His Name Was Zach (Book 2): Her Name Was Abby

by Martuneac, Peter

  Her Name Was Abby

  By

  Peter Martuneac

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Copyright © 2020 by Peter W. Martuneac. All rights reserved.

  This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  Dedicated to my beautiful and amazing wife, and to our kids, for their ceaseless love and support.

  With thanks to Dita for reading one of the early drafts and providing feedback, and to Cody for another stunning cover.

  Cover art by Cody Phan

  Prologue

  Abby shivered as she pressed the cold, metal barrel of her pistol against her temple. Of course she was already shivering because of the extreme cold all around her, but this shiver came from the fear of what she was about to do.

  She knelt on a small, oval rug, probably handmade as evidenced by the mediocre stitching, in the middle of what once was a small bedroom on the second story of an old abandoned house. The floor was made of wood, dark and in some areas blackened, and scuffed beyond any hope of repair. Except for a bare, single bedframe and an empty set of drawers, the room was destitute of furniture and decoration. The room’s only window was smashed, allowing a bitter breeze to snake its way towards Abby, blowing strands of dirty, hazelnut-colored hair across her face. Flakes of snow came with the wind, as always, and they alighted upon the back of Abby’s neck, biting her with their icy fangs.

  Her old boots were torn and rarely kept out the snow when she walked. Her cargo pants were thin and even with the addition of some leggings she had found, her legs would still get cold. A large, moth-eaten jacket she’d come across was warm when the air was still but the nearly incessant wind cut right through it. She still had her hat, hanging onto it as a reminder of happier times, but it did little to warm her head. And try as she might, she never found a pair of gloves more practical than some old leather ones.

  Abby wept quietly and sniffed, her red, runny nose helping to make her look as pitiful as she felt. Her silver eyes were filled with immeasurable pain and loss such that a fifteen year old girl should never have to endure. She ran her trembling forearm across her nose and cheeks again and then pushed those loose strands of hair back behind her ear out of habit. It did not matter much how she looked now, she supposed. Taking her own life, if what she had could even be called a life, was the only path left to her in this world so cold, where the dead ate the living and most survivors were horrible, remorseless criminals.

  But she had not been infected. No, that was not what had led her to this dark place, on her knees and believing that her life had run its sad, miserable course. She just could not take it anymore. It had been over three months since her adoptive father, a man named Zach, had died, along with everyone else she had ever loved. And with Zach gone, so too was Abby’s sense of safety. Zach had always defended her and had always found a way out of every bad situation for both of them. But during their last escape, Zach paid a heavy price for Abby’s safety: his life. He had been bitten while saving Abby from that very fate, and Abby, after some convincing by her dear father, killed him before he could turn.

  She saw no end to her abject condition. She was lost, trying to find her way to civilization, but she kept going in circles. She knew she was in Utah, which was supposedly where the new American capital was, but she did not know where exactly to find it. The cold was unbearable and inescapable. She was sick and desperately hungry, her last meal having been several days ago.

  Fear followed her, as well. Abby was still terrified of running into someone like Henry, someone who would think nothing of beating and raping an innocent, young girl. And without Zach to save her again, there would be no way she could defend herself from a much bigger, much stronger man. This fear kept her up at night and followed her with every step during the day. More than once she considered cutting her hair very short and masquerading as a boy, but her façade would be short lived; by this point in her life, her body had become distinctly feminine and there was little she could do to conceal that besides wearing her large jacket.

  Abby’s hand shook as she held her gun, Zach’s old pistol, to her head. “Zach,” she whispered, “if you can hear me, please stop me.”

  But she received no answer. No voice in her head, no miraculous sign manifesting itself before her. There was only the hollow howling of the wind, her short, erratic breaths, and her quiet sobs. “You were wrong, Zach,” she whimpered as tears streamed down her soft cheeks. “I’m not strong enough. I can’t take this anymore.”

  She reached into her pocket with her free hand and carefully pulled out a folded-up photograph, the one of her and Zach together in Little America. There was so much hope and joy in this snapshot, but Abby could hardly even recognize her old, smiling self. She took a last, tearful glance at the face of the man she had failed and then slipped the picture back into her pocket.

  Abby cocked the hammer of her 1911-style pistol back and flicked the safety off. She wrapped her cold, trembling finger around the trigger and clamped her eyes shut tightly.

  “I’m sorry, Daddy,” she whispered.

  BAM!

  Part I

  The Wild

  Chapter One

  -three months earlier-

  The road seemed like it would go on forever. After every turn, after every rise in the terrain, there was always more road to follow. Occasionally an old highway sign would tell her how many miles it would be before she reached a major city, but Abby did not like those reminders of how far away she was from her goal. To make matters worse, she did not even know where exactly she should be going. All she knew was that she should head west.

  So that is what she was doing. Like the pioneers of old, Abby was heading west in search of a new home.

  This search was long and arduous for Abby. Being alone, she doubted herself at every turn, wondering if she was making the right decisions. And with no one to talk to, no one to offer advice, Abby could do nothing but brood on the past. Many times she would feel so encumbered by her memories that she could barely trudge forward, making progress at roughly the rate of a glacial movement. Other times she would simply sit in one place for days, at an abandoned gas station or an old farm house, unable to find the will to even walk.

  The onset of winter further slowed Abby’s journey. It was an unseasonably cold winter, and it started snowing as early as late October. Abby had clothes that were suitable for the cool air of autumn, but not the snow and ice of winter. At every car, every house, and every building Abby searched for winter clothes, finding little besides an old jacket and some leather gloves.

  The cold forced her body to work harder to stay warm, and with the scarcity of food, it had precious little energy with which to do this. Add this to the long journey that Abby faced and it is plain to see how her physical toughness was being tested just as much as her mental strength.

  After weeks of travelling alone, Abby was only about halfway to her objective. She stuck to westbound highways as much as she could for two reasons. One was to avoid getting lost, and the other was to hopefully find cars with useful gear in them. But she was in a rural area of Kansas, just outside of a small, abandoned town, meaning vehicles were few and far between, and most were as empty as a Monday morning church.

  That is why Abby was hardly hopeful when she came across an old Jeep Cherokee a
long the side of the road. It was a pale, washed-out red color and fitted with some heavy-duty, off-roading tires. The back of the vehicle had no less than a dozen bumper stickers, most of which were clichéd or crude jokes, though one of them did manage to put a small grin on Abby’s face. It was a parody of those commonly seen bumper stickers that begin with “If you can read this…” followed by a punchline about being too close or not paying enough attention to the road. But this one read, “If you can read this, I’m not impressed. Most people can read.”

  Abby at first wanted to just pass by this one. No other car had ever yielded anything useful to her, so why would this one be different? But something prodded Abby to just check it anyway. She sighed and casually opened up the back and glanced around inside the abandoned vehicle.

  For the most part, all she could see was trash, but Abby decided to take a closer look. Besides, she certainly wouldn’t mind taking a second to get out of the brutal wind. She looked over her shoulders to make sure that no one would be sneaking up on her, mostly out of habit since she had not seen anyone since Zach died, and then climbed into the old Jeep. She crawled up to the front seats looking left and right for anything useful. Up in the passenger seat was a thin, blue toolbox. Abby opened it up and to her delight found some potentially useful items: needle-nose pliers, a flathead screwdriver, and a small plastic bag filled with screws of varying length. She dumped these into her mostly empty ruck, then observed the driver seat.

  Abby’s eyebrows arched up in surprise. The keys were in the ignition! Did Abby dare hope that she could get the car running? She dropped her ruck onto the floor, pushed the bill of her hat up a bit, then clambered into the driver’s seat. She rested her hands on the wheel for a second, saying a silent prayer as she did so, then put her hand on the key, closed her eyes, and gave it a turn.

  The engine was turning over. Abby held the key there for a second, hoping to hear the roar of the engine coming to life, but it didn’t come. “Come on, start. Start!” she pleaded. She tried again but with the same results. Abby moaned in frustration, but she refused to give up on the old Jeep yet, not after coming so close to getting a ride.

  She popped the hood open and hopped to the ground. Walking around to the front of the car, Abby lifted the hood up and propped it open with the support rod. She then turned her hat around backwards and looked down at the engine block with her hands on her hips, trying to spy something out of the ordinary. Zach had taught her a little bit about car mechanics over the years, as well as some minor repairs that she might be able to do, so there was a slight chance that Abby could get this thing running.

  First she checked the battery connections, but those were fine. She pulled out the air filter and sniffed the inside of the air cleaner housing. There was a smell of gasoline, so the engine was getting gas properly, which also meant that the fuel pump was functioning.

  She put the air filter back in its place, then checked the spark plugs, and she noticed that one of the wires had been disconnected. She knew how to fix this, she just needed to recall it from her distant memory.

  Abby went back into the Jeep and reappeared a moment later with the needle-nose pliers from her ruck. Returning to the engine, she stood up on the front bumper and leaned into the engine so that she could more easily reach the spark plugs. Locating the spark plug in question, she pulled the rubber boot off with her hand and used the needle-nose pliers to detach the small metal clip from the end of the wire. She grasped the spark plug wire in one hand and disconnected its other end from the distributor.

  She turned suddenly and jumped to the ground, reaching for her pistol, as she heard a noise from just behind her. But nobody was there. Only a bird that decided to land on an old chip bag in the middle of the road. Abby frowned and said, “Shoo! Go on!” The bird cocked its head towards Abby in a disinterested manner, and then it flew away. Nothing else caught Abby’s eye, so she turned her attention back to the engine.

  She pulled the end of the wire through the boot and drew her KA-BAR knife. She didn’t have any wire cutters, so she would have to improvise to strip back the rubber cladding around the wire. Doing it with her KA-BAR was difficult, clumsy work, but it sufficed. Once that was done, she bent the inner material back over the rubber and held it there as she slid the metal clip over it and pinched it closed. She slid this end into the boot and got back on the front bumper of the car.

  With the reassembled spark plug wire in hand, Abby leaned forward again and pressed the boot firmly back into place. She heard a quiet but distinct ‘click’ as the metal clip reattached to the spark plug. She hooked the other end of the wire back up to the distributor, climbed off of the front bumper, and shut the hood.

  Abby got back behind the wheel of the car and slid the needle-nosed pliers into her ruck after shutting the door. She took her hat off and set it in the passenger seat, then sat in silence for a moment, hoping that she had fixed the problem, and that that was the only problem that was keeping the car from running properly. She set her hand on the keys, still in the ignition.

  “Three, two, one!”

  She gave the key a solid turn forward, listening to the engine churn and chug, struggling to find life. But once again it failed to turn on.

  “Damn it!” Abby cried, striking the dashboard with the heel of her palm. The old Abby would have scolded herself for cursing like that, but that Abby was long gone.

  She turned the key in the ignition again out of frustration. Then she did it again, as if to mock herself. But the engine suddenly sputtered and coughed, then roared to life. Abby’s jaw dropped and she ran her hands through her hair. Her smile took up half of her face as she shook her head in disbelief and said, “Rock on!”

  Abby looked at the fuel gauge to see that it had almost half a tank of gas. Assuming there would be no further engine problems, she could probably make it a quarter of the way across Kansas. She giggled in delight at this thought. She was finally catching a break.

  Abby put her foot down on the brake and pulled the shifter down into ‘drive’. She then eased off of the brake, allowing the old Jeep to roll forward. She placed her foot on the accelerator and pressed on it. The car lurched up a bit and proceeded down the road as Abby steered it off of the shoulder, slowly increasing her speed as she went. She decided to test her luck even further with the car’s heater. Amazingly, this also was functioning, and soon the interior of the Jeep was warm enough for Abby to take off her coat and gloves.

  “I wonder if we can get some tunes in here,” Abby said aloud. She reached over and opened the glove compartment, looking for a CD. After pulling out a couple of envelopes filled with insurance cards and registration forms, Abby found one.

  “Briefcase Full of Blues. The Blues Brothers,” Abby said, reading the title of the CD and the name of the group performing on it. Not her favorite genre, but better than nothing. She slid the disc into the CD slot on the radio and waited for it to warm up. After a few seconds of buzzing and whirring, Abby heard the classic sounds of trumpets and saxophones begin to play a fast, upbeat intro tune. She grinned and turned up the volume, grooving along with the beat.

  She drove west, soon passing just to the north of Topeka, across the Kansas River. She drove through some small towns along the way but did not stop. Now that she was mobile, she wanted to keep going until the car ran out of gas or the engine fell apart. Being able to cover so much ground so quickly was a huge morale boost for Abby, as was not having to carry her ruck.

  “Speaking of my ruck,” Abby said to herself, “it’s pretty empty.”

  She had the tools she’d found in the Jeep, her slingshot, some climbing rope and a couple carabiners that she had nabbed in Missouri, a full CamelBak, and assorted odds and ends that she had picked up over the weeks, things that might one day come in handy. But what she did not have was food. She used the last of what she had for breakfast that morning.

  After about an hour of driving, Abby’s stomach growled for the fifth time, reminding her once
again of how hungry she was. She saw signs for a city just a little farther down the road.

  Abby pulled over to the shoulder and put the car in park. She opened up the glove compartment again and fished around for a map but with no luck. She sat back in her seat, chewing on her lower lip and evaluating her position. Cities in this region were few and far between, and most of them were small and had been picked clean years ago, either by people fleeing The Crisis or by roaming nomads that still lived out in the Wild. There would be no knowing for sure when she would get another decent chance of scavenging food. And the way things had gone for Abby that might prove fatal for her.

  “I suppose I should scope it out, at least,” Abby finally said. She put the car back into drive and headed downtown.

  Abby approached the city limits with caution, scanning the area for any potential warning signs, but the city looked deserted. Even so, she drew her pistol from her thigh holster and set it in the cup holder next to her as she took a left turn off of the highway and entered the city. She drove slowly as she looked from right to left, hoping to find an old grocery store or even some wildlife. There were plenty of houses and cars, but they all looked ransacked, and Abby was not about to stop and spend hours upon hours searching every house.

  Being inside of a large city brought Abby back to her several incursions into Chicago, though Chicago was far bigger and seemingly more dangerous than where she was now. It made her think of Zach again. He was a man who took no chances if he could at all avoid doing so, a man who always planned for, and indeed expected, the absolute worst. Zach would probably have kept driving past the city, Abby knew, but she felt like that would be a greater risk than the city itself.

  Just a few blocks into the city, Abby noticed signs for two universities up ahead, one that looked very large, and a smaller one that was just across the road. She slowed down as she drove between the two campuses, debating if the large one would be worth looking over. “There’s probably a lot of stuff I could take,” she mused. Maybe the university had an ROTC program, which would mean there was somewhere on campus where she could probably find some military gear.