Refuge: After the Collapse

by Scott B. Williams

  “Fuck! What are we gonna do, Joey?”

  Joey didn’t answer. He already had the shotgun at his shoulder. He fired into the mob in a panic without even bothering to aim, hoping they would turn back at the threat of a gun. At least one ball of double-aught buckshot hit one of the thugs in the shoulder, and the long-handled axe he’d been brandishing dropped to the Interstate slab. But the rest of the gang didn’t even pause or seem to notice. Joey wondered what kind of drugs they were on as he racked the slide and picked another target. He fired again, but he was shaking badly, and this time he missed completely. Then Zach howled in pain. Joey turned to look and saw him doubled over, clutching at something that had completely pierced his upper thigh. With shocked disbelief he realized it was a fucking hunting arrow, just before something whistled past his head so close he could feel the wind. Whoever had the bow was apparently behind one of the vehicles and out of sight. Joey let go with two more panicked rounds from the shotgun, firing wildly from the hip before dashing down the embankment for the woods as fast as he could go, leaving the gas can where he’d dropped it and ignoring Zach’s pleas for help. He figured there was nothing he could do for him anyway. Zach had already fallen and was trying desperately to crawl off the road. Joey only had four rounds left and that was not enough to fight off these deranged whackos, who were coming at them like a horde of zombies. Why they were so determined he had no idea, but he wasn’t about to hang around to find out. He practically dove down the embankment and plunged through the tall cattails until he reached the boat and threw himself in with enough force to set it adrift into the canal. Some of the attackers were already chasing him down the bank. Joey leveled the shotgun on them and quickly unleashed his remaining four rounds. He thought that he hit at least one squarely in the chest before he threw down the gun into the boat to exchange it for the paddle and clawed his way to deeper water as fast as possible.

  Two things saved him: the rest of his pursuers were unsure how many rounds he had left in the shotgun (zero), and the deep water prevented them from charging him in the boat before he could get the outboard started. He had dropped the gas tank when he ran for his life, but there was enough fuel left in the carburetor for the motor to start and run a few minutes, and that got him far enough down the canal to be out of the sight and reach of his pursuers before the motor finally sputtered and died for the last time.

  Joey unscrewed the motor mounts and lifted it off the transom, dumping it overboard in a rage. If he had to paddle, it would be easier without the extra weight. He felt bad for Zach, who he was certain must be dead by now, but what else could he have done? If he had stayed to fight, or to try to help him back to the boat, he would be dead, too. What he needed now was a place to rest and recover from the trauma of the attack. Then he would resume his journey alone. Jessica was the only hope he had left.

  SIXTEEN

  Casey had the last watch, from midnight to 0200, when it had been decided they would haul in the anchor and get moving again. Uncle Larry wanted to go past the small community of Pearlington and under the Highway 90 bridge in darkness, and he figured they needed to allow a minimum of four hours to do it. It was less than five miles to the bridge, so he didn’t want to leave too early, either. If they timed it right, it would be getting to be daylight not long after they were south of the bridge, and they would need the light to step the mast and sort out the rigging and sails, as well as for navigating out of the river mouth.

  Casey was finding it hard not to doze off, as she had not been able to get much sleep earlier while Artie and Jessica were taking their turns on watch duty. Her uncle had insisted on keeping an around-the-clock guard posted, and no one argued with the reasoning behind that. The AK-47 was lying on the cockpit seat beside her, and she had the .22 pistol close by, as well. She was just thinking it was doubtful anyone would be on the river at night, when she heard a distant sound that was at first unrecognizable, just different from any of the normal night sounds of the forest. It changed pitch frequently and grew louder, and then it was unmistakable: it was the sound of a motor! Casey felt a rush of adrenaline as she grabbed the AK and stood up in the cockpit, the flashback image playing vividly in her mind of waiting in hiding while the men on the fishing boat drew near. She tried to pinpoint the direction the sound was coming from, and after a few more seconds she had no doubt that it was somewhere to the north, in the direction from which they had come, but this sound was different from that of the big fishing boat, the motor high-pitched and buzzy. Could it be Grant and Scully returning in the Johnboat? She pushed the companionway hatch to the port hull open and called down to Larry. He had been sleeping soundly, but he was on deck in seconds. Jessica and Artie were not far behind. The motor sound had stopped, though, and Larry had only heard it for the last few seconds it was running before someone shut it down.

  “It sounded to me like it was in the vicinity of the bridge,” he said.

  “You mean the Interstate we just passed under earlier, before we stopped?”

  “Yeah. And it was an outboard, all right, but no telling who.”

  “Do you think it could be Grant and Scully?” Jessica asked. “Who else would have a motor like that?”

  “It’s possible, but why would they come this far down in the Johnboat? They wouldn’t know where we went unless they saw the old boat and note we left. And if they did, Scully would know they couldn’t take that little Johnboat out to Cat Island. They would be coming this way in the big boat. It must be someone else, probably some locals running trotlines or night hunting or something. I’m sure a lot of people that lived out here before the blackout had old outboards that would still run. But even if it is Grant and Scully, by some chance, they’ll keep coming down the river if they’re looking for us. What we need to do is go ahead and get moving again. We’ve got to get past that last bridge before daylight and get our rig up. There’s no telling what kind of activity is going on around that Pearlington community in the daytime.”

  Since Casey had been the last person on guard duty, Jessica took the first turn with Artie in the kayak once they hauled in the anchor. Casey sat in the cockpit with her uncle as he steered by the moonlight. They had barely gotten started when once more the night was interrupted by sounds of human activity off in the distance: this time gunshots. The shots were fired sporadically, in singles and doubles in rapid succession. There was a break of silence, then four more, and nothing else. Artie and Jessica had stopped paddling to listen, but after another minute of quiet passed, Larry waved them on.

  “I sure hope Grant and Scully are not somehow involved in that,” Casey said.

  “I really don’t think it’s likely. Like I said, they would have had no reason to continue in the skiff if they found that fishing boat. That could have been someone who is a really lousy shot trying to headlight a deer. It sounded like all the shots came from the same gun, and it sounded like a shotgun to me, so it most likely wasn’t a fight.”

  “I just wish we knew for sure.”

  “Me too, Casey, but how? The only way would be to send someone back up to that bridge in the kayak, and there’s no way you or Jessica are doing that. I don’t want your dad doing it either, and I can’t do it. So that’s that. We’ve got to stay focused on getting this boat down the river, no matter what we hear. Just help me keep a sharp lookout for anybody coming up behind us or waiting in ambush ahead. I really hope we can slip by those houses near the bridge without attracting attention.”

  Though Casey listened for the outboard, more gunshots, or anything else out of place, she heard nothing as she sat there with Larry for the next hour until it was her turn to spell Jessica in the kayak. The river was much darker now—the moon was obscured by a cloudbank that had rolled in from the Gulf. Before she took the forward seat in front of her dad, Larry told her they should reach the bridge within the hour if they kept up the pace. Her dad was determined to do so, and the two of them paddled without taking a break, having figured out the afternoon before
the best cadence to provide enough speed to tow the big catamaran without wearing themselves out. She was proud of the job they were doing and she knew her Uncle Larry was proud of them all, too, and happy to be moving at such a respectable pace despite the lack of an engine. She sincerely hoped no one was out there somewhere in the dark watching them pass, but the thought occurred to her that it would be quite a surreal image for anyone observing: the big seagoing catamaran gliding ghostlike in the wake of a kayak, the only sound the rhythmic dipping of their double-bladed paddles.

  Casey knew they were coming up on an hour when they finally saw lights in the distance along the east bank of the river. Seeing such a sight was a surprise, and so out of place after so long, but she quickly realized the lights were only campfires or gas camping lanterns, and not a miraculous sign the electricity had suddenly come back on. From the bow of the catamaran Larry stood looking at them, too, while Jessica took the helm from the cockpit.

  “Let’s keep as far to the west side of the river as possible,” Larry said. “Now that the moon is behind those clouds, it should be hard for anybody at any of those houses to see us if we keep enough distance. Keep it quiet, too; no more talking, and try not to splash with the paddles.”

  Casey did her part to follow her uncle’s orders. She was nervous as she saw signs of such a large community of survivors in the place he said was called Pearlington. While they might all be good people concerned only with looking out for their needs, she knew someone with a rifle might see the big boat gliding by in the darkness and perceive it as a threat, shooting first and asking questions later. She had to consciously steady her breathing to stay calm as she paddled, wondering any minute when a hail of bullets might rip up the dark waters around her and possibly kill them all. Casey knew she was having a hard time trusting anyone now, and sadly, she didn’t foresee regaining that ability anytime soon.

  But despite her fear of an attack, she had to wonder who the people were and what their lives were like now in that cluster of fire-lit houses along the river. Were they the original inhabitants of that community, holding their own in hopes of a life restored to normalcy in the near future, or were they refugees or desperados who had found their way here from somewhere else? She hoped it was the former, and that if so they would be able to hang on long enough to see this through. But regardless of who they were, she breathed an audible sigh of relief as she and her dad finally towed the big catamaran beneath the bridge, and the steel grates of the closed drawbridge passed slowly overhead. And when she took a deep breath in, the air smelled of salt, sea, and freedom! They were close to the Gulf’s vast expanse, where the wind would carry them far away. If only Grant and Scully had been aboard, things would be about as good as they could be for Casey, considering the circumstances.

  They paddled a bit farther until they reached a wide bend in the river, bounded on either side by open expanses of salt marsh grass. The forest was behind them now. It grew all the way to the banks only upriver, where the water was fresh. Larry dropped the anchor, and Casey and her dad quickly clambered aboard the cat, hauling the kayak up onto the forward deck after them. Then, following Larry’s instructions, they all set to work stepping the mast. The heavy lifting was done by the four-part mainsheet tackle and the big cockpit winch, but there was plenty for all to do: sorting the shrouds and stays, and bending on the sails and attaching them to the sheets and halyards. By the time the work was complete, dawn was giving way to sunrise, and a gentle breeze from the west was steady enough to fill the sails and breathe life once again into the Casey Nicole, as her builder and master steered her once again to her element.

  Grant’s journey down the Bogue Chitto was little other than a grueling test of will and endurance. After coming so close to catching up to Joey and Zach because of their apparent troubles with the outboard, he paddled through the rest of the morning and didn’t stop until the afternoon sun was so warm that he could no longer resist an hour’s nap on a shady sandbar. He never heard the sound of the motor again, so he had to assume Joey and Zach had had no more trouble with it and were long gone. But regardless of where they were, he planned to push himself as hard as possible to reach the catamaran.

  A normal canoe or kayak trip from the cabin to the lower reaches of the Pearl near the coast could take a week, assuming lots of stopping during the day and camping normal hours every night, setting up before dark and waiting until after sunup to leave. But Grant knew what was possible from following the exploits of serious long-distance paddlers, who could go nearly around the clock for days at a time when necessary to win a race. Though Grant didn’t train for competition paddling, he was in excellent shape from going everywhere on his bicycle, and he had trained for and ridden in a few endurance cycling events and long charity rides, so he knew what it was to push well beyond his comfort zone. Thinking in those terms, he knew he might be able to compress the river trip down to two more days, or perhaps two and part of a third. After today, he and Scully would already be well overdue in their return to the catamaran. Since it had taken two days to go up the river to the cabin rather than the one he’d hoped for, they would have been a day late even if they had not run into Joey and Zach. He knew Casey and Jessica would be worried, but he hoped that Casey’s uncle, who was so experienced at travel by boat, could reassure them by pointing out how hard it was to predict arrival times in any kind of boat journey due to all the variables.

  It would be easier to push at a racing pace if he had proper nutrition to fuel his body, but at least he had food and he would make do with what he had rather than wish for the unattainable. When he woke from his short break he sorted out the supplies he had brought from the cabin and what he had found in the dry bag Joey and Zach lost overboard. He had learned a long time ago that raw ramen noodles could be eaten straight from the package, and that they didn’t even taste all that bad. Wanting to save the wheat crackers for later, he spread peanut butter for extra protein over a brick of the ramen, and after eating that was back in the kayak within minutes. He would stop sometime later and build a small fire to cook hotcakes or bannock from the cornmeal and pancake mix. In the meantime he planned to keep an eye out for any easily gotten fish, reptile, or other animal to add to the larder.

  Grant had to assume that if the motor had continued to run after he’d heard them start it, and if they had not stopped somewhere for any length of time, Joey and Zach could have reached the catamaran already. He wondered what they planned to do about Scully, but since they hadn’t shot him rather than simply leaving him at the cabin, he had hopes they would likewise simply put Scully off on a sandbar or in the swamp somewhere when they no longer needed him for directions. He intended to keep a sharp eye out in any case, though if Scully were stranded somewhere there would be no way of fitting him into the one-person kayak and they would have to figure out alternative transportation.

  He paddled through the rest of the afternoon and beyond twilight into the night. The moon was full this second night on the river, and the channel here was wider and deeper, making for slower current and fewer obstructions. Grant was tired but not to the point of exhaustion. He finally stopped when he estimated it was midnight, and craving more than crackers, ramen, and peanut butter, he built a small fire on a sandbar and let it burn down to coals. Then he mixed up a half and half batter of cornmeal and pancake mix, adding enough water to make it the consistency of thick dough, which he twisted around the end of a green branch that he first peeled with his knife. Propping the stick up so the dough was just over the glowing coals, he waited while it baked. Though he had not seen this first hand during his time with the Wapishana in Guyana, he knew that some North American tribes baked bannock bread this way, and besides, having no skillet or oil to fry it, it was the only option he had.

  The bread came out better than he expected, and Grant ate his fill as he let the fire go out and sat in the glow of moonlight on the white sand. It was a perfect night for camping on the river, and he’d enjoyed many such campsi
tes in prior times when he was outdoors by choice rather than necessity. Even in these circumstances, Grant could appreciate the beauty of the night, and especially the utter quiet in the absence of all sounds of manmade machinery. He had known such silence in far more remote places, like the Essequibo River, but never expected to find it anywhere in the southern United States. He wondered again how far the effects of the electromagnetic pulse really reached. Did it shut down the grid in all of North America? All of the Western Hemisphere? Could it even have been a global event? Grant wondered if he would ever know. If so, it would probably be a long time from now, in the future when the infrastructure was rebuilt and order was restored in place of the anarchy that seemed to have consumed everywhere people were concentrated.

  He thought about the prospect of sailing far away on the boat that Casey’s uncle had built, and wondered if they would find someplace where life was normal, or at least relatively safe. Thinking of this brought a wave of anger over him as he realized that this very night, he and Scully should be aboard that boat with Casey and the others. That bastard ex-boyfriend of Jessica’s had ruined everything, and Grant wondered what on Earth she had ever seen in him in the first place. He knew Casey saw right through Joey, and he was surprised she hadn’t talked Jessica into dumping him a long time ago. Maybe Jessica just didn’t get it. Grant thought a lot about the two girls as he sat there, and he wondered what would happen if things ever worked out and they really did sail away together. He knew they both liked him, and not just because he helped them get out of New Orleans. It had started with Casey long before, when they had met on an anthropology dig he was leading as a grad student. He’d been oblivious to it at the time, but looking back he realized there were plenty of clues he wouldn’t have missed if he hadn’t had such a one-track focus on his work for the department.