The Dead Road: Apocalyptic

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The Dead Road
An apocalyptic short by @KingBritain

Samuel Harper put the whiskey to his lips and necked the whole drink back. Even after thirty odd years, the good stuff had a damn fine kick to it. He scoured his throat with a cough and beckoned for the barman. 

'Another.'

The barman wandered over and pulled a bottle of whiskey out from under the counter. Harper's tongue went fat with excitement, eyes bulging and lidless as the barman poured the whiskey. With a hand that had held maybe a thousand different glasses, Harper reached out, took and swallowed the drink whole. His stomach heaved. God, it felt good. 

'Another.'

This ritual was repeated some number of times. Samuel Harper felt his legs go weak, felt the bruised light of the stinking bar dim till it seemed it were only him in there, sitting at the bar, drinking himself into a stupor, alone. Just how he liked it. The music coming from the grimy speakers faded away into a hubbub of noise, then ceased entirely. Very soon, Samuel Harper was drunk. 

The barman came up to him, wiping the counter with a mangy cloth. 'Maybe you should quit while you're ahead, old man.'

'Don't tell me what to do.'

'I ain't telling you to do anything,' the barman said. 'I said maybe. Maybe you should quit while you're ahead.'

'I'm fifty-three.'

'What?'

'I'm fifty-three years old. Don't be calling me old man.'

The barman scoffed and shook his head. 'Fine. Either way, you've been getting mighty drunk.'

Samuel Harper nodded. 'Yes. I have.'

'You're going to wake up with one hell of a hangover.'

Harper slammed the whiskey glass on the counter. 'Another.'

The barman laughed again, huge yellow teeth snapping up and down. Harper's fingers twitched into a fist. 'You're crazy, old man. Oh, sorry. Young man. Or would you just prefer–'

Harper slammed his fist into the barman's jaw. Blood squirted out of his mouth like juice from an orange. The barman staggered, wheeled over, and collapsed into the bottle laden shelves behind the bar. Glass exploded everywhere, and the sound was absurdly like gunshots. Suddenly Harper was being hurled back through time, back to the sounds of dying people and the red sky. Bullets everywhere. Flames leaping. Blood soaking the ground. A woman screaming for her child.

David! David! David!

The child was watching him, clutching a mouldy teddy bear. He was crying and in his wet eyes the flames were burning–

Harper blinked hard and pushed himself off the stool, grabbing the whiskey bottle. His legs were drunk but he'd learned how to use his drunk legs better than his sober ones. Swaying gracefully, Samuel Harper slipped out through the door, whiskey bottle tilted at his gaping mouth.

The air was hot outside. Sand itched his feet. Harper sucked greedily at the bottle, his throat retching, his stomach flipping, his head pounding. Harper slurped and coughed and spluttered and drank. 

And then the bottle was empty. He threw it away, into the endless, burning sand. Like a huge red skull, the sun vomited heat down on him. Samuel Harper looked up, shielded his wrinkled eye – one being covered by an eyepatch – then keeled over and emptied his stomach. 

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