by Cross, Amy
I stare at him. To be honest, I want to just get away from his as fast as possible, but at the same time he seems friendly enough and I don't feel like I have the energy to run. There's even a part of me that worries I might have started hallucinating; maybe I'm just standing here alone, talking to thin air?
"You're scared," he says after a moment. "That's okay. I understand. I'm scared too. Only a fucking madman wouldn't be scared at a time like this. Planes falling from the sky, dead bodies piling up. Everything's so calm and quiet. I've been walking around for a couple of days, and I swear to God, this place is fucking creepy. I mean, it was creepy before, but now it's off the scale, you know what I mean?" He turns and looks into the distance. "There's supposed to be people in a place like this," he says eventually. "New York's supposed to be full to the brim with people bustling and hurrying all over the place, but..." He glances back at me. "I just saw some people. A bunch of them, heading over the bridge. Looked like they were heading out of town. Maybe they're the smart ones. I think I'm gonna get out of here myself. I guess I should have run and caught them and maybe gone their way, but I waited too long and now it's too late. Still, I've got legs. I can get out under my own steam. Too many rats around these parts for my liking. I fucking hate rats."
"Me too," I reply, looking over at a nearby doorway and seeing a couple of rats scurrying along the sidewalk. "They're everywhere."
"I don't blame them," the guy says. "If I was a rat, I'd be doing the same thing. This is perfect for them, if you think about it. New York's always been full of garbage, but now they don't even have to contend with humans. I swear, this is gonna be a city of rats before too long. I wouldn't be surprised if they start organizing into little communities, walking on their back legs, and chatting shit." He smiles. "That's a joke, but stranger things have happened. Speaking of which, have you been down into the subway lately?"
I shake my head.
"Don't," he replies. "Just... don't. That's my advice to you. It's not nice down there, There's a lot of dead folk, all piled up everywhere. The rats have found them, of course. Some of those little bastards are getting so big and fat, I started to think they could take me down." He smiles. "My name's George Crow. Do you mind if I ask your name?"
"Elizabeth," I tell him. "Elizabeth Marter."
"Elizabeth, huh?" He laughs. "From the Hebrew, meaning God's daughter or God's promise. Nice name. Not as nice as George Crow, but nice enough. George is a Greek name, referring to a farmer." He pauses. "You've gotta pay attention to names, Elizabeth Marter. They have meanings. It might just seem like a superstition, but there's more to it. A person grows into their name, whether they like it or not."
I smile politely, figuring that this guy is perhaps a little crazy in the head.
"Well, Elizabeth Marter, daughter of God," he says after a moment, "I think I'm gonna get on my way. I've got a long way to go, even if I don't entirely know the right direction, but I'd like to leave something with you, if that's okay?" He reaches into his blazer pocket and pulls out a black feather, which he holds out to me. "Take it," he continues. "It's for you." He waits for me to say something. "Go on, take it."
"Why?" I ask.
"Why not?"
"I don't..." I stare at the feather, and I can't shake the feeling that it's something I shouldn't accept. In fact, the more I look at it, the more I feel as if something terrible would happen if I even touched the damn thing. "I don't want it," I tell him eventually.
"It's just a feather."
"Thanks, but... It's yours. You keep it."
He sighs, before putting the feather back into his pocket. "Well," he says, clearly a little put out by my refusal to take the gift. "I know better than to argue with a lady. You don't want the feather, you don't want the feather. I'll just hang onto it, in case it's needed some other time. I hope you manage to get by, Elizabeth Marter. If you want my advice, don't stay in the city too long. Get out of here. Head somewhere else. Sooner rather than later, those rats are gonna get so big, they'll be able to bust down doors." He turns and starts walking away. "Maybe you should head west," he calls back to me. "You never know, you might meet someone interesting! A lot of good things have come out of folks heading west!"
I watch as he walks away. There was something slightly creepy about that guy; he had an expression that made me feel as if he thought he was somehow better than me, or that he thought he knew something special. With my heart racing, I stand and watch until he disappears into the distance, and then I turn and carry on walking back toward my building. There was something pretty weird about the way that guy tried to give me a feather, but I guess there are some pretty weird people around. As I walk, I keep glancing over my shoulder; I almost expect to find George Crow following me, but he's nowhere to be seen. I guess he and his feather have got somewhere else to be.
Eventually I reach the street where I live, and I spot my building a few hundred feet away. I make my way carefully to the corner, and finally I glance through the front window and into the lobby. Sure enough, I spot Henry, sitting at his post with his rifle slung over his shoulder. He looks as if he's taking is guard role very seriously, and it's almost like he doesn't care that I've gone. I guess, to him, I'm still a traitor thanks to my decision to help Mallory get away. I wish I could run through the door and shake him until he comes to his senses, but I know that wouldn't work. I need to be smarter and more careful, so I hurry around the back of the building and manage to slip through into the yard that links the service entrance to the rear of the nearby hotel.
Although I still don't have a plan, I know I can't just hang about in the city and wait for an idea to pop into my head. I figure I'll come up with something, eventually; all I need to do is get to Henry and talk to him when Bob's not around. He's my brother, after all, so I'm certain I can find a way to make him see reason. Making my way quickly across the yard, I try the back door, but it's locked. The same goes for all the windows, and I suddenly realize that even the first step - getting inside the building - is going to be difficult. Stepping back, I look up at the windows on the side of the building, and I see that they're all closed. I try to think of some other way in, of some route that Henry and Bob might not have remembered, but I can't think of anything. Frankly, I'm not sure how -
Suddenly a hand grabs my face, pulling me back as another hand grips me firmly around the waist.
"What a surprise," Bob hisses into my ear. "You came slinking back, just like a rat." I feel a jolt deep in the base of my neck, and everything goes black.
Chapter Eight
Oklahoma
"At least the bleeding's stopped," Clyde says, as he wipes his hands clean. "I don't know how much he lost, but..." He glances back over at Joe, who's unconscious on the kitchen table. "The fact that the blood's stopped means that his body's started to heal. I guess that means he's fighting back, and he's stable. That's something."
"Stable's good, right?" I say. "Stable means he's gonna get better?"
"I guess it means he's not getting worse," he replies. "I don't know. He lost a lot of blood. A hell of a lot. I don't know how the body recovers from something like that. And the wound... He needs proper medical attention. Anything we do for him is just patching him up. We need to get him to a doctor. I mean, only a doctor can really work out what the hell needs to be done with an injury like that. If you look at how big it is, I reckon one of his lungs has to have been damaged."
"Then we've got to find people," I say. "We need to get him to somewhere where there's lots of people. We need to go to a city."
"Tulsa's closest," Clyde says. "I guess it's more likely that we'll find a doctor there than anywhere. One thing's for certain, though. There's no way we can just stick him back together and expect him to recover. The guy's gonna get an infection. You saw the size of that wound, and to be honest, the towel wasn't exactly sterile. Nothing about this whole place is sterile. I wouldn't even want to clean a paper-cut on that table."
I look down at Joe's
bloodied torso. "If we don't try to help him," I say quietly, "he'll die."
"There's gotta be a truck," Clyde says. "Somewhere in this whole town, there has got to be a truck tucked away somewhere. I saw people with trucks. There was a guy who used to transport stuff between towns, and there was a guy who had a couple of fields nearby. You can't tell me that they don't have trucks. We just need to get better at looking. We need to go through garages and gardens until we find something, and then we need to get them started."
"Joe was the one who knew how to hot-wire the ignition," I point out.
"Then we'll practice on other vehicles," he continues. "We can't sit around waiting for someone else to help us. We need to get on with it, and if that means learning a few new tricks, then I guess that's just what we'll have to do. You can't seriously think that it's beyond the pair of us to steal a fucking truck from somewhere."
I nod, realizing he's right.
"You know..." He pauses, as if he's reluctant to get the words out. "I don't mean to be down on things, and I don't mean to scare you, but I think you need to prepare yourself for the possibility that not everything is gonna work out."
I stare at him for a moment. "What do you mean?"
"I mean... We're gonna try to get your brother to some place where he can get helped, but the odds of that working are... You know what I mean, right?"
"No," I say firmly, "I don't know what you mean. Why don't you come out and say it?"
He sighs. "Just accept that the odds are stacked against us, okay? He's lost a lot of blood, and an injury like that would be difficult to fix at the best of times -"
"He's gonna make it!" I say, raising my voice a little.
"But if he doesn't," Clyde continues. "I mean, like I said, he's lost so much blood, and that's not good. We'll do our best, but I think it's gonna be tough, okay? I think we need to be realistic."
Walking over to Joe, I stare down at his face and see that there seems to be a flickering movement under his closed eyelids. "Can he hear us?" I ask.
"No idea," Clyde replies, heading over to the door. "Like I said, I don't have any medical training. I guess it's good that he's stopped bleeding, and I suppose the fact that he seems to be sleeping might be promising. Might be, but again, my medical knowledge comes from TV shows. Other than that, your guess is as good as mine. The only thing I know for certain is that we need to get him to a doctor, so let's focus on that, okay? I'm gonna head out and look for a truck. I'll be back soon, okay?"
Once he's gone, I realize I have no idea what to do. Joe's wound still looks deep and bloody, and I figure it should probably be cleaned; at the same time, I have no idea how to do something like that, so I figure I need to leave it alone, in case it starts bleeding again. Reaching out, I feel his forehead and check for a temperature; nothing so far, but I need to keep an eye on him in case he gets some kind of infection. It's not much, but I feel like I have to do something. I've lost both my parents in the past few days, and I can't lose my brother as well.
For the next couple of hours, I try to keep busy. Although I check on Joe regularly, I manage to spend some time out in the street, attempting to learn how to hot-wire a car. While the truck is still broken, Joe reckoned the engine wasn't the problem, so I remove the bodywork under the steering wheel and finally I find the various wires that run to the ignition. I'm not sure I feel confident enough to start ripping them out yet, but eventually I identify two wires that I think might be the ones I need to try. I guess all I need now is to find another vehicle, perhaps a small car, so I can practice.
Sitting up on the driver's seat, I look out the window and spot Clyde heading back this way. I'm about to get out and see if he had any luck, when I narrow my eyes and see that I was wrong: it's not Clyde. It's another, older guy, and he's walking in a kind of slow, jerky manner. Instantly tensing up, I get out of the truck and take a few steps toward him, and that's when I see it: his face has that same green and gray color that I saw on the cop who crawled to our house yesterday. He's walking slowly in my direction, and I take a few steps back, determined to keep a safe distance.
"What do you want?" I ask, glancing over my shoulder to make sure that there's no-one else nearby.
"Ride out of here," he says, his voice sounding rough. "I need a ride out of here."
"You're sick," I say.
"Who's sick?"
"You're sick," I say again. "I can see it."
"I'm not sick. I'm tired, but I'm not sick." He smiles. "I've seen you before, haven't I?"
I shake my head, moving carefully around the truck in order to make sure I keep out of his reach.
"Yeah," the guy continues, "you were in... Tokyo, right? No, that can't be right. London. Bristol. Paris... It's so confusing. Where are we now?" He pauses for a moment, wobbling slightly as he holds the side of the truck. "Oh, yeah, that's right. You set me on fire."
"I don't know what the hell you're talking about," I say, preparing to run inside.
"Yeah, you do," he says. "I was on the ground, and you poured petrol on me and light a match. Let me tell you something, kid, that was quite an experience. I was still getting used to it all. I'm still not quite there yet, but..." He holds up one of his hands and wriggles his fingers. "Even the small things are hard to re-learn, but I'm getting there slowly. I've even learned how to coordinate the others and run them on a kind of auto-pilot. That's impressive, isn't it?"
"I..." I stare at him, and then I turn and run into the house, pushing the door shut as I go and securing the lock. My heart's pounding and I can hear the guy shuffling around outside. After a moment, I hear a knock on the window.
"You don't wanna come out with me?" the guy shouts. "I think we need to talk!"
I draw the curtains, so that at least the guy can't see me. Heading over to Joe, I look down and see that he's still unconscious. There's no way I can move him, not right now, but at the same time I don't see how we can stay here. The guy could easily break the window, and the only thing I can use to defend myself with right now is one of the knives over by the sink.
"Come on!" the guy shouts, pounding on the glass. "Don't make me force my way in there, kid! Be reasonable. After all, you set fire to me, remember? I'm the one who should be kinda nervous in this situation. Why don't you come out here and hear what I've got to say?"
I stand completely still and listen to the sound of the guy still banging on the window.
"You like setting fire to people, don't you?" he calls out. "I was in the house when you torched the place. Whose body was that, anyway? It's hard to tell, especially when you don't have time to get to a mirror. I got to the door just as you and your brother drove off into the sunset. Is that what you're gonna do this time? You gonna burn me again? I'll just keep coming, so you might as well open the door and talk to me alike an adult."
Hurrying over to the back door, I pull it open and see that there's a small yard to the rear of the building. Just as I'm considering carrying Joe out this way, however, I spot movement over by the gate; seconds later, two more figures appear, one male and one female, and they've both got the same deathly pallor about their faces.
"I've got reinforcements!" the guy calls from the front of the house. "I can see through their eyes!"
"I can move through their bodies," the second guy suddenly says.
"I can talk through their mouths," the woman adds. "Does that freak you out?"
Slamming the door shut, I make sure it's locked before going back over to check on Joe. He seems to be the same as before; my hands are shaking as I realize there's no way I can move him.
"It doesn't matter what you do," the first guy calls out through the window. "You can run, you can hide, you can do absolutely anything. Whatever. I've got strength in numbers, and I'm coming for you. I always knew I wouldn't be able to execute a perfect kill rate, so I anticipated a little mopping up in the aftermath. Just a few thousand odd souls to extinguish before I reach the point of total biological saturation. Don't worry, th
ough. I can make it nice and quick. In one way, you're one of the lucky ones. Then again, in other ways, you're not."
The back door starts to rattle, as the two figures in the yard start trying to get inside.
"There were nearly seven billion people on the planet when this started," the first guy says. "I reckon maybe a few hundred survived. Out of the rest, about half were wasted in the first couple of days while I was still working out how to do all this. Still, that leaves me with, what, about three and a half billion bodies at my disposal? You think you can set us all on fire, kid? Why don't you just accept the inevitable?" He starts banging harder on the window. "Come on, let us in. Don't make us do this the hard way!"
Hurrying to the other side of the kitchen, I start gathering together the biggest knives.
"You're stubborn," the first guy continues. "Let's try a different approach. What's your name?" He waits for me to answer. "Okay, my name's Joseph. We're all Joseph now. It's a long story, but I've been working up to this point for years. The main thing you need to know is, anyone who's not Joseph, is no longer welcome. So why not open up and let's get this done, huh?" There's another pause, and suddenly the window smashes. I see the guy's arm start to reach inside, so I run over and plunge one of the knives into his shoulder.
"No pain," he continues. "That's good. I was wondering how that'd work, although..." He pulls the arm back outside. "You've damaged a tendon or two. On a purely mechanical level, you've done a bit of a number on me, that's for sure. Still, there's plenty more where that came from." He reaches the other arm inside. "Is this what you want, kid? You want to spend your final moments fighting? Why not just accept your fate? I promise I'll make it painless. If you keep fighting, though, I might let things get a little ugly. After all, you set fire to me, so why shouldn't I do the same to you?"
I step back as he starts trying to climb through the window. Taking a deep breath, I rush forward and push one of the knives straight through the top of his head. He wobbles for a moment, and I take the opportunity to push him back outside.
