Deserted
A novel by
L.M. McCleary
Copyright ©2015 L.M. McCleary
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All Rights Reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
Table of Contents
Journal Entry # 1
Journal Entry # 2
Journal Entry # 3
Journal Entry # 4
Journal Entry # 5
Journal Entry # 6
Journal Entry # 7
Journal Entry # 8
Journal Entry # 9
Journal Entry # 10
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Journal Entry #1,
The sun beat down harshly, causing my already cracked and dry lips to beg even harder for hydration. But I couldn’t drink just yet. My supplies were low – much too low – and I couldn’t justify using more every time my mouth was sore. Besides, I just left the only piece of civilization behind me; there would be no scavenging on this trip.
Or so I thought. Thinking of it as nothing more than a mirage on the horizon, a shadow appeared ahead, its image wavering in the heat. I barely paid attention to it; I just wanted to sleep the day away at this point, to force my hunger and thirst from my mind for a while. My horse, however, continued on relentlessly, as he always had. His head swung low and his gait was jagged as his hooves dragged through the sand around us – yet he did not stop. I don’t believe he has at all since we left. I patted his neck gently, rubbing the small, smooth hairs that ran across his skin. Specks of sand stuck to my fingers from the gesture; Ponika was covered in a fine layer of it. I started to dust him down, hoping I could keep my mind preoccupied.
The next time I looked up, however, I knew it was no mirage ahead. The dark silhouette of a town had appeared through the blowing winds, although the buildings didn’t look quite right.
“A town, Ponika?” I said to my horse as I straightened my back to peer over his head. “I thought we were the only ones? Please don’t tell me we went around in a circle…” I groaned. That would be just my luck.
We continued on towards it, the vision of the town spreading out before me like open arms. Something was definitely wrong, though; its silhouette only grew darker as we neared. It wasn’t my hometown; I could see that now, and what a relief that was. A smile passed my lips in spite of the sudden eeriness, and I decided to nickname the town ‘Salvation’, as we would most certainly be able to restock here.
Or so I thought.
“What in the hell…?” I mumbled, staring at the decrepit buildings that now stood a few small feet away.
It wasn’t the silhouette I had seen; it was the buildings themselves, charred black by some long-lost fire. Their foundations were crumpled in upon themselves, with stray beams and furniture sprawled across the remains of a stony trail. A few stray doors still stood intact in their frames, the wind blowing them gently against what remained of a staircase in one house, or a busted dresser in another. Everything I saw was a deep black and covered in soot, their ashes blowing into the wind and spiraling around me in its escape. So much for salvaging.
“Just what do you think happened here, boy?” I slid off my horse’s back, leaving a reassuring hand upon him as I gazed at the ruins of a town I never knew existed.
It was much larger than my own hometown, with rows of houses and the hint of a cobblestone street lying deep beneath the sand. A broken beam lay at my feet, and with a small kick of my foot its front end crumbled into dust. “This must have happened a long time ago…” I thought aloud, “…otherwise that surely would have been touched and disintegrated before we came along.” Ponika, of course, ignored me but that didn’t stop me from continuing. “Of course it happened a long time ago, Ponika. The Reckoning destroyed everything. Although I never heard of it starting fires…”
Just what had happened here? Did the Reckoning really cause all this? Honestly, I have no idea; it all took place before I was born and no one would talk about it.
“Probably because they know just as little as I do.” I muttered.
I hadn’t believed that as a child, but it became obvious as I got older that my parents weren’t just hiding something; no, they were completely oblivious. Even if they wanted to, I doubt there would be anything they could tell me.
“God’s punishment for our sins, Ponika.” I mocked the voices of my old neighbours, a preachy couple who spent most of their time locked up indoors. The only time they spoke was to shame us, as if they were somehow excluded from the Apocalypse Club. “I wonder how true that really is?” I guess it was possible. But what do I know?
Movement from my horse jolted me out of my thoughts. He was prancing beside me and before I could utter a sound he took off down the path, farther into Salvation. I stood there momentarily in shock before calling after him. Using up what little energy I still had, I followed him and ended up in what must have once been a Town Square. There was an empty fountain in the centre and grass dotted the cobblestone around it. Houses circled the area, opening up into different pa--- wait a minute, grass?
Ponika was already there, eating what remained of the yellowed flora. Most of it was long-dead, its leaves brown and mushy underfoot. But there was enough decaying ones to feed my horse, and I was at least thankful for that, although a little confused.
“So…I guess it does exist.” I sat down on the edge of the fountain and watched my horse, thinking of the stories my father used to tell me about the world before. A world full of water and trees, birds singing overhead and fields full of flowers; he used to paint the most amazing pictures of it all. I never thought there’d come a day when I would actually see such a thing for myself.
“Dad…where are you now?” I kicked at the sand, my heart heavy with the thought of him. I was already exhausted; I didn’t need to feel depressed, too.
The wind had slowed in its onslaught, its sound almost a distant memory. With it having blazed in my ear for so long, I was surprised that I heard it – water. I looked around me with a frantic sweep of my arms, feeling for a wet spot upon the hot stone until I found a crack in its foundation; a crack that zig-zagged towards the earth and spilled out small speckles of water onto the yellowing grass at its side. Without hesitation I grabbed my near-empty canister from my hiking pack and held it out beneath the drip, watching the slow but hopeful process as it trickled its way inside. It would take hours, but I didn’t care; we needed it.
I slid my way down the side of the fountain and plopped into the sand, holding my canister steady beneath the falling water. I rested my head against the stone foundation and rested my eye on Ponika, who happily darted from one withering green to the next. I hadn’t expected this trip to take so long and the toll it was taking on my only friend had hurt. I wouldn’t have gotten this far without him, sure, but this wasn’t his journey to make. Did I really have to involve him? In the end, I think I was just more afraid of losing him, too. That’s why I brought him along; I couldn’t handle this trip alone.
With the sun’s rays now gentle on my skin in the slight shade, I closed my eyes and the image of home immediately jumped into my mind. I tried to squint away the thought, but I knew there would be little fighting it here. This fountain, this Square - even the cobblestone – was exactly like the one from my hometown. The local hangout spot; Kay and I spent a lot of our
time there.
Kay and I had spent most of our days sitting at the fountain, checking out the books my dad had managed to nab for us from the library. I got him into books, I think, as I can vaguely recall a time when he had no interest in them. I guess that’s why he was so drawn to me over the years; no one else in town really cared about stories. The girls would rather gossip than read and the boys only cared about roughhousing and women. Kay and I were much too involved in fantasy worlds and history to really care about anything else and we would get lost in our imaginations or the painted worlds that our books opened up for us instead.
I remember one story lent to us that we tried to read at the fountain. It was an informational book about oceans and all these great critters that lived within it. The book was in worse condition than any other, though…half the pages were gone and more were falling out! It left us frustrated and wanting more.
“Imagine if we had an entire ocean in this fountain! How incredible would that be!” Kay had exclaimed.
I smiled at his enthusiasm but I was a more grounded girl, just like my mother. “I don’t know much about oceans, Kay, but it sounds like it wouldn’t fit in our dinky little fountain.”
“But what if it could?” He would always grin wildly at me while encouraging my imagination.
“Then we’d never go thirsty again!” I laughed. “Can you imagine a whale swimming about? They sound so huge!”
“I’d love to see one someday; I doubt they’re as big as the book says.”
I could only shake my head at him; we had had this kind of conversation before. “How do you expect to find one? Good luck.”
Kay shrugged. “Who knows? Maybe there’s one out in the wasteland somewhere? You never know what could be out there!”
“The great, elusive desert whale?” We both laughed.
“You never know though…” he said softly as our laughter faded, staring down at the crumpled book in his hands, “There could be a beautiful world out there…full of colour; full of life. With whales, and horses…” he beamed at me; his smile was contagious, “…and birds and trees. There could be someplace so much better than this.”
I nodded. “It would be so wonderful…”
“We should go find it! Let’s go there together.” He fumbled with the book as I looked over at him. “I, uh, don’t mean now or anything…but someday?” He stammered his words out, speaking almost nervously, “would you go there with me?”
“Of course I would.” I looked at him fondly, “once we’re eighteen, we should go find it.”
“Definitely. It could be our own private world…our place.” He smiled softly at me then; he did that a lot during his last days, too. I never thought I would miss a simple gesture so much.
I awoke with a start, swirling my head around in a panic before I realized what had grazed my arm; it was my horse, nudging me lightly with his nose as he attempted to gather water between the falling droplets and my canister. I patted his head with a smile.
“Thirsty, huh?” I slid up from my position. “Of course you are; you’ve worked so hard since we left.” I had barely gotten to my feet when Ponika moved in, his back end forcing me farther from my position next to the fountain. I couldn’t help but laugh. “Alright, take what you need, buddy. I think it’s about time I took a look around anyway.”
Ponika huffed in response as I looked around the Square, deciding my next course of action. There were multiple paths, of course, but most appeared to be obscured by debris and rotten buildings. Only one direction seemed possible to journey down, and so I headed north.
The path I had wandered down appeared empty and the line between houses seemed to become larger as I journeyed on, eventually opening up completely to the wild desert. My eyes rested lazily on the sweeping sand in the distance as I noticed a slight ache ripple across the insides of my stomach. I had assumed it was from hunger, although it was not a hunger pain I had ever experienced before. I rested my hand on my stomach and rubbed it gently, knowing how futile the action was but briefly remembering a time when my mother did the same for me as a child. It was a comforting feeling and that was enough for me. I made my way towards a home to my right, standing rather sturdy in the crumbling remains of Salvation. As I neared it, however, I scrunched my nose up instinctively and exhaled sharply; a strange, acrid stench was in the air and it singed the inside of my nose. As the scarred yet still standing door of the house was within my grasp I started to realize just how upset my stomach seemed to be. What was once a slight gurgle had erupted into a roar, making my mouth feel dry and my head had started to spin. I felt something bubble up in the back of my throat and I fought to keep it back. I stumbled away from the home and back towards my horse, hoping that water would help assuage my sickness. I should have stopped to rest before exploring, I supposed. It was strange, though; by the time I reached Ponika, I felt almost completely better. How could nausea just dissipate that easily? I sat precariously on the stone fountain, my sickness dulled to a slight throbbing and it continued to lessen as the minutes ticked by. I focused my gaze on a speck of dirt on the ground before me as I waited out the churning feeling in my stomach, taking slight gasps of breath as I rubbed my belly and willed the entire ache away. A sudden nudge at my arm showed Ponika’s concern and I leaned against his muzzle, my eyes drowsily blinking in the sand that swirled up around us in sudden bursts of wind.
As I gradually recovered, a sickened thought crossed my mind. “…something in the air?” Could there be an airborne sickness permeating the town? Is that why it’s abandoned?
My stomach dropped at the thought and I suddenly felt like the whole town was against me – like I had to get out, fast. I ended up not really having a choice in the matter. The wind had kicked up considerably as I rested – dangerously so. Its sound was almost deafening now and I struggled to tie my bandana around my face in the wind’s onslaught. As I brought myself to my feet I glanced casually towards the entrance to Salvation and realized I could no longer see it. Sand obscured my vision of the path and only small specks of the blackened buildings could be seen between bouts of the voracious wind that was ripping through the town. This wasn’t an ordinary wind; it was a sandstorm coming in, and coming in fast.
I hopped onto Ponika’s back, much to his distaste, and prodded him onwards as fast as my legs could kick. My fingers wrapped around his mane in a tight entanglement, my lips pursed as I hoped to outrun the storm that now seemed to be giving chase. I wasn’t about to get caught in that thing; fairy tale or not, I wasn’t planning on finding out what truly lay inside them today.
Ponika and I continued on, past more and more dilapidated homes that looked even less sturdy than the houses I had already travelled past. My horse drudged drearily onwards, still tired from the days of work I had put him through. I constantly peered over my shoulder at the thick swirling sands that had already engulfed most of Salvation. My breath caught in my throat as the wind raced towards us, the town seeming to cease to exist as the storm took over. I may have enjoyed the view of a sandy vortex from afar back home but being lost in one put me on edge; who knows what could appear in the cover of a storm? I tried to charge forward even faster but was met with resistance from Ponika, who shook his head in apparent anger at my goading. I patted his neck and whispered into his ear as we continued on. I felt for him, I truly did; we had to rest soon but a sandstorm was no place to do it in.
“Sorry boy…we’ll stop soon, I promise.” I had hugged him briefly as I remembered the multiple times I had said that to him before.
I glanced around again, my stomach still churning at the thought of being exposed in the vortex…until I saw hope in a cliff face on my right; what appeared to be an abandoned mine. Summoning the last of my energy I bolted towards it, calling Ponika after me as I went. The winds were swirling into my eyes and nose now and I struggled to keep my bandana in place as I urged my horse onwards; he was charging after me now but he limped slightly in his gallop and I could hear his breath
heavy on the wind. Even through his exhaustion he must have seen the same hope that I did in that dark earthen entrance before us. As soon as I found myself under the small wooden awning of the mineshaft I collapsed on the cold dirt floor, landing inside just as the storm overtook the total of Salvation. We reached the mine with nary seconds to spare and the wind seemed to howl in defeat. We made it; we were safe, and for the first time on our journey we were protected from the elements for the night. The winds danced sand and dirt around my face as I lay for a moment inside the mine’s entrance but I didn’t care at the time; all I wanted was rest. I eventually had hauled myself up and made myself comfortable on a spot where the sands and the earth intermingled beneath me. Ponika had immediately sat himself down opposite me and watched the sands with a steady gaze for a few moments before he lowered his head to the ground and finally slept. I wanted to join him, but my heart was still racing and the storm whisked by our sides; we may have been safe now, but who knows for how long? What if something in the winds…found us?
I sighed and stared with an aimless ambition at the wall across from me, my eyes following the cracks and jutting earth that ran along its face. It was broken, yet sturdy; Ponika leaned against it as he slept and the wall behind me was stiff against my head. We would be protected in here for sure and I tried to focus my thoughts on that; it had been a long time since I could sleep without sand resting in every orifice when I woke. My heart calmed as the minutes ticked past. The blowing storm was screaming outside but nothing came for us, nothing attacked us or moved within it. Perhaps it really is all a fairy tale. My eyes rested on my horse, watching his chest rise and fall with each deep breath he made. He was sleeping so peacefully and I couldn’t help but be somewhat jealous.
“Once Ponika is done…”I mumbled to myself. He always watched over me; the least I could do is the same for him.
It was a long time before I remembered my journal. I had to rummage through my backpack for a few minutes to find it, but when I did I grew excited; I had never written in a book before – now was the perfect chance! I never had much to write about back home, but at least now I can keep track of my progress. I held the unopened book in my lap for a while, running my fingers across its hard surface. The kids I grew up with had never seen a book before, let alone own one. My family was the only one that seemed to cherish what little pages they had left from the Reckoning.
Deserted Page 1
