The End of Eden (Water Worlds 1)

Chapter 18

18

Father and Kasey navigated over rocks and limbs until the way was blocked. Then we stopped and pulled and tugged at the debris, with the cars, with the winch, with our hands, until there was a way through.

We didn't see a soul, living or dead.

We had to push on north and east, keeping the Potomac and Monocacy Rivers, and the still flooded plain, far behind us. We needed height — altitude — and north was the way up and out.

"If we make it to the highway, I think we'll be all right," Kasey said, as he struggled to get us up a wet, muddy hill. "There's good elevation separating Frederick from the lowlands that lead into Washington. It'll probably be fine, until the refugees come, but from there we can turn west and get to open country quickly."

With that, the car dropped two feet suddenly, compressing a pile of debris and slipping us backwards down the narrow slope.

I shrieked a little, I think, but Kasey ignored me, or pretended to, as he twisted the wheel and downshifted the manual gears. I was mystified by his ability to shift like that. I'd only known my autocar, really, and it had no gears at all, that I knew of.

Soon the debris all around us disappeared. The sides of the scour-wall were smooth and slick, running along a line off into the distance that perfectly described the edge of the tsunami's limit. 

That's when we saw the bathtub ring. 

It was a 5-meter-high pile of rocks, pieces of buildings, broken trees and mud that seemed to stretch forever. I didn't want to look too hard, for fear of what else I might see in it. Kasey found a gap not too far along the line and Father followed.

As we cleared the debris ring and crested a final hill, we could see a line of bulldozers and backhoes up on the highway, just a steep slope away. We'd made it down from Sugarloaf Mountain, and then 5 kilometers to the highway, in just under 4 hours.

We could hear the chop chop chop of helicopters, and soon we saw one overhead. I waved out the window but I don't think they saw. We were nearly to the highway now, and I could hear the construction equipment.

First Father, and then Kasey, found a way up to an intact south-bound off-ramp of the 270 highway, and we drove up it the wrong way. Once up to the roadway, I could see they were clearing debris where the highway simply ended, broken off in a ragged edge. 

Beyond, it was a moonscape of a scene, completely unrecognizable from the neatly tended farms and villages of yesterday morning. Deep canyons were carved into soft farmland. A trillion liters of water had sucked it all back towards the ocean. The men working the edge of the road said nothing. They were lost in their work. They had seen plenty of survivors, and now were focused only on opening the road towards the capital. 

Helicopters, light aircraft and hover drones filled the sky now. The flashing red, blue and amber lights of emergency vehicles and equipment rimmed the border between civilization and disaster with a deathly halo. 

Kasey pulled up next to Father's car and we all exchanged expressionless looks. Joo Chen looked at me and just shook his head.

"We must move on," Father said to Kasey, simply. "If we linger, we risk being swallowed by the chaos."

"Agreed. I've got enough fuel to get us pretty far away. At least six or seven hundred miles. How about you?"

"Same here. Plus there's more petrol in the back. Global positioning is out, but in-car coms should work, as long as we stay within sight of each other. Now let's go!"