Survival: Strategy

Chapter Seven

Click

shhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

There is a sudden hissing in the darkness as the radio turns on. I’m not sure why I bother anymore. I haven’t heard a human voice from that thing in forever. The radio is old and battered, military grade from when the military still graded things. Its camo pattern is still visible, although it’s so dark now that all I can see are the barest glints of metal from where the paint has been scraped off.

After carefully concealing the weapons I’ve unlocked from my bunker in a safe place for needed use, I decided to come here and try the radio again, which again, is useless.

Standing in the ruins of the library, the smell of musty, old, mildewed books surround me. The library was not a place that I frequented before. Before. Before the world turned on its head. Before the sun set on this skeleton kingdom. Before our lives were worth less than a good pair of boots.

But the library is somewhere I have found solace in. It is one of the few places not stripped to the ground, because who needs books? Several hundred were taken in the first year or so after the disaster, until the buildings became too damp and the books too degraded to make the trip for firewood worth it. So now what’s left are dark lines of shelves with books fused shut and more often than not stuck down with mold, slowly crumbling into piles of debris. Maybe that’s the other reason I come to libraries whenever I can. To remind myself of what we’ve lost. What we’ve taken from ourselves.

shhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

The radio crackling knocks me out of my reverie, and I realize that I’ve been standing here in the dark for some length of time I don’t want to contemplate. Everyone is relying on me, so what am I doing staring off into space? This is not the sort of thing I can let myself fall into the habit of doing. But the Marines seem so long ago, and I’m not getting any younger. I click the radio off, and the sudden silence settles over me like a thick blanket. God, I need one of those.

I force myself to take a step forwards, and then another. Although I do go to libraries often, this time I’m looking for something specific. I feel my way carefully along the aisles, watching closely for stepping stools and other obstructions. The only light shines from a staircase window high above me, so everything around is clothed in shadows.

Concentrate.

I need to get upstairs, although how I’ll manage that I have no idea. The closer I get to the staircase, the brighter it is and the clearer I can see the damage ten years of neglect have wrought upon it. The balustrade—an obsolete word if I ever saw one, is missing in several places, and the stairs themselves don’t look like they can support much weight.

Something shifts in the darkness and I tense immediately, every muscle ready to fight. If the Marines taught me one thing, it was how to respond to a sudden attack.

Part one: pinpoint location.

The shift came in a shadow by the back of the library, where I’d come in from. Probably a recent arrival, trying to be quiet.

Part two: mark exits/exit strategies.

This one is trickier, the only exit I know of aside from the window, two stories up, is effectively blocked by the assailant. If I tipped over a bookshelf though, I could loop around enough that I would be reasonably safe unless the assailant doubled back as well, which was unlikely. The other option was to use my firearm, but the limited supply of ammo made that a last-resort strategy.

Part three: understand assailant.

They were still hiding, unwilling to show themselves. They might be someone just looking for somewhere out of the wind to sleep, and scared witless by the armed ex-army type haunting the building. Or they could be one of Lionel Banks’ crew, looking to gain some extra points by taking me out. Another Marine training kicked in—assume the worst.

I began to move towards one of the bookshelves. Push the bookshelf over to block the path and move around to the other side of the room and exit through the back of the library. Simple enough, and the commotion with the bookcase should draw the assailant’s attention away from my other activities.

When I move, I move fast. I had already knocked over the bookshelf and started running when I heard a scream and a surprised voice behind me.

“Sargant Kirkland, is that you?”

I pause because I know that voice. I’d have thought he was back at camp by now.

“Felix?”

He steps carefully out from behind the overturned bookcase. His hair and eyebrows are completely covered in the sticky dust kicked up by the commotion, giving him a comically surprised expression. “Sargant! I’m so glad I found you.”

“Felix. What are you doing here?”

“I came to find you. You’ve been gone a long time. I got back to the camp with the rest of them, but... ”

I suppress a sigh. “But you figured I might need help.”

He looks awkwardly at his torn and ratty sneakers. “Well, yes. It’s like you said. We’re all worth more than a bunch of rubble, and you’re for sure worth more than whatever you’re looking for. We need you alive if we’re going to face Banks and his gang.”

“Thank you. I appreciate that you’re looking out for your teammates; that’s what we should all be doing. But I don’t need help. That’s not how I operate.” I turn away.

“You want to get up those stairs and you don’t need help?”

I can’t see him, but Felix’s tone is laced with disbelief and goddammit, he’s right. I do need the help. Felix could get up to the second floor in a heartbeat, whereas my climb could take hours. And by that time, it might be too late.

I turn back to Felix and say, “Okay. You want to help? Up on that floor is an atlas section with a big table. I heard—never mind how,” I add as he opens his mouth to ask, “that there’s a book up there we can use. The title is Historical Sketches of the L.A. Area. It was one of the rarer ones, so it should be protected in a glass case. Get the book, get back down, and we get out as quickly as possible. Got it?”

Felix’s eyes are shining, and I start to wonder what I’ve gotten myself into. “Of course Sergeant! I’ll be right back.” And he is away, scrambling up a bookcase by the side of the room.

“Be careful Felix,” I mutter under my breath. “Someday your generation will inherit the world. I’d rather you be around to experience it.”

Bryan couldn’t help but worry about the boy. Skinny kid, barely 17, and he certainly has no fighting skills, but the boy has heart. There is a fire inside him, you can see it in his gray eyes. He wants to help so badly. Maybe I’ll take him under my wing and teach him a few things on how to defend himself.

“Hey, Felix?”

Looking down, Felix said, “What is it?”

“What were you thinking about studying in school if you could have gone?”

“Space technology.”

*****

Felix begins his climb, all the while thinking about Bryan and the man he idolized.

At 6’2”, 225, and around 38, Bryan Kirkland is an imposing character. From what Felix had heard spoken about him, the man is a professional with weapons and explosives, a martial arts expert, and even had two tours in Afghanistan, received a silver star for meritorious action. His sandy brown hair and piercing blue eyes and rugged looks could make anyone shiver in fear if they didn’t know him. The small scar over his left eye, so the story went, came from a hand-to-hand struggle when he was overseas.

All Felix wanted was to be just like him some day.

Written By:

JaneF