Post-Apocalyptic Adventures of Ott & Ren: Crevice

By Jeremiah Donaldson

Ott and Ren are almost to Denver when yet another shortcut slows them down in the form of 'Crevice', a settlement build around an old ski lodge. The leaders won't let them pass through without paying or completing several tasks for them. With no time to lose, they get to work, not knowing that they will be expected to offer their services in more ways than one before the day is over.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Jeremiah Donaldson
• Release date: Feb 21, 2020
• ISBN: 9780463327647

Jeremiah Donaldson

Jeremiah Donaldson is a science fiction/horror writer, editor, game designer, free thinker, corporate slave, and overly blunt commentator that grew up in rural Kentucky and lived in Florida for 13 years before moving back in 2008.When he's not working...whatever, he always works, let's start that over. When he's not playing his part as a cog in the machine for the specified number of hours per week, or doing housework, or planting fruit trees in preparation for the climatic meltdown we're forcing upon the planet, he strings together words for peoples' enjoyment.

Book preview

Post-apocalyptic Adventures of Ott & Ren:

Crevice

Copyright 2019 by Jeremiah Donaldson

www.ephiroll.com

Cover art by Jon Wells

Smashwords edition

ISBN: 9780463327647

All rights reserved. Any resemblance to persons you know is the result of fevered delusions caused by environmental contamination.

Chapter1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 1

Lightening flashed, blinding Ott with sickish, green light that flooded the interior of the car through ragged holes cut in sheet metal fitted over the windows. Thunder sounded immediately and so hard the car shuddered. Water dripped onto the interior from a hundred different spots as the car bounced over the rough road. He ignored the yellow, slimy rain running down the side of his face and concentrated on the wheel and road in front of him. His vision returned...and he still couldn't see where he was going.

Ott glanced at Ren in the glow of a dozen haphazard dashlights that looked like bobble heads dancing in the busted up dash recesses. A feeble LED bulb dangled over where the glove box used to be.

Ren had a laminated map in his lap he held with his right hand while his left held the extended handle of the jury rigged spotlight mounted next to the machine gun on the roof. He shook his head once in a while to get rid of the foul rain threatening to run into his eyes. His seat was pushed as far forward as possible, the opposite of Ott's.

Ott glanced at him and kept driving.

Ren raised an eyebrow and looked at him.

Ott didn't respond.

Ren went back to trying to keep the light pointed steady as they lurched side to side and front to back across rocks and potholes.

Ott glanced at Ren again.

Ren turned his head and looked straight at him.

Ott starred at the road ahead, ignoring him.

Ren looked intently at the corner of Ott's right eye.

Ott finally turned to look at Ren once more, and responded, What's up?

Do you need something? More leftover dog, perhaps?

Could you keep the light on the road? Ott squinted at the hole in the sheet metal in front of him made smaller by the water running in the edges.

Ren put the map on the dash and stood to his full height in the floorboard, still not reaching the roof of the car with his head. He tried not to touch the pools of weird rain gathered in the torn up interior, but had no choice if he wanted to hold himself up against the car's movements. Nothing could be seen through the viewing port on his side. He moved the light around, looking for the road. He finally made it out in the torrent of rain that moved over solid objects like watered down honey and sounded like flesh slapping against the metal of the car.

Puke green lightening branched over the purple sky, silhouetting crooked sign poles hanging over the two lanes and revealing the split in the road beyond that glistened from the rain. The main road looked as if it continued to the ridge while a secondary road without a visible center line angled down and to the right. A makeshift sign erected at the center of the intersection had something written on it. Darkness returned before either of them could read it.

Ren tried to find the sign with the spotlight, but the strange rain kept the light from reaching more than five meters in front of them. He pointed with his free hand as he squinted through the ragged hole on his side of the windshield. Pull us closer to that sign.

Ott nodded and goosed the gas until the post came into view before slipping the shifter into neutral and coasting to a stop.

The wood sign with 'Crevice' spray painted on it had came loose and pointed at the ground a bit to the right, but markings on the original metal sign it was attached to indicated it'd been spun.

I don't like it. Ren looked out the port in his passenger side window and then to the back, which was pure darkness. Not even the glow of taillights were visible in that direction. He flipped a switch in the center console and a lonely LED lit the area to the rear of the car. Only their tracks in the mud covering what remained of the asphalt stood out. I still don't like this.

Which way are we going?

Well, not to whatever 'Crevice' is.

But which way is 'Crevice'?

They looked at each other.

Dammit, dummy, do I have to solve everything? Ren searched the floorboard with his foot until he uncovered a washer among the screws, nails, bits of wire, and other assorted scraps from scavenger findings. He used his pocket knife to scratch one side. Heads or tails?

Which is which?

Ren groaned. Scratched side is heads.

Heads.

You don't even know what we're flipping for.

To not go to 'Crevice'. Ott grinned. You're being the dummy now.

Ren growled low in his throat and narrowed his eyes. Just fucking pick a side. I'm too tired to screw around with you.

I already did. I'm waiting on you to flip.

Ren gave him a snide smile, and nodded. Of course. He flicked the washer into the air, caught it, and slapped it onto his forearm with the same motion, before he pointed to the left. That way.

Ott slipped the car back into gear and touched the gas. Mud mixed with the gooey rain caused the tires to spin until the all-wheel-drive got them moving up the steeper incline. He had barely drove far enough for Ren to get the spotlight adjusted before he stopped again.

More lightening revealed a landslide across the road ahead of them. A chunk of the mountain had peeled away and fallen across the two lane road. Rocks bigger than Ott's car stood out of the debris from the dirt being washed away by rain.

He crept forward, looking for a way through and not finding one. A path big enough for bikes and quads went over the lowest and least rocky section of the fall, but the car was two big by twice. There was no way for them to continue except by foot