SAFE

by Dawn Husted

Again I looked at James, wondering what the answer was.

  “Four days,” James replied. I hadn’t realized we were at sea for that many days and was startled hearing the number.

  The old man cleared the spit from his throat and wiped his hand along his white beard in an observing manner. The young woman walked over and brought us some water and bread. “We should pull into the next port by tomorrow evening, and then you both will be on your way,” she said. Her long hair swung around as she turned and left the room.

  I held the glass with both hands, letting the lukewarm water linger against my cracked lips. I took only sips after, doing my best not to heave the water up.

  Chapter Eighteen

  It had been almost ten months since the boat came rescuing us from near starvation and sun exhaustion, now I was sitting around a fire in the cold, eating breakfast with James.

  273 Days Before:

  Shortly after our rescue at sea, we docked beside an old, rickety, pier floating on top of the ocean connected to a Land. When I climbed out of the boat, I stood on warped wooden planks. A feeling of gratitude swept over me as I scanned the area around. Our boat was the only one in sight, and all three individuals held their automatic rifles close to their sides, pointing them down the mouth of the pier. In return for our passage to Oregon, apparently, we repaid them with gifting two of our guns, five ammo boxes, and three knives and sheathes. Then James and I walked down the pier, our fingers interlocked as we left the boat behind. The old man had mentioned Oregon was only a middle resting point until their next destination—a state which took a few days sailing time. Oregon wasn’t much of anything and they would be leaving later that day. Even though the woman said we wouldn’t find anything here, I was happy to have arrived. This was the first Land we boarded since leaving our home. This meant maybe we’d be able to locate some useful information, hopefully leading us to Madeline’s whereabouts. If there was another Land with her and others on it, from our home, we needed to stay within close sailing distance to where we originated from. Madeline was the only family I had left now. The feeling of despair gripped my stomach tight and I needed to hurl the emotions from my throat, but I couldn’t. I had to keep levelheaded and forced myself to push on, afraid if I took a moment to sulk into my surroundings, I may not be able to stop. Oregon would be the place, I thought. The place for us to have a tiny bit of hope. Hope. Something which I was having a hard time finding within all the lies I believed growing up. Who we all were. What we all were. The truth behind why our Land really existed. James asked the group from the boat if they knew of any such place existing, our Land, but they looked back at us strangely and eagerly waited to be rid of us.

  That day when James and I reached the ground attached to the wooden pier, thin, tall trees blocked every direction. I looked back. The pier was clearly the only safe means into the ocean from this side. There was no beach or incline. Just a clear drop off from the edge, unstable layers of dirt, on both sides of the pier. I squeezed James’ hand and we took our first steps, heading straight into the trees. Eventually we came to a path, an old street filled with potholes and jagged cracks throughout. Roots had grown tall through the cracks and the edge of the street was undefined. It must’ve been a street prior to the devastating earthquakes. Yet, I was still surprised by how well the street appeared intact.

  James agreed staying on the path would be our best shot at coming across any other living individuals. However, we weren’t sure what kind of people we might come across, good or bad. Or if we would actually see anyone. The entire time we walked, there was zero evidence anyone lived here, the entire edge of this state seemingly deserted. That fact scared me, and I was hoping we hadn’t made a wrong decision by docking on a land completely foreign to us. As well as separating from the only boat we knew with means of leaving this place. I knew that group of people didn’t want us on their boat any longer than we needed to be, but I’m sure we could have bought our way on with the amount of weaponry we had. I debated with the decision to keep moving forward or turn around while the boat was still an option.

  We walked for miles on the one street. Other streets crossed our path. However, they were entirely covered with foliage winding across, weeds taller than we were. Nobody would be along those routes. Unconsciously, I let go of James’ hand and my pace slowed. The only thought lingering in my mind was Madeline. And I wasn’t giving up this easily. We weren’t turning around.

  Eventually, after a month of living on and off the main street, we passed a set of abandoned homes and used them for shelter. One afternoon a large group of people crossed through the yard of our home. If you could call it our home. Or our yard. Twenty-three men, women, and three small children made up the group. These were the first group of individuals we came across. And we chose to join them. They were hiking from one side of the state to the other. We didn’t tell them much about ourselves, just that we had a boat which died in the middle of the ocean, and that another boat brought us here. Two of them questioned us about the boat and wanted to know what direction we left it. We told them it didn’t matter because it was long gone. The larger guy with a short, stubby beard glared at me and repeated the question to James. James assured him there was no boat and whispered to me. He didn’t want to join the group and didn’t have a good feeling about them. Truth be told, neither did I. But I insisted we needed to join them, and maybe we’d come across other individuals along the way. Plus, it was nice to have a group of company other than each other. Reluctantly, James came along. I told him I’d leave him behind if he didn’t. He knew that was a lie, but it got my point across.

  We hiked along an old street for weeks until it ended and then we marched through a variety of tall grass. Old piles of trash and skeletons scattered about every so often. Days after joining the group, we came across a bunch of vehicles. Old. Rusty. Many burned to a crisp, still sitting behind one another. The road, which was once beneath them, was no longer visible, covered up by the natural terrain. I caught the stubbly man staring at me during a rest stop and days after, I caught him looking at me occasionally. The glossy-eyed look wasn’t welcoming, and I wondered what he was thinking. James and I decided if we didn’t come across any other people within a few more days, then we’d leave the group voluntarily and take our chances on our own. Those days turned into weeks. We had removed ourselves to the outskirts of the group, stopped involving ourselves in conversations. The only nice thing was sharing food—we each took turns hunting. Everyone had their own ways of catching animals. Some of them used guns, most used traps.

  One night after a large campfire, I awoke to James fighting two of the men. One of them being the guy who wouldn’t stop staring at me—stubbly man. They were trying to steal our bags and had a gun pointed at James. The stubbly guy walked towards me with a knife in his hands. Fortunately for us, they didn’t know who they were messing with.

  James hit the gun out of the guy’s hands before he could pull the trigger, and then threw his body in the air. It came smashing down onto the ground in front of me. I kicked the knife from stubbly guy and punched him in the groin. He dropped the knife and winced, grabbing himself between the legs. We quickly grabbed our bags and ran before the rest of the group arrived.

  Seventeen days later, we found another house. All the windows had been shattered and large cracks spidered from the ceiling to the floors and across the room. The roof was barely hanging on and the front porch had caved in. Days had passed since James and I came across any animals. We were starving, and hoped the house might have food inside. When we entered, human waste and trashed covered each corner of the room. The smell was overwhelming, especially for James. We covered our noses and kept searching the room—weak. Suddenly, the sound of a rifle cocked behind us. We both were caught off guard, our minds solely focused on finding food, our stomachs the only thing driving us forward—logic clearly not at the forefront of our minds. We assumed nobody would be here, the place appeared abandoned.

  A rugged
voice broke the silence.

  “Turn around slowly with your hands up. No sudden moves or I’ll blast your little heads clean off,” the raspy voice ordered.

  I wanted to look over at James, yet didn’t want to be mistaken for making any sudden moves. Two weeks ago, James would’ve had no problem taking the gun from this person. Now, we were both malnourished—his strength and speediness was poor.

  I knew he was contemplating the options. Should he try to go for the gun or not?

  I slowly raised my hands in the air and noticed my bag no longer on my shoulder. I dropped it when we started searching the place. I only needed a minute of rest, not holding anything, nothing weighing me down. I never thought for a second this would happen.

  From the corner of my eye, I saw James’ bag around his neck. At least we still had our guns. If the person was smart, we’d be ordered to leave our supplies. I wondered what would happen to us. James raised his hands and we both turned around.

  A little old lady held a gun bigger than she, the weight of it leaning her forward a bit, something I also didn’t expect. An old lady. The surety of her voice didn’t match the exterior of the fragile lady with a long, silver braid draped over the side of her shoulder. Her tiny eyes flickered back and forth under the floppy hat that covered her ears. A belt holding rounds of shotgun bullets wrapped around her waist and the gun was clearly aimed at James’ head.

  “We’ll leave. Just don’t shoot us,” his voice weak as he pointed towards the entrance, of the house, we climbed through moments before.

  The old woman tilted the edge of the broad rimmed hat, allowing her to see us better. “You’re just children,” she said. “But boys and girls a lot younger than you have done a lot worse. You best be getting on your way.”

  We began walking sideways and her gun followed our every move. I bent down carefully, grabbing the strap of my bag from the floor. When I did, she aimed the rifle directly at me. I slowed my movements.

  “Sorry,” I said and followed James out the entrance, jumped through the non-existent porch, and landed flat against the ground.

  We chose our path carefully, knowing the gun was still aimed at us from behind. We walked twenty yards and neared the remnants of a white picket fence before hearing…

  “Blasted,” the woman said. “I’m gonna get myself killed. Stop!” she yelled.

  James and I halted in mid-stride.

  “Come on back in now,” she coughed.

  James and I turned around. Not sure what to think.

  “Well, unlike the last group, she isn’t hard to read. And she could’ve easily shot us back there and chose not to,” James whispered, hands still in the air. For some reason, always banking on the fact that a person hasn’t killed us yet, is how we decided who was good.

  The lady dropped her rifle to the side and walked back into the house. James and I climbed through the large hole and followed her across the main room as she led us to another room, a rotted piece of wood shielded a small hole cut in the wall. The old lady moved the wood to the side and told us to put it back in place once we were through. Then she bent down and crawled in. It was just big enough for her and I had a hard time fitting through. But once inside, it became larger, allowing more space to move around. James followed me, he got stuck but forced himself through; I heard him scuffling with the wall and looked back to see pieces falling to the ground as his back scraped against the top of the hole. He turned around and slid the piece of wood back into place, shielding the hole once more.

  The three of us crawled down a long tunnel until it ended, opening into a large, dark room with skinny windows barely lighting the top. The windowpanes were smeared with black paint, helping camouflage the room even more.

  “This used to be a basement,” the old lady said as she walked over and fiddled with a lock hanging on a narrow door. When it opened, food, blankets, and other necessities like soap neatly lined the shelves.

  She told us to sit down in the middle of the room on top of a blanket and then she brought us two clay cups filled with a hazy liquid and two chipped plates. The old lady plopped down pieces of tree bark and worms next to a nice, colorful array of chopped vegetables.

  “Eat up.” She motioned towards the plates. She ate some as well. After we finished, she insisted we stay the night and have breakfast in the morning.

  The next morning, the food was a little more appealing. I ate my first over-easy egg. Eggs weren’t something we were accustomed to eating raw in the Colony, for fear of any diseases the birds carried. A sour look spread across James’ face. He didn’t like them. However, I thought they were a tad slimy, but good.

  The lady said her name was Janelle and told us to call her Jan. After breakfast, we told Jan about my sister and why we were looking for her, mentioning briefly of Colonel West. Her head perked up at the mention of his name. We went on to explain his supposed experiment on the island. Upon talking about him, she told us a story she overheard years before. Jan called them Lands as well, “…nothing broke perfectly on state lines. Just one big jumbled mess of broken lands.” The one we were on was just one small part of the entire state of Oregon.

  When the chain of earthquakes shattered the continents, her grandparents perished. Her parents were kids at the time, not knowing one another. It took years to create a life they considered normal, as close as it was prior to the devastation. Over the years, people left, others died, and some took their own lives. Her best friend, Urma, grew up next to her. When they were older, they decided to head off on their own, see what was out there, and that’s when they found their way to the current state of Oregon. “It wasn’t as bad as it is now,” she said. Eventually, she and hundreds of other people started a small town together where a church was established. One Sunday, the preacher of the church spoke about a place that had been rumored to have food and shelter beyond what any of them could imagine. He said where such things existed, the devil did too because where there was abundance like that, only evil could be responsible. Only people of hate would conduct such an alluring way of life without including the rest of the damaged world. Everyone in the church wrote it off—a crazy notion of a man who had experienced too much heartache from lost loved ones, and nobody but Urma thought much about it.

  Weeks after establishing the town, Urma couldn’t stop talking about finding the place. She wanted to know if it really existed and she wanted to find a place away from all the death. She talked Jan into leaving the safety of the town and they walked east until they came to the edge of this part of Oregon. They searched the coast until they came across a military boat boarding a large group of military men and women—soldiers. The boat was anchored around a large piece of wood hammered into the ground. A man walked off the boat, his clothes nice and pristine. Urma ran up to him and asked if she could join the soldiers. He informed her that anyone was allowed to enlist as long as they were okay with knowing they could never come back. And his name was West.

  Urma begged Jan to join her, but Jan didn’t have a good feeling and refused.

  When Urma boarded, that was the last time Jan ever saw her. And years later, the small town Jan helped create was overtaken by raiders. Including this house we were currently in—the house where she and her husband lived.

  “Can you show us where you saw the boat?” I asked.

  Jan felt her legs and told us she was in no condition. She was old and barely able to walk down the street without gasping for breath, only good at faking a strong person when the occasion called for it. “Hold on a sec,” she said.

  Jan walked back over to the locked safe, opened it, and grabbed something small. When she came back, a compass sat in the palm of her hand.

  “If you walk east until you hit the coastline, then you’ll hit the same spot Urma and I did. If you pass an old warehouse with graffiti, you’re headed in the right direction.” She finished giving us directions and handed the compass to me.

  This was our first real hope of finding Madeline and I co
uldn’t wait to get back on the road. I gave Jan a huge hug, showing her my gratitude for being kind.

  “Honey, it was such a long time ago. You probably won’t find anything,” she added.

  It didn’t matter. It was worth a shot. We accepted her kind offer of the compass and hospitality. She gave us a few loafs of bread as we gathered our bags and left.

  We walked forever, headed east, and only stopped when it was absolutely necessary. After three days, we finally reached the old warehouse Jan described. A large wing connected two rusty buildings, and across the wing the words Z-O-M-B-I-E-L-A-N-D had been sprayed, painted big and bold. The look of the buildings sent shudders down my body. Voices came from inside—hooting and hollering. We decided to walk further into the woods for fear that someone might see us.

  After four more days of hiking, we reached the coast. Once we arrived, there was no sign of a boat. However, we had all the time in the world and decided to make camp. That evening, we walked the edge of the coast and stumbled upon a large piece of wood hammered into the ground, stuck so far down into the sandy dirt that shrubs had grown all over, encasing the wood. It had been there for a long while and we knew we were in the right area. After that night, we survived weeks off various animals James and I took turns hunting.

  Present Day:

  This morning, James and I sat eating breakfast around a fire. The weather began getting rather cold. The seasons were changing and winter was coming. We huddled close to one another inside our scavenged jackets and tattered hats pulled over our ears. Out of nowhere, a large vessel with the words U-S painted on the side, slid firmly onto the ground half a mile down the coast, directly where the hammered wood was. James threw dirt over the fire, grabbed our bags, and we made a mad dash for the ship. The front of the boat weighted heavily on the ground, and a large door lowered—a gate allowing access into an ancient castle. People began walking off and they didn’t appear to be soldiers. In fact, they weren’t wearing uniforms. Instead, they were nicely dressed with long, thick coats and furry hats.