Yesterdays Gone: SEASON TWO (THE POST-APOCALYPTIC SERIAL THRILLER) (Yesterday's Gone)

barriers in the stairways and halls, which Ryan happened to excel at creating. Turns out stocking intricate displays on the end caps did serve some purpose, after all. So, as long as he was careful and built good traps, he was safe . . . from the monsters, for now.
    He peered out the window and saw a young black kid racing down the street with two men chasing him.
    “What the hell?” Ryan said as he tried to make sense of the scene below.
    This was the first time he’d seen anybody, let alone three people at once, since the third day after the world flushed its people away. The first person had been a crazy guy pushing a shopping cart down the street outside Warson Woods. Ryan had asked the guy if he’d seen anyone else, but the guy yelled something about yellow cabs that made no sense to Ryan, so he left the stranger to wander aimlessly, knowing full well he would attract the wrong attention soon enough. The last person he saw was some weird guy later that day who seemed to be following Ryan from a long distance, but then vanished never to be seen again.
    The men chasing the young black kid were wearing jackets with hoods, one red and the other blue. They appeared to be white, or light skinned, from the best Ryan could tell seven floors up. They also seemed slower and older. But guns were a great equalizer to speed. And the man in red was aiming a pistol at the kid.
    The kid stopped in his tracks in the middle of the road, just beneath the awning of Ryan’s borrowed apartment. Ryan cracked the window open so he could hear what they were saying. A crisp, cool breeze floated into the room, and on it, the voices from below.
    “Give it back!” the man in the red jacket demanded.
    “It ain’t yours,” the kid said, a voice that seemed younger than the kid’s height. Judging by the rising crack in his voice, Ryan pegged him at about 13 or so.  
    “I ain’t askin’,” Red Jacket said, stepping closer, gun aimed directly at the teen.
    Blue Jacket had no gun, but stepped forward to intimidate nonetheless. “Hand the shit over, kid. Now.” he pressed.
    The boy reached into his pocket and retrieved something too small for Ryan to see from his birds-eye perch. Red Jacket took the item, then pistol-whipped the kid hard upside the head, sending his six feet or so crashing down to the cement.
    Ryan took both the thugs to be in their late teens, early 20s. Grown men picking on an unarmed kid.  
    Fucking pussies.
    Ryan returned to the bed, retrieved the rifle he kept propped against the nightstand at all times, then went back to the window and scanned the street. The two men retreated back down the street while the boy sat on the ground, glaring at them, hand on his head where he’d been hit. He looked as if he was contemplating making a run at the men, but didn’t know how to level the playing field without a gun. Ryan wondered why the boy hadn’t been armed. It wasn’t as if you needed a license to carry any longer, and there were no shortages of stores to get a weapon without a license, waiting period, or even cash.
    Ryan opened the window the rest of the way and leaned out. “Psst, you okay?”
    The boy snapped his head up, flinching. For a moment it looked like he was going to bolt. He tried to stand, but lost his balance and fell back on his ass.  
    “Hold on; I’ll be right down,” Ryan said, then turned and raced from his apartment, already dressed. Ryan always slept in sweats, a shirt, and sneakers because he never knew when he’d need to run next, or in which direction. It was best to be ready at all times. He may not have done the best job of preparing for many of life’s slings before the world went away, but he’d become incredibly resourceful in the past few months.
    He unlocked the wooden gate he’d just finished building, then eased his body past the stacked items that served as a barrier blocking the stairwell and ran down the stairs, two steps at a time.
    The boy, in jeans and a green long-sleeve jersey, looked even younger up close, despite his height. His eyes widened to softballs at the rifle.  
    “Don’t worry; I’m not gonna shoot you,” Ryan said soothingly. “What happened? What did those men take from you?”
    “Medicine for my Gramps. I took it from the drugstore down the street. I didn’t know it was their drugstore.”
    “It isn’t,” Ryan said, watching as the men turned the corner a block away, heading toward the drug store. “Were they in the drugstore when