by Dave Conifer
After she’d hoisted the shell-shocked little girl onto her back and left the scene, she remembered the shotguns. This was a whole new war now, and she had two or three rounds left in her pistol at most. It would be stupid to pass up an easy chance to re-arm. She shook Allie off, told her to wait there, and went to retrieve the guns.
This is all because of that money, she was convinced. These guys wouldn’t be chasing a bunch of kids through the woods over a few bags of fish. Maybe if she gave it back, they’d leave them alone. She pulled the bag of rations from inside her jacket as she walked. If the money was in the one she happened to pick up on the way out, she’d leave it with the two bodies.
But it wasn’t, so she focused on the task at hand. One of the dead men had a leather satchel around his neck. Guessing that it had extra shells for the guns, she took it. Both guns had straps, which made them easier to carry, except that she was already going to be carrying rations and another human being at the same time. It was too much. Reluctantly, she pulled out the water bottle, threw the fish away, and went back for Allie.
Before she got there she heard what sounded like a couple of motorcycles along the road. It was evident even from that distance that these weren’t the Japanese ones back at the lake, which they’d disabled anyway. These sounded more like Harleys, the riders of which must have heard the shots.
As she’d already acknowledged, this had become a whole new war. It was clear to her now that it wasn’t just the hostage holders at the lake that were chasing them. Apparently they had more friends than anybody had realized, and these friends were well-armed. She’d bitten off a lot more than she’d intended to chew. They had to get moving before the reinforcements got any closer.
Originally she’d planned to stay near the road. Now, the road was a much less friendly place. Instead, she turned and headed deeper into the woods. With any luck, whoever they were would be less anxious to follow. Unfortunately, Dewey and the others probably wouldn’t know they were being pursued and would stick to the original route.
There was nothing she could do about it, so she slogged on, with Allie slumped on her back and two little hands clasped tightly around her neck from behind. Eli wouldn’t have been happy with her for leaving Ethan behind, but there was no alternative. She and Allie were lucky not to be in the same condition Ethan was. That would have to be enough.
It was slow going. Sarah tried several times to get Allie to walk, but had no more luck than her brother did. Instead, they took breaks. Sarah tried to take ten minutes out of every hour to rest, using that time to hold Allie and try to pull her away from whatever had gripped her. At least she was able to get her to sip from the water bottle.
Occasionally they could hear distant shouting through the trees. There was no doubt in her mind who it was, or what they were doing. Or why. It wasn’t just the money, now. There was also something carnal in their minds. She knew she was a commodity in the new world to people like this. Allie too, as sick as that was. Greed and lust, she said to herself. Weren’t those among the deadly sins, or something like that?
Her wounds were bleeding openly now, having soaked through her shirt and jacket. There couldn’t be anything worse for her to be doing than this. But there was simply no alternative. Even if their pursuers never caught up to them, standing still meant nothing but certain death by dehydration, starvation and exposure. So at every break, after she’d counted off ten minutes, she somehow found it in herself to load back up and move on.
When it got too dark to walk she chose a cluster of small pines for home base and they settled in for the night. While Allie waited, Sarah looked unsuccessfully for something to eat, and gathered pine needles to make their temporary home as comfortable as possible. Maybe they could even sleep. The worst problem was going to be staying warm. If only she hadn’t left the bag of clothes and boots at the cabin, she thought, torturing herself even though she’d had no choice.
Allie still hadn’t taken a step or said a single word. They shared the last of the water and then huddled together in the darkness. They hadn’t heard the shouts in several hours, which helped Sarah let her guard down, at least a little. She put her arm around Allie, now sleeping fitfully, and told herself they’d start moving again at first light.
~~~
Allie was already sitting up, her arms wrapped around her own body, when Sarah woke up the next morning. Although she, too, was cold all the way through, she crawled over to Allie and bear-hugged her. Something was going to have to give that day. Sarah thought she could make it through another night, but she wasn’t so sure Allie could.
Since there was no breakfast to eat or drink, they resumed walking soon after they woke up. Allie, still speechless, again rode piggy-back. Sarah’s wounds had closed up over night, but she could feel them open up soon after they set off. That was another problem that time wasn’t helping with. Somehow they needed to find help soon.
They walked through the morning and into the afternoon following the same pattern of ten minutes rest per hour. Sarah’s mouth was as dry as cotton and she was exhausted. She doubted Allie was feeling much better. Late in the afternoon, when the temperature rose high enough that Sarah began to sweat, they reached a two-lane road. She thought it looked familiar but she couldn’t be sure. There were a few hulks of abandoned cars in both directions. She put Allie down and walked up the road to the first one, but it had obviously been cleaned out of anything useful. After that, the closest one was past Allie in the other direction, but there was nothing to be found there, either. She saw no point in investing the time to hike to another one. The result would be the same.
On her way back to where Allie stood, Sarah heard the sound of running water. Irrationally excited, it didn’t take her long to follow the sound until she was standing on the bank of a small stream at the side of the road. She knew she should take care of Allie first, but her insane thirst led her to drop to her wounded belly and jam her face into the stream to drink. She could feel grit between her teeth and mud on her chin, but the cold water in her mouth felt glorious as she gulped it down.
Finally she lifted her face from the creek. Allie was watching with a distant expression on face. Sarah smiled and waved her over. Much to her surprise, Allie walked to her. Sarah cupped her hands and filled them with water, which she held out. Allie looked unsure, but leaned over and slurped some. The process was repeated a dozen times, the last of which drew traces of a smile from the toddler.
The relief was short-lived, unfortunately. Before Sarah had a chance to offer Allie more to drink she heard the roar of motorcycles, and maybe even the truck. Up the road, no more than a mile, were several vehicles coming their way. They’d spent too much time out in the open, and now somebody had seen them.
Sarah carried Allie into the woods before going back for the rifles and ammunition. With such a meager head start, she knew they wouldn’t win if it became a footrace. Better give them something to worry about. Maybe they’d be more cautious as they followed. After moving a hundred yards into the woods, she reached for a gun and the satchel with one arm while nudging Allie behind a tree and onto the ground with the other. By the time the attackers drove close enough to enter the woods to chase them, she’d be ready.
The box of shells was labeled “20 gauge.” She’d have to hope those worked with this shotgun. This wasn’t a weapon she’d fired much, but she’d seen Eli do it. Not knowing how many shells were already in the gun, she decided to shoot everything already loaded before inserting any new ones. After studying the pump action, she reviewed what little she remembered, tore the box of shells open, and took a deep breath before taking aim and squeezing the trigger.
She watched the first shot splinter the face of a tree just fifty yards away. Vowing to do better, she pumped the action, took an extra second to aim, and hit the truck with the next shot. The feel of the action told her that the chamber was now empty. Unsure how many shells it could hold, she turned the gun over and dropped four in, pumping the acti
on each time. Three of these next four shots hit a truck, a motorcycle, or for the last one, a human being who screamed in pain as he fell.
Sixteen shells later, after The Men had taken cover and began to return fire, she decided it was time to move. At least two of her pursuers had gone down. She thought she’d taken a third one out, but couldn’t be sure. Hopefully they thought they were up against more than just a couple of helpless females now. That should slow them down. She strapped on the guns and satchel, loaded Allie onto her back and began another retreat.
For an hour she scrambled through the woods. Their pursuers, most likely angry that at least two of their comrades had been killed, had obviously abandoned the road and were giving chase on foot in the forest. Twice she sacrificed valuable seconds to stop and fire a few rounds back into the trees to keep them guessing, but mostly they just ran. The yelling and commotion grew louder and louder, although it was difficult to hear over her own panting. There were a lot more of them than she’d realized.
Her strength and resolve were nearly gone when she heard them in front of her. How had they managed to circle ahead and cut them off? It seemed impossible. She shook Allie off and pulled her into a clump of growth. Bone weary and completely spent, she was struggling with fresh shells that kept falling from her shaking hand when she heard footsteps. She looked up into the barrel of a rifle. A bearded face glowered at her from behind it.
“Drop it and get out of there, real slow, little lady. If you know what’s good for ya.’”
If Allie hadn’t been there Sarah would have taken her chances, even though she was a lot longer than five seconds from being ready to fire back. She’d rather be shot than caught, but she wanted to be around to defend and care for little Allie, for whom life was about to become a nightmare. “Okay!” she yelled back. “Don’t shoot us!” The sound of her raspy voice shocked her. She sounded like a dying animal. Which was exactly what she felt like. In fact, she conceded as she raised her arms as high as she could, it’s what she was.
Twenty-four
When Dewey arrived at Southampton Middle School after two tough days on the road, he’d hoped that he’d be well-received. It was only when he had the school in his sights, with four teens and three young children in tow, that he realized that most of the occupants of the school had never seen him before and would have no idea who he was.
The trip had been difficult. Dragging the younger siblings along had been the biggest challenge. A lot of the time they had to be carried. Even Dewey had taken a few shifts with somebody on his back, despite his injured leg. Having no food, water or shelter made it all that much worse; he didn’t think they’d all have made it if they hadn’t stumbled across that stream on the second day.
Robert and Albert, who’d shepherded their little brother, Dallas, turned out to be the strongest of the travelers. Kelly struggled with her sister Katie. It was Katie who spent the most time on Dewey’s back and shoulders. Gygax and his younger brother Benjie also had a hard time along the way. Gygax was already thin, but now he looked like a ghost. All along the way Dewey had been promising a paradise at the end of the journey. Now that he’d arrived at the school, he was no longer sure he could deliver one.
Missing from the group, along with Sarah, were Ethan and his four year-old sister, Allie. Dewey knew Sarah stayed at the cabin even though the oncoming truck had been reported, so she could take a few shots at the invaders. That was the last he’d seen of her. Allie had already been with the rest of the teens when Ethan and Robert linked back up with them in the woods. Nobody was sure when she and Ethan had disappeared. They’d all been so worried at the time about escaping that they’d been thinking only about themselves and their own sibling. By the time they noticed that Ethan and Allie were no longer with them, there were too many voices and gunshots in the woods to risk going back to look for them.
Dewey knew his arrival at Southampton Middle School wasn’t going well when a wall of about twenty men who’d been on the sidewalk suddenly rushed toward them. Geez, he wondered. Do we, like, ever get to the part where nobody’s after us? All of the men, dressed in blue uniforms, were carrying weapons, some of which were pointed at them. Oddly, there was a handful of soldiers in traditional green fatigues trailing behind them, also with weapons drawn.
“Hands up!” one of the blue-clad men yelled. “Get on your knees! Show us your hands!” he yelled. The tension of the moment quickly dissipated, however, when it was obvious that this group of emaciated youngsters was unarmed and posed no threat. Even so, they were ordered to leave their hands in the air until they’d been frisked for weapons.
“I’m part of this!” Dewey kept saying. “I’m one of you!” Nobody seemed to understand who he was. His hopes were revived, however, when the man Nick always called “Roethke” sauntered over from the building, accompanied by a disheveled soldier in a green uniform. Some of the toddlers began to cry as the men in blue surrounded them. At least two of the teenagers looked ready to.
“You can stand down. I know him,” Roethke declared to the edgy band of soldiers. “It’s the prodigal son. He’s okay. And I mean that in every sense of the word. ‘Okay’ is as far as I’ll go.”
“Can you feed us?” Dewey asked. “At least the little ones? We haven’t had anything to eat or drink for three days.”
“Well, whose fault is that?” Roethke replied. Then he surveyed the group, as if he hadn’t noticed them before. “Who in God’s name are all these kids, and why did you bring them here? They’re not from the roofer’s gang. Those freeloaders are already here.”
“It’s a long story,” Dewey said.
“And where’s the woman with the hyphen?” Roethke continued. “You were off with her last I heard.”
“She’s missing,” Dewey said. “Can you, like, feed the kids at least?”
“Have a heart, Doc,” the man next to Roethke said. “I don’t know the story here, but these people aren’t going to last much longer if we don’t get them some chow. As a matter of fact, I could use some myself.” He looked directly at Dewey. “We’ll get you fixed up, son. I haven’t been inside either. I got here about ten minutes before you did, and he hasn’t invited me in yet.”
“If they come inside, they have to be quarantined,” one of the soldiers in blue said. “Grover’s orders.” The green-clad soldiers snickered and elbowed each other.
“I’ll give the orders here,” Roethke retorted. “Quarantine them if you must, but they can be fed. Then we’ll get their story.” He looked at Dewey. “That doesn’t mean you’re staying. You’re not a popular man around here after that stunt you pulled.”
~~~
“How long before you finish this one?” Mark called up to Nick, who was up on the roof of the new hospital. It would be known as “The Medical Center” here, but Nick wasn’t used to calling it that yet. In its former life it had been the camp arts and crafts center. With a labyrinth of rooms of all sizes it was ideal for a medical facility, except for the dilapidated roof. Nick had taken care of that in just over a day, with the help of a crew that tore off the old shingles and replaced them with new ones.
So much had happened in the space of four or five days. As best as Nick could gather, a third of the entire group had moved permanently from Southampton to Tabernacle and were now living in the village. Water and food production facilities had been completed, and except for the permanent meat-smoking facility, all were operating at normal capacity. A sizable contingent of security personnel was now in residence and was operating out of the armory. The fortifications were way ahead of schedule, thanks to the tireless work of Jesse Cobbins and his refugees. Nick was looking forward to the day when the rest of the Outhouse Coalition was living down at the camp, which he was already doing. He got along with everybody, but those were his friends.
Jenny McElligott-Cohen had indeed been transferred to Medical and was living at the camp now as well. Nick tried his best to stay close to her and help in any way he could. He thought of it as
an unspoken promise to Sarah, wherever she was. Jenny had responded well. Meaningful work had been the best remedy for whatever was getting her down, although it was no substitute for the parents that had been ripped away from her.
“About an hour at the most!” Nick yelled down to Mark from the roof. He looked over at the last of the shinglers still on the job, Nancy Shaughnessy and Dwayne. For two people who’d never laid a shingle before, they’d done pretty well. He hoped he’d have them when he moved on to the armory, which was to be his next project. “Any noise complaints from down below?” The medical people were already inside the building, setting up offices and operating rooms.
Mark laughed. “A few. They’ll live. They want a roof over their heads, don’t they?” Nick took a seat on the roof and wiped his forehead with a sleeve after Mark was gone. This one was just about done. With a green crew it took a lot longer than he was used to. At least he’d been given two pneumatic hammers, or it would have taken a lot longer.
“Last one’s nailed down!” Nancy shouted from where she was perched, her hammer now silent. Dwayne, who’d quickly mastered the art of roof-walking, was already moving about coiling up the pneumatic hoses. Nick wrapped up his own tools and followed Nancy to the ladder, but stopped to listen when one of the security men burst out of the woods and over to Mark. Nick heard the words clearly. “We’re under attack!”
~~~
He nearly slid down the ladder in his haste to find out what was happening. By the time he’d pushed his way to Mark through the growing crowd, he’d already missed a lot. The gist of it, from what he was able to gather, was that the woods were full of armed men who were rapidly advancing on the camp, and would be at the fringes within minutes. The security man had already rushed back to the armory to inform his superiors.
“What’s going on?” Nick yelled to Mark over the sea of voices. Mark shook his head as if to say “Not here,” before making his way over. He grabbed Nick by the arm and dragged him inside the Medical Center, slamming the door behind them.