The Damned Read Free Page B

fucker came on the Tee Vee—radio too, I’ve been told.”
    Crazy fucker.
    “What do you mean?”
    “Seven weeks ago some crazy bastard broke through the airwaves: television, radio, even the movie theatre screens winked out into a staticky buncha noise, and a voice came outa that jumbled mess proclaiming the end of the world. Black clouds will gather, he said.”
    Scott gasped.
    Black clouds will gather.
    “The sun will leave the sky!”
    The sun will leave the sky.
    “He was right about that shit; fucking sun ain’t shone around here for seven goddamn weeks. Look at that smoky grey shit up there.”
    “ What? ”
    “Yeah, it’s the middle of the friggin’ day. Bet you thought it was night, didn’t you? I would too if I didn’t know better.” Warren laughed. “Fire will pour from the Heavens and—”
    “The damned shall walk the earth. I remember now. I was chasing some prick down the expressway and the radio cut off, and some… I thought I’d jumped stations and some crazy preacher was spouting off a bunch of bullshit. Next thing I know the gun’s in my face and… a swirling mass of black clouds raced across the sky and the gun went off.”
    “You don’t know the half of it, pal. I was onstage, dead in the middle of a performance, and half the audience vanished, just up and disappeared like some kinda crazy Twilight Zone episode. The rest of ‘em started going at each other like a pack of jackals, beatin’ and tearin’ and rippin’ the shit outa each other. The roof of the tent caught fire and I got the hell outa there. The sky was fallin’, just like the man said. Great balls of fire falling outa the sky as far as the eye could see, cities burning, forests set ablaze until not a tree was left un-scorched. The Rapture came on a Friday afternoon but the Bible was wrong, wasn’t no seven years of prosperity following it, just Hell on earth, seven weeks and counting, until all that’s left are bands of brutes and nightmarish creatures slithering about the landscape.”
    Warren snapped his fingers. “Just like that, the lights winked out and the sun went away, and damn near half the world went with it. All the decent folks, anyway. I ain’t run across a straight-shootin’ son of a bitch since it happened. Just a buncha evil doing bastards. Like that preachin’ cocksucker said: the damned are walkin’ the earth and it’s dog eat dog, and you’d better watch your nuts or one of those big behemoth motherfuckers’ll be gnawin’ on ‘em. God knows they ate everything else they could get their mitts on.”
    “God Almighty,” Scott said. “This can’t be happening.”
    Warren laughed. “Pinch yourself… what’d you say your name was?”
    “Scott.”
    “Pinch yourself, Scott, and pray to God you can’t feel it.”
    And Scott did. He pinched his forearm hard, but it wasn’t pain that brought the tears streaming from his eyes. “Jesus, where’s my wife?”
    Warren shrugged. “Gone to Heaven if she was righteous, I’d guess. On a spit if she wasn’t, or being fucked to death by those pricks—if she looked halfway decent. They ain’t got the highest of standards, you know.” He got to his feet, and Scott, placing a hand on his stomach, said, “Jesus, I’m hungry.”
    “Got some rusty old cans of Spam at my place. Better than dirt, I guess.”
    “Spam?”
    “Ain’t no meat. When the sky fell, the power winked out. The meat went fast—those big bastards seen to that. Next thing you know they’re runnin’ around barbequing people; men, women, don’t make no difference to them. They’ll eat anything.”
    “What about cows, chickens… farm animals, for chrissakes?”
    Warren laughed and shook his head. “You just don’t get it, do you, Scotty? When the Rapture, or whatever the hell it was, hit, everything good in the world went away: plants, animals, dogs and cats and all the nice neighbors you used to have—hell, there aren’t even leaves on the trees anymore, just one