The sound of the world ending woke him up. Mitch lived in DC, well, the outskirts of DC. You know, one of those suburbs that are within an hour’s metro ride to all the government buildings. He was in Maryland, where the cost of housing was a little more reasonable, at least compared to Northern Virginia.
The world ended. DC, it was completely gone. The first explosion woke him. The second, he saw the brilliant light through his lights out curtains – they were blackout curtains. The third one blew out his windows. The curtains were just thick enough to contain most of the glass, just thick enough.
Mitch ran into the bathroom. He jumped into the tub and pulled all the towels over his head that he could. He waited.
While he cowered in his shower, he decided the end of the world was a lot less exciting than it was made out to be in many movies. Mitchel worked for the State department, so he knew he should be trying to log into… something. He was certain there was someone running a meeting right now trying to figure out what to do.
After a quick cry, Mitchel worked up the courage to crawl out of the tub. He smelled smoke. His curtains hung in tatters. His bed was covered in glass.
Mitchel found his slippers next to the bed. After giving them a very vigorous shake, he slipped them on. With his feet more adequately protected, he shuffled to his work bag. He tried to pull out his laptop, only to find his bag shredded and a good size hole in the plastic shell of the laptop.
Mitchel shuffled into his kitchen, which faced away from DC. He grabbed his cell phone and his iPad. Both worked fine. However, there was no internet.
Mitchel walked to his TV, turned it on. The screen stayed black. He glanced about. His shoulders fell, there were no lights on in the house that he could see. Even the coffee maker’s light was off.
In the light of the fires, he dressed, putting on some work boots. Steel toed, just in case. He opened the door to his garage. His asshole neighbor’s tree had fallen through the roof onto his car.
Mitchel’s phone suddenly rang. He jumped. He nearly fumbled his phone. He held the phone to his ear, he could see his hand shaking as he tried to hold it. “Mitch here.”
“Mitch, it’s Gerry. Can you log into Foggy Bottom?”
“No sir. Glass destroyed my computer, right through the Lenovo logo. I didn’t even have phone service for a while there.”
“Right. Well, I can’t connect to it. We have some servers up somewhere. It’s time for us to rendezvous at site B.”
Mitchel blew a hard breath, “My car’s totaled. Tree fell through the garage.”
“Figure something out. Be there in 12 hours. Gerry out.”
“12 hours?! Middle of no where Pennsylvania in 12 hours? fuck.” Mitchel cried to no one in particular.
Mitchel returned to his house. Mitchel grabbed his coat and shrugged it on, then thought better of it and packed some food and extra clothes. He grabbed his personal laptop and a couple chargers.
He walked outside to see his asshole neighbor gawking at his downed tree. Mitchel walked over to him. Sonny was a much larger man than Mitchel, but Mitchel was tired of this bull shit.
“Sonny, I need your car now. You didn’t fucking fix your god damned tree and now, at the END of the FUCKING world, it destroyed my car. Now, I gotta drive for work. State business. I don’t have a car. Make this. Right.”
Sonny gave him an innocent look, “What do you mean? Make this right. You never offered to pay for an -” Mitchel punched Sonny as hard he could. Sonny collapsed into a heap.
Sohla came running towards Mitchel, “What was that for? Mitch! What’s going on?”
Mitchel gestured towards DC, “The city is burning. Foggy Bottom might be gone. I need to meet my team. You have two cars. Give me one for now. Once this is over you’ll get it back and I’ll get a new car.”
She gave him a look. She wasn’t stupid. She worked for an agency too. So did Sonny. There was a good chance she’d never see Mitchel again let alone the car.
She glanced at DC, then back to Mitchel. She stormed off into the house. The garage opened minutes later. Their small car was pulling out of the parking space. She got out.
She grimaced as she handed over the keys. “I’m sorry you and Sonny didn’t get along. Good luck.”
“Thanks Sohla.” Mitchel shrugged, “These things happen. Maybe I’ll see you at site B or another site.”
He hopped in before she could respond and took off. The driving was treacherous. Power lines were down. Cars and trucks were crashed all over the road. As he inched through the traffic, he heard people wailing about blindness.
Mitchel continued. He hoped he could get past Baltimore and Pittsburgh without much problems. He could probably bypass much of Pittsburgh if he went north of it. Baltimore might be harder, he was so close to it.
As Mitchel came closer to the city, he found he had a lot and a little to worry about. Like DC, it was on fire. Like DC, it was mostly a destroyed husk of what it was. However, that meant traffic and cars on the road. People were panicking. The emergency broadcast channel was playing loops of cautions, but not providing any news.
Once Mitchel got far enough away from the large cities, power came back. cell coverage returned. usually the places he cursed for shitty coverage and bad food, had coverage and at least something to eat.
A few hours after being on the road, he stopped at a Sheetz. He got some food and a coffee.
As he filled up a local stopped him, “Is it true?”
“Is what true?” Mitchel asked.
The man pointed at the license plate, “That DC’s gone? I heard NYC’s gone too.” He squinted at Mitchel, “You got a sun burn man? Oh shit, wait, I remember seeing Chernobyl, were you close to the blast?”
Mitchel paused and looked at his hands. They were red. bright red. The gas pump thumped as it stopped filling. “Yea. I uh, I was close. A tree fell on my house from the blast.”
“Fuck man, get the hell away from me.” The man ran back towards his car.
Mitchel plopped into the car. Sohla’s car. She was probably in worse shape than him. Mitchel plugged his phone back in. He dialed a number.
“What is it Mitchel?”
“Ger, I think I have radiation poisoning. Does Site B have detectors?”
“I’ll make sure they pull them out. We’ll set up different rooms for you and anyone else that’s poisoned.” There was a pause on the other side, “I’ll probably be joining you there. See you soon Mitch.”
“Yea, Ger.”
Mitchel decided to get some more food. If he was going to be dying soon, he’d at least get another MTO.
By the time Mitchel made it to Boyers, site B, the Iron Mountain. His hair was starting to fall out. He just hoped he’d do some good before he went.
Mitchel parked and staggered his way out of the car. He’d barely made the 12 hour timeline. Traffic was terrible, even with so many people dead. Mitchel was pulled into a side building, away from the rest of the folks. The people unaffected by the bombs.
Blood was dripping from Gerry’s nose when he greeted Mitchel. “Yea, I’m getting worse. I had to drive close to Pittsburgh. That second dose may’ve done me in. Here take these. Might save your life.”
Mitchel took the pills. “What’s the plan.”
Gerry snorted. “No plan to speak of.” Gerry sat heavily, coughing. “Shouldn’t have snorted.”
After his coughing fit passed, he continued, “Well, since I’m basically dead, you’re the highest ranking person in the state department. SoS is gone. Internationally, we responded with nukes, too. No one is talking to us. When we tried talking, they blamed us for everything.”
Gerry handed Mitchel an envelope, “Here, get caught up.”
Apparently, World War III, was like WWI. One small incident set it off. It escalated quickly and beyond anyone’s control. Allies were pulled in on every side. Of course, the US had a lot of enemies. We were the biggest, so they decided to neutralize the US first. We responded in kind. Like WWI, everyone is settling back and waiting. Waiting to see what it means to survive after all these major city bombings.
Mitchel put the folder on the table. He just said he was getting something from his car. He left. he went to his brother’s cabin in West Virginia. No cell phones. Sure they could find him there, but given everything else going on, why would they bother.
Mitchel’s brother Adam found him. He was collapsed along the creek in the back of the property. There were a handful of dying fish in their caught fish pool.