Season two, Episode Eight “The King”

12/11/21 • 31 min

1 Listener

After the Apocalypse

A Pandemic Survival Story

The King’s given name was Andre Bobette.

No one called him that.

No one had ever called him that.

When he was a kid his hard-drinking, white-trash father had called him ‘Bubba’.

At least he had, as long as that miscreant loser was still living with them in the double-wide trailer.

...

S2 E8 The King – Outro

Hello my survivor friends. Welcome back. How’s the apocalypse going for you these days?

This was a long episode. 3500+ words. I thought about breaking it up into two episodes, but it seemed to hang together well enough, and it advances the story line in the right direction.

I just listened to Roberts read of the King’s backstory – OH MY GOD! It was terrifying!

Great work.

Why does Janet care so much about what these bad guys are doing? Because she sees the bigger picture. She sees that this is one of those moments in the arc of time when direct action by a few individuals can determine or alter the broader outcome.

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After the Apocalypse

A Pandemic Survival Story

Season two, Episode Eight “The King”

The King’s given name was Andre Bobette.

No one called him that.

No one had ever called him that.

When he was a kid his hard-drinking, white-trash father had called him ‘Bubba’.

At least he had, as long as that miscreant loser was still living with them in the double-wide trailer.

...

S2 E8 The King – Outro

Hello my survivor friends. Welcome back. How’s the apocalypse going for you these days?

This was a long episode. 3500+ words. I thought about breaking it up into two episodes, but it seemed to hang together well enough, and it advances the story line in the right direction.

I just listened to Roberts read of the King’s backstory – OH MY GOD! It was terrifying!

Great work.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Previous Episode

Season two, Episode Seven “Industrial”

After the Apocalypse

A Pandemic Survival Story

Season two, Episode Seven “Industrial”

It was slippery and tough going in the industrial rubble by the river’s edge.

The old man pulled himself up over a concrete slab that blocked the trail. The slab had rebar sticking out of it like the broken bones of an old corpse that had been torn open by wolves.

...

Hello survivors. Happy Thanksgiving!

Let me say, first of all, that I have been dying to use the phrase “Arms akimbo” in a story my whole life.

Akimbo is an interesting English word that means "with the hands on the hips and the elbows bent outward at sharp angles".

They think the word akimbo has some relation to the word ‘bow’ like ‘bow and arrow’ – because the arms are bent like a bow. The first recorded usage was by Chaucer in the Canterbury Tales in the 1400’s.

I’m going to stop right there before I start waxing poetically about Richard III and Henry IV and Iambic Pentameter.

All in good time.

Back to the story...

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Next Episode

Season two, Episode nine “Reunion”

After the Apocalypse

A Pandemic Survival Story

Season two, Episode nine “Reunion”

Bella watched as the big dog pushed his head into the old man’s lap. The dog was wiggling its butt like a puppy and the old man was pretending to be mad.

“No”, the old man said, looking away from the supplicant dog, who was vigorously nuzzling at him. “You didn’t listen to me. You could have gotten yourself killed.”

The dog gave a big push and the old man slipped out of the chair sprawling onto the linoleum floor. Bill pounced on the old man as he fell to the ground and licked at his face. The old man put his hands up for protection and laughed despite himself.

...

Outro S2 E9

Hello my survivor friends.

Welcome back to the apocalypse.

In this episode I wanted to give all y’all a bit of a breather from all the tension and action. That last episode where KJ has to escape across the river was harrowing. Death, destruction, fear, tension, cats and dogs living together – real end-of-the-world stuff!

My editors and I had a multi-day discussion as to whether she would bring her boots with her. Tim said to tie the boots around her neck. I just couldn’t see how she could swim with the boots around her neck.

I rewrote it 3 times. Tried a compromise. Long distance swimmers actually have these waterproof floaty bags they put stuff in and tie to their ankles. But it was getting to complex and awkward, so I sent them a text that read “I don’t care about the @#$%@ boots!”

It’s running joke between us now.

I figure in the Hollywood version of the story this scene will give them an excuse to have the heroine take her clothes off! Of course, by the time Hollywood is done with it there will be sea monsters, laser beams and aliens.

So – I wanted to take it easy on you this week. And I gave you that tense reunion scene as a flashback so you would already know the outcome and it wouldn’t require so much stress.

Then we got them all together back at the school.

A bit of a holiday gathering if you will.

The security of the group.

The gathering. Not the quickening. The gathering.

It’s odd how strangers can come together for a common purpose in times of crisis.

...

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