Though they experienced their fair share of violence and hardship, the first couple of months were a bit easier for them. They’d gone from pillar to post being pushed around by agencies and organizations, but they weren’t completely aware of what was happening outside the walls of the shelters where they sought refuge.
After a while, the volunteers only showed up sporadically with a promise of help that was coming. Then the news stopped. People started disappearing. The food supply depleted. The violence increased. The weeks faded into months, and it became evident to them that the help they were promised wouldn’t be coming. They were on their own.
Everyone was on their own.
Tye couldn’t help but laugh as he watched Elex attempt to walk directly in his dad’s footsteps. Then they were all stopped dead in their tracks.
“What was that?” Junior asked.
Immediately, Caleb and Tye rushed to hide the kids then peeked around to see what was going on. Standing behind a cluster of trees they got a good look. Caleb’s body thrust forward in an attempt to intervene, but Tye placed a hand on his chest and stopped him. Tye suddenly felt heavy, unable to move. His primal inclination was to help women in need but this wasn’t the same world it was five months ago.
A chill invaded his body as sweat saturated his clothing. If his wife, daughter, or sister were being attacked, he'd want someone to help, but there were risks like being hurt or killed. Even worse, he knew they took a chance of putting the kids in danger if they did anything. The odds didn’t seem to outweigh the reward. They could no longer act without thinking of their own families.
Suddenly he felt Caleb’s hand on his shoulder. He heard him whisper, “I’m not saying we do anything but if we do, save the bullets. It’s only one guy. We can take him.”
He watched as Caleb put his head down for a moment then looked back at him, “We really should just walk away…”
Tye’s mind raced. If they were going to leave, they needed to go now. He may have been determined enough to walk away to protect his family, but he wasn’t strong enough to witness this man defile some poor woman.
While his humanity wrestled with his instinct, he saw something he recognized. His eyes widened, and his mouth went dry. He focused on the scene playing out before him.
A few yards from them, the man struggled to get the woman to comply. The man took a deep breath and leaned in to attack her once more. When he did she spit a mouth full of blood right into his eyes. She managed to get her hands free and thrust them against his shoulders. Given the room she needed, she shifted her body from under him and put her legs into position to inflict damage.
Tye gasped, “I know that kick.” He gave Caleb a look that expressed grave concern. Without giving it any more thought they both ran to help her. Caleb tucked his head and tackled him to the ground. The man started swinging at him, so Caleb slammed his fist into his jaw until he submitted. He took the guy’s gun from his waistband and pointed it at him. “Don’t move!”
Tye ran over to the stunned woman. He pulled her up and tried to stabilize her, but her legs wobbled underneath her. “Are you okay?” he asked.
Tye held onto her shoulders, and when she looked up at him, he could’ve sworn there was a glimpse of recognition in her eyes. He was about to say something when he felt that familiar pain in his groin. He buckled over in agony then watched as she grabbed her backpack and took off into the woods.
“Agghh!” Tye bent down holding his manhood and tried to will the pain away.
“Quit being a wuss and come help me. There’s another one under that tree.”
Caleb held the gun on the two men though the guy Maia stabbed had long been passed out. The other guy was incessantly attempting to be set free claiming she stole from him and he was just trying to get his stuff back.
“Yeah? Out of her pants?” Caleb kicked him, “Save it, jackass. I’m not gonna kill you. Unless you do something stupid.”
With the ache somewhat subsided, Tye helped Caleb tie them up using laces they removed from their boots and the braided belt one of the guys had been wearing. It probably wouldn’t hold them for long, but it would give them a head start.
Caleb stuck his foot on the leg of the younger man and ripped the knife from his thigh. Blood gushed out. “That don’t look good,” he said while cutting up a t-shirt. He tossed a piece to his buddy.
Tye couldn’t help but notice the knife. It was a combat knife, and he was sure he knew and respected the Marine who owned it. For a split second pride enveloped him then he got a whiff of the man’s stench and wrinkled his nose. “He smells like a distillery,” Tye said, tying the t-shirt strip around the eyes of the loudmouth who was still attempting to negotiate his way out of the situation.
“C’mon, man. Let me go. We can all go after her. After we get a piece, we can sell her.”
Tye and Caleb weren’t entertaining his offer, but that didn’t stop him from trying, “Dude, listen! A whole herd of Yanks just got here and they all looking to buy. You know what they trade for healthy women like that? You see them hips, man?”
Tye could no longer resist. He summoned the pain from his groin and directed the energy to his fist. He threw two punches and knocked the guy out. “Agosta: 1, Guy who won’t shut the hell up: 0,” he said, a throwback to his days in the ring before an opponent shattered his knee and took him out for good.
The man with the stab wound bled profusely. It concerned Caleb enough that he tore another piece of the t-shirt and tied it over the wound. He checked his pulse. It felt weak but steady. There was nothing else they could think to do for him. If he lived, he lived, If not, well, so be it.
They dug through the men’s belongings, keeping the weapons, whiskey, food, and a few supplies for themselves then they tossed the rest as far away from the men as they could. They wanted to make it as difficult as possible for them to follow after them.
Tye noticed Caleb glance down at his watch. “What time is it?”
“Almost one o’clock.”
Soon it would start getting darker and colder. The wind was already beginning to blow through their jackets and snap trees all around them. They would have to find a place to settle within the next few hours.
Tye jogged back to the where the kids were hiding. “Everybody all right?”
“Yeah,” Junior said, while the two youngsters glared back at him. The crew grabbed all of their gear, rounded up the kids, then took off walking again.
Tye was sure they’d come across something soon. Hundreds of years living off the land meant Cajuns and Creoles were religious about hunting and fishing. He’d lived and played here long enough to know that deer stands, tree houses, and hunting camps were prevalent in these backwoods and most likely, they were abandoned. The last reports they heard stated that more than half the world’s population was gone. Though it was always on their mind, it was something they tried not to dwell on. Surviving was hard enough without that burden.
“You sure you know that woman? You couldn’t even see her face,” Caleb asked.
“Oh, I know her. She was one of my best students. I’m positive it was her. After the rape escape technique, the one you just saw her do, she always kicked four times with the right foot then one time, hard, with the left. Pop, pop, pop, pop, POP!" he mimicked motioning with his hands. "Most people alternate. Not her,” he recalled with a chuckle. “She’s so stubborn. She wouldn’t do it any other way.”
“I guess it’s a good thing she took your class,” Caleb said stating the obvious.
Ty’s mind drifted, “Yeah. Her husband, Lance…he’s a good friend of mine. We went to high school together. That’s a character there, boy. I don’t know if you ever met him or not…anyway, he was gone a lot. Marine. Three tours in Iraq,” he said looking over at Caleb. “He didn’t like that she was alone so much, so he asked me to train her.” Tye adjusted his backpack. “I worked out with him and the boys the week before everything went to crap. I can’t imagine him leaving her out
here by herself. I wonder what happened to them.”
I wonder what happened to them.
Statements like that tended to cause people to drift off in memories of their family and friends. Everyone had lost someone. Most people had lost many. Some lost everyone and everything they’d ever known.
“Look. Is that her?” Caleb said pointing to a slim figure darting from tree to tree.
“Nah, I thought she’d be much further by now.” He pulled out the binoculars they’d just taken off of the would-be rapists. He adjusted the lenses, but the dust and the haze made it difficult to see clearly at that distance. He shrugged his shoulders at Caleb.
“Let’s just keep an eye out. If that is her, she might be hurt. I️ hope it’s not hers, but I️ got blood on my hands when I touched her,” he said, holding out his hands for him to see.
Caleb nodded in agreement. They continued hiking through, occasionally getting a glimpse of the figure they thought to be her. The only sounds to be heard was the squishing of the muddy ruins beneath their feet and the occasional cracking of limbs from the gusts of wind.
Chapter Three
Maia rushed through the winding thicket nearly collapsing several times as she cut sharp corners. Too bad Mother Nature wasn’t into Feng Shui. That would make things a whole heck of a lot easier. It was a wonder how anyone could make it out of here in one piece.
She pushed herself to go thirty more seconds. She dodged a scampering gray fox and barely cleared a cluster of waterlogged maple roots. She forced herself to go thirty more seconds when the time was up, but exhaustion overwhelmed her.
After the torrential rains, winds, dust, lightning storms and floods, the landscape was left perilously altered. The Gladiator obstacle course she'd conquered two years ago had nothing on this apocalyptic nightmare. She picked up the pace and thought, “where’s my medal now?”
She continued to play mental games to psyche herself up. Most of the time it worked, but today her body refused to cooperate. Summoning the strength, she muttered, "Bring it,” and pushed herself forward down the slope thanking God for physics the whole way down. The momentum she acquired allowed her to get into a stride. She felt good about her progress. Then just as quickly as things started to look up, she fell into a pit of quickdust.
"Really?" she said out loud.
Quickdust was a term her group not-so-affectionately coined because of the similarities the goop had to quicksand. Water seeped from underground, saturating the dirt and fallen dust turning it into a concrete mixture. It was thick, sludgy and ridiculously hard to walk through and it was even more challenging to climb out of the deeper pits. And we won’t talk about how burdensome it became if it dried on you.
She trudged her way out of the trap, breath by breath. She stomped the funk off of her shoes, her leg muscles felt weak and shook uncontrollably. She ignored the pain and trampled several boxes of moldy snack cakes attempting to get to the next visual goal she'd set. The deer stand seemed so far away, but in reality, it should take mere seconds to reach.
She willed her heavy limbs to move then rounding the bushes, she felt as though she’d been punched in the gut. She wailed, "Oh God, why do you hate me?" Her body tensed as a gust of wind slapped her blood covered face. She caught herself on a tree and pounded her fists into the fraying bark. She'd just been through here. The remains of a lone hunter peeked through the cracks in the elevated hideout. She noticed him the first time she passed through. The dead were everywhere, but their service to the living as landmarks was a necessary inconvenience.
Some of them died where they stood or slept while others were brought in by the floodwaters; those smelled the worst. In the beginning, people who attempted to seek refuge in these woods most often didn’t make it out alive. They were either murdered at the hands of thieves or fell victim to Mother Nature. The domino events were marked by Judgement Day One through Judgement Day Seven. That was the last day of news reported by the media before they went off the air. After the string of natural disasters, it was the starvation, infection, and illnesses that brought on the most visits from the Angel of Death.
She hated admitting it but looking up at that dead man she faced the grim reality that the only reason she stood a chance in the woods today was that most of the population had perished. The remaining survivors found their tribe with others like them and banded together. All of that added up to fewer people in the woods. Well, fewer who were alive in the woods anyway.
She felt the familiar ache in her stomach. Out of fuel, she made her way around the tree looking for the entrance to the deer stand. She found it, but there was no ladder. He must've pulled it up once he got inside.
A road sign was in plain view just a couple yards away. Maia debated whether or not to bother with scavenging the dead man's supplies, but she needed energy if she was going to make it out alive. She walked over to the sign and lifted it up. The thing felt as though it weighed a ton. She dragged it over, and before she could change her mind, jabbed it up into the corner of the deer stand. The rotten wood cracked. She waited, hoping it would cave…it didn't.
The failed first attempt gave her time to contemplate. If she hit the wood again and it did collapse it would surely make more noise. She stumbled. It became impossible to prioritize or even separate all the thoughts clouding her mind. She lost her nerve and her strength. The double-edged swords were laughable if only she had the energy to be amused.
She pushed aside every other thought in her mind and chose to live. She had to do it. If ever there was a reason for all those squats and lunges it was now. Before her body sent any signals to her head to resist, she grabbed the sign again, bent her knees, then thrust every bit of energy, weight, and hope she had into the bottom of the deer stand. This time it fell. The dead man plummeted to the ground, and the smell immediately sent her stomach into rebellion. She dry heaved until the eruption of stomach acid burned her throat.
Her eyes watered, so she pulled her safety glasses away to relieve some of the moisture then put her bandana back over her face. She pulled some vapor rub out of her bag and put it under her nose. It only camouflaged the smell, but some bodies were riper than others making it essential.
She tore through his bags looking for food and water. She dropped to the ground, shoving the bag aside. He had nothing. The poor man probably died of starvation. Reality at it's finest. She looked over at the dead man and searched for any sign of who he once was.
Early on, Maia attempted to cover and pay respects to each soul she encountered. She'd say a prayer, and if she could find a name on an ID, jewelry or anywhere else, she’d write it down in her notebook. She believed it was a sign of respect to acknowledge mail lady Sondra, Thad from Wilbur Middle, Judy the Waffle House waitress, and Seth from Mississippi who worked at the Dow Chemical plant. In some way, it paid homage to the owners of the tents and sleeping bags that became signs pointing her in the direction to the place she now called home. If only she could get back there soon.
This man left no clues about his identity. It was just as well. She didn’t have the strength to dig out her notebook and jot it down anyway. She reached over and grabbed his empty bag then tossed it over his face. That would have to do.
Unfortunately, this particular stretch of land was unknown to her, and the dead man just became another landmark. She stood, struggling to move on. She willed herself into running fifteen-second bursts. After a couple, her throat burned even more because of the heavy breathing and dry heaving. The crusted blood that lined her nostrils and the bandana she wore to filter the ash-filled air made it worse.
She stumbled from tree to tree barely covering any ground. She stopped. Her sweat, mixed with the muddy water and quickdust, left her drenched, and now the temperature was falling. She had to change or bundle up, but she was too frail. All she could do was slide down the tree into a scraped and bruised heap, too miserable to move. She'd been on the run for three days. With little food or water and hardly any sleep, her body was
starting to give up on her.
She fought the urge to close her eyes, but she had to rest, if only for a minute. She was sure the other two guys she encountered earlier were following her. She’d looked back several times and caught a glimpse of them or their companions. She didn't know the taller, rugged man but she did finally remember how she knew the unfortunate victim of her knee; Tye Agosta.
It had taken her a moment to get her head straight after he’d pulled her away, but as she looked up, she realized she was staring into his eyes of a man she knew. As familiar as he seemed at the time, she couldn’t place him, but she didn’t care. She no longer trusted most members of the opposite sex. It didn’t matter who he was.
She rested her eyes and recalled some of the memories she had of him. He'd been her self-defense coach and in many ways, a lifeline during her husband's last deployment. That type of rigorous training requires an ample amount of self-discipline; something she had in short supply. But, being an intuitive and patient teacher, he was able to coach her to dig deep and embody what she lacked. He didn’t put up with her nonsense either, and she had plenty of it. She could think of dozens of reasons as to why she couldn’t do certain things, but he taught her over and over she only needed one reason why she could: life.
Tye used her strengths and weaknesses to mold her into a fighter. She knew he was part of the reason she was alive today. Allowing her mind to drift away, she could see the look of joy on her husband’s face as she showed him all the techniques his buddy had taught her. That only served to add to her agitation.
Maia and Lance were battle buddies in life. She gave him her hand in marriage, three sons, countless hours of face-to-floor prayer during deployment and she followed him wherever the Marine Corps took him. She worked to make ends meet and did her best to give their boys a well-rounded life. She learned to live without him while he was gone and learned to love him all over again when he returned. She came from a military family, so it wasn’t a problem for her that he was a Marine. For her, it was a standard way of living; until it wasn't.
Amitola: The Making of a Tribe Page 2
