Roads Less Traveled | Book 5 | End of the Road

by Dulaney, C.

  “But they weren’t,” Jonah added. He was on the couch with Kasey. Mia and Caleb sat in chairs they’d brought in from the kitchen, and Michael was with Jake next to the desk, checking the map against the activity Jake had come back to report.

  “Right,” Michael said. “Probably not. The ones in Matias weren’t.”

  “Nope.” Jonah gave Kasey a sideways glance. “But… they do seem dangerous, at least when they’re interrupted.”

  Kasey bobbed her head but kept her eyes on her dog. Gus, splayed out on the floor with his hind legs stretched out behind him, worked himself silly over a deer legbone Caleb had saved for him.

  Jake pointed to Bill’s Fork and said, “Bill’s sendin’ out scouts. They know where some pretty big groups of ‘em have been hangin’ out. Said they’d send word when they found somethin’.”

  Michael folded his arms over his chest. “Good. What about Bentree?”

  Jake snorted. “Those guys damn near threw me in the ‘brig.’” He made a face and rolled his eyes when he air-quoted the word. “So I said, ‘What brig, motherfucker? You mean that one-man tent over there next to the shit house?’”

  “Jake. Focus.”

  “Oh, right. So yeah, soon as the guy finished the letter you sent, he balled it up, threw it in the trash, and started threatenin’ me.”

  “What?”

  “I know! That’s what I said!”

  “Okay,” Michael said. “What exactly did he say?”

  Jake took a deep breath and looked at the ceiling. “He said, ‘We are aware of the issue and as has been stated in the past, no person or group is to interfere with the gabs. The punishment for interference is severe and will be carried out immediately. Is that understood?’ And so I said, ‘What the fuck is a gab?’”

  Kasey laughed. She couldn’t help it.

  Michael pinched the bridge of his nose.

  “He didn’t answer that,” Jake went on. “But then he did say a good bit about repeatin’ this all to the LC, and then what was gonna happen to all of us if you didn’t get your goddamn people under control.”

  “Who the hell’s the LC?” Mia asked.

  Jake pointed at Michael.

  Michael waved it away. “Doesn’t matter.” He turned to the others. “The real issue here is this hard line they’re taking.”

  “They’ve said from the beginning to leave the terminators alone, let them do their jobs,” Caleb said.

  Jonah agreed. “That’s true. But they also know we’ve had to put some down.”

  “Not just us,” Mia added. “Everyone has.”

  “They never fought us on that,” Jonah said. “Us and them, we been in agreement how to handle the terminators. And when the hell did they start callin’ ‘em gabs?”

  Jake laughed. “Yeah, well we sure as hell ain’t in agreement now. I mean, he didn’t outright say it, but he made it pretty clear that there’s no exceptions now. Leave ‘em be, or else.”

  “Or we’ll be shot,” Kasey said.

  Jake nodded.

  “So what’s changed?” Michael asked.

  The room fell silent.

  Michael took a deep breath and turned back to the map, then Jonah spoke up, “We know exactly what’s changed.” He pulled a smoke from his shirt pocket and lit up.

  Michael narrowed his eyes. “What’s that?”

  “They have,” Jonah said. He leaned back and pulled a booted foot up to rest across his other knee. “The terminators.”

  “Genetically altered beings,” Caleb whispered. All eyes turned to him and waited. He noticed they were staring after a time and said, “I remember now. Hearing someone say that, back at the lab.” He blanched thinking about his time spent as prisoner at the CC.

  “Well, shit. We already knew that,” Jake said.

  Mia spoke up, “He meant that’s what gab stands for, shut up.”

  Kasey said, “Those fuckers at the CC called them gabs? So then why the hell did the Guardsmen in Bentree call them that, too? Never did before.”

  “No,” Michael said, “they didn’t. The Guard’s position has changed. The only thing I don’t understand is why.”

  “Right. Because if they were fine with us putting them down before when they were dangerous, they really should be fine with it now,” Kasey said.

  Jonah shifted on the couch to face her. “Well, we might’ve figured that out if we’d just watched ‘em and not mowed ‘em down like weeds.”

  Caleb’s back stiffened about the same time as Kasey’s.

  Mia jumped in. “We need to find another bunch and watch them, then. Follow them if we have to, see what they do, if anything. Either there’s a reason for this change, or there’s not.”

  “They’re turnin’, or they’re levelin’ up,” Jake said. “Oughta be able to figure out which if we trail a group long enough.”

  Tensions eased, and everyone considered this for several minutes.

  Michael ran a hand over his beard and finally asked, “But leveling up for what?”

  ✽✽✽

  Three days later, a dozen horses stood outside Michael’s cabin, tied to the porch banister. Their riders were inside, holding a meeting with him. The men and women were Bill’s people, the folks he’d sent out to track down some of the larger groups of terminators. Kasey had seen many of them before on her trips to the Fork.

  She, Mia, and Jake waited outside on the porch. Michael had only wanted Jonah inside with him, and her dad was in the barn with Gus.

  “Doesn’t sound good,” Jake said.

  “How do you know?” Mia asked. “We can’t hear anything.”

  “Exactly.”

  Mia blew out a breath.

  “Hey, I’m just sayin’.”

  “You’re an idiot.”

  “And you wondered why Jonah was the only one allowed in,” Kasey mumbled. She stood away from them and stroked the forehead of one of the horses. From time to time, her eyes wandered to the barn. “Just be patient. We’ll find out soon enough.”

  Mia chuckled. “Yeah, patient. Cause this one was blessed with an overabundance of it.”

  “I know you’re not talkin’ about me,” Jake said.

  Kasey listened to them a couple more minutes, then said, “Wow.”

  “What?” they asked.

  “Just do it and get it over with already.”

  “Do wha− ow!” Jake started, but Mia punched his arm.

  They both shut up and stayed that way until the door opened an hour later and the riders came out. A few traded words and greetings with Kasey, then they climbed in their saddles and rode off. Jonah came out last and leaned against the post next to her.

  “Kasey,” Michael called from inside.

  She hesitated. Three of the riders had left their horses tied to Michael’s banister, and rode double behind a few of the others. Finally she motioned for the other two to follow and went inside. Michael was, as usual, bent over his desk, staring at that damn map.

  “They’re all reporting movement,” he said after they’d gathered close. His finger moved from one terminator cluster to the next, all circled in yellow marker. “Here, here, here.” He traced lines, then tapped his finger at a place where several back roads met the main highway that ran north and south. “All converging here.” He straightened, then grimaced and rubbed the small of his back.

  “So…” Kasey said.

  “So they’re migrating south.”

  Jake laughed. “You’re shittin’ me. The terminators, or gabs, or whatever the fuck we’re supposed to call them… what do we call them?” He turned to Mia. “Gabs is shorter, but sounds like a cartoon character.”

  “Jake, focus,” Mia said, still looking at the map and biting her lower lip.

  “Yeah.” Jake turned back to the map. “The terminators aren’t birds, man. They don’t migrate.”

  Michael shrugged. “I don’t know what else to call it. After they woke up, the groups around here met up there,” he pointed to the convergence point o
n the map again, “and now they’re all headed south on that road. What would you call it?”

  “The scouts had eyes on them?” Kasey asked.

  Michael nodded. “But once they got out so far, they agreed to only send two on to follow. The rest came home.” He held his hands out and looked at the map.

  Kasey said, “So where are the scouts now? The two that kept tailing?”

  “Somewhere on that road.”

  Kasey leaned in and drew a line with her finger, straight across the intersection where the two scouts were last seen following the united gang of terminators. “So anywhere south of here?”

  “That’s a lot of ground to cover,” Jake said.

  “Not really,” Michael said. “There’s no reason to believe those terminators won’t stay on the highway, and so as long as nothing’s happened to the scouts, they should be right behind them. And we saw how they moved. They’re slow.”

  “Wait a second,” Mia said. “You’re talking like you want us to go follow them.”

  Michael raised his eyebrows and smiled. “You’re quick.”

  “Well what the hell for?” she protested. “We don’t work for free.”

  Michael shifted from one foot to the other. “I didn’t say we were.”

  “So,” Kasey said. “What’s in it for us?”

  Michael took a deep breath. “Solar panels. Three of them.”

  Kasey and Mia traded a look. “Solar panels,” Kasey repeated.

  Mia shook her head. “Job like this, we’re gonna need more than that, considering we’re getting along just fine without power.”

  “Yeah, but power would be nice. And this is an easy job. Besides, they only sent two scouts,” Michael said. “Two. You know what it’s like out there. Your odds of coming back are a helluva lot higher if there’s more than two of you.”

  Mia wouldn’t relent. “We go out all the time. And we’re only three.” She gestured to Kasey and Jake.

  Jake spoke up. “Yeah but, no offense, we don’t know how good those two scouts are. We know what we can do. And this is all kinds of weird. Can’t sit this one out and ignore it, regardless of payment.”

  Mia dropped her head and planted her hands on her hips.

  Kasey turned back to Michael. “If you want us to go, we’ll go. Hell, it’s not even that far. Still in the county. I like Bill, but they better not be bullshitting us on those panels, or we’ll take it out of their asses. Just tell us when we’re leaving.”

  “Today, if you can. And it won’t be just you three.”

  Michael opened one of the desk drawers and pulled out a roll of paper. He untied it, smoothed it out on the desk, and rifled through several small county maps. He pulled out a few, rolled them back up, and tied them. He noticed Kasey, Jake, and Mia still standing there, staring at him.

  “Well?” He waved toward the door with the rolled-up maps. “Go pack your shit.” He turned from them and went to his bedroom.

  “You heard the man,” Kasey said. She faced her friends and shrugged. “Let’s go pack our shit.”

  Chapter Three

  It was ten in the morning by the time they left. Caleb and Jonah took the lead, Mia and Jake rode in the middle, and Kasey and Michael brought up the rear. Gus, as usual, scouted out ahead, but never went any further than fifty yards or so of the group. He kept his nose to the ground and darted back and forth across the road. When they reached the gate at the bottom of the mountain, Caleb dismounted and held it open until everyone had passed through, the beagle waiting next to his feet.

  Once her dad was back in the saddle and they were moving again, Kasey signaled to her dog using a few hand gestures. He barked and ran ahead of the horses, resuming his sniffing and swerving pattern back and forth from ditch to ditch.

  “After all this time,” Michael said, “that dog still blows my mind.” He reached behind him and pulled a small sheaf of paper from one of his saddle bags.

  “He’s not really looking for anything,” Kasey said. “It’s just something to keep him occupied.”

  “Or so you think.” Michael wrapped the reins around the saddle horn and unrolled the little county map. “We can stay on this road and it’ll bring us out on the highway a little ways north of where the scout parties split. Only a few small towns between here and there.”

  They came up on Matias. Kasey could already see the post office. “Yeah, I was that way a few times, well, Before,” she said.

  Michael nodded. “Shouldn’t be a problem.”

  Just ahead, Jake twisted around in his saddle and said, “You know, I used to get in trouble for sayin’ that kind of shit.”

  “Still do,” Mia said.

  “What? So it’s okay for him to say it and not me?”

  “Just turn around and ride, jinx.”

  Michael caught Kasey’s eye and grinned. She snorted and shook her head. They passed the post office, and, after the bickering from the two in front of them died down to a dull murmur, Michael continued.

  “Anyway, there aren’t any people in those towns, and the terminators should have already been through the area. So we probably won’t run into any kind of dead trouble.”

  “Didn’t think we would,” Kasey said. Her attention was less on Michael’s assurances, and more on the bodies lying in the middle of the road.

  Gus sniffed around the perimeter of them. Caleb and Jonah pulled on the reins and came to a stop. They traded a few words, then Caleb shifted and looked back over his shoulder at his daughter. Kasey caught his eye and held it.

  Michael whispered, “Let it go.”

  After a moment, Caleb turned around and got his horse moving. He snapped his fingers to get Gus’ attention, then sent the dog away from the dead terminators and down the road with a hand gesture the others had seen Kasey use several times.

  “I’m gonna have to fix this,” Kasey said to herself.

  “Yeah, you are.” Michael said. “Problem is, you’re a cookie-cutter version of him. Just not as pretty.”

  Kasey rolled her eyes.

  Michael smiled. “How many times has your nose been broken, again?”

  “Uh huh.”

  “Bullheaded. Too proud for your own good.”

  “Keep it up.”

  “Just stating facts.”

  Twenty miles and several hours later, they decided to stop for the night in Betty’s Boulder. The town, if it could be called that, was a dozen homes clustered around a roadside bar. The small parking lot out front was overgrown with weeds. Wild vines and out-of-control bushes cloaked porches, and vehicles abandoned next to houses and garages were covered in either rust or bird shit. In some cases, both. This place hadn’t been touched by people since Z-Day.

  Kasey hadn’t come this far south scavenging, even in the very early days. She’d always preferred looking for supplies to the north and west of her home, because the terrain was rougher and the woods were thicker this way. That meant bad visibility and a good chance of being ambushed.

  “Hey, think there’s any hooch left?” Jake asked. He dismounted and looked for a place to tie off his horse.

  Mia tied hers to the door handle of a car sitting cockeyed between the bar and the house next to it. “If there is, it’s skunky.”

  Caleb laughed. “I don’t think he’s got a problem with skunky beer.”

  Jake grinned and held his fist out for a bump. Caleb ignored it, as usual, and the two headed for the door.

  “Careful,” Jonah called to them. He borrowed Mia’s idea and tied his horse to the same car.

  “He’d drink horse piss, given half the chance,” Mia said.

  Jake and Caleb pried the door open. It wasn’t locked, but the hinges were rusted pretty badly. Caleb flipped on his flashlight and Jake took point, raising his rifle and scanning the area within as the older man lit it up. Satisfied it was safe, they motioned to the others and went inside. Jonah and Michael beat down the overgrowth around the doorway with their machetes and feet. Kasey and Mia pulled packs off th
e horses and carried them into the bar.

  “C’mon,” Michael said before closing the door. “Get in here.”

  Gus, who’d had his head shoved into a thick patch of weeds at the corner of the building, ran over and darted inside.

  “Caleb,” Michael said, “check if this place has a back door. Jake and Jonah, check the upstairs.”

  The three men hurried off. Kasey and Mia dropped the bags they carried and started pushing tables out of the way, clearing an area in the corner opposite the door for sleeping bags. After that, they fished some jerky and bottles of water out of one of the backpacks, and laid it all out on one of the tables. Michael walked around the room, kicking trash off to the side, and checked the two windows. They seemed solid and were locked. Gus trotted straight to the bottom of the stairs and stuck his nose to the floor. His sniffs and snorts came quicker and quicker: he’d picked up a trail. It took him in the same direction Caleb had gone, through the room and toward the back. A couple minutes later, they both returned to the main room.

  “There’s another door, alright. Been well-used,” Caleb reported. “All the weeds and shit are beat down around it, and you can see a path to the houses and woods behind this place.”

  That got their attention. Kasey and Michael drew their pistols and moved to the bottom of the staircase leading upstairs, and Mia took up a position next to the front window and watched outside. Caleb snapped his fingers once and Gus planted himself at the man’s feet.

  Michael pointed toward the back. “Watch that door,” he told Caleb. “Jake?” he yelled up the steps.

  No answer.

  “Let’s go,” he said to Kasey.

  The pair moved up the steps, one on each side with their backs flat against the wall. They kept their pistols aimed on the door at the top. It was ajar. There were no sounds of movement from the other side. The old steps creaked as they ascended. Michael grimaced and shook his head. They drew close to the door and Kasey peered through the crack. The only things she could see were a slice of carpet, a couch, and the corner of a coffee table. But she did notice there wasn’t any trash on the floor.

  She nodded once to Michael, then kicked the door open and they both burst inside. The upstairs was a single large room, and what Kasey had seen before was the living area. Beyond that was a bed. Lying on the floor next to it was Jake, face down and unmoving, a small dark spot at the base of his skull. Jonah was closer. He was on his knees, facing Kasey, and a woman stood behind him. She was shorter than Kasey. Her clothing was dirty and well worn. Her face was well-worn, too. While not as crooked as Kasey’s, the woman’s nose had seen the business end of a blunt object a time or two.