Levi looked at Harper from his seat. “In Briersville, you and your, uh, son saved my life. I’m forever grateful. When I was lying in Dr. Hanson’s hospital bed last night, I saw how you rallied our people and saved this town--”
“Now, Levi,” Trudy injected. “You know this town needs your woodworking skills more than ever.”
“I know, Trudy,” Levi replied. “But I owe her my life. Harper, is it possible to take this easy? We can scout and build simultaneously. That’s the ideal solution, in my opinion.”
“I can’t,” Harper said honestly. “Call me stubborn or stupid but as long as he has Eli, I have to go.”
Harper turned to the remnants of Brighton. “Anyone else?”
Dustin stood up slowly from the second row, holding his cap over his chest. “I’m in. Sorry, momma. Eli’s my friend. He’s the closest thing I have to a little brother. I ain’t leaving him.”
Trudy frowned. “Don’t make me the bad guy, Dustin.”
“I ain’t, but I ain’t sitting around either.”
“You’re a man,” Trudy said after a few seconds. “Go on then. Keep Harper safe and don’t be wasting time.”
“We’ll be back,” Dustin slid on his cap. “Eli, too.”
Harper waited a few moments for any more volunteers, but she only got averted eyes.
“Thank you all,” she finally said. “When we return, I expect this place to be tidied up nice and neat. Don’t want to tarnish Brighton’s reputation.”
A light chuckle echoed through the grand hall.
Trudy smiled sadly at Harper. Her blue eyes did not hide her disapproval. “You’ll be in our prayers. Good luck out there, girl.”
“Thank you, but there’s something I need to do before I go.”
Dr. Hanson nodded and rose from his seat.
Smoke rolled from the rubble of Brighton’s outlying farmhouse. Acres of green fields, rolling hills, and trees cast for miles around the four-foot mounds of branches and corpses they supported. The entirety of Brighton gathered around their fallen loved ones. As confused and distraught as they were, even the children paid their respects.
Apart from the paleness and stitches, the beings on the slab looked like their living counterpart, only sleeping deeply. Dr. Hanson had shut their eyes and closed their mouths. A few family members gave permission to strip their dead’s clothes for later use. The bodies, divided among unlit pyres, were covered with old blankets. If not for the rush, they would’ve buried them properly. However, disease spread too fast and man hours were needed for repair.
Out of view, tarps covered the dead of Brandy’s army. Harper wouldn’t wait for their final departure. Giving her respects to Church and her lost friends put Brandy hours ahead of her. Nonetheless, she wouldn’t be able to live with herself without some closure. She owed Church that much.
Brighton’s Mayor rested on the center pile of kindling. Unlike most of the bodies, Jonathan Church had been properly sutured and dressed. A thick wire sewed his head to his neck in a baseball weave. His natty grey beard covered most of it.
Still dressed in their dirty clothes, everyone listened to Pastor Bruce’s Word about the frailty of life and what comes after.
Farris’s wife cried the whole time while Martha Doyle lifelessly glared at her husband’s body. The diner girl, Kimmy, stood next to her, sniffling into a handkerchief. Dr. Hanson and Levi didn’t say a word. Around the circle of people, no one looked away from the bodies. They all knew that their home had changed forever. Festivals would be for remembrance now. Houses and beds would be dismantled and used to fortify and rebuild. Soon, Harper knew, no one would talk about the fight. It would be a black page in Brighton’s history.
“Would anyone like to say a few words before we depart with our loved ones?” the pastor asked. His shaky demeanor laid testament to his lack of funeral experience.
Trudy stepped forward and pulled her hand out of her paint-stained overalls. “Though he’d never admit it, Jonathan was a good man and a great leader. When most of us were ready to give up, he revived our spirits. At first, his plans sounded ridiculous but when we heard his passion and conviction, every one of us rallied behind him. If he could speak now, I believe he’d tell us to keep unified, protect our own, and fight hard until the bitter end. Thank you, Jonathan Church.” Trudy kissed his forehead and lingered for a moment. “May you finally be at peace.”
After squeezing the Mayor’s hand, Trudy stepped back into the crowd.
Harper took James’s arm off her shoulder.
“I didn’t always agree with Church, but he helped my family in unimaginable ways. He did the things no one else would.” She looked over the man’s body. His hands were crossed over his broad chest. Pale skin drooped his round cheeks and beneath his eyes. Even in death, he wore a stern face. “I’m going to get the man who did this,” Harper vowed. “Find rest in that, Church. You’ve earned it.”
After the rest of those willing to speak gave their final remarks, torches were handed out to the crowd. James lit his up and touched the tip of Harper’s. Pastor Bruce said a final prayer that ended with, “...watch over Harper, James, and Dustin on their journey, amen.”
“Amen,” Harper said with the rest of the survivors and jammed the flaming stick into the pile. It took a moment for the fire to spread, but then all six pyres were alive with fire. Heat waves splashed against their skin as crackling flames overtook the lifeless bodies. Harper refused to wipe away her tears.
Wearing a backpack, Dustin joined her after the service. James, Harper, and Dustin said their final goodbyes and loaded into the Humvee. Harper held her breath. She imagined Brandy and her son and pressed down on the accelerator. The vehicle skidded out of Brighton and into the wilderness.
3
Trail
Harper yanked the corroded battery out of the Humvee. She slid it into the potato sack and placed it inside the foot-deep hole James had dug. Using her fingers, she raked dirt, leaves, and twigs over the battery until nature had concealed it. To create a marker, she placed a distinctly shaped stone on top. The lack of battery should be enough to prevent anyone from stealing her bullet-riddled Humvee. Nonetheless, they could strip the hulking vehicle for parts.
Harper rose to her feet and rubbed her palms together. A small cloud of dirt formed between her hands as she swept away the loose earth not embedded in her skin and fingernails. The hunting rifle rattled every time she moved an arm, but the weight and strap kept it on her shoulder. She had four shots and that was it. To compensate, Church’s machete dangled from her belt in its buttoned-up leather sheath. Dustin wielded a pump shotgun--also lacking significant munitions--and a sturdy hatchet. James shouldered a smooth bolt-action rifle and a row of survival knives tucked in his belt. Unsurprisingly, their attire consisted of dirty tees, worn jeans, and laced boots.
“We’re going to need gas soon,” James stated as he finished relieving himself.
Harper put her hands on her hips and looked out to the surrounding trees. “Not in these woods.”
The Virginian flora stretched for miles. Brandy could’ve killed Eli, dropped his corpse in a ditch, and Harper would be none the wiser. The corrosive nastiness of her morning veggies lodged deep within her throat as she thought of her baby boy and whatever cruel fate Brandy had in store for him. She would’ve continued driving the Humvee if the trees weren’t so dense.
“We should pick up where the trail ended last night.” Dustin spit out a glob of sunflower seeds. A few hairs sprouted from his normally shaven jaw and cheeks while droopy dark circles lined his once-jolly eyes.
“Keep spitting seeds and they’ll be tracking us,” James said as he started into the woods.
Harper adjusted the rifle strap, smelling sap and the greenery around her. “Lead on.”
The woods in the day seemed like a whole different world. The oddly formed bushes and jutting boulders marked the path Dustin guided them down. The trees didn’t seem as high or foreboding as last night, but the
y still went on forever. They followed the search party’s footprints to the first bloody fern. The red marks had been washed away by the morning dew but they kept on the trail, using their old tracks as a guide.
Without relying on torchlight, the three of them moved much quicker than the previous night. Brushing by thorn bushes and ducking beneath low hanging branches, they reached where the trail went cold: an opening enclosed by trees.
“Square one,” James mumbled.
Harper scanned the outlying area, looking for any disruption on the dirt, bushes, or scraggly tree limbs. Lowering to a knee, she examined a broken twig. “Not quite.”
“Good eye,” Dustin complimented. “Now, the real work begins.”
They looked beyond the trees and to the massive Smoky Mountains in the distance.
James stepped forward. “Do you really think…”
Harper rubbed her fingers up her short, unwashed hair as she studied the row of foggy zephyrs that formed Piedmont’s western spine.
Hours waned and mosquitoes clawed at their arms and necks. Their pursuit led them over grass knolls, through trampled shrubs, and across sprawling game trails. They avoided rolling their ankles in gopher holes and spotted a family of deer at the end of the thickest trail, thus forcing them to backtrack and try another trail of crunched grass. Dustin had the most experience with his background in hunting, and, a bit past noon, they’d found a set of tracks. Two people with adult male-sized shoes had staggered through a bushel of scaly-plated Virginian Pines.
With a beating heart, Harper took the lead and deftly slid the rifle into her blistered palms. She forced herself to remain patient as she walked parallel to the man-made tracks. Dustin and James followed her, stepping quietly. Dead branches snapped beneath their boots. An indistinguishable voice sounded nearby.
Harper dropped to a lower stance. Her vision and breathing found their focus. Her finger hugged the trigger. Her mind quieted to a whisper as it readied for the kill. Like a nocturnal predator, she stalked the noise.
“... get on them feet,” a man said with the cadence of a thick country accent. “You know what happens if you don’t.”
Through the untamed branches and limbs, Harper saw a man’s broad back hunched over the base of a tree. Harper pushed through the web of leafy wood that left pink scratches on her forearms and right cheek. Two boot-wearing feet stretched out beside the hunched man as it became clearer that he was hunching over another person. Eli?
Harper kept the rifle sight centered on the man’s spine and slipped out of the woods. “Turn around. Slowly.”
The hunched man froze up. His shoulders stiffened and his hand went to the kitchen knife on his belt.
“Don’t even think about it,” Harper threatened.
The man twisted back like a stiff cog. Crimson splatter tarnished his jean jacket and crusted like cracked red clay on his hairy, bear-like hands. A Band-Aid covered the bridge of his hooked nose. His shifty silver eyes skipped from the black rifle barrel to Harper. Yellow teeth were revealed through the slight parting of his chapped lips. He wasn’t Brandy, and the pale dead man resting against the tree wasn’t Eli.
“You,” the hook-nosed man said spitefully. He stood fully, looming over Harper by six inches.
“You were at Brighton?” Harper asked as James and Dustin fanned out, keeping an eye out for any unwanted arrivals.
The man stared at her, not saying a word.
Harper kept the rifle aimed center mass. “Where’s Brandy?”
The large man’s crazed eye twitched. His hand neared the knife.
Harper kept the shot ready. “Answer the question.”
The man stood in silence. His eyes twitched again as he shifted his attention between Harper, Dustin, and James.
“This guy,” James stated. “He was part of Brandy’s posse. I saw him flee when you…you know.”
Harper nodded, keeping her eyes on the man. Something about him made the hairs on the back of her neck stand up. “What Brandy did, what he made you be a part of, I get you probably didn’t have a choice. So I’m going to give you the benefit of the doubt and let you walk, but only if you tell me where Brandy is and where he is going.”
The man sized her up. He cocked a smile, exposing his yellow and rotten teeth. “The more you yap, the more your stupidity shines. You ain’t got the darnedest clue about what he’d do if I’d talked. Not the darnedest clue.”
“I’m offering you a way out,” Harper said, her patience slipping.
The man shook his head. His eyes went as wide as silver dollars. “There’s only one way out.”
With a motion, he jerked the knife out from his belt. Harper put a bullet into his knee. The shot echoed. The man collapsed, screaming through his clenched jaw.
“Tell me where Brandy is and I might patch that up for you,” Harper said coldly.
The man clenched the knife like a winning lottery ticket as a pool of red bloomed beneath his kneeling leg. Tears streamed down his gaunt face from his terror-filled eyes. “You don’t know him like I do! You don’t know the things he’s done!”
With a trembling hand, the man lifted the knife.
“Drop it!” Harper commanded, aiming the sight on the man’s forehead.
He let out a cry as the knife’s blade slashed across his own wrist. Dustin swatted him with the shotgun but by the time the weapon was in the dirt, so was the man’s blood. Harper swiftly lowered the rifle and ripped a ribbon off the bottom of her tattered shirt. James tensed up. The man sank to the ground. Darting over, Harper pulled his arm up and wrapped the cloth around it.
“It’s too deep!” Harper exclaimed. “I can’t stanch the bleeding!”
Lying on his back, the man shook his head rapidly and mumbled, “You don’t know him,” repeatedly until he was dead next to his partner.
James paced next to a tree, cursing.
Dustin stumbled back. “What the hell just happened?”
Harper let the man’s wrapped arm drop. She stayed on her knees in front of the man’s warm cadaver. “He killed himself…”
“The guy’s crazy,” Dustin said in shock.
“No,” Harper looked over the man and felt queasy. “He’s terrified.”
They didn’t talk, but Harper knew they all thought the same thing as they moved deeper into the woods. How much did they actually know about the man who attacked their home and took Eli? What could he have possibly done to terrify his own people into taking their own life before giving up his location? A part of Harper would rather stay ignorant.
As they went on, the more the last twenty-four hours felt unreal. She had shot someone in the leg without a second thought, and no one called her out on it. She had killed dozens with the Humvee turret, and people praised her. It was for Eli, of course, but her conscience didn’t agree with her rationalization. A couple of months ago, she had been a productive member of society. Harper doubted if that part of her still existed.
A tail of black smoke climbed out from deep within the trees. The three exchanged anxious glances and started toward the mountains.
Camping tents formed a semicircle around a neglected fire pit. Trash bags hung from trees and boasted long slashes across their black skin. Putrid piles of rotting garbage collected an impressive host of flies and other buzzing insects.
Harper arrived at the eastern side of the perimeter, keeping a watchful eye for any people. After a few minutes of stillness, she craned her leg over the fishing wire fitted with tin cans, little bells, and other Macgyvered chimes. Dustin and James covered the right and left flank, creeping into the small encampment with guns at the ready. Harper moved in between the tents, noticing their zippers to be untouched. However, large cuts tethered the sides and back. Beneath the tears, the dirt was tousled and patted down, eventually ending at a large flat area in the middle of the camp. Blackened and broken tinder crumbled in the middle of the smoking fire pit. Flat rocks rested nearby with canned beans burned on their faces. One had an especially he
inous chunk of meat hardened on it. Upon closer inspection, Harper gagged and stepped back. A diamond earring stud glimmered on the dark meat. There were no other immediate instances of such meat throughout the site.
The tents were stripped of pillows, blankets, and whatever else one would use for comfort while camping. The western side of the makeshift alarm system was trampled and cut. Its surrounding bushes were stomped down and imprinted with many footprints.
“You think they passed through here?” James asked after securing the perimeter.
“Hard to say,” Harper replied, slinging her rifle over her shoulder. “There was a struggle, but this fire looks to have been going for days.”
Dustin chimed in, “What if Brandy hit this encampment before he led the attack on Brighton?”
Harper chewed on her inner cheek. “All I know is that the more time we spend trying to solve this mystery, the farther Brandy takes Eli. We’re already a night behind as is.”
They followed the stampede tracks to a recreational campsite nesting on the bank of a flowing stream. Multiple cabins hugged the waterfront while picnic tables and charcoal grills spotted an area cleared of trees. Hunting posts were built high into outlying trees with wooden planks nailed into the back to make steps.
Lawn chairs formed a circle around a massive, stone-enclosed fire pit. At the foot of one chair rested an alarm system much like the one from the small encampment. This one had yet be strung up and was only three quarters through getting fully equipped with cans before being abandoned completely. The site had a sort of homely, well-lived in feel, and the smooth noise of the rushing water added to the ambiance. At the far end, Harper spotted the makings of a vegetable garden. Near the river, a knotted fishing wire held dried clothes and dirty towels. Without spotting any form of human life, it appeared this place had suffered the same Roanoke dilemma as the last encampment.
Harper, James, and Dustin fanned out, kicked in doors, and formed a secure perimeter within a few minutes. Dustin made an interesting discovery buried shallowly behind a cabin. The box was wooden and held several family photos and a diary. Its contents chronicled a woman's journey from after the blackout to her discovery of this campsite. The last entry explained her fondness for her new garden and a man arriving, requesting charity from her and her friends. Dustin put it back where it belonged.
Surviving The Collapse Super Boxset: EMP Post Apocalyptic Fiction Page 109