Darrick and Marcus were the first to jump out of the truck. Carissa and Andy stayed behind to help lower Tonya over the side. Tommie assisted. The driver exited and slammed his door shut, making it all too apparent that they were in the area, as if his loud exhaust wasn’t enough. Everybody stared at him. His name was Frank Simms, but everybody just called him Pete. Nobody knew why. Some guessed that it was because his middle name was Peter and that was what he preferred; others thought it might be a nickname.
“What?” the driver asked, staving off everyone’s stink-eye. “If we’re going somewhere that’s supposed to be friendly, why fret over a little noise?”
His point was taken. Everybody went back to unloading their gear and exiting the truck. Curtis was already standing at the entrance to a trailhead that seemed to disappear into the mountainous horizon.
“This is it,” he said, turning to assure his new friends.
Tonya was standing on her own, but she wasn’t looking good. It would be an understatement to say that Darrick was concerned for his wife. He was steadfast. Determined. Solid. There was nothing going to stop him from getting his wife to this so-called community.
“If we’re going to make it by nightfall, we’d better start now,” Curtis said, snugging the straps of his pack to his back. “I’m not quite sure how far up it is.”
Marcus grabbed Curtis by the arm. “What do you mean not sure? How do we even know this is legit?”
“Marcus?” Darrick said, interrupting his interrogation. “What option do we have?”
Marcus’s shoulders dropped.
“We don’t,” Darrick continued. “We’re out of options.”
Marcus started up the trail, followed by Curtis. Andy went in front of Darrick and Carissa, who were each lending support to Tonya. Tommie walked right behind them, with Pete and his passenger, Chris, in the back of the line. Right off the cuff, they knew they were in for a long difficult hike. After a couple of thousand feet of elevation, the party was stretched out over a mile. Darrick, Tonya, Carissa, and Andy were in the back, mostly due to Tonya’s poor condition. Marcus provided point security with Pete and Chris. There were no side trails, so no real concern for unsuspected security issues. The biggest problem was Tonya’s inability to keep up. She simply couldn’t do it. She reached a point where she couldn’t breathe, so Darrick, Tommie, and Carissa stopped to care for her.
“Andy? Go on ahead and let Marcus know that we’ve stopped. Tell him your mom can’t go any farther. She needs rest.”
Andy took off running ahead of them.
“Darrick?” Tonya whispered. “I think it’s time.”
The comment shredded Darrick’s soul. He held it together. He could see her breathing was labored. The climb was too much. It pushed her over the brink. “You’re going to be fine, baby,” Darrick said, trying to reassure her.
Carissa was holding her hand. “We’ll just sit here, in the shade, and wait for Marcus to get help from the community.”
“Carissa, not you too,” Tonya whispered.
Carissa could only smile back. “I have hope. We have to.”
“And here I thought you were the realist,” Tonya bantered back. “You don’t really believe there’s something in the woods that’s gonna save me, do you?”
“Let’s just rest,” Darrick interrupted. “We’re fine here. Hopefully Marcus and Curtis won’t be long.”
“Tonya,” Tommie said to catch her attention, “all we have is hope. We’re gonna believe that you’ll pull through this somehow.”
8:37 p.m.
The sun was below the horizon of the mountains, and light barely filled the sky. The temperature change was noticeable at four thousand feet of elevation. The situation became direr when a cool front moved in. It might not have been much for Darrick, Tommie, and Carissa, but Tonya’s internal thermostat wasn’t properly regulating her body heat. That was why Darrick had her sitting up against him. His arms were wrapped around her as he tried to give her as much heat as he could.
Over time, that spot of the mountain got quiet. The chirps of a nearby cricket could be heard. Except for Tonya, the whole experience was less than exciting. It didn’t take long for the comfort to kick in. At first, it was just relaxed heavy breathing on Darrick’s part. It was Carissa who fell asleep first – then Darrick and finally Tommie.
9:21 p.m.
Darrick snored and disrupted his own sleep. Now awake, he recognized his own negligence and tried to sit up to reposition himself. His back was stiff, and Tonya was slouched over. His worse fears were being realized.
“Tonya?” Darrick said, with excitement. The loudness of his voice awakened Carissa.
“Tonya?” she said, grabbing her by the hand again. The elevated voices awakened Tommie.
Tonya heard them too. She mumbled.
“Thank God,” Carissa uttered. “We thought we lost you.”
The temperature had dropped considerably while they were sleeping. The body-heat trick was okay when the temperatures were fair, but now they needed a heat source other than natural thermoregulation.
“I’m going to build us a fire. If the others are still alive, they’ll need it to relocate us, anyway,” Darrick said.
“Go for it. I’ll cuddle with her.”
Darrick pulled a fire starter from his backpack and stuffed it into his pocket. Next, he found some kindling in the form of small sticks. He found a large chunk of tree bark that he planned to use as a holder for the tinder. The tinder was the easiest to locate. Everywhere he looked on the ground he saw old pine needles. He scooped some up and placed them in the chunk of bark. He set everything down in the middle of the trail and pulled the fire starter from his pocket. It contained a magnesium stick and a striker. He scraped some magnesium into the kindling and used the striker to jump-start the fire. The kindling caught fire and he began to gently place the tinder on top of it. While the tinder was burning, he began placing larger sticks and eventually small chunks of branch.
Carissa sat Tonya against the heat of the fire, just away from the direction the smoke was blowing. When the fire was well established, Darrick and Carissa laid down their bedrolls. Tommie didn’t have one. He rested his back against a tree.
Once Darrick and Tonya were done setting up their sleeping arrangements, they tucked Tonya between the two of them and decided they would take turns watching the fire. Within a couple of hours, Carissa was taking her turn at the fire watch when the sounds of voices were heard coming down the trail.
“Darrick! Darrick, wake up.”
Darrick sprang to his feet at the sound. He grabbed his rifle and ran up the trail. Just fifty yards up, he heard familiar voices. It was Marcus, and it sounded like he was leading some unfamiliar people to Tonya. If his assumptions were correct, then it was mission accomplished.
“Marcus?” Darrick called out, hoping to know that their luck had finally changed.
“Darrick, it’s me,” Marcus said from the darkened trail. “Don’t shoot us. We’re rounding the bend.”
Darrick shouldered his rifle. It was dark, but the moon gave off her light and it was just enough to see Marcus – and he wasn’t alone. Eight men and women were behind him, and three of the men were armed. Two of the women were carrying a stretcher. The other three seemed to have no purpose; they weren’t even armed.
“Marcus, what is this?” Darrick asked, taking his rifle from his shoulder to hold it in the low-ready position.
“It’s okay. They’re here to help. You can put your rifle down. Look, they even brought a stretcher to carry Tonya.”
Darrick wanted to believe that their luck was changing for the better. He wanted to believe it so bad, he was willing to trust complete strangers to save his wife. Save – it was a word that rattled the back of his mind for a long time. He knew Tonya couldn’t be saved, but in these desperate times, the word had new meaning. He just didn’t know what it was.
Darrick reluctantly lowered his rifle and then led them fifty yards back to the
fire. When they arrived, Carissa and Tonya were hiding amongst the trees.
“It’s okay, ladies,” Darrick called out into the forest. A rustling was heard from about ten yards up the side of the mountain. It was Carissa carrying Tonya back down to the trail.
The stretcher was a welcome sight to behold. By the time she had Tonya on the trail, the two women who were carrying the stretcher met them and were assisting Tonya down onto it.
Two of the three extra women grabbed Darrick’s and Carissa’s backpacks, the goal being to carry them for their new guests, but both Darrick and Carissa objected. Tommie didn’t have a pack. Marcus, seeing them refuse the assistance, asserted himself. “Guys, it’s alright. Let them carry your stuff.”
Again, reluctantly, Darrick conceded to the strangers’ will. Carissa followed suit.
“Where’s Andy?” Darrick asked Marcus.
“He’s safe. He’s in the Community.”
“What’s the name of this place, anyway?” Carissa asked.
“That’s the name,” Marcus answered.
“What’s the name?” Darrick asked.
“The Community.”
Five hours later
The trail opened up into a bald when they reached an area near the peak of the ridge. Small campfires were scattered about the opening, revealing a tent city of sorts. Many of the tents were patched up from overexposure to the elements. A spring, fed from the face of the mountain in the near distance, couldn’t be seen, but the flowing water could be heard.
The Community came to life with news of visitors. People were standing outside their tents, watching the entranceway, when Darrick, Carissa, Tommie, and Tonya, along with their escorts, entered the camp. Pete, Chris, and Curtis met them. Armed guards stood nearby and approached Darrick and Carissa, demanding that they forfeit their weapons. Darrick pushed away the hands of the men as they reached for them, but they were only met with hostility. The armed guards raised their rifles and pointed them at Darrick and Carissa. Marcus was already standing out of the way, knowing that this would happen. He’d chosen not to warn them. He knew they wouldn’t enter if they were going to be forced to surrender their protection. Darrick and Carissa were outgunned. It was pointless to resist.
“It’s okay, Darrick. You gotta trust me on this,” Marcus said.
Darrick released his grip on the rifle. Carissa followed suit.
The armed men took their rifles then patted each of them down.
“Where’s Andy?”
“He’s safe,” a woman’s voice said.
Darrick and Carissa turned their attention to the woman who was walking toward them.
“My name’s JoAnn Epperson. I’m the leader in these parts. Welcome to the Community.”
Seventeen
ALL GOOD THINGS MUST COME TO AN END
Blue Ridge Mountains, Northern Georgia
That night
Darrick couldn’t sleep. The Community had Tonya and Darrick in a tent to themselves. For most of the night, women kept walking into the tent, unannounced, to check on Tonya. They would feel her forehead for temperature changes and place herbs and natural remedies in her mouth, telling her to chew, or to keep it under her tongue.
The women smelled bad. To Darrick’s knowledge, nobody had deodorant in the new world, but these women smelled like they hadn’t bathed in weeks. They were especially ripe. Sometimes, when they entered the tent after Darrick had dozed off, the pungent smell would awaken him before their voices did. The entire experience was odd, in general.
There came a time when the visits stopped. Darrick checked on Tonya and saw that she was sound asleep. He sat there, on the ground of the tent, for several minutes pondering several questions.
Where is Andy? Where’s Tommie, Pete, and Chris? What is this place? Where are our weapons? Why can’t we possess them? What are they hiding? What are they afraid of?
The questions were a bothersome thing. He couldn’t find peace as long as his mind was being plagued by curiosity.
Finding resolution in his mind, Darrick quietly unzipped his tent and peeked his head out. Several campfires lit the environment around the bald. He carefully scanned the canopy and saw armed guards in trees every so many yards. His intentions were to sneak out and go do some surveillance of the area, but the guards were a game changer. No, no, they weren’t. Darrick waited for two guards whom he could see to turn away from him. He slipped out the door of his tent and moved to the back of the tent, where he was in the shadow that the nearest campfire was casting on him.
I’d better check my back.
Darrick spun around and looked into the tree canopy again. There was one more man with a rifle standing in a makeshift guard tower like the other two. He wasn’t watching. Darrick snuck toward that guard’s tree. His logic was that if he stood beneath him, he would never be spotted. He used the tree to block the line of sight of the other two guards, who were across from the face of his tent. He hoped to find some kind of fortified structure that was housing their weapons, but didn’t see anything out of the usual – a few tents, a few clotheslines with clothes hanging out to dry, and a few people snoring.
Darrick was startled when he was suddenly grabbed from behind. One man’s hand around his mouth, the other around his chest.
“It’s me, Marcus,” Marcus whispered into his ear.
Realizing he had a death grip on Marcus’s arms, Darrick released him. “You scared the hell out of me, dude!”
“Sorry,” Marcus whispered nonchalantly. “I think we have the same thing in mind.”
“Which is?”
“Surveillance.”
“What have you found out?”
“There’s a trail that leads away from here. It goes out several hundred yards and opens up to another community like this one. Same thing. Armed guards in the trees, tents, and so on. There’s a wooden hut-looking thing at that one, though. I think that’s where they’re keeping our guns.”
“How do you know?”
“I can’t be certain, but there’s two armed men standing on the deck. It’s the only wooden structure I’ve seen. There’s a strange marking on the trees here and there, too.”
“How strange?”
“It looks like an A with a third leg coming down the middle of it.”
“That’s the Appalachia Trail symbol. If we follow it, it’ll lead us out of here, if things get crazy. It runs north to Maine and south to Springer Mountain.”
“Suggestions?”
“Let’s wait things out and get a feel for what’s going on. Have you seen Andy?”
“They took Andy when we got here. They assured us he’d be fine. There were a few kids here at first, but they moved them to safety before you arrived.”
“He’d better be safe, Marcus. This is on you if something happens to him.”
Marcus nodded his head and accepted the fact that he deserved to be held accountable. “Let’s get back to our tents and try to catch some Zs. If we don’t have our wits about us, we’ll be useless.”
“Agreed.”
Marcus and Darrick separated to their own tents.
Early the next morning
That smell. That awful smell permeated the tent where Darrick and Tonya spent the night. At first it was the smell. Then it was the feminine voices. “Is there a pulse?” the first lady asked.
Darrick sprang from his bedroll.
“I can’t find one,” the second lady responded.
“What’s going on?” Darrick asked, refusing to believe the words he heard.
The women ignored him, choosing instead to stay on task. The first woman pushed the second out of the way and placed her hand on Tonya’s neck, where she was trained to feel for a pulse in the carotid artery. “She’s cold,” the woman said, with no tact whatsoever.
Darrick was in disbelief. He stood there and watched. Listened. Nothing to say. Nothing to add. His mind was a blank canvas.
“Tonya?” he finally said, breaking his silence. “Tonya?” he s
aid again, rushing to her side. He scooped her up off the floor and into his arms. The women moved out of his way. Tonya’s body was as cool as the morning’s air. Her body was limp and her arms fell to her sides. Her head tilted toward Darrick as gravity pulled her into the angle she was being held. Her eyes were slightly opened and not fully closed, a slight indicator that she was probably asleep when she died in the night.
“Get out,” Darrick yelled at Tonya’s caretakers. There would be no consoling him. No kind words would comfort him. He needed his space – the tent wasn’t enough.
Darrick bolted out of the tent with Tonya in his arms. He screamed at the morning sun and cursed the God of creation. He turned three hundred and sixty degrees with her in his arms, yelling the whole way. It was primal. His instincts to wail over his loss took over the most primitive parts of his mind. His cries were heard throughout the forest. Soon, people were standing outside their tent spaces and watching in bewilderment as the new guest lamented his loss.
As Darrick finished his three-hundred-and-sixty-degree rotation, Marcus was there to greet him.
“Get away from me,” Darrick yelled into his face. “Go on! Get away from me!”
Marcus gave his friend his space. Only time would calm his suffering.
Darrick dropped to his knees. It was a natural response to his body’s fight-or-flight response. His legs grew weak as his body shifted blood from his extremities to his vital organs, supporting both his mind and his heart. It was the only thing that calmed his cries. The forest grew quiet.
Less than a mile north
Andy unzipped his tent and stepped out at the sound of the screams heard in the distance. He was the only child in the area to do so. Several adult females were already standing outside. It was their job to watch over the kids and to make sure they were cared for. There were no armed guards here. Only patrol assignments. Andy wasn’t standing outside for long before he was approached by one such patrol.
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