Bloodshed (Book One in the Apocalypse Trilogy)

Chapter 7: The Crater

Location: Crater Zone and Surrounding Area

Cal

The sun was high in the sky when they finally slowed to a halt. They had to, because the Jeep had run out of fuel. And it was when they got out that they saw the damage. 

Not a single window remained, but that wasn’t the bad thing. There was a trail of fuel trailing along the road, and Cal realised that at some point the gas tank had been punctured.

“Well, now we’re screwed” he remarked. Without gas they wouldn’t be able to travel as fast and they wouldn’t have a shelter to survive the nights.

“Let’s not jump to conclusions,” Williams said. “We still have the car; maybe we could take it apart and build something else.”

Johnny scoffed. “Without fuel? Not bloody likely.”

They all knew that that idea wasn’t an option. They also couldn’t continue on foot, because they had no water and were low on food.

Cal was just about to give up and suggest suicide, when he saw a faint dark line on the horizon. He lifted a pair of binoculars, and saw something that might just save them. 

“Well fellas, I think I might just have a solution.” And he pointed to the dark shape, which he now knew was a crater. The crater that had made them head for Darwin in the first place. The crater that might just save their lives now.

***

Cal was right; it was the crater created by the bombings.

It was a huge basin in the middle of the continent. Even with the binoculars and the scope they couldn’t see the other side, and they all realised that the world was bigger than they all knew. But rather than marvelling at this huge symbol of destruction, they got to work.

The bottom of the Crater was littered with debris, including pieces of cars and planes, and there were pools of water, sheltered by the shade provided by the basin.

“Let’s all split up and bring anything that might help get us to Darwin,” Cal said.

About an hour later they regrouped by a wrecked plane. Williams had found a crate of canned food, which with luck could still be edible. Johnny had found a few guns. Jake found a locked, metal trunk that had a warning label for explosives and Cal came back with a few military-style radios that still worked.

“We can’t stay in the crater forever,” Williams said. “We could survive here for a time, but eventually we’d have to leave.”                                                                                      

The others also agreed. “We could walk around the edge of the crater until we can find Darwin,” Johnny suggested. After looking at the map, they decided that this would be their course of action. 

They packed the new supplies into the bags and took turns carrying the explosives.                                                                                           They walked by the crater for the rest of the day, and stopped for the night in an empty gas tanker. Outside, the zombies came from nowhere and prowled the desert.