Flashback/The Dinosaur Apocalypse: The Final Trilogy of Stories

Chapter 3-1

These are stories of the Flashback, the time-storm that vanished most of the world’s population and returned the world to primordia, and thus are all connected. They are not, however, told linearly, but rather hop around the timeline at will (as is appropriate, perhaps, for a world in which time has been scrambled). Therefore, a certain nimbleness on the reader’s part is assumed. I hope you enjoy them as much as I enjoyed writing them.

—WKS

It had all come down to this, thought Sammy; this, well, whatever it was—this nondescript black and yellow gate in a nondescript neighborhood near Lake Hollywood Park. This lazed-open wrought iron door with golden fog filtering through (the same weird fog that had rolled in as they approached from the Hollywood Freeway) and a heart-shaped placard secured to it which read, simply, Welcome to the Garden of Oz (and Magic Labyrinth).

“This is it,” said Miles from the back of Satanta’s blue roan—which snorted and flicked its tail. “This is the place. Oz. Home.”

He dismounted and approached the gate. “My house is just around the corner.”

“Wait a minute, wait a minute,” Sammy used his feet to move his quieted Harley up alongside him. “Are you telling me that you used to live here?”

Miles nodded. “Uh-huh. Right next to the garden. My—my bedroom opened directly out onto it. So did my parents’ room.”

Quint and Jesse just looked at each other from the backs of their respective horses.

“And I need to know if they’re okay. So, if you don’t mind,” He walked through the gate briskly. “Let’s get this show on the—”

“Hey, wait a minute, kid—!”

And Miles was repelled: just whisked off his feet and thrown backward—as if by an invisible force—just knocked halfway across the street even as a blue barrier shimmered briefly and electricity crackled.

“Miles!” Quint and Jesse piled off their horses and scrambled toward him; slapped his face, sat him up—found him shaken but otherwise okay. “Jesus,” said Quint. “I mean—what in the hell was that?”

Sammy looked over at Satanta and Galaren—both of whom appeared grave—then reached into his breast pocket and took out a box of Marlboro Reds. “Well,” he said. He shook the remaining cigarettes out and slid them into his pocket. “I’d say that what we have here is ...” He tossed the box through the gate and it was repelled in a shower of sparks, even as the blue wall reappeared. “—some kind of force field.” He gazed beyond the treetops and powerlines as the blue barrier faded. “A dome, to be exact. A big one.”

“Gramercy,” cursed Galaren, fighting to keep his horse steady. “Witchcraft!”

“Well, now what?” said one of his knights. “Have we come all this distance just to be shut out?” He cupped the mouth-grill of his helm. “What, ho! Whoever—whatever thou art: Pray thee, open this door!”

Satanta glanced around—at the hazy, fortress-like adobe house across the street and up and down Ledgerwood Drive, which was choked in mist. “An ancestor of mine once said: when you see a new trail or a footprint you do not know, follow it to the point of knowing.” He took a deep breath. “I say we wait. If anyone needs something to do, they can map the perimeter.” He looked at Sammy and Galaren. “Patience—is what I’m saying. The situation could be, shall we say, more acute.”

And then there was a grumbling and a groaning—and a kind of snarling—as something shifted in the golden mist. Something elephantine, inelegant, massive. Something that was rapidly drawing near.

“It’s more acute,” said Sammy, even as he unshouldered his rifle and the knights drew their broadswords. As Quint raised the Magnum and Miles and Jesse brandished their wooden spears.

As the snarl became a rumble which became a thunder which became a roar—and the fog glowed white and red until two great lights coalesced abruptly and a massive machine materialized—and promptly slowed; its engine winding down, its brakes hissing. Until it had ground to a complete halt and they were all facing each other; after which a hatch popped open and a man appeared, who called down to them, “You have no quarrel with us, Dreamers of the Dream. Nor we, with you. We are all in this together.”

Which of course would have gone over better if the .50 caliber machine g*n (which was mounted directly beside him) hadn’t whirred about suddenly and aimed directly at them; no, not at them, Sammy realized, at it. The thing now standing in the doorway. The 8-foot-tall thing that was neither fully human nor (prehistoric) beast—nor even nub-horned demon—but rather an unlikely hybrid of all three. The creature, he suspected, that had been at the very center of the vision.

“f*****g Livingston, I presume,” he said, marveling, and spat.

∆My apologies for the mist; and for the shield, but they were—they are—completely necessary, as you will see.∆ The creature shook its head. ∆Alas, there is no time. Miles, Quint, Jesse, come with me. As for the rest of you: guard this door, this place, this garden—with your lives. And mind the sky. Because something is about to happen. And when it does—you must know what to do.∆

Sammy dismounted his bike and stepped forward. “What? What’s about to happen?”

∆For you, Sam of Zemlja; of Dharatee, and of Earth—nothing, or very little. For others, Everything.∆

After which Sammy could just look on—disoriented, confused—as both the kids and the creature vanished into the mist, into the maze.

––––––––

Leif didn’t know how long they’d been there (‘there’ being the crossroads of Interstate 15 and State Highway 58, just outside Barstow—as a strange, gold fog rolled in), maybe five minutes, maybe an hour. All he knew for certain was that nobody had done much of anything yet; not he and his people (with all their idling, tricked-out Hondas and trunks full of fuel for the fire), and not them; with their pickups and chromed exhaust-stacks and blue Tucker flags drooped in the gloom. All he knew for certain was that no one had yet made their move—not since they’d faced off like mechanized infantries (although at a reasonably safe distance of approximately 100 meters); and also that his people were growing increasingly impatient, increasingly belligerent—revving their engines, blasting their stereos—which meant he needed to get them focused, needed to dial them in. Needed to k****e and fan the flames so that when the time finally came, they could burn.

Burn the Garden of Oz, which was close enough now to taste.

Burn the traitor and his machine; which were less than 80 miles away.

“Aleister, I want you to use your scope and cover me—okay?” He opened his door and placed a shoe on the ground. “Because I’m going out there.”

“Jesus, you can’t be serious. I mean, Leif—they’ve got guns pointed at us.”

But Leif hardly paused, remembering Szambelan’s words: I will give you the power. Nor will you be alone, for our forces are gathering as we speak.

“Friend or foe—we have to know,” he said. “Just cover me.”

He slammed the door and walked out: out across the gold-shrouded asphalt and past an empty Tesla; out to the dusty fork in the road where he stopped and simply waited—patiently, fearlessly, audaciously—even as a single truck left the group and brought with it a lone (and very large) man—who got out and faced him.

“There are just two kinds that I know of so far,” said the man gruffly, and spat viscously upon the ground. “Those who got this, this vision, this hallucination, and want to go to L.A. because they think they can end the Flashback,” He tittered a little at the thought of it. “And those who didn’t, and don’t, but are supposed to go there to stop them.” He moved to within a foot of his face. “And what I want to know is: how is anyone supposed to get there through this f*****g fog—this bean with bacon soup—this s**t that seems to have just rolled in out of nowhere; and which one are you?”

At which Leif just looked at him—and at his truck, with its angry grill and chromed stacks and America First sticker—its drooping, impotent flag, and said, “Now here’s a man who wants to get right to it. A real bootstrapper. A patriot. What my old man used to call a ‘High-Toned Son of a Bitch.’ And proud.” He sneered slightly. “All right, then, Mr. ...?”

“Colmes. Hannity Colmes.”

“Is that some kind of joke?”

“That’s my name ... Sprout.”

Leif chuckled. “‘Sprout’—that’s good. All right, then ... Mr. Colmes,” Leif looked into the fog. “Let me show you what kind I am.”

And then the glass shard was in his hand—just there, out of nowhere—and he’d slashed once across the man’s belly and once in the opposite direction—opening him like a sack of red snakes. Then the man was fondling his own innards and finally keeling over as the bullets punched through Leif’s body and he raised his arms in supplication; in praise—in worship.

“Hear me, oh, mighty Prince of Hell,” he cried—even as the winds began to stir, the dust began to cyclone. “For I offer these entrails to you now in the hope that you will aid me—aid your faithful servant!”

And the gunfire stopped—just like that. From both sides. Yes, he had their attention now.

His wounds healed and closed over as he wandered further into the murk. “Clear a path for us, oh, Lord, if it be Thy will. Show us Thy power and glory—and show them so that they may follow us. Yea, if Thou canst surely hear me: Part for us this wicked brume!”

At which the wind positively roared and the ground seemed to shake; and Leif was amazed to see the golden fog parting like a curtain, like the Red Sea itself—clearing Interstate 15 as though swept by a broom; opening a corridor they could follow all the way to Los Angeles—and to Oz. Bidding all those gathered—both the cars from Las Vegas and the trucks that had blocked them—to reorientate and head west—as a single column, a single armada.

Lifting all the American flags and Donald J. Tucker banners and ‘Don’t Tread on Me’ standards so that they crackled on the wind.

––––––––

Ank basically knew what was coming from the moment Will dismissed the others: his excuse being that Luna was in danger so long as they remained out in the open—indeed, the San Gabriel Cemetery in South Pasadena was pretty exposed—and, also, that Travis (who’d been a mechanic in the Marines) should check the auto-hauler’s engine, which had been running hot since Modesto.