i guess ill throw one of my stories in. this story is from a series im writing and i decided to write 31 stories in 31 days and this one was the most popular so i thought ill post this hear for you all too read. there is a song that goes with it if you want to listen to it while you read, it adds to the mood.
Whiskey over Water:
Even if the world fell into black, there still was a tomorrow.
A month since the cleanse, those outside the confinement of the concrete jungle were affected as much of those who perished in the once thriving cities. Farmlands of dying vegetation left unattended. No one to care for what was left in the fields, small towns became a sad image to those looking for help.
Red Walton, spends his waking days now sitting on a porch with a rifle drinking heavily from a bottle of whiskey, calling out for his dog while staring at the abandon town that lays in waste since the bombings. He sometimes mutters a few words, mumbling to himself as if someone is still around. He spent his whole day shoveling in his fields, drinking from his well and getting drunk.
He’s a dying man now, low on food… and ammo.
A life out here once before had a strong meaning to a man. Spent your days raising crops or livestock, took care of a family that needed to be fed and raised. Lots of work put in everyday so you can just get by… take that away and what does a man have left?
Red was a man of respect, he loved his wife and child, even his big dog Mirv. He helped anybody who needed it, he thought of it as his duty to his community to watch over them. He never drank, nor did he swear at anyone. He would be the first to church and would greet everyone at the door. In the critical times of war and riots he still tried to keep everyone above water. Sacrificing his own wealth to feed the misfortunate, he was their Shepard and they were his sheep. This was “his town” as he would say and those agreed.
In the final hours he witnessed the falling of the sky, his family away, his dog missing. He bolted for his truck and made his way into town. Before he could even get there a bomb hit, a quake shaking his truck off the road. He ends up rolling several times, cut up and banged up he crawls out. He staggers to his feet and runs the rest of the way. He reaches the edge of town but found nothing but horror. Frantically he checks each body, and then in the distance he spots his wife’s car, crushed under rubble. He limped his way to the vehicle and fell before it. Reaching in with hope he attempts to feel for his family… all he felt was coldness. Screamed their names but not an answer, surrounded by the misery he laid for a moment. He then stood up with red watery eyes and found anyone he could… and put them out of their suffering…
Radiation was thick; he took what he could of anything nearby and stayed up at his farm. The water down below was polluted, food spoiled. A man would go mad if he consumed any of it.
So in his waking hours with a shovel at his feet he waited, singing a song when soon enough something will come staggering by.
“Mr. Reynold, glad to see you come visit a lonely man in his down time, please come sit.” As Red would blurt out with enthusiasm, followed by the click of the chamber of his rifle.
“Say hello to the misses” And the trigger pulled. The shot echoed, baiting another to come witness Mr. Waltons grieving.
“Oh Margret you’ve grown up so well” another round slid into place with a click it goes flying through little Margret.
Red stands from his chair, walks to the bodies of Margret and Mr. Reynold. Over checks them and drags them to a pit and throws them in. Goes back to his chair and yells out for Mirv.
“Where are you ugly?! Come on now it’s getting late I better not find you chasing tail again!”
Then a few more staggering in come growling, screaming with anger. Few more rounds go off, few more into the pit.
You see Red, continued to live for his community. He called those to come to his home for supper and offered himself up as the host and dinner. Those mad enough to come were helped, those who came were saved. Taken from their pain and misery, a bed made for them in his land. He would start all over again tomorrow.
As the month was nearly through, he himself was nearly through. He fell ill from a slow reaction of the radiation, he still needed to go to town now and then, sometimes find his townsfolk glowing and would drag them from the radiation and bury them. And like always he called out for his dog to come back. But today was silent. He saw nothing for miles or anything from the town. As he would he waited. The sun started to go down, and in his sights he saw what was few become many. A herd of them come screaming for blood, and that leading the herd of mad souls was his dog Mirv, his bull mastiff.
“there you are you old ugly son of a gun! Who’s your friends?”
He stood up and hollered. “Welcome to my home, its not what it was but please! Make yourself at home!” He took a shot from his hard liquor and threw it over the mad folk when they got close enough. He opened fire on a few, which then became many, all lighting a flame. His dog leaped for his throat, quickly he knocks him aside with the butt of his gun. He drops his rifle, as he backs up into his front door grabbing for his shotgun. Mirv comes back biting, gnawing for Red’s face, he then put’s his gun up against his jaw. With a quick jerk he then jams the butt of the gun in Mirvs mouth, keeping him at bay as the mad folk raged their way through the windows and door. He pushed Mirv back one more time and went up the stairs, while knocking over candles. The candles fueled the fire of those already in flame, spreading to the walls and furniture. All screaming with agony, Red yelled his prayer, as he continued to shoot his fellow community. Red was then cornered near the rear window of his balcony, still firing a way with his gun, now out of rounds he uses his Magnum. Mirv ran up the stairs as Red used his last resort and shot a fuel tank near the end of his stairs. Mirv reached Red and gets a lock of his throat. Both get propelled through the rear window from the explosion. First Red, then Mirv. Both laid on the ground suffering. Mirv one more time comes to bite Red on the face. But with recoil Red first stands up firing a shot into Mirv’s chest, followed by a couple more. Now out of rounds he stands tall prying his dog’s jaws off his face and tosses him aside into a pit. Red pulls out a hunting knife and sticks his dog in the head, gently he whispers a prayer, shushing his dog petting his snout. His dog then stops kicking, and falls back into the pit. Red releases and falls to his knees. He stared out into his field under the moonlight. His house falling to pieces as it burns he looks to each sign he wrote. “Friends, Community, Family” He stood up with whatever energy he had left. Kicked dirt over his dog enough to be hidden then he crawled to the farthest plot of land titled “family”. He laid on his wife’s grave speaking about how they met as he had one hand on his daughter’s grave. As it pans out from a dying man bleeding to death over a grave you see many that he once knew, his sheep as you would say that followed him to the very end and still came to him. Hungry, dying and lost, yet he still kept his word, and saved them from misery.
-J.B. Beverly - Disappear on down the line-