Brett covered Jack, who stood at the front door, waiting for me to arrive.
I knelt beside the oak tree. “Go for it.”
Jack twisted the handle and shoved the door open with his shoulder. They both entered. I scanned the immediate area for any danger signs and followed.
Both of them were in a farmhouse-style kitchen, rifling through rustic mahogany cupboards and placing cans and packages on top of a large black range. I left them to it and headed upstairs. Brett seemed to be adapting quickly to our situation and I admired his “have a go” attitude, even though he was even more out of his depth than we were.
My luck held in the master bedroom. In the walk-in closet, I found a solid pair of hiking boots, one size too big, but I compensated with a thick pair of walking socks. Unfashionable light-blue jeans with an elastic waist—but I didn’t give a fuck. I winced while pulling on a purple baggy golf sweater, feeling my arm protest.
Back in the kitchen, Jack opened two cans of Dinty Moore beef stew, placed them on the table, and stuck dessertspoons in both. Brett sat down and immediately tucked in. I grabbed the other while Jack leaned against the counter and attacked a can of tuna.
The stew tasted great, and I looked around the kitchen while chomping the contents of the can. A bunch of car keys hung on a small hook next to the fridge. I finished the can, grabbed the keys, and rattled them. “Fancy a ride in that Pontiac?”
Brett threw his can to one side. “Sounds good to me.”
“No point hanging around,” Jack said. “We packed the food while you were getting changed.”
Going back into more densely populated areas, I knew we would come across more people, possibly still suffering the effects of GA’s technology. So far, Brett didn’t have any answers for us in that regard. I decided we should keep our distance from all people until we could establish their motives.
I placed a car key in the Pontiac’s door and twisted. All internal locks popped up. Jack threw his pack on the back seat and clambered in, and Brett sat next to me. I adjusted the front seat and started the engine.
Brett took a map out of the glove box. He clicked his tongue against the roof of his mouth while working out a route. “Go along the two toward Cleveland and take the fifty-seven down to Elyria. It’s less than twenty miles. We can easily get on Interstate 80 from there.”
I placed the car into drive and bumped onto the road.
Getting out of town proved slightly awkward. I had to slowly mount curbs and grassed areas to guide the car around blockages in the road. The way ahead cleared slightly as the urban area disappeared from our sides, allowing an increase in speed to around thirty miles per hour until we reached the highway.
5
State Route 2 didn’t differ from our previous experiences of highways. Multiple crashed vehicles spread across the road, mingled with corpses. Some cars had pulled to the shoulder, where drivers took advantage of injured parties in the wrecks. All hallmarks of the carnage the first activation had brought. Brett silently stared out of the window, shaking his head at regular intervals. I wondered just how much he had seen around Monroe. He’d told me he was part of the cleanup operation, but I guessed it had only been in a limited capacity. The burden he carried must have weighed heavily, knowing that he was part of the “solution” that caused the devastation outside the Pontiac.
Rubbish drifted around hotels and fast-food joints that lined Route 57. Things were starting to change. When we’d fled New York, it had felt alive with killers and survivors; the infrastructure was still fresh and intact. The heightened sense of abandonment around here gave the impression that civilized life had drained from the landscape. It wasn’t obvious at first, but as I paid closer attention to the buildings, the signs became clearer. Not a single window gleamed, corpses were in advanced states of decomposition due to the warm spring sunshine, and the entire area was deathly still.
I thought back to a trip Jack and I had taken to Machu Picchu three years ago. I remembered him asking, “How come they just stopped living here? Why didn’t somebody else move in?”
Back then I had no idea and naïvely accepted it as part of history. I never thought that the same thing would happen to major towns or cities in my own lifetime. To imagine Manchester quietly decaying, covered in weeds and slowly being swallowed by nature, seemed ridiculous, but it was probably happening as we drove toward Elyria.
I wondered if we would still have a human population to walk around and marvel at those city ruins in five hundred years.
“A penny for your thoughts?” Jack said.
“I was just thinking about our trip to Machu Picchu.”
He grimaced as we crunched over a stray detached bumper in the road. “That’s a bit random. I was thinking what we should do if we come across another person like that bloke on the island.”
“We keep our distance and take no chances,” I said.
“Exit here,” Brett said. “We’ll be there in two minutes.”
I swung the car right and headed along Broad Street, which ran through the center of Elyria.
“Stop the car!” Brett suddenly cried.
I thrust my right foot against the brake pedal, and the Pontiac came to a screeching halt. Jack aimed his rifle around the windows.
I glanced to either side of the road. “What’s the problem?”
“Over there. A pharmacy. Didn’t I tell you?”
Jack frowned. “You could do it a little less dramatically next time, and not put the shits up me.”
I grabbed my rifle from between the back seats and headed for the pharmacy attached to a general medical building. Jack and Brett covered me as I peered through the glass. An aisle ran along the center, with various hygienic and homeopathic products. Medical kits lined the shelves to the right. Two women in white coats both slumped over the counter at the end.
A two-toned electronic beep and an eye-watering stench greeted me when I pushed open the door. I went straight for the right side and grabbed a green plastic case with a white cross on it. I popped it open and found exactly what I was looking.
I returned outside, sat on the step, rolled up my sleeve, and snapped on a pair of plastic gloves. I rolled off the flimsy crusted bandage, splashed on antiseptic fluid, rubbed sterile cotton across my arm, and clenched my teeth as the stinging sensation intensified. Brett unrolled a fresh, more robust bandage and passed it to me. I wrapped it around my arm, feeling pleased that I had hopefully addressed the problem.
“You wanna quick look around town before we head off?” Jack asked. “See if there’re any gun shops?”
“Do they have them around here?” Brett asked.
“No harm in trying,” I said.
I put my rifle on my shoulder and carried out a quick visual sweep of the area. A hundred yards ahead, a sheet of newspaper danced across the street. Three hundred yards to our left, a flock of birds circled high in the air. Further into town, cars littered the road at atypical angles, mangled and smashed.
“I can pick out a route through the mess,” Jack said. “No point getting split from our supplies or have somebody take the vehicle when our backs are turned.”
“Let’s not hang around here for too long. A quick search, then straight for the highway.” I turned to Brett. “You okay with that?”
“Whatever you say until we get to Hart Island.”
We got back into the Pontiac, and Jack twisted and turned a mile along the main street. He halted when we reached an area with a host of shops on either side of the road. Most had broken windows. A woman in a blue flowery dress slumped through a bookshop window, impaled on a shard of glass that rose out of her back.
Brett gasped and pressed his hand against his chest. “What the fuck?”
Five naked corpses were propped against the wall of a gym. All sitting tightly together. All beheaded. Somebody had written “This is the End
” above their bodies on the brick wall in white paint.
I opened my door. “We just need to make sure we don’t join their line. Be on your toes.”
Jack walked over to a bakery. He pushed open the door, and a bell tinkled. “Already looted. Might be some survivors around here.”
“Can’t blame them for that,” I said.
I wandered past a store filled with home decorations and peered through the smashed window at the contents inside. A small ornamental glass clown caught my eye. Similar to one that our grandparents once had above their fireplace. I reached in, picked it up, and dusted it off.
“What have you got there?” Jack asked.
I held it up. “When did you last see one of these?”
Jack shook his head and continued down the street. “Useless piece of junk. Come on.”
I thought for a moment about pre-activation life. Most people I knew, now probably dead, occasionally shopped for these small trinkets to decorate their houses. But for what? They would all be gathering dust in our decaying world. I decided to keep the glass clown. It provided me with memories of cutting my grandparents’ lawn before relaxing on their couch with a glass of sherry. Their clown always smiled at me, no matter how useless. Besides Jack, memories were all I had.
“This one looks more like it,” Brett said.
I joined him at the doorway of a café. Inside, cakes rotted below plastic protective shielding on the counter. Eight tables and their surrounding chairs had been pushed all over the place. White cups and plates lay on the floor, some in pieces, still smeared with food or coffee stains.
“Get yourself inside then,” I said to Brett.
He went straight for the counter. Jack and I followed him inside.
Flies buzzed around a body on the brown tiled floor. The man wore an apron and was missing three fingers on his left hand. One stupid fly tried to escape the café and constantly bashed against the window. An ideal candidate for the Monroe Genesis Alliance team.
I leaped over the counter, grabbed two husklike croissants and tossed them over to Brett.
He froze and they bounced off his chest.
Jack glanced outside. “Something’s coming. Get down.”
I hunched down and aimed my rifle over the top of the counter. Brett knelt behind a fallen circular table.
Jack stood by the edge of the window. “A red pickup truck. Two men inside.”
The brakes squeaked as the vehicle came to a halt close to the café.
“Are they wearing black?” Brett asked.
“No, both civvies. One’s holding a sack; the other’s got a shotgun.”
“Might just be looters,” I said. “Let’s keep our heads down and wait it out.”
I felt my pulse quicken and shuffled across a few feet to give myself a clear shot at the entrance. Brett stared at me and clutched his rifle to his chest.
“Stay where you are,” I said to him. “You know the drill.”
The men, both in jeans and T-shirts, stood ten yards in front of the café in conversation, oblivious to the fact that at least two of us could drop them in a second. The shorter man ran his hands through his greasy black hair. They moved to the left, out of sight. I could hear their muffled voices next door. Judging by their apparent casual attitudes, they were on a familiar excursion and weren’t expecting trouble.
“We don’t want to end up in a close-quarters situation,” Jack said. “It’s too easy for somebody to pull the trigger.”
It would only take us seconds to sprint back to the Pontiac, parked twenty yards to our right.
“Back to the car for cover,” I said. “When they come out, we get them to drop their weapons.”
“You want to recruit them?” Jack asked.
“I want to talk to them. Find out what they know.”
I vaulted over the counter. Jack checked that the coast was clear, and the three of us edged back to our vehicle while aiming at the shop next to the café.
Brett knelt with me behind the hood. Jack aimed around the rear.
Seconds later, the two men casually walked out of the shop. One had his arms wrapped around a full sack; the other followed with a shotgun lazily held over his shoulder.
“Freeze! Drop your weapons,” I shouted.
The man dropped his sack and spun in our direction. A can spilled onto the road and rolled to the curb. The other fumbled with his shotgun and started backing away toward their pickup.
“Who are you? We don’t want any trouble,” Shotgun said.
The other tentatively bent down to pick up the sack while keeping his focus on me.
“Drop your shotgun. We’re not going to shoot,” Jack ordered.
“You can have these supplies—take them,” Sack Man said. He widened the top of the sack, revealing cans and packages. “I’ll leave them on the ground.”
“We just want to talk,” I said.
The other lowered his shotgun. They both glanced at each other. I needed to do something to put everyone at ease and end this standoff.
“Cover me,” I said to Jack and Brett.
I held my rifle above my head and walked toward them.
“We don’t want any trouble, mister,” Sack Man said. “Let us get on our way, and you won’t see us again.”
“We’re not here to do anything stupid,” I said. “I want to talk to someone who isn’t either trying to kill us or planning world domination.”
It seemed impossible to form any trust in a few minutes. We should have been embracing each other as fellow survivors in a decaying world, happy that we’d found each other.
I stopped a few yards short of them and placed my rifle on the ground. The man placed his shotgun down. I heard Jack and Brett close in from behind. They placed their rifles alongside mine.
“There, we’re all friends,” Jack said.
“Where did you come from?” Shotgun said.
I didn’t immediately reply. My mind replayed events since leaving Manchester, and I shook my head, trying to think where to start. Brett’s silence was a little more obvious.
“We landed in New York, and that’s where we’re heading,” Jack said.
“You landed in New York and you’re going back there?” Sack Man asked, astonished. “Where else have you been?”
“Long story,” I said as I came to the realization that these people probably knew nothing of Genesis Alliance, and it couldn’t be explained by a quick chat on the street. “Is it just the two of you?”
“Just the two of us,” Shotgun said.
This awkward meeting needed some direction. But we stood making stilted conversation, eyes breaking away for fear of making too much contact and appearing aggressive. The fact that we were facing two people standing together and not trying to throttle each other gave me hope.
“I’m Harry, that’s Jack and Brett. We landed last Friday, a few hours after the shit hit the fan. We’ve been through a nightmare and only want to sit down and talk.”
“Sure, why not?” Shotgun said. “Let’s grab a pop and talk.”
The word “pop” took me back for a moment. I hadn’t heard it called that in years. He walked past us to the café. Sack Man, who stood around six feet five inches, towering over all us, followed. He attempted to smile, but I could see the anguish pasted across his face.
Jack looked at me and shrugged. He picked up his rifle and headed to the café. I passed Brett his rifle and followed suit. The larger man dragged his sack inside, opened a dead fridge, retrieved four cans, and passed them around.
Shotgun dragged the corpse to one side and straightened a table, and we dragged chairs around it. My can hissed when I popped it open, and I took three gulps of fizzy lukewarm coke. “We use the word ‘pop’ back home. I didn’t know you used it here.”
“You’re a long way from home, guys,”
Sack Man said. “Is it the same in the UK?”
“We’re not sure. We’ve had conflicting information,” Jack said. “As far as we know, it’s worldwide.”
Brett remained quiet and fidgeted with a paper packet of sugar. I could imagine a hundred reasons why these two strangers would beat him to death.
Shotgun sighed. “I thought as much. It’s been a nightmare around here. A few of us have managed to hole up in a hangar. You’re the first people we’ve come across outside our group that hasn’t been insane.”
“There’re more of you?” Jack said.
“Eight of us,” Sack Man said. “An old guy runs the place. He’s a bit weird, but it’s better to be in a group, right?”
“I suppose so,” I said. “What do you remember from last Friday?”
“I remember a car crashing into the back of mine at high speed and my face smashing into the wheel. I woke, alone on I-80, with a massive headache and death all around me. I found him a day later.” He gestured to Shotgun. “I was hiding out in an abandoned house, and he just walked right up the street. I thought he was another psycho. They were everywhere.”
Shotgun smiled. “When I saw him come out of a house, I nearly ran. I’d been fighting and running for days. I was working in a lab when the killing started, and didn’t know what was happening until later that night.” He paused and stared at his can. “When I left the secure environment, I found our security guards dead. Somebody tried to smash down the door and threatened to kill me. I called 911 but got no answer. I eventually left and spent days on the run. I’m one of the lucky ones, and thank God someone found me wandering.”
The two stories appeared to make sense. Meeting fellow survivors gave me encouragement that if we could destroy the control unit and stop the second activation, society would eventually come back together.
“You’re both lucky to be alive,” I said. “We had similar experiences after landing. We’ve been traveling around and have information that might keep you safe in future.”
Sack Man leaned over the table. “Information? You know what’s happening?”
Second Activation (The Activation Series Book 2) Page 10
