THE FALLOUT
By Hannah Utley
CHAPTER ONE
Friday, June 12, 2243
They sat
there. The tension suffocating. Neither saying a word. Not knowing what to say or how to respond. Telling your ex-boyfriend that you’re
pregnant with his baby will do that to someone.
His words kept repeating themselves over and over in Abby’s head, “Abs,
maybe you should just, you know, take
care of it…?” As if she could even
think about doing such a thing. That was
her baby he was talking about—their
baby—and he just wanted her to ‘take care of it’? Ridiculous.
Abby couldn’t think straight, let alone put a
coherent sentence together. She sat
there in utter disbelief, holding back the tears and the anger. She had known Nate forever, lived in the same
area outside of Denver since Junior High.
They vowed to remain friends even if dating didn’t work out, but things
never seem to go as planned. After
high school, Abby went off to college, ending their relationship, or so she
thought.
She would always be in love with Nate, but
somehow kept finding reasons for them to be apart. By distancing himself from her, burning the
bridge so to speak had only deterred her even more from trying.
It seemed silly, childish even, to hope that
things would change, that he would see the light and want to be with her
because of the baby. But hope, and hope
with all her heart she did.
The shrill voices
of the Spice Girls coming from Nate’s phone broke the deafening silence,
bringing Abby back to reality. Hearing
the song, all Abby could think was tell
me what you want, what you really, really want. How ironic are those lyrics
now?
“Landon, what do you want? This really isn’t a good time.” It was Nate’s
brother Landon. The ringtone should have
given it away. They were a bit gay with
their music choices. “What? Why? I’m
a little busy, man. Abby’s here… What?
Okay, fine, but this better be important.” He sighed and rubbed his face with
his free hand, like he always did when he was extremely stressed about
something. He gave Abby an apologetic
look before turning the TV on to the news.
“Alright, it’s on. Wait, what the
hell?” He asked.
Abby looked at Nate, and wondered what could be
so important that Landon would call Nate.
Landon wasn’t what one would call active or aware of what was going on
in the world.
The caption at the bottom of the screen caught
Abby’s attention though. It read:
METEORS
TO HIT THE EARTH?
The anchorman was
talking while the image changed to satellite images of a cloud of rocks flying
through space. Nate turned it up the
volume so they could hear what the man was saying better.
“…see,
meteors like this are pretty common to hit the Earth every so often, but they
usually burn up in the atmosphere before getting the chance to make contact or
do any damage. The shear amount and size
of these meteors, however, is quite staggering and honestly alarming.”
Abby’s stomach was already churning, but
suddenly felt the room spinning and almost threw up her breakfast from that
morning. She took a deep breath and
steadied herself on the arm of the couch.
The look on Nate’s face suggested he was feeling the exact same
thing.
“Oh my God…” He whispered, still on the phone
with Landon. “How did you hear about this?
You don’t watch the news.” He asked.
Abby turned her attention back to the anchors as
they continued with their explanation.
“President
Lewis and his administration claim to have just found out about this, but
sources say otherwise, that they’ve just hidden this from the public because
they thought disaster could be averted. They have been trying to think of any
solutions to this problem, but so far have come up with nothing concrete. NASA says they will be trying to shoot
missiles into the asteroid cloud to break it up more…”
Abby couldn’t breathe. She turned to Nate, almost asking him what to
do, but he was still talking to Landon. She
was so mad at him that she wanted to just leave and go home, but something told
her what they were seeing on the news was serious and would change their lives
forever.
**********
Ever since Abby told Nate she was pregnant,
with his baby, he couldn’t stop thinking about their first date. Nate was a nervous wreck. He had asked her out while at school. They were sitting in the cafeteria eating
lunch, when he blurted out, “Will you go out with me? Like on a date?” And by some miracle, she said yes. It was a perfect, beautiful May afternoon,
but nothing compared to her beauty. She wore a purple sundress with little
flowers on it. Every time she brushed
her hair aside, he caught the scent of lavender, taking his breath away. He knew from their very first date, that Abby
had changed his life. Once again, Nate
was transformed into that five year old kid with a crush on his teacher.
Abby was an amazing
girl, probably the best thing that ever happened to Nate. But hearing that he was about to become a
father? When they weren’t even together
anymore? Hell, he had just begun to get
over her, sort of.
Okay, not even close.
The phone call from
Landon and what was happening on the TV had him distracted though, if at least
for just a little while.
“Landon,
where are you? You need to come home now. Katie’s been asking about you, and I’m
running out of lies to tell her.” Katie
was their little sister, and at only twelve she didn’t really understand any of
their family crap. Their mom left when the
boys I were in Junior High; Katie was only four. Their dad, Jeff, was a truck driver and was
always gone so Nate and Landon basically raised Katie.
“Nate…man, I can’t,” Came Landon’s
response.
“What? No.
No, Landon, forget it. Whatever
you did can be fixed…” Referring to the
fact that Landon was always getting himself into trouble, and Nate was always
the one to bail him out. Landon was his
older brother, by only nine months, but Nate still felt it was my responsibly
to take care of him regardless of their age difference.
“No you don’t get
it, bro. I’m… I’m in jail.”
“You’re what?!” Nate asked.
“Yea… I really
screwed this one up…” Landon explained.
“Okay… Where are
you? I’ll come get you.” It didn’t matter what happened. Landon was still Nate’s brother, and was still
willing to risk everything for him. And
the funny thing is that Landon probably wouldn’t even appreciate it. Sure, he didn’t mean to be a jackass, but he
certainly was sometimes.
“No, man, you need
to get Katie and go somewhere safe. I’ll
be fine. Jail cells aren’t so bad ya
know… And anyway I’m all the way in Wichita.”
“Landon. How the hell did you get all the way to
Wichita?” They lived in the suburbs of
Denver, and Landon was supposed to be working down in Colorado Springs. At least, that’s what he kept telling
everyone, even though his work had reported him missing for several weeks. Landon was a loose cannon in the family.
“It’s a long story,
man. It doesn’t really matter. I really just called to make sure you and
Katie are all right. I gotta go though. They’re booking me, so I gotta give up my
phone and crap. Guess I’ll talk to ya on
the flip side, eh?” He half-heartedly
chuckled. He always was trying to
lighten the mood.
“Alright… but I
promise you, I will come find you when this is all over. We gotta be a family again. I love you.”
Nate said, resigning himself to the situation.
“Alright, I love ya
too, bro. Tell Katie that I love her
too.” When Nate hung up, the anchorman was
still talking about all the possibilities and implications of what could happen. Nate barely understood any of it, and was
only half paying attention, but it didn’t look good. It didn’t look good at all.
“Nate? What’s wrong? Is Landon okay?” Abby asked.
“What? Yea… Yea,
Landon’s okay. He’s just… in jail so…
I’m not really sure what’s going to happen.
I mean, I’ve already got enough on my plate with work, and raising
Katie, then you’re freaking pregnant,
so that complicates things a bit. Then
this damn meteor crisis happens and I find out my brother’s in jail.
I mean, what the hell is happening?”
Nate was usually pretty calm under pressure, but this was beginning to be too
much for the young man.
“I know, but
everything will be alright. We’ll go, I
mean…you will go and find Landon and
you guys will be okay.” Abby placed her
hand on his arm reassuringly, but he barely noticed.
“Wait, what did he
just say?” Nate asked, turning up the TV.
He had almost completely forgotten about the real issue at hand.
“...again, they have warned us that there is
nothing they can really do. We will get
hit. The face of the Earth will be
changed forever…” The screen went
back to the anchormen, who weren’t looking so steady. Finally one spoke, “This is devastating news indeed.
Since this is short notice there isn’t a lot that we have time to do,
but we do have some general precautions and advice for you to take. Try to get as far below ground as possible:
basements, cellars, fall-out shelters, whatever you can find. Store as much food and water as possible. Take any blankets, pillows, and mattresses
that you can into wherever you’re staying.
And… be with your family, for as long as you can.”
Nate felt Abby squeeze his forearm in
fear. The gesture sent chills racing
down his spine. He hated how she could
still do that to him, even in the middle of all this drama around them.
The anchorman continued, “The President himself will be giving an address as soon as they’ve
moved him to his secure bunker underground, but we’ll stay on the air with you
until we… Wait a second.” He pressed his earpiece to his head and listened
intently for a second.
He quickly whispered something to the other
anchorman, then they both sat there looking lost in thought for a few moments
before one spoke, slowly and articulately.
“I just received some breaking
news from NASA. They’ve determined approximately
when the meteors will hit. They say it
should be sometime this afternoon, about 4:00 EST. They will be giving us updates as soon as
they know anymore. We’ll break for a minute, before hearing
President Obama’s address. God be with
you all.” They went to an emergency
broadcast just then; bad timing in Nate’s opinion.
***More to come later!! please comment!!***
Hannah(:
