Age of Monsters by John Schneider (a book to read txt) 📕

The man – 'Bud' – nodded, but said nothing, simply huddling back, glancing nervously up at the still-crumbling ceiling.

Overhead was darkness – Rosa could see stars.

She could also still feel the staccato quaking in the ground – impact tremors from massive weight – and the roar of thunder that was not thunder – echoes of primal rage.

This storm was not passing – it had settled on the city, growing in strength.

Rosa wondered what must be going on in the streets.

By some miracle, the little group of them had fallen through the cracks.  In terms of survivability, there were critters that survived in a field under a rototiller – bugs, worms, mice – fragile life-forms that had somehow missed the churning blades.

But that wasn't the way to bet.

“What's happening?” Rosa whispered, as if the sound of her voice would bring the beasts down upon them.

She looked at the blinking circle around her.

No one answered.

But whatever it was, it wasn't over.

Chapter 5

In San Francisco, it lasted for ten days.

The small group of them hunkered down in their little impromptu bunker, waiting out the blitz.

San Fran was one of many big military hubs along the California coast – the invasion of dragons did not go unanswered.

The counter-strike was prompt, and soon enough, there came the sound of jet-engines.

And with the roar of the war-birds, came the bombs.

Officially, all hell had broken loose.

For better than a week, America's Finest battled the Beasts from The Pit for possession of the city.

By the third straight-day – feeling every impact, every explosion, breathing the stench of burning smoke – hearing the gale-storm roars of the outraged beasts – Rosa was beginning to wonder if anyone in the city besides themselves might have survived.

Really – how could they?

Rosa had been waiting for a lull – that was the part when the aid-groups came in – just like the ones she had done so much volunteer-work for – they waited until the principals took a break from killing each other, and then she and her fellow bleeding-hearts would go scrape up all the human wreckage.

This time, however, there was no lull.

Sometime early on, Rosa stopped believing in rescue either – and actually felt a touch of resentment – she had spent her life giving aid, but there would be no FEMA coming for her.

Ten days eating out of vending machines, breaking into cars – the coffee-girl had a week's stash of cookies and crackers.  They had stored water from a fire-hose in janitorial buckets.

And all along, they could hear it – all around – just above – waiting for the moment when the eye of the storm might finally decide to descend directly down upon them.

Whether dragon-beast behemoth, or stray missile – the blades of the rototiller were still turning.

In the main part of the city, once the skyscrapers had started cascading down, for most people, it was simply over – it was not a question of waiting out the storm.

And if you made to the street, all there was left was to run.

The screaming in the streets, however, had not lasted much past that first night.

There was the difference from a Tsunami – once it rolled over, the wave didn't circle back to finish the job.

Another seemingly deliberate action – like rhinos stamping out ants.

Rosa knew their little group had somehow been missed, but didn't yet realize how near a thing it was.

In fact, they knew almost nothing at all – they didn't even have radio after the second day – and all they got from the initial reports was that things weren't any better anywhere else.

And so the group of them hid away in the cracks.

Go back far enough, Rosa thought, and humanity's humble roots were not much more than that – tiny mice, hiding in their little holes.  And in the course of a single day, they had come full circle.

Eight of them – out of a city of eight-hundred thousand.

Or initially eight.  The older couple had both been injured badly – the husband had gotten the worst of it, having thrown himself on top of his wife as the stairway above started to collapse.

He had only lived for a short while, dying sometime before dawn after that first night.  He had lain discreetly, under a plastic seat-cover for the next two days – that is, until he began to stink in the heat, and they had carried him up the surviving steps to the street level, where he had lain ever since.

The old man's name had been 'Larry' – or 'Uncle Larry' to the children in their neighborhood, since he and his wife couldn't have children of their own.  Rosa knew this because his wife – 'Aunt Rita' – sporting two broken legs, and a great deal of pain to go with her fresh grief, had spent a lot of time talking about him in the days since.

Julie had been in constant attendance to the old lady – she was a nurse, and here were people to help.  Here in a crisis, she was the very caricature of Florence Nightingale, right there in the garage.

Rosa had worked enough disasters to recognize the psychology – people took on roles – shielding themselves with the balm of activity and purpose – that all-important distraction.  Rosa watched, semi-amused as Julie all but duplicated her morning rounds at the hospital – tending to the old lady – to all of them, including Rosa herself – checking on every last scrape and cut.

Then there was the poor girl from the coffee shop – with her pathetic little label-maker name-tag – 'Jamie'.  On the second day, Rosa had found her in the corner, crying.

Her cat, she said, was home alone – and then apparently unable