Born In The Apocalypse (Book 3): Jericho

by Joseph Talluto

  I tried not to think about the people who had died because of that wall and those lies. My parents, my friends, the list went on and on. The more I thought about it the angrier I got. I wanted to cause damage, hurt in some way, something to pay them all back. I didn’t have any idea how, and every scenario I thought of just got myself killed.

  I stood up, and arranged the pack and my coat in a more comfortable fashion. I left the satchel on my left side, leaving my right hand free. I didn’t know what I was going to face as I made my way north and west, but I really didn’t care. I wasn’t a child of civilization; I was a child of the apocalypse.

  A buzzing sound interfered with my thoughts and through the leaves of the trees overhead I saw two white things zip past. They weren’t planes, and they looked like small helicopters that had four rotors each. I was curious enough that I climbed out of my little hole and went to the edge of the trees. I watched the strange flying things soar away, and as they did, they split apart and went in different directions. As I got a side view of the things, I could see a small bulbous protrusion on the bottom of each. I wasn’t sure that that was, but I had a suspicion I knew that they might be looking for me.

  I looked around my little hidey-hole and figured I may need to think about traveling by night, But I was going to get moving anyway. I figured I could get out of sight when the damn things came near, since it wasn’t hard to hear when they were nearby.

  As I stepped out, one thought made me smile. If they wanted to hunt me, they were going to earn it. I was going to show them what a survivor could do.

  Chapter 12

  “Report.”

  “Sir, we’ve conducted sweep throughout the eastern portion of the state, as much as we figured he was on foot. Every town has been alerted, and so far, the local authorities know to keep a lookout for a man of his description. They aren’t asking why, but some of them are starting to wonder and figure out our interest.”

  “Damn. All right. Well, if we go with an announcement, we’ll have trouble for sure. What about those two you picked up earlier?”

  “The ones who tried to rob him? They’ve been dealt with, sir.”

  Vega didn’t ask what that meant and he didn’t need to. He knew Townsend was as good as a soldier as he could hope for. He sighed long and hard. For some reason, he felt his years, even though they weren’t that many. He looked at Townsend.

  “What aren’t you telling me, Sergeant?” Vega asked. He kept his nearly black eyes on the taller man, reading him as if he was reading a warrant.

  “Sir, there may be some greater trouble from this one. Corporal Baker was of the mind that this one was different, that he was a survivor and we needed to think like one to get a handle on where he might go. I didn’t do that, and I think we lost some search time because of it,” Townsend said.

  Vega nodded. “We’ve seen some survivors before, this one just happens to be lucky. No cause for alarm.”

  “Sir, I believe there is, sir.”

  “What?”

  “Sir, this one went to a library and went back to the beginning. He found out why the wall was built and he learned what we did with the refugees. He knows about what the government did, what we did. He knows, sir,” Townsend said.

  Vega leaned back against his desk and let the full import of that statement wash over him. He put his head down to try and keep the feeling of dread from overwhelming him, but it came up anyway. Vega turned his eyes to the ceiling and blew out the breath he had been holding.

  “Oh my God,” Vega said in barely a whisper.

  Townsend was a little nervous. He had never seen Vega like this before. Even when the order came to terminate the refugees, Vega never flinched. His gun was firing before anyone else’s. He just knew what had to be done. Townsend saw something in Vega that he had never expected to see before. Townsend knew without a doubt that Vega was suddenly very afraid.

  “Did the drones find anything?” Vega said suddenly, hopefully.

  “No, sir, they’ve been sweeping the state. This guy either knows what they are for and he is avoiding them, or he has figured out that they have a limited range and is just waiting them out. Like I said, he’s a survivor,” Townsend said.

  “Well, not for long.” Vega punched a button on his intercom. “I want all runner squads to report to base within the hour. Send out the alarm. Seal the frontier.” Vega released the button and looked back at Townsend.

  “With what that boy knows, he needs to be captured or killed before he talks to anyone. God help us if he comes in contact with one of those anti-wall idiots,” Vega said.

  Townsend saluted and left. He knew what the captain was talking about. When the wall went up, dozens of protest group sprang up, calling the wall fascist and the government murderers and worse. If the survivor managed to make it to one of those groups, and he was living proof that there was life inside the wall, then there would be a shit storm the likes of which no one had ever seen. Townsend had no respect for those people. They sat in their comfortable homes and complained about how bad the world was, but they never faced down a Tripper. They never saw what a family looked like after a horde had swept through and torn them to pieces. They passed judgment on the world without knowing a damn thing. Townsend knew their anger firsthand, because a lot of it had been directed at him and his men.

  “Sorry, kid, but I’m not going through that again,” Townsend said to himself as he walked towards where his men were waiting. If one of his men had a shot, he was ordered to take it, period.

  Chapter 13

  I stayed off the roads, and I mostly traveled during the night and around the dusk and dawn hours. The only things I came in contact with were farm animals and creeks. I figured I made about eight to ten miles a night in walking. I would have been able to make a lot more time if I got onto a road, but I knew that the roads would be watched, and the more time I spent under the trees, the less likely any of those flying things would be able to see me. I’d seen several of them over the past couple of days; they crisscrossed the sky something fierce during the middle of the day. I didn’t hear any at night, so I thought they were hard pressed to see well in the dark. I wished I had my bow with me. I would have liked to see if I could knock one of those things down for a closer look. My handgun could do the job, but I would have to be close.

  I discovered that the town I had found was called Hebron, and I only knew that because I saw the sign thanking me for visiting as I looked back. They were pretty nice there, overall, except for those two idiots who thought they could rob me. I wonder what happened to them after I told them I was from Illinois? Guess I’d never know.

  I used the night to travel for more than just concealment from flyers. I could also see from the glows in the sky where large concentrations of people were. I didn’t want anyone to see me, because I didn’t want to get caught. But I also didn’t want to meet people on this side of the wall because I was mad at all of them. They let the wall happen. They let the government shut us up and shut us off as if we didn’t matter. They didn’t say stop when they could have, and I was holding a grudge against them all for that. My mother, my father, my friends. Everyone who had been left behind for no other crime than being in the wrong place at the wrong time. We didn’t deserve to be treated that way. We didn’t deserve to be left to die.

  The one bad thing about trying to go quietly in Indiana was there was a lot of open space. The crops were harvested, leaving huge open spaces of flat land. I walked in the ditches and the banks of creeks, keeping myself as low as possible. During the day, I slept in what abandoned places I could find. If that didn’t work, I found that there were a lot of small platforms in the few groves of trees around the area. Every forest I came to had at least two or three. They were a lot more convenient than sleeping on the ground, and several of them were sheltered from the wind and rain.

  I had only been discovered once, and that was by a small boy. He saw me get up out of his daddy’s barn, and I held my finger to my l
ips as I passed him by. Since he didn’t scream, I wonder if he had seen such a thing before and it wasn’t a big deal to him.

  This evening, I was still headed north, aiming myself between a very large light on the right and somewhat lesser light on the left. The route I was taking had me following a road for a small amount of time, and I stayed in the ditch to keep out of sight. I ducked a few times as cars passed by, but as I was discovering, people in cars tended not to see anything other than the spot in their headlights when they were driving at night. I got nervous every time a car passed, and I was looking forward to the time when I could get off the road.

  I was about to get out of the ditch when I heard a heavy motor sound to the south. I had seen trucks going by so I knew the sound, but this time it seemed different. The truck didn’t seem to be in any real hurry to get where it was going, so normally I would decide to slip out of the ditch and into the tall grass on the side of the road. At normal speed, people didn’t see me. At slower speeds, I was running a risk, and for some reason, I decided not to head out into the grass but stay where I was. The ditch was deeper at this point and was home to a small creek that had been dry for a time. I leaned back against the bank and the truck was completely hidden from my view.

  The truck rolled past, and it was slow in rolling. I heard boots walking along the road and there were bits of conversation that drifted down my way.

  “Heard he’s a fighter.”

  “Maybe. I doubt it. Don’t matter if he is.”

  “Anything on your side?”

  “Nothing on heat, night vision empty.”

  That was a new one to me. I had no idea they could see in the dark or were able to see the heat I gave off. I gave a small prayer of thanks to whoever was listening that I had stayed in the ditch. More conversation fell to earth.

  “Vega’s nuts about this one.”

  “Don’t matter. He’s dead like the rest we catch.”

  “Towns know it?

  “Yeah, they got notified earlier today.”

  “Why are we out here?”

  “’Cause we have no rank, dumbass.”

  I felt like a bucket of cold water had been dumped down my back. It was bad enough they were all against me because I wasn’t dead when I was supposed to be, but now they wanted to make me dead. I thought about that for a while, and it dawned on me that I represented what they were afraid of. I had survived, and we were proof the government killed its own. No wonder they wanted me dead. They weren’t afraid of infection; they were afraid of the truth.

  I waited until they were out of hearing, and then I waited a little more. If there was one thing I had learned from dealing with Trippers, it was patience. It was a full fifteen minutes before I left the ditch.

  My first thought was to head into the woods and disappear, but then another thought came to me. I would just follow the soldiers. They obviously figured the area they had just been through was clear, so why would they look behind themselves? If I stayed in between the patrols, they would report all is clear, never knowing I was right here all the time. With any luck, I’d be back over the wall in a few days, a week at the most.

  I thought about the wall and I thought about Kim. I hoped she was doing okay, and the Tripper horde hadn’t chased her all the way back to the houses. She was safe enough behind our walls, but if they knew she was in there, they would never leave. I realized I suddenly had choices. I could get Kim, get the horses to someplace safe, and we could jump the wall anywhere. Knowing what we were in for, we could blend in easier, and no one would ever be the wiser.

  I remembered the stories my mother used to teach me about the Underground Railroad, and how the slaves were brought north to freedom. I wondered if Kim and I would be like that, getting people out of Illinois to the states of freedom on the other side. That thought amused me as I walked on, keeping myself heading north. I left the road when it began to angle over to the east, and I wasn’t moving in the direction I wanted any more. Once I was past the two cities, I was going to head west, and get closer to the wall. I knew it would be watched closely, so I was going to have to be careful.

  If I was caught I was killed, simple as that.

  “Who goes there?”

  Chapter 14

  A harsh voice shattered the night calm like a rock through a window. I nearly jumped back into the ditch, but I knew that would trap me.

  “Just me, no trouble, no trouble,” I said, trying to look down but at the same time I was trying to see who it was that had hailed me.

  It was a lone soldier, a young man of around twenty. He was dressed in full battle gear, carrying what looked to be a very serious rifle. He had on a helmet and the helmet had some strange contraption that swung down to cover one of his eyes. That must be what they used for looking in the dark.

  He walked up to me, looking me up and down.

  “You a local?”

  I realized he couldn’t see my backpack, as I was facing him directly. He was about six inches shorter than I was, and it seemed like he was irritated that I was taller than him. He kept looking me up and down.

  “Yeah, just trying to get home, that’s all,” I said. “What’s going on? How come you’re out here? What’s with all the trucks and troops?” I asked. I was playing a dangerous game, but it was the only play I had, outside of taking this man down. I wasn’t sure that was going to be easy, and I didn’t know if there were any others out in the dark.

  “Looking for someone, that’s all. You see anyone strange walking around?” The soldier looked at me again, like he was trying to remember something.

  “Nope, haven’t seen anyone, but it’s dark,” I said. “Should I be worried? Is this person dangerous?

  “That it is. No need to worry, we’re here, it’s all good.” The soldier tried to affect a comforting tone, but he failed miserably.

  “What should I look for?” I asked. Inwardly, I groaned. I knew I just made a huge mistake.

  “We’re looking for a fella about your height, wearing …” The soldier hesitated and began to bring up his rifle. “Wait a minute …”

  I grabbed the barrel of the rifle and pulled it forward, jerking him off balance, while at the same time I grabbed the main section of the gun, sticking my thumb behind the trigger, keeping it from firing. I slammed the top of the rifle into the soldier’s face, knocking his helmet off and causing him to let go of the rifle. He stumbled back and I tossed the rifle away.

  “Son of a bitch!” the soldier swore as he wiped off his bloody face and lunged at me, reaching out with both hands to try and grapple with me.

  That might work with someone on this side of the wall, but that’s a classic Tripper move that we learned how to avoid when we were children. I redirected his right arm to pass me by and I punched him in the side of the neck as he passed. If he had been a Tripper, I’d have killed him with that punch, since I would have done it with a knife in my hand. As it was, I didn’t have a need to kill this one yet. That punch took the soldier to the ground, but he was game, I’ll give him that. On his hands and knees, he tried to wrap his arms around my legs, and I gave him a knee to the head for his trouble. He fell back and immediately started to roll over to get back up.

  I knelt on his shoulders and pinned him to the ground. He wriggled and tried to buck me off, so I took out my Colt and gave him a good rap on the head, quieting his struggles. I used the cord I had to secure his hands and feet, and by the time I was done, he wasn’t going to go anywhere without help for a while.

  I took his helmet with the weird goggle on it and left the rest. I had no need for the rifle and it would only serve to confuse anyone who might be following me.

  Taking off my hat and replacing it with the helmet, I turned on the special goggle and found the landscape was oddly green and bizarrely lit. But I could see in the dark, which just made traveling easier and faster. I moved at mostly at a jog, my final thought being that instead of keeping in between the patrols, I was going to head overland. They were c
onstrained by their equipment and their transportation.

  I, on the other hand, had no problem with walking, keeping low, and staying in the shadows. I’d been doing it my whole life.

  After about an hour of moving, the eyepiece suddenly went dark. I took off the helmet and realized the batteries were dead. I buried the helmet in what appeared to be a field of cows. I doubted they could track me this far, but I just learned they could see in the dark and could see the heat I gave off. As far as I knew, the helmet was sending off distress signals every ten minutes.

  The eastern sky was starting to turn grey, chasing away the purple night. I had to find some place to rest up, and then I was going to head out. Traveling at night was no longer an option. If I wanted to stay hidden, I needed to move during the day. Not ideal, but I needed every advantage I could gain. I had to get to Illinois.

  Off in the distance, I saw an outbuilding that looked like it used to belong to some kind of farm, but it was little more than a few sticks with a roof stuck on top. As I got closer, I realized that if it wasn’t for the holes in the sides, the wind might actually blow it over as opposed to blowing through. I didn’t really care about that; I just needed to keep the rain off my head should it happen.

  Inside the place was surprisingly clean, and there were no other occupants to challenge my intrusion. I used my rope to make a bed in the rafters by wrapping it around a couple of the beams. Once it was secure, I tucked my gun into my backpack and carefully stretched out in my hammock. The beams held, and I was comfortably tucked up in the rafters, out of sight of anyone just glancing in to see if there were any intruders. I briefly thought about the soldier I hit earlier, but then sleep took me and I was out. The wind blew underneath me, but it didn’t reach the beams, something I was sleepily thankful for.