Failsafe of the Street Soldier

Chapter Three - The Sands of Time in the Hour Glass of Our Times

Once the radiation got to her she stopped being beautiful. She remained his wife for a while though.John Daring struggled to carry the huge sack full of cans the last few steps back to his house. It was a grueling endeavor but for the love he had for his beautiful wife and his two wonderful children he steeled himself and hobbled down the steps into the basement. It was nearly dark outside and he could hear a soft sobbing sound coming from the shadowy corner of the basement.

"Sweetheart," said Daring, "I got about ninety cans of peaches and ten cans or so of other stuff."

His wife did not respond other than continuing to sob softly, which wasn't really a response since she was doing that long before he walked into the cellar. Daring approached her and held her in his arms.

"What's wrong?" He asked, because as a police officer he learned to judge when someone was distressed.

"The children are dead," she said matter-of-factly. "They must have succumbed to the radiation."

"But I hardly feel sick at all," said John, but right as he said it his nose began to bleed and one of his teeth fell out on his tongue. He pulled away from his beautiful wife and when he did he saw that a fairly large clump of her hair was clinging to his arm.

"Oh no," he said, the children forgotten in favor of concerns over his vanity. "My hair, please don't fall out hair."

His beautiful wife just continued to sob softly. John Daring went to find a hairnet and then bury his children.

Meanwhile on Air Force One the President was safely buckled into his seat as the plane prepared to land at the secret base of the government. He could see that a large group of survivors had gathered at the gate leading into the mountain retreat. It made his heart skip a beat to think that so many people had survived the nuclear bombs and deadly lasers the Soviets had used on his country. It was a difficult landing to pull off with the winding mountain roads the only available place for Air Force One to put down, but the pilot found a stretch just long enough to touch down on. The President and his two remaining Secret Service bodyguards walked to the exit of the aircraft and stepped down on the road. The people trying to get into the bunker turned and began to walk towards them.

"I'm sorry folks," shouted the President, "as much as I would like to we cannot offer you accommodations at our big secret underground bunker in the mountain."

The Secret Service had already drawn their guns that had the cool laser dot things underneath them. That's pretty common these days but back in 1982, which is when this awesome story takes place, only really secret agents and maybe the Yakuza had them.

The crowd was actually trying to get to the delicious fleshy treats inside the secret bunker."Hey, uh, Mr. President," said the Secret Service agent with the unfortunate name Malphus, "I don't think they're going to listen. Look at them."

The President put on his thinking glasses and took a second look at the crowd of Presidential well-wishers who were approaching. He was fairly surprised to see that they were in fact a throng of flesh-eating zombies, and they were between him and the entrance to the secret bunker.

"We have to make a path through these horrible zombies!" Shouted the President.

The fearless Malphus and his equally unfortunately-named fellow agent and life-partner Corduroy began to shoot their guns and walk towards the zombies. Very predictably the zombies encircled them and began to chew on their heads and innards. The President, unable to run fast enough to escape the slowly walking zombies, found himself encircled. He looked into the red eyes of one particular beast, its jaw hanging shattered from its skull thanks to one of Corduroy's last shots, and he knew he was doomed.

"God bless America," he mumbled as the zombies began to chew on his head. A few seconds later the chewing began to really hurt a lot so he added, "AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHH."