The Curse: A Post-Apocalyptic Thriller (After the End Trilogy Book 1)

by Mark Gillespie

  Eda stayed with the two women for a long time.

  She couldn’t bring herself to leave them and as she sat there in the pouring rain next to the corpses, she lost track of the fighting and shouting noises that drifted north from the impromptu battlefield outside Grand Central.

  But she couldn’t stay there all night.

  Eventually, after the rain had eased off a little and with no sense of how long she’d been sitting with the women, Eda dragged herself back to her feet.

  “I’ll come back,” she whispered to the bodies. It was a hollow promise, but it was all she had.

  The man called Pike was dead too. Although the young bandit had killed him, Eda had been the one to make sure of it. She’d dragged Pike’s body to the side of the road and stamped on his head with the flat of her boot. She’d spat in his face and punched him all over for as long as her arms worked. But it was no good – even if the bastard’s head had exploded all over the sidewalk, it wouldn’t have made her feel any better.

  Eda walked back to Lexington Avenue with a heavy heart. Every step she took felt like it was landing in a pool of thick mud that was trying to drag her underground. It was quiet now. The sound of clashing steel was gone, replaced by the gentle pitter-patter of the dying rainfall. There were no spirited battle cries to rouse hope or inspire fear. The only thing that drifted up from Grand Central now was a ghostly silence.

  Eda turned the corner and looked over at the bloody mess that had formed outside the station. She clamped a hand over her mouth. There were bodies everywhere– mostly male bodies. They were sprawled out in a variety of gruesome poses, limbs frozen at impossible angles like a bunch of dead circus freaks on display.

  Whatever private horror they’d seen at the end, it was tattooed in their wide-open eyes.

  The giant was there too, lying flat on his back with his arms outstretched on either side. It would take at least another massive downpour to wash away all the blood that clung to his rigid frame.

  Eda counted eight warriors down. She saw Lex walking across the battleground with several others, inspecting the bodies of her fallen soldiers in grim silence. Lex’s face was a mask of black blood, but Eda had a feeling that most of the splatter belonged to the dead bandits.

  “Eda. Are you alright?”

  Eda spun around in a dazed shock. Somehow Shay had managed to creep up behind her and Eda, usually so sensitive to her surroundings, hadn’t heard a thing.

  Shay’s hood was up. It had been pulled low over her face, shielding the older woman’s eyes from view.

  “Are you alright?”

  Eda could only nod.

  “You look like your legs are about to give way,” Shay said. “Are you hurt?”

  Eda looked down at her legs. It was true she could barely feel them – she might as well have floated all the way back down to 42nd Street.

  “I’m okay,” she said. “But…”

  “But?” Shay said.

  “There are two gardeners on 43rd Street,” Eda said. “They’re dead. I’m sorry, I don’t remember their names.”

  Shay looked at the bloodstains on Eda’s fingers. The rain hadn’t quite washed everything away yet.

  “Are you sure you’re not hurt?” Shay said.

  Eda looked at her hands and shook her head. She clenched her fists tightly together to hide the sight of blood.

  She was lightheaded.

  “It was so dark,” Eda said. “I couldn’t help them.”

  She wobbled on unsteady feet.

  Shay grabbed a hold of her, pulling the younger woman into a tight embrace. Eda fell willingly into Shay’s arms and buried her head in the older woman’s chest. Shay’s heart didn’t sound like it was beating at all. How could she be so calm after everything that had happened?

  “Thanks for letting me know,” Shay said. “We’ll pick up the bodies as soon as we can.”

  “Why did they do it?” Eda said, lifting her head off Shay’s chest. She stepped back and brushed down the front of her rain cloak, which squeaked in protest. Eda felt like she was swimming in blood but there was only water on her clothes. “Why did they come here with two ambassadors tied to their cart?”

  Shay pursed her lips. “They wanted to go backwards,” she said. “They wanted to create a little patriarchal society of their own, to live in the past and do all the things they wanted. At our expense.”

  Eda pulled her hood up, dragging it forward over her forehead. It was as close to disappearing as she could get.

  “Is it worth it Shay?” she asked. “Sending the ambassadors out I mean.”

  “That’s the risk we take Eda,” Shay said. “We could live here, keep ourselves to ourselves and no one would ever have to venture outside Manhattan again. We could accept the curse as final and live out the rest of our lives in peace. It’s tempting. But I believe in what we’re doing here. So do the ambassadors – they know the risks before they go out there and no one ever forces them to do what they do. And in turn, we know the risks in terms of what might show up on our doorstep.”

  “So it is worth it?” Eda said.

  Shay’s eyes lingered on the growing pile of corpses on the road.

  “Don’t know yet.”

  6

  After the battle on 42nd Street, the women in the Complex were wary of who would show up next.

  Still they tried to carry on as normal. The gardeners tended to the fruits and vegetables, to water storage and overseeing the distribution of supplies to the various occupied hotels. Lex’s self-defense classes grew in popularity. Fitness training, swords and archery practice – there were women who hadn’t picked up a weapon in their lives now showing an interest in these things. They’d seen the importance of learning how to fight first hand. If not for the warriors, the bandits would have taken over and they’d be as good as slaves.

  But Eda wasn’t interested in either the fitness classes or sword training. She took on a new role after the battle and one that suited her growing need for solitude, something that had become more important to her after the death of the two gardeners. With Shay’s blessing, Eda became the official lookout for the Complex. She was their eyes. Every morning, she’d leave the Fitzpatrick hotel and walk down 42nd Street. She ventured far to the west as most of the men who came in arrived from that direction, probably having made their way into New York through the Lincoln or Holland tunnels.

  Eda took up residence in a variety of lookout spots – usually on the upper floor of old stores, restaurants and coffee shops. She’d sit alone inside these empty buildings and sit by the window for hours, watching and waiting.

  On most days, nothing turned up but the rain.

  Eda didn’t mind the nothingness or what other people might call the boredom of the job. She liked her new role. It was a useful job and thank God because it wasn’t gardening or carrying supplies or doing any of the other mundane chores that kept the other women busy. She was no gardener and she was no warrior either – after what had happened with the two gardeners, Eda was convinced that all those years of soft living in the Complex had turned her into a coward. She wasn’t that little girl who’d survived the wild years, not anymore. What was the point in learning how to fight if she lacked the guts? It didn’t matter. She could be useful in other ways. Eda was still young and she had good eyes and ears. Her intuition was on point too. If something or someone showed up in Manhattan on its way to the Complex, she’d be the first to see or hear it.

  Eda would stay away for days on lookout duty. She was in no hurry to get back to Grand Central and as long as she had supplies – food, water and books – in her backpack, there was no need to leave her post. She’d sleep in abandoned buildings, grabbing a few hours here and there throughout the day. When she was awake she’d perch on car roofs or stand on the top floor of tall buildings, staring out at an ocean of stillness.

  One day however, the stillness moved.

  On that day, Eda was doing squats close to Times Square. She pushed her body up
and down while her eyes kept watch on a long stretch of road in front of her.

  She stopped all of a sudden.

  There was a speck of movement in the distance.

  Something was coming towards her.

  Eda grabbed the dagger lying at her feet. Slowly, she edged to the side of the road. Taking another look at the blurry shape up ahead, she took cover behind the grimy wreck of an old Ford and waited for it to get a little closer so she could take a better look.

  A couple of minutes passed. Eda took a deep breath and peered out from behind the car. Now she saw what it was. Immediately, her tense muscles relaxed and a smile stretched across her face.

  It was a dog.

  Eda hadn’t seen a dog in a long time and not knowing if this one was friendly, mad or riddled with the biting disease, she stayed hidden behind the car. But it was no good. About a minute later, she was peering out and having another look at it.

  The dog trotted down the street at a brisk but leisurely pace. It was large and handsome, with a long black and tan coat that appeared to be in excellent condition. Its brown eyes perched over a long black snout and missed nothing. Eda wondered if it already knew she was there, hiding behind the car and couldn’t care less.

  Eventually, the urge to make contact proved too strong.

  Eda got back to her feet in slow motion, holding her breath like she was underwater. With her heart racing, she stepped out from behind the car. Then, without looking at the dog, she strolled casually towards the center of the road where she’d been doing her squats.

  Slowly, she glanced to her left.

  The dog had stopped and it was looking right at her. Its tail was stiff and upright. Eda thought it looked more like a bronze statue of a dog than the real thing, such was its perfect stillness in that moment. What was it doing? What was it thinking? Eda figured there had to be two options running around in its mind right now – fight or flight. And she felt certain the big creature would choose fight. Any second now, it would come charging across the road towards her at a frightening speed, snarling and baring its sharp canines.

  But she was wrong.

  After a long and silent exchange between them, the dog turned tail and ran back in the direction it came from.

  Eda’s heart sank. A stab of loneliness went through her.

  She returned to the Complex that night. During her report to Shay, Eda stated that she’d seen nothing of interest while on lookout. The next morning she packed some extra food into her bag and told anyone who was listening that she’d be on lookout for a few days. After that, she took off west along 42nd Street, going back to the exact same spot where she’d seen the dog, not far from where Times Square used to be.

  The first day out she saw nothing. The dog didn’t come back.

  Eda had taken up residence in the shell of an old Foot Locker store on West 42nd Street. There was a plethora of advertising billboards on the opposite side of the street. Eda sat at the window, staring across at one of the images for a long time. It was a black and white photograph of two people, a black man and white woman. There was a guitar featured in the picture. Who were they? They must have been a big deal if they’d had their faces on billboards of that size. One thing was for sure – they looked happy. Music must have been quite something to make people smile like that. Eda had only heard singing before – she’d never experienced the sound of musical instruments like guitars even though she’d read about them, as well as pianos, trumpets and many others. A lot of the women in the Complex used to tell Eda that music was one of the things they missed the most.

  It must have been quite something.

  She tried to pass her time thinking about things like that. To take her mind on a journey somewhere nice. For the most part, Eda sat at the first floor window fighting off the drowsiness. She hadn’t slept much for thinking about the dog.

  God knows why she wanted to see it again so badly.

  Why she had to see it.

  Whenever Eda was on the brink of falling asleep she got up and walked around a little. Sometimes she counted her steps as she paced around the room. Foot Locker was like a bombsite. It had been ransacked a long time ago and now there was nothing but the occasional piece of upturned furniture and shards of broken glass on the floor.

  After a while, Eda sat down at the window again. She nibbled on a little potato salad and watched the rainclouds gather in the sky.

  The dog came back on the second day.

  When Eda saw it, she pressed her face up against the glass. She felt a surge of energy shoot through her, like a flower in the sun. Outside the dog sniffed its way along the sidewalk, stopping occasionally to look up and check the surroundings.

  Was it looking for her?

  She grabbed some supplies, threw them in her bag and hurried downstairs onto the street before the dog reached Foot Locker. She didn’t want to jump out on it this time and frighten it away.

  As Eda walked outside, a gentle drizzle fell from the sky.

  She pulled out a brown paper bag full of food from the backpack and placed it down on the road. Then she took a couple of backwards steps and sat down cross-legged on the wet road.

  When the dog saw her it stopped and its tail went stiff like last time. Eda didn’t call out or look at it in case she freaked it out. She did her best to look bored by the creature’s presence. That wasn’t easy because her heart was thumping and both her hands shaking.

  The dog didn’t run away but it didn’t exactly come forward either. It kept still for a long time, watching Eda with exceptional patience. Its eyes were a mystery to her, hidden in the fog of its jet-black face.

  Eda reached slowly towards the paper bag in front of her. As gently as she could, she opened it up and scooped out a chunk of potato salad with her fingers. Then she put it into her mouth. It tasted cold and wet but nonetheless she made a happy, contented noise as she chewed the food.

  She could feel the dog watching her. When she looked over and made loud yummy noises, it tilted its head.

  Eda dipped her fingers into the food and stirred back and forth. It felt disgusting and the rain getting into the box was only making it worse. When her hand was messy with food, she lifted it out and held it up, making sure the dog could see everything.

  She had to repeat this act several times as the food kept slipping off her finger.

  “C’mon,” she whispered, holding her hand outstretched. “Are you hungry?”

  The dog watched her for another minute. Just as Eda though it might be on the brink of trusting her, it turned and trotted away.

  She was alone again.

  The dog came back on the third day. It was raining harder this time but Eda didn’t let the weather get in the way of what she was trying to do. When she saw it walking down the road at a steady pace, she hurried outside and went through the same procedure as last time of trying to lure it closer with food.

  As she sat on the road, Eda kept her hood down. It was stupid to sit out in the rain like this for so long and her well-worn waterproofs were barely keeping her skin dry underneath. But it would all be worth it, if only the dog would come closer.

  She sat there, pulling out chunks of wet salad, slipping them into her mouth and chewing slowly. After that, she’d grab some more and offer a finger out in invitation, beckoning the dog closer.

  “C’mon,” she whispered. “If I eat any more of this I’m going to be sick. And then you’ll never come back.”

  The dog watched her for a while like it had before. It seemed unfazed by the heavy rain and Eda’s heart leapt when it began to walk forward, edging closer to where she was sitting in the middle of the road.

  She kept her hand out as it approached.

  The dog lifted its nose into the air. The black nose twitched as it inhaled the scent of the food.

  It came closer, leaning in with its face.

  Eda felt its wet lips take the food from her fingers. She wanted to laugh out loud but knew that such a hysterical reaction would s
end the dog running off again. So she fought back the surge of emotion and kept silent, waiting until the dog had licked all five fingers clean.

  “You want more?” she asked.

  She reached into the bowl and worked the salad onto her fingers. Then she fed the dog for a second time until her hand was clean. It went back and forth like that for a while – Eda coating her fingers in layers of food while the dog stood beside her, waiting patiently for yet another helping.

  Eda sat in blissful silence throughout. She hadn’t felt this content in a long time.

  Eventually however, the food ran out. By then, both Eda and the dog were soaking wet. Eda didn’t mind – she could have sat there for hours.

  The dog turned around and walked away. Eda wanted it to stay for a little longer but she didn’t move. She let it go, certain this time that she’d see it again.

  On Eda’s fourth day away from camp, supplies were getting low. She didn’t go back to Grand Central however, not right away. Determined to see her new friend again, she stuck around and when the dog showed up that afternoon, she gave it the majority of the remaining food. The rain had eased off, apart from a light drizzle that was more refreshing than bothersome.

  After the final feeding session, Eda was able to stroke the dog on its back and she talked to it in a soft voice.

  The dog, with a full belly, seemed to be enjoying the attention. At least Eda hoped it was.

  “Where have you been?” Eda said, scratching the dog’s ears. “Where did you come from?”

  The dog sat down beside her and licked its lips.

  “I know what you’re trying to tell me,” Eda said. “But it’s like I said, I’m all out of food. Listen though, I’m going to go back to the station and get some more. I’ll come back tomorrow, okay? Will you be here?”

  The dog blinked slowly, its eyes heavy and ready for sleep.

  Eda stroked its back for a while longer. While the dog snoozed, she stared down the long, empty road that stretched out ahead of them. Eda found herself thinking about Frankie. Had her old friend traveled down this same road when she’d left the Complex?