Manitoba Lost (Book 1): Run (Survivors #1)

by R. A. Rock

  That’s how my mom was. Someone else might have yelled at me to clean up the mess and stop crying like a baby. Not my mom. She understood how much I had put into that cake and how it had killed me to see all that effort and energy gone to waste by my own mistake.

  But she hadn’t berated me or offered advice. She had simply helped me try again when I was ready. That’s how she had been all my life. And I loved her for it.

  Some grown up kids didn’t like spending time around their parents but not me. I loved hanging out with my mom. She always made me feel accepted. Completely.

  And the thought of losing her made me sick to my stomach. I had to get out there. I had to.

  Even if I had to walk.

  I got home and went to the spare bedroom where I had stored all my guiding equipment for the time being.

  The house was so much the same as when I had lived here as a child that sometimes I found it a little disorienting — as if by walking through the door, I had somehow travelled back in time.

  Same dizzying red and white patterned wall paper that my mother had kept spotless all my life. Same threadbare red carpet that my parents had never felt the need to change.

  The place smelled of the lemon cleanser my mother used and behind that smell my nose — sensitized by years in the bush — could pick up an odor of decay, as if the house itself were rotting — though it was only about fifty or maybe sixty years old.

  Since my parents had it paid off, they had decided to keep it in case I wanted to live in it someday. They had definitely been hoping I would someday return from the west coast because they had no desire to move out there.

  Instead, they had moved to the lake and they had rented our house for a while to a nice young couple that was up here on their big northern adventure.

  I snorted at the thought.

  But then the southerners had returned home, like they all do and it had sat empty since then. I only used the place once in a while when I was in town. My parents had occasionally stayed here if the weather was bad and they didn’t want to drive home to the lake.

  Opening the closet, I pulled out the big backpack that I had taken to Europe the year after I finished high school.

  That trip had been one long attempt at erasing Nessa from my mind and heart. At the time, I thought it was simply a matter of putting enough distance between us. Oh and women. I had tried erasing her by sleeping with a lot of French women. And Italian women. And I think there had been a Swedish woman in there, too. I’m not quite sure. That time is a little hazy in my memory.

  I did remember that there had been a lot of wine involved in the erasing attempt.

  Obviously, it hadn’t worked.

  I had a smaller pack that I used when I was guiding because lately I had only been doing three-day trips and we had supplies left in a cache partway along our route so that we didn’t have to carry everything on our backs. So, I hadn’t used this backpack in a long time.

  But it was time to put it into use again. I began pulling equipment and supplies out of the bins they were neatly stored in, sorting through what was essential and what was too damn heavy to bring with me.

  After a couple hours, I had filled the bag with what I felt was the most important of equipment. I had a sleeping bag and a wool blanket that would keep me warm no matter what. I had a couple changes of clothes, plenty of extra socks, and my tooth brush and tooth paste.

  I attached my tent to the outside, strapping it to the bottom of the bag. Then, I hung a pot from one of the hooks on the outside of the pack, and put in a metal plate, bowl, and cup — along with a spoon and fork. A small, thin cutting board also made it in as well as my 1L water purification unit. It didn’t purify much water but it worked quickly and didn’t take up much space.

  I brought with me the usual trail foods, like energy bars, nuts and seeds, dried fruit, and a bunch of jerky that I had made when a client had bagged a moose and hadn’t wanted all the meat. He had given moose meat to anyone at the lodge who wanted and I had taken a bunch and smoked it. I also put in whatever I could take that was left in the fridge. And finding some freeze dried food with the camping supplies, I threw that in, too.

  I always carried a good sharp knife, which doubled as a fire starter. It had a flint that you struck with the back of the knife to produce sparks, which tucked into the handle when not in use. I slid it into the long pocket of my cargo pants, where I usually kept it when I was in the wilderness.

  I gazed longingly at my guitar, knowing that bringing it would be a major pain in the butt and that I couldn’t bring it. I knew that.

  But I wanted to anyway.

  My guitar made me feel better when I was low, it kept me company when I was by myself, and it made any party better. I sighed. There was no way I could bring it, so I shoved all thoughts of it out of my mind.

  The last thing I did was find the hidden money belt that I had used when I was backpacking. It was waterproof because I had been into white water rafting, canyoning, and other wet sports back then. I grabbed the boxes of pills out of the white paper bag they had come in and took the blister packs out. I laid all of them out in the belt, packing them two by two. I was able to fit all the medicine in. Then I wrapped it tightly around my torso.

  Yep, that would keep it safe and dry and no one would know it was there. Perfect. I was ready.

  I would give the authorities one more day to get things sorted and then I was bugging out. I needed to make sure my mom was okay. And besides, it was the best place to be while there was no hydro because we had a wood stove and some solar power.

  I would head for my mother’s place and stay there, taking care of her, until the modern world came back online.

  I didn’t think if the modern world came back online, but the thought was there.

  Deep in my mind.

  A niggling doubt that wouldn’t go away.

  Nessa

  I returned from the Information Board Friday morning, sure that things were going from bad to worse. An argument had broken out while I was there between two women and there had been a cat fight.

  I hated that term. As if women couldn’t fight properly. But these two actually couldn’t. They were pulling each other’s hair and slapping each other. It was terrible to watch.

  Some people broke it up and the women left but the remaining people, including me, had looked around at each other in dismay. Three days without power and civilization was already disappearing?

  My first thought had been that hydro needed to get the power back on. Immediately.

  Then a city representative had come out. It was a woman that I remembered from high school. She told us that Hydro had sent messengers to as many communities as possible to tell everyone to prepare for a significant amount of time without electricity.

  The news was that it had officially been declared a CME — a massive solar flare — that had fried the entire grid…in the whole province… all at once. I didn’t quite understand some of the technical explanation. But the bottom line was that the hydro wasn’t coming back on anytime soon.

  This was bad, bad, news.

  People were hungry.

  Tempers were starting to fray.

  I was afraid of the other people in town, who in the end would pose the most threat to me. It wouldn’t be starvation or a lack of amenities — I was prepared for those things. It would be people. If a panic started because of this news, I might be hurt or worse — trapped here.

  The thought sent a shot of adrenaline through me and I took off.

  I ran all the way home and burst in through the door, shutting it hard behind me and locking it with a quick flick of my hand. I glanced around the kitchen at the dirty bowl and spoon still on the table and a hoodie hung over the chair. There wasn’t time to tidy, not really. I had to get out of here.

  I finished the packing I had started but hadn’t finished yesterday after I had seen Matt. His idea to go to his mother had reminded me that I too had a better place. A place where it
would be much easier to survive than here. Where there were less people and what people there were, I knew and trusted.

  My cabin.

  I had to get to Sipwesk Lake.

  And to get there, I needed to be ready for whatever I might encounter.

  I took only a few clothes. My backpack wasn’t that big and I needed more room for cooking and camping supplies. I packed fire starter sticks, matches, along with my camping knife and cooking stuff. A sleeping bag went in, of course, but I also put in a thermal blanket for emergencies and a real wool sweater that would keep me warm even if the weather was damp. Wool is horrible and itchy most of the time but if you’re freezing, you suddenly don’t notice any itchiness and it really warms you up.

  When the backpack was full, I took a ziplock and half filled it with matches, pushing the air out and zipping it up, then I put it in my pocket. The matches were my parachute, so to speak. If everything else failed, I knew I could keep myself alive in the wilderness with those matches. I hoped I would never have to use them, but if I needed them, they would be there.

  The matches reminded me of Matt.

  Oh, who was I kidding, everything reminded me of Matt lately.

  But I knew I had probably missed him, so I didn’t bother going to his house. Likely he had left already. Besides, he lived in the Eastwood area and to get there, I would have to go through some of the poorer neighbourhoods.

  I didn’t know for sure but I was fairly certain that those people didn’t have a bunch of food in their cupboards and they probably hadn’t stocked up before the grocery stores emptied out because they probably hadn’t had the money.

  I didn’t want to be walking through that area. Already I could feel the tension in the air. And I wanted out. I hid my bag in the basement till tonight and put the rest of the food and supplies in the back of the crawlspace under my house. Then I piled up a bunch of old junk up against the little door that led to it. Hopefully that would keep looters from finding it. And when… If?… I came back, I would have some supplies.

  The thought seemed awfully pessimistic. Things couldn’t really be ending. Our civilization couldn’t really be falling. Hydro would get the electricity back on. And the government would sort things. And we would be back on track in, say, a month or so.

  I just had to stay safe till then.

  And my cabin was the best place to do so.

  I hoped that Matt had made it out safely and I would check on his mother when I got there. I had my fingers crossed that he would be there, too.

  I took a deep breath and braced myself to wait until sunset. So there was time to clean up, after all, but I wasn’t sure I had the heart for it. I lay down in my bed and tried to sleep. I was going to drive out under cover of darkness, to avoid being noticed. Already, cars were seldom seen driving and everyone gaped when one went by as if they’d never seen a vehicle before.

  I planned to leave around midnight because I had heard that no one was manning the station on the highway at the south end of town from midnight till four in the morning.

  I didn’t want to be stopped. I didn’t want to be bothered. I just wanted to get away. My fingers tapped against my leg as I went through the plan in my mind another time, looking for problems and loopholes. My gas would allow me to drive about a quarter of the way there.

  Then I would have to walk.

  I could do it.

  I would have to.

  I swallowed hard, fear roiling in my belly.

  If only I could make it out of town.

  Nessa

  It was the darkest hour of the night and I was in the driver’s seat — frozen — from fear, not cold. I had been sitting here for about five minutes already, thinking about what could go wrong.

  Finally, I put my key in the ignition and turned it, cringing at the sound of the engine, which seemed loud to my ears. I stared in despair at the gas gauge.

  Why hadn’t I thought to fill up? I could have driven all the way to the lake.

  As it was, I was almost empty. I cursed my once a week gassing up habits that left me with an almost empty tank by Wednesday when I did my weekly fill up.

  I sighed. Nothing for it. I would go as far as the gas would take me and then I would walk. I didn’t have any choice at this point.

  I had my backpack in the front seat and was wearing layers of clothes because I worried about being cold if the temperatures dropped below freezing as they certainly still did in April.

  I put my hand to my jeans pocket to make sure the ziplock bag of matches was still there. I don’t know where it might have gone since I left my house and got in the car but I knew that I felt better knowing it was there. With those matches, I felt I could survive almost anything.

  I pulled out of the driveway into the shadowy street. I was driving without my lights on but I had had to block the day-running lights because those wouldn’t turn off. I had used electrical tape and cardboard to cover them and hoped it would last till I was out of town when I could uncover them again.

  It was odd to be driving through Thompson at night without no street lights on and no headlights on my car. There was a moon that lit the night but clouds kept going across it every once in a while and plunging everything into darkness.

  I wished for more cloud cover to hide me, but I couldn’t do anything about the moonlight. Everyone seemed to be inside, which made me feel better but my breathing still came too fast and I could hear my pulse pounding in my ears.

  I turned off Greenway and onto Thompson Drive, following the four lane street down until I came to the set of lights that led to the pool. I turned right and saw some shadows wandering out of the Old Trailer Court. I had a tight feeling in my chest until I saw them cross to the other side and continue into Greywolf Bay, which was filled with town houses — row upon row of low income houses stuck together like stairs on their sides.

  I let out the breath I hadn’t realized I was holding and continued down the road, trying not to drive too fast or too slow. I didn’t want to draw attention to myself by driving too fast but I didn’t want to go slow enough that someone might be tempted to bother me.

  I checked again that the doors were locked, as I turned left and then right through the deserted industrial section heading towards the only road out of town to the south — highway six.

  As I turned onto the highway, my heart started pounding in my chest. There were people just ahead near where the city had set up a checkpoint. But I couldn’t stop now. I had to get out of here.

  Fear filled every cell of my body and I felt frozen with it. My chest so tight I could hardly breathe. But I kept driving — slowly — towards four young men.

  As I approached, they jumped out in front of the car. They were yelling and pounding on the hood and the top. I made a little scared sound in my throat, not knowing what to do. They were in front of me and I couldn’t floor it or I would maybe kill one of them. Two of them moved to the sides and started rattling the doors, trying to get in.

  They yelled at me to open the doors. One guy put his face right up to the window and banged — hard. So hard that I was afraid he would break it. I felt panic rise up in me.

  Who knew what these men would do to me if they got in? They would certainly steal my food and supplies. I didn’t allow myself to think worse thoughts but they were there in the background anyway.

  I don’t remember ever having felt such terror before in my life. I knew that these men were hostile. That they meant me harm — if only by taking my means of surviving away from me. I needed to get away from them. Now.

  The pounding and yelling and rattling went on until I saw one of them leave and go to their SUV that was parked on the shoulder.

  Oh God, he was going to get something to break the window.

  I just knew it.

  He came back a moment later and yelled for me to open up again. I didn’t, so he took the crowbar he had in his hands and smashed in the window of the backseat on my side. I screamed as he reached in to undo t
he lock.

  The fight or flight response burst forth inside of me but I could do neither. I couldn’t get out and fight them. That would be idiocy. I couldn’t run. I couldn’t even drive…

  Just then the one who had still been in front, climbed onto the hood. I took my chance. I probably wouldn’t get another.

  Clumsily, I floored the gas pedal and sped away from the other men. The one who had had his arm inside screamed in pain and rage as the glass scraped his arm when I took off. The one left on the hood, yelled at me to stop. He looked more and more scared as I gathered speed and began turning the wheel right and then left, sharply, trying to get him to fall off. As I did it a third time, he must have figured that he had more chance of surviving if he jumped, which he did because I would keep doing it until he fell.

  I looked in my rearview mirror and saw him tumbling down the road and into the ditch. I didn’t slow down a bit but only accelerated to highway speed — 100 km/h.

  There was no way I was stopping to take the cardboard off the lights so I drove on, glad for the moonlight now, though I had cursed it before because it made me more obvious. After a couple minutes of driving carefully, watching for animals — or maybe more people — I drew a deep breath and relaxed a bit.

  I didn’t know if I would ever feel safe again, but at least for now, the intense fear that had gripped me while those men had been attacking the car, had gone and sweet relief flowed through me.

  I remembered that I would get better gas mileage at a lower speed and I slowed down to about 80km/h, still keeping a vigilant watch out for animals, hopefully of the four legged variety. I had no desire to meet anymore people.

  The needle on the gas gauge dropped lower and lower and only minutes after leaving town the light came on telling me I needed to fill up. Damn. I went even slower to try and get as far as I could before the engine quit on me. I thought about what was ahead and decided I should try and make it to Ospwagan Lake. I could park my car down that road and hide it, hopefully then I could sleep till morning, when I would have to start walking.