The Day Humanity Left

When the power went out, we used the bumpy texture on the walls to guide us like constellations back into the living room. 

My sister, Liz called out to me from the other room, while I could hear her friend panicking nearby. I think we all felt the same thing when the light's finally shut off. 

We all thought it was the end of everything. 

They say the last bits that you lose when you die is your hearing.

So I understood Liz's friend, Beatriz shouts of fear.

"Eddy are you there?" Liz said. She only waited a moment before flat-out shouting. "Eddddy!? Mommm?! Somebody fucking talk!"

"Yes! Follow my voice, I have candles somewhere around here."

"Is Dad with you!?"

"Yeah, he's right behind me..." I turned but, couldn't hear my Dad rustling around.

"Dad? You there?" Silence followed. 

The last time I saw him was when my bad luck started in full throttle. We were rushing back from Kris' house after finishing a meal. Kris had just assured us he would gather important information from his drone after releasing it out into the flock.

Me and dad made it only a few steps to the empty neighborhoods before confronting a pack of those salivating suburban coyotes. It had been too late to turn back so we tried to make a run for it.

One of them lunged from somebody's lawn and startled my dad. It gnawed the metal cylinder at the end of his shotgun almost yanking him back before Dad whipped it sideways.

"Get off it!" My dad yelled trying to regain balance. "Stupid...goddamn...mutt" he fell back and scraped his palms on the gravel. He tried to push them away but was outnumbered, that's when I had jumped on one of them trying to kick the others behind.

One of them clenched their jaw against Dad's leg, leaving a gash and a trail of his blood. Dad finally managed to cock the shotgun and shoot It. He created an explosion of red into the air that left the culdesac looking like a horror movie set.

And he cocked it again to keep shooting.

I remembered the pulsating vein protruding from his neck. His eyes and face splattered with rancid-smelling coyote blood. He eventually emptied the remainder of the 20-Gauge on the pack of beasts until all was left was an indistinguishable pile of meat and hair on the paved street. We then quickly limped back towards the house within view. 

Then the lights went out, and it had blinded us. It was a darkness our eyes couldn't adjust to.

Then something glimmered from further away, the last few seconds of a dimming solar garden lamp in the front yard guided us like a lighthouse.

I figured, Kris' plan had worked. But, we were ill prepared to deal with the consequences. Our enemies had surely cut the power off, and they were furious.

"Dad?" I desperately called out. "You out there, old man?!"

"Quit your hollering." My Dad grunted. 

He had finally found the entrance of the house after hearing our stress calls.

"Those bastards! They finally killed the power." Dad said pushing apart furniture from his path through the dining room. 

"Now hurry, gather around, everyone." He said as my mother found her way to the couch. "You're all listening right?" 

Liz and Beatriz made their way and sat between us.

"We're gonna have a little pow wow." Dad said. "Good, Good."

The five of us discussed plans on how to stay safe in a world without power. We were a community so far from the main city, closer to nature. Dad said it was a good thing. He had learned some tactics from his time served in the military.

"We would all need to learn how to make fire, use a knife and hunt coyotes for meat."

"That's if they don't kill us first."

After an hour, the lights went back on. It took a few minutes for all of us to adapt from pitch black to the brightness of the tungsten light bulbs. Then I saw the beam of red peeking through my windows. The call from the four legged robot-dog Kris had control of.

"Eddy!" he said as he positioned it in front of the gate to meet me. "Listen to me."

"I'm listening!"

"I need to make my way over to your place. It's too dangerous for me to be in here alone. I'll bring some supplies, can you meet me half way?"

Kris never returned.

When I headed out looking for him armed with a baseball bat and extra layers, the bad luck continued for him and I, when all I could find were pieces of his clothes. There was his laptop still dangling tangled from a USB cord through the back of the hindlegs. I knew he was gone... but, Kris probably had something important there. So I had carried the laptop and rushed back to my home. When I made it home I was surprised we were able to get it to work. Kris had recorded aerial footage of what the new world was like. There were mostly baricaded-communities living isolated from each other. A big chunk of the city was left burnt and destroyed to crumbles and ash from the forest fire, while a small section of it occupied with people by a large church. The church of Eden was still a mystery to me. All I knew was the folks, seemingly polite were after the outtage now very persistent for members to join.

In the remainder of the week we were visited by two men, wearing clean ironed shirts. It was an odd occurance considering nobody had functional washing machines in the last month with the absence of a water line.

"Greetings, Brother!" The two men said smiling ear to ear. They never averted their eye contact.

"Church of Eden?" I asked but knew the answer.

"Why yes!" one of them said merrily. "Oh. So you're very smart and well knowledged I see. Because you know of us" he laughed. "And a very capable survivor" the other one said. "Say, can you spare a few minutes to talk about our all-father's survivor philosophy? He is our contact to The Great Beyond after all."

"And our Lord and savior is hanging out up above, in that comfortable throne of his. He's leaving space for us all."

"Oh is that right?" Dad said from behind.

"Mhm. You know this is all just a punishment for living a life of sins. But, good news for us all, we can still overcome this wretched world, would you like to know how?"

"We know all about your hippie Governor." Dad shouted jabbing his finger out. "He's no good. Never cared about the city then and doesn't give a shit now."

"Our all-father Governor Fitzpatrick would be most grateful to have you two in our community. And we have a very extensive pharmaceutical collection too sir, for your elderly ailments."

"BITE me." Dad grumbled.

One of them smirked. He looked down to my Dads bandaged leg. "Seems someone beat us to it, mister."

"You know we have two thousand strong, fully-clothed, fully-fed, and a community of people building a better tomorrow?" The other one said.

"But, that's just surviving! Aren't you people doing anything at all to combat the enemies?"

"Well, we can share that with you back at the House of Eden if you'd like to discuss it further."

Liz opened the front door wearing her comfort pajamas. "Eddy. Dad wants your help putting the last plywood on the windows." 

The two of the well-dressed men were immediately interested and focused on Liz. A much wider grin painted their faces when they turned to each other. 

"Well. Neighbors... I had not realized there were more residents in this property."

"Get the fuck out of my house or I'll sick Louie." Dad said sounding more fed-up. Louie had ran to the gate and started barking aggressively as commanded.

"What a gorgeous animal." One of them said before Louie poked his snout through the gates and chomped the tip of his tie tugging his neck forward. The man quickly pulled it away and jumped back with his friend.

"Stupid dog."

They both headed out back to their bicycles and waved back. "Farewell, Friends!"

Several days passed and there had been a moment of peace and comfort, but like all good things they tend to come crashing down abruptly. My Dad had still been injured but my Mom had been by his side supporting him. Me and Liz and her friend had taken charge boarding up the windows. We learned to shoot using BB gun pellets we had found. My Dad had given us chores until while we waited for a definite plan to move away to where we thought there was a safe community.

Then in the middle of the night, we were awakened by singing chants.

The two familiar men had visited us again but brought along their peers. They all wore the same white formal attire.

"Oh, oh, we pity the sinners that this dark world has claimed." They chanted in the dark tossing bottles with rags in them towards the windows. "Oh, oh, they won't be saved when the Devil rolls up in flames!" Their singing had an aggressive tone to it.

One of the bottles broke into the gap in the boarded windows and engulfed parts of the living room. Beatriz quickly doused it in our collected drinking water to put it out.

"What are you waiting for, kid." Dad handed me the shotgun and had me poke it out through the window.

"Don't make me shoot. You're not giving me any choice, you creeps!'

"We're just washing away this sinful life you're all living here." One of them said with his bulging unblinking red eyes.

"Give us the girls. We'll let you keep the old Bitch". The other one says.

"Not now, brother." They bickered.

Before another lights up another molotov cocktail, Louie jumped on him and bites his arm.

One of them kicks him so hard all I could hear is the loud yelp.

After this, I just see red and shoot at them mercilessly and hit another bottle they're preparing to throw. It explodes and ignites a couple of them before they make a run for it.

"Nice shot, Eddy." Beatriz says.

We managed to fight them off but our family dog, Louie is hurt bad.

The next few days were rough ones.

We were unable to save my boy. We end up burying Louie the same place we did all of my pets growing up. But Louie died a hero that day.

I sat down and felt things couldn't get worse, but the bad luck strickened me again like a curse. My Mom turned on the TV as she usually did for several hours displaying the white noise in the background just in case.

This time the images on the TV finally returned after what felt like ages. There was now an entire North America now filled in red.

"Kids, bring your Dad to the living room right NOW!"

Then an image of the oval office displayed on screen. It was our very own active president Johnson. But, something felt off about him. His skin, his mannerisms and face, didn't look right, I couldn't tell if it was the hue or proportions. Something was eerie and off about him.

Then another person followed, with the same stiff creepy smile that made the hairs behind my neck prick up. The former President Dougan took a seat besides Johnson too, and she looked not quite right, it's the little things the human eye can catch, that realizes somethings unnatural. She was also a woman from a polarizing political party who swore to never be caught dead in the same room as her successor, but there they were, sitting and smiling amicably. Then, one of our very own beloved and most respected actors, an American icon also sat down. A prestigious Celebrity Chef followed forming a circle behind an empty red velvet chair. Their eyes were all locked to the camera, staring all together fully focused. Finally the familiar man in the blue suit, the man who appeared first when our internet had first disrupted sat in the front of them.

These people we admired, they were all now addressing us. They each spoke in unison as one voice, only differentiating them by the slight differences in pitch. They said the new order would commence now, and we would be a part of it. After a few moments I figured they were using deep-fake imagery to trick us. Everyone else in the room couldn't decipher it. I feared for how many others were so easily fooled, but it was too late now. We were all so terrified when they gave us instructions and location points for the re-education camps. They were leading us to our new destinies, a new singular culture under their new rule or we'd face extinction. A clean slate fueled from our division and the uglyness we've created to something far worse.