The Effacing (Book 1.5): Valley's End (3 page)

  The motorcade’s engines idled in the distance.

  Surrounded by fences, dying trees and backyards, lower income level family homes and fading daylight, Jim and Girder made their way through the alley desperately searching for an opening, fleeing from their pursuers through puddles of disease-tainted water.

   “We’re almost there, homeboy.” Jim huffed.

  Girder continued to stumble along, still nursing his wound. “Shit burns, main.” he rustled.

  “Make a left here.” Jim shifted his weight toward the fenceless opening, looked back through the alley.

  A shadow appeared, coming around the corner, into the alley from which they came.

  Girder stopped.

Jim spun his head back around to see a soaking wet, red-coated, white chest, full grown Akita. It stood in their path, sniffing at the air. His dried eyes were centered by a strange, azure-greyish color. The dog didn’t bark, nor did it growl or show signs of aggression. It was just there, sniffling, nose up. And twitching as if bewitched and trying to morph back into his human form.

   Giving a first look, neither Jim nor Girder found anything out of place. The dog, clean and muscular, seemed extremely healthy. But after a couple steps forward, a further examination revealed its hairy, blood-dried paws.

  Jim extended his TP9 at the dog, nudged at Girder’s ribs and softly chanted, “We got to keep moving.”

  They moved closer, hoping not to startle man’s best friend. One disquieting maneuver could spark the animal’s kill or be killed instinct, which would for sure result in its extermination before obtaining the opportunity to sink its teeth in either of them.

   The Akita backed up.

  Girder whispered, “It’s their dog. He tracked us down.”

  “Keep moving.” Jim slipped back, vision still fixed on his target.

  They kept pushing forward.

  The dog backed away, growled.

  “Don’t make me kill you, Sparky.” Jim grunted, fixing to put a hollow slug right between the animal’s eyes if it barked or lunged forward.

  An abandoned, forest green, gold striped custom made van was left in the center of the street sitting on bricks, front and rear doors ajar. Across the sliding door, the word,
Necropolis
, written in red spray paint. It could easily pass for a rectangular Christmas tree on a gloomy, Hungarian Sunday, with the presents missing at the base. The surrounding vehicles, stripped, some with flat tires, others burnt, or the fires set within them, sluggishly burning out. Busted windows were all throughout the apartment buildings, and smoke rose from other openings at the far end of the complex in another structure.

   The explosive combined smell of rotten food, burning wood and sewage, lashed out with a warm breeze, a stomach-turning disgusting odor, like a triple scoop of Shit-Chunk on a charred Redwood cone, topped with sour milk poured like Hershey’s chocolate syrup, and freckled with hot, construction worker’s after-the-job and a company flag football game dead skin and foot-fungus, all on fire.

  “Damn!” Trivo exclaimed. “Fuck is that—”             

  “Shhh!” Ann turned back, finger pressed against her lips as she walked beside Rebekah.

  Rebekah held Itchy’s AK. She’d wrapped a flashlight underneath the nose with electrical tape found in the glove box of her pick-up truck, pointed toward a busted window on the main level of one of the three story project buildings and motioned for her clique to follow with a swift jolt of the head.

The rusting refrigerator and freezer doors were wide open, the sour smell of spoiled milk and bad meat bounced off the sweaty walls. The water-damaged cupboards had been ransacked; boxed food and canned goods, broken stoneware and drinking glasses spread across the filthy ceramic tiles. And the sink, filled with dirty dishes and maggots.

In the darkened front room, overtop the old and worn out plaid sofa, a family portrait of four hung crooked on the wall; a young man and his younger wife; their son and daughter, a most happy family dressed to impress in their Sunday’s best. Dead plants sat in a pot near the fogged up naked window – fire escape just outside – the blue curtain and child-destroyed blinds, off in a far darker corner, overtop a pair of spray painted 50 pound dumbbells. The purple loveseat and orange recliner were overturned, the 60 inch flat screen, lying face down on the grey, cardboard-grinding carpet. The finger-printed metal door was kicked in from the outside, badly dented around the center.

   The golden door knob twisted, the door opened, and Jim and Girder lurched through. Jim, locking the door behind them, made way to the couch, finally taking a load off opposite his friend. 

  “
Yo, man, what the fuck
? Shit went straight through.” he thundered, tossing the guns down in between himself and Girder.

Girder threw his hands out, bloody palms up. He was hardly bleeding anymore. “What I supposed to know? I’m
hit
. The shit burns. End of story.”

  “You was actin’ like a lil bitch about it… cryin’n shit.”

  Girder looked around the room. “Main… whatever, dog.” he drifted. “Yo… whose crib is this?” he asked, rubbing his hands clean on the sleeve of his sweater.

  “A partner mines.”

   “What? You partners with the enemy?”

   “Nah, it wasn’t like that, G-man. He ain’t rock with the hard knocks. Dude worked an had a family an shit.”

   Girder did not believe Jim in the slightest. They were complete opposites on the same team. Jim, considerate of others and well liked, AKA, the good guy. Girder was an out-of-control live-wire and loose cannon; the bad guy. They might have been friends since kindergarten, Jim, three months older – only separated through jail stints – but Girder didn’t trust him. More-so, Girder had envied him for just that long. The icing on the death-cake was when Jim took off after they were being hunted down earlier that day. Jim left Girder to get shot and never turned back, not even once, to make sure he was alive. Girder held a lot of animosity toward Jim behind that, although he didn’t show it. And what Jim
didn’t
know, Girder, Girder planned on get back, a most terminal form of breaking even… even though the unsuspecting Jim
was
a good friend.

  “Yeah, sure you’re right.” Girder huffed, and then changed the subject. “Ya boy need a maid… like yesterday. Did they get him, where is he?”

  Jim knew the answer to that, but he wasn’t saying. “Ain’t nobody here, man… just chill out… an try to keep it down.” stood up, peeped out the window and headed toward the apartment’s hallway.

  Girder continued his observation of the room. Soiled couch pillows near a half-empty box of Huggies diapers, yellow cracked vase by the hallway. Smaller portraits with their gold plated frames, glass shattered, over by the China cabinet next to the front door, a white, slim unused candle near the overturned coffee table.

   He quietly slid off the funky couch and stretched for the candle, spotted a Ziploc sandwich bag that housed a fluffy ounce of weed. He picked it up, smelled it and smiled. “Found a bag of that good shit, Jimbo!” he called out, ear up.

  No response.

  He grabbed the candle.

  When Jim finally returned, he held an ace bandage and alcohol, needle and thread in both hands. He was also upset – a candle lit, Haze clouded in the atmosphere –
Purple
Haze, clouded the air.

  “Yo! What the
fuck
you doin’? You want everyone to know where we at?”

  Girder tried to pass the blunt. Jim tossed the medical supplies into his friend’s open chest.

  “What you mean… the
light
?
Everything
is burning ‘round here! Ain’t nobody gonna think we in here, main! Plus, this shit gets rid of that funky ass smell. So shut the
fuck
up an take the blunt!”

  “I’m
talking
‘bout the weed! We gotta campout here until they pass. And when the shits clear… we’re outta here, ya feel me? I ain’t about to be killed over no goddamned weed, man, I’m telling you.” Jim slightly lowered his head and bucked his intimidating brown eyes, anticipating his partner’s response.

  “Where we gonna go? We can’t leave the city. We might as well just stay here, away from the bullshit outside. Them chumps ain’t gonna smell this shit from up here.”

  “You need to listen to yourself. The place on fire! We need to go link back up with
Rain
. He got a connect with an escape plan. If it ain’t too late we still gotta chance to catch up with him before this thing gets any worse.” Jim paused. A tingly feeling beneath him disturbed his thought. His head lowered, swung in every direction, and then he looked to his childhood friend. “You feel that?”

  The floor began to throb as if a locomotive were moving its way through the city – but there weren’t any tracks on that side of town, not even underground. Maybe it was a tank engine. Silverware begun to rattle, the crooked family portrait fell behind the couch, and then the vibrating flower pot in the windowsill crashed to the carpet.

  It became silent.

  Girder put the blunt out. “Hell was that?”

  A ponderous thud, followed by crashing sounds shook the entire apartment, and the crackling sounds of another fire broke out from somewhere in the building. Five long seconds that had the young thugs twisted on edge.

   Jim and Girder both acknowledged each other in shock, not knowing if it were their eclipsed foes that hunted them, found their hideout and now trying to flush them out with grenades – maybe even a rocket launcher – their enemy wanted them to suffer, die from smoke inhalation. Or maybe it was Billy Rain; not even. If it had been big bad Billy Rain, he would have used a Molotov cocktail to extract his damage. No boom there, just glass and gas. Plus the fact, which Jim and Girder were not aware of, their infamous leader,
Billy Rain?!
He was already dead.

  Jim and Girder grabbed their weapons.

  Jim blew out the candles. “Im’a kill the first mu’fucker come through that door,” he cautioned his lightly wounded partner.

  Girder took aim. “Get ready, main!”

  The rumbling stopped.

  It was silent.

  “We need to get outta here.” Jim whispered, looked over to the window.

  The sun had fully diminished.

  “Main, I ain’t leaving till I hafta.”

  Jim stood, slowly crept over to the window, hoping it wasn’t anything he’d made up just seconds ago. Before he could get a look at the ground level, he heard footsteps near the door, raised his firearm and took three steps back.

Rebekah stepped on the square wooden board and cautiously maneuvered through the busted window, landing softly in silence. She clicked the button on the homemade flashlight attachment, aimed her rifle at the closed door and defensively awaited the rest of her brave trio making their way through. Trivo, the last in, looked over to Rebekah. She pointed to the door. He boldly crept toward the door and timidly placed a sandpaper-rough hand over the dirty metal knob, waited for Rebekah’s signal.

   Rebekah’s head slightly rose and lowered, then Trivo gripped the knob and flipped his wrist in one motion, jumped back, and another warm heat wave of a Shit-Chunk special ice-cream cone rushed the room.

  Rebekah was first out, discreetly made way for the front door. Ann followed, while Trivo, his mind on investigating and being cautious, made his way deeper into the apartment.

  “Strange,” Ann shook her head to the barricade before her. “Everything in the house is pushed up against the door—”

  It was true, everything that could be moved, mountain-stacked in front of the metal door which led out into the building corridor, from the kitchen fridge to the living room furniture, dressers to bed mats. Besides that, the rest of the apartment was fairly neat. From the spotless floors and bare walls to the kitchen appliances placed on acrylic countertops, and the two animal dishes, one red the other blue, that sat in a corner; the red one full of Whiskers cat food, the other, just a nauseating milk stain. A tell-tale that only the residents would know of that transpired, a Chris Angel vanishing act mystery in itself.

  “They must have had their reasons. We need to find another way through.” Rebekah said.

  Then, coming from the back room, aggressive eyes locked to Rebekah. Trivo declared, “Follow me,” gazed to Ann before he about-faced.

  In the backroom, red bricks, a mega dust cloud and nip-tuck pieces of plywood strewn across the grey, carpeted surface, a crowbar, and an iron mallet that would instantly remind any comic book superhero fan of the mighty hammer of Thor; and a huge, forced opening in the back wall of the room that led into the next apartment. Yes indeed, a way out… but what the hell from?

  “Wow…” Ann gawked.             

  “Tell me about it.” Rebekah walked toward the damage, felt the brutalized edges. Alleged, “They were surrounded. Barricaded themselves in and busted their way out, maybe.”

  “Why the ply over the bricks?” Ann examined, surprised.

  Trivo strode to the wall. “Cuz… the city ain’t paying to break it down and build it back up. So instead, they do this.” He slapped a piece of ply from its place over the free brick. “They make it
look
new, raise rent, kick out the poor and rehouse this bitch… loses less, makes more cheddar. Ain’t it obvious?”

  “Yeah,” Ann inserted. “But who preps a breakout in their own home? If whoever did this was a doomsday prepper, I’m pretty sure they wouldn’t get many points.”

  “Come on,” Rebekah declared. “The sun’s faded.”

  They stepped into the next room, stayed on guard as they made it to the front door. It was open. And the three inspected the entire level for anyone that could have survived.

   The floor was vacant.

    The trio made their way out, and up an old, cockroach infested concrete stairwell, headed toward the rooftop, when in between the second and third floor they encountered a pile of burned logs – more ashes than wood – positioned dead center, under the raised window, its seal used as an ashtray, defaced – like what part of the building wasn’t – with a mob of cigarette butts that were extinguished along the brim.

  “Wonder what that was for?” Ann muttered, about the logs.

  Small concrete rocks and pebbles, followed by sand and dust fell from above, created popping sounds that echoed on the concrete below.

  Trivo glanced up for a second. Replied, “After the lights went out and we were forced to stay indoors… this is how some people lived.”

  “But wouldn’t the plywood and bricks keep the place warm if they’d kept the window shut?” Rebekah asked.

  “This is how they
ate
. Fire alarms ‘round here don’t work. They kept doors open and windows up. The busted windows and building fires came from the Molotov cocktails, gunshots and rocks.” Trivo informed them.

  “How do you know so much?” Ann asked.

  “Because… we the ones that did it. There was so many sick in these buildings, nothing we could do for ‘em. We thought we could kill ‘em all, but we were wrong.”

  “That’s horrible!” Ann exclaimed.

  “Yeah…
sounds
bad. But we didn’t have any other choice then. If a swarm of that many were to hit the streets… it would have been lights out for a lot of the people traveling with us now, for sure.”

   “Where are the corpses?”

   Where
were
the bodies? True, the Centre City hoods bombed the location of their rivals, but if the building had been overcome with ill residents, then their bodies should have been visible all throughout the projects. In their travels, they had only seen demolition and barricades, not one dead body or a single speck of blood. Everyone, at least some, must have come together and escaped. But the question still stood. Where were they?

   “Back where all the fire and busted windows are.” Trivo answered.

   “Then there
are
other survivors.” Ann winced.

  And the ground beneath their feet rumbled. The building shook, more debris fell.

  Rebekah shifted her sight up the stairs and proceeded to climb. “We need to hurry.”           

  The concrete steps were fractured in many different sections, couldn’t hold more than three hundred pounds of pressure. Rebekah stopped just before they touched the third floor, spotted a brown, paper Kiwi grocery bag filled with assorted canned goods and spring water bottles near the last step. As much as she wanted to quench her thirst, she knew they were at war and kept it moving. Ann followed, not trying to appear needy, even though the goods and fluids would have come in handy for the younger members of their group.

  Trivo bent over to pick it up. “Shiiit… I ain’t passin’ up no free food and water.”

  “No!” Rebekah spun around to warn him, swinging the AK around with her, shining her flashlight back down the stairs, illuminating his scarred, ruffled face.

  Trivo stopped in his tracks and threw a hand up to the light’s blinding beam. “
What
?”

  “Who leaves a shopping bag in the stairwell? Leave it there.” She continued up, Ann right behind her. “Didn’t you say your gang ambushed the place?”

    Trivo stood erectus, watched as the girls walked through the exit door. He thought of what Rebekah said (Who leaves a shopping bag in the stairwell?), and thought,
someone in a rush.
He stretched back down, put a hand in the bag, and just as he grabbed a can of Pineapple Tidbits, he hollered, “Holy shit!”

  Who else would have been that fucking improvident? It was a trap. The pin on a hand grenade had already been pulled, and the weight of the can goods preserved the detonation.

  BOOM!

   The floor opened up and Trivo’s body parts were scattered throughout the stairwell during the discharge, donating his plastered remains on what was left of the nearby brick walls. The floor beneath him crumbled and formed a blockage at the main level. The explosion caught Rebekah and Ann off guard, the strength of the impact chucked
them
into the third floor level of the structure, skimming across its sooty floor.

   Only seconds after, another explosion sounded from nearby, and it all began to settle into the ladies heads by the time Rebekah had a very precise intuition that the worst had yet to come, the worst was yet to come.

   “RUN!”

   The girls were 50 feet away from the other side, a cracked window at the end screaming
, jump out here,
the
s
moke, abruptly intensifying around them. The surface began to break away from the staircase, the bricks from the walls. Ann scrambled to her feet, sneakers kicking dust while racing through the hallway.

   Rebekah followed, just inches away from the falling rock, leaving the AK to fall with the flooring. An explosion from inside one of the units left a scorching blaze seeping underneath the door before the base gave out there. Then it was on the lower level, and little by little, growing.

   By the time they reached the window, Rebekah and Ann stood side-by-side, the demolition, creeping up on their heels.

   Then, it brusquely stopped.