by V. L. Dreyer
"Oh, so you give us the dangerous mission, while you guys slack off scavenging?" He made an indignant sound, but when I glanced at him, I could see on his face that he was only kidding.
"Hah! You're not getting out of scavenging duty that easily, mister," I told him dryly. "I just think it's best if you two go since you're familiar, and I don't want to cross that damn bridge again."
"Fair enough." He laughed and nodded his agreement. "Of course, honey. Wish me luck."
"Good luck," I replied with a knowing grin. "You're gonna need it."
Michael just sighed dramatically, and rolled his eyes heavenwards.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
It took us less than an hour to find what we were looking for. My mental encyclopaedia was not infallible, but it was generally pretty good. Once our vehicles were safely stowed inside the warehouse, Michael and Hemi departed and I gathered the remaining people around me to hand out duty assignments.
"Okay, guys," I called, vaulting up to stand on the Hilux's bonnet again, so that everyone could see me. "Doc, Anahera, I'd like you on babysitting detail, please. The rest of you, I want you to break up into pairs and head out into the town. We need clothing, footwear, petrol, and any toiletries you can find. Also keep an eye out for fishing gear. If you can find any, that'll help us supplement our food supply as we travel. Skye, can you think of anything else we need?"
"We could use a couple more sharp knives, and another can opener or two," she called back. "And more propane to power the stoves." She paused and glanced at Doc. "Oh, what was it you asked me about the other day?"
"Citrus," Doc supplied, adjusting his spectacles. "Any kind of citrus. I'm slightly concerned about everyone's vitamin C levels with winter coming on, and want to make sure we're getting enough in our diets. Lemons, oranges, grapefruit, anything you can find."
"Speaking of winter," I added once he was done. "Keep an eye out for clean blankets, sleeping bags, and tents. It's not going to be fun being out in the weather without a few conveniences. If you find something and aren't sure if we need it, bring it back anyway. Better safe than sorry. Everyone good?" A chorus of agreement met the question. I smiled and nodded. "Right, let's get to it, then!"
A spontaneous cheer went up from the crowd, for reasons that I couldn't define. It pleased me, though, knowing that people were more or less content with my leadership. One by one, my companions paired off, picked up their weapons, and headed out into the streets of Arapuni. Soon, the only people left were me, Skylar, and the folks that were staying with the youngest kids.
I shot a glance at Anahera and Doc, and gave them a reassuring grin. "I hope you two don't mind being left behind."
"Oh, not at all," Doc answered dryly. "My back is too old to go out there lugging goodness-knows-what around, anyway. I'm more than happy to leave that for you young folk."
Anahera chuckled softly and nodded her agreement. "While I would be more than happy to help, I appreciate that you must consider me as one of the walking wounded today. I shall turn my efforts towards taming these little monsters instead. The good doctor and I can begin training them in the vitals."
Madeline laughed merrily, and the Yousefi boys gave us grins so naughty that the rest of us laughed as well.
"Come on, Skye," I clapped my sister on the shoulder when the levity subsided. "Let's go see what we can find."
Just as I was turning away, a young voice cried out to me. "Wait!"
I turned back, to find Javed rushing after us.
"I want to come," he told me, his face a mixture of anxiety and excitement. "Please?"
"Oh? We're just going foraging." I raised my brows, genuinely curious. It was the first time that any of the boys had shown an interest in the activity around them, including Matt. While the eldest Yousefi boy did as he was told, he never looked pleased about it.
"I know." Javed took a deep breath, and puffed out his chest; it took all of my willpower not to melt into laughter at the sight. "But I'm almost an adult! I want to help. May I please help?"
My barely-hidden amusement vanished in the face of his earnestness. "Well, of course you can, if you want to. Stay close to us, though. Don't go out of our sight, okay? If you see something you want to investigate, tell us."
He grinned, and nodded in agreement. "Yes, ma'am!"
"Well, all righty then." I laughed and led the way out the door and back into the muted sunlight. Heavy clouds still obscured the sky, but the rain had passed for the moment. I glanced back, and watched as Anahera slid the door closed behind us, locking herself and the others safely inside.
"I saw a house back that way that looked pretty much intact," Skylar suggested, pointing deeper into town. "Shall we go check it out?"
"Sounds good." I unslung my shotgun, and moved it around to rest in the crook of my arm. "Lead on, little sis."
Just as he'd promised, Javed stuck to me like glue the entire way. When we reached the front door, he watched with interest as I picked the lock. I beckoned him closer so that I could show him what I was doing. He was a quick study; within a matter of minutes, the door swung open to let us into the dusty interior.
"Why was the door still locked?" Skye asked, coughing and waving her hand in front of her face to chase away the dust. "Surely those two down at the power station scouted this place."
"They have an entire town to themselves," I answered with a shrug. "I guess they just never needed to. Or maybe they did, but locked it up when they left. Check the pantry, we'll know soon enough."
Skye nodded and passed through a doorway into a dusty dining room. I headed towards the back of the house, to check out the other rooms. I felt Javed close behind me as I made my way across the faded carpet, but neither of us said anything. Ever-cautious, I eased myself into a defensive crouch and slowly opened the first door that I came across.
Nothing leapt out at me, except for a few ancient dust bunnies. I waved them away and took a quick look around the room. It wasn't much, just an old storage room, with a bunch of boxes along one wall, and a few pieces of furniture beneath drop-cloths that had long since become obsolete. I heaved a sigh and eased myself back up straight.
"Javed, can you please take a look through those boxes and see if there's anything useful?" I asked, gesturing towards the crates under the window. The boy nodded and hurried off, leaving me to investigate the rest of the house on my own.
At the far end of the hall, I found three closed doors. The first opened into a linen cupboard, and the second into a small bathroom. By the time I reached the third door, my nerves were on edge. Something wasn't right. It wasn't something I could see, though. It was something I could smell. I smelt the pungent odour of decaying meat.
I took a deep breath and braced myself, one hand on the door handle and the other on my gun. Instinct and experience told me that whatever I found wasn't going to be pretty. Still, better I see it than Javed or Skye. I silently counted to three, and then I swung the door open.
The wall of stench that hit me almost made me retch. In retrospect, I was glad that we hadn't taken the time to stop for lunch, so there was no chance of me losing it all over the floor.
"Jesus, what is that?" Skye demanded. I jumped, and shot a startled look over my shoulder.
"Just… stay out of here," I ordered quietly. "I mean it. Please?"
"Yeah, I'm not fighting you on this one." She wrinkled up her nose and vanished into the bathroom instead. I sighed softly and turned back to the opened doorway, staring into the gloom within.
It wouldn't be the first time that either of us had seen a dead body, and it wouldn't be the last. Still, it didn't feel right to subject my little sister to yet another dose of horror when she'd already been through so much, and I definitely wanted to protect Javed. As much as I loathed what I had to do, I put my feelings aside and stepped into the room.
The lights flickered when I touched the greasy switch, but after a moment they steadied. I almost wished they hadn't, as if that could protect me from the
sight of two corpses snuggled in bed together, their flesh almost entirely rotted away. Shrivelled eyeballs stared at me blankly from beneath eyelids that had pulled back due to the natural mummification of age.
I wanted to take another deep breath, but that would only make the stench of putrefaction worse. I pulled my faithful cloth out of my pocket, and tied it over my mouth and nose. The perfume had begun to fade away, but it was enough to at least keep the stench at bay for a couple of minutes while I searched the room.
A few strands of grey hair lay on the pillows, which told me that the couple had been elderly when they died. I stepped around the bed with as much respect as I could, and went over to rifle through their drawers and the wardrobe in the corner. All I came away with was a couple of woollen jerseys that were in fairly decent condition, and a dozen pairs of socks. Everything else was beyond salvaging.
"Sorry," I whispered to the couple as I made my way back to the door, then closed it up tight behind me. Sure, I could have searched more thoroughly and maybe come away with something else, but… it felt wrong. I wanted to leave the elderly couple to their eternal slumber in peace. Still, some part of me thought that they'd like to know that their belongings would help to prolong the human race well beyond their own expiration date.
I found Skylar in the bathroom, digging through a medicine cabinet and tossing assorted jars, bottles, and boxes into the sink beneath it. She glanced up at me, and jerked her head towards a small stack waiting on the floor by the door.
"I've got a few bars of soap, and a tube of toothpaste that's still sealed, plus some assorted medicine for Doc to look through," she told me. "Nothing much in the kitchen besides a few cans of spaghetti. What did you find?"
"Just a couple of jumpers, a few pairs of socks, and some dead people," I answered, tossing my findings down on top of hers. I unslung my backpack and set it down at my feet, then began folding things and stuffing them into the bottom for easy carrying.
"Oh." Skye paused and stared at me, then she shuddered. "Yeah, okay. No wonder you didn't want me going in there."
"Sorry. I know you hate being treated like a baby, but there are some things that I don't want to subject anyone to if I can avoid it." I heaved a long, long sigh, and tried to distract myself with packing the toiletries into my bag. But when I picked up the toothpaste, I paused for a second to look at the label. "Uh, Skye? This isn't toothpaste. It's haemorrhoid cream."
"What?" Skye turned and stared at me, her expression one of total bewilderment. "What's haemorrhoid cream? And how do you spell that?"
"I have no idea how you spell it," I admitted, "but it's cream that's supposed to help when your butt starts bleeding."
"Oh!" she exclaimed. "I had that when I was pregnant. It sucks. I didn't know there was a treatment for it."
"It's probably long past its use-by date, but we'll take it back to Doc anyway." I tossed the box into my backpack, and carried it over to her. "Here, put whatever you want to take back in here. I'm going to go check on Javed."
"Sure," she agreed cheerfully. I patted her on the shoulder and left the room.
I found Javed exactly where I'd left him, except now it looked like a small tornado had gone through the storage room. The boxes had been torn open, and their contents lay scattered across the floor. In the middle of the room, Javed sat cross-legged, staring fixated at something on the ground in front of him.
I stepped carefully over a mound of old photographs, and came up behind him. "Hey, kiddo. What have you got there?"
The youth jumped, and shot a startled look back over his shoulder. Once he recognised me, he relaxed and held something up for my inspection. "I don't know. What is this?"
"It's a train," I answered, kneeling down beside him to get a better look at it. "Not a real one, of course. It's a toy train. I bet it used to belong to a little boy just like you, back before the plague."
"A toy?" he asked softly. "My brother uses that word sometimes. What does it mean?"
My heart just about broke at the look on his face. I eased myself down to sit beside him, and reached out to take the train from him. "A toy is a plaything for kids. Sometimes they're for learning, but mostly they're just for fun. This one is a model train. You see this word here? That's the stamp of the people that made it."
Javed took the train back, and turned it over to inspect the undercarriage. He wrinkled his face up, and slowly read the letters out loud. "Märklin Trains… where's Märklin?"
"It's not a where, it's a what," I explained. "That's the name of the people that made this train, and probably the rest of the train set, too. It's from a place called Germany, which is a country a very, very long way away." I paused, and glanced down at the carriages scattered on the floor. "My dad used to collect these, back when he was still alive."
"Oh." Javed went quiet for a moment, then he gave me a long, thoughtful look. "I'm sorry your dad is dead."
"It's not your fault," I said, reaching out to squeeze his shoulder. "I still have my sister. Just make sure that you take care of your mum and dad while you can, okay?"
"Yeah," he agreed softly. He frowned to himself, then looked at me again. "Some people say it's our fault the plague came. My mum said they were lying, but I don't know. Is it our fault?"
"No," I told him firmly, shaking my head. "It's not your fault. It's not anyone's fault. The plague would have come here one way or another, that's the nature of a plague. You and your family are innocent."
"But then why are my mum and dad alive, and yours are dead?" the little boy asked, looking so crestfallen that for a second I thought he was going to cry. "Maddy told me that her parents died, and Priyanka's, and everyone's, but mine are still alive. Why? Why do I get a family, but no one else does? It's not fair."
"Hey, hey, it's okay." I reached out and put my arms around him, to draw him into a hug. He resisted at first, but once the tears finally broke through he slumped against me. "It's not your fault, Javed. It's just pure chance. Some people have this immunity, and some people don't. You were just lucky enough to have two parents who are immune, which is why you guys are immune."
"Then why did my sister die?" the boy demanded, rubbing his cheeks as though to banish the tears, but they were insistent. "God punished us for bringing the plague."
"Your sister?" I froze and stared at him. "You had a sister?"
"Yeah—well, sort of." He sighed deeply and shrugged. "When Mum had Ommie, there were two babies inside her – twins, I think it's called. One boy and one girl. Ommie came out first, but when our sister came, she… she wasn't right. She didn't cry. Mum and Dad told me that she was born dead, but she wasn't. I saw her. She was alive, but there was something wrong with her. Mum cried for days and days, then she made us pack up and move on. When we left, she didn't bring our sister with us."
"Oh, God," I breathed, shocked by the story. "So it's true… Oh, my God, it's true…"
"What's true?" he asked innocently, looking up at me.
"Nothing." I took a deep breath to steady myself, and wiped my eyes with the back of my hand. "God isn't punishing you, Javed. It's not your fault that this happened. Promise. I'll tell you what, I'll make you the same deal that I made Priya. If you want, you can bring the train with us, but if we end up walking, then you'll have to either carry it yourself or leave it behind. How does that sound?"
"I can have it?" He stared at me wide-eyed, all thoughts of dead families forgotten. "This train? I'm allowed to have a toy?"
"I don't see why not." I summoned a smile for him, doing my best to shove aside the disturbing topic as well. "I do have to put in a clause for your mother's sake, though. You have to share it with your brothers, okay?"
"Okay!" Javed's expression lit up. Suddenly, he leapt to his feet and rushed around gathering up the pieces of the train set so that he could shove them back into the box they'd come from. I smiled as I watched him, right up until I heard Skylar whoop in delight from the back of the house. Her words were some of my favourite words
ever, words that would never lose their potency even after a decade of living in the ruins of our old world.
"Yes! Yes! I found toilet paper!"
"Woohoo!" I cheered, throwing my hands up in the air. Javed shot a bewildered glance at me, but didn't seem to care either way. "Well, I guess that's a girl thing, then."
"What is?" Skye asked, trundling into the room with my backpack over her shoulder, and the sealed package of toilet paper under her arm. It was so old that the plastic wrapping had faded to clear, but the paper itself looked fine.
"The toilet paper thing," I explained, gesturing at Javed. "Kid's more interested in his train set."
"Oh!" She laughed merrily. "Yeah, definitely a girl thing. Boys can be so gross sometimes."
"They sure can." I chuckled as well, and gave her a quizzical look. "Are we all done here, then?"
"I think so," she answered. She shrugged off my backpack and handed it to me, and I put it on my shoulders. By the time we were done, Javed had joined us, watching expectantly with the faded train set clutched against his chest.
"Let's head off, then," I suggested. I took point and led the way down the hall, out of the front door, and across the overgrown lawn towards the street. Along the way, I paused to check the mailbox; I'd found more than a few little treasures in them over the years. Sure, it was mostly just stacks of old bills and irrelevant junk mail, but every now and then you struck gold. As it turned out, today it was the latter.
"Hey, what have you got?" Skye asked curiously as I pulled the package out of the mailbox.
"Not sure, but it can't hurt to look," I answered. I turned the package over, and examined the label to try and work out who the sender was, but it was illegible. Skye and Javed came up behind me to watch as I tore open the package.
"Honey?" Skylar shot a bewildered glance at me. "Why would someone have mailed these people honey?"
"It was a thing, back in the day," I answered, excitement rising in my breast to replace the darker thoughts. "Mail-order honey. That means this'll be the good quality stuff. Oh man, Doc's going to be thrilled."
