Dark Days (Book 3): Exposure:

by Lukens, Mark

  The rippers outside knew that he and Wilma were still in the safe house; their memory was good enough for that. There always seemed to be a few rippers watching the house, usually with some kind of weapon in their hand. They would watch the house for hours, like some kind of guard dog. Luke figured after a day or two the rippers would get tired of watching the house or even forget that he and Wilma were inside. But they were always there, always watching.

  After the third day, Luke didn’t see too many rippers roaming around out there. He wondered if this particular horde had moved on after scavenging all the houses nearby. Eventually they would have to move on in search of more food. Of course the rippers could be hiding somewhere nearby, watching and waiting to attack, just like they had done the first morning that he and Wilma had shown up here.

  This morning when Luke got up he checked the windows, looking for more “guard dogs,” but he didn’t see any. The mist was heavy again this morning, so they were going to have to do their best at spotting the rippers.

  “You ready to go?” Wilma asked when Luke met her in the garage.

  They had packed their backpacks and the packs on the bikes last night. Wilma had selected the two best bikes out of the ten dirt bikes left in the garage—a red Honda 250 for her, and a blue and yellow Yamaha 250 for him.

  Luke used his backpack for his own supplies: a change of clothes, an extra pair of socks and a pair of thicker gloves, his extra gun, his extra magazines, the extra boxes of ammo he’d gotten from one of the storage lockers, a rain jacket, a few MREs, and two extra bottles of water. The pack wasn’t too heavy.

  The pack on the back of Luke’s bike held a rolled-up tarp, a thermal blanket, a LifeStraw for drinking water, a packet of water purification tablets, a box of waterproof matches, electrical tape, a small roll of cordage, and a first-aid kit. Luke also had a small leather pack strapped to his handlebars that held his third gun (an H&K 9mm), an extra magazine of ammo, and another bottle of water.

  The dirt bikes had just the bare essentials, more like racing bikes than street bikes, but they had been enhanced for this purpose. The bikes didn’t have a headlight or a speedometer, but they were equipped with a compass and a fuel gauge, and Luke’s bike had a metal scabbard welded to it so he could shove a shotgun down into it with a leather strap to hold it in place. Wilma’s bike also had a small leather pack strapped to the top of the handlebars where she stowed her extra gun, extra ammo, and a bottle of water.

  They had dressed as warmly as they could without constricting their movements on the bikes. They decided not to wear dirt bike boots or helmets, but they wore gloves, goggles, and bandanas over their mouths and noses to cut down on the wind and dirt.

  For the last two days they had gone over the route they would travel down to West Virginia, and Luke was already trying to visualize the first leg of the journey in his mind.

  Luke was as ready as he was ever going to be.

  “I’ll take a look outside while you get the bikes ready,” he told her.

  Luke drew his gun from his holster and went to the side door. He already had his backpack on, ready to jump on the bike. Wilma was already pushing his bike towards the side door right behind him.

  He unlocked the side door and opened it. He stepped outside, his hiking boots crunching on the cold grass. It was definitely light enough outside for Luke to see, but the morning mist was still pretty heavy. He listened for a moment, but he didn’t hear any screeches or calls in the distance; he didn’t hear any movement in the mist. But the rippers could be out there—they could be watching and waiting.

  Luke unzipped his hoodie and pulled out a pair of binoculars he had hanging around his neck. He raised them to his eyes, searching the vast field of crops beyond the back yard of the safe house, looking for any sign of movement out there in the mist.

  He didn’t see anything.

  Wilma pushed Luke’s bike out into the back yard a few feet and handed it over to him. Luke stuffed his binoculars back down inside his hoodie and pulled the zipper all the way up to his throat. He slipped his goggles back down over his eyes and held on to his bike, waiting while Wilma got hers.

  She pushed her bike out and leaned it against the wall for a moment while she shut the door to the garage as quietly as she could and locked it. They had already made sure all the electricity and water was shut off inside the safe house—not that it mattered much now.

  Wilma pushed her bike over to where Luke stood. She got on her bike, put it in neutral and stomped down on the kickstart. The bike started up immediately. Little puffs of white smoke shot out from the exhaust pipe. The bike sounded amazingly loud and Luke couldn’t help looking around, expecting to see rippers materializing out of the morning mist.

  Luke made sure his bike was in neutral and he squeezed the clutch as he stomped down on the kickstart. His bike started right up, making a tinny sound that echoed back at him from the block walls of the garage.

  Wilma took off towards the field of crops, racing across the grass of the back yard. Luke used the toe of his boot to put the bike into first gear and goosed the throttle a little too much. The front tire came up off the ground and he let off the gas a little as he shifted into second gear and then into third. This bike was a little more powerful than he had anticipated. It might take a few minutes for him to get used to this.

  They raced across the field of grass, and Luke could almost feel the rippers coming now. He looked back to his right, back towards the safe house as he sped away. He saw the rippers coming, at least two dozen of them. He looked back at Wilma who was so far ahead of him, already at the dirt trail that ran parallel with the edge of the field of crops. She was fast on the bike, and he could admit that she was far more skilled on a dirt bike than he was. It had been years since he had ridden any kind of motorcycle, but it was beginning to come back to him.

  As long as he didn’t dump the bike right now.

  CHAPTER 28

  Luke caught up to Wilma on the dirt trail. She was at least thirty feet ahead and riding even faster. She had to have seen the rippers running towards them. Some were throwing rocks as they ran, but they were still too far away to hit them.

  They were going to make it.

  Luke followed Wilma down the narrow dirt trail next to the edge of the field. He saw the faint tracks from where Matt and the other two had ridden a few days ago. He watched Wilma in front of him, and he kept glancing back to his left, watching the horde of rippers. But they were already slowing down and giving up.

  Even though the morning mist was beginning to fade, the sky was slate-gray and the wind at this speed was icy; his face and hands were so cold even though he had the bandana covering his face and the gloves on his hands. It didn’t matter; he would just have to tough it out.

  They were nearing the end of the trail where it disappeared into a stand of trees—the beginning of the woods. Wilma entered the woods first, slowing down a little, following a trail only she seemed able to see. As the minutes ticked by, Luke became more relaxed, he was sure that they wouldn’t see as many rippers in the woods as they had in the city. He figured most of the rippers would stay near the cities where the food was more plentiful—both the salvageable food in the abandoned houses and buildings, and the living food they seemed to love so much: other humans.

  Luke and Wilma slowed down in some areas of the woods, slowing down to ten or twenty miles an hour as they navigated a tricky turn or squeezed through a narrow gap between a thick stand of trees. They only had to stop once when Wilma came across a fallen tree. She found another way around it and stopped once more for a moment to get her bearings on the compass. She looked at him before taking off, and Luke didn’t bother saying anything to her; he just gave her a thumbs-up, and they were riding again.

  An hour later the woods began to thin out a little, which allowed them to ride a little faster. Wilma slowed down when they came to a two-lane road. They stopped at the edge of the road in the woods, looking for any sign of trouble,
but there were no buildings, cars, or anything else in sight. Wilma made a right onto the road, goosing the gas, her bike screaming in the morning air. Luke followed her.

  In no time at all they were back up to at least fifty miles an hour, racing down the road as it dipped down into a valley, the woods thinning out and giving way to vast fields. While they were still at the top of the hill, Luke had a few seconds to scan everything down in the land below, which was made up of farmland, crops, dairy farms, barns, houses, vast acreage, and stands of trees in the distance. But there were no fires on the horizon, no hordes of rippers, and there wasn’t any sign of the anarchy gang.

  When they had been going over the route last night on the map, this road was where they had anticipated the most danger, because it ran through a small town. But all they had to do was get through the town and then they would reach the railroad tracks. Luke kept his head on a swivel as he followed Wilma down the road into the valley, the two-lane road like a black ribbon snaking through the green grass and fields below.

  About halfway down into the bottom of the valley, Luke saw two rippers standing in front of a home that was set back a hundred feet from the edge of the road. The place wasn’t a farm, but there were several tractors and other farm equipment in front of a massive garage. Luke figured that the person who used to live in that house had been some kind of local mechanic who worked on tractors.

  The two rippers, a man and a woman, stood as still as two deer on the steps that led up to the front porch of the home. They stared blankly at Luke as he passed by. Both of them were overweight, and neither of them seemed interested in trying to chase their bikes, almost like they already knew there was no hope of catching up to him and Wilma. Their clothes were torn and soiled with dirt and blood. Their faces and hands were soaked in blood. The front door of the home was wide open, and the doorway looked like a black rectangle in the morning light, a black rectangle that led to horrors hidden inside that house.

  Luke didn’t see any other rippers once they were past that home, and he didn’t see any more rippers once they reached the bottom of the valley. There were large fields to their left and right. A barbed-wire fence ran alongside the road on the right-hand side, a cow pasture dotted with dead animals in the distance, rib bones sticking up from the rotting carcasses. Flocks of birds swarmed the dead cows.

  As they began to ascend the next hill, the road veering slightly to the right, Luke saw a white building in the distance that was at least a hundred yards beyond a two-story farmhouse; the place had to be some kind of barn. On the side of the barn was a large anarchy symbol painted in bright red paint. But there was something strange about this symbol; the circle around the A didn’t look exactly like a circle, it looked more like a capital letter D; he was sure of it this time.

  They were past the farmhouse and barn in a few seconds. Luke wondered why there were so few rippers in this area besides the few stragglers he’d just seen. Could it be that this area was too rural for the rippers? Maybe there weren’t enough houses to scavenge or people to eat. There would be plenty of farm animals to eat, but it looked like many of those animals had already been slaughtered and eaten. Maybe the rippers had migrated to the urban areas where the food and shelter was more plentiful. It was strange to think of the rippers being that organized, but Luke found himself thinking of them as animals again, and he had to remind himself that the rippers were still humans; even though this disease had turned them into raging animals, they were still smart in some basic and instinctive ways.

  They’re getting smarter.

  Luke didn’t know where that thought had come from again; it almost sounded like someone had just whispered those words right into his ear, penetrating right into his mind. He was pretty sure he had heard those same words in his dream last night. It had been the skinny guy with the beard and the tattoos on his neck who had said those words; Luke suddenly remembered that part of the dream.

  He’d had dreams of the two men, the boy, and the blond woman every night, but when he woke up, he could only remember bits and pieces of the dreams. But then sometimes, like right now, a piece of the dream would swim to the surface of his mind and he would remember that part of the dream so vividly he was amazed that he could have ever forgotten it.

  Even though Luke was sure the blond woman was blind, it was like she could still see in some way, like she had psychic powers. He had never been a believer in anything supernatural, but after everything that had happened in the last few weeks, he found himself open to just about anything right now. He could feel things in his dreams. He could feel that the men, the boy, and the woman were all good people and that he needed to be with them. He felt that it was inevitable that all of them would be together. But what about Wilma? He hadn’t seen her in the dreams. Did that mean that Wilma wasn’t going to go with him? She seemed dead-set on getting to her militia’s camp. If Luke wanted to leave the camp, he wasn’t so sure Wilma would go with him.

  His mind continued to wander as he rode up the next rise into a stand of trees that crowded both sides of the road. He thought of that anarchy symbol he’d just seen on the side of the white barn, a symbol that might not be an anarchy symbol but something else entirely. The letter D and the letter A. DA or AD. Wilma had seen that same symbol in her dreams again last night, but Luke hadn’t seen that symbol in his dreams. They were both having recurring dreams, but their dreams were so different from each other’s.

  Except for the Shadow Man—he’d been in both of their dreams, the shadowy man with the shining eyes. He hadn’t spoken in either of the dreams, but he always seemed to be there at the edge of the dream, watching and waiting.

  Wilma told him yesterday that she had tried to run from the Shadow Man in her dream, but no matter where she ran to, the Shadow Man was right there.

  They were through the thickest part of the woods, and the trees soon gave way to more farmland, and in the distance there was the small town that Luke had seen on the map last night—just a cluster of buildings. As they got closer Luke saw small family farms, then small neighborhoods of homes, a one-street trailer park, a strip plaza, a veterinarian’s office, a feed store, an elementary school, a lumberyard, a country store, a church, and a few gas stations.

  Luke and Wilma sped towards the first intersection in the town. The railroad tracks would be after the next intersection. Once they were on the railroad tracks, they would ride them until dark, looking for a place to spend the night.

  There were more DA symbols spray-painted on some of the buildings in this town, the symbols painted on the sides of buildings, on driveways, and on abandoned cars in bright red paint. There was no doubt about it now; it wasn’t a circle around the letter A, but a D around the letter A. He wasn’t even sure how he had ever thought the D was a circle before.

  Luke thought he saw movement out of the corner of his eye as they closed in on the intersection. At first he thought it might be a ripper, but then he heard the gunshot ring out in the air.

  CHAPTER 29

  Someone was firing a rifle at them.

  Wilma swerved a little, keeping low on the bike yet still speeding through the intersection. Luke kept right up with her.

  Three more gunshots rang out and Luke swore he practically felt one of the bullets whiz right by his head. He pulled his gun out of his holster underneath his hoodie and aimed it across his body towards the other side of the street where the gunshots were coming from. He fired blindly three times, his gun spitting and recoiling slightly in his hand. He didn’t even look at where he was shooting; he just wanted these yokels to realize that he would fire back.

  He kept his eyes on Wilma as she raced through the intersection. She was still crouched low on her bike, trying to make herself a smaller target. The next intersection was in sight—only two blocks away.

  The gunshots were coming from behind them now, so they had to be well past their shooter, who had probably been aiming at them from a window or up on a roof. If they could just get to the ne
xt intersection, then they might be out of his line of sight and be safe.

  Luke heard the roar of the engine before he saw the pickup truck pull out from between two buildings a block ahead of them, trying to block them off from the next intersection. The truck was an older Ford pickup, jacked up on large tires. A driver and a passenger were in the cab and a man with a rifle was in the back, already trying to aim his rifle over the top of the cab at Luke.

  Wilma swerved to the right immediately as the truck bounced out onto the road. She slid sideways on her bike just a little, the back tire screeching in the air. Luke still had his gun in his hand and he aimed at the man in the back of the truck, shooting him before he ever got a chance to draw a bead on Wilma. The man flew back when the bullet hit him, dropping his rifle as he flipped over the side of the truck, landing in the street, his arms and legs flapping around as he rolled away.

  Luke followed Wilma around two parked cars next to the sidewalk and the strip of grass, but he still managed to shoot four times into the front of the truck as he rode away. Two of the bullets hit the front grill and the other two went through the windshield. Luke was sure he’d hit the driver, but he couldn’t get the passenger because he had ducked down too far below the dashboard. The pickup truck sped across the street and rammed right into a parked car, caving the whole side of it in. Steam shot up from the wreck like a geyser.

  Speeding back up, Luke caught up with Wilma at the next intersection. The railroad crossing was right past this intersection. A dead traffic light hung above the intersection from the wires. Wilma turned sharply at the railroad crossing, her back tire skidding, her left foot down and guiding her in the turn. She straightened the bike out and goosed the throttle, her front wheel coming up just a bit, and then she bolted down the tracks, disappearing behind some trees. Luke was right behind her a few seconds later, keeping fifteen feet behind her.