I bought the house becuase of the abandoned missile silo on the property, but it was a novelty. I was interested in the instruments of mankinds demise, but now the humor is lost. I have the means to survive, but no idea what to survive for. I laughed when I bought my Geiger counters on eBay, unaware that I would never be prepared for the eventual reality of watching the needle jump.
I was in town when I saw the flash and then the sun went out. It must have been miles away, but I was fortunate not to be pelted by the rain of debris. I was sheltered by the Bancroft building on Placet St. All the cars stalled, most coasted through intersections and into mailboxes and whatnot. Only two cars, probably antique, were still going and wove franticly through the stalled cars, pushing some out of the way until they could go no further. My ears are still ringing from that most horrific roar. I was painfully aware of people screaming and out of sight, people were dying.
It was really a new kind of nightmare.
Fortunately there was somebody else on the sidewalk where I was, scanning the sky in horror. I shook her shoulder to get her attention and shouted to follow. I had planned for everything except the loneliness of the shelter, I never thought I would need to worry about these things. We ran two blocks to where I had parked, I knew that with no electronic parts my vintage Vespa would still run, but found that it had been knocked over and seemed to have tumbled. I opened compartment by the seat and gave her a gasmask, putting one on myself. Their novelty was long gone, and I knew the filters had been mostly wasted, getting rotten meat out of the fridge or avoiding teargas at a protest gone wrong. The scooter started after a kick or two, and we both mounted and wove between the stalled or trapped cars, the clock over the bank had gone out. The hot ash had only just begun to snow down and I lowered the Vespa down with us on it on the pnumatic elevator, and sent it back up to close us off from the fallout. To close us off from the outside.
I had her hold the flashlight as I gassed up the generator and pulled the starter untill it roared to life and left my coat in the garage, telling my guest that she should do the same. She indicated that she was only wearing one layer so I brought her a sweatshirt from the barraks, and let her change. I took off my mask, unscrewed the filter and when she came out of the garage, I took hers, took off the filter and tossed the two of them on my coat. I wrapped all this in a trashbag, and threw it down into the bottom of the missile silo to get them as far from us as possible. I was glad I had spent all the money I thought I had wasted filling my survivalist fantasies.
This was when I wept.
She tried to console me but the reality of this situation was too much for me to handle. Dead...They were all dead. Dead or dying. And nothing I once loved would be so damned important anymore. I could only hope we had lost whatever conflict this was. The death was so terrible that I could only hope that in losing, a few people could survive. If America had managed to strike back then everybody would be dead. Everybody. Nuclear war cannot be won, only lost and tied, and nobody survives a tie.
She went to explore the abandoned, but stocked and decorated Titan III launch site while I cried over the terrible loss above us. I have my mechanical typewriter and my geiger counter, the detecter is outside, and all I can do is write, and watch that needle bounce at about 10 R/hr. That and gather up the nerve to go down the spiral staircase and face my guest.
Fiction Home
I was in town when I saw the flash and then the sun went out. It must have been miles away, but I was fortunate not to be pelted by the rain of debris. I was sheltered by the Bancroft building on Placet St. All the cars stalled, most coasted through intersections and into mailboxes and whatnot. Only two cars, probably antique, were still going and wove franticly through the stalled cars, pushing some out of the way until they could go no further. My ears are still ringing from that most horrific roar. I was painfully aware of people screaming and out of sight, people were dying.
It was really a new kind of nightmare.
Fortunately there was somebody else on the sidewalk where I was, scanning the sky in horror. I shook her shoulder to get her attention and shouted to follow. I had planned for everything except the loneliness of the shelter, I never thought I would need to worry about these things. We ran two blocks to where I had parked, I knew that with no electronic parts my vintage Vespa would still run, but found that it had been knocked over and seemed to have tumbled. I opened compartment by the seat and gave her a gasmask, putting one on myself. Their novelty was long gone, and I knew the filters had been mostly wasted, getting rotten meat out of the fridge or avoiding teargas at a protest gone wrong. The scooter started after a kick or two, and we both mounted and wove between the stalled or trapped cars, the clock over the bank had gone out. The hot ash had only just begun to snow down and I lowered the Vespa down with us on it on the pnumatic elevator, and sent it back up to close us off from the fallout. To close us off from the outside.
I had her hold the flashlight as I gassed up the generator and pulled the starter untill it roared to life and left my coat in the garage, telling my guest that she should do the same. She indicated that she was only wearing one layer so I brought her a sweatshirt from the barraks, and let her change. I took off my mask, unscrewed the filter and when she came out of the garage, I took hers, took off the filter and tossed the two of them on my coat. I wrapped all this in a trashbag, and threw it down into the bottom of the missile silo to get them as far from us as possible. I was glad I had spent all the money I thought I had wasted filling my survivalist fantasies.
This was when I wept.
She tried to console me but the reality of this situation was too much for me to handle. Dead...They were all dead. Dead or dying. And nothing I once loved would be so damned important anymore. I could only hope we had lost whatever conflict this was. The death was so terrible that I could only hope that in losing, a few people could survive. If America had managed to strike back then everybody would be dead. Everybody. Nuclear war cannot be won, only lost and tied, and nobody survives a tie.
She went to explore the abandoned, but stocked and decorated Titan III launch site while I cried over the terrible loss above us. I have my mechanical typewriter and my geiger counter, the detecter is outside, and all I can do is write, and watch that needle bounce at about 10 R/hr. That and gather up the nerve to go down the spiral staircase and face my guest.
Fiction Home
