Decay (Book 1): Civilization Read Free

listen close enough that day.
    Perhaps what he was working on is important in some way , Jonathan thought.
    The remainder of the car ride had Jonathan sitting quietly while his father spoke to himself under his breath. Brian grabbed the remote for the gate as they pulled up in front of their house. The large steel gate lurched open under its own weight. Many of the other homes on this end of the city had gates as well, but none of them were as excessive as this one. It stood nine feet tall and spanned the width of the driveway.
    The gate slid back behind the wall, and the bars were intertwined to give the gate additional strength, while the frame was made from steel that was four inches wide by six inches thick. Very little space was left between the bars, which made it feel like a maximum security prison. To keep the homeowner’s association happy, Brian had a delightful flower design worked into the outside.
    The large gate shut smoothly despite its weight as the car drove up the driveway and came to a stop in the garage. Jonathan unbuckled his seatbelt and climbed out of the car. Walking up to the door into the house they walked past a ladder bolted to the wall that lead up and out onto the rooftop. Brian wanted a way to keep an eye on things outside. Michael always joked that his father should have just put in a periscope.
    Immediately after walking inside Brian pulled his iPhone out of his pocket and called his wife. “You need to either get home now or take Michael and find somewhere safe to be,” he warned. “I can’t be sure, but I think we went too far. The subject came back. Nobody else made it out of the building, and I’m afraid contamination is spreading fast.”
    Jonathan tried to stop and listen this time, but he kept walking to his room. Upon entering, he set his backpack down on the bed and pulled the chair out from next to the desk built into the wall and started on the math problems that his father formulated for him. He could still hear his father talking in the other room, but unfortunately he could no longer make out any of the words.
    After finishing his math problems and the two science questions his father gave him to work on a few days ago, Jonathan sat down in front of his small TV to play video games. Despite being encouraged to use firearms by his father he wasn’t allowed to play violent video games. His father did believe that video games had the power to “keep the mind sharp” as he put it, so the boys were only allowed to play puzzle games that would test their minds.
    Jonathan should have been reading at this time, but he figured while his father was distracted he could play games instead. His father made them read each day also, however, they could only read fiction in their free time. He preferred they read the books that were on the shelves on the walls of the family room. Many of these books came from the college. Some of them were new while others were outdated. With all the options presented for educational reading Jonathan decided to pick up the biology books like his father. Michael always chose to read the books that would help him with his chosen career of mechanical engineering.
    Both Jonathan and his brother were brilliant. Their father had them doing math problems before they could talk. Brian believed that math was the key to everything. “Any problem can be solved with math,” he’d always say.
    Brian worked hard as a young man to gain his PhD in biomedical engineering. He also acquired his master’s degree in chemical engineering. His academic pursuits lead him from his home in Iowa to Clay Hills, California. Here he found work at the Biological and Chemical Research Corporation researching diseases such as cancer.
    It was later on that night after Jonathan and his father had eaten supper that the peacefulness that had finally settled in was disrupted by the sounds of sirens. Not much sound penetrated the walls of this fortress that Brian had worked hard to build.