Saviour

Chapter 4

Not a Sausage

          My expectations were shattered, having not been met with a fighter escort or radio chatter I glumly aimed for Florida. I could already see in the distance that the place was barren. My heart sank. My belief in my country and its power had been misplaced or at the very least it appeared as much. Florida was the sunshine state and I was expecting to see people down on the beach as my plane gracefully glided over. I could see a fair bit of debris as I slipped by. It appeared that at some point in the not so distant past there had been a pretty bad hurricane, but no people meant no clean up. So, the beach and local structures were trashed. I flew on and headed to the airport, that too was a mess. A commercial plane had collided with one of the terminals causing a huge explosion, like everything else this had happened a long time ago. The fire had been left to its own devices, ravaging all the planes connected and totally destroying the port. The sad thing for me is I needed to land, and my plane wouldn't make it to next closest airport.

          I felt like I had just been dropped off in a war-zone, the place had been devastated. Between the melted plastics, twisted metal's and shelled out husks of planes, I limped around. My leg felt worse and I believed it was because of the stress. Everything I could see from my vantage point was wrecked. The eerie silence was becoming annoying as I stumbled forward and there was an overwhelming need to get home. I felt very small in this alien world and I felt choked by the sense of impending doom.

            My walk became more hurried as I exited the port. I would have tried to refuel my plane but the chances of finding fuel in or around a shelled-out airport was slim to none. Instead I hoped to find a car to travel the rest of the way home, either that or walk.

           After a few hours of looking at the cars in the car-park, I decided walking would be the better option, at least for now. They were so different to how I remembered them. Most cars now had little screens on the centre console or dash and all the ones I saw were automatic. I knew even if I could gain entry, bumping one was impossible.

          So, my long walk started, and I have to say I was sort of excited, well as excited as you can be when facing almost certain death. I ambled down the desolate streets of an empty city not knowing whether to be confused or scared. The lack of animals was a huge worry. I expected at least K9's to have taken over the streets as the dominant mammal, maybe even cats. But alas I saw nothing. "Maybe all the domesticated animals died" I said aloud and for a moment I found comfort in hearing my own voice. "BLAAAR!" I growled out the noise. I was hoping to get the attention of something! Anything, even a damned alien would be a blessing right now.

          Noises aside I realised that I wasn't about to be rescued. So, with one foot in front of the other, I started my epic journey. It wasn't like I'd have to walk a million miles or something. Nope not at all. My walk would be around 840 miles or 1200 kilometres. Not an impossible thing to manage, but damn I wished I had a car. Driving would certainly cut down the distance. I could probably do it all in two days if I had a car. Which got me to thinking; If I didn't have the limp, I could probably do that walk in and around 12 days, but with the limp I figured it would take me 20, plus I would have to find food—I had a plan though, from here get to the interstate and take it easy, if nothing else I had time on my hands. Well if nothing came down and killed me.

          If I had to be honest; seeing empty cars wasn't something I would call entertaining but there was a great many of them. It appeared at some point there'd been some mass-exodus on the roads, and I felt then that the civilians had made it easy to be taken if that was what had happened to them. I walked on dodging between cars and after a few miles I was very much aware of my leg. The bone was throbbing with every step I took. The pain wasn't crippling or anything, but it was noticeable. I knew then that my journey was going to take a little longer and became even more aware of the lack of water I was carrying. The temperature was pretty stifling as I walked up the West Bay Parkway. I guessed the temperature was around 80 degrees Fahrenheit and my mouth was drier than desiccated coconut. If I had to be honest, I needed to be out of sun, but I wasn't going to be offered such a reprieve and after an hour of walking, I decided to check the cars for water. My hope was that someone would have put bottled water in the trunk. Success! It took about 20 minutes to find something to drink. All the cars still had their key's in the ignitions, so gaining access to the trunk wasn't hard. The water though didn't seem to quench my thirst, no matter how much I drank. So, I carried on – each step took me closer to CR-388 and that bit closer to the interstate. I was tired, so tired, I couldn't believe how exhausted I was. I had to press on, I had to fight this fatigue. Each step was becoming an effort taking my mind back to when I was a kid, I can still hear my dad. "Look at your brother, why can't you be like him?" He was referring to his ability to do the work of a man at 14, I was 10. Pitting us against each other had been something dad had done since we were little and even now, I felt like there was a contest. I used my dad's constant taunts as fuel to drive my feet and it wasn't long before I was quite a way's down that country road. I don't really remember stepping foot on it. I must have been somewhere between daydreams as I ambled along.

          Evening fell, and it was cool outside, I was sure I could smell salt on the air from the ocean. The idea of it made me laugh; I was sure I wasn't close enough. The night was pretty lonely as I sat on the bonnet of a car, I lay back and looked up at the sky. The moon looked so inviting I imagined there was a man on the moon looking back at me, we were both joined in an odd dance and our partners were the celestial bodies we were sat upon. My mind drifted into another night of restless sleep. I could smell the forest as I lay there and could hear people talking. I wondered then if that was wishful thinking. The language was foreign, it sounded Hispanic in its phrasing, but I wasn't totally sure. Then there was a sharp pain in my blasted leg again that sat me bolt upright on the car. I looked around, there wasn't anybody about – in the distance the sun was climbing. The only thing missing was the morning chorus of birds. Again, I felt painfully alone, like I was forgotten... I wished that my mind didn't keep having these moments. I got it; I was all alone and there was nothing I could do about it. I couldn't avoid my predicament I had to get on with it. I had to get on with that and my continued overwhelming sense of impending doom.