by Lukens, Mark
Luke stayed down behind the tree he’d been crouched behind. He fished the binoculars out from under his hoodie, unzipping the jacket so he had access to his pistol if he needed it.
He got a better look at the campsite below, at the rock formations that must be the mouth of the cave. Rose said she’d stayed at a small cave, but this one looked big.
Maybe this was a different cave. Maybe Rose hadn’t stayed here, maybe these were other people. Not rippers, obviously, but other survivors. Maybe many others had followed that same logic Sayid had suggested—going into the woods, into the mountains, remote places where there would be fewer rippers, or maybe none at all.
There could be small bands of survivors everywhere out here, two or three people, some larger groups.
Or it could be Dark Angels down there.
But it looked too disorganized to be Dark Angels. No, he still had the feeling this place had been abandoned quickly.
He needed to get down there and look inside the cave; that was the only way he was going to know for sure. He had scanned the trees with the binoculars but hadn’t seen anything or heard anything. If people were hiding, they were hiding well.
This was it. This was what he’d come this far for. He had to know. At the very least, it seemed like Rose might have been lying about being alone in the woods.
After a few more minutes, he slid down the hillside, moving slowly, holding on to tree trunks as he made his way down to the small clearing without a sound.
As soon as he was in the tiny clearing, only about the size of a small house, in front of the cave, he could smell the unmistakable odor of death, of flesh and blood, of fresh kills.
He jerked his rifle up into a shooting position, ready to fire. He inched closer to the opening of the cave. Flies were buzzing around, making a swarming sound like bees—the same sound he’d heard when he and Wilma had come across the pile of rippers in front of a house.
And after he was closer to the cave, he saw the bodies inside, three of them. But rippers hadn’t done this—human beings had.
This wasn’t a mound of dead bodies like he’d seen before, like some discarded trash. These were three people naked and staked down to the hard dirt floor of the cave, hands tied to the other’s feet, laid out like big X’s. Chunks of their flesh were gone, like they’d been tortured, but also like rodents and other creatures had been feasting on their rotting flesh.
Luke backed away from the cave. It didn’t seem to go back very far, like it wasn’t really a cave but more like a recess into the rock formation.
He got back into the trees, needing the cover right now. He worked his way to his right, around to the other side of the huge rock formation and the shallow cave. He saw things hanging from the tree branches on the other side of the formation, three men and a woman, all naked, all hung upside down, their hands bound behind their backs, their faces beaten to pulps. Someone had had fun using them as batting practice while they hung upside down, helpless to defend themselves.
And painted in blood that had turned dark on one man’s torso was a big DA symbol.
This was a trap.
As soon as that thought entered Luke’s mind, he heard gunshots ringing out, bullets pelting the tree trunks around him.
PART 4
CHAPTER 27
Kate
I’m going to need all of you to get in the van, the man with the mustache said.
Kate stood next to their SUV, which had overheated from a busted hose, stranding them on this lonely road in the middle of the woods as the rippers Lisey had summoned headed their way.
The man with the mustache stood only fifteen feet away, his weapon still in his hands, still aimed at Max. The man with the paintball mask was still behind the open door of his pickup truck, still aiming his rifle at them. Another man got out of the pickup truck—a teenager really—and hurried up to Kate with a pistol clenched in his hand. He kept his eyes on Kate as he darted to the strip of grass to grab her shotgun. Then he backed away, quick as a fox. He was around the SUV, giving them a wide berth as he grabbed Max and Petra’s weapons from the street. Then he was back to the pickup truck a few seconds later.
“Okay,” Max said. “You’ve got our weapons now. You can lower your guns.”
Mustache Man lowered his rifle down and seemed to relax just a little. “We’re not going to hurt you. Please, you have to trust us.”
The rippers called out, the shrieks and screams filling the air.
“You need to come with us,” Mustache Man said. “Those rippers are coming. They’ll be here in a few minutes.”
Kate wasn’t sure about this. But Petra was right: What other choice did they have? She glanced into the back seat at Brooke; she held Tiger on her lap, Tiger’s eyes big and round.
“What’s your name?” Mustache Man asked. “My name’s Lance. That’s Dale and Zak back there in the pickup, and Crystal’s driving the van.”
“I’m Max. This is Petra behind me. Kate over there. Brooke is in the back seat. We’ll go with you. We’ve got food and supplies we could take with us. We don’t have everything from the house.” He smiled just a little. “We had to leave in a hurry.”
The rippers were getting closer. Kate heard their calls, the roar of a crowd. It was an eerie sound, almost like it wasn’t coming from humans at all but from some other species.
“Okay,” Lance said. “We’ll load up your stuff, but we need to leave right now.”
Lance looked back and nodded at Dale. He jumped back into the pickup and drove forward, passing them and then turning around in the road so that the truck was facing the same direction as their SUV, but parked a car-length behind them. Zak got out and hopped into the back of the truck with the rifle Dale had been aiming at them only minutes ago. He aimed his rifle down the road, waiting for the herd of rippers to crest the hill.
The van turned around and then backed down the road, parking right beside the SUV. Lance opened up the sliding door on the side.
Max and Petra were already at the back of the SUV, grabbing cardboard boxes and bags.
Kate looked in at Brooke through the open passenger door. “We’re going to need to get Tiger back into his box, okay?”
She nodded.
“I hear ‘em coming,” Zak called from the back of the pickup truck. “They’re almost here!”
Kate hurried to the back of the SUV and found the box for Tiger. She got into the back seat and helped Brooke get the cat into the box. Tiger didn’t like the idea of being stuffed back into the box, but he didn’t fight too much.
“Don’t be scared,” Kate told Tiger, but she kept her eyes on Brooke. “Okay?”
Brooke nodded again.
“We’ll be all right,” Kate told Brooke. “I promise. They’re going to take us somewhere safe.”
Two quick rifle shots sounded from the back of the pickup. The roar of the crowd of rippers was loud. They were running, rising up over the hill, the crowd as wide as the road. Some of them were running in the woods, moving through the trees and brush like animals.
They had everything from the SUV and they piled into the van through the side door. The pickup was right behind them, the motor rumbling. Crystal already started taking off as Lance was getting inside and shutting the passenger door.
Kate finally exhaled. It felt like she’d been holding her breath for minutes, her head was light but also throbbing. Everything seemed slightly out-of-focus but also hyperreal. Her heart pounded, her hands shook, her muscles twitched.
The van had no windows on the side, just windows in the doors at the back. It looked like it used to be some kind of work van or delivery van. There was only one bench seat; Brooke and Petra took the seat, Petra holding the box Tiger was in. Kate and Max sat on the floor among the boxes and bags they had taken from their SUV.
Lance turned around in the passenger seat with a big smile on his face. “That was close, huh?”
Kate looked at Lance, then at Crystal. She hadn’t turned around or
said anything, focused on driving the van. She was small and trim, compact and strong-looking, like Petra. Her blond hair was short like Petra’s and she had a big tattoo on the side of her neck.
“Here,” Lance said. He had a first-aid kit he’d gotten from the glove box. He handed it to Petra. “You’re bleeding.”
Petra accepted the kit without a thank you. She opened the case and pulled out a gauze pad, opening it and holding it against the gash in her hairline.
“It might need to be stitched up,” Lance told her. “We have a doctor at the store.”
“A doctor?” Max asked.
“Yes. Well, a nurse, but we call her our doctor.”
“Why are you helping us?” Kate asked.
“The manager wants to help people.”
“The manager?”
“We go out on scouting missions every so often,” Lance said. “We have a year’s worth of dry food and drinks at the store, among other supplies and weapons, but we’re always looking for more.”
“And you’re looking for people?” she asked him.
“Yes. When we can find them. Which isn’t very often anymore.”
“Why people?” Max asked. “If you don’t mind me asking. Believe me, we’re grateful.”
“All of us are going to need to band together to survive. I guess you know by now that no one is coming to save us. There’s no government anymore, no military. Nothing nowhere. Not here in America or in any other country. It’s up to us now to survive, and to eventually rebuild.”
“And you’re going to rebuild at a Super Bea’s?” Kate said.
“To begin with. The store will get us through the winter. In the spring and summer we’ll look for other places, eventually branch out. Hopefully a lot of the rippers will die off in the winter, maybe even kill each other off as they get hungrier. But we have another threat that’s worse than the rippers.”
“The Dark Angels.”
Lance nodded. “Yes, you already mentioned them. I guess you’ve run across them, then.”
Max and Kate nodded. Petra kept the gauze pad pressed against her head.
“The Dark Angels are roaming around and pillaging anything they can find,” Lance said.
“What about your store?” Kate asked. “The Dark Angels haven’t attacked you there?”
“They’ve tried a few times, but we pushed them back. We have our defenses.”
“What kind of defenses?” Petra asked.
Lance smiled at her. “Oh, you’ll see when we get there.”
Kate found it strange that the Dark Angels had been pushed back and given up so easily. She was surprised that they didn’t keep watch when these guys went out on their scouting missions. It seemed suspicious to her, but she didn’t want to say anything.
“Do you know who the leader of the Dark Angels is?” Kate asked Lance. She wondered if he had seen the Dragon in his dreams like she had, like Max and Petra had, like Brooke had.
“We haven’t seen him,” Lance said. “But we’ve heard he calls himself the Dragon. He wants to control all of the resources in this area. There’s a rumor he controls a town about a hundred miles south of here. Somewhere in northern Georgia.”
Kate saw the town he spoke of in her mind, the wastelands she’d seen so many times in her dreams.
“We hope to eventually set up a parlay with the Dark Angels,” Lance said. “Maybe in the spring. Try to come to some kind of truce with them. Maybe eventually turn some of their followers to our side, let them know that there are alternatives to survival besides being with the Dark Angels.”
Kate sat back against a box. She was happy to be headed somewhere safe, but this all seemed too good to be true. With the bad luck they’d been having, she was happy with this stroke of good luck, but she figured something bad was going to happen, and she was waiting for the hammer to drop. She was still suspicious of this whole thing, but what could they do right now besides go along for the ride?
“You said you were taking us to see the manager,” Kate said. “He’s your leader?”
“She,” Lance corrected. “Her real name’s JoAnne, but everyone calls her Miss Jo or just the manager. She was the general manager of the store when the Collapse began.” Lance and Crystal exchanged glances. “She’ll want to meet you when we get there, I’m sure of that.”
*
Thirty minutes later they entered the town of Perry. Crystal drove the van down the streets on the outskirts of the town where the newer buildings and businesses had popped up over the last twenty years, keeping the downtown historic and untouched. Like all of the other towns Kate had seen, this place was trashed. Stores had been looted, some of the buildings burned, trash and debris everywhere. Abandoned and wrecked vehicles clogged the roads, but Crystal seemed to be following some well-traveled route through the wreckage, swerving in between the cars and trucks. The two pickups were right behind them, Dale and Zak’s pickup, and another one with the “spotters” inside, the ones who had been up in the mountains. They all communicated by walkie-talkies.
Kate could only really see out through the windshield and back windows of the van, so she didn’t get much of a view.
“So the Dark Angels don’t mess with you guys?” Max asked.
Kate glanced at him, but couldn’t read his eyes. He looked at Lance, waiting for him to respond. But Kate could tell he was as suspicious of their story as she was. It just didn’t make sense. If the rippers hadn’t attacked, then what were they waiting for?
Us? her mind whispered. The Dark Angels are waiting for us to get there.
A chill danced along her skin, making her shiver, and she wondered where that thought had come from.
“Like I said,” Lance said, turning around in his passenger seat to look at Max. “A small group of them have tried a few times, but it wasn’t anything major. Only a few of them at a time. Easy enough for us to shoot at them from the roof and drive them off.”
Max scrunched his face just a little like he was confused about something. “But you said you had enough food and water in your store for a year. I mean, if they’re pillaging for supplies, wouldn’t your store be a goldmine for them?”
Inside her mind, Kate was pumping her fist in victory. Yeah, explain that, Lance. At that moment she loved Max for voicing her suspicions, for thinking just like she was, and for being bold enough to ask about it.
“I think they’re concentrating on grabbing up some of the other little stuff, maybe saving our store for later. They know it’s always going to be there. Maybe they’re making plans right now.” He shrugged. “I don’t know. That’s all I can tell you.”
Kate still didn’t buy it.
“Like I said before, we’re going to try to make a truce with them. Maybe even set up some sort of trade. We’re all going to have to do that eventually.”
“We’re going to have to plan way beyond just the winter,” Crystal said.
Lance nodded in agreement. “That’s what the manager says. A lot of people, maybe like the Dark Angels, are thinking short-term, and that’s perfectly understandable, but we’re thinking of the future, years into the future.”
The walkie-talkie stuffed down into the center consoled blared static, then a voice squawked from it: “We’ve spotted a herd of rippers. Off to the left. Down Chestnut Street. At least a hundred of them. They’re coming this way.”
CHAPTER 28
Kate
Lance picked up the walkie-talkie and pressed the button on the side. “Roger that.”
“Are we close to your store yet?” Max asked.
“It’s right up there,” Crystal said, pointing out the windshield.
Kate saw the large building in the distance. It had a big yellow sign at the top with a cartoon bee next to the name of the store. The sign used to light up at night when they still had electricity.
There were no other buildings around the Super Bea’s store, and the woods weren’t too far beyond the rear of the building, a ridge of mountains set a littl
e farther back forming a ring around this large valley that Perry had been built in.
A road branched off from the road they were on, a dead traffic light strung across the intersection. The road that led to the Super Bea’s looked newer and fields had been cleared beyond the road where once developers had planned to build more businesses. One building was partially built, some of the block walls constructed with scaffolding set up all around them, construction materials piled up near the construction site.
“How close are the rippers?” Lance said into the walkie-talkie.
“Close,” the person responded.
“Can we make it inside?”
“I think so. Gonna be close, though.”
Lance and Crystal glanced at each other as she turned right onto the newer road that led to the Super Bea’s in the distance.
Kate saw a line of cars and trucks blocking the entrances to the vast parking lot into the store. Part of the parking lot had a big ditch naturally blocking it off; other areas had trees and block walls.
Crystal raced up to the line of cars and trucks, some of them smashed up, glass busted out, metal crunched in, tires flattened, old bloodstains smeared on the interior. She stopped the van in front of two cars parked nose to nose.
“Why is the entrance blocked?” Kate asked.
Lance had two sets of keys in his hands. “We put them there. It’s one line of defense for us.” He got out and slammed the door shut.
Kate saw Lance and another man who must have been from the spotter’s truck. They each got into a vehicle, started them and backed them out of the way.
Crystal grabbed the walkie-talkie and flipped to a different channel. “Miss Jo, we’re coming in.”
She shifted into drive and drove through the opening. The pickups followed right after her.
Kate heard the rippers coming. So many of them. They would be up and over the wrecked line of cars and trucks in a flash, flooding the parking lot.
