Winds of Change

Winds of Change

Jason Brannon

Published by Permuted Press at
Smashwords.

Copyright 2011 Jason Brannon

www.PermutedPress.com

This book is dedicated to Jillian Faith, who
has always been my light

in a darkened room. You have changed me for
the good

in more ways than I can count.

I.

Several people saw the shooting star as it
fell to earth, but nobody thought much about it. Not even when the
world started falling apart. I guess there were too many other
things to consider at that point, too much death and despair and
all-around weirdness. Whatever the case, we didn't make the
connection between the star and the disaster until the following
day. By then it was too late.

Most of us were too preoccupied with the moon
to notice the falling star. It was a blood moon, a brilliant ruby
hanging in a sable sky. I had never seen anything like it, and I
couldn’t help watching it. It was beautiful and frightening at the
same time, like a strain of anthrax studied under a microscope.
Although I wasn’t really sure why, the sight of the moon, looking
like it had been dipped in a vat of blood made me more than a
little nervous. I wasn’t superstitious, but I couldn’t help
thinking of signs and omens and prophecies.

No doubt the police station and emergency
room would see their fair share of lunatics tonight; the crazies
always come out in force when the moon is full. I couldn’t imagine
how much more severe things might become with a full,
red
moon. Little did I know, I was about to find out.

Thinking back to my morning ritual of
oatmeal, orange juice, and
The Crowley’s Point Sun
, I didn’t
remember reading anything on the front page about the phenomenon.
Usually if there was any sort of upcoming cosmic activity of
importance like an eclipse or a meteor shower, it made the paper.
Not so with this.

Of course, maybe the scientists didn’t know
this was coming. Maybe this was a bona fide omen of some sort that
came from nowhere and would disappear just as quickly, or maybe I
had simply overlooked the article in my haste to get to work on
time. Stranger things had happened.

Although I had plenty of other things I
should have been doing, I stood there in the vestibule of the
store, watching the moon with a childlike fascination. I imagined
werewolves, curses, and ancient rituals which were probably being
performed at that very moment by secret societies dressed in black
hooded robes. I had an overactive imagination I suppose.

That imagination kicked into overdrive when
the lights went out.

Apparently, everyone else’s imagination did
the same thing. One minute the hardware store was a fully
functioning, well-oiled unit, the next it was a perfect example of
chaos. It’s strange how quickly balance can shift in a matter of
seconds.

Thankfully, it was closing time and there
were only a few people left inside the store. I’m not sure what
would have happened if the building had been full of customers. We
probably would have realized that something was wrong a lot sooner,
but that would have also meant that more people were dead as a
result.

Someone - a child, I think - screamed out in
fear as everything went dark. The few people that remained in the
store could be seen roaming the aisles frantically in search of
their loved ones. It was a natural instinct. Of course, nobody was
panicking at that point. Power failures were common enough.

Having experienced similar situations during
thunderstorms and power outages, I wasn’t that upset. This sort of
thing had happened before, and everything always turned out all
right. The fact that it wasn't storming outside, however, bothered
me a little. The weather couldn't be blamed for this. Maybe a drunk
had simply driven his car into a light pole or somebody at the
power plant fell asleep and accidentally flipped a switch he
shouldn’t have. I didn’t have any good explanations, but I didn’t
feel like I needed any at that point. Order would be restored soon
enough.

I stood there for a few minutes in the dark,
wondering why the backup generator hadn’t kicked in. The generator
should have started up immediately unless the mechanics were faulty
or someone had tampered with it. It was kept in a locked
maintenance room at the back of the store. Only the managers had
keys to that room, so it was pretty unlikely that anyone had
actually sabotaged the machine. The generator was also serviced on
a regular basis which made it hard for me to believe that there
might be mechanical failure of any sort.

“Anybody know what’s going on?” Chuck asked
me.

“The lights went out,” I joked. “We’re all in
the dark here.”

“I’m being serious.”

"I haven’t heard anything,” I admitted,
dropping the humor. “Maybe a transformer blew.”

“That doesn’t explain why the backup power
failed. That’s never happened before.”

“I don’t have an answer for you, Chuck. All I
know is that we’re in the dark right now and there are still people
inside the store.”

“Do you think we need to call Mr. Kingsley
and tell him what’s happening?”

I thought about it for a moment. Mr. Kingsley
was our boss and the owner of Kingsley’s Hardware and Appliance. If
I knew him as well as I thought I did, he was probably either
pickling his liver at one of the local bars or stuffing dollar
bills into some white-trash stripper’s G-string. Mr. Kingsley was a
man who didn’t like to be disturbed, especially when getting drunk
or fondled. I remembered what had happened the last time I called
him in the middle of a lap dance. I had spent the next month
working the late shift. I wasn’t too eager to relive my past
mistake.

“No need to call the boss,” I said. “We can
handle it here. That’s what he’s paying us for. We’re in charge.
Let’s just make a decision.”

“It’s just strange that the generator isn’t
working,” Chuck said, not willing to let that point pass. “The guy
tested it last week. He said everything looked good.”

“So what do you think is wrong with it?” I
asked.

“Maybe terrorists are responsible,” Chuck
said, only half-kidding.

“Come on, Chuck. Terrorists? Get a grip,
buddy.”

“I’m serious,” Chuck said. “I think we really
stirred ‘em up by going into Iraq. This feels like something they
would try.”

“Terrorists don’t care about us,” I said,
peering out the glass front of the store. “We’re nothing. A speck
on a map. This is the last place terrorists would hit. Besides, if
they were going to hit us, they would do it when we were busy, not
when we’re about to close up for the night.”

“That’s exactly why it would be so
disturbing,” Chuck reasoned, running a hand through his thinning
blond hair. “It would completely catch people off guard. An attack
like that would really hit home. People would realize that they are
never truly protected. I mean, think about it. We always expect the
worst at the obvious times. The news always posts terrorist alerts
on the Fourth of July and on New Year's Eve and at Christmas. But
what about 9:30 on a Friday night? Who would ever suspect something
like that?”

“It's an interesting theory, Chucky, but I
think we need to start ushering people out of the store. We can
talk about this more when we don’t have to worry about people
filling their pockets or stumbling around in the dark and breaking
a leg. Mr. Kingsley would can both of us if he got sued because of
something that happened in his store while we were in charge.”

Of course, fear of shoplifters wasn’t the
reason I stopped the conversation. The truth of the matter was that
his logic scared me just a little bit. Chuck was thinking like a
terrorist, and his rationale made a certain amount of sense. I
didn't like to consider the possibility that he was right.

The sound of brakes screeching and the squeal
of metal outside only reinforced the notion that something was
wrong. I thought about going to see what had happened, but I wasn’t
sure I wanted to know.

“Things are going to start falling apart any
minute,” Chuck said. “I’m telling you. Go ahead, think I’m a fool
now. I’m willing to risk that. I’ll gloat later.”

“Chuck, there are people in here we need to
take care of. Enough yapping.”

“You know I’m talking sense, Matt. The
element of surprise is a key weapon to a terrorist. Hitting a
little town like this would make the entire country stand up and
take notice. It would turn everything on its head. Until now,
people in the big cities have felt the pressure while we’ve sat
back in our recliners and watched it all on television. We’ve
walked around thinking ‘I sure am glad I live in a little place
like this because nobody will care enough to come after us.’ Well,
what if somebody got wise to that kind of thinking and decided to
do exactly that?”

“We need to get some flashlights and get
these people out to their cars,” I insisted. “We can play this game
some other time.”

Chuck sighed. It was obvious that he had
almost talked himself into believing his own explanation and was
desperate for somebody else to side with him. “You think about what
I said,” he grumbled.

“Fine, I’ll think about. You just think about
the fact that nobody is dying in this scenario. The lights are out
and somebody wrecked their car outside. Other than that, there’s
not been anything to get worked up about.”

“Not yet at least,” Chuck said.

“Let’s just round everybody up and make sure
nobody’s hurt.”

“You start at one end,” Chuck suggested once
he realized he wasn’t going to win me over with the terrorist
argument. “I’ll start at the other. This shouldn’t take long. I
just hope we don't run into any of
them
.”

"Can it, Chuck," I muttered. "And don't start
talking about terrorists in front of the customers. I don't want to
scare everybody because of your overactive imagination. We
shouldn't get people worked up until there's a reason for it."

Chuck started to raise some sort of argument,
but I didn't give him the chance. I walked away from him and
started rounding up the people who hadn't yet made their way to the
exits.

Getting all the customers out of the store
wasn’t nearly as easy as we had anticipated. For starters, the
Weavers didn’t want to leave, and Jesse Weaver wasn’t the kind of
man that people argued with.

Although Jesse Weaver wore greasy overalls
and steel-toed boots and had two arms’ worth of tattoos, he was one
of the richest men in town. Nobody was really sure how he had
acquired his wealth, and the really smart people didn’t ask. Some
people mentioned bootlegging. Others whispered smuggling and
murder. Gambling certainly figured in there somewhere as well. All
of the theories were probably true to one extent or the other, and
the fact that his sons were following in his footsteps wasn’t much
of a comfort either. The fact that they weren't with him was even
less consolation. I had seen them all come in together and knew
they were in the store somewhere. Those boys didn’t go any place
that trouble didn’t follow.

I immediately thought of the generator and
the problems we were having. Maybe the Weaver boys were to blame.
If anybody could have picked the lock to the service room where the
generator was kept, I knew it was them. Wisely, I didn’t say
anything in front of Jesse and Vera Weaver about their sons. That
would have been trouble for sure.

“I’m not leaving,” Jesse Weaver told me when
I approached him. “Not without what I came in here for. The wife
needs a stove. That’s what you do here. You sell stoves.”

“The power is out,” I said. “I can’t sell you
one right now.“

“Why not?” Jesse asked, undeterred.