Out Past the Breakers

Your Current Location is Chaos Keep : Stories : The Golden Light : Out Past the Breakers

"We can live down by the Ocean,
Leave the fire behind.
Swim out past the breakers,
And watch the word die."
--"Santa Monica" By Everclear

Cleo trudged along the boardwalk, stopping every few feet to readjust her backpack. The pack was a bit over full now with different supplies, and was getting hard to carry around. The changes in her body weren't helping her life very much ether.

Dropping the pack, she sat down on it. Jumping back up with a squeak as she sat on her still new tail. Cursing to herself, she sat back down, keeping her tail out of the way, then brushing down her skirt.

It was still hard to believe that she was a mouse, just the whole idea of it was absurd. People just don't CHANGE into animals! There are laws against that type of thing.

'Which, no one is apparently enforcing anymore' she though to herself, resting her head in her hands... or more accurately paws.

It had happened the day before. It was close to nightfall, and she had been walking along I-5, watching the second moon rise over the horizon, and trying to come up with some way for that moon to have appeared out of no where two days before.

As she had walked, things had gotten even stranger, when a shaft of light, maybe twenty feet accost and golden in the fading sun, had suddenly appeared a few miles away. It rose into the sky as far as she could see, turing from a swath of light to a golden thread, then fading as it reached for the sky.

It had sweep over the freeway, wrapping around the hulks of dead cars as it brushed pasted. Before she even knew it, the wave of golden light had sweep over her.

The pain had come first, like someone reaching into her body and trying to rip her heart out. She had buckled over, clutching her stomach, where it was the worst. Through her almost closed eyes she could still see the light, as it enveloped her body.

Over the next few minutes the pain ebbed and flowed, one time over her face, and others burning her ears. Over her hands, and for a long time it was centered right at the base of her spine. It was so bad her skin felt like it was being burnt from her body. Her screams echoing through the night.

Some time during it, she wasn't sure exactly when, she had passed out there among the dead cars. Waking up that morning she found herself stiff, and transformed into a mouse.

There wasn't to much of a change to her body as a whole. Of course there was the fur, some of her muscle tone had gone and the tail! She was happy she was wearing a skirt, it would have been uncomforted otherwise. It still was actually, with how the thick base pushed down her panties, but she was dealing with it.

Her ears had grown as well to much larger then before. Not to mention the ever present muzzle with the little pink nose. All in all the most uncomforted part of the change was that her feet had grown about an inch longer, and pinched in her shoes. She was going to need to get a new pair the next shoe store she found.

When she woke up that morning though, that wasn't what was on her mind. It was the fact that she, Cleopatra Rains, Eighteen year old honor student, senior in high school, and future Scotty, not to mention survivor of the Plague, had become a five foot six mouse!

After spending about an hour swinging from screaming to crying and back again, she finally got herself back together again and back on her way south.

She had no idea where she was heading, but she was heading that way. She also wanted to get another bike or a motorcycle or the like. Walking wasn't cutting it.

Which brought her to where she was, on the boardwalk of some small beach town off of I-5 some place north of San Diego, and south of the blaze that was LA.

With a sigh, she pulled her shoes off and started to rub her feet. Her fingers slowly running through the grey fur.

A slight brush of wind from the ocean brought the sent of the sea to her nose, but that wasn't all. For a second, she though she heard a guitar playing.

Standing up, she moved down the boardwalk a bit, looking between a pair of buildings and down at the beach. She could definitely hear someone playing a guitar, and what sounded like singing.

She broke into a run, not haven seen anyone in almost a month. Down the boardwalk, she found some steps, thundering down them she landed on the beach. Taking off in a run, her bare feet kicking up the send behind her, she tried to find the source of the music.

Stopping next to the water, she swung her head, trying to hear more of the music. It was easier to hear now, and seamed to be coming from close by. Going back into a run, she went around a large out-cropping of rocks and into a small bay.

At the center of the cove was a jetty of rocks, extended maybe a fifty feet out into the water. On the end of the rocks, someone sat, playing and singing.

Running down the cove, she could hear the words of the song becoming clearing. The singer sounded like he was on the courses.

Reaching the start of the jetty, she started to carefully walk her away down the rocks. Placing her feet carefully so as not to fall, or to cut herself. Finally she got close to the end, and the singer, who was finishing the song, holding the last few notes.

From the back it looked to be a human and Cleo had no idea what there reaction would be when they saw her. As the last of the song trailed off into the still air she started to clap.

The singer jumped, there head snapping up. Slowly looked back at Cleo, she saw that the singer was a man, maybe twenty or so. He had a beard and slightly bent nose.

He smiled when he saw her. "Thank you." He said, slowly standing, cradling the guitar in his arms.

Cleo couldn't think of anything to say. She had expect him to have acted surprised, or at least shocked when he saw her. Not giving her a half smile.

"I image," she said, trying to keep her voice calm, "that Santa Monica is burning along with the rest of Los Angeles."

He nodded. "To be joined by most of the west coast I would say."

She nodded a bit, noticing the guitar was electric, and plugged into a small amp that was sitting at the guys feet.

"Mark." He said, holding out a hand.

It took her a second to realize that he was giving her his name. "Cleopatra." She said, taking his hand and shaking it.

He grinned, picking up the amp. "Nice to you meet you." Then brushed past her and started back down the jetty. He walk with a sure and agile step, not even stumbling where Cleo almost fell half a dozen times.

He helped her off and onto the beach. "I assume you have some supplies around here?"

She nodded. "Up on the boardwalk."

He started walking. "Then lets go get it shall we?"

Cleo followed, feeling her tail bounce around behind her as she walked.

"I've already run into the light myself, yesterday."

She frowned. "How did you know, if you're still human..."

He shook his head. "No... it was my companion it hit. Changed him into some kind of cat, cheetah I think. He ran off, I haven't seen him sense."

"Oh."

He shrugged, starting up the steps onto the walkway. "Such is life. I can't do anything about it. If he comes back, he comes back. Anyway, he wasn't to stable after the Plague in the first place. Which was is your stuff?"

She pointed down the boardwalk, and he started that way. "So, what brings you to this small town."

She shrugged. "I'm not sure. I've just been wondering south for the last month or so. I don't exactly know why."

"Ah... I, myself, am a native here. Born and raised. When the Plague began I came here for my family. Now I'm the only one left."

They stopped once they reached her pack, Cleo pulling up over her shoulder and back on. "I don't suppose there's a shoe store around here?" She asked, kicking her old ones. "I seem to have outgrown my old pair."

He nodded. "Yes, there is one in the mini-mall where I've taken up residence." He started walking back down the walk.

Cleo followed. "A mini-mall?"

He chuckled. "Yep, half a dozen stores. Including a super-market and a music store."

"How about a Radio Shack?" She asked, her voice sounding a little excited.

"Yes, one of them as well, why?"

She patted her pack. "I've been hauling around a CB for the last three hundred miles. All I need now is a converter and a car and we'll be in business."

Mark turned a corner. "Won't you need an antenna?"

She chuckled. "Nope, scrounged one off a semi-truck a week ago."

"You are resourceful." He said, walking down the side of the street. "But why do you need a car?"

"Well, I need an older car actually. One's that still have a acid battery and not the water-cells. It will be easier then trying to get a generator going." Using city power was out of the question as most of the power plants had come to a halt three weeks back.

He let out an 'ahh'. "I see, and the only place that now sells the plugs for the older cars electric outlets is Radio Shack."

"Yep!" She as they turned the corner. Standing accost the street was the mini-mall, just as Mark had said. But there was something wrong, something seemed a little bit off, and she couldn't place it.

Mark started accost the street, jumping over a car that sat rusting. Cleo just stood on the far side, trying to place what was wrong.

Mark looked back, seeming to understand what she was trying to do. "No bodies." He said bluntly.

It suddenly hit her that he was right. There were no bodies at all, none in the parking lot, or on the sidewalk, no were. What frightened though was the idea that dead bodies had become so common place that she didn't notice them unless they were gone.

Mark stood on the other side of the road. "Come on."

She picked up her feet and ran to him.

* * *

Three days later, Cleo was half under the dashboard of a '02 Jeep, working on some wires. She had been having some problems getting the CB connected to the cars electrical system and hoped this last modification would do the trick.

Sliding out from under the plastic, she also steeped out of the car. Walking to where the CB rested on top of the hood of the Jeep, she flipped on the power.

There was a burst of static, which faded into some light background noise. She tapped it a couple times, then smiled to herself. The fuse was holding this time, it looked it was finally going to stay working.

She gave a quick tug on the antenna wire, making sure it was stable. It was patched together and the antenna itself was perched on top of the super-market. So if anything broke it would be a pain to try and fix.

"Mark." She called.

He pop his head around the corner of the building. "It's working?"

She nodded.

He jogged over. "Good, where do we start then?"

She shrugged. "I don't know. I would suppose the old emergency channel." She flipped the CB's dial over to channel 9. "Is anyone out there?" She asked into the microphone.

She waited for about a minute before shaking her head. "Ok, let's try nineteen." She said, turning the dial over to the channel all the semi-trucks used.

Half way down the dial, Mark grabbed her hand. "Stop." He hissed.

Cleo looked at him for a second, then let her paw drift away. She started to ask him what had happened, but he shot his hand up pressing it against her muzzle.

Then, in the static on the CB broke and a voice spoke through. "Team 3, have you found anything?"

Mark and Cleo looked at each other then she slow brought up the microphone. "Can you hear us?" She asked into it.

"Yes, I can." The voice replied. There was a bit more static to it, but was still understandable.

She smiled. "That's great! Where are you?"

There was a pause. "I'm in Wagon Mount, New Mexico. We're are you?"

"I'm not sure of the exact town," she replied as Mark dived inside the Jeep. "It's between San Diego and LA."

"Look," the voice said, a burst of static washing over him. "This is a one in a million shot to talk to you. Get over here, we have a settlement set up, we need all the people we can get."

Cleo frowned, not sure if she wanted anyone to see her like she was. Though, before she could response, Mark had reached over and plucked the microphone from her paw.

"Where exactly are you?" He asked, dropping a road atlas on the hood of the car, then opening it to New Mexico.

"I-25, north of Santa Fe."

Mark consulted the map for a second, his fingers tracing along it. "Got it. Looks like... um... nine-hundred miles from here."

"Alright, who are you two, so we can watch for you?"

"I'm Mark, and my companion is named Cleopatra."

There was a pause. "Noted." The voice said, the static getting worse. "Also, before this goes away any more. Have you two encountered any golden light?"

Mark cleared his throat, glancing at Cleo. "Yes, we've run into it."

"You're still welcome." The voice said the static flaring up. "Now get here as soon as you can. We need--" There was a blast of static that drowned him out, then nothing.

"Still there?" Mark tested. There was no reply.

Cleo shut it off, giving a slight sigh. "Well, we know where others are."

He nodded, flipping through the pages of the atlas. "Funny, I would have though they would of all gone to Boulder."

She shrugged. "How long do you think it will take?"

He gave her a slight glance. "Can you ride a motorcycle?"

She nodded.

"A week, maybe two, most of it will be a strait shot over, so not much need of a map."

She nodded again. "I suppose we had better go then."

"Yes," He said, giving her a smile. "I agree."

This story is (c) 1998 by Fox Cutter, hardcopy reprints limited to one a person, all other rights reserved. This story may not be distributed for a fee except by permission of the author, and this copyright notice may not be removed.

Your Current Location is Chaos Keep : Stories : The Golden Light : Out Past the Breakers
Page last updated: 04/05/2008