But was he right here? She wasn’t sure. She thought of going to Canada with Dean and Petey, but what then? A cabin in the woods, living alone until the end of their days, undisturbed? She almost laughed to herself. It didn’t seem likely.
But an actual society… that was something she could see. Something she could help build. She was a doctor. She didn’t have any supplies, but she could help so much more in a new society than she could out in the woods, away from everyone else.
Dean grabbed his duffel bag and gave her a look. She got up and picked hers up, as well. Together, they set off, trying to find the trail Dean had talked about the day before. Right now, they were together. But when they passed Marshall Mountain, she wasn’t sure if it would stay that way.
And would she want it to?
*
They were making decent time; as well as could be expected, anyway. Dean wanted to move fast, and he knew that Gina wanted to move fast, too, but she wasn’t prepared for the trail that wound up and down the Appalachians.
It wasn’t easy going, but she did her best, especially when weighed down by her duffel bag full of supplies. A duffel bag that was getting lighter by the meal.
The day after they’d found the radio, they’d done just over 10 miles. It wasn’t as much as Dean had wanted to do, but he could tell that Gina was sore. The last thing he wanted to do was to push her, or have her push herself, so far that she got injured. An injury out here could spell worse than disaster. It could mean death.
The second day, they’d done just over eight. It had been an easier day than the one before and he could tell that both Gina and Petey appreciated it. He admitted to himself that taking it a bit slower was nice, too.
At every break, Dean turned the radio on, hoping to hear more from General Harris. The message that repeated was always the same, and they couldn’t pick up any other radio stations. Dean didn’t know whether that was good or bad.
He recognized what that radio message meant. For Gina, it was salvation. For him, it was death. He knew that they would recognize him in that camp. He was a wanted man.
What he’d told Gina could be true, though. It could be a trap. He didn’t think it was, though. Maybe it was his Shifter intuition telling him that. Maybe it was him rebelling against what his grandfather would have done.
So the plan had changed. He would continue on, past that little spot in the woods that was to be his salvation. He’d continue on to somewhere more secluded and start his new life there. On his way, they would swing close enough to that camp for Dean to check it out. Make sure it was safe. And then, if she wanted to, Gina would stay.
And he knew she would.
She would be a fool not to. She could help others. She was a doctor, after all. She could be one of the major pillars of rebuilding society as they knew it. With Gina there, they might even stand a chance. But it wasn’t for Dean, no matter how much he wanted it to be.
So they continued on, 30 miles from the mountain where they would have to make their decision. Their food situation was dwindling, though not alarmingly so. With Dean’s foraging, and maybe a little bit of luck hunting or fishing around the lake, they would make it to that camp hungry, but alive. He was going to avoid going into the city now more than ever, considering the warning that North Williamstown was lost.
After they’d listened to the first broadcast after passing Haysberry, Gina had brought it up. She thought it was destroyed, probably by a bomb blast. Dean didn’t bother to correct her, but he knew better. When the General said that it was lost, he didn’t mean destroyed. North Williamstown was probably a cesspool; a major location of trouble and death.
One of the ideas his grandfather had instilled in his mind was that in an apocalyptic survival situation, humanity would quickly fall. That didn’t necessarily mean that society would crumble immediately. Rather, civilization would crumble. Men would give in to their baser instincts. Dean knew, in his gut, that that’s what had happened in North Williamstown.
Gina hadn’t said much to him for the past few days, beyond the usual. He didn’t know whether that was good or bad. He didn’t know what was going on between them anymore. He had wanted to talk to her, to articulate his feelings towards her, and why it wasn’t a good idea. He hadn’t done it, though. He didn’t know if he would ever get the chance.
By his estimation, they had maybe three days of walking before they would get around the mountain. After that, it should be an easy day or two to where he imagined the camp was set up. In five days, he would part ways with Gina. With that amount of time left, he didn’t think it would be important to let her know his feelings. They didn’t have much time left together, so why did it matter?
There was one small mountain before they reached Marshall Mountain, and that’s where Dean’s plan absolutely collapsed.
The ascent was gradual, but the descent on the northern side of the mountain was absolutely brutal. It was less hiking and more scrambling down thick, massive rocks. Nearly every few feet, Dean would have to make his way down a rock, then turn back towards Gina and help her down. After that, he would grab Petey and they would repeat the process.
On one of the smaller rocks, Gina went to climb down. Her foot caught between two boulders and she fell. Her ankle twisted between the rocks. Behind him, he heard a scream of pain and his plan shattered.
*
“It’s not broken,” Gina reassured Dean, though the reassurance was as much for herself as it was for him. But it wasn’t in good shape. She felt around, poking and prodding the joint lightly. Bolts of pain shot through her leg at the slightest touch. “It’s not broken. Just sprained. Bad.”
And she knew in some situations, like now, that could be even worse.
Petey was barking next to her, lapping at her face. She tried to tell him it was going to be okay, but she knew it wasn’t. This was bad. Even Dean’s calm exterior had shattered. He looked like a panicked mess.
It had all happened so quickly. He’d been helping her and Petey down the mountain and she’d went to climb down one of the rocks and slipped. As she had fallen, her foot had got caught between the rock and another. When she’d struggled, she had wrenched it and fallen forward, hard.
“How’s my face?” she asked, trying to make the best of a bad situation.
“Pretty as ever,” Dean told her. Whether or not that was true, she didn’t know, but she appreciated his response just the same.
“This is bad, huh?”
He nodded sagely. “Yeah, we’re in trouble.”
“Dean, what do we do? You’re the expert.”
“Give me a minute,” Dean told her and took a few steps back to think. Gina grabbed Petey and embraced him. He could tell when there was trouble, but she didn’t think he understood the gravity of this situation. It was possible that this accident could lead to her death.
After a few minutes of silent thought, Dean came back and opened up the duffel bags. He rummaged through their food. They had enough for a week’s worth of meals each, unless they wanted to eat Petey’s dog food. Then they would have a few more days, at best, and Petey wouldn’t have anything.
“Okay, we have a week left,” Dean said. She could tell he was doing some calculations in his head. “Normally, we would be past the mountain in three days. We’re only about 20 miles away from it. Now, we’re not going to be so lucky. You can’t walk. I’ll have to make you a litter. That’s going to eat up a few days, at the minimum. So we’ll have five days of food left when we get you down the mountain and get moving. Then we’ll still have two, maybe three days of walking until we’re past the mountain. So, when we come out the other side, we’ll have two days of food left. If we’re lucky.”
“We won’t,” Gina told him. She knew it was the truth. “There’s no way you can survive off of that kind of food if you’re lugging me through the forest. And you’re certainly not leaving me behind.”
Dean crouched down on the balls of his feet. He nodded again. “You’re right. We’re going to run
out of food, way before we can get to our destination. We’re expending so much more energy than we’re taking in. It’s not going to work.”
“What do we do, Dean?” Gina asked. She had a sinking feeling in her stomach.
“We’re going to North Williamstown,” he said. It was said without any gravity, as if it wasn’t a big problem.
“Dean, it’s been destroyed.”
“No, it hasn’t,” he said. His golden eyes glinted. Gina could tell that he knew something she didn’t.
“What?” the question had a bit of venom in it.
“When the broadcast said ‘lost’, the General didn’t mean it had been destroyed. It’s probably a breeding ground for the worst of mankind right now.”
Gina felt her heart turn to ice. She had expected most of the town to be leveled, littered with dead bodies and rubble. But she had imagined it would be possible to find some food, somewhere. Dean had a good nose and sharp eyes. She had believed they could get food there.
She had never imagined it to be full of the dregs of what remained of society, but it made sense. She’d seen some of them in Haysberry on that first night — they had already started looting within hours. What would they be doing a few days after the fact? She thought she knew, but she refused to dwell on it.
“Is there any other option? Can you hunt?”
Dean looked unsure. “I can try, but if I fail, I’ll burn up even more of my energy. This is a serious situation, Gina.”
“I know.”
“Well, then let’s get you down the mountain.”
Gina swallowed and reached for a bag, but Dean shook his head. “We can’t leave them, Dean.”
“I’ll come back up here later,” he told her. He packed up most of their food, with the exception of two meal packs and a can for Petey. He also grabbed a blanket. Then he stashed the duffel bags underneath a rock overhang, hidden from view.
He came close to her, bending down. Gina felt his warmth enveloping her, felt his hands wrapping tightly around her body. She wished it was for something else. Tears were rolling down her face.
“Dean, I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I’m so, so sorry.”
“Don’t worry about it,” he told her with a smile. She knew he was saying that for her sake. Things were bad. “You’re going to have to carry our food and blanket.”
Gina reached out and grabbed them, pulling them onto her stomach. Petey jumped up on her, and then Dean lifted them both up, one arm under her knees and the other under her shoulders. He took a few steps and Gina could hear him already wheezing under the load.
He was beat, though she hadn’t noticed how badly until now. His wounds were healed, but the low food intake and the constant hiking had taken its toll.
Getting down the back side of the mountain took hours, but finally, they reached the bottom. Dean was dripping sweat and Gina was wincing in pain at every step Dean took. Petey whimpered the whole way down.
Once they reached the bottom, Dean deposited them in the bushes, hidden from view if someone was out in the woods. He laid out a blanket for Gina, gave her two meal packs, and then headed back up the mountain.
“Wait,” Gina said. “Dean, you can’t go back up there tonight.”
“We need our supplies, and we can’t spare that time in the morning. Get some rest. I’ll be back soon.”
“At least take a meal and eat while you’re going up.”
“You’ll need them more than I will,” he said, then he came over to her, and kissed her on the lips. Gina was so surprised that she didn’t immediately kiss back, but then she was, their lips moving together. When Dean pulled away, even he looked surprised, but he gave her a smile and disappeared into the forest.
The sun was going down and the gloom was darkening. All around her, she heard the sounds of the forest she was growing accustomed to. That didn’t mean she had to like it, though. She heard a few bird chirps, the hoot of an owl, and another stream gurgling. Petey, on the other hand, was relaxing, face buried in his food. Gina looked down at her own meal pack, feeling her stomach turn at the thought of eating another.
Still, she had no choice. She was starving and her body needed the nutrients. What little the meal packs could offer, anyway. She peeled the first one open and dug in, eating it in only a few minutes. The taste of the food helped keep her mind off of her ankle. She looked at the second meal pack, and shrugging, opened that one too.
After eating two entire meal packs, Gina felt a bit better. She wasn’t in good shape., not yet, anyway, but the food helped. She lay back on the blanket, lacing her hands behind her head, and thought about what was going to happen next.
Dean was a strong, powerful man. But even he had his limits. She hoped that he wouldn’t reach them while trying to get her safely out of the woods. She couldn’t even imagine how he could keep his energy up. He was going back up the mountain tonight, then coming back down, and then tomorrow he’d be chopping down trees and building her a litter.
After that, he’d be dragging her through the woods, all while most likely starving himself. It was going to be tough.
Gina sat up and poked at her ankle. Flashes of pain jolted through her body. The sprain was bad, but she thought in maybe as little as a week she could be walking again. It hurt, but she thought it was just a grade one sprain. If it really was a grade two, then it could be an entire month before she was walking again. She would never survive.
Gina tried to keep her mind occupied and off of her injury and Dean, but it was pointless. She couldn’t think of anything but. Her thoughts mainly focused on the kiss he had given her before he had gone up to the mountain. What had that meant? Was he coming around?
*
Why did I do that? Dean had been asking himself that question over and over as he climbed back up the mountain. He couldn’t find the answer.
Kissing Gina hadn’t been planned, but once it had occurred to him he’d been powerless to resist. It wasn’t like he had tried to fight it, though.
He enjoyed it more than he would admit.
Now, he was using that thought to keep his mind off of the grueling climb in front of him. But getting their supplies was only the first step. He’d have to make his way back down, carrying the heavy bags of food, and then start working on the litter to drag Gina through the woods.
The litter was the only idea he could think of, and it made sense. But they had no traditional tools, so Dean was going to have to shift. He’d have to really exert himself cutting down all of the trees and branches they would need, and that wasn’t even the hard part. The hard part would be shifting in the first place. It was never easy, and now, in his weakened state, he wasn’t even sure if he could do it at all.
“Damn,” he muttered to himself. His grandfather would be more disappointed in him than he could express. He’d yell at him, berate him, and ask him what kind of a Shifter he was. Ask him what kind of a survivalist he was. He wouldn’t have an answer.
Dean growled, pulling himself up a rock. He pushed the thought away. His grandfather was dead; he had been for years. He was good at surviving and embracing his Shifter tendencies. But that didn’t make him a good man, as Dean was finding out. They had never butted heads in life, but now that Dean was with Gina, he was finding out that he was clashing with his grandfather. He was learning some things about himself every day.
He was realizing that he would do nearly anything for Gina. She’d stuck by his side, even when he had blamed her for starting the fire. She hadn’t abandoned him, even when his temper got the best of him or he drove them hard through the woods.
She had taken care of him and brought him back to the world. So he would take care of her, no matter what the cost.
He found the bags easily and picked them up. They were heavier than he was expecting, but he reasoned that was a good thing. They still had food. Without even waiting for a break, Dean started back down the mountain. He made good time going down. Instead of carrying the bags down each rock, he just tos
sed them in front of him over and over.
Kenny (Shifter Football League Book 2) Page 86
