After the Blast

by Ryan Casey

  Kumal looked outside the window. He looked at the grounds. The grounds where they were planting things. The grounds where they were laughing. Where things were getting back together.

  He looked outside, and he tried to convince himself that everything was okay.

  “Just have a little faith, Kumal,” Gina said. “Just… just try to see the good. Just see what happens. And if it doesn’t work out… well, you heard what David said. We can just leave.”

  Kumal turned over. Took a deep breath. Closed his eyes.

  “I’ll give it a try,” he said.

  He waited until he was sure Gina was asleep.

  Until he was absolutely sure the whole place had gone quiet.

  And then he opened his eyes.

  He had things to do.

  The village of Woodbridgeton was never as quiet as David made out.

  That was something that stuck with Kumal. David had claimed it was a sleepy village. Which to an extent, it was, but only in the same way that any village was less crowded and populated than a town or a city.

  But at the same time, this place was a community—and a bubbling one at that. There was a park where people were always walking their dogs. There was a pub right in the middle where the locals all gathered. Really nice place, great food, which Kumal had visited with family a few times.

  And the little road through town was always bustling with life. It was idyllic, in truth. The kind of suburban paradise where everyone wanted to live.

  It was never a ghost town.

  Except now.

  A bitter taste filled Kumal’s mouth as he stepped out into the street. The darkness and the silence were suffocating. He felt like there was something lurking, something just out of sight. Secrets.

  He looked back at the church. He’d sneaked out of there quite easily, which added up with the whole idea that he could just leave at any time.

  And he wasn’t sure what he was looking for. Not exactly.

  Just that there had to be something out there. Something that solved the puzzle. Something that gave him the answer he was looking for—whatever that answer was, and even if he didn’t know what the question was.

  He walked down the street, not seeing anything, not hearing anything. Which was weird too because David had claimed that there were locals who had stayed here. So they were just staying out of the way of David’s group? Keeping such a low profile? Why?

  He walked a little further down the street, hairs on the back of his neck standing on end.

  And that’s when he looked at the pub.

  It caught his eye a few minutes ago. But he’d kind of overlooked it at first. Now, he was looking back at it again.

  Something was drawing him towards it.

  Something about it was igniting his curiosity.

  He looked over his shoulder. Took a deep breath.

  “Stuff it,” he said.

  Then he started walking over towards that pub.

  The closer he got to it, the more his tension started to grow. The more his urgency to see what was inside built. Because he felt like that pub had the answer, somehow. That there was some kind of clue in there. Some kind of piece of the puzzle he was so desperately looking for.

  He reached the pub, and he noticed something.

  The windows were boarded up. The doors were locked shut. It looked like someone had holed up in here.

  But then why was everywhere so quiet?

  Why was everything so silent?

  He walked around the back of the pub, and he saw something.

  There was a gap. A gap between the top of the boarded-up window and the rest of the wood.

  Kumal’s heart started to race. He walked over to that gap. Reached for it. Went to pull it away. He felt like he was so close. So near.

  He just had to go inside.

  He just had to see what was—

  “You okay, Kumal?”

  His body froze. Every muscle inside him went numb.

  He turned around.

  David was standing there in the dark. Smile on his face.

  Kumal’s mouth went dry. His throat tensed up. He didn’t know what to say.

  David walked over to him. Hand raised. And everything inside Kumal’s body told him to get away. Everything within told him to run; to get the hell away from here.

  Then David just planted a hand on his shoulder, squeezed.

  “Come on,” he said. “It’s late. And the pub… it’s not a place you want to go. Not unless you want to disturb the landlord. The last person who did that… let’s just say it wasn’t pretty.”

  Kumal felt David pulling him away. He started to walk, too. And as he walked, he looked back at that pub. Because maybe David was right. Maybe the landlord really was in there, defending his territory.

  But what if?

  What if?

  “You should get some rest,” David said when they reached the church. “Wouldn’t want anything to happen out here in the dark.”

  He looked back down the street, back at the church.

  The next day, he didn’t notice the gap in the wood had been boarded up already.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Mike felt the agony split through his right ankle, and he knew he was in deep shit.

  He yelped and let out an agonised cry. There was nothing he could do about it. No adaptation to pain, nothing could stop the way his reactions were flowing right now.

  He’d stepped right into some kind of trap. It looked beefy like a large spiked jaw fox or wolf trap that had slammed shut around his ankle.

  And now he was stuck, and Holly was out there somewhere.

  He turned around. Looked at his leg as he gasped for air, the burning sun beaming down from above, making him sweat—as with the pain.

  When he saw the state of his leg, his stomach lurched.

  The trap was slammed shut around his leg.

  It was wrapped right around him, its teeth deeply stuck in his flesh.

  He was bleeding. Badly.

  He knew he was screwed. Like he was under no illusions about the kind of shit he was in right now. He was caught in a trap that was going to be very damned hard to get out of. And even if he did, he was bleeding. Badly. In the woods. On his own.

  And Holly was out there, somewhere.

  Holly was with a group. Or maybe she was with someone alone, he wasn’t sure.

  He just knew that the odds were stacked against him.

  But he couldn’t just stay here. He had to make a choice.

  If he didn’t do anything, he’d die here. He’d bleed out. No debate about it.

  But if he managed to get out of this trap… well, it wouldn’t be ideal. But it would at least give him an opportunity to do something. It would give him a chance.

  So he was going to have to try.

  That’s the only option he had.

  He reached down for the trap. The closer he got to it, the more his tension and uncertainty grew. He didn’t want to do this. He didn’t want to move it because he knew it’d turn out much more painful than it was already.

  But he had to do something.

  He just had to get out of this.

  He wrapped his hands around the sides of the trap. Winced right away. His hands were shaking. His body felt like it was going to crumble under the pressure.

  But again… he knew it would be nothing compared to what would happen if he didn’t act.

  He closed his eyes. Took deep breaths. Thought of Holly, and what might be happening to her; what might happen to her if he didn’t act fast.

  And then he wrapped his fingers around the trap and began to pull.

  Splitting pain spread up his leg.

  He stopped, letting go right away, making the intensity of the pain grow even further. He gasped. Tried to keep his composure as well as he could. But it was pointless. He wasn’t going to be able to do this. He was stuck.

  He closed his eyes again. Took a deep breath in, right through his nostrils, out through his mout
h. He remembered a technique he’d learned when he was in the military. A mindfulness technique. The idea was just to observe the sensation rather than get caught up in it. Don’t try to fight it. Don’t try to resist it. Just allow it, let it be… but keep on going.

  Easier damned said than done.

  But still something that needed to be done.

  He closed his eyes again. Took a few breaths, adrenaline surging through his body. He was going light-headed. If he didn’t act fast, he’d pass out, and then he’d have no chance to even get out of this trap.

  He needed to embrace the pain.

  He needed to lean towards it, let it be.

  He needed to act.

  “Screw this,” he said. “Screw this.”

  And then he yanked the trap apart with all the strength he had.

  The pain was excruciating. The trap was solid. Every instinct in his body screamed at him to stop pulling it, to give up, but he couldn’t. He allowed the pain, as terrible as it was. He allowed it, and he let out a cry.

  And then as he kept on pulling, fingers bleeding now, convinced he was going to have to give in and stop soon… the trap came free.

  He fell back when it did. Collapsed onto the grass. Relief washed over him.

  But he knew he couldn’t allow that relief to last too long. He couldn’t rest in the euphoria of being free.

  Because now he was free, he arguably had even bigger problems on his hands.

  He looked down at his leg. The wounds from the trap were deep. The blood was flowing heavily. He had to get it wrapped up. He had to get it covered.

  And then he had to hope his damnedest it didn’t get infected.

  He shuffled upright. But as he did, he noticed the blood started flowing even more heavily. Shit. It was bad. If he applied any pressure on the leg, it was going to bleed out even faster. He needed to think. Fast.

  He reached into his rucksack. He was so woozy from the pain and the urgency of the situation that he’d forgotten it was even there. There wasn’t much in it, the bulk of his supplies being taken, but there were a few things that would help him while out on the road. He rummaged around it, found some dental floss, then some bandaging. He tightly wrapped the floss around his leg to ease the flow, and then bandaged it up as well as he could with such shaky hands.

  The blood seeped through the bandages right away.

  Shit. It was worse than he thought.

  He stood up, though. Limped through the woods. Because he wasn’t going to get anywhere by just staying here. At least if he got out of the woods, he’d have a chance at finding somewhere he could gather some supplies to help the wound. He’d have to beware of bleeding out. He’d have to beware of infection.

  He’d have to beware of so, so much.

  He stumbled further through the woods, further in the direction he knew Holly had gone. Although even that was becoming uncertain, becoming blurry. He’d lost all sense of location, of time, of everything.

  But he had to keep going.

  He had to keep pressing on.

  He saw the edge of the woods up ahead. And he swore he heard something. A voice. A few voices. Or was that just his imagination? Was that all in his head?

  “Holly,” he said.

  He staggered forward. Fell to the left a little, then to the right. He felt something trickling down his ankle, saw it was blood, leaking down the side of the bandage. He looked back up. Sounds were distorting all around him. He was losing his sense of smell—his sense of everything.

  But he had to keep pressing on.

  He had to keep going…

  He felt his legs weaken. And as much as he wanted to carry on, as much as he wanted to continue… falling flat on his face felt the much better choice.

  So he fell down.

  Felt the seductive pull of sleep wrapping its arms around him.

  He took a deep breath of the warm air.

  Felt the warm blanket of comfort covering the pain, covering everything.

  Then he let out a sigh, and he smiled.

  As he did, as everything went blurry, as everything went fuzzy… he swore he heard a voice right above him.

  “Take him.”

  Chapter Sixteen

  “You sure you’re ready for this?” Jenny asked.

  Alison nodded. “I’m ready.”

  “I mean, there’s a chance,” she said. “Like I said. There’s a chance you can turn around. That you can walk away. You’ve got your antibiotics now. You should be on the right path. Hell, you look a shitload healthier already.”

  Alison swallowed a lump in her throat as she crouched there in the darkness. She could still see, as clear a night as it was, but visibility was distorted just enough to lean in her and Jenny’s favour. “I’m not walking away,” she said. “Not after what you told me about the bunker. Not after what you told me about what these people took from you. And… and not after everything you’ve done for me already.”

  Jenny shrugged. “Fair enough. But don’t just stick around here ’cause you think you’ve got some kind of sentimental attachment to me ’cause I helped you out. Do it because you think it’s the right thing for you.”

  “For someone so selfless, you’re actually pretty selfish.”

  “Selfishness keeps people like me alive. Anyway. No more time to waste. You know what you have to do.”

  Alison looked at the bow and arrow in her hands. Jenny had given her a crash course on using one. After all, she’d used one in the past on archery trips with work, and she’d actually been pretty good. The instructor told her she had a knack for it.

  But this was different. This was actually using a bow and arrow with its original intention and purpose.

  Alison wasn’t sure how she’d react when she was faced with whatever situation lay ahead.

  And now here she was. Standing over this weird old bunker, waiting to intercept it, not only so Jenny could get her stuff back—but so that they could take this bunker for themselves.

  The bunker was strange. It was landscaped into the grass. The metal looked rusty and worn down. It didn’t look like this place had been used in years.

  But then Jenny had good reason to want to take a place like this. Even without electricity—even with the generators out of order—a bunker provided a real safe place. It was somewhere they could lock down, somewhere they could defend.

  Which was what made Alison nervous about this whole idea of going in and taking it.

  “There’s five of them,” Jenny said. “Five that I saw. We go down there, take out the two on night guard. We raise some kind of alarm, get a panic going. Then before they even know what’s hit them, we take them out. Okay?”

  Alison had to admit she was nervous about this whole thing. After all, she didn’t even know who these people were. Maybe they’d had good reason to steal from Jenny. Maybe they had children. Maybe they were just doing what they had to in order to get by, in order to survive.

  “There can be no room for sentimentality,” Jenny said. “It’ll only get you killed. It’ll get your dog killed. It’ll get all of us killed. Okay?”

  Alison looked over her shoulder at the tree where Arya was tied. She looked worried like she feared she was being abandoned. But the truth was, they couldn’t go taking her into what was potentially a dangerous place. Especially not if they were taking it by force.

  “Are you ready?” Jenny asked.

  Alison swallowed a lump in her throat.

  And then she nodded.

  “Then it’s time.”

  They crept down the side of the hill. Crept slowly, in the darkness, more of the bunker being revealed in the process. And when they got midway down the hill, that’s when Alison saw them. The night guards. Sitting on plastic chairs on the sloped side of the bunker. Neither of them looked like they were particularly “heavy.” They didn’t look like they were doing their best job of defending this place.

  They didn’t look particularly nasty, either.

  Alison heard
the stretching of Jenny’s bow.

  Her stomach turned. Because this was becoming reality now.

  She looked at Jenny.

  Then she looked back at the person sitting there, book in their lap, flask by their side.

  She wanted to warn him.

  She didn’t want this to descend into conflict.

  She didn’t want—

  It happened in a flash.

  The arrow flew from Jenny’s bow.

  It surged towards the man sitting there on this hill.

  And with perfect precision, perfect accuracy, it flew into his neck.

  Alison watched him struggle. She saw him try to gasp something, try to shout.

  But all he could do was tumble out of that chair.

  All he could do was roll down that hill.

  “This is where we get to work,” Jenny said.

  She started to jog closer to the bunker. Alison joined her. Right in time, the man’s body slammed against the concrete.

  The other man stepped up and looked over at his friend. “Danny?” he called.

  Again, the tension built up inside Alison. She raised her bow. Went to fire.

  But then she saw it.

  She saw the way this man’s eyes met hers.

  The way he looked at her.

  The total fear.

  She held the bow there, hand shaking, not sure whether she was going to be able to do this.

  Then another arrow flew past and slammed into his throat.

  She watched him fall. Heard him shout out. And when he hit the ground beside his fallen friend, who was still twitching, she looked at Jenny, and she couldn’t believe any of this was happening.

  She heard footsteps approaching the bunker door, as the pair of them sat there, bows and arrows in hand.

  “Ready?” Jenny asked.

  Alison went to respond.

  She didn’t get the chance.

  The door opened.

  And the second it did, she didn’t even think.

  She released the arrow before even Jenny could.