cold and alone

Carl Jones, the self-proclaimed new furor left the compound earlier than he wanted to. He really wanted to get some food in his belly, but he had to leave before his wife could get home from the women’s meeting. Carl had assigned his wife to lead the meetings twice a week as a form of group counseling for the women of the new world. This way of thinking was very alien to people who had been taught by society that men were equal and sometimes even inferior to women and that they had their own independent voice for years. Everything seemed to be coming along nicely. There were a couple of escapes. First, there was George Sampson’s wife. She got out about a week before her eighteenth birthday, but they found her a couple of weeks later. The wolves had gotten ahold of her, but it looked like she had fallen down in to a crevice in the rocky mountainous terrain. That Sunday at the weekly meeting for the whole compound, Carl himself explained the extreme danger to the others living there. They had to understand that the outside was a very unforgiving world. It was impossible to make your way through the wilderness that surrounded the compound, because this one spot was the only one that Carl found that would suit human habitation when he began the new world. Her death was a benefit to the new furor, it discouraged further escapes.1

Eugene Carlton’s wife had also escaped. She wasn’t really his wife, but that’s how she was seen by the whole community. On the morning of her wedding day, her mother went in to her room and fond her bed empty. Her name was Vanessa Richardson, and it was though that she would never be found, but her body washed up a couple hours away in Spoken. The police said that she had been raped and strangled, then tossed in to the river. Her death was very useful. Carl stood before the group and reminded all of the sixteen-year-old’s short stature and childlike features as well as her innocent and loving nature. She was always taking care of the younger members of the new world and never complained about having to do extra work.2

“I’ll tell you who did this!” shouted Carl in outrage at the meeting, “It was one of those people! The inferiors that have been allowed to run this country and suck money out of our system for way too long now!”3

Everyone knew who those people were, and Carl’s ulegy of the young girl moved everyone present to hear it.4

There was a dirt road leading from the compound’s main entrance to county road 16, an unmaintained road leading to the more rural reaches of the county. Noone ever tried to escape using this route, because it was made perfectly clear to the inhabitants of the compound that outside waited the police who gave the breaks to all those who were evil and below God’s chosen people as well as the members of the major gangs and drug cartels that were the real financial force behind the enforcers of the law or of the lawlessness as Carl often said. He was on this road however, driving his ’92 Chevy pick-up to pick-up Dr. Hamilton. He was a friend of the community who lived outside the compound in the world of the corrupt and twisted. The new world needed him for medical skills, because those who ran the hospitals were inferior and would only let a white man die in pain as opposed to administering any humane treatment. The real medicine was saved for the precious minorities.5

Dr. Hamilton needed to see Carl’s daughter Brianna who was sick. That’s what had pushed him out here before supper. Bri’s condition had worsened. The fifteen-year-old was just skin and bones because she couldn’t keep anything down, and her temperature was above 101. Carl had to force his wife to go to her meeting and allow him to take care of Brianna who at about four o’clock, stood up from her bed to use the bathroom and fainted. She didn’t regain consciousness for a long while, and Carl worried that she had died under his care. There were those in the compound who didn’t fully believe in the doctrine of the new world. He knew that they would stir up trouble if Bri died. They would start talking to others, and if they mysteriously died or disappeared, the whole community would become suspicious of him. 6

Dr. Hamilton lived in Shelton which was over an hour away, so Carl set-out immediately. That’s what had brought him to this ravine.7

As he drove, Carl listened to a nearby radio station. At the top of the hour, a weather report was given that mentioned a winter storm that would be there “long before midnight. The meteorologist was estimating it would happen closer to eight or nine o’clock and Carl was planning on being home at 8:00 or later.8

Driving along a curving rural highway, he had hit some black ice. Carl estimated he was maybe a half hour from Shelton when suddenly he felt the front of the truck swing to the left. He stamped on the break in a panic and tried to straighten out the wheel. The truck simply spun on the slick icy road. Everything was totally out of Carl’s hands. He saw the edge of the rocky ravine coming seconds before he felt as well as heard the front bumper come in contact with the low railing that was installed along the highway. He was moving too fast for that to stop the truck. It flipped end over end and landed wheels-up on one of the ravine’s banks. He slid sideways down the incline for a short moment before rolling the rest of the way. Carl’s world rolled over and over before finally coming to rest upside down at the bottom of the ditch-like crevice in the earth.9

Carl finally was able to get the dizziness to stop and went through it all in his head. The truck was damaged but intact, and so was Carl. There was pain in his right arm, and he knew that there was blood on his face from a wound in his forehead, and a bloody nose he had gotten from the crash. The seat of the truck had moved closer to the wheel, so Carl had to work his way out from behind it. This is how he found out that his right arm wasn’t broken. It hurt, but he could still move it and it still had quite a bit of strength in it.10

He ran through it all in his mind as he tried to open both doors of the truck. They both wouldn’t budge. The partially crushed roof of the truck held them shut. He tried the engine, but there was nothing. He was hoping to be able to turn the heat on. A light snow had begun to fall. It was a preview of the storm to come. The temperature had also begun to drop quickly. It was nearly thirty when Carl had left the compound, but now he saw that the truck’s thermometer read 15. He wanted to use the truck’s cb radio to call for help, but nothing worked. Not the headlights, not the starter, nothing. The truck was totally and truly dead.11

Carl wondered who would find him. He was too far from home for a friendly familiar face to come hovering in to view outside the cracked front windshield of the pick-up. He had no cellphone, it was a way to keep the outside world in your ear corrupting you, so it was forbidden at the compound. To show the others how devout Carl himself was, he kept no phone on his person and no account under his name. He wondered if some motorist would find him. It would probably be some inferior, or possibly one of the true followers of God who were being lead astray by the mainstream media of these last days. Carl did something that he himself hadn’t really done in quite a while. He prayed. Although he only had hate and a desire for power in the beginning, the beliefs that he taught to his flock soon became his own true thoughts, and the fear of being left to die or being killed by those would recognize him for what he was and meant to stop the new world from forming scared him more than the freezing cold and his confined state inside the truck. He had to find some way out on his own. Maybe he could walk or possibly hitchhike back to the compound. No, he thought, a better way would be to find a pay phone. He had some money in his pocket to buy a few things while he was out picking up the doctor. He wanted to put gas in the truck, and possibly buy the doc something for supper on his way back home. He could pay for a phone call with that. Who could come to get him though? His wife could, but what if she turned on him. She was a very loyal wife, and a true believer in the philosophy of the new world, but anyone could turn without any outward signs. He had seen it before. It had happened a couple of times at the compound. He had heard of people dieing out in extremely cold weather. It might be okay to risk it, but would the others understand? Would they know the true severity of the situation without having experiencing it themselves? Of course, they couldn’t survive without a leader. IF Carl were gone, what would become of them? Many would defect, and the new world would end right there with him, or would it? What if, he was killed by those who wish to destroy what is good? Carl thought about what would happen if it was believed that the accident was no accident or if he had been found and murdered by members of the corrupted U.S. government. His son could lead the community, that was sure. Jason had the passion for the new world and Jason was twenty one now, he was old enough to take over, and if the brave martyr were his own father, Carl was sure that he would be sufficient, perhapse even better than he was.12

He wondered how to do it. He knew he couldn’t shoot or stab himself although the equipment to do those things was right there in the truck. He knew that it would be easy for the police to findout and then tell everyone including the others what had happened. He wondered what he would do if he found an enemy in such a vulnerable position. If they didn’t wish to take his money or other personal property, it was still possible that they could set the truck on fire so that it would explode. Carl thought this as he looked out the broken driver’s side window to see a small tree that had been torn from the ground by the truck’s violent decent down the embankment. It was young, it hadn’t grown to its full height but it would be perfect for Carl’s purpose. He reached through the broken window Paine and pulled the tree inside. Extracting his lighter from his pocket he wiped the snow from the wood of the trunk, and tried to light it. It was too wet. Carl opened the Swiss army knife he kept on his person and cut away at a section of the cloth seating. He ripped it off and used it to dry off the tree. He wrapped it around it and hoped it would absorb the water from the wood. Leaving the cloth wrapped around the tree, he flicked his lighter again, and put it to the dry cloth of the seat. It instantly went up. Not caring if he cut himself, Carl stuck his good arm out the window burning tree in hand and threw it up toward the truck’s under-carriage. In doing so he cut his forearm on the window glass and blood flowed freely from the wound. The branch went up far enough to hover in the stiff breeze for a moment, the flames fanning in to a greater fury. It then came down landing in a puddle of gasoline that leaked from the ruptured tank and pooled near the engine block. It flared up immediately and fire shot up all the way to the tank which exploded in a spectacular fireball. Debris was flung in all directions, and Carl was thrown from the vehicle. He landed on the side of the ravine and rolled down back toward his truck, but caught on some brush before reaching it. He was still on fire when he awoke from the state of unconsciousness the blast had quickly put him in. The pain was greater than any he had ever felt even being accidentally shot as a child hunting with his dad and being carried, fully conscious and crying in pain back to the house where an ambulance was called. He screamed in agony. Wishing the pain would simply stop.13

As Amy Nelson was driving home from her job in Shelton, she drove by the ravine where Carl’s truck lay. She also hit that same patch of black ice now with a light coating of snow on the road. The flakes were falling faster as she skidded toward the railing. She cried out as she came close to falling down the steep embankment. She was saved by the guard rail. Her small sedan wasn’t moving as fast and wasn’t as top-heavy as Car’s truck, so the railing stopped it. She called the police and sat in her car trying to calm down as she gave her location to the 911 operator. Out of nowhere, she shouted “Oh my God!”14

“What’s wrong?” asked the operator.15

“Something just blew-up,” cried Amy, I think it was another car! There was this big fireball!”16

“It’s okay ma’am, please calm down, the fire department and an ambulance are coming. They’ll help you.”17

Carl lay in agony on the embankment as firefighters tried to get to him. Through the blur of his own tears, he saw one of them trying to climb carefully down with a rope attached to a harness that he wore. The man was clearly black, but Carl raised his hand to gesture to the man. He wanted to cry out for help.18

“I’m comin, just hold on,” said the rescue worker as he made his way down the steep slope. Carl’s weight shifting when he lifted his hand however, was enough to break the hold that the bushes and vines had on Carl's body. He rolled down the hill screaming in pain as he went. He could see the window of the burning remains of the truck. It was now blown out and lay open in front of him like the mouth of Hell. The cab of the truck was full of fire. Carl knew the end was coming. In his mind he saw Vanessa when him and Eugene had taken her from the compound to a remote clearing after they had found her on the road walking toward county road 16. He remembered her crying out in pain and fear quite like he was doing now as they passed her back and forth bound hand and foot having their fun with her before Carl had strangled her and the two had thrown her body in to the back of that very truck and driven her to the river.19

He saws George’s wife’s fearful face when she had turned around and realized she had been found. He remembered her words, “Please don’t kill me! I’m sorry, I’m sorry, please no!” She had said them just before he had pushed her over the side of a steep narrow ravine quite like this one.20

What would happen to him? If the god he preached about and the bible he read from was real, he knew. He cried out in fear as he rolled in to side of the truck, “Noooooooo!”21

He rested against the super-heated metal of the trucks bare frame and torn sheet metal outer skin for a moment fully conscious feeling the pain of the intense heat before finally losing consciousness and never waking up.22