“I’m Diana,” the woman said, after taking the empty plate back to the fire.
“I’m Luke,” he said. “Thanks for the meat.”
“You’re welcome,” she said, with a brief smile that didn’t quite reach her eyes. “Thanks for bringing it our way.”
Luke suddenly realized what he had just eaten.
Diana laughed at the look on his face.
“They had a good chew on you before we killed ‘em,” she said, looking down at his lower legs.
He followed her gaze. His leathers were torn up pretty good, and there was a clean bandage around his lower left leg. He hadn’t felt it till she pointed it out, but now that he was aware of it, his leg started stinging. Funny how the body worked.
“Guess I have to thank you on two counts.”
“It’s fine. We cleaned and disinfected the bites, but if they had rabies, that probably won’t help. We’ll have to shoot you.”
Luke laughed. She didn’t. Because she wasn’t joking.
“Where are you from?” she asked.
“Rhode Island, originally.” Luke then gave her an abbreviated version of his story and told her where he was heading.
“Portland?” she asked, her eyes narrowing.
The talk around the fire hushed and all eyes were on them again.
“Yeah, why?”
“Exactly. Why? Why Portland?”
Luke suddenly felt he was on dangerous ground but had no idea why.
He shrugged. In this case, he decided honesty was the best policy.
“I went there as a kid. It was the best holiday I ever had. I guess I just wanted to see the ocean again.”
She seemed to relax.
“I see.”
“Is there a problem with Portland?”
“Don’t know,” she said, and her face told him the subject was closed.
He didn’t push it.
“So, I couldn’t help but notice there are no men.”
“Nope.”
“Why?”
“All dead.”
“I’m sorry… what happened?”
“You ask an awful lot of questions, Mister.”
“Sorry, I’m just curious. Tell me to shut up if I bug you too much.”
She regarded him a moment, as if trying to read his thoughts.
“So, you don’t know what’s in Portland?”
He looked at her blankly.
“Old shops, the seaside…”
“Not what, I mean like… who.”
He shook his head. Diana bit her lip as if weighing up something. She looked at the one called Cathy who gave a quick nod.
“Have you heard of the Brotherhood?”
“No, should I have?”
“Not sure, but you sure as hell wouldn’t be thinking of going to Portland if you had.”
“Who are they?”
She spat on the ground.
“They’re the reason there are no men older than fifteen here. When the boys turn sixteen they come and take them to God.”
“What?”
“They take them to God. It’s a fancy way of saying they draft them into their army.”
Luke thought about this.
“I take it you don’t get a choice?”
“Nope. There’s a graveyard right behind that house over there marked with the crosses of those who said no.”
“You fought them?”
She nodded.
“When?”
“The first time?” She looked at him fiercely. “Two years ago. Looked all friendly and God fearing, wearing their crosses and carrying staffs like fuckin’ monks.”
“What happened?” he asked, noting that everyone had started listening, some moving closer to hear better.
“We let ‘em in. We had gates then. They didn’t look no trouble and we had lots of guns. We were being neighborly. Stephen always said,” her voice hitched. “We can’t lose our humanity – and now – well he was the first one they killed.”
Cathy went to her and put her hand on Diana’s shoulder.
“They came in and ate with us,” Cathy said. “Then Brother Mike, the leader, told us that he wanted the men to come and serve God.”
“Stephen said, thanks for the offer but we serve God in our own way. And we did, still do. The community center is our church.”
Luke felt like he had some unfinished business with the man upstairs.
“That’s great. I’d like to pray there some time if you’ll let me.”
He wasn’t lying, Diana’s raw emotion had triggered his own thoughts about Brooke. Praying was the one thing he hadn’t done since losing her. It felt about time.
“Anyway,” Cathy continued. “Brother Mike said, it’s not an offer, and that’s when things went south, real fast.”
Diana took over again, her eyes far away.
“Long story short, things got a little heated and we kicked them out. I remember Brother Mike saying, you don’t want to do this my son, and Stephen spitting on the ground at his feet as we shut the gate on them. Stephen said, I’m not your son. Stay away.”
“They came back the next day. Drove their stupid truck with its golden crosses all over it straight through the gate. They poured out of that truck. At least twenty of them and some had guns. We managed to kill a few, but they had too many men.”
Cathy took up the story again.
“They shot all the men and two of the women before the rest of us surrendered. We had to, or they would have killed us all.”
“Of course. You did what you had to.”
Cathy looked down at Diana who was quietly weeping again. Diana nodded.
“One by one, they executed our people who had been injured but not killed and then Brother Mike dragged Stephen out into the middle of the main street, so everyone could see.
Let this be a lesson to you, he said. God punishes those who shirk their responsibilities and we are the hand of God in this world. They shot him in the head.”
Silence fell over the group, the horror of what had happened two years before still fresh on their faces.
“So, they haven’t been back?”
“Of course, they’ve been back,” spat Diana. “They’re like a cancer, you can’t get rid of them. They come back every full moon, and we give ‘em a ‘contribution’.”
“A contribution?”
“It’s what they call it. Food and stuff we’ve grown or stuff we’ve scavenged that we think they might want.”
“What happens if you don’t?”
She looked at him like he had turned idiot.
“What do you think happens? We haven’t let ourselves find out. This time, they’ll be taking Tommy and Jacob with them. They’re of age.” She nodded in the direction of a teenage girl with sad eyes. “And probably Sarah too…”
Diana’s eyes told him all he needed to know about why they’d be taking the girl. He looked up at the perfect half-moon – that meant they had roughly a week before the Brothers were due.
“You could fight them you know? I could help you.”
“No. We fight, we die.”
“We could fight, Di!” said Tommy coming forward. Hid friend Jacob backed him up with a solid, “yeah!”
“Don’t be fools!” she snapped, then put her hand on Tommy’s shoulder. “You’ll be the first ones they kill Tommy, I can’t lose you too. At least this way you’ll be alive, and you and Jacob can look after each other and look out for Sarah.”
Tommy let it go.
“It’s time to bed down,” said Diana. “Stoke the fire, for our guest.”
“You’re going to leave me here?” Luke asked.
“Yep,” she said, smiling but not unkindly as she draped a threadbare blanket over him. “I was actually going to slash your throat if you caused a ruckus, but I think you’re alright. If you behave tonight, we’ll talk more in the morning. I might even untie you.”
“Gee, thanks,” he said.
“You’re welcome,” she said.
>
He couldn’t tell if she was ignoring his sarcasm or didn’t notice it.
Jacob and Tommy put some more wood on the fire as everyone started to head into the houses. When they had it roaring nicely, Tommy came across and stood over him.
“No funny business, Mister, or a throat slashing is the least you’ll have to worry about.”
Luke looked up at him, suppressing a smile. The kid was a bear cub trying to protect his family.
“Sure thing, Tommy. I’m not here to cause any trouble.”
Satisfied, the boy nodded and turned and headed back across the road to the house Diana had gone into. His friend followed him.
Luke tested his restraints. There was no give. Nothing for it but to try and sleep. He was warm and comfortable, but his head ached. His leg was throbbing a little now too. He began to think about his next move.
He suspected he was going to be able to leave Willatan Green with no problem. Diana and her group seemed decent enough and he didn’t intend on giving them any trouble. Problem was, if they were right about Portland, he would have to change his plans – no sense walking out of the frying pan into the fire. That wasn’t the worst of it though.
Luke had always hated bullies and this ‘Brotherhood’ sounded like the worst type. The type who killed in the name of God. He was surprised that this was the first time he’d heard of such a group since the flu had wiped out the country. In nearly every movie or book he’d consumed about the end of the world as a teenager, religious fanatics made at least one appearance.
It wasn’t a stretch to believe that the post-apocalyptic world would be fertile ground for people looking to find meaning in what had happened and in their new lives by turning to religion. There was nothing wrong with that, in fact it was human nature, but there were always those who could twist it to their own wicked interpretation, one needed to look no further than Islamic Jihadists.
Luke fell asleep about an hour after his hosts had retired for the evening.
14
Luke woke up to find a young boy of about eight looking down and examining him curiously. The throbbing in his leg was worse than it had been the night before. On a positive note though, his head seemed better.
“Samuel! Leave the man alone, you’ll freak him out.”
Diana was at the fire stirring a large pot hanging over it on a rudely made timber frame. The kid retreated. The resemblance to Diana was obvious, they both had the same dark eyes and olive skin.
“Your son?” Luke asked, brushing the hair from his brow, only then realizing he was untied.
She nodded.
“He looks like you.”
Carefully, he swung his legs over and sat up on the deck chair. It creaked under his weight. No one else had yet emerged from the other houses.
“Thanks for letting me loose.”
“You’re welcome. Want some oatmeal?”
“Oatmeal? Where the hell did you get oatmeal?”
“We grow the oats of course.”
“Seriously?”
“Sure, want to see?”
“Yes, I do!”
Luke stood up and gingerly put weight on his bandaged leg. It was painful, but in a stinging kind of way rather than achy.
“You all right?” Diana asked, walking over to him.
“Yeah, it’s just sore.”
“What about your head?”
He rapped himself on the skull.
“Hard as ever. Which way?”
“Samuel,” she said to her son. “Stay here and stir the oats, we’ll be back soon. Just gonna show the man the farm.”
“It’s Luke.”
She smiled.
“I’m just going to show Luke the farm.”
The ‘farm’ was actually a repurposed park in the center of the subdivision. Despite this, Luke couldn’t help but be impressed. It was barely half an acre but had been sectioned into four segments and, to his untrained eye, was flourishing.
“That’s the oats crop,” Diana said, pointing to the largest of the section. It just looked like tall dry weeds to Luke and he said as much.
“I guess it does,” she laughed.
As they walked closer, Diana explained that Stephen had grown up on his father’s farm. One of the first things he’d insisted on, was growing crops. After the Chinese had retreated, he had spent at least a month on a trip to Montville, the town where he grew up, scavenging as many seeds and grain and tools as he could.
His efforts had borne fruit… and vegetable and grains. They grew potatoes, pumpkin and carrots and had a decent plot of corn as well as the oat crop. Luke ran his hand over the feathery tops of the oat grass.
“So how do you harvest it? Must be hard work.”
“Oh no, harvesting is the easy bit,” she said. “Separating the chaff from the grain is the worst bit.”
Luke looked at her blankly.
“Sorry, I’m a city boy through and through.”
“Here,” she said, pulling a long stem towards her. She pointed to the seed heads lining the long stems. “See these pointy bits, they’re the husks and inside them are the actual oat grains. We gotta separate them from the grains by hand before we can mill them. We’re due to harvest this crop in a couple of days actually.”
Luke looked over the field.
“Holy cow. Even in this little patch you must have millions of them.”
“Yep, so when you’re eating your oatmeal in a minute, just remember how much blood, sweat and tears went into it.”
“Yum, sounds appetizing.”
She laughed, deciding right then she liked him.
“Come on, enough of the tour, now you get to sample the goods.”
“So, what do you do for meat?” he asked her, on the way back. “You know, when strangers aren’t leading dogs to you.”
“Apart from the chickens, and the occasional rabbit,” she said, her cheeks reddening. “We’ve just gone without. We have two goats. We’d never eat those, the kids raised them from babies so they’re just for milk.”
He was glad to see he wasn’t the only one who felt a bit funny about eating dog. Perhaps it was a necessity, but it didn’t mean they had to like it.
“Where are the rest of the dogs we killed?”
“Butchered and salted. We have a house set aside for that. We’ll give the Brothers four and keep the last one.”
They headed back to the fire and she served him a steaming plate of oatmeal.
“So, how much of your crops do you have to give them?”
“Half.”
“And how many people do you have altogether?”
“Thirty-five.”
Luke did some figuring in his head.
“That doesn’t leave you with much.”
No wonder they were so happy about the dogs.
“We get by,” she said and shrugged.
***
Later that day, Luke sat on a bench by the fire as she unwrapped the bandaging on his leg. The bite marks were starting to scab over and thankfully, there was none of the redness or swelling that might indicate infection.
“So,” he said, as she was re-bandaging. “My plan of visiting Portland is dead in the water. Do you mind if I stick around for a while?”
She pondered this for a moment, several emotions at war on her face, and when she opened her mouth to answer, he knew the answer would be no.
“I can help around the place,” he said, preempting her. “Hunting and such. I’m not even above de-husking the oats if you want. I promise I’ll bring more food in than I eat.”
“I really like you Luke, but I can’t say yes. I would have to call a meeting, so everyone could vote. Even if they said yes though, it would be pointless – if you’re here when the Brotherhood come in a week or so, they’ll take you… or kill you if you resist.”
“You’re really going to let them take the kids?”
Luke immediately regretted the question. Diana paused replacing the bandage, and her eyes filled with tears.
“You think I want to?” she asked through gritted teeth. “He’s my kid brother. But if you’re asking if I’d prefer to see him go with them than dead on the ground, the answer is yes.”
“Sorry,” said Luke, feeling like a heel. He decided to persevere though. “Listen, I can hide out when they come. Besides, when they take the three, you’ll be down numbers and I can help bear some of the load.”
She bit her lip and concentrated on finishing her job before looking up at him.
“I’ll put it to a vote,” she said, and stood up, wiping her hands on her jeans. “But the answer will be final.”
“Okay,” he agreed. “So where is this little church?”
15
Diana left him alone in the hall of the small community center. Their place of worship was, as he expected, quite Spartan. An optimistic number of chairs were set in rows facing the front where a roughly hewn but impressive cross made of two weathered railway sleepers hung on the wall above a low dais and lectern.
As he walked to the front, he looked at the faded posters that lined the wall. They advertised book drives and child minding and the like. A monument to the original purpose of the building. It was comforting but sad at the same time.
He sat on a chair and closed his eyes.
“God,” he began. “I want to believe you’re there. I need to. So here goes. Please look after my beautiful Brooke, and our baby…” His voice cracked, and he took a deep breath before continuing. “They were taken from me, but I want to believe you had a reason for allowing that to happen. It doesn’t make me feel any better about it but – I guess I just need to get this out.
“I fucking hate you for taking them from me. I mean what were you thinking, dude? The only thing that keeps me going is that I can still see good in this messed up world.
“Sorry for swearing but… man.”
He took another deep breath and wiped away his tears with the back of his hand.
“Anyway. I want you to tell Brooke I love her and our baby with all my heart. Tell her I’m sorry I couldn’t save her, but I promise I’ll try and make up for it. That’s it I guess. Except I’ll see her before long.”
He stood up.
“Thanks, and… amen.”
***
Diana stood up after the evening meal.
“We’re taking a vote. Luke wants to stay on for a time.”
Luke's Trek Page 7
