Chet & Floyd vs. The Apocalypse: Volume 1 Read online

  I have since then listened to their reasoning and keep my person at a very safe distance from the side of the road. Or, at least before the world went kaput with the Big Death. Seeing that truck rambling down the road brought all those feelings and memories rushing into my mind. I looked over and there you were. Totally unsafe standing on the edge of the street. You could have been killed Floyd.”

  “That truck was nowhere near me.”

  “That would have been the last thing you thought. Right before your body blasted into a hundred pieces all over the truck’s hood,” Chet said. “Anything could have happened. I had to think fast.”

  “So you shoved my girl across the street into the truck’s path. Was that how you helped me?”

  “I would lay down my life for you,” Chet said.

  “You murdered somebody!”

  “Not if you see it my way. I just laid the proper person’s life down for you. If Sue wasn’t there, I would have taken that moment to plunge myself in front of that truck and died just as she did. I would have done that for you Floyd. We’re best friends. Would you have given your life up for me?”

  “I guess so,” Floyd said.

  “Thank you Floyd. That means a lot,” Chet said. Tears were welling up in his eyes. “I was going to jump across that street and ram myself into that truck for you.”

  “That’s just the thing,” Floyd said. “That truck was nowhere near me. I may have been right at the edge of the street, which I agree is not safe, but that doesn’t mean that every passing car is going to jump the curb and strike me down. That guy who hit the stone in that story from your youth was probably drunk at the wheel the night before.”

  “I had to think fast Floyd, and there are no second chances.”

  “There were people all over those sidewalks getting ready to be picked up for work. No one was in danger.”

  “Are you going to let me finish? I am the one on death row here,” Chet said. He waited until Floyd nodded dejectedly. “I had to think fast, and I would have flung myself in front of that truck, but I had a moral dilemma. I wanted to jump, but there is a hierarchical rule for the laying down of life.”

  “You’re going to have to remind me of that rule.”

  “If you’re in a situation where you have to lay down you life for someone and you’re in a group, you have to be the person highest on the hieratical laying down of the life ladder. Let’s say a child is drowning in the water and there are several adults around who can save him. An adult could save the child by bolstering him up with their body. They would drown but the child would live.

  “Now here’s where the hieratical rule comes into play. Let’s say the child’s mom, dad, eldest sister and older brother were there. Which one of them trades their life for him?”

  “That’s a theoretical question,” Floyd said.

  “No,” Chet said. “There is no question that the father is the one who should die.”

  “Not true.”

  “Very true. By following the hieratical laying down of life, heretofore known as the HLDOL rule, the father would die. Listen, the eldest sibling trumps the youngest. And the mother trumps both the children. However, the father trumps the mother. Chivalry is not dead Floyd. The father is the highest on the ladder according to the HLDOL rule, and he should be the one who makes the trade.”

  “So you’re saying…”

  “Girlfriend trumps best friend. Sue died so that you could live. I would have done it myself, but with her there, my hands were tied. She had to be the one to go.”

  “She didn’t lay down her life for me. You pushed her,” Floyd said.

  “She—and you know I would never disapprove of your choice of girlfriend Floyd—wasn’t the brightest bulb in the light bulb drawer. She didn’t think fast enough, so I helped her. I helped her lay down her life for you. That is the highest demonstration of love. She loved you Floyd.”

  “You are the most messed up person I know,” Floyd said. “Somehow this all makes sense in your head, and I must be just as messed up because I can follow your logic. But I must insist that I was never in any danger whatsoever.”

  “It’s all in how you see it Floyd,” Chet said.

  “What if there’s a grandparent in the water too?” Floyd asked.

  “The dad still drowns,” Chet said. “Unless the grandparent has some old person disease and will die soon anyway, or if they say something to the effect of ‘I have already lived a full life,’ or something like that. I must admit there is some grey area in those types of situations, but not in ours. Girlfriend trumps best friend every time. If the best friend dies while the girlfriend looks on, that puts a real strain on the relationship because the girlfriend knows she should have died, and the guy cannot trust her anymore. Usually ends the relationship within a couple weeks.”

  Floyd thought this all over for a couple minutes.

  “I think the only thing that’s saved you this time is the fact that I only knew her for about twenty hours,” Floyd said. “Otherwise this would have been a deal breaker.”

  “I admit I may have been a little hasty.”

  “You shoved her like ten feet.”

  “Maybe a little bit more than a little bit hasty, okay?” Chet said. “I have always been a man of action Floyd, and I make no apologies for that.”

  “I feel that I need to make a new rule for our friendship. Pay very close attention. I don’t ever want you to kill another one of my girlfriends over the HLTDTLH or whatever rule.”

  “The HLDOL rule,” Chet said.

  “Whatever,” Floyd said. “Let’s just make sure you don’t do that. And, I would like to add, for any other rule or moral anything. Don’t kill any more of them. Got it?”

  “Got it. Sorry Floyd,” Chet said.

  “Lord help me. It’s okay,” Floyd said.

  Chapter 43

  “Floyd I have to go to the bathroom,” Chet said.

  The small cell didn’t have much for privacy. The toilet sat exposed in the dead center of the room. Chet had a shy bladder at the best of times. This, for him, was absolute torture.

  “I haven’t gone in days. I am so off my cycle. It’s not good for me to be off my cycle. It used to be like this: pee in the morning right away, after breakfast take a really big…”

  “You don’t have to tell me your bowel cycle,” Floyd said. “I get it.”

  “I really wish you would stop interrupting me Floyd.”

  “If you would ever take a pause in your constant stream of consciousness, I wouldn’t have too. The answer is ‘no’ by the way,” Floyd said.

  “What do you mean ‘no’?”

  “I mean ‘no’ as in no I will not turn around completely and cover my ears and sing a song so that you feel comfortable enough to use the loo. I won’t do it.”

  “That’s not very friendly of you,” Chet said. “I can’t go unless you do that. I am very shy.”

  “If it was one or two times I would do it for you no problem,” Floyd said. “You have me doing this every thirty minutes, and you never go.”

  “I’m working my way up to it.”

  “Eventually your body will have to do it whether you want to or not. You should just let the cycle happen.”

  “I haven’t gone in days though,” Chet said. “All I can think of is all that waste just sitting inside me. I’m festering inside myself Floyd, and it’s freaking me out.”

  “I’m sorry. I will not help you this time,” Floyd said. “If you have to go, just be a man, sit on the pot and go. Damn everyone else in the room.”

  “Just be a man?” Chet asked.

  “Yeah, men don’t care. They don’t sweat peeing in front of other men. It’s an attitude thing.”

  “I’m feeling it Floyd. I am a man, and I don’t care about what I do in front of others! I will defecate as I please,” Chet said.

  “Just sit on that toilet, and let her go!” Floyd said.

  “That’s just what I’ll do!” Chet said. He sauntered
over to the toilet, dropped his pants and sat down.

  His look of defiance quickly vanished. He looked at Floyd who was looking out the cell window. The guards were playing a game of cards and not paying them the slightest attention. Still nothing would come.

  “Could you at least plug your ears Floyd?” Chet asked.

  “You’re hopeless Chet,” Floyd said.

  Chet sat on the toilet for a moment, then got up and zipped up his pants. “This will never work,” Chet said. “I just can’t relax.”

  “Well, at least you tried,” Floyd said. “That’s all we can ask for really.”

  Chet lay down on his bunk and put an arm over his eyes.

  “Did you have sex with Sue that night?” Chet asked.

  “A gentleman doesn’t speak of those things, but yes indeed I did,” Floyd said.

  “Is that the first time you’ve had sex?”

  “No,” Floyd said.

  “I didn’t have sex with my girl. I wanted to wait until our relationship deepened a little bit more,” Chet said.

  “Chet, I know you’re a virgin.”

  “I am not!” Chet said.

  “Yes, you are. You can admit it to me. I’m your best friend.”

  “Okay, you’re right,” Chet said. “I’ve never had sex. But I want it clear that this is not a decision I’ve made by choice or religious beliefs.”

  “You want it made clear that you’re a virgin because nobody wants to have sex with you?” Floyd said.

  “It didn’t sound that way in my head, but I guess so. It just hasn’t happened for me yet.”

  “Don’t worry, it will happen.” Floyd felt an odd sense of déjà vu. It was odd that their conversation on using the bathroom and having sex came to the same conclusion.

  “I had girls in the past tell me that they wouldn’t have sex with me even if we were the last two people alive on earth,” Chet said.

  “So?”

  “That’s becoming more of a distinct possibility every day,” Chet said. “Maybe one day there will be just two people left on earth, me and a girl. Sorry about that. May you rest in peace Floyd.”

  “No offense. Carry on.”

  “I bet they would want to have sex with me. There would be no other opportunity for them to experience that singular human warmth. That closeness.”

  “A bunch? You’ve had more than one girl tell you that?” Floyd said.

  “I just don’t understand it,” Chet said. “Am I handsome Floyd?”

  “I don’t want to have this conversation,” Floyd said.

  “Be honest. You can tell me. A man can think another man is handsome without any underlying meaning behind it. You think Sean Connery is handsome. You think Brad Pitt is handsome.”

  “You are a very handsome man Chet,” Floyd said. “Now shut up.”

  “Very nice of you to say so,” Chet said. “That wasn’t so hard, now was it?”

  Chapter 44

  The execution was mere hours away. Zukov had come down to witness the last guard change and to make sure preparations were under way.

  “Time for you to say goodbye to your friend,” Zukov said to Floyd.

  “I thought they would just execute you too for the hell of it,” Chet said. Floyd winced.

  “Let’s not put that thought in their head right now, okay?” Floyd said. He turned to Zukov. “I get to leave here unharmed. That is what we agreed on.”

  “I’m still willing to follow through with that agreement,” Zukov said.

  “Can I be allowed to go back to my home and get my things?” Floyd asked.

  “I’m afraid not. We’ve already taken ownership of your home. Everything inside is ours. I would suggest you be thankful that we’re allowing you to leave with your skin.”

  “I can dig that,” Floyd said.

  Zukov nodded to one of the guards who opened the cell and gestured Floyd to come out of it. Floyd came out without trouble.

  “See you later,” Chet said.

  “Good luck buddy,” Floyd said. He walked out with the guard. The outside air felt pretty good to him. People never smell that great to begin with, let alone when there’s not enough water for a shower. Four people—guards included—in that small area was pretty rank.

  Outside there was just enough breeze to carry away his odor, and that was all he could ask for.

  “I know you,” Floyd said to the guard.

  “Everyone here seems too. They all want to know the man behind the mask. Makes me a bit of a legend around here,” the guard said.

  The man was indeed the community executioner. He’d been very busy lately, especially right before the riots when the previous ruler had people put to death left and right. Chet was his first under the new regime.

  “It’s been a few days since I hung anybody,” he said. “I promise that I will do a good job for your friend. Snap his neck right off. No struggling.”

  “Is that supposed to make me feel better about you killing my friend?” Floyd said. The executioner shrugged.

  “Everybody’s got a job to do. I’m just doing mine. I understand if you don’t want to make friends. Let’s get you on your way.”

  “This isn’t the way out,” Floyd said.

  “We have to make a stop first. I forgot all my stuff this morning for the execution ceremony, and I don’t have time to walk you all over the place and get back to it. We’re going to my place first. Can’t be late. Can’t keep people waiting when they’re attending an execution. They tend to get a little restless.”

  “So executions, like the trains…”

  “Have to run on time. Exactly,” the guard said. “You sound like you have the makings of an executioner, but you never can tell. Some people just don’t have the stomach for it. Ever kill anybody?”

  “More than quadruple the number you have,” Floyd thought. Instead he said, “Name me someone alive now that hasn’t. Everyone has killed, either by his or her own hand or doing nothing to save someone from death. We all have blood on our hands.”

  “You’re kind of a weird one, aren’t you?” the guard said. “My house is coming up. Let’s pick up the pace a bit.”

  Floyd and the guard went up to a non-descript house that looked much like all the others in the area. There seemed to be no special perks for the community executioner.

  “You wait here now,” the guard said. “I don’t have to tie you up or anything.”

  “You might want to. You never know what I might do,” Floyd said and smiled. The guard laughed.

  The second the guard turned to get his things Floyd hit him with a reckless haymaker. He hit the man so hard his hand went numb. For a moment Floyd thought he’d broken it.

  The guard fell with a grunt, unconscious. Floyd gave him a good and hard kick in the head just to make sure. He dragged the guard to the bathroom, took off the guard’s belt and tied him to the toilet.

  Floyd searched through the house until he found what he was looking for. The executioner garb was all black, long and baggy. It hid his frame well. The hood completed the ensemble. Looking in the mirror, you couldn’t tell Floyd from the real executioner.

  Even though it was a hanging, Floyd had to then locate the ceremonial axe he’d seen the executioner bring to other events. If he showed up without the ceremonial axe, there would have some explaining to do. He found it in a closet.

  It was a hastily made plan for saving Chet. There was a good chance they would both be killed while carrying it out. Chet would bear most of the risk, although he didn’t know it yet. Floyd was fine with that.

  Chapter 45

  Floyd, fully clothed in executioner garb, hefted the large broad axe used for the hanging ceremony. It was blunt as befit a weapon only used for ambiance. He had made sure to sharpen it before he left.

  Floyd felt overwhelmingly cool in the get-up. He put a little extra swagger into his step as he went to Chet’s cell to pick him up.

  There were six guards already there who looked up annoyed. “You are
very late. We’ve been waiting a long time,” one of them said. He held a huge broadsword that was likely as dull as Floyd’s axe used to be.

  “I am late. I had some last minute paperwork to do,” Floyd said.

  “Paperwork?” the guard asked.

  “Yes,” Floyd said. “There’s an awful lot of bureaucracy when it comes to execution. I don’t want to go into it now. Just be warned, if someone ever tries to give you my job, remember there’s about two hundred pages of paperwork for every head that’s chopped off. It’s not just chop, chop, chop, go have some soup. I’ve been up all night. Plus I have my other guard duties.”

  “I had no idea,” the guard said.

  “An executioner’s job is never done,” Floyd said. “Let’s kill this guy.”

  The guards opened the cell. Chet jumped at them with all the fury he could muster. He was so trussed up it left him very little movement. All his effort was for nothing and only got him some extra kicks and punches.

  Chet lay on the floor and promised to behave. Floyd watched the whole thing from across the room.

  “I do have one question for you,” Chet said.

  “What is it?” the guard asked.

  “You have no reason to lie to me since I am a dead man. I just really want to know. Do you eat your dead?”

  “No!” Floyd jumped in. “We are a society. We are not the ravenous dogs who roam the desolate landscape outside these walls. We would never do that. There is no reason for any ‘last revenge.’”

  “You know about my ‘last revenge’? How could…” Chet said. Floyd quickly interrupted him with a slap to the face.

  “I used to have a friend who planned on soiling himself right before he was taken by cannibals. He was a very odd person,” Floyd explained to the guards. “This one may be plotting the same thing. It would be very gross to drag him all the way to the block with his pants full of filth.”

  “That’s crazy,” one of the guards said.