James Axler – Judas Strike

Standing, Ron took another deep swig from the bottle and walked over to where David sprawled in the bunk.

“Hey,” the wounded man whispered, a pained smile twisting his feature. “It’s not a dream is it? They dropped the Big One.”

“Looks like,” Ron said, placing the bottle aside. He felt cold. So very cold.

David sniffed. “You drinking booze?”

“Yeah.”

“Morphine is doing me fine, but you go right ahead and have one for me. Hell, have one for everybody!”

“There’s lots of food,” Ron found himself saying. He had no idea why. It was as if somebody else were speaking through him. God, what was he doing? Dave was his best friend. Pulling the 10 mm U.S. Navy pistol from his belt, Ron clicked off the safety, the tiny noise incredibly loud in the locked bunker.

“Trouble?” David asked, struggling to sit upright. He reached out a hand for Ron, and the man stepped out of the way. “Somebody at the bunker door?”

Ron felt a hysterical laugh bubble up from inside. “I wish to God there was somebody at the door,” he said softly, “but there isn’t, and there never will be. We knew the risks when we took this assignment. World War III, pal. We’re all alone and nobody is ever coming to rescue us.”

“Nonsense,” David began gently, a shaking hand rubbing his bandages. “Why, over on Kwalein Island they have an underground base the size of—”

“Shut up!” Ron screamed, his hand shaking so badly he almost dropped the weapon. “Shut the fuck up! There’s only enough food for twenty years! Twenty, that’s all!”

“So?” David asked, puzzled, leaning back in his bunk. “Hell, that’s plenty. A lifetime!”

Ron fired again and again at the blind man until the corpse fell off the blood-soaked bunk.

“Now it’s forty years,” Ron whispered, watching the body twitch and then go terribly still.

That was ten years ago. Long lonely years. Taking up the fountain pen once more, Ron shook his head to banish the memory of that insane day. But it had been a decade since he heard a human voice. The TV and radio never worked again, the phone only static. The CD player and VCR were junk, the computer useless. The hundred thousand Web sites of the Internet vanished in the first microsecond pulse of the nuclear detonations. His new URL was now www.gonetohell.com.

There were still ten thousand gallons of diesel fuel in the storage tanks for the generator that powered the lighthouse. But he hadn’t turned on the beam in years, first to save fuel, then out of fear others would arrive and discover his crime. Murder. That was the word. He was a murderer. Assassin. Coward.

Thousands of people were probably raping and killing one another across the world, but this had been while the ground was still shaking from the bombs. While the taste of civilization was still in his mouth. There had been enough food for forty men for one year, or two men for twenty years, or one man for forty years. The math was easy, the results unacceptable. He had wanted a full long life, but now Ron was paying the price for his bloody crime.

Sometimes in the dark, Ron could hear the dead sailors from the Navy base whispering, asking why he did it, calling him a traitor. He woke screaming, drenched in sweat and used up all of the whiskey to force dreamless sleep. When it was gone, he switched to the morphine, but now that was depleted, and the nightmares were tearing apart his mind, until he wasn’t sure when he was awake or asleep. David stood behind him a lot these days, never visible, but always there, reminding him that he had something to do. One last act before he could finally sleep.

Putting aside the pen, Ron slowly walked to the middle of the stairwell, checked the rope he had tied there yesterday, slipped the noose around his neck and jumped. It was that easy.

The shock of the noose tightening filled him with cold adrenaline when Ron realized in horror that he hadn’t tied the noose correctly. It was supposed to break his neck and kill him instantly. This was slow strangulation! Standing at the foot of the stairs, David watched him thrash about with those pure white eyes and did nothing to help. Clawing madly at the rope slowly crushing his windpipe, Ron managed to suck a sip of air into his burning lungs. Then another, and another. He was going to live. Live! With excruciating slowness, Ron started to climb the rope, going hand over hand back to the stairs.