony to smash mercifully onto the ocean rocks below.

It just didn’t stop, and she was no longer some fifteen year old girl in the first throes of puppy love. No longer a pregnant eighteen year old, too frightened of her parent’s disapproval to tell them that she didn’t want to get married. She was a woman now, she was thirty, and her life was slipping past in a blur that she’d been cautioned about as a child, but never truly grasped until last year.

She’d woken up one day and had a clear epiphany; she didn’t love her husband anymore. Hell, she didn’t even like him anymore. Not even a little. As she reviewed the past few years and became brutally honest with herself, she’d realized that she’d actually never really liked him. She’d simply been in awe of the striking, slightly older boy who had desired her too.

And now the baby they had married for had just turned twelve. Their daughter, Rochelle, was smart and beautiful. She'd inherited her mother’s looks and her father’s brains. Unfortunately, she also inherited her mother’s rebellious, know-it-all streak. The combination was brutal, especially with the hormonal teen years looming. Though she dreamed of it every day, Mary Ellen knew she wouldn’t leave the marriage, not until Rochelle was out of high school. She was terrified a divorce would send her already headstrong daughter into a perilous emotional spiral that could never be controlled.

She’d done many things wrong in her life, but she’d be damned if she took her daughter with her too.

Six more years, she told herself. Six more years and she could be free of the whistling, and the controlling, and the shirts that held a different array of perfumes. Mary Ellen didn’t even wear perfume. In the beginning, she fought with him about it; she cried and carried on about his affairs, railed at both him and the heavens for the sheer unfairness of it all.

On the day she had her realization, however, she quit fighting. Quit crying. Instead, she hired a private investigator who had now been tracking Larry for a little over six months. The day Rochelle left for college Mary Ellen was going to file for divorce, and she planned on taking her fair share with her when she went. The PI was accumulating a good amount of damaging evidence against her husband. Without it, she knew Larry would leave her with nothing. She’d endured too much for too long to allow that to happen.

Larry had the college degree and a law degree on top of that. He was incessantly manipulative, and had a cruel streak that somehow still managed to astound her, even after so many years. Shortly after the wedding she’d found herself shoved into the role of meek little housewife. To be fair, however, she had allowed him to delegate this role for her, willfully accepting it. It seemed easier to compromise than to fight with him over it.

In the beginning she’d done everything she could to make him happy. In the middle, she had continued to do so in the hopes that he would come home, that he would somehow learn to appreciate her and the things she did for him.

Today? Today she didn’t give a rat’s ass if he ever came home again, and she definitely didn’t expect him to appreciate anything. Honestly, she wished she could get back all those years she had wasted trying to make him happy, years that she should have used to make herself happy, or even be happily married to someone else. Anyone else.

She sighed. As her mother always used to say, if wishes were horses then beggars would ride. It had seemed like such a silly saying when she was growing up. As an adult, she understood it all too painfully.

The back sliding glass door slid open behind her as Larry stepped onto the porch with her. Mary Ellen turned as Larry strode toward her, adjusting his tie as he moved. He was still striking, handsome and tall with dark hair going partially gray, and a firm physique. Even so, she found him ugly now, repulsive even.

He broke off whistling. “Fix my tie.”

It wasn’t a question. It was a command, and Mary Ellen’s jaw clenched ever-so-slightly. She quietly placed her coffee cup on the railing, smiled at him and grasped his tie. For one brief moment she allowed herself the delightful image of pushing it all the way up, shoving it into his throat and finally ending the unremitting whistling for good as she happily choked the life from him.

Her smile widened into a grin as she released the tie. “All set.”

“I’ll be working late tonight.”

“Would you like me to keep dinner warm for you?”

“Don’t bother. I’ll be having dinner with clients.” Or whatever new girl he was dating this week. He jutted his chin out. “You have to dust better; there was some on top of the bookshelf in my den this morning.”

Mary Ellen clenched her teeth as she forced a tight smile to her mouth. “I’m sorry,” she said with a nod. “I’ll make sure to take care of that today.”

“Good.” He turned away from her, whistling again as he grabbed the briefcase from inside the glass door. “You might also consider hitting the gym again. You’re putting on weight, you know.”

No, she didn’t know. Other than pregnancy, she’d always been the same size six she’d been since she was fourteen. Not that she expected him to notice. She didn’t say any of this though; she simply nodded and continued to smile her irritating, phony smile at him.

Six more years. Just six more. On days like today, it felt like an eternity.

“Of course,” she placated, unwilling to give him the pleasure of seeing her upset by his words.