A World Without Trust

Chapter One

I didn’t feel the tears streaming down my face or my nails digging into my cheek as I tightened my clasp over my mouth. All I could feel was the strong urge growing inside me to scream and yell my twin brother’s name as the men dressed in black combat uniforms and helmets with tinted visors dragged him into their glistening black van.

The blood gushing from my brother’s forehead made my stomach churn. He was hurt and being torn away from me all because he heroically saved my life.

It all happened so fast, as he shoved me down behind a bush and told me to stay quiet right before the black van grinded to a halt a metre away from where he stood. The van door swung open and before Luke could react a man dressed in black jumped out and smashed him over the head with a baton causing him collapse onto the pavement like a rag doll. And me? I just continue to lye there behind that fucking bush feeling helpless literally arms length away from my brother’s unconscious body.

It has been one month since my brother was taken away from me, one year since the global terrorist attack, one year since the start of the end of the world.

For years terrorist groups around the world in each country have been planning on defeating the Government and building their own empire from scratch. New rules, new countries and new leaders.

Unfortunately they succeeded by bombing Government buildings in every country, killing all the previous citizens involved in the countries government. This of course forced uprisings in cities causing shootings, more bombing and people looting local houses and shops. Eventually people didn’t know who was on whose side anymore, obliterating the concept of trust from the whole of mankind.

Men dressed in heavy, black uniforms slid down ropes from thundering helicopters herding scared citizens like sheep. From there they piled them onto old school buses to be taken to the hostage camps in Los Angeles. That’s where they took my brother, it has to be! Those lucky enough to escape buried themselves deep in the woods or based themselves on far away secluded farm land in the hopes of escaping the new Government’s world.

Since then I have been playing it low moving from town to town here in Florida heading towards the state of Alabama. Along my way I have experienced several black vans, like the one my brother was taken away in, cruising around picking up people and taking them to the camps. When I say ‘Picking up’ I don’t mean a friendly greeting and an offer of a ride, I mean weapons out and dragging people by their feet as they claw at the ground ‘Picking up’.

These situations are only supposed to happen in books or movies... aren’t they?

Before I left my family’s home, for what will probably be the last time, I made sure I equipped myself well for survival. I sprinted into the basement still in shock from what happened to Luke and grabbed my father’s hunting pack. In their I stuffed a one man tent, sleeping bag, some clothes, food, water bottle, a map of America, first aid kit, torch, my brother’s hunting knife, some boxes of bullets and my father’s trusty Marlin 336XLR Hunting Rifle. Then I hightailed it out of there trying not to look back.

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I arrive in Tallahassee and it is so airy and ghostly that it sends a shiver down my spine. The power to the whole country was cut when the bombings started in Washington DC, so now there isn’t that hum of electricity in the air anymore, instead there is just the loud sound of silence threatening to turn you crazy.

I slink my way from building to building careful not to make myself too noticeable to potential ‘Spies’ in the area. That’s another lovely bonus that has come with the whole Forth Horseman package, mother F-ing spies. They work for the ‘new’ government as undercover strugglers like me. They aim to make a fake friendship with you and try to entice you to follow them to Las Angeles to the camps, telling you how they’ve heard it’s amazing. If you don’t oblige they either track down one of their trusty black vans to ‘pick you up’ or shoot you between the eyes. Why do I know so much about this you ask? Well I have had first-hand experience with a spy and I tell you, she deserves an Oscar for her act because she had me fooled!

Eleanor Springer was her name, reminded me of my mother. A sweet lady in her late forties, lost her family in the shootings, desperate to survive and liked me because I reminded her of her daughter. Or so she claimed. She tried to talk me into going to the camps, so I told her my plan that I was going anyway, but only to rescue my brother then get the fuck out of there. That’s when she laughed, but it was a very harsh, loud laugh as to say: “You stupid girl!” She then turned into not so sweet Eleanor after I told her I wouldn’t join her in her little quest to the camps and she suddenly reached out beside her and hit me over the head with a lamp. It had no effect on me apart from a dizzy spell and when I gained my bearings again I tackled her to the ground, managing to prop myself up on her back with my legs either side of her. Next thing I knew I had a fist full of her hair and was smashing her head against the wooden floor.

I have to admit, during my burst of anger, I imagined myself in a James Bond movie and before I knew it I blurted out, “WHO DO YOU WORK FOR?” I almost felt embarrassed, but to my surprise she answered me and told me all about her assignment and that there where many more like herself.

I had heard enough and had worked up so much adrenalin that I smashed her head into the floor one last time as hard as I could and felt her body go limp underneath me. I got up realising I had only concussed her so I needed to get out of there fast. Before I knew it I was high tailing it North-West to Tallahassee.

So here I am in Tallahassee, sitting in an abandoned candy shop chewing on a raspberry liquorish stick… alone.