How could there be so much water? It seemed like everywhere he turned in these mountains there was another stream. Another waterfall. As he trudged slowly back up the stream, careful of his footing, he saw Marcy return from the woods and wash her hands in the stream. His gaze sought out any sign of Jessica.
She had called him “baby.” They hadn’t had a chance to speak about that yet. Between the early morning, high adrenaline fight, time in the cold creek, and miles of walking through the mountains, she’d been unconscious almost as soon as she got warmed up from the fire.
Even towing a dead guy behind him, that made him smile. Which got him a glare from Daniel, who had walked over to look. “What the fuck are you smiling about? You like dragging dead people around?”
It sounded harsh in the early morning, but Jensen just shrugged. “Happy to be alive, brother.”
Daniel didn’t smile in return. “Give me some coffee and about two pounds of bacon and I might smile about being alive. Hell, give me some coffee and a single pound of bacon and I might give you a little Mona Lisa smirk. Otherwise, let’s just bury Rob and get the fuck outta here.”
As he was looking up, Jensen lost his footing on the slippery rocks and face-planted in the water. His knee impacted a rock sticking up from the bottom and tore through his pants, drawing blood from the side of his knee. He rolled over, cursing, and held his knee as the water rushed past him. Suddenly he saw Daniel’s giant body looming over him.
“Ok, now I’m smiling. You okay?” He reached a hand down and held it in front of Jensen’s face until he gave in and grasped it, allowing Daniel to help pull him up. The big man reached another hand down and grabbed Rob’s body, lifting it half out of the water with little effort. As he started to walk back to the bank, he turned to ask, “Do I need to carry you out, too?”
Jensen, smiling again, or grimacing, he wasn’t sure which, flipped him off. He took a tentative step forward. Definitely a grimace. That shit hurt. The water, which was diluting the blood running down his leg, made it look like he’d nicked an artery. Jensen gingerly put weight on it. Nothing broken, but he was probably going to have a hell of a bruise later.
Just add that to the burn across his shoulders. Lying on his back on the rocks hadn’t done him any favors. Now his back felt even more scraped and raw. Oh well, you have to be alive to hurt. They’d managed to outrun a nuclear blast and were pardoned by the guy in the helicopter. He’d trade hurt for dead any day.
Daniel was already pulling dirt onto the body by the time Jensen arrived. Daniel took a quick look at Jensen’s bloody knee before taking another jab. “That time of the month, huh?”
Jensen snorted. “I was going to ask you the same thing.”
Smiling again, Daniel told him, “I’m not a morning person. I’m definitely not a ‘camp out under the stars wearing wet clothes with no tent or sleeping bag next to a dead person’ morning person.” He stopped moving dirt for a moment. “You think Brent’s okay?”
Jensen looked concerned. He’d been wondering the same thing. The only thing to do was to ask. He walked over to the sleeping form and gently rocked his shoulder. “Brent, we’re getting ready to break camp.”
The older man started awake and took a moment before he realized where he was. “Holy shit Jensen, you scared the crap outta me.”
The younger man watched as Jessica came back out of the woods and gave him a tired smile. To his side, he heard Brent tell him to go on, he was going back home. It took him an instant for that to sink in, distracted as he was. He looked back down at Brent, “You’re going home?”
From the ground, Brent nodded, “Yeah, I’m going home. That’s where I want to be.”
Jensen thought for a second. “Well, we don’t have anywhere planned yet, maybe we can go with you.” Brent shook his head, “No Jensen, I’m going home. Alone. I’m going to be with Rebecca.”
He was about to ask who Rebecca was when realization hit him. Rebecca was his wife. She’d died in Dahlonega. There was only one way he could be with her, and that was if he joined her. Brent was going home to die. Tears came to Jensen’s eyes. He had cried when he’d been forced to kill Jamie, the boy from the car dealership, but those had been tears of pain and shame.
This was a different kind of pain. It was love and pain. Brent had become a part of his family, almost like a father figure to the young man. Brent sat up and put his arms around the younger man. It was a strange feeling, this hug. It was a goodbye. “It’s what I want. And you have no part in this.”
The hug had drawn the attention of the three others. It wasn’t the quick one arm, chest bump type hug they were used to seeing with men. This was a hug of solace. Of one comforting another.
As Jess drew closer, she could see tears in Jensen’s eyes. “What happened?”
Jensen didn’t answer, he just drew back and wiped his eyes. He was embarrassed by his tears. But he was soon joined by Marcy and Jessica when they found out Brent was planning to leave them. Daniel turned away and shuffled his toes in the dirt. He didn’t say anything. Then he turned back. “Can we take you at least as far as Clayton?”
Brent shook his head. “No, I need time to get right with the Lord if I want to see my Rebecca again.” He indicated the Accuracy International rifle he’d inherited from Aaron. “I’ll leave this with you if that’s okay. I don’t think Aaron wants it back.”
Jensen accepted the rifle from Brent in silence. It had belonged to Aaron, then to Brent, now to him. He slung it over his shoulder in acceptance and gave Brent one final hug, followed by Jessica, Marcy, and finally, Daniel. Neither was that a typical man hug.
Then they turned away north, while Brent started following the stream back down toward the campground. He had many miles to go to be reunited with his wife.
Chapter 21
Bobby Snead put the phone down with satisfaction. General Windmer had reported the loss of one King Stallion, with all souls on board. Doug didn’t quit, he got fired. One more loose end tied up. He was trying to think of catchy names for his new security group. Vampirgruppe wouldn’t do. It needed to be something solid, wholesome.
He was leaning toward Sentry group, or maybe Granite. No, that sounded stupid. Celestial? Too girly. Too many syllables. It had to be simple and dramatic but signify strength. But it couldn’t be overtly religious. People hated that. He searched his memory for something which would fit. Kennesaw? Too many syllables. Vidalia? Same. Peach? Too soft. No, Sentry Group it would be.
Bobby leaned forward and punched one key on his phone. “Darlene? Sweetheart, would you get John to paint the name Sentry on the sides of the rations trailers? Block letters, all caps, blue. It’s S, E, N, T, R, Y. Both sides. Thanks, dear.” He huffed with impatience after having to spell a simple word for her.
His plans were coming along nicely. With the addition of the Sentry Group, he had almost all the strings of power in his hands. Military, police, private security, food, water, electricity, media. He could give or withhold at will. He had even staged rallies in some of the larger cities to cheer for him, which was certainly televised.
The Senator was going to be President. The only shortcoming right now was medical. It was an unfortunate oversight how many of the doctors and nurses passed away during the virus. He should have thought of that and selected some of them for the real vaccine instead of the live virus cocktail. He shrugged; live and learn.
For now, he had some medical expertise and a few EMTs working as doctors until he could either find or train more. It was a long process. He could have a new police officer or private security officer churned out in a few weeks. Doctors took years.
Some people were bartering for medical care off hours. He wasn’t sure if he wanted to put a stop to that or continue to let it happen. There didn’t seem to be any real harm done, but it also loosened his hold over those professionals. Expert power was a very real thing. Should he curtail those activities? Maybe cut power as needed to bring them in line? Maybe some additional securit
y at the facilities?
He made note of that on his desk calendar. Bobby didn’t think anything needed to be done right now, but he would keep an eye on the situation. It couldn’t hurt to bring them back in line a little bit. He was more concerned about the slow pace of construction. He wanted to have a glorious capitol building when he finally stepped up to lead … at the behest of the citizenry, of course.
Chapter 22
The small group of four was very somber as they hiked further into the mountains. They were heading generally north and west, back toward civilization and away from the blast. Even Daniel kept his mouth shut, which was a first.
Two days ago, they had all the comforts of home, and their friends were still with them. Now they were still part of their lives, but only as memories. Sheila had died the morning before in the firefight. Abby had killed herself after losing Dylan to the virus. Emmy had died then, too. Aaron had gone home for the last time. Now Brent was gone. They feared he was following Aaron’s lead. Their group had been more than cut in half since April began.
They had finally given in and begun to drink the water in the cold stream. First Jensen, still suffering mightily from dehydration, then the others. It probably wasn’t safe to drink, and they might get sick, but they needed water. They could make a fire, but didn’t even have a cup to boil it in. The only sounds were their breathing, their footsteps, the water sloshing in their bellies, and an occasional grumble from the same.
Even the birds were silent. Perhaps they had been killed in the blast wave, maybe they’d just left for greener pastures. Up here on the mountain, they hadn’t been shielded from the worst of the blast like the humans in their cars pressed against the foothills. Up high, the devastation was evident. Off to their east, they could see a portion of mountains that seemed almost entirely denuded of trees.
The peak was outlined against the sky without the tall trees providing a softness to the skyline. It looked bleak. White smoke filled the sky from the burning forest. Without firefighters to put it out, it continued to burn sluggishly. From what they could tell, it appeared to be mostly traveling away from them.
Daniel’s theory was the combination of westerly winds and mountain peaks would keep the fire from getting much closer to them. He figured it would burn like hell up the east side of those mountains but flame out as the fire tried to run downhill. Where he came up with that, nobody knew, but it seemed to be accurate from their view on the mountain.
They were also running low on ammo. Marcy and Jessica still had their 1911s, but only had sixteen .45 caliber rounds between them. No spare mags, no spare bullets. Daniel and Jensen were doing a little bit better with their 9mm pistols; Jensen had thirty-five rounds between his pistol and one magazine, Daniel only had sixteen total rounds. They were doing a little bit better with the 5.56 rifles. Marcy, Jessica, and Daniel all had thirty rounds each. Jensen wasn’t quite so lucky, with only ten rounds in his 7.62 rifle.
They hadn’t thought to look for the pistol Rob dropped in the stream, and the other two had been taken from him by the men in the helicopter. They had gone from thousands of rounds the morning before to fewer than two hundred now.
That would probably work if things stayed quiet, but to date, they hadn’t been quiet at all. Things had been quite the opposite. What were the chances they wouldn’t have any run-ins with the locals? Or another visit from some of Snead’s men?
Pretty slim. At least that’s how Jensen saw it. His knee also hurt like a bitch. He didn’t want to complain, but it was really starting to hurt. At least it wasn’t bleeding anymore. He was distracted by the scratching of his shirt across his back, too. Yesterday had been bad, today was worse. He desperately wanted to take it off, but that would just allow the sun to attack him again.
All in all, he was feeling pretty miserable. Ironically, the lone bright spot in their day was the sight of clouds beginning to gather to the west. They would help block the sun and give his back some relief. Jensen wasn’t sure if it was steaming, but it certainly felt like it. He resisted the urge to look back to check.
Back behind them now was Rob’s body and Brent. Brent who was going home. Jensen didn’t really feel anything about Rob. He’d been there, now he was gone. There hadn’t been enough time to get to know anything about him other than his name. The man named Doug had killed him. It was simple vengeance. Rob had killed Nate. Doug had killed Rob. It was elegant in its simplicity.
Brent was far more complex. What had happened to make him choose his path? It wasn’t the loss of Rob; the two had barely spoken to each other. Was it the destruction of their safe place in the mountains? The attack? Taking lives? Loneliness? Something else? He just didn’t know. He had so many questions. But Brent had broken.
He was a strong man, but he had broken. The final straw which snapped the camel’s back was a mystery. Jensen didn’t know if Brent had taken a life before the attack. He also didn’t know enough about Catholicism to understand if that was an issue for Brent. It probably wasn’t. He was pretty sure the crusades were carried out by Catholics, and there had been plenty of killing there.
But something had happened. It had been traumatic enough to break Brent and send him home to be with his wife. His dead wife. Something had happened to make Brent decide to join her.
Chapter 23
Brent picked his way down the stream toward the tub. He could have cut across the mountainside to pick up the road further on, but he was in no hurry. Time didn’t matter anymore. It was irrelevant. Past years, future years, they didn’t matter. He had all the time in the world.
He had one thing left to accomplish. Go home. Even if he didn’t make it for some reason, he was certain he’d be with Rebecca soon. He had faith. This journey meant something to him though. He wasn’t sure why. Physical location and proximity to his wife’s body wouldn’t matter. Or maybe it did. Maybe she’d be easier to find when he passed over. It was a good enough reason to go there.
As he reached the road, he looked toward the tub, which wasn’t far away. It seemed small, somehow. It was one of man’s weapons of war, and it had been destroyed by another. The power of the bomb, which had been miles away on the other side of a mountain, was amazing. The armored vehicle had been destroyed from afar. It was destroyed forever.
But around him, the earth would recover. The shattered trees would be replaced by saplings, and in time the forest would grow up again. The road he was standing on would probably crack and crumble. Roots would travel underneath and push it up. Rain and weather would attack it mercilessly until it was gone or buried, and the land would grow again.
Brent’s uncertainty was gone. He was in his 50s. Most of the people from his graduating class were probably already gone. Some had passed on even before the virus. Car accidents. Heart attacks. One had even died skiing in Colorado. He’d caught an edge and collided with a tree. The tree hadn’t noticed. His friend had died.
He counted himself fortunate to wake up each day. He didn’t know how many more he would have. Based on the most recent life expectancy news from a couple years ago, he could have maybe twenty-five left. If he was lucky, maybe thirty. Even forty. By then, the survivors would have rebuilt. Hell, it sounded like they were already doing really well further south.
Anything could happen. As he walked, he took stock of the trees around him. Many had fallen, but there were still many more standing tall and proud. Most of the leaves had blown away, but maybe they had enough to survive. They’d bud again next spring and grow more.
The tree in front of him had been a survivor. Brent couldn’t count the rings on the exposed trunk because it had shattered from the force of the wave, but it had to be over a century old. It had been there since before World War I, standing quietly on this mountainside in northern Georgia. Now it was gone.
As he climbed over it, he gave the bark a loving pat with his hand, as if to let it know it had done well. It was tragic, but it was life. Everything died eventually. What was most surprising was how li
ttle the nuclear blast had really done. Nukes were the most powerful weapon man had ever created. In his mind, they could take out entire cities with one blast. This one had done little more than knock over trees a few miles away.
Maybe it was a small one, but he’d lived through decades of talks about nuclear weapons. His expectations had been of something far worse. Honestly, he hadn’t expected to survive the blast, even though they were halfway to Clayton by the time it finally exploded.
The fallen leaves looked like a green carpet, as though the trees had chosen to drop their leaves now, when they were bright and green, rather than in the fall, when they would be multicolored and brittle. The leaves would still degrade. Still leach into the soil and provide nutrients for future growth. The only thing the bomb had really done was change the timeline.
In the life of a tree, what were a few months or years? Nothing. A mere moment. He’d seen something once which said there were around four hundred trees for every human on the planet. Well, now there were about thirteen hundred trees for every human. Based on how good we were at our own destruction, eventually that number would probably be much higher.
In construction, Brent had worked with lumber quite a bit. It was amazing what those slivers of tree could turn into with a little work. Small homes. Grand homes. Stores. Furniture. Tools. Decks. The list was practically endless. That didn’t make him feel much better about the scratches he was getting from climbing over and through the branches on the ground.
He didn’t heal as well as he used to. When he was twenty, his cuts would probably have healed ten minutes later. Now it took days. At least, that’s what it felt like. The gap probably wasn’t so pronounced, but his body was degrading. His body was losing the fight to heal and replenish. It was just a shell, though. His spirit was what mattered. His soul. He was going to try to heal it as much as he could as he walked.
Tomorrow's Dawn (Book 3): Escape and Evade Page 9
