Dakota had no idea what to say or do, and so she said and did nothing.
When Elijah next spoke, it was to confirm for the other people on the wall that the figure was indeed a zombie and that he would take care of it. Slinging his rifle back over his shoulder, he stood up and opened one of the upper containers next to him, and drew from it a long spear. Dakota watched as the zombie approached. Whenever it looked remotely like it was about to stagger off into another direction, Elijah tapped the butt of the spear on the container beside him, the sound luring the dead back in his direction.
“Have you ever killed a zombie?” Elijah asked as it got near.
“No,” Dakota admitted. “I’ve never really been close enough, and only those who’ve completed their weapons’ training are taken out by their teachers to kill one.”
“Here.” Elijah held out the spear to her. “If you ask me, this is the safest way to do it for the first time. There’s only one, it can’t reach you, and you don’t need to waste any bullets or make much sound. Hell, you can even drop the spear, because we have more.”
Dakota tried to keep her jaw from dropping as she accepted the weapon. She wasn’t certain she should be doing this, not without permission from Cameron, or Brunt, or Freya, or Bronislav. It felt like it was against the rules, but then the rules had been changing over the past few days. She had a sling now, and was being trained to go over the wall. Elijah was right: it would be better to kill her first zombie from up here rather than when she was down there. Down there, she was in more danger, and if she froze up, someone would have to save her. Here, she could freeze and still be safe.
“Okay, turn the spear over so that its point is down,” Elijah instructed. The dead woman was just about to reach the wall.
The spear was large and a little cumbersome, but Dakota managed to turn it over without dropping it or hitting anything.
“It helps to lean it against your shoulder,” Elijah advised. “The skull on this one is likely still pretty solid, so you’re going to need to put some strength behind it, although the weight of the spear will help. She’s likely to look up once she reaches the wall if her neck still functions, so aim for an eye. The orbital socket will actually help guide the point of the spear where it needs to go.”
Some of the advice Dakota already knew, but she was glad to hear it again. Her heart was hammering in her chest, and it wasn’t easy to think straight. As she stood on the edge of the container, she felt Elijah’s hand wrap itself around the back of her sling belt; slowly so as not to startle her. He was making sure she didn’t fall forward.
“Whenever you’re ready,” Elijah told her.
Dakota stared down, meeting the eyes of the zombie woman below. It was much easier to tell that she was dead up close. Her skin had begun to grey, her veins blacken. Her eyes were partly cloudy now, but they had once been brown. Dakota focused on where Elijah’s knuckles pressed against her back through her T-shirt.
Moving the point of the spear so that it hovered over the zombie’s eye, Dakota took a deep breath. She held the air in her lungs for a few seconds, and then, in one swift, smooth motion, lifted the spear and then plunged it down. Her aim wasn’t completely true. The point of the spear struck the bridge of the woman’s nose, but it skidded sideways and found an eye. Elijah was right about the orbital socket helping to guide the spear, but it was so strange to feel.
When the zombie slumped, the spear was nearly pulled out of Dakota’s hands. Why she thought it would just simply slide right out again, she had no idea, but the dead woman canted sideways, and if it weren’t for Elijah holding onto her, Dakota might have gone right off the wall in an attempt to hold onto the spear.
“I gotcha,” Elijah said, as he reached around her with his free hand to help her steady the spear. “I should have warned you about pulling the spear back as quickly as possible. Have you got it now?”
“I got it.” Dakota was acutely aware of Elijah’s arm alongside hers, his shoulder against her scapula.
“Okay, try to pull the spear up.” Elijah let go of it, but he kept his arm hovering next to her own in case she needed help.
She did not, and yanked the spear up and out of the zombie’s head, allowing the corpse to collapse completely to the pavement. Elijah then stepped back from her, gently pulling on her sling belt so that she’d step away from the edge as well. When he let go and Dakota turned around, she couldn’t help having a huge smile on her face, even if it might look ridiculous.
“You did it!” Elijah cheered, partly throwing up his hands for her.
“I did,” she realized. Dakota put down the spear and cautiously peered back over the edge. A zombie lay dead at the base of the container wall and she had been the one to kill it.
She knew it would be the first of many.
12: Onida
Approximately One Year Ago
Shawn must have taken many overnight trips to know the terrain as far away from his cabin as he did. Even when they reached a mound of sharp rocks and razor cliffs, he knew a way to get the horses safely down. It wasn’t much farther, however, when even Shawn ceased to know what was ahead, and their progress slowed.
Before then, they had ridden the horses all night and all of the following day after Shawn’s cabin had been attacked. Onida felt sore in a dozen places, unused to being in a saddle for such an extended period of time. At least she didn’t have to control her horse much, as it seemed content to follow the train of horses behind Shawn’s. This allowed Onida to wiggle around somewhat, and change the position of her legs a little bit. Still, whenever she got off the horse to pee, she just about fell over. By the time they stopped the next night to rest, Onida could barely walk.
It seemed that Shawn was also unused to riding horses for such a long time, but he powered through whatever pain he felt. While Onida sat on the ground, rubbing her sore spots, he took care of each of the horses, bringing them by twos to a nearby stream to drink. Mask was delighted to be able to run around again.
“How well do you know horses?” Shawn asked her that night.
“Okay, I guess,” Onida shrugged. “Depends on what you want to know.”
“Can you tell which two horses are the ones who like the lead the most?”
Although Onida hadn’t been allowed to ride the horses very often, she had taken care of them many times and knew them fairly well. “I would say that one, and that one,” she pointed.
Onida had slept while Shawn had worked. By the time she got up, he had modified the tack on every horse but the two Onida had picked out. All the saddles had been carved up. The straps and saddlebags remained, but the seats and horns were gone. The reins had been cut into long leads, and the bits removed for the comfort of the horses. Shawn had even taken their backpacks and attached them to the backs of a couple of horses using the saddle straps that remained. The leather that used to hold the stirrups had been saved and bundled up.
“We’re just going to leave all this stuff here?” Onida had asked of the saddle remains.
“If they’re still following, and they make it this far, then they don’t need confirmation that they’re going the right way. It won’t matter if they find this stuff.”
That day was spent in the saddle again. The packhorses appeared more comfortable with the greater space the longer leads allowed them. Shawn called for a midday stop, and then another stop that night, so the ride wasn’t as brutal.
It had been the day after that when they descended the cliffs and entered unknown territory.
“Where are we going?” Onida asked when they stopped for lunch.
“South.”
“Yeah, but where south? Do you have a destination in mind?”
“Do you?”
“I don’t know where anything is.”
“I don’t know what it’s going to be like to the south. All I know is that we aren’t going to find shelter from the winter weather up here.”
“What is to the south, anyway?”
“Death.”
“That doesn’t sound like a place I want to go.”
“We won’t be. We have to go around. We have to avoid the irradiated areas.”
“Can we do that?”
“I have a Geiger counter in my pack. But it’s possible there isn’t a way around. We’ll just have to find out.”
Onida didn’t like the sound of that. “And what if we don’t find a way around?”
Shawn’s only answer was silence.
They travelled through the woods for days. Sometimes they would make camp around noon, and Shawn would go hunting, but every morning was spent riding the horses. There were fifteen of the animals with them, seven males and eight females. Onida knew most of their names, and for those she couldn’t remember, she made up new ones. Shawn didn’t seem to care about them as individuals, only as a collective for riding and carrying supplies. He was always more concerned about Mask’s wellbeing, even more so than Onida’s. She supposed that was fair. It had been her fault that his home was burned down, after all. While Shawn was good at finding water for the horses and making sure there was greenery that they could eat, Onida more often took over the job of caring for their wellbeing. Whenever he went hunting, she would remove a horse’s gear and give him or her a good brushing down with the supplies she had found in a few of the saddle bags. There were too many horses to brush down in one go, but she created an order in her head, always knowing which horse’s turn was next.
Rain was the worst. Whether it was a drizzle or a deluge, Shawn had them press on, occasionally having to backtrack as the path he chose was either a dead end or began to hook north for too long. Onida didn’t have any spare clothes to change into; she always had to hang her wet stuff in the tent when they stopped, hoping they wouldn’t be too damp when she next put them on. She was never comfortable lying naked in her sleeping bag, awfully close to Shawn in the small tent. He never made any sort of comment or advance though. Shawn just seemed to see her as another set of hands to help him, never as a woman.
There was very little conversation between the two of them. Because they rode their horses single file, with each of them leading half the train, they were never near one another while on horseback. When they stopped, they both had the jobs they had assigned themselves, which often took them apart. Even on stormy nights, when they ate cold meals in the tent, with the rain making it sound like they were in a river, the two of them didn’t speak. What words they did pass, always related to their predicament: which way to go next, how the horses were holding up, what their supplies were like, did either of them feel ill, and so on. Most of Shawn’s words were saved for a whispered and one-sided conversation with Mask. Sometimes this bothered Onida, who, on occasion, wished to discuss other things, like the way the trees sparkled after it had stopped raining, or the way the sunlight slanted through a particular section of leaves, or even their different childhoods. But most of the time she knew to keep quiet, not wanting Shawn to press her about why she was being pursued.
Perhaps it was their lack of horses, but the people hunting Onida hadn’t been seen or heard from since the night of the fire. If they were still following her, they must have fallen a fair distance behind, hindered with all their resources gone. It was even possible that they had simply given up, but Onida wouldn’t let her heart believe this. She feared that the moment she did, that was when they would reappear.
Onida hadn’t been counting, but it had certainly been over a week when she finally saw another human construction. This time it was a road: a strip of sun-faded asphalt that carved its way through the forest. Winter after winter had cracked the surface like a broken windshield, and without anyone coming to fix it, weeds had taken hold within those cracks. Young trees and long grass had sprouted from the gravel shoulder, all of it at its last peak of greenery before the cold nights truly hit.
“Is it safe to follow the road?” Onida asked. Once they started along it, she was finally able to ride abreast of Shawn.
“How should I know?” he asked her in turn. “I haven’t seen a road in eleven years. Have you?”
“Yes. But my people protect them. I don’t believe this road is within their range, however.”
“What did they protect the roads from?”
“I don’t know. Zombies, I suppose. Raiders, maybe, although we know all the tribes in the area and are in good standing with them. And I’ve never heard of a stranger coming to our lands.”
“We should be safe enough.”
It was the should that worried Onida. Shawn had his bow and arrows, and was good with them, yet Onida had nothing but her knife. If it turned out that they weren’t safe on the road, she would be in more trouble than him.
They followed the asphalt—Onida twitching at every sudden sound—until they came to a rest stop. It wasn’t much, just an overgrown gravel parking lot, some rotting picnic tables, and a relatively simple structure to house both toilets and a little information centre, but it made a good place to spend the night. Shawn went inside the building to investigate, while Onida prepped the horses for the night. They were very good at sticking together overnight, so she only needed to put a long lead on one horse that she tied to a rusted flagpole on the side of the building. The rest of the horses just wore their hobbles. That was when she noticed something wrong with the horse she had named Askuwheteau.
“What’s wrong with it?” Shawn asked when he returned, noting that she was giving the horse special attention.
“I’m not sure,” Onida admitted. “I can’t see anything wrong, but he’s favouring his foreleg.”
“When we head out tomorrow, put it at the back of a line and we’ll distribute its packs among the others.”
“If we stop for more than a night, it could get better.”
“You’re the one those people are after; do you think it’s a good idea to stop?”
Onida felt the anxiety seize her throat. “No, I suppose we shouldn’t.”
“I’m going hunting. There’s enough space inside that we don’t need to set up the tent.”
“Understood.”
Shawn took only his bow and arrows and disappeared into the nearest stand of trees. Mask stayed behind, exploring the area in which they had made their camp. Onida switched the long lead to Askuwheteau, figuring that it would be better for his leg if he weren’t hobbled.
“What do you think of all this travelling?” Onida asked the raccoon.
He looked over at her when he heard her voice, but then went back to sniffing around a picnic table.
“Must be strange for you. Riding on great beasts all day, and spending every night in a different place. I wonder if you still know the way back to your home.”
Mask waddled over to her, and placed his paws on her leg. He probably thought she had something for him, as she had occasionally slipped him a little treat from their supplies.
“Maybe you don’t care,” Onida continued, bending to pet his head. “You have Shawn, your family, and that’s all you need.”
Thinking of her own family caused her guts to twist into knots.
When Shawn returned, Onida had a low, smokeless fire going that they could use for cooking. It had just become dark, and the occasional mosquito fluttered over to harass Onida, but thankfully the lateness of the year reduced the biting insects to more tolerable levels than during the height of summer. Shawn walked over with two dead rabbits, a pheasant, and a porcupine. He had a good hunt. While Shawn skinned, gutted, and cooked the rabbits for dinner, Onida prepared the pheasant and porcupine for tomorrow’s breakfast and lunch, as well as other ensuing meals. As she plucked the quills, she laid them out on a rag beside her, intent on keeping them despite not having an immediate use. Any feathers that might be good for arrows, she also set aside. The pheasant’s long tail feathers she wove onto the side of Shawn’s quiver as decoration. He didn’t seem to mind.
Meal complete, and the rabbit skins taut in small stretching frames, Onida, Shawn, and Mask went into the visit
or’s centre to sleep. It was dark and musty inside. There was probably a large number of spiders, but Onida had never been bothered by arachnids all that much. Mask had explored the place earlier, when Onida had laid out the sleeping bags, but he gave the room they were staying in another once over, sticking his nose into all the corners and getting covered in dust.
Onida curled up inside her sleeping bag, grateful that it hadn’t rained, and that she could keep on whichever articles of clothing she wished. She had gotten rather good at falling asleep despite being afraid, but on that night, she lay awake for longer than usual. The old structure was strange to her, after she had spent so many nights in the tent, but she didn’t think it was that. She was more afraid of the dark than usual. Something nagged at her. Some of her elders had told her that this could be a sign of the spirits trying to warn her, but she wasn’t so sure. The spirits were unlikely to want anything to do with Onida. She closed her eyes and willed sleep to come.
***
A most mournful, haunting, and dangerous sound had both Shawn and Onida sitting bolt upright. Onida could hear her companion breathing rapidly in the dark.
“Wolves,” Onida said as the sound came again. It was not as far away as she would have liked, and there was more than one voice calling.
“We have to bring the horses inside.” Shawn’s voice trembled with fear. Other than bears, Onida had thought he wasn’t afraid of anything. It turned out that she was wrong, that he had an even greater fear of wolves than he did the mighty polar bears.
“Is there room for the horses?” Onida asked, scrambling out of her sleeping bag.
“We have to bring the horses inside,” Shawn repeated, as though he hadn’t understood her question.
Onida went over to the metal door and pushed it open, letting in the moonlight so that they could see. Shawn hadn’t moved from his sleeping bag; he continued to sit there, staring with wide eyes. He had Mask cradled in his arms.
Survival Instinct (Book 5): Social Instinct Page 18
