Suddenly, Jeremy heard a shuffling behind him, and he turned, looking over at Derrick as he slowly rose, looking around in both confusion, and probably some irritation.
“Look who decided to not die?” Jeremy said. “Glad you’re okay, buddy.”
“Ugh… What?” Derrick asked, scrunching his face, trying to adjust to the light. He rubbed his face, and felt the stitches laced around his cuts. He looked over at Jeremy with a worried expression. “W-What the hell happened!? Where are we!?”
“Calm down, it’s fine,” Nolan assured. “We’re in some log cabin. Still headed west, I think; you’re the one with the compass. We outran those things outside the house, but you hit your head pretty bad. You don’t remember any of it?”
“Um… not really,” Derrick said. “I remember falling onto the ground, a little bit of running around in the dark, and then… I threw up, and it felt really good.” Jeremy wouldn’t forget that part, if his already flaring nostrils gave any indication. “And then… I remember hearing you guys yelling at each other, but I couldn’t understand what or why, and I couldn’t see you guys. Now… I’m here.” Jeremy and Nolan glanced at each other, and Jeremy felt a heavy hit of regret, for having gotten so heated with Nolan, and now as well for keeping Derrick awake. Nonetheless, it was time to move on; Jeremy knew he could do that, as could Nolan.
“Right, well, same as always, right?” Jeremy joked. Derrick gave a scoff, and moved over to them, slowly.
“Yeah, pretty much,” he agreed. “So uh… I assume we got split up from the others, right? They’re not… you know?”
“We uh…” Jeremy said, unsure how to approach that.
“We don’t think so,” Nolan admitted. “We couldn’t see anything out there, and after a while, we couldn’t hear anything either, but I’m willing to bet they’re okay; they have to be. We’ve got to keep going though, whether they are or not.”
“Right…” Jeremy concurred. “I’m sure we’ll find them, if we just keep heading west.”
“We are heading west, right Der?” Nolan asked. Derrick pulled out the compass from his pocket, but he struggled to focus on it.
“Gah… I still can’t really read it, Jer, can you?” Derrick asked, handing it to Jeremy. Jeremy grabbed it, and took a look. Their direction wasn’t too far off from where they were headed; things didn’t look bleak at least, but it wasn’t exactly clear either.
“We’re in between north and northwest, a little more toward north, if we keep moving in the direction we came from,” Jeremy said. “And we went this way all night, running, so we are a bit off track.”
“So… we have no idea where the road is?” Derrick asked.
“Well, in a sense, we do,” Jeremy said.
“We know how to get there, that’s a start,” Nolan agreed. “So long as it doesn’t stray in a different direction, we should be able to find it again, probably in a couple hours, right?”
“Probably, yeah,” Derrick agreed, shutting his eyes hard and then opening them again, focusing. “Alright, well… we can’t go backward right? Too dangerous, I assume.”
“Right,” Jeremy said. “But, if we go sort of southwest, kind of curve into it, I’d say we’ll be fine.”
“And what if the road does split off?” Derrick asked. Nolan looked to Jeremy, not sure what to say. Jeremy didn’t know why though; not like he had any better idea than either of them.
“Then… I don’t know, damn! We’ll figure it out, I know that!” Jeremy said decidedly, jumping up onto his feet. “We ready to go?” Nolan nodded, zipping up his backpack and slinging it onto his shoulder. “Der, you good to walk?”
“Uh sure, if you guys help me a little,” Derrick said, somewhat uncertain.
“I got you Derry, no problem,” Nolan offered, walking over and propping Derrick’s arm around his own shoulders. They made their way out, and as they did Jeremy looked back at the inside of the house, as he exited after them. It looked lot like the old house, with all the wood and whatnot. Jeremy scoffed, and turned around, shutting the door behind him.
It was still early– about mid-afternoon– before any of them said another word; most of their journey thus far was spent in a peaceful kind of silence. Jeremy found it to be that way, at least. It gave him time to think, about a lot of things. Where they were headed, when they would get there, how to ruin Derrick’s life through a subtle, yet neverending form of payback. Lots of stuff. Plus, he was able to get everything he wanted jotted down into his notebook, which was always a comfort.
The soft and gentle breeze of a new day’s wind pressed lightly on the tall, swaying trees around them, and he was just beginning to really formulate a revenge plan on Derrick when suddenly they stopped moving.
“What the hell?” Jeremy asked, rather annoyed, having walked right into Nolan’s back.
“We stopped,” Derrick said.
“Yeah, no shit we stopped,” Jeremy replied. “I’m asking why? We’re still headed in the right direction, aren’t we?”
“Look,” Nolan pointed, “there’s the road.”
Jeremy focused a bit, and looked out through all the trees. A ways through the woods, he could see it. An opening, and a long, grey road stretching out, headed a bit off to the left from their direction. It was wide: two lanes on each side, a long stretch of a straight shot down; this was definitely their road.
“Holy shit!” he shouted, running toward it. The others followed, and soon after, they made it out onto the open street.
For a few moments, they simply stood there, looking back and forth as though they had expected something to come from either end any second. However, to both their relief and disappointment, nothing did.
“Well… well what should we do now?” Jeremy asked. “Are they ahead? Behind?”
“I think they’re ahead…” Nolan answered ominously, walking forward a bit with Derrick. He was something, and Jeremy just then noticed it himself. There was a backpack, in the middle of the road.
Jeremy sprinted ahead of them, and slid down on his knees to inspect the bag. It was zipped open, but there were still supplies inside it. Water, some food, a knife. On the backside of the backpack, was a message: Go forward until you find Bristleback Path, then enter. Please, guys - Luke
“W-What the…!?” Jeremy stuttered out, in shock at what he was reading.
“You think they were taken?” Derrick asked, looking around cautiously.
“I don’t know why else he’d say please,” Nolan remarked, staring at the bag nervously. His face twitched a little, and Jeremy noticed. In that moment he realized something else; something that he felt stupid for not noticing before.
Nolan had been putting on a facade ever since they ran. He kept acting tough, trying to take charge, and it almost broke just at the mention of Lily. Now with this, he might not be able to relinquish the leadership role back to Luke, and it was slowly killing him. He wasn't meant to lead, not like this. So, Jeremy decided to do the only thing he could: step up.
“Okay, let’s go,” Jeremy said, grabbing the bag and zipping it up, sliding it onto his back.
“W-What?” Nolan asked, then recomposing himself. “I mean, you can’t be serious! What if it’s a trap!?”
“Then we’ll outwit them,” Jeremy argued. “Look, whoever it is, they left the supplies; that means they were trying to show a sign of good faith. Whoever they are, they’re trying to be reasonable.”
“Reasonable!?” Derrick spouted. “What’s reasonable about taking people hostage!?”
“I don’t know, but we’re going to find out,” Jeremy said, already walking away “They’re alive, or at least they were; that’s more than we knew thirty seconds ago, so we have to go off of that, and find them. We can move through the woods, keep an eye on the road, and go until we find the place. Bristleback, right? Let’s keep an eye out.” He moved off, and the others followed quickly behind him.
“Well at least slow down!” Nolan shouted, still helping Derrick move. “We can
’t move as fast as you! We have a cripple!”
“Well Mr. ‘I’m-jacked,’ better start using those muscles, huh?” Jeremy scoffed, grinning as he walked onward.
On the inside, he was a bit split, however. He was trying to be confident, and truly believe that they could find the others, like Luke surely would. That said though, there was a serious part of him that believed that that was nothing more than wishful thinking. And if that was true, then they were in for a really shitty two-day streak.
Day 502 – Pt. II:
“Bristleback”
“So what, are we just gonna walk until we find something? Like, a sign or something?” Chris asked, still quite uncertain what was going on.
“Maybe,” Luke answered once again, now rather irritated. “We don’t really know; we’ll just go until we either find them, or they find us.”
“I… That just sort of sounds dumb to me, man,” Chris responded, Luke grimacing as he heard it.
“Well what else could we do, Chris?” he asked.
“We could set up camp, wait a few days, and see if they catch up,” Chris thought aloud. “If they don’t, we keep going until, you know, we find them.”
“There is so much wrong with that idea it’s stupid,” Adam said. “What if we were found by other people? What if they wait for us and they’re ahead? Or behind? What if they’re ahead and they need us and run into something, but we’re too busy playing camp to do anything about it? Don’t be an idiot man, come on.”
“Look, I’m just saying there’s got to be a better way to deal with this than how we’re doing it!” Chris said, annoyed. “What if we’re making a mistake by just moving on? What if they’re waiting for us? What if they are behind? We don’t want to just leave!”
“Chris, what else can we do?” Luke asked. “I mean really, you think staying put, or going back is a good idea? I think it puts us in more danger than it’s worth. We know them, there’s no way they just fell behind and gave up; they will be coming this way, or they did.”
“You’re seriously willing to take that chance?” Chris asked, baffled.
“Yes, I am,” Luke said. Chris scoffed. “What?”
“I just… you’re acting kinda hypocritical, dude,” he said.
“How is he being hypocritical?” Cody asked, getting annoyed himself with all the arguing.
“Luke talks all about sticking together, being this unit. Now we’re split up, and rather than find the unit, he just wants to keep going?” Chris argued.
“In the hopes that we’ll find them, yes!” Adam said. “He’s not being hypocritical, you’re just being stupid!”
“How!?” Chris fired back. “I just want to find our friends!”
Suddenly, a spear flew down in front of them. Well, it was a spear of sorts; that’s what Luke assumed anyway. It was a pole, and it had something like 3 or 4 sharpened knives connected to the tip. Were the road not so solid, it probably would have gone through; it was thrown well. Luke tried to immediately analyze the situation; who, what, where. Why didn’t really matter to him.
“Looking for your friends, are you?” a voice called. It was deep, and loud. Sounded younger, maybe 20’s? Luke looked all around him, and then saw a man walk out from the brush to their right.
He was right, the man was young. He was fit too; decently built, tall, black. He didn’t seem dangerous– not initially to Luke anyway– but if he was, then it wouldn’t matter who he was or what he looked like, and right now Luke had little else to believe. Either way, he pulled out his pistol. Even if it didn’t have bullets, hopefully it could at least seem intimidating
“Man, not now!” Cody impatiently shouted, flipping out a pocket knife. Adam grabbed the spear and armed himself, already walking toward the man.
“What do you know? Who are you?” Adam asked as intimidatingly as possible, and trying to cut right to the chase. It did little to sway the man though, at least from an outward perspective. Luke just held his arm out, stopping Adam from going forward.
“I’m a friend. At least, I can be, if you’re willing to work with me,” the man laughed. “My name is Cyrus. Who are you guys?” The others stood silent for a moment, unsure what to say. Nobody was very confident in whether or not this man was trustworthy. After all, every person so far who asked their names didn’t turn out to be very wholesome. Still, what choice did they have?
“I’m Luke,” Luke introduced, rather impatiently.
“Luke,” Cyrus repeated. “What happened to your hand?” He gestured. Luke looked down at his hand. It had a lot of dried blood on both it and the bandaging Chris had given him.
“Hit something,” Luke said.
“Hmm,” Cyrus marveled. “And these are your… friends? Don’t tell me you’re all related.”
“This is Adam, Cody, and Chris. We’re a group, and we’re looking for our people: Jeremy, Nolan, and Derrick. Jeremy’s short, dark brown hair. Nolan’s a big blonde guy, and Derrick’s a tall skinny kid; he should have a head injury. You see them?” Luke said. Adam and Chris glared at him angrily, clearly displeased he had just released so much information. Luke didn’t care though, he was going to find them, and if this guy had them, he wouldn’t for very long.
“Hmm, well unfortunately no, I haven’t seen anybody like that, together or alone. Haven’t heard of them either… but how about this? You come with me, back to my place, with my people. We can leave signals for your friends, and direct them there; if they see those, they’ll find you,” Cyrus offered, maintaining a warm smile throughout.
It didn’t look like he was lying to Luke, which was a good sign. He could have always been a good liar, but Luke was trying to work quickly, not diligently.
“Yeah, no way,” Chris shot down decidedly. “We’re not falling for that shit, man. Right?” He looked over to Luke, but saw a complexed expression on his face. “Oh, Luke! Come on!”
“Okay,” Luke said, after waiting another minute. “Take us back with you. How do we get there? And how do we leave directions for our people? Assuming that they’re not ahead of us.” Adam and Chris looked shocked, while Cody held the same expression as Luke. If that meant to Luke what he thought it did, Cody was wary, but knew that this was the best shot they were probably going to get. Cyrus smiled, and began pull out a marker from his pocket.
“Wonderful! We just gotta move down the road for a ways, and then on the right should be the entrance to Bristleback Path; that’s my place,” he explained. “Here, I’ll leave my bag right here, and keep all the things in it; I was going to give them to you, truth be told, if you didn’t want to come back. I’ll write down a little note for them, tell them how to find us.”
Cyrus took off his bag and immediately started writing a note, meanwhile Adam and Chris kept exchanging curious and uncertain glances. Luke understood their confusion, but it didn’t really matter right now. He was setting himself in a strong get-my-people-back mentality, and so he was going to do whatever it took. He had to. Call it a heroic act or a fatal flaw, Luke didn’t really care. He would not be able to go on without everyone that mattered to him by his side.
Plus, strange or not, this guy seemed like he could help, and Luke was going to exploit that every way he could, for as long as he could. After all, if he was lying, then they could just kill him.
“What’s your name again, man?” Cyrus asked, looking at Luke.
“Luke,” he said. Cyrus nodded and smiled.
“Luke. You want me to add anything to this, so they know it’s you?”
“Uh, sure. Just say ‘please guys,’ and then a dash and my name,” Luke explained, wanting to keep it simple. Cyrus followed.
“Wow, you sure they’re gonna be able to crack that one?” Adam said.
“Shut up,” Luke responded, shutting him down before he had the chance to further snicker.
Cyrus finished writing, stood up, and began to move down the road, walking backward as to still face the Luke and the others.
“Alright, this-
a-way. Should only take us something like fifteen, maybe twenty minutes,” he said, moving at an idle pace. The guys looked at each other, sharing a knowing glance of both caution and acknowledgement, and then ran over to catch up with him, walking down the road and leaving the bag behind.
“So,” Cody said, after a solid few minutes of silence, “are you like, what do you call it… the leader of your place?”
“Well, in a sense, yeah, I guess so,” Cyrus replied, looking forward at the road. “I’m not the oldest, probably not even the smartest, but I guess I just sort of picked up the mantle when nobody else would. Someone’s got to step up sometimes, you know?”
“Yeah,” Cody responded lightly, trying to remain friendly in tone.
“How many people do you have back at your place?” Adam asked, though his tone remained skeptical. “Double-digits?”
“Oh yeah, we’ve got a good handful,” Cyrus said proudly. “I’d wager we’ve got thirty, maybe forty people. All different ages and sizes.”
“Kids?” Chris asked.
“A few,” Cyrus replied, still happily. Adam glanced over at Luke warily.
“Really…” Adam said. “Because we’ve dealt with a place like that before, and they didn’t turn out so great.”
“Like, they’re all dead? Or they were bad people?” Cyrus asked, though still looking forward. Nobody said anything, and he glanced back to Luke, who had a painful scowl on his face. “Or maybe a little bit of both, huh? I see…” he said, sensing the tension. “Well, for what it’s worth, no, I’d say we’re pretty decent people; kids can be bratty sometimes, but what can you do?” He chuckled a little, but noticed that only Cody gave him a small smile back. “I suppose ultimately it’s up to you guys to agree on or not, but that’s my two cents anyway.” He paused, thinking of what to say. Then, after a moment, he continued. “Things are rough out there, I get it; you do what you gotta do sometimes to protect the people you love. I imagine that’s reason enough.”
“Yeah…” Luke agreed, losing himself in his thoughts. Cody swiftly but gently pulled on his sleeve however, and caught his attention. He gave another small smile and a knowing glance, and Luke understood that he had to maintain his composure. At least for now.
The Way Back (Book 1): The Way Back Page 19