In the Aftermath: Burning of the Dawn

by Coleman Thompson

  Daniel drove slowly and remained cautious. For the Hannigans, it had been a while since they’d been in a town of this size. The last time was Lock Haven months ago, and it resulted in Maria being attacked and her mother subsequently murdering her daughter’s attackers. Clarissa was nervous, but she remained composed and focused on Vita. Maria was a little scared, but also intrigued. The geography of the bigger towns and cities enthralled her and occasionally reminded her of those less barbaric times from her no-so-distant past. It wasn’t long before Daniel was crossing a bridge over a large creek, French Creek, which was the same creek Clarissa had followed into, and out of, Daniel’s town. After crossing over the bridge, Daniel navigated through some of the city parks and made his way to South Main Street. Eventually, he reached Diamond Park, the heart of the city. Bordering the park were many churches, along with the county court house, and a public library. The park itself, with its lack of maintenance, had gone rogue and no longer possessed much in the way of aesthetic appeal. Daniel passed it by without much thought. With the park behind him, he was now on North Main Street, which was also highway 86: the route out of Meadville and on to Daniel’s home.

  The ghost city of Meadville was left behind and the eastern sky was coated in an orange and yellow radiance as the sun finally arrived. Twenty minutes after leaving Meadville, Daniel reached his home. He parked his truck close to the front of his house and promptly proceeded in assisting the Hannigans in any way that he could. Clarissa handed Vita’s resuscitator bag over to Maria, again; she then lifted Vita up from the truck bed and carried her to the back where Daniel was waiting. She handed her daughter over to Daniel as Maria climbed out beside her sister. Daniel then carried Vita towards the house as Clarissa climbed down from the truck. As Clarissa touched the ground she finally began to feel her injuries. The Sayona had hundreds of small thorns along their arms and on the palms of their hands, and these little spines left scratches all over Clarissa’s face, head, and neck. Her right hand had dozens of small puncture wounds from where she had grabbed the Sayona by her barbed, hair-like tentacles. The Sayona had also partially bitten Clarissa on the head, which dug deep gashes into her scalp. However, the pain from all of those many wounds was minuscule compared to the obstinate agony that repeatedly stabbed her in the side with every breath she took. It was just under Clarissa’s left arm, where the Sayona had clubbed her with its tail. Clarissa knew it was bad, but right now she would have to ignore her injuries, as Vita’s situation was much more dire.

  With her free hand, Maria opened the front door to Daniel’s house and led him inside. Daniel carried Vita over to the entrance of his secret storeroom and waited for Clarissa, who soon arrived.

  “This is the safest room,” Daniel spoke. “I think we should keep her in here.”

  “That’s fine.” Clarissa agreed.

  “You want to put down some blankets or anything?” Daniel asked. “She might have to be here for a while.”

  “All right.” Clarissa confirmed. She then took over the ventilator duties from Maria.

  The blankets that the Hannigans had used the previous night were nearby. Maria retrieved them and blanketed the storeroom floor once again. Daniel then gently placed Vita onto the blankets as Clarissa took her position on the floor beside her daughter. She reached down and felt of Vita’s pulse: she was still very much alive.

  Daniel reached over to a nearby shelf and obtained a bottle of water, which he then handed to Maria. She downed the beverage voraciously. Daniel then retrieved another, removed the lid, and handed it down to Clarissa. She, too, did not hesitate to drink. It didn’t take long for Maria to finish her bottle. After she had finished, she stared at the empty bottle for a moment and then looked down to her helpless sister lying on the storeroom floor. A startling realization overcame her.

  “How long will she be like this?” Maria asked.

  “I don’t know,” Daniel replied. “There’s no tellin’, it could be days… but we’ll be here for her.”

  “Oh no,” Maria whimpered. “How’s she suppose to drink? She can’t go without water. If we remove the breathing tube she’ll suffocate… what’re we suppose to do?!”

  “It’s all right, hon’.” Daniel calmly replied. “There are other ways to keep her hydrated.”

  Maria could see that neither Daniel nor her mother seemed worried about Vita succumbing to dehydration. They obviously knew something that she did not, and she was curiously as to what that was. “How? Like putting her in a bath or something?”

  “Well, you could do that,” Daniel awkwardly answered. “But… there’s a better way.”

  “What is it? An IV bag? You have one?” Maria pressed him further.

  “No, I don’t, but… please trust me Maria, she’ll be fine.” Daniel pleaded; though he was well aware that Maria wouldn’t be satisfied until she had her answer. Thankfully, her mother intervened.

  “Proctoclysis…” Clarissa stated as she looked up to Maria. “An enema.”

  “Oh,” Maria responded. “Really? Wow, poor Vita.”

  Daniel leaned over and quietly asked Clarissa, “Is she allergic to latex?”

  “No, she’s not.”

  “Why do you… never mind.” Maria nearly questioned. She remembered that her paralyzed sister could possibly hear everything that they were saying. Maria knew that Vita was not one who was easily prone to embarrassment, but still, it probably wasn’t something she wanted to be hearing at that moment.

  Daniel went upstairs to the room in which he housed his bounty of propane and gasoline. Somewhere in this room he located a roll of latex tubing. He had originally found it at the Meadville Medical Center and at the time he had only planned on using it as an alternative to rope (which was surprisingly difficult to find). Now he had another use for it. Daniel cut off about a meter’s length of tubing and then procured his smallest fuel funnel from a nearby toolbox. He then returned to the first floor and obtained his LED lantern. All of these supplies he brought to the storeroom.

  Clarissa was still in her original spot, but Maria had taken a place lying down next to her sister on the storeroom pallet. Daniel set the tubing, the funnel, and the lantern down next to Clarissa. He also took a small bottle of castor oil from a shelf within the storeroom and added it to that collection. Daniel looked down to Vita and Maria lying on the floor. Maria was holding her sister’s hand; she now had her eyes closed as well. He could only imagine how exhausted the young girl was, along with her mother. Clarissa showed signs of fatigue, but she didn’t look overtly tired. This was good; Daniel needed them awake for a little longer.

  “I have to leave for a while.” Daniel spoke. Maria quickly sat up with a disapproving scowl.

  “Leave? For what? And for where?” Maria demanded.

  “I have to go back for your car,” Daniel answered. “Or at least for what’s in it.”

  “You have to right now?” Maria implored. “We just got back.”

  “I know, but what you have in there is too valuable. If the Sayona haven’t taken it yet, they definitely will by tonight. I’m sorry, but I can’t let that happen.”

  “The Sayona might have damaged the car,” Clarissa spoke. “They took out a tire at least.”

  “Do you have a spare?”

  “I do, it’s under the car.”

  “Okay, if I can fix it I’ll pull your car back. If I can’t, I’ll take whatever I can and just leave it. I’ll probably need your keys.”

  Clarissa reached into one of her pockets and retrieved her car keys and handed them to Daniel. She, too, did not like the idea of him leaving her in such a vulnerable state with her daughter, but she really disliked the idea of the Sayona pillaging all of the valuables that she and Daniel had fought for.

  “Thank you,” Daniel spoke as he took the keys from Clarissa. “I’ll move fast. It’s not that far, so I shouldn’t be more than a few hours at most.”

  “Don’t do anything foolish,” Maria commanded. “We need you here, with us!�
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  “I give you my word, Ms. Maria; I will return.” Daniel promised her. “And where is your car? I didn’t see it last night.”

  “It’s parked behind the house.” Clarissa answered.

  “Okay, all right then, I’ll return shortly. Maria, can you lock the door behind me?”

  Maria stood from her spot on the pallet and followed Daniel all the way out to his truck. He inspected his vehicle to see if he had everything that was necessary for his impromptu excursion. Daniel would need a chain to pull Clarissa’s car. He had one in his garage which he would retrieve on his way out. For now, he gave some parting words to Maria.

  “When I leave, hide in the storeroom. Close the door and just stay in there ‘til I get back. I’m sure nothing will happen, but it’s best to be safe while I’m gone.”

  “Can I ask you something?” Maria asked.

  “Yeah, of course.” Daniel answered.

  “Why’d you come looking for us?”

  Daniel did not reply right away; he didn’t know how Maria would react to his answer. The girl had been through a hellish ordeal already, which was still not over yet, and the last thing Daniel wanted was to burden her mind any more than was necessary, but he didn’t want to be dishonest with her either. He decided to give Maria the truth, most of it anyway, as gently as he could.

  “That family you girls met a few days back…” Daniel spoke softly. “The one I promised to go looking for.”

  “You actually found them?” Maria spoke, her countenance flushed with surprise.

  Daniel nodded in cold acknowledgement, “Yeah… what was left of them.”

  Maria’s surprised expression immediately faded into gloom. She looked down to the ground as tears filled her eyes. “We let them die… my mother left them to die.”

  “No, this was nobody’s fault.” Daniel asserted. “Not yours and not your mother’s.”

  “That poor, little girl… how horrible.” Maria wept. She remembered the frightened look on Sophie’s face when Clarissa aimed her shotgun down upon the little girl and her family. Maria never could have imaged just how much worse that day was going to get for the Doniphan family. “Do you know how terrifying it is to know that those things are going to kill you? To know that they’re going to rip your family apart right in front of you and to know that there’s nothing you can do about it?”

  “No, I don’t, but I do know this: if I had found them alive, or if I hadn’t found them at all, I wouldn’t have come looking for you. Their deaths saved your life, and your mother’s and your sister’s.” Maria made no vocal reply. Daniel continued to try and comfort her. “They were good people and they didn’t deserve what happened to them, but there’s only one thing at fault here for their deaths… and you know what that is.”

  “Yeah,” Maria replied. “I remember.”

  “When you go back inside, look at your mother.” Daniel beseeched. “She is torn up. She took that thing on to keep it away from you, didn’t she?” Maria nodded in response. “Remember that, and remember what you and your sister did. What I witnessed last night was nothing short of remarkable. You girls took on the Sayona and you won.”

  Maria chuckled through her lamentation, “I think you might’ve had an assist in that.”

  “One of those things was missing an eye and another one had bullet holes all over it by the time I got there.” Daniel retorted. “Hell, I practically missed the whole fight.”

  “You saved our lives.”

  “You saved yourselves actually; I just took all the credit.” Daniel smirked as he spoke. “Now go back inside and protect my house for me, okay? And by protect I mean you hide in that storeroom with your mother until I get back.”

  “All right, I will.” Maria replied, mustering a smirk of her own. “If those dead Sayona are still there, kick ‘em a few times for me, will ya?”

  “Oh yeah,” Daniel approved. “I’ve got some plans of my own for them.”

  Maria waved goodbye to Daniel as she walked back into his house. She closed the front door and dutifully locked it behind her. Daniel closed his truck door and started up his vehicle. He drove over to his garage and retrieved a long, heavy-duty chain with iron hooks on each end. He tossed it into the back of his truck and set off to salvage what he could from Clarissa’s car. Before leaving his property, Daniel stopped for his utility trailer that sat just off of his driveway. He hitched it to his truck and then continued on.

  Maria did not return to the storeroom directly; instead, she took a detour to the downstairs bathroom in search of some items. She found them in the bathroom’s medicine cabinet: a bottle of iodine and a tube of antibiotic ointment. She grabbed a few small rags from the sink and returned to her mother in the storeroom. Clarissa was examining the wound on Vita’s leg when Maria returned. The hole left by the Sayona’s stinger was around two inches deep and about the size of a standard pencil in circumference. Even though the injuries inflicted by the stingers were extremely deadly, they were also much less destructive to the flesh when compared to the venomous fangs in the Sayona’s mouth. There was a light, clear discharge coming from Vita’s wound (her body’s attempt to expel some of the venom), but otherwise the little puncture was not showing any signs of infection. Clarissa took notice of the items that Maria was carrying.

  “We shouldn’t use those yet,” Clarissa spoke. “Her body will take care of itself, so long as we keep her breathing.”

  “They’re not for her, mama.”

  Maria acquired another one of Daniel’s bottled waters and sat down next to her mother. She poured some of the water onto one of the rags and then began to wipe away the grime and the dried blood from her mother’s face.

  “Grazie, Maria.”

  “Prego, mama.”

  Clarissa’s many little cuts and scratches stung as her daughter cleaned them, but it was difficult for Clarissa to notice this due to the searing pain in her side caused by the Sayona’s vicious tail-lashing. This would soon change as Maria moved on from the many small injuries and focused on the large bite marks on her mother’s scalp. There were two severe gashes left in Clarissa’s head by way of the Sayona’s teeth; both were about a centimeter wide and fifteen centimeters long. Although the Sayona had not bitten her properly enough to inject any venom, the beast still had remnants of the venom on her many teeth. The Sayona periodically expelled their venom into their own mouths to both cleanse their teeth and to make their bites all the more painful for their victims. The trace amounts of venom in Clarissa’s scalp would not cause her any significant harm, but it would’ve proven to be exceedingly painful had she not been distracted by her side injury.

  “This one’s gonna hurt, mama.” Maria spoke as she readied the dropper in the iodine bottle.

  “Yeah, I know.” Clarissa prepared for the imminent pain.

  Maria ran the dropper along both head wounds, bathing them in iodine. The pain in Clarissa’s side temporarily abated in place of the powerful stinging in her scalp. Despite the pain, Clarissa did not flinch, she did not cry, and she did not protest in any way. She focused solely on keeping Vita’s breathing steady. After a few moments, the pain on her head went away and the pain in her side returned. Maria finished things off by applying the antibiotic ointment to her mother’s more substantial wounds.

  “Those bigger scratches in your hair might need to be stitched,” Maria spoke. “I don’t think I can do it though. When Daniel gets back maybe we’ll have him look at it.”

  “I’ll be all right,” Clarissa responded. “Thank you.”

  Maria could detect a change in her mother’s tone. She had first noticed it that morning after they had spent the night at the truck stop. Maria first assumed that it was from when the Sayona had grabbed her mother around the neck. Clarissa’s neck had many scratches, yet not a single bruise. The change in tone had also taken many hours before manifesting itself. Maria then remembered back to when the Sayona had struck her mother with its tail. There was no telling how much damage it h
ad done, and it would explain why she was now having difficulty speaking.

  “Mom, are you hurt anywhere else?” Maria asked, knowing that she was not likely to get a straight answer.

  “I don’t think so,” Clarissa predictably replied. “I’m okay.”

  “Please tell me the truth. When that thing hit you with its tail, how bad did it hurt you?”

  That was a difficult question for Clarissa to answer. It was without question that she had been injured badly by the Sayona’s tail whip, but she also knew that there was little she could do about it. Clarissa looked to Maria; she couldn’t lie to her daughter, but she didn’t want to give her the whole truth just yet.

  “It hurt, but it’ll heal,” Clarissa answered. “It’s not that bad.”

  “Can I look?” Maria spoke as she moved to flank her mother.

  Clarissa stopped her and said, “Not yet, we need to tend to your sister first. I’ll be all right. Once we get her through this you can fret over me as much as you like, but for now, Vita needs our full attention.”

  Maria recognized that her mother was at least half right. Vita was the one in critical condition and who demanded constant care, but Maria was also aware that her mother was not all right. The only thing that she could do was wait for Daniel to return. Maybe then her mother would see reason and let either Maria or Daniel look after Vita while she attended her own injuries. If she did not see reason, then Maria desperately hoped that Daniel could think of some other way of persuading her mother.

  Free of injured passengers and on an open, sunlit road, Daniel had little to slow him down on his return trip to find the Hannigans’ vehicle. He made the thirty mile trek in about half an hour’s time. Daniel parked his truck in the same spot he had done so the night before. The two dead Sayona still lay where he had left them. Daniel walked towards the Sayona that had attacked Clarissa, he stepped over the deceased beast and retrieved Clarissa’s shotgun. He also obtained Maria’s MP5 and Vita’s revolver. Daniel located the Hannigans’ car behind the house. The only damage he could find was the destruction of the back right tire; everything else seemed in working order. Daniel placed the Hannigans’ firearms in the passenger seat of their vehicle; he then started up the car, drove it around to the front of the house, and parked it on the gravel drive where it would be easier to change the damaged tire. Daniel always kept a floor jack and a four-way lug wrench in his truck, which he used to quickly swap out the defunct tire with Clarissa’s spare. Daniel’s trailer was eight feet wide and twelve feet long; it would hold Clarissa’s vehicle from a dimensions standpoint, but the weight limit was an unknown. The tailgate of the trailer was a thick, metal grating that would likely hold the weight of Clarissa’s car, so long as it did not break loose from the trailer itself.