by Amy Cross
"When?"
"Three days ago."
He stares at me for a moment. "Where is he now?"
"I buried him," I reply, feeling the first tear starting to trickle down my cheek. "I dug a grave in Central Park, and I buried him there. I tried to save him when it happened, but there was nothing I could do. It was a rifle. There was too much damage, and he bled to death." In some weird way, it actually feels good to be explaining what happened. I've run over and over the whole thing a million times in my mind, but it's different now that I'm actually saying things out loud. I'm pretty sure I'm still in shock.
"Who shot him?" Toad asks.
"A man," I say, shivering as I think back to Bob's evil, grinning face. "There was this guy, back in Manhattan. He had all these guns, and he tried to turn my brother into this little soldier. He told him that he had to grow up and be a man, and that the only way to be strong was to have a gun in his hand all the time. He got into his head and made him believe all this crap." I take a deep breath, trying to control my emotions. "He was going to shoot me, too, but I..." Pausing again, I think back to the moment when I plunged the knife into Bob's chest. "I killed him eventually," I say, my voice trembling, "but only after he'd shot my brother."
"You shot him?"
"I stabbed him," I reply, and I can immediately see the look of surprise in Toad's eyes. "He was going to kill me," I continue. "He chased me, and I had nowhere else to go. It was kind of a blur, but..." I pause. "I don't regret it. I hated doing it, but I didn't have a choice. He killed Henry and he was coming for me next."
"Sometimes we have to do what we have to do," Toad replies.
"Have you ever killed anyone?" I ask.
"No," he says. "I would, if I had to, but so far it's never been necessary. I guess that's one area where you've got more experience than me."
"I wish I didn't," I tell him. It's crazy to think about how much stuff has happened recently. Life seems to be hurtling forward so fast, I can barely stop to think. This time two weeks ago, I was a normal girl living a boring life in Manhattan; this time one week ago, I was with Henry in our apartment and we were waiting for our parents to come home and for the world to get back to normal; now I'm standing in a forest with a man I only met yesterday, and he's trying to get me to carry a gun so that I can defend myself.
"You still need to have a gun out here," Toad says after a moment. "It's just a fact. I'm sorry about what happened to your brother, and I'm sorry you ran into some kind of maniac who thought guns were toys, but there's no reason to be scared. A gun is a tool, just like any other tool. As long as you respect it, and you don't start waving the damn thing around, there's no reason to be scared." He pauses, and for a few seconds I feel as if he's peering directly into my soul. "I wouldn't have invited you out here today," he says eventually, "and I wouldn't be forcing you to carry a gun, if I didn't already know that you're reliable."
"How do you know that?" I ask.
"I can see it in your eyes," he says with a smile. "I don't know if anyone's told you, but I'm a brilliant judge of character. Really, it's almost like a super-power. Guys like Thor and Erikson, I can see through their bullshit. I let them stay for now, but I'm onto them. I know they won't last. The only people around here that I trust are Bridger and Connors." He pauses. "And now you."
"I appreciate what you're saying," I reply, "but -"
"Don't over-think it," he says, taking a step back. "Respect the gun, respect human life, but be ready to defend yourself. Just because some guy misused a gun and killed your brother, don't assume that all guns are bad. Okay? Trust yourself. You can carry a gun, you can even use it if necessary, but it's clear that you're not the kind of person who'd be irresponsible. As I said, I'm good at reading people."
Looking down at the gun, I realize that he's right. Out here, in the middle of nowhere, we could be attacked by wild animals at any moment. "So what's out here?" I ask, looking back at him. "You said this is hostile territory. What does that mean? What are we supposed to be looking out for?"
"There have always been wolves around here," he says. "They don't normally attack, but given the circumstances, I have no intention of taking a risk. Then there are other things, things I don't really understand. I don't like when I meet something I don't understand, so maybe I'm a little over-cautious, but I figure that's better than running blindly into something that might be dangerous."
"You mean the creatures?" I ask.
"You've seen them too?"
"In Manhattan," I reply. "One of them talked to us. It didn't really make much sense, but it was definitely..." I think back for a moment to the creature trapped in the car. "Do you know what's happened?" I ask eventually. "I mean, the world's gone crazy, and I have no idea why. Do you know?"
He shakes his head.
"Do you think it'll ever go back to normal?" I continue.
"After all this?" He pauses. "I doubt it. I saw this coming, and I always knew it was going to be bad when it happened."
"How could you have seen all of this coming?" I ask.
"How could you not?" he replies.
"It came out of nowhere," I point out. "The power just went off without any warning. Planes fell from the sky. Everything just stopped."
"The world was getting crazier and crazier," he says. "Faster, dirtier, nastier. Civilization has been spinning out of control for too long. People were taking more and more shortcuts, more and more risks. Greed and anger were reaching unsustainable levels. Little accidents were happening everywhere, and I saw the writing on the wall. I had no idea what was going to happen, but I knew the shit was gonna hit the fan eventually. That's why I came out here and started to stockpile things. Food, gasoline, water, books. Everything I thought I might need in case the world came crashing down. I didn't make a big fuss about it, 'cause I didn't want people to tell me I was being paranoid, but I quietly got prepared. At times, I wondered if I'd lost my mind, but I kept at it. Looks like I made the right choice, huh? This time two weeks ago, I was a crazy guy living in the middle of nowhere. Now suddenly I look pretty smart."
I stare at him. In a way, he seems like the opposite of Bob. They were both prepared for the possibility of something like this happening, but while Bob became a megalomaniac, Toad seems more rational and calm. It's strange, but I feel safe out here, as if I know that this guy understands the natural world and recognizes the dangers.
"Come on," he says, hauling his backpack over his shoulder. "We've got a lot of ground to cover before the day's over, and I don't think the weather's going to hold forever. There's rain coming from the north, and when that happens, it usually sticks around. We'll just check the traps and get back to the farm."
As we start walking again, I try to stay calm. For the past few years, I've been getting on with my normal life, and it never even occurred to me that things might suddenly just stop. While people like Toad were able to see the way the world was headed, people like me were just running around, blindly assuming that nothing could go wrong. Now that the world has ended up in such a mess, I feel pretty dumb. It's a miracle that I'm one of the few people who managed to survive, but I don't have any skills for this new world. I'm helpless. If it hadn't been for Erikson and Shauna picking me up the other day, I'd probably have died on the journey. My luck can't hold forever, though. Sooner or later, I need to get better at looking after myself and making smart decisions. Still, I can't deny that the gun in my hand makes me feel a little safer. I just wish it didn't remind me of Henry's death.
Thomas
Missouri
"Get me out of here!" I scream, banging on the door. "Get me the fuck out of here!"
I wait.
Silence.
"Help!" I scream, banging again. "Someone help me! Someone -" Before I can finish, I'm overcome by a wave of anger and I drop to my knees. I swear to God, if I ever get my hands on that old bastard, I'll kill him. I don't care if he's got a million excuses for doing this, I'll wring the life from his neck. With tea
rs flowing down my cheeks, I try to stop panicking, but it's no use. I feel out of breath, as if there's not enough oxygen down here.
"Let me out!" I scream again. "You can't just leave me down here!"
Elizabeth
Pennsylvania
"Bad day to be a rabbit," Toad says as he reaches into one of the traps and pulls out his latest catch. Turning to me, he smiles. "What's wrong? Don't you eat rabbit in Manhattan?"
"Not really," I say, barely able to look at the poor dead creature. Toad has spent the past few hours checking a series of primitive traps, which are little more than small pits filled with sharp spikes, over which he's been setting thin layers of leaves. A set of small poles mark out the location of each trap, and Toad has been carefully guiding me through the undergrowth in order to ensure that I don't accidentally get my foot spiked.
"There's more meat on these things than you'd realize," he continues. "I might not like the guy much, but Thor sure knows how to take your basic lump of rabbit meat and make it a little more appetizing. Trust me, we're going to eat well tonight. We've got plenty of vegetables around the back of the farmhouse, and even though a good old slice of rabbit might not seem like much right now, it's pretty damn good food." He pauses. "It's probably better than anything else you can find right now, unless we happen to luck into a deer."
I smile politely, even though the thought of eating rabbit is kind of disturbing. All in all, I feel totally out of place here, and it's as if Toad is going out of his way to remind me that I'm some kind of stuck-up, protected city girl. Sure, I've never caught and cooked a goddamn rabbit before, but that doesn't mean I'm an idiot. It's just that all my skills are linked to things that aren't any use out here. I can build websites and I can draw pretty well, and I'm pretty good at playing the clarinet. A few weeks ago, those things were kinda useful and I felt like I was really learning; now, it's as if I'm back to square one. I don't know how to catch or prepare my own food, so I guess I'm completely dependent upon other people.
"We don't exactly have a lot of choice around these parts," Toad continues, getting to his feet. He glances up at the darkening sky. "Believe it or not, I used to eat rabbit even before the world went to hell." He holds the rabbit up and admires its dead body. "You know how to skin a rabbit?" he asks eventually.
I shake my head.
"You want to learn?"
"Right now?" I ask skeptically.
"When we get back to the farm," he replies. "There's no point skinning it until we're ready to cook. We'll take it home, and then we'll get all the fur away, take out the parts we're not going to use, and season it up before we put it in the oven for a few hours." He smiles as he stares at me, and it's clear that he's enjoying every second of this. "Don't worry," he continues after a moment, as he places the rabbit in a plastic bag, "you don't have to do anything you don't want to do. I'm sure you've got other skills."
"Not particularly," I reply.
"Everyone's got skills," he replies. "I don't believe there's a person ever been born on this planet who can't do something better than average." He pauses, and moments later there's the sound of thunder in the distance. "We're due a storm," he says, sounding as if he's concerned. "It's coming in much faster than I expected. We should start heading back to the farm. This isn't the kind of place where you want to be caught out."
"But we don't have enough food," I reply, shocked that one rabbit could feed seven people.
"I brought some extra back over the past couple of days," he says, leading me away from the traps. "We'll be fine. I always like to have a few days' worth of supplies set up in advance, for precisely this kind of situation. Besides, you wouldn't believe how many tins of food I've got in the basement. Seriously, I've got enough food to last for a year, although it'd be a bit of a stretch with a full house."
"So why do you let people stay with you?" I ask, as the first drops of rain start to fall. "Wouldn't it be better to just hold on to all your resources and wait as long as possible?"
"I'd go crazy," he replies. "Besides, it's a trade. It's useful to have Dr. Connors around in case anything goes wrong. Bridger's good with mechanics, and Thor kind of comes with Bridger. Erikson and his girlfriend aren't really much use, but they're not staying too long. People who stay are here because they've got something to offer, and I offer them shelter in return."
We walk on for a moment. "What about me?" I ask.
"What about you?"
"I don't have anything to offer," I point out. "I'm not good at anything."
"I thought you were just passing through," he replies. "Aren't you leaving with Erikson and Shauna in a couple of days?"
"I guess so," I reply. "To be honest, I don't really know where I'm going."
"Well," he says, "where did you come from? If you can work that out, maybe you can work out where you're going. Don't you have any momentum?"
"I have this friend who's heading up to Lake Ontario," I tell him. "I was kind of thinking of going to join her, but I don't know exactly where she'll be, and..." I pause, and finally I realize that even though I keep telling myself that my destination is Lake Ontario, I have no idea whether that's actually where I'm going. "I guess I'll stick with Erikson and Shauna for a while," I continue. "If they'll let me."
As the rain intensifies, we pause to take shelter under a tree.
"You can stay," Toad says after a moment. "When Erikson and Shauna leave, I mean. I'll let you stay if that's what you want."
"I can't do anything," I remind him.
"You're smart," he says. "I can see that. Smart people are useful. I'm sure you'll demonstrate some kind of skill eventually."
"I've never really been good at anything," I reply.
"Then now's your chance to shine," he says, as the rainfall gets even stronger. "I think I've got us into a bit of a spot here," he continues. "I didn't know the weather was going to be so bad. We can't walk home in this, but it's okay, I know where we can go until it passes." There's a flash of lightning, and a couple of seconds later a rumble of thunder can be heard in the distance. "It's a proper storm," Toad says, leading me back out into the rain. "We can't hide under a tree while there's lightning."
"Where are we going?" I shout, barely able to hear my own voice over the sound of the rain.
"There are caves all around here!" he replies, heading to the left and starting to climb up a narrow bank of soil. "I know this place like the back of my hand, and there's nowhere else to go."
"Caves?" I ask, shocked at the idea. As I struggle to follow him, I slip and slide back down the bank; the second time, I manage to climb up and join him, just as another flash of lightning is accompanied by an almost simultaneous rumble of thunder. "That means it's right above us, doesn't it?" I ask, looking up. "When the thunder and the lightning come at the same time, that's a bad sign, right?"
"It's okay," he replies, grabbing my hand and leading me between the trees. "There's not much further to go."
"How long is this going to last?" I shout.
"The storms stick around sometimes," he replies, barely audible over the sound of rain falling all through the forest. "It's because of the mountains. Don't worry. I've seen worse. I just got caught out by how fast the storm reached us."
"Who's worried?" I reply under my breath, even though I'm already soaking wet and terrified.
A couple of minutes later, we reach the foot of a large stone cliff-face, and Toad leads me around to a gaping entrance. As soon as we're under cover, I pull free from his grip and turn to look out at the raging storm. Rain is still pouring down, and thunder continues to rumble up ahead. For a moment, I'm transfixed by the beauty of what I'm seeing. Having grown up in New York, I've never really been out in the wilderness, and although I'm very much aware that the natural world can be destructive, I can't help but stare in wonder as another arc of lightning lights up the darkening sky.
"It's like the end of the world," I mutter, and it's true. Whatever's happening, it's as if everything is getting
worse and worse. I can't shake the feeling that the whole planet seems to be trying to scrub every last human away, and right now it wouldn't be too hard to believe that we're the last living things alive.
"Are you just gonna stand there," Toad asks after a moment, "or are you going to help?"
Turning, I see that he's already got his backpack open, and he's using a small shovel to dig into the ground. I stare for a moment, trying to work out why he'd bother trying to do something so pointless.
"So you just like to watch while other people work, do you?" he asks.
"I'm not like that," I reply, a little annoyed by his tone. "I'm not some kind of New York princess who can't do anything for herself."
"You're not."
"I'm not!"
"But you just said you've got no skills," he replies. "How the hell do you think you're gonna survive long-term if you can't do anything for yourself."
I pause for a moment. "Why are you digging a hole?" I ask eventually.
"I'm not," he says. "I'm creating a small trench so that when I start a fire, air'll be able to get underneath."
"So what do you want me to do?" I ask.
"Fetch some wood."
"From where?"
He glances at me, and for a moment he looks as if he thinks I'm an idiot. "Just grab whatever wood you can find close to the cave entrance."
"It'll all be wet," I point out.
"Don't worry," he says. "Just get whatever you can." Grabbing a small ax from his bag, he slides it toward me. "If necessary, hack some branches down, but hurry. We need to get dry."
Hurrying back out into the rain, I struggle to find anything that might be useful, and eventually I start using the ax to chop pieces off a nearby tree. It's hard work, especially since there's almost too much rain for me to be able to keep my eyes open. The whole thing feels totally hopeless, but after a while I manage to swing the ax a little better, and eventually I've got six fairly decent-sized pieces of wood, and I take them back into the cave. Still, they're soaking wet, and I don't see how they can ever be used to start a fire.
