Gone to Shit: Surviving

By Berend Van der Poll

Life is never going to be the same for Michael Munroe, his brother and his family. Seven years ago, scientists warned the world of a NEA – near-Earth asteroid – but assured everybody that it posed no threat to life on Earth. They were wrong. Billions of lives were lost, leaving only a million survivors scattered across the globe.

Surviving is the only thing on Michael’s mind and sticking together is the only way his family and the handful of people under his watch are able to live to see the next day.

However, this annihilation gave birth to a new kind of threat, The Night Wind – a community who scour the city at night, abducting women and impregnating them to help give birth to a new world, and those who refuse and stand against their visions for the future are butchered without mercy.

With The Night Wind growing every day, Michael is forced to make decisions to keep pushing forward and keep his family alive, but, unlike his brother, Julian, who eliminates a threat without hesitation, Michael prefers to talk his way out of bad situations... How do you question your beliefs, hold onto your morals and reluctance to kill or be killed after The Night Wind comes knocking?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Berend Van der Poll
• Release date: Aug 6, 2014
• ISBN: 9781311942517

Berend Van der Poll

I was born in South Africa in 1979 and discovered my love for writing twenty-three years later. I find it very easy to create good characters, because each one of them is created using a part of me. As a child, it was hard settling down and making friends, because we moved around a lot. When I am not writing, I am enjoying fine pencil art - something I have been doing since I was seven years old, and spending time with my beautiful family. I live in Fish Hoek with my wife, Melanie, and Tyler – our son.

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Gone to Shit

Surviving

Berend Van der Poll

Smashwords Edition

Copyright 2014 Berend Van der Poll

Things were different before all this began. We had jobs. We had lives. Things were ordinary. You went to work every day to earn your salary, paid the bills, entertained the wife and spoilt the kids. We were normal people who had friends, had braais and got pissed.

Now, life is different. We are trying to survive what this world has become. We have been living like this for over five years. Ever since that asteroid hit, this is what our lives have become. NASA scientists warned the world seven years ago that there was an asteroid heading for Earth, and they said there was nothing to worry about, because it wasn’t going to be a danger to this planet. They calculated the size of the asteroid with their state of the art telescopes and concluded that this thing was three times the size of a rugby field and that it would crash into the Atlantic. People living near the coast were evacuated and put into camps. Those residents inland were asked to open their doors to them and make room. The government was going to reimburse all those who helped out over a period of two years.

However, these scientists got their measurements wrong. I don’t know the complete story, but I heard that the size is determined by the time the anomaly is dimmed and then multiplied by the speed to Earth. In the beginning, this thing was supposed to be a NEA, or what they call a Near-Earth Asteroid. It was supposed to pass us by at a distance of 35, 000 kilometres. Soon, that changed into a potential hit, but we were in no danger of it hitting land. Scientists warned of a tsunami on the southern African coast and Madagascar. South America and Australia would remain unaffected.

We were warned two weeks before the asteroid hit that it was forty-five kilometres wide and had an estimated mass of around 130, 000 metric tons. Something happened to it during those two weeks. It broke up and scientists never told the world. Then an insider at NASA leaked out that the whole world was in danger and the pieces were heading for land. The broken pieces were estimated to be between half a kilometre and a kilometre wide.

People didn’t know where to go. We were told to go home to our families and pray. For two weeks, the world came to a halt. There was not a soul on the street. Shops were closed and businesses were shut down. Everybody just waited for the world to end. I remember we looked out at the skies during the day and there were dozens of these stars. It was beautiful, but then reality hit you and you realised you should not be able to see stars during the day.

The end began when television signals went out and cell phones stopped working. I remember some sort of interference on the radio an hour before the pieces of asteroid entered our atmosphere.

It was a losing battle and it was something you could not stop. The only thing you could do was grab your family and run.

After the whole event, the world was shattered, if that is even the word to describe it. It was dead. Everything was destroyed. Buildings that once stood tall, touching the skies, we can now literally step over. Many towns are just rubble and what were our landmarks are now only memories. Everywhere you look, you are reminded of what happened. The asteroid left the lives of the survivors scarred and with little hope of there ever being a tomorrow.

In the beginning, we used to go through many filters for our gas masks to survive the dust in the air. We had to sleep in shifts and those awake had to wake up the slumbering to change the filters in their masks. This had to be done every hour, sometimes sooner, but it is the only way to survive. Many of the men scouted the lands and came across military bases, warehouses, or what was left of them, and looted filters, dried foods, weapons and medical supplies. We looted shops, homes and pharmacies, any place we came across. The foods we were used to eating before do not exist anymore. Nowadays, we eat rice, dried beans and fruit, honey, noodles, nuts, powdered milk and soup, canned foods and chocolate. These foods can last for many years and we have enough of it.

There are rumours going around that there were a million survivors after the asteroids hit. Some said they heard it on a radio broadcast, but then again, it was just a rumour. Even if it was true, a million survivors scattered around this broken planet is not a lot considering the billions there were before. You would be lucky if you saw a new face every day now.

That’s the least of our worries, for now, because this annihilation gave birth to a new kind of threat. They call themselves The Night Wind. They are a bunch of survivors who scout the lands at night looking for other survivors to join their community and change the world. They found a way to start Earth again and increase the population, and they go to all degrees to do that. We lost four of our people to The Night Wind. I will never forget that night…

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The sound of gunfire jolted Julian awake. As his eyes shot open and his hand streaked out to grab the handgun from under his pillow, a knee was shoved against his chest, pushing him down on the bed and giving him no way to defend himself. The masked man punched Julian’s face and head repeatedly, then grabbed his feet and pulled him off the bed, sending him crashing onto the concrete.

Julian tried to focus on the man through narrow slits as he signalled down the passage and called in another Night Wind.

"Take him outside and gather everybody," the man ordered and left the room.

Rough hands grabbed Julian’s ankles and began dragging him. He blacked out.

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Julian woke up to the sounds of soft cries in the distance that got louder as he surfaced. His eyes opened to find everybody on their knees with their hands tied in front of them. When Julian looked around and saw Cindy, Brandon and Shaylee on their knees next to Michael, he flew into a murderous rage, trying to break the ropes around his wrists.

Cindy assured the kids that everything was going to be fine and Michael tried to negotiate something with the seven Night Winds