by Noah Mann
The doctor and I climbed down. Neither of us needed to confirm anything. Once again, we were on our own.
* * *
“Does anyone have any idea where we are?” Martin asked.
We’d moved a good half mile from the smoldering wreckage, to a spot in the flat, open expanse of dirt that, at one point, must have been fields of wheat. Or corn. Or some staple vital in nourishing the masses. Now, it was nothing. The last evidence of dead and dried vegetation was long gone, rotted through spring rains and swept away by winter winds.
“Middle America,” I said. “East of the Rockies.”
“Thanks, Fletch,” Martin said, acknowledging my purposely vague estimation. “At least you didn’t say ‘earth’.”
I smiled at my friend’s mild jab. But his question was an important one to answer. Before we could decide our direction of travel, it would help to know where we were, hopefully with some specificity. Unfortunately, that wasn’t possible.
“We know home is to the west,” Genesee said. “Why not just start off in that direction.”
Schiavo pointed toward the horizon where the sun was slowly settling lower in the sky.
“A hundred miles that way could be swamp,” she said. “Or impassable mountains.”
“Wait...”
It was Carter interrupting the discussion, suddenly energized.
“The GPS,” he said. “It wouldn’t work in the ash, but we’re not in the ash anymore.”
I’d forgotten about the device provided by the SEALs in Bandon. We all had. Until now. I dug through my pack and found the handheld unit at the bottom.
In pieces.
“Sorry,” I said, retrieving what was left of the device, shattered plastic and circuit boards. “It didn’t take to that landing too well.”
Schiavo didn’t dwell on the setback, because we were no worse off than just a moment before.
“All right,” she said. “We have a decision to make. Which way do we start walking?”
It was quiet for a moment as those she’d posed the question to pondered what the best answer would be, most, I thought, gravitating toward the obvious choice that Genesee had already voiced.
I had another suggestion entirely.
Twenty Eight
“North,” I said.
“What?” Genesee asked, scanning the barren landscape of dead farm fields that surrounded the smoking debris.
“North,” I repeated.
Schiavo looked that direction. Hanging in the darkening sky was a still darker cloud, stretching from west to east. Thousands of tons of ash, the volcanic grit that had brought down Air Force One, drifted there, much of it settling to the earth below.
“Fletch, we’ve done our time in the ash,” Schiavo said. “Now I’m not sold on moving due west like Commander Genesee suggests, but I’m less inclined to repeat the past.”
“That ash cloud is twenty miles away,” I said. “Maybe thirty. We glided from twenty thousand feet. Pedigrew and Handley put us a good distance south of it. Besides, we’re not heading north to find home—we’re heading north to find the way home.”
Schiavo puzzled at my explanation. Carter, though, did not.
“A road,” the private said.
“Exactly,” I confirmed, nodding. “We head north until we find an east-west road, hopefully a highway with signage, and then we hang a left. There’s got to be something substantial between us and the ash cloud.”
Schiavo looked north again. In the waning daylight the cloud, with its origins not far from what had become our home, looked more ominous than it possibly was. But it had done damage far and wide, and was due some deference in how we approached it.
“We’re losing daylight,” Martin said. “At the very least we should get moving and see if there’s someplace we can shelter for the night.”
“This is farm country,” Genesee said. “There’s got to be a house or a barn or something within a few miles.”
Carter spun slowly, scanning the landscape in every direction. When he was facing us again he drew a breath and shook his head.
“Maybe more than a few miles,” the private said.
“All the more reason to get moving,” Martin said. “In some direction.”
Schiavo considered the input for a moment, then looked to me.
“North it is,” she said.
I picked my pack up from where I’d rested it on the dry earth and slipped into its straps.
“I’ll take lead,” I said.
My offer wasn’t akin to some soldier volunteering for duty on the point of a tactical column. The chance that we’d face any threat out here was remote. It was my idea, and I felt compelled to be the one at the front of our group, just in case some obstacle presented itself.
* * *
Twenty minutes later, nearly a mile north of the crash site, something did present itself. Not a threat, but the rusted hulk of a car on a what had been a dirt road, its shell rusted and interior empty but for shredded upholstery and empty soda cans. Every window was broken and all four tires were flat.
It did, however, hold some value to us.
“Kansas,” Carter said, crouching at the bumper of the abandoned Chevy and brushing dirt off the license plate. “We’re in Kansas.”
“Or that car drove here from Kansas,” Genesee said.
Schiavo, though, wasn’t ready to dismiss the information we’d just stumbled upon.
“It’s reasonable to assume we’re standing in Kansas,” she said, looking to me. “But this is just a north-south dirt road.”
I nodded and started walking again. Heading north.
* * *
Night came, just a hint of daylight left, the twilight landscape that surrounded us appearing almost unsullied by years of blight. The world looked better in shadow. This part of it, at least.
“A building,” Carter said.
He was pointing northeast, his youthfully sharp eyes having spotted the angular shape that was darker than the sky that silhouetted it. A half mile away at most, I thought. I shifted direction and led us there.
* * *
It was a farmhouse, validating Genesee’s supposition about the area we’d crashed in. A classic two story home, with a barn out back that had been flattened by years of snow load and lack of maintenance. The structure where we’d chosen to stop for the night had fared better, with nearly half of its windows intact and a collection of furniture which was covered with layers of dust, but still supported our weight as we sat and laid upon it.
“How’s your water?” I asked Schiavo.
She shook her head. I handed her the clear bottle from my pack, about half full. She took a sip and handed it back.
“We’re not going to find any here,” she said.
“No,” I agreed.
Just across the living room, Martin had broken up some vintage side tables and had the beginnings of a fire going in the hearth. Genesee and Carter were upstairs, scouting and scavenging.
“We’ve covered six miles,” Schiavo said. “Maybe seven.”
I knew that. Glancing behind as we’d walked, when there was still enough light in the sky, I’d been able to make out the smoke column from the crash site until just before Carter had spotted the farmhouse. And in that distance we’d found a dirt road and a car, but no thoroughfare that would lead us west.
“There’s something else to consider,” Martin said, joining us, the wood blazing in the fireplace now.
“What’s that?” Schiavo asked her husband.
“The actual act of crossing half the country on foot,” he said, looking to me next. “Fletch has done that, and from what he’s shared about it, I don’t know how we approach a journey like that.”
There was some odd symmetry to the trek he was referencing. The first leg of it, from Bandon to Cheyenne, had begun by plane, then continued when we’d been forced to land after mechanical trouble. Continuing on foot, we almost immediately lost one of our number, Burke Stovich, leaving Elaine,
Neil, and I to push on through the wasteland. The return trip from Cheyenne, though, had been what had truly tested us. And almost bested us.
“We put one foot in front of the other,” Schiavo said. “That’s how we do it. We scavenge and supply ourselves, and we keep moving. If some abandoned bus or pickup truck will start, we’ll use that. One way or the other, we’re getting home.”
Martin didn’t doubt his wife at all. And he hadn’t been dismissive of our chances to reach Bandon again. He was simply reminding us that we were about to set out on a journey that would require all that we had within us. And maybe more.
“Ma’am,” Carter said, coming down the stairs, Genesee right behind.
“What is it, private?”
“I’m pretty sure I see something in the distance,” Carter said. “Through binoculars.”
“I looked, and I can’t see anything,” Genesee said, countering the private’s restrained excitement.
“There is something there,” Carter said, his confidence unshaken. “I’m sure.”
“What sort of something?” I asked.
“Some terrain feature,” he explained. “Like a low hill. It is hard to make out, but just north of us the ground isn’t all flat.”
“Are there many hills in Kansas?” Martin wondered aloud.
“There are hills everywhere,” Schiavo said.
“Maybe,” Martin mostly agreed. “It could just be an aberration in the dark. Your eyes playing tricks on you.”
Carter wasn’t buying that. And he wasn’t backing down.
“Ma’am, permission to go scout that area.”
Schiavo thought for only a second on his request, then shook her head.
“In the morning we’ll be able to see clearly,” she said. “With rested eyes.”
Disappointment showed mild upon Carter’s face, but the feeling was real. I could see it in his eyes—he really believed that something was out there.
* * *
“Fletch...”
I woke to sunlight streaming through the downstairs windows and Martin standing over me.
“Come look at this,” he said in a hushed tone.
I brushed the sleep from my eyes and sat up on the couch where I’d drifted off. Across from me, near the fireplace where just embers remained, Schiavo still slept, curled up in an overstuffed chair.
“Where are Carter and Clay?”
“Doc is in a bedroom down the hall,” Martin said. “The kid is upstairs standing at the window waiting to say ‘I told you so’.”
It took only a minute to reach the bedroom upstairs where Carter stood at the window, his gear already packed on the bed he’d slept in.
“I told you I saw something,” he said.
Martin smiled at me, the both of us joining Carter at the window, no binoculars necessary to make out what lay in the distance to the north.
“Man made berm,” Martin said. “Railroad tracks on top.”
“Running east and west,” I said, putting a hand on Carter’s shoulder. “We’re going to start calling you eagle eye.”
Martin nodded, smiling as he turned away from the window.
“I’m going to wake the others,” he said.
He left the room, Carter right behind with his gear in hand, eager to get to the feature he’d spotted in the dark. I was, as well, but even though I knew it was close to what we’d been looking for, it still meant we’d be on foot, trudging west, low on food and, more importantly, water. And what Martin had referenced the night before, my time trekking from Cheyenne to Bandon, bubbled up again in memory right then as I stared out at the steel rails cutting across the prairie. They seemed to stretch endlessly in both directions, and I remembered the feeling that the road ahead of us would just go on, and on, and on, until we either reached home, or died trying.
This was no different, I was realizing, and the thought of reliving that ordeal was weighing on me. As was the case in that past journey, I had to keep at the forefront of my thoughts what lay at the end of the road. That would keep me going. It had to.
Twenty Nine
We reached the train tracks we’d seen in the distance and stood on the manmade rise that supported them. Without a map, or GPS, or some innate recollection of geography, we could only be reasonably certain, based upon the rusting license plate on an abandoned car which we’d passed, that we were in Kansas.
“West or keep pushing north?” Schiavo wondered aloud, requesting opinions.
To the north, across the flat landscape that bore only a skim of volcanic grit, the dissipating ash cloud still hung thousands of feet in the sky. But there was sky to be seen, blue and beautiful.
“This isn’t exactly a road,” Genesee said. “Tracks like these can run through the middle of nowhere. Just like they are here. We’re bound to hit a real road if we keep pushing north, like Fletch originally said.”
The ash cloud had lessened since we’d risen, the event that had created it almost certainly waning. That would match up with what the president had suggested about the west coast clearing somewhat. That was both a blessing and a curse, considering the reported advance of Unified Government forces moving north. Here, though, we had to take it as a sign that our way home might not be fraught with as many environmental obstacles as we’d feared. So, we could continue north in search of a highway.
But that was not what we needed to do, I suddenly realized.
“West,” I said.
“Why West?” Schiavo asked.
“Because Colorado is that way,” I said.
“Colorado,” Schiavo said, realizing where I was going with my suggestion. “Colorado.”
“There were Unified Government forces in Colorado,” I told those members of our group who hadn’t been privy to the president’s briefing. “They attacked NORAD.”
“There are also Marines on the border,” Schiavo said.
“Marines?” Genesee asked. “You’re sure about this?”
“The Second Marine Expeditionary Force is holding a position near the border between Kansas and Colorado,” I said.
“Second MEF,” Genesee said, energized slightly by what he was learning.
“If we can reach the Marines, we have a better shot at getting home,” I said. “At the very least they’ll have supplies.”
Whether they’d be inclined to part with food and water was an open question, but that destination, and the hope it made possible, was our best move. At least to me.
“Tell me you remember the name of the town, Fletch,” Schiavo said.
I nodded.
“Colby.”
Schiavo scanned the landscape. The tracks appeared to follow a mostly western course ahead, deviating slightly north in the distance. Somewhere along them there had to be a town where we could search for supplies. And information.
“Get us moving, private,” Schiavo said.
Carter nodded and began walking, leading us west.
* * *
Two hours later, with the sun rising higher over the parched, windy landscape, Genesee tapped Schiavo on the shoulder.
“We should stop,” he said, motioning to Martin.
Schiavo looked to her husband. Our injured friend had kept up, pressing on through pain that he denied, but that was, nonetheless, real. With Carter setting the pace, Martin had been right behind him. When we’d spotted streams near the tracks he was first to hustle down the berm to check the waters, all of which had been very clearly fouled beyond any filtering we were capable of performing.
Now, though, it was obvious that he was hurting, his arm tucked close to his injured side, the bandage that Genesee had continually tended to only capable of doing so much to relieve the discomfort and limitations on his motion. Having survived a violent plane crash hadn’t helped his situation any, and yet he was pushing on. Pushing himself.
We had to force a rest.
“Hold up, private,” Schiavo said.
I moved forward and handed my water bottle to Martin as he stopped. H
e eyed the meager contents and waved off the offer. His canteen was dry, as was Schiavo’s. Genesee had less than I did, and Carter just a bit more.
“I’m okay,” Martin assured me.
“I’d feel better if you took a drink,” I told him.
He bent forward, planting his hand on his thighs to rest, and eyed me.
“This stop better not be for me,” he said.
A few yards ahead, Carter lowered himself to the tracks, taking a seat on one of the rails.
“We all need a break, Martin,” I said, holding the water bottle out to him again. “So just take a swig and get moving again in a bit.”
This time he considered the offer, but still hesitated.
“Look,” I said, “if you take the drink, your wife’s not going to be concerned. If you try to play the superhero, that’s going to be exactly what happens.”
He knew my logic was unassailable, and finally he straightened and took the container from me, draining about half of what remained in a quick swallow. When he handed it back, I drank what remained, then put the empty back in its pocket on the side of my pack.
“Happy now?” he asked.
“Joyful beyond all description,” I told him.
“Ma’am,” Carter said.
I looked and saw that he’d moved, from sitting to a position on all fours, one hand planted solidly on one of the thick rails.
“What is it, private?”
“I feel something,” Carter said. “The rail is...vibrating.”
Schiavo walked to where the young man was hunched over between the tracks, crouching to put her own hand on the rail near his. She held it there, eyes widening just before she bolted upright and looked west, then east.
