(STBSS) A DAY IN THE APOCALYPS, page 1

A DAY IN THE APOCALYPS...
I wrote this short story because for ones I had a meaning to do it, which was ATS. So it got me started, but after I wrote this, I kept writing, and somehow it turned into a fifty page short story. Still working on it though. So I decided I might as well post it. ADITA. Thanks for the inspiration.

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A DAY IN THE APOCALYPS: I
There's nothing funny about life out here. It sure as hell isn't like the movies, and I can tell you I picked the wrong day to quit smoking.

An average afternoon, if you can call it that, dust frolicking as a school of fish, bringing with it the raw metallic sensation of death, hell, all I had to do was load my gun to experience that, and that was my life, the gritty unsanityzed feeling you get between your toes, ya, that was life. We trailed behind in our hum-vie, a worthless box of tin with a rat powered motor, hell, one martyr and were all dead, even the FBI got better cars than us. I don't see the point in this war, there's always gonna be war, I guess killing people is the only way to keep them in order, hell, that's all just a god damned opinion.

I lit a cigarette, the charcoal fire, a fire within itself, I thought, could do more damage than our guns could, hell, it would do more damage if we hit em with the butt rather than shoot em. In other words, we had a class Vietnam jungle rifles for our suburban weapon trafficking operations. Hell, at least I don't have to put up with my wife, that's why I came here, not to get away from her but to end this, I didn't realize of course that once I got here, it was just a second degree hell away from her. Its all time with me, people ask me why the hell I stand so damn close in gunfire, I tell em now or later, were all gonna die, and you wont make much difference in the great trilogy of time. Now naturally they just shake there head, but some fine chap took my words and organized em, you know what he found? Just what I said, strait forward, and he knew that I was damn right; the others just didn't want to believe it. How the hell could death be that bad, by the time your dead, I honestly don't think you'll care. Besides, pain is mental, just accept it and know its just your mind telling you were the point of impact is, its nothing actually. I'm not saying go ahead and shoot yourself, but, you know.

Anyway were going down a hill, nearly vertical, to bad the seat belts are made out of god damn jerky sh`t wire plaster that'll melt into your skin before you can get it off, cause I nearly dropped my cigarette into my gun, hole. So I chucked it and got myself another. Now by this time sarge had caught on to the ordeal and told me that if I light another one Ill be eating the whole carton. I awnestly didn't mind this, but I didn't feel like sh`tin on his fifty ton gold. Sarges moral; 'Life is a Fuc`in trip, so smoke it'. And, by that he meant acid, the bitter chalk acid, that rot's in your stomach, and damn he meant it.

I don't see how the hell weapons trafficking is supposed to stop the end of the world, all people are eligible weapons, I cant swear as a fact that the lord is watching me, trust me I know when he is and when he isn't, cause serge's period starts up, he's a woman so you know.

And so on this road we see a guy and a place and the sky is bright and the road is long and its hot so I cant friggin think of what to say next , well, I know. These long summer days, reminds me of my nerd-ling years, god damn was I a loser. I thought I was a hottie saying I was watching every woman who was replying to my threads, saying I like the finger movements, and the salted sweat dripping like thick blood down into the succulent ripe caverns of her natural elixir binding jugs. It never really lasted if you could imagine. God, damn the radiation, every last armor piercing shell, hot led moving like an iron through your delicate butter like skin, and than the hard frozen bone in the middle. It was an art, like a blacksmith the weapons that came to be our souls obsessed us in there sweet yet bitter rhapsody, firing every split second, like the drums of war they beet down the terrorist threat. And they were, our children, these sweet weapons of depleted life, artillery shells, we became to love the war more than our god, like a drug, like an obsession. Damn the radiation.
We hated the war, and yet worshiped it. Satin had won, in a way, although it was the days of revelation when the lord would come, but even still, Satin had won, he had won me anyway, and I can admit it.

I glanced at my watch but didn't have the will to look; I thought it was broken anyway. Time doesn't matter anymore, not anymore. Its funny how we can base our lives so much off of time and yet in the end time seems to finally admit to being a mirage. When time and place overlap each other they create an illusion, like when red and green overlap they create a 3D image, but you know its not reel. After I looked at my watch, a dusted solder was terrified at me, crying. I asked what was wrong, he only shuttered and shook. I couldn't tell if it was the Hum vie that shook him or pure fright at he fact that we were all covered in Human remains and dust and that blood draped like wight cloth soaked about our clothes. The solder, Pale as the permission slip to drop the first nuclear weapon he portrayed, it could have been anyone, it could have been you who happened to want to become president and

I lit another cigarette, I didn't really give a damn what Sarge stuck up his a`s, I needed a cigarette. The lighter, flimsy, flames succumbed to the stick of concentrated death as I inhaled unconsciously to the portrait around me, leaned back, and closed my eyes. A weathered melody danced within the heavy humid air, an old Irish melody. The eyes of the solders, so young and yet so old. The things they had seen, sometimes I wish we were all blind at times, but than I remembered, we already are. There minds scared with violent opinions, usually by old yuppie Republican politicians, my god it was horrifying, but somehow we stayed com, some how we continued living.

Time goes in ages, this sure as hell was an age to say, positive ages and vile ages, we all have our moments, time sure had its moments to. Trees dead, all dead. Like black skeletons they mimicked us, they mimicked us as a prophecy of the future, black dead rotting skeletons, burnt on every edge, burnt on every crisp, burnt like apple pie my grandmother used to make, damn that was bad. The endless litany of excessive violence plundered in my mind, that was how we lived, that was how we breathed, we breathed water, we breathed, death. Our minds filled with the chaos like my last girlfriend, we were all lost.

One man told me, how can I be lost if I know were I am. I told him there's two kinds of lost, one in presens and one in soul. I exclaimed to him you can never be truly lost in presents, were ever you go, you are there, and so you are not lost. I mean, when Columbus came to America he didn't know were the hell he was but he built a house were he stood and made it his home. You are never truly lost unless you decide to be. Although he was a lying cheating bastard and stole everything from the Middle East, he still, wasn't lost. But that doesn't matter now, nor douse the history of Columbus and the acts that portrayed who we are, all that forgotten, now were just living robots, striving to merely survive, our rations; peanut butter and year old rice crackers. Then there's lost in soul, were, another way to say it is that you are blind, were you try to be like everyone ells and forget were you are and who you were before. I told this man, but impatient as he was, before I could finish the bastered had walked away. I enjoyed the absents of his presans more than wasting my time explaining life to him. Well, he was my son, but it's the thought that counts right?

I thought as the radiation consumed my mind that possibly now that everyone was dead that the goasts and demons would take the advantage of the freedom to roam the Earth to the extent that they don't start possessing all of the survivers. They were aloud to roam now that everyone was dead, I swear I could see figures, figures in the distance, my mind tricking me playing with me, getting back for everything that I've ever done wrong to it, getting back for the hard core obsessions of excessive pleaser, drugs and alcohol, killing brain cells, tar.

I'm not a god damn solder; I know this and everyone ells knows this. Were not solders anymore, were civilians with guns and armor, rusted with peperjack plating, the last god damned people on Earth so what the hell are we gonna do? I'm high, drunk, or the radiation has completely destroyed all of my brain cells, because dark shadowed figures are strolling around the vehicles as we slow. Chains strung around them carrying the burden of life, although they were dead, they carried this burden for us. They wanted us to die because they didn't want to carry this burden. Once all has died they can be free and determined to heaven or hellfire. I understood, but I didn't want to die. I told them to drive faster, although you cant run from death, they thought I was insane. I didn't know what the hell to do, was it just my mind or were these people real? These things these figures, trapped here in the great cage of Earth. Mabey were the shadows.

We came down to the center hill; the potholes were filled with the remains of what was a thriving trash aroma dwelling city. We trailed behind the hum-vie, eager to reach it, what we didn't know, we thought there was always something, something waiting for us. What we didn't know is that we would have to make that something, because the truth was, to our knowledge everything was dead.

The hum-vie in front of us halted, like Clinton and Monika it puffed rotted smoke from the pipe, a breakdown, it just couldn't get it up, the hill. I sah it as it slowly crept into the depths of a masked city motionless below us. We backed up in safety of our lives, we didn't want to die, and yet we all wanted to die, to be rid of this Earth strung hell.

Life as they know it was shattered, like glass it stuck into there skin. The plastic wrap was burned like rice candy, they began to unthread, and in sick distortion, the leading hum-vie exploded in the hole, a leak and a spark, a concoction to ruin someone's day.

Solder Oromo: “Oh Sh`t!” Pronouncing each syllable clean and un-ravished we continued into the hole, “Sh`t!”

Sarge Wight: “Shut the hell up solder, everyone dies. Who decided you could say sh`t anyway? Who decided you could speak? Answer me!”

Solder Oromo: “Como-“

Sarge Wight: “Shut the hell up and get in there! I don't give a damn if your guns melt a tattoo into your a`s, you get in there and save those damn solders marine! Sh`t!”

Deep: “There dead Sarge, Stephan Hawking could see that.”

My name is Deep, or Deeps what they call me.

Sarge Wight: “Don't get smart with me boy, I, I know who Stephan Hawking is and I could kick his a`s any day. By the way, since you look so much like you know what your doing how about you get in there and save those men.”

Deep: “There dead Sarge, so stop fu`king around and lets get out of here before we fall in to.”

Sarge Wight: “Are, are you orderin me around?

Deep: “No, you're the boss, I just w-“

Sarge Wight: “There aint no boss's anymore, this is free country, its back to old mans land-“ He pondered at the thought of control and hunched over the dead Earth, smelling its rich fragrance.

Solder Linton: “No mans land-“

Sarge Wight: “Shut the hell up!” He turned to study the boy, starved of sympathy, and food, he had grown week and was consistently shaking, “

I never liked Sarge, taking more rations than respected among the others, there was no one around, you could kill now, its been a while, no one on the road. My fists became moist with anger.

To many desperate faces, I cant feel sorry for them. Not all of them. Its been a long while since I last devoured the sweat erratic taste of desperation, save death. My hands tasted the death, and the demons inside, I could only smell it, the delinquent aroma, it filed my hart with grief and my hart with fulfillment. Inhumane pleasure, I hated it and loved it, but in a different way. I knew it wasn't me, that difference was the demon. I tried to stop, but I couldn't succumb. My common sense and will lost within my anger. False will led to vile crimes on life, it became an addiction. I tripped upon the anger, a trip wire, hanging delicately in the presents of death. Then, he was gone, into the pit he belonged, into the hell.

Solder Oromo: “Oh, sh`t. Oh sh`t! You, he's-”

Deep: “Ya, are you surprised to find that I didn't really like him much iether? Let me finish, he's-“

Solder Oromo: “Dead.”

Deep: “Look, I'm sorry but.” I lit a cigarette, tasted good after a kill, Sometimes its good clean, sometimes bloody, this time it was clean and easy, nothing, now lets keep moving, “He was takin more ration than he should have, he messed with the solders at night, and,” I had forgot he was a woman, I think, he, or, she had never confronted me at night, so I assumed she was a woman, cause I not to attractive if you remember earlier, “so I dump him in the pit were he belonged.” I gradually made my way to settle upon the truck, to lean, I was a bastard, I guess we all are in hart, “A bad seed and you know that-“

Solder Linton: “Thanks for killin him and all but now the military has a hook on our a`s! A serious offence to the US! A marshal warn-“

Deep: I closed my eyes and marinated in the succulent taste of the sun, warm, “Fu`k it, there all dead-“

Solder Linton: “What? Who-“

Deep: “Your family, their friends and there friends and your girlfriends friends and everyone around you!” I shook off the relaxed pose and charged unsettlingly at him, making contact with his breathe, sh`t, “Everyone is, Dead! Don't you realize? Were the only ones left on the hole-“ I continued, but the bastard felt like crying who knows why.

He lay sprawled out upon the floor on the desert, a hot pan he sizzled on, sunburns formed into clusters of blisters, a zit like fashion they all exploded. This is how long he had been morning the deaths, as I nearly ran out of cigarettes, enjoying the microwave like magnificence of the sun, as we all slowly cooked alive. What did god have against me I thought, what did I do to get this fate, a destiny reviled to me. At this very point in time I couldn't tell if surviving was the right thing to do, or if I had been blessed and saved, what douse it matter anyway? Were all just gonna die anyway. I think I'm to god damned optimistic.

I knew what would happen, they were talking to each other, all three little bastards, there rats, rats, wet petite plagued rats, damn right, they thought I was insane, I'm not insane, there insane! Stay com, what to do? Kill em, no, one kill was enough, run into depths below into the forgotten city? Yes Ill, no, It'll collapse eventually, I need to get away the truck. Ill leave em; they can live in the tunnels and Ill get the hell out of here! Just sneak around to the other side of the Hummer and run em over, No! What the hell is wrong with me, kill, no! The heat, its gotta be the heat. Its sure would be nice to have some alcohol, some beer, I can drive drunk and never ht anything out here, except for a rat maybe, good! Ill run em over! God damn it no! Almost there..

“Oh, what the him-“ My skeleton, so frail and torched with limited rations, I couldn't withstand the pressure of the ton Hummer as it grazed over me, I rolled to the side, the three solders had commandeered the vehicle, waiting precariously for me to tred into his trap, and the jaws of the beast I believe, shattered my back, I lay feverish, sweating and in unconditional shock, waiting, once again waiting. And, I cried, not out of pain, but because of some shadow of a reason lurking within my mind, and soul, I think it was out of grief of the dead that they could not leave this Earth, and that they had been here this entire time, I had sinned, confusion of the human comprehension, and then I cried because of everything I hadn't cried for before, such remorse, the heavy swollen soaked feeling you get in your hart, bruised and tired I couldn't fight it though, I had lost the opportunity to cry in the past, and at that become stiff and emotionless.

The mellowed hum of the Hummer vibrated his soul. And as the hummer left me in a haze of misunderstanding and distasteful dust, mostly dust of the dead, and the sun mimicked the rotted trees and slunk beneath the Earth, I cried all through the night, making up for the years I had not expressed my self, and the goasts of the dead smothered me in there abundance and shadowed me, I felt like dying now, they scratched at my soul, they devoured and ate it, I didn't care, I didn't think I had one, I closed my eyes to sleep in a pool of drenched emotionless tears, and in this desert I would create an ocean ones again, so life could thrive and bodies would rot, again. I listened to the Earth, its beating gently, I didn't know it was alive, I would like to accompany it, have a new life, but I guess my day of judgment has come, that is, if I die or live, its up to God. And the twilight receded, dying along with my soul, faith consumed me. I realize what this was as the first star bloomed and I lit a cigarette and closed my tear-some eyes, still crying inside, I couldn't wait to dream again, to leave this place. I lay on my side, and breathed, and sighed. Just another day in the Apocalypse

The Surrealist

[edit on 30/7/05 by The Surrealist]