The rest of the dead man’s pocket contents were mostly things like keys, a wallet, credit cards, plenty of cash, a couple cell phones, a pair of headphones, a flask of what smelled like cheap whiskey, and plenty of other odds and ends. She took the cash and the flask, stood up, and realized that she needed a plan.
A plan was the tough part.
Well, not really.
She knew what she needed to do. Find Jim and the others.
The only hard part was figuring out how to do it.
Well, it wasn’t really that bad, if she took a mental step back from the situation and carefully thought about it.
Her eye was damaged, and her body was a little bruised and battered. But everything else more or less worked. She could still use her legs to walk with. She could use her arms to shoot with, or stab with, whichever was necessary. She was tired, exhausted, really. But she could go on. She’d done it before and she could do it again.
She didn’t know where Jim, Aly, or Rob were. But she knew where they’d been. The pharmacy. It was the best she could do. Head back there.
Sure, she didn’t know exactly where she was now. But it shouldn’t be rocket science. She just had to head back to the main road, figure out which way north was, and head along the road until she came to the pharmacy. It’d be recognizable, that main drag with all those shops on either side.
With only a small grunt of pain, Jessica rose up to a standing position. Her eyes turned briefly towards the sky, looking for the moon, but it wasn’t there.
It was as if the moon were some kind of sign of hope. Not seeing it, she shivered in the cool air.
But it didn’t matter to her if she saw a sign of hope or not, whether or not there was a beacon up there in the sky. It would matter to some, but she remembered now that she wasn’t like the others.
She’d just go on. She’d do what she had to do.
The lack of moonlight was good, actually. There was enough light for her to walk by without running headlong into anything. And there wasn’t enough light for anyone to see her from a good distance, and hopefully she’d remain a good distance from everyone else for the whole night.
Hopefully she’d get to the pharmacy by morning, before sunrise. And hopefully Jim and the others would be there with the RV. And then they’d continue on down south, finding their place in the woods where they’d be safe from everyone.
It sounded too good to be true. It was too good to be true. It sounded more like some fairy tale than real life.
But maybe it was just what she needed to tell herself. Maybe it’s what she needed to keep on going.
After all, no matter how strong she was, and how good her outlook was, the truth of it was that she was all on her own out there in the middle of the night, in a world that had been torn apart.
What would she do if she never found the others?
She knew she wouldn’t simply give up. But that’d be the temptation, just to let that feeling of weakness and hopelessness completely take her over, letting herself sink down to the ground, too weak and disillusioned to even look for food or water, or even protect herself when it came to that. A lot of people would succumb to that, to hopelessness and fear.
She wouldn’t. She knew that. But it would take everything she had just to fight against that.
Jessica understood what so many didn’t, which was that the mental terrors that could haunt an individual could be just as dangerous and just as lethal as the real physical dangers like a lack of food, or a guy with a gun jammed in your face, ready to blast your head off.
Giving the corpse one last little kick, just for good measure, almost like a good luck gesture, she was off, heading alone into the night, her hand wrapped tightly around her gun, her ears perked for the slightest sound that didn’t belong, her good eye scanning the dim surroundings for something, anything, that meant trouble.
19
Bill
Bill was angry.
Angrier than he’d been in a long time.
Rod’s plan hadn’t worked, and he’d promised him that it would.
But instead of a Stockholm Syndrome woman who would become his very own, Bill had nothing except a dead, lifeless corpse.
Instead of a woman who would grow to love him over the coming weeks and months and years, he had just a dead body.
And what good was a dead body to him?
None. None at all.
He didn’t know why he’d done it exactly. Except that everything had happened quickly and it hadn’t seemed like he’d had any time to think.
Not that thinking had really ever been his strong suit. He liked to let others make the plans for him. The way he saw it, why should he go to all the trouble of coming up with a plan on his own when a perfectly good one was already there?
It was easier to go through life as a cheat than an original. In fact, Bill hadn’t even come up with that slogan on his own. He’d stolen it from his father, who for all Bill knew had stolen it from his own father.
Bill was covered in blood. He was just lying there next to the dead girl and wondering why he always had such bad luck. It was like he could never catch a break, no matter how hard he tried.
If there was one thing he was very, very good at, it was avoiding responsibility, and doing whatever it took to avoid blaming himself.
He recognized his talents, to some extent. And to the extent that he recognized them, he was fine with them.
Finally, after long minutes of lying in the darkness, Bill pushed the corpse off of him and rose to his feet.
He headed off to the corner and grabbed the flashlight from where it lay, illuminating only a small patch of wall. As he picked it up, the light flooded through the basement. Bill pointed the light at the corpse of the young woman.
He sighed when he saw her. She really was pretty. Beautiful even. A real shame. She could have been his.
Bill dug out a little plastic baggie from his pocket and took a couple deep sniffs of the off-white powder. It burned, and his head got that familiar expanding feeling that he loved so much. Bill didn’t use as much as Rod. Usually just enough to recenter himself, to gain some perspective. It was helpful in moments like this.
And now he felt the energy from the drug starting to pour through his system. He felt his arms start to tingle, and he took another hit for good measure. This was an unusual situation, after all.
Now there was more energy coming through.
Good. He felt good. Very good. He felt like he wanted to go for a run. A sprint, maybe. Or a marathon.
He started bouncing up and down, just because it felt good to use up some of that energy.
He was really starting to feel good when there was a gunshot off in the distance.
A gunshot?
Shit.
He didn’t know if it was good or bad. But he knew it meant something.
Rod was likely involved. Somehow. Either he’d shot someone, or he’d been shot.
In other circumstances, Bill might have shrunk back from a fight where a gun had already been discharged. Sure, it was supposed to be the gang against everyone else. It was supposed to be everyone in the gang defending everyone else. The whole was more important than the individual. But it had never really been like that. Sure, in theory, yeah, but when you throw in the complications of life, not to mention the legal system, things start to change pretty quickly.
And since the EMP, well, things obviously weren’t the same as they’d been. He and Rod had broken off from the others. They had their own ideas on how to do things.
And what if it came down to Bill risking his neck for Rod? Or the other way around?
If he were being honest with himself, Rod might have liked to hide there in the basement and wait until the smoke had settled, so to speak.
But he wasn’t feeling shy at all. He was full of this energy that was practically boiling over. He wasn’t even standing there normally, he was rocking back and forth on his heels, and doing that thing where he flexed and rela
xed his muscles repeatedly without actually moving them. Isometric, he thought it was called. He’d actually dated a physical therapist for a little while. Well, that was the way he told the story. In actuality, she’d put a restraining order against him.
But those were thoughts for another time.
Without a second thought, Bill burst out of the basement, leaping up the multiple concrete steps in a single bound.
His eyes weren’t adjusted to the darkness, but he had the flashlight.
He wasn’t thinking about whether or not the flashlight made him a target. After all, he wasn’t the victim type. He wasn’t prey. He was a hunter. He’d always been, and he always would be.
He ran towards the sound of the gunshot.
As he ran, the rifle that he had slung across his back bounced against him. He considered grabbing it but thought better of it. This was a time for a handgun. Not because of the actual situation itself, but more because he didn’t feel like staying back, lying patiently on his stomach, looking through the sights and waiting until he saw something. Sure, maybe it made the most sense strategically, but he just didn’t feel like doing it.
What he did feel like doing was running through the darkness, hunting, with his handgun.
Unlike Rod, Bill knew about guns. Really knew about them. Not in the way that some of the real enthusiasts did, but he knew enough to shoot properly, and he could differentiate between junk firearms and quality ones. He’d put his time in on the range, and if it came to a gunfight, as it had in the past, he was sure he’d come out on top.
Suddenly, off to his right, he spotted a flash of movement.
Was it a figure? Someone running?
“Rod?” he called out, swinging his flashlight around before thinking it through, realizing that maybe that wasn’t the best idea.
The light caught a figure. A woman. It was that other woman. A gun was in her hands.
It wasn’t Rod.
And she shot at him.
A gunshot rang out.
The bullet missed.
Bill threw himself to the ground. He had enough sense despite his drug-addled state to know that he needed to get down. He still had some strategy to him, some wits about him.
He switched off the flashlight. He had enough sense to do that too.
Seconds passed.
It was hard to lie there. The energy was practically bursting out of him. He wanted to get up. He wanted to fight. He wanted to make love. He wanted to dance. He wanted to do a thousand things. None of them made sense for the situation.
He was starting to lose the grip on the edge of his mind. Sometimes that happened to him when he did too much of the stuff, when he made the lines too big or overindulged in one of the thousand ways that a man could overindulge.
He couldn’t wait there. He couldn’t do it. He was already fidgeting, his fingers moving rapidly, making it difficult to keep the gun steady.
His feet were tapping behind him. His whole body felt like it was shaking.
Shit. He was really losing it. What had he taken again? He couldn’t even remember.
Maybe he’d taken the wrong stuff. Shit. That’d happened to him before, and he hadn’t been able to sleep for a whole week.
Well, if he didn’t get it together soon enough, he’d be asleep forever.
Yup, he’d be dead. He had enough rationality left in his wigging-out brain to recognize that.
He had to make a move. Yup. That was the only way. There was no way that he could make it patiently waiting, playing the long game, like a miniature version of the cold war.
OK. “Get a hold of yourself,” he muttered to himself, as softly as he could. It was hard to get the words out. His teeth were chattering from the drugs. He had to fight the effects. Fight the buzz. Fight it all.
And he was good at it, in a sense. He knew how to play to his strengths, recognize his weaknesses. He’d had plenty of experiences getting blasted to know the signs, to know how to handle his high. Hell, back in the day, he’d done enough acid to know how to handle all that shit too. And there was some crossover. Not much, but just enough.
“OK,” he muttered. “You’re losing it again. Stay with me here, buddy. Stay with reality. Or you die.”
It was a sobering thought. Cold, like the ground. Like the night.
He had his hand on the gun.
He knew where she was. More or less. Off to the right still. She’d thrown herself down.
It’d be hard to hit her like that. But not too hard.
He’d done something similar back at the range plenty of times. It wasn’t like he didn’t know what he was doing.
His teeth were chattering from the drug energy. He was hopped up. His mind was frazzled.
But not too bad.
Not bad enough to make him miss.
The next step was easy. Easy in theory. Probably easy in practice too. At least that’s what he had to tell himself to get through it. Or did he?
He was so messed up he was actually looking forward to it. In some sick way, it seemed like it actually might be kind of fun.
Kind of fun? He really was losing it.
Or maybe he wasn’t. Maybe he was just feeling good.
Whatever.
Time to do it.
No time to waste.
Once he turned the flashlight on her, he wouldn’t have long. If she’d killed Rod, she was a decent shot. And that made it all the more fun, in that twisted way his mind was working.
Once he turned that flashlight on, he wouldn’t have long to find her there on the ground. Wouldn’t have long to shine the beam on her. Once he switched that light on, he’d be a target himself.
And that was all part of the game.
“OK,” he muttered under his breath. “Almost time. This is the big one, buddy. The one you’ve been waiting for. The one just like in the old movies. Just the shootout you’ve been waiting for. Just the time. Just like those old-timers. Just the way you’ve always wanted it.”
As he was talking to himself, his finger started inching its way towards the on switch of the flashlight.
As he talked, a vague thought bubbled up from the back of his mind, a thought that said, “Hey, you wanted to make this woman your wife. Now you’re going to shoot her. This doesn’t make sense. And what kind of movie-worthy stand-up has you paired off against a woman?”
But he was too far gone from the drugs to listen to a pesky little thought like that. He was all keyed up and he was ready for action. And he was going to have it.
His finger pressed the button.
The flashlight burst to life. Its bright beam cut through the night.
He swung the flashlight around, across the ground. His arm moved rapidly. But it didn’t shake. He was enough of a good old-fashioned doper to know how to keep his arms steady despite the stuff pumping through his veins. Hell, he’d been to the range how many times when all drugged up?
The flashlight beam found her.
She was there. Lying in the ground. Gun in hands.
He got an impression rapidly, his brain taking it all in. A flash of a beautiful young woman. Pretty bad off. Beat-up or something. Blood in her hair. She looked ghostly in the pale white light of the flashlight beam, surrounded by the shadows and the darkness.
Shame to shoot her.
She was going to shoot him if he didn’t.
His finger pulled the trigger.
20
Jim
The night had been long.
Too long.
Physically, it’d been more or less comfortable.
Mentally, it had been torture.
Well, maybe saying it had been physically comfortable was a stretch. Even for Jim, who hadn’t been “enjoying” the most comfortable of circumstances since he’d left Rochester.
But it’d been comfortable in the sense that he wasn’t getting his face beaten in by a giant biker, and that there wasn’t a gun or a knife jammed into his face. And that he wasn’t starving.
He’d spent the night resting, eating, keeping watch, and worrying.
After all, he knew that he was still alive. But just because his wife and his friends had left when the bikers had arrived didn’t mean anything about their safety. It didn’t mean that they were still alive, and it didn’t mean that they hadn’t run into the bikers later. Or someone else. Some group of even worse people.
Why hadn’t they come back yet? Surely they wouldn’t simply leave him there for dead. Yes, he’d told them to leave. He’d given them explicit instructions, and he was glad that they’d followed them. But they must have understood that he hadn’t meant that they should simply leave for good. Right?
In moments of weakness, he’d imagined terrible things. Too many terrible things to count. Terrible things that had happened to Aly, Rob, and Jessica. And there was, of course, the possibility that was the most painful, the most private, the one that he’d never admit to anyone. And that was that his wife and his friends had decided to leave him behind.
He’d managed to push these thoughts away at times. Enough to fall asleep for ten-minute stretches several times throughout the night. His body and mind had been too on edge to sleep for any longer than that.
He’d needed the rest. And he was beyond the idea of trying to keep awake all night to keep watch. When it was his wife and his friends that he was protecting, that was one thing. But when it was just himself? It was a different story, especially considering how long he’d been awake, and what he’d been through.
The darkness of the cloudy night had made the mental anguish much worse. It really was strange to be sitting there alone in the darkness, staring off into nothing. When he was in the pharmacy, he couldn’t tell the difference between keeping his eyes closed and keeping them open.
Before the EMP, he could only remember a few times when the world had been this dark. Really there were just the handful of times he’d gone camping in the last dozen years or so. It’d been hard to get away from the business in Rochester, and the light “pollution” from streetlights, buildings, and cars had meant that no matter where he’d gone that wasn’t really far out there, there was going to be much more light than there was now.
Final Dread: A Post-Apocalyptic EMP Survival Thriller (Surviving Book 3) Page 13
