by Harley Tate
Harvey had been a friend to her father and to Doug. He deserved better than to die in the back of a Humvee bouncing through underbrush and dry creek beds. He should be sitting at the kitchen table right now, drinking coffee and watching the sunrise.
Melody snuffed back a sob. Her brother squeezed her hand, but she shook him off, anger welling up inside her to replace the grief. “What are we doing out here?”
She looked up at Doug. He’d always been so confident before the power loss. Taking charge and protecting her. Now what could he do? Sit there and stare while Colt figured out what to do next?
Lottie yipped from Dani’s lap. The poor dog hadn’t eaten a decent meal in days and spent the last night with nowhere to sleep except beside a dying man. Melody reached for her and Lottie scrambled into her arms.
If things continued down this path, soon she would be saying goodbye to Lottie, too.
Colt spoke up from the front. “I’m sorry, Melody.”
She snorted and wiped at her face. “Are you really?”
“Mel!”
“What?” She snorted at her brother. “It’s a legitimate question.”
Colt answered. “Of course I am.”
Melody swallowed. Rage simmered below the surface of her body, writhing like a serpent kept too long in a cage.
Rage at Colt for forcing their decision to leave Eugene. Rage at Jarvis for taking over the only town she’d ever really known. Rage at the US government for their incompetence. If regular people had some warning… If they knew what space weather could do…
Maybe Melody would have prepared. Maybe they all would have.
She wiped at her face again, smearing tears and dirt across her cheeks. “How did we get here?”
Colt shrugged. “Drove through the forest, mostly. I’ve tried to head due south.”
Doug snorted a laugh, but Melody couldn’t shake her anger and hopelessness. Larkin wouldn’t even be able to cheer her up now. The thought of him sent another pang of heartache lancing through her body. He would never find them now.
“What are we going to do?”
Colt leaned forward and stared up at the still-dark sky. “Walk, I suppose. We can load up as many weapons as we can carry and bury the rest. Then we’ll head southeast. We should hit Lake Tahoe sooner or later. Maybe one of the small towns Harvey talked about in between.”
Melody glanced at her brother. “How far is it to Lake Tahoe?”
He scratched his head. “At least a hundred miles.”
“A hundred miles!” The matte-painted metal of the military vehicle closed in around her and Melody struggled to breathe. “We’re planning to walk a hundred miles to get to some lake we’ve never been to in the hopes there will be something there for us?”
Her brother turned sheepish. “When you put it like that…”
“What are we supposed to eat or drink on the way?”
No one said anything for a moment. At last, Dani broke the silence. “Do you have a better idea?”
Melody blinked. “Do you?”
“No. That’s why I’m asking. Since you’re so upset about the plan, is there something else you’d rather do?”
Melody sagged against the seat. She wished she could say yes, but every option she could think of wasn’t any better. “No.”
“Then stop complaining.” Dani waited until Melody met her heavy gaze. “The situation sucks, we all know it. But I’m not giving up.”
“Neither am I.” Colt flashed a tight smile in agreement.
Melody wished she could share in their optimism, but all she could think about were the negatives. No food, no water, no shelter. Her neighbors were dead. Larkin was gone. How could they hike a hundred miles and not die on the way?
She asked another question. “How will we know which way to go?”
“I can land nav. Between the sun and the stars, we can head in the general direction.” Colt scratched at his head. “From what I remember, Tahoe’s huge. We won’t miss it.”
“You really think that’s the best option?”
He nodded. “For right now, yes.”
Melody thought about Larkin out there on his own, no idea how to find them in the miles of forest. She thought about all the what-ifs and the hope he’d given her.
“He’ll find us.”
She cut Colt a glance. “Easy for you to say.”
Lottie squirmed, sticking her nose out to sniff at Harvey’s body. Melody pulled her back. “We need to bury Harvey and say a few words.” Melody paused to maintain composure. “We might have left Gloria and Will out to the elements, but I won’t do that to Harvey, too. He deserves a burial. They all deserve a memorial. To be remembered.”
She didn’t wait for anyone to respond. Grabbing the door handle, Melody jerked with all her might. The door opened and the cold morning air whipped her face.
It took Doug and Colt an hour to dig a deep enough grave with the shovel and pick axe stored underneath of the Humvee. The pair of them dragged Harvey into the ditch and Melody straightened his clothes before Doug filled the hole.
Melody stood at the makeshift cross Colt had fashioned out of a branch and closed her eyes. She tried to think of the right words to say. Something full of meaning and purpose that would do justice to the Wilkins family.
She opened her eyes. “I’m sorry, Harvey. I’m sorry for all of the mistakes of the past month. All the missed opportunities and sacrifices. All the hesitation and doubt. I’m sorry we failed your wife and grandson. Most of all, I’m sorry you died like this, running from strangers after the whole world turned upside down.”
Doug reached out and squeezed her shoulder. There wasn’t anything else Melody could say. What was the point of sharing her memories of a family that would soon live on only inside the minds of a handful of people?
Colt cleared his throat. “I owe Harvey Wilkins my life. If it weren’t for his choice to pull me into his basement, I would be dead. Dani, too.” He glanced at her and nodded. “Harvey gave up his own safety for a stranger and I will never forget that generosity.”
Part of Melody wanted to scream. Beat her fists against Colt’s chest and blame him for everything that happened. But what good would it do? What good would anything do?
It was only a matter of time before they all died. They were fooling themselves if they thought Lake Tahoe was a reality. She thrust Lottie into her brother’s arms before walking away from the grave.
“Melody? Where are you going?”
She answered her brother without turning around. “I need a few minutes alone.” Melody knew now how hopeless this powerless future would be. This moment, standing around with two strangers and the only family she had left in the world was the best it would ever get.
Her hair clung to her scalp in ratty, greasy clumps. Her jeans were stained with dirt and grime and a dead man’s blood. She didn’t know if the ring of black beneath her nails was filth or a permanent stain, but it didn’t matter.
The old Melody Harper who loved to curl up on a couch and watch Hallmark Chanel movies with a pint of ice cream was dead. The animals she cared for at the vet clinic. All dead.
Just like her parents. Just like the Wilkinses.
Larkin was never coming back. No man would ever look at her and see the future again. Maybe a quick romp on a dirty floor or the leaf-strewn forest. But a wife? The mother of someone’s children? Forget it. All the dreams she thought would still come true. All the things she’d hadn’t crossed off her list.
Gone in the blink of an eye.
Maybe the power going out was punishment. Was this comeuppance for a world of frivolity and leisure? Was this some twisted retribution?
Melody walked without seeing. She didn’t know where she was going. She planted her feet one after the other in the lumpy, dank earth. Thoughts of life and death and the meaning of it all swirled inside her head, more real than the forest all around.
She stumbled over a hidden log on the forest floor. The ground rose up, full o
f branches and leaves and broken twigs. Melody thrust her arms out to break her fall, only there wasn’t any more ground. Her hands led the way as she tumbled off a hidden ledge.
As her body hit the first outcrop of rocks, her ribs crunched and splintered and Melody screamed.
Chapter Twenty-Three
DANI
Northern California Forest
3:00 p.m.
Dani bent over and sucked in a lungful of air. They had been searching for Melody for hours. At some point, they had to accept reality. She stood up and unscrewed the cap on one of the few bottles of water they managed to salvage from the truck. A splash of water hit her cracked lips.
Crap. She shoved the empty bottle in the back of the Humvee and groaned. Spending their precious energy circling out in wider and wider arcs around the Humvee to search for Melody wasn’t getting them anywhere. They could all end up dead before too long.
As if he’d read her thoughts, Doug called out. “We’re not giving up. I can’t leave without my sister.”
Sometime over the last six hours, Doug aged a decade. Gone were his wide-open eyes and easy smile. In their place, a haggard, broken man who couldn’t admit what Colt and Dani already grasped: Melody was dead or dying.
Lottie yipped at Doug’s feet and he scooped the hungry little dog up. “I know you miss her, Lot. I do, too.” He ruffled her fur. “We’ll find her. I promise.”
He set Lottie down, but the little dog only pawed at his leg.
Dani stated the obvious. “She’s hungry.”
Doug cut her a glance. “We’re all hungry.”
“Someone needs to look for water and food. We’ve got a million guns, we should be able to shoot something.”
“I’m not doing anything except search for my sister.”
“You’d rather die out here, then? Because that’s what’ll happen if we don’t find something to eat.”
“Enough.” Colt broke through a thicket of scrub brush and entered the small clearing where Doug and Dani stood. “Arguing will get us nowhere.”
He set his rifle on the ground and stretched, wincing as his back bent. Dani didn’t know how the man even managed to stay upright after the crash he survived. “Dani, how about you go on a hunt for water? There’s got to be a stream or river nearby. They snake all through this area.”
“What about Melody?”
Colt turned to Doug. “You and I can keep searching. We’ll increase the radius, fan out from here and look for any signs of her.”
“She could be miles away by now.” Or dead, but Dani didn’t offer the most logical answer. Melody wasn’t cut out for a hike in the forest. Without food or water, and no concept of direction, she didn’t stand a chance. Even if she were only lost, the chances of finding her now, after searching for hours, had to be slim.
First Gran, then Gloria and Will, Harvey, and most likely Melody, too. At some point over the course of the night before, Dani turned it all off. Her emotions, hope, any thought or feeling that wasn’t tied to her own base need to survive. Dani was ready to call off the search right now and hit the road.
She wasn’t going to die out in the middle of the California forest searching for a needle in a haystack. Glancing up at the sun, she thought it over. If they weren’t any closer to finding Melody by sunset, that was it. Dani would stay the night with Colt and Doug, but she would hightail it out of there first thing in the morning.
At some point those men from the road would come looking for them and she planned to be miles away by the time they found the Humvee. She headed over to the vehicle and dragged two empty jugs from the back.
“If I find water, I’ll clean these out and fill them up.”
“Good. Head for lower ground. You might find a stream tucked between two ridges, or a small fall on the slope of one of these hills.” Colt picked up his rifle and motioned to a nearby tree. “Mark your path so you can get back. A notch on a tree every fifty steps.”
“I can do that.”
“Good.” Colt turned to Doug. “Let’s restart the search. We’ve got three solid hours of daylight left. Let’s make the most of it.”
Dani watched the pair of them head out with Lottie trailing behind. The poor little dog would go the way of her owner if Dani didn’t come back with at least something to drink. She grabbed a strip of rope from the Humvee and tied the jugs together before looping them over her shoulder along with a rifle.
As she traipsed through the underbrush, her worn-out sneakers slipped and skidded. The jugs banged against each other in a hollow echo and Dani slowed down. She couldn’t listen for gurgling water if she couldn’t hear anything but her own clumsy movements.
On and on she walked, slow enough to catch the sound of birds as they landed in the treetops above and squirrels jumping from one branch to the next. If she were a better shot, she might be able to kill one or two for a makeshift dinner.
Squirrel couldn’t be any worse than the mystery meat from her old school cafeteria. They had more than enough ammo now; maybe it would be worth a try. She unslung the rifle from her shoulder and positioned the jugs so they stopped colliding as she moved.
With slow steps, she eased forward, looking and listening for an animal to kill. Hunting had never been her thing, but desperate times called for desperate measures. Dani was done running and hiding and hoping to survive by being invisible. She would own every decision from here on out.
She would live by choice, not by default.
The sound of rustling leaves stopped Dani mid-step. She twisted in place. A deer stood no more than twenty feet away, ears pricked as it spotted her.
Dani eased into position. If she shot it, they would have meat for days. Saliva pooled in her mouth and she swallowed. As she stepped back into a crouch, a twig snapped. The deer spooked and ran. Crap! Dani hustled after it, skidding and slipping down a muddy embankment.
I can’t lose it!
Her shoes squelched in the mud and Dani almost fell time and again. The jugs banged together on her back in a staccato drumbeat and sweat beaded along her brow. She couldn’t slow down. She would catch the animal and bring something to the table.
The deer crashed through brush and Dani caught glimpses of its black tail in the dappled afternoon sun. Come on. Just give me a clear shot. With the rifle pinned to her shoulder, Dani ran as fast as possible, dodging leaves and branches, but the deer always stayed just out of range.
She couldn’t catch it. Dani slowed, huffing and puffing out her exhaustion as the gap between her and the deer increased. A minute later, she lost sight of it in the trees.
Dani stopped. Blood thundered in her ears like a thousand tiny hooves. She sucked in one breath after another, panting as she leaned against the nearest tree. All that work for nothing.
She expended a ton of energy and what did it get her? More hunger and thirst and a longer trek back to Colt.
After a few minutes, her breathing slowed and Dani looked around her. While chasing the deer, she’d skidded down a gentle slope. The pine trees of the roadside gave way to the big leafy varieties with branches that blocked out the fading sun.
She stopped to listen. Beneath the racing of her heart and the twittering of random birds, a constant rumble lurked. It couldn’t be a train or a highway or a distant airport. Those things were long gone. No, it had to be a river.
But what direction?
Dani closed her eyes. The sound bounced off the higher grades of land, echoing on all sides. She turned in a slow circle, trying to place the source. She couldn’t be sure, but her best guess was the path the deer had taken.
She glanced back the way she had come. How long had she run? Would she be able to find her way back?
Dani marked a tree where she stood with a double notch to remind her of where she stopped. It might not be enough, but what choice did she have? She couldn’t backtrack now when the promise of a river lay out of sight.
Setting off in the direction of the deer, Dani kept one eye on the setting
sun. If she stayed out much longer, she wouldn’t make it back to the Humvee before dark. Hiking in the pitch black of night wasn’t a welcome thought.
Dani picked up the pace, stopping every now and then to mark a tree or bend a branch. As she stepped through a tangled bramble, the ground dipped and she stumbled. The jugs clattered on her back, the rifle slipped off her shoulder, and Dani scrambled to grab the nearest tree.
Her hand slipped on the sapling, but she dug her nails into a branch, clinging on as her feet slipped out from under her. Leaves tore from the branch as she slid another foot. A ravine. Her feet dangled off the edge of a steep drop and the sound of a river rushed up from below.
Water.
With one hand still holding onto the tree and one thrust into the dirt for purchase, Dani eased to sit on the soft ledge. If she used her backside as an anchor and the trees as checks, she could make it to the bottom. Climbing up would be a massive undertaking.
She glanced up at the sky. Making it back before dark would be impossible. If she wanted to reach the river, she would need to camp there all night. Dani chewed on her lip. Could she do that? Could she figure out a way to survive at the edge of a rushing stream all alone?
Her parched lips cracked with her answer. She didn’t have a choice. Water was the difference between life and death. Dani reached for the next tree and slid three feet down the hill. Gravel and sticks and pinecones rumbled past her. She reached for another tree.
Foot by foot, she made her agonizing descent toward the river. The rushing water grew louder and louder and the sun dipped lower as she trekked. At last, her feet landed hard on the bank and Dani laughed out loud.
Eight feet wide and crystal clear, the stream beckoned. Dani dumped her gear on the ground and rushed up to the water. Falling to her knees on the sandy shore, she scooped up the precious liquid in her hands and drank and drank until she couldn’t swallow another drop.
Only when she reached her fill, did she lean back.