by Sweet, Dell
“Still is east,” Haley said. “Compass doesn't know where true north is anymore, so it hardly matters. For now it's east.”
Scott nodded. “Don't know why it matters to me anyway,” he admitted.
“Because it keeps things normal,” Alice said quietly.
“Maybe,” Scott admitted.
“The doctor's office is closed,” Haley said and laughed. “We're all fucked up. No doubt about it. Let's get some supplies and get on the road.” Silence held for a split second and then Scott laughed. Alice joined in and Joel chuckled right along with them.
“Let's go,” Scott agreed. A few seconds later he was gunning the motor slipping through the high grass, fighting his way up to the overpass.
Tremont PA.
The streets seemed deserted, the buildings dusty and empty. Most of the main street was gone, what buildings remained perched on the edge of a yawning chasm. They approached carefully and looked down to see a small stream flowing across the floor of the cut some forty feet below: Emerging from a dark smudge on one side and flowing under a huge rock overhang on the other. Moss grew on some rocks near the stream. It had an air of permanence. The imagery below looked like something out of a wilderness camping guide.
“Looks like one of those forever wild things... Hike the Appalachian trail or something,” Alice said. She let her eyes wander upward where the buildings perched on the edge of the abyss, as though waiting to plunge down into the small, peaceful stream far below. “And then you have this,” she raised her arms to encompass the buildings where they sat. “Surreal.”
Scott nodded his head. He stood from his crouch and looked around at the buildings. “Deserted, I guess.” He had no sooner spoken the words than gunfire erupted and shattered the quiet afternoon air. He dove for the ground, remembered where he was, but too late. He hit the slope to the bottom of the gully and rolled toward the bottom. Halfway down his head struck a small rock outcropping and he stopped wondering about the gunfire and where it had come from.
Alice lunged for the gully, but Joel grabbed her just as quickly and pulled her toward one of the buildings Haley had run for. Already she had made the doorway and stood beckoning to them. Joel pushed Alice forward toward the building and then leapt the short distance to the cover of the corner of the building. The leap was too much for his still healing leg and he collapsed in agony just within the shadow of the building.
“Joel!” Haley from the shadowy interior of the building, Alice crouched next to her.
Behind him he heard running footsteps approaching, he motioned for Haley to go before he pushed himself over onto his back to face who ever this was. The pain flared bright in his leg as he used it to turn himself over, and he almost passed out. He got his gun up and pushed himself up on one elbow ready to fire. A second later a figure ran around the edge of the building and into his line of fire. He hesitated only the briefest of seconds, but it was long enough for the young girl to bring up her own weapon and fire. Joel's pistol roared as he felt a stinging sensation on his neck, and he watched the young girl twist backwards and slam off the brick buildings inside corner as his bullet found her. As quickly as the noise had begun the afternoon turned deadly quiet. No bird calls, the vague gurgle of the stream as it flowed far below in the gully, nothing else. Joel put one hand to the side of his neck and bought it away bloodied. “Great,” he muttered to himself. He turned slowly, used one hand to get his good leg under him and stood from the sidewalk he had fallen on. Haley spoke from behind him and he nearly jumped before he could calm his staggering heartbeat down and respond.
“Baby... Baby, come on,” Haley whispered again.
“I told you to go,” Joel said tightly as he limped toward the darkened doorway of the building.
“And I didn't,” Haley said every bit as tightly.
Joel made the doorway and looked around at the darkened interior. “Where did Alice go?”
“Ran back toward the pit when you went down. I... I couldn't stop her, Joel,” Haley told him.
“Of course not... Wouldn't have stopped me if it was you down there either.” He sighed.
“Jesus, you're bleeding bad, Joel, really bad,” Haley told him. She pulled her t-shirt over her head, wadded it up and pressed it against the side of her neck.
“Feel funny,” he said, “Sleepy... Hey, no bra, that's...” The lights dimmed down suddenly; winked out completely, and he spiraled down into darkness.
Tremont PA
Full dark
“I wanted... I wanted you to know it... I wanted you to know... Know it,” Joel said. His words were garbled and barely intelligible. His eyes snapped open in the darkness, his breath caught in his throat, and he began to sit up. Haley placed a hand against his chest, leaned close and whispered into his ear.
“Lay still, Babe. Lay still... Be quiet... Something is out there... Someone... Quiet.” Her hand kept firm and steady pressure against his chest and he sank back down to the floor. It seemed he was barely holding onto consciousness, his eyes kept rolling up into his head.
“Goddammit,” Haley exploded. A second later her machine pistol began to chatter. Joel sank back down into unconsciousness.
The Gully
Scott's eyes flew open in the darkness. Something... Something had awakened him... He had been asleep and something... Close by a woman screamed and the sound of a semi automatic weapon firing fast came to him. The scream tore off abruptly, reduced to a series of gagging, pleading sounds, and then nothing. He tried to move and nearly grayed out from the pain that flared in his left arm. Something, he thought, was broken or badly injured. He tried again and this time it responded better. Dislocated, he told himself, as he grimaced to bite back the cry that wanted to slip past his clenched jaw. He whimpered slightly from reaction and the expenditure of energy, and grasped his left wrist firmly with his right hand. A second later he was pulling and twisting slightly. A sharp pull, a sharper twist. Once, twice and he was on the edge of passing out. He drew several deep breaths and tried a third time and the shoulder slipped back into place. He fell back against the moist earth and closed his eyes, intending only to gather his strength for a moment, but his eyes betrayed him and he spiraled away down into the dark.
The Vacant building
Haley made her feet and duck walked forward to where the two figures had crumpled to the ground. The one, a woman, half her lower jaw missing, one leg hanging by a thread and blood pumping out of her at an alarming rate, was snarling softly and crawling toward the road where a second woman lay breathing hard. She reached her and rose on one elbow before lowering her face and beginning to bite with what was left of her shattered jaw. The woman laying in the street began to scream, Haley switched to single shot, stood and walked up behind them and shot them both. The one on top still whimpered and snarled, almost sounding as though she were pleading, before Haley shot her one more time and she collapsed: Silent at last. Haley faded back into the shadows, listening, but the night was silent.
She returned to Joel who had slipped back down into a deep sleep once more. She had given him morphine, a small shot. They carried it. She had debated doing it, but he needed it. He had opened up a large section of his neck and the bleeding was heavy. She had to stitch it and she couldn't have him waking up halfway through that. She had looked with dismay at the dirt grimed into her hands and under her fingernails. Infection was a real possibility in this world. She had drenched the whole area with a full bottle of peroxide, something else they carried, stitched the wound with dental floss, and then sprayed it down with a once popular spray antibiotic. She had managed to force three penicillin pills into him and got him to swallow them down, out of it as he was. There was nothing else to do, but wait it out. He had lost a great deal of blood, but she had not been able to get him to swallow again, the water just poured out the sides of his mouth when she gave it to him.
She took his head into her lap now and held him. Watching the black and silent night, her machine pistol across h
er lower legs. Safety off and ready.
Tremont
September 20th
Her eyes blinked rapidly, she drew a deep gasping breath and then came fully awake. Alice stared around the ravine at the gray light that was beginning to paint color back into the world. Rock, sand and water. Moss on some rocks. She puzzled the information over and over again in her head. Rocks and water... Rocks, water, moss, sand, rocks... Moss, water... The realization of where she was come to her as she remembered the events of the day before. She rose to her scraped and blood crusted elbows and then to a sitting position. Her back felt sprung, maybe it would hurt more later, but for now she could deal with it. Her heartbeat seemed a little odd. Too slow, something, but it wasn't skipping beats or anything so she dismissed that too. She sat, shaky, and let her mind come more fully back to herself before she raised her head and took in her surroundings more fully.
Hypothermia, her mind said, and she was cold, very cold, there was no heat in the ground down here. That could explain the heart beat seeming to be too slow, hypothermia did that. Her mind seemed determined to keep up a dialogue with her as she studied first one side and then the other side of the ravine.
Her eyes slipped over a dirty bundle of rags where they lay half in half out of the water and continued on before she realized they were no bundle of rags, got to her feet and stumbled the thirty feet or so to where Scott lay, half in, half out of the water.
Her fingers, stiff though they were, felt at his neck for a pulse. He moved as she jabbed her stiff fingers into his neck.
“Jesus... Jesus, Alice... That hurts. That hurts,” Scott said. His words started out mumbled but grew a little stronger as he spoke. “So damn cold,” Scott finished. His lips were blue tinged and he was cold to the touch.
“I know, baby, I know. I have to get you out of this water. Going to move you,” she told him as she made her own feet, fought the dizziness that threatened to down her, and bent once more, wrapping her arms around his upper chest and dragged him backwards. Scott called out a second later and then lapsed back into unconsciousness once more. Alice struggled to pull him back farther away from the water and then let him go, sinking to the ground herself and breathing hard. A few minutes later she had caught her own breath and was checking herself over for injuries. Obviously, she told herself, they had both tumbled down the ravine. Him first, her as she tried to follow.
One side of her face was a ruin of scrapes and crusted blood. Her mouth was numb on that side, but that had been the side against the ground so that was no real surprise. She flexed her jaw experimentally and it seemed to work fine. One knee ached, but did not seem to be swollen. Her tailbone hurt, no way to check it now, but she assumed it was most likely black and blue. Right ankle hurt a little: Could have been the way she slept on it too. No way to know, but it was also not swollen: She was bruised, a little battered, but no big deal. She needed warmth and she would be fine. She turned her attention to Scott.
Bruising on his jaw line and temple on the right side of his face and scraped up skin in the same place. What wasn't scraped up was deeply bruised. Probably where his head collided with something on the way down to the bottom. His shoulder felt larger on one side, but she was able to move his arm with no problem.
“Hey,” softly from above, but she nearly jumped out of her skin.
“Oh my God you scared the shit out of me,” Alice whispered.
Haley only nodded. “He okay too?”
“No,” Alice said softly. “Too cold... Have to get him out of here... Warmed up.”
Haley nodded and then disappeared for a few seconds. “Okay... Listen, I'm going to get the truck. The one you and Scott were driving had a winch. We should be able to get you up with that.”
Alice felt at her pocket for the keys, but as she looked down at her pants the pocket was gone, ripped from the fabric of the cargo pants. “Keys are gone,” she called up. Haley swore lightly under her breath.
“Plan B,” Haley called down after a few minutes. “Our truck is gone, don't know if that was why they attacked us, but they took the truck. I don't know how to hot-wire a truck or a car... Joel is out, so I'm going to go look for something that will run, get a rope and come back here and get you out that way. Hang on.” Her face disappeared from the top of the embankment and then was back a few moments later. “Water,” she called down. “Don't try to catch it.” She took her time, aimed, and then tossed first one and then two more bottles down. They landed with a hard thud not far from where Alice sat with Scott's head pulled into her lap. “Drink... You don't want to get dehydrated too,” Haley told her with a tight smile. “I'll be back as soon as I can.” She disappeared before Alice could speak.
“Come on, baby, come on,” Alice said as she slapped at the side of Scott's face. She finally got him to open one eye, pulled his head slightly higher and got him to drink half of one bottle before his head sank once more into her lap.
Afternoon
They were all huddled around the fire Haley had built inside the small sidewalk area under the overhang of the doorway. There was very little room, but there was a building at their backs and a wide view of the downtown area and the edge of the ravine a few hundred feet away.
“We have got to get out of here,” Haley said. The day was slipping away. She had no doubt that whatever it was that had attacked them last night; plague victims most likely would be back tonight once the sun went down. She had only a dozen bullets for her machine pistol. Joel's pistol had a loaded magazine, nine, and Scott and Alice had both lost their weapons on their fall into the ravine. Haley had smashed the window on their truck, but all the ammunition had been in their own truck, and that was long gone.
“Bad straights,” Alice said.
“Very,” Haley agreed. She eased her lap out from under Joel's head, and rose to her feet. She had found an old minivan that she had used to get Alice and Scott out of the ravine. It ran well enough, and had nearly a half tank of gas. It would have to do. She had already transferred what foodstuffs there had been and supplies they could use from the second truck into the minivan, and packed it carefully along the sides of the rear windows. The rear seat had folded down, and there was space to lay both Joel and Scott out in the back. The problem was that neither of them were conscious and they were both big men. Not an easy task. Alice had been banged up too. One side of her face was going to be covered with spectacular scars. Haley had dug the small pebbles out of it, washed the dirt away and disinfected it. There was nothing more she could do. She didn't know if Alice was up to the work or not.
“Think you're up to it,” she asked now. She looked up at the sky. “The longer we wait the worse it will be. The day's getting away from us.”
Alice nodded. “No, but I will have to be. Let's do it.” She rose to her own feet, steady now, where just a short time earlier she had been shaky. She had warmed up nicely, and she saw that Scott had as well. His breathing had become something closer to normal, even; no rattle in his chest or gasping that she was afraid she would hear. He slept deeply.
Haley had pulled the small van close to the building earlier. She went to it now, opened the rear hatch and returned to where Alice waited. They decided on Joel first. Joel was the heaviest and it might be better to get the heaviest out-of-the-way first.
It took more than twenty minutes before they managed to get Joel securely into the back of the van. They had both collapsed to the pavement breathing hard, not wanting to do anything else, but after only a short break they had forced themselves to their feet once more. The longer they sat, the deeper the weariness had moved into them: Settling into their bodies.
Scott had been no trouble at all. Maybe it had been the first tugging and fighting to get Joel into the van, or maybe he was just that much lighter, but he was easily positioned into the back of the van. They both collapsed to the pavement once more. Breath ragged, lungs aching and burning, sharpness resting just below their rib cages, a feeling Haley had always acquainted with run
ning too fast, too hard. She took her time, slowed her breathing, dragged Alice to her feet and walked back and forth in front of the building until her heartbeat resumed its former slower beat, and the sweat began to dry on her skin. Only then did she slow and rest against the hood with Alice.
“This is so hard,” Haley said. She burst into tears, but fought them back just as quickly.
Alice lowered her head into her own hands and a few sobs slipped past her hands before she got herself under control. “Better go,” she said aloud as she raised her tear streaked face.
Haley nodded, moved around the truck and opened the driver's door with a rusty screech. A few moments later the broken pavement of downtown Tremont was shrinking in their mirror as they made their way west once more, heading back to I 81 to continue their trip south.
EIGHT
Harrisburg PA
September 22nd
The fires burned low around the small open area. The six of them sat quietly watching the stars come out.
Joel shifted and Haley curled into his side, head on his chest, eyes closed.
“Okay?” Joel asked.
“Um hm,” she agreed. “Just tired.”
They had met Cathy Cross on their way out of Tremont, just before they had made it back to I-81. She had been on foot, walking the tree line, heading vaguely south. She had heard them coming, she had told them, and ducked into the woods. Something, maybe the sight of what appeared to be two women traveling alone, had made her come back out and fire her gun into the air to get their attention. The gun had nearly made Haley drive on. Her initial impulse had caused her foot to ram the gas down, but a split second later Alice had spotted Cathy where she stood just outside the tree line and got her to stop the van.
Haley had stepped outside the van, machine pistol ready, willing to waste the precious few bullets she had left if she had to.
“You're not weird are you?” Cathy called out. She was maybe a hundred yards away. Nearly lost in the tall grass. Her own rifle was clasped tightly in her hands. Not aimed at Haley and the van, but ready for whatever the van and its occupants might bring.
