EMP (Book 3): 12 Years Old and Alone

by Whitworth, Mike

  Chapter 4

  We tumbled head over toes as the water carried us out of the trees and into the main channel of the creek, now a wild, white, twisting torrent covered by floating hail and broken trees. The flood filled the little valley from brim to brim. I had a grip on Sackett’s collar and I refused to let go, even when the current slammed me into a tree trunk.

  I was glad I could swim, having learned at the creek close to home when I was eight. But this wasn’t really swimming. It was more like riding an insane waterslide filled with fast-moving debris, a life or death game of water dodge ball.

  And the water was cold. Literally as cold as ice from the melting hail. If we couldn’t get out of the water soon, we might freeze to death.

  Sackett was a strong swimmer. He kept us moving toward the bank while I fended off the debris, most of it anyway. Once a limb on an uprooted tree grabbed us as the tree rolled in the current and pulled us under water. I could feel Sackett tangled in the smaller branches. I frantically broke branches with one hand while I hung onto Sackett. If I let go of him, he’d drown because he couldn’t free himself.

  I was running out of air. Arkansas ain’t a place for a kid to practice staying underwater. Not if they had a mom like mine, anyway. Mom firmly believed she knew what was best for her children, and swimming wasn’t one of those things because her cousin drowned when she was a kid.

  Finally, when I was sure we were gonna die, we broke free and our heads popped out of the water and floating hail. I gasped and took a series of deep breaths in between choking on water that splashed up my nose.

  Sackett seemed fine although he was breathing in great gasps as well. He was swimming hard toward the bank. I kicked my legs to help, but he did most of the work while I fended off debris.

  It was a rough ten-minute ride, although it felt like an hour. After we were washed nearly a mile downstream, Sackett managed to swim us to slack water. From there we made it to a rocky knoll and dragged our asses out of the water.

  Hey, you think I’m kidding? We did just that. We were both so tired, and cold, we couldn’t walk at all. We crawled about ten feet from the water’s edge and passed out with the roar of the flood still echoing off of the rock ledge above us.

  It was nearly noon when I awoke. I was still shivering slightly. Sackett was sitting guard. I knew why he was sitting when I tried to stand and fell down instead. The pain in my muscles and from all the bruises where I was pounded by sticks and flotsam nearly made me throw up.

  By mid-afternoon we had crawled to the top of the knoll. I sat there and looked down at the little valley. The water was receding now. I hugged Sackett, whose fur was finally dry, and said, “Thanks Sackett. You saved my life.”

  Sackett licked me on the cheek and we got up and doddered farther away from the flood. As we wobbled and stumbled, I took inventory of our situation. All we had left was what was in my pockets. My pack was gone. My knife was gone. My nascent bow and arrows were gone. All of my extra clothes were gone. All I had on were a ratty pair of jeans and a rattier tee-shirt. Even my shoes and socks were gone, kicked off to swim better in the flood. I checked my pockets. My matches were there but they were soaking wet and useless.

  Some survival expert I was. If there was a dumb-ass award for worst survivalist, I’d win it.

  But, it wasn’t like we were stranded in deepest, darkest Africa, far away from civilization. No, we were stranded in Arkansas, where civilization was just dying.

  Yeah, I know, folks on the coasts think there is no civilization in flyover country, but there is, well, there was anyway. But I wasn’t really interested in civilization. I was interested in the remnants of civilization—a knife, some matches, a jacket, and a pair of shoes. And, of course food. Damned if I wasn’t hungry again.

  I was worried about going back into a town. The closest town was where the cannibals killed the man. I laughed, those fuckers probably ate their comrade, the one Sackett and I whopped upon. Thinking about that grossed me out.

  The truth was that I watched horror movies because my friends said they were cool, and I wanted to be cool too. But I didn’t like blood and gore, not even the fake movie kind.

  Now I was discovering that the real thing had a deeper and even more damaging impact on me than what I saw on TV. At least I didn’t have to pretend any more. I didn’t want to witness anyone else killed, including me and Sackett, but we needed stuff to survive. Town was where I had to scrounge or die.

  I decided we’d look for hickory trees along the way, and, maybe if we were lucky, a pecan tree. I couldn’t think of a better supper right now than shelled pecans roasted on a rock, unless it was bacon.

  We found some more walnuts and I spent an hour cracking the tough green-hulled nuts for Sackett and me. Now I understood the term tough nut. I’d heard it all my life, but until now, I didn’t realize where it came from.

  The walnuts helped, but I was still hungry when we were done.

  We reached the edge of town an hour before dark. My intention was to slip into town and search through houses until I found some matches and a candle so I'd be able to continue searching after dark when I’d be less likely to be seen. A flashlight would be nice as well, but I’d take what I could get.

  The first house we entered was empty. I don’t think anyone had lived there for a long time. The next house had a lot of stuff in it, including some kids toys, but it was tossed like folks had been here searching before.

  I tried all the usual places that kids hide stolen matches and was rewarded with a half-full box of strike anywhere kitchen matches. The kid who lived here must have been a lot like me. I had matches stashed in our house too. I wondered what happened to him, or her.

  Where there’s matches, there’s bound to be a candle for secret clubs, or just for telling ghost stories. It took me a while but I found it, a fat white candle about four inches long. We were in business. I lit the candle and searched for useful stuff while Sackett sat guard.

  I found a dirty blanket, a man’s small chambray shirt, and a man’s medium denim jacket. There were shoes in one closet, but they were too big for me. I found a pile of socks near an empty drawer and kept putting on socks until the sturdiest-looking shoes fit tolerably well. I rolled up the useful stuff into the blanket and kept searching. In the kitchen I found several knives. They all had serrated blades. I kept the one that looked most like a filet knife.

  I hit the jackpot in the garage I found a big plastic container in the rafters full of camping gear. Good shit too, not the cheap stuff like mine had been.

  I spent an hour filling a backpack, packing it just so. I was most pleased with an old folding Buck knife, the one with the wooden handles and a four-inch blade that weighed a fucking ton. And there was a hatchet too, the kind the guys in the vids called a hand axe. Shit, hatchet was good enough for me. One word is always better than two no matter what Shakespeare said.

  I really needed a flashlight. I didn’t find any, but I did find an iPhone with a 50% charge, and it had a flashlight app. I was set.

  I debated sticking around to see what else I could find, but I was afraid of the men who killed the man in the street. I didn’t think the man that I beat with my bow was dead when we ran away. If he found us, he’d kill us for sure.

  Should I try to find a gun? I wanted one. Hell, every boy in Arkansas wanted a gun. But a gun makes a lot of noise and hunting with a gun would let people know where we were.

  “What do you think, Sackett? Should I try to find a gun?”

  Sackett just looked at me like I was stupid. I couldn’t tell if he thought it was stupid to look for a gun or stupid not to look for a gun. So I agreed we should look for a gun, but not for very long. Even if we found a gun, we wouldn’t be able to protect ourselves from those men. I’d have to learn to shoot first. It would be better not to hang around.

  I’d never fired a gun, although I lied to the other boys saying I had, just like they probably lied to me. I kind of knew how to use a gun from watc
hing TV and Internet vids, but I wasn’t sure.

  My dad said guns were dangerous but he had the shotgun, which us kids were never allowed to touch. Mom always said she hated guns, yet she threatened me with Dad's shotgun. I vowed to be careful if I found one. Apparently they could do strange things to some people.

  Me and Sackett slipped into the next house. It had been trashed too. If I was gonna have any luck finding good stuff, I’d have to be smart and look for hiding places.

  I did just that. I found a roll of cash taped behind a dresser drawer. I left it there. It was worthless now.

  I found a stash of Playboy magazines in the back of a closet. I wasted some of the candle looking through a couple of them, but when I saw the naked ladies, I thought of my mom and sisters and how they died. I threw up all over the stack of magazines.

  And then I found it, a big old blued pistol, a revolver, but not the cowboy kind. I looked at the holes in the cylinder. They were empty so I didn’t think it was loaded. I also found a box of cartridges. I stuffed both gun and cartridges deep into my new pack.

  In the next house I found a good hunting knife and a whetstone. I stuffed those into my pack as well.

  I wanted food, but there was none.

  Then I heard the gunshot. It was close.

  I heard voices. They were coming closer. We needed somewhere to hide.

  I remembered the opening in the closet that led to the attic. I wasn’t sure how I was gonna get Sackett up there. Shit, he weighed more than I did.

  I quickly piled up a few dresser drawers, bottom side up. Sackett climbed them like a set of stairs.

  I heard the front door open. They were here.

  I put Sackett’s paws on the clothes rod and got a grip and pushed him up. He saw the opening into the attic and scrabbled through it.

  “Did you hear something?”

  “Naw, probably just another damn raccoon.”

  “They eat good.”

  “Yeah, let’s shoot it.”

  Fuck. I quickly removed the drawers from the closet floor. Then I pulled myself up on the clothes rod, and pushed the pack into the attic. I wasn’t sure if I could pull myself into the attic, but fear makes you stronger. In a heartbeat, I was in the attic, lying next to Sackett, and using the iPhone as a flashlight.

  I held my finger to my lips. Sackett knew what that meant. We'd been working on hand signals.

  I led Sackett away from the opening and into a corner of the attic, behind some old cardboard boxes. We settled in to wait. I turned the iPhone off. I wasn’t worried about getting a call. I wanted to save the battery.

  Damn, I had to pee. All I could do was hold it. Now wasn’t the time.

  Me and Sackett sat as quietly as we could. I could hear two men talking and moving around in the rooms below us. I thought about digging the gun out of the pack but decided against it. Better to just wait until they were gone, even if it took an entire day. If it took much longer though, I was gonna have to find something to pee in. If I just urinated in the attic, the pee dripping into the house below might give us away.

  An hour later, they were still puttering around below and I still had to pee. I was holding it in by clenching my teeth and pinching my leg, but just barely. If something were to make me laugh, I’d burst open like a sprinkler hooked to a fire hose.

  The men were talking. I listened.

  “Hey Jarvin?”

  “Yeah, man?”

  “Let’s burn this motherfucker down.”

  “Shit, why not. We got nothin’ better to do. Maybe the fire will attract someone with some food?”

  “Yeah, we could take it from them.”

  “You bet we can,” I heard a flurry of activity. “Let’s get busy.”

  “Righteous Bro, I’ll stay here and pile up some burnable shit while you go get some gasoline.”

  “Back in ten.”

  I heard someone leave through the front door, and I heard the other guy tossing shit around below. Man, talk about being stuck between the frying pan and the fire. This sucked. I had to get me and Sackett the hell out of here before we were crispy critters.

  But how was I gonna do that? The guy downstairs was between us and the door. Maybe we could go out a window?

  I used the iPhone set on dim and Sackett and I made our way back toward the attic exit.

  I had to pee so bad I just couldn’t hold it. Zipper down and instant explosion. I didn’t care where it went as long as it was outta me. I had no control at all. I pissed here and there as I twisted to relieve my painful bladder. The insulation deadened the sound. I was grateful for that. Sackett got into the scheme of things and hiked his leg too. I reckon between us we could have filled a kiddie pool. Pissing is no big deal until you can’t, and then it becomes everything.

  Much relieved, me and Sackett made it to the hatch. I slipped through the hole, dropped to the floor, and set the backpack down. Then I laid all the clothes and soft stuff I could find under the access hatch. I climbed back into the attic and shoved Sackett into the hole. At first he didn’t want to go, but I convinced him. He jumped through and dropped the seven feet to the pile below. He landed on his feet.

  I jumped next. I landed on my ass, cause my foot hung up on the edge of the access hole into the attic.

  The guy in the house was at least two rooms away and was making more noise than we were. I think he was getting into destroying furniture and shit. I boosted Sackett out through an empty window frame, tossed the pack out after him, and climbed through. As I was standing up I heard, “What the fuck… This is piss, piss dripping from the damn ceiling. Shit…”

  “What’s up Jarvin?”

  “Somebody is up in the attic pissing all over me. Shit, it stinks.”

  “Well, let’s burn the fucker alive. I fetched some gas.”

  I grabbed the pack and Sackett and we ran for all we were worth. We were at the edge of town before we saw the flames.

  Man, this town was full of crazy fuckers. But I knew there’d been good people in the town when the power went out. I wondered if any of them were still alive. It seemed to me that nice people were at a tremendous disadvantage when facing monsters in human form. I vowed to never let my guard down.

  Me and Sackett went back to where we’d camped the night before. I figured that was as good a place to have an empty belly as any. We had to find some food in the morning.

  Later that night, I sat beside Sackett, who was snoring. I had no idea that dogs snored, but it was okay. There weren’t any womenfolk around to complain.

  I took the pistol from the pack and figured out how it worked. Pushing the little lever on the left side opened the cylinder. There was no safety. I figured I’d best try the trigger while the gun was unloaded, so I opened the cylinder and made sure all the holes were empty.

  The trigger was a long hard pull, but I managed it.

  I took five bullets from the box and fed them into five holes. There were six holes in the cylinder, but I remembered a cowboy in an old movie saying that you should never put a live round under the hammer as it could go off if the gun got bumped. Once I had the bullets loaded, I closed the cylinder so the empty chamber was under the hammer.

  When the gun was loaded, I set it on the pack in front of me. It seemed ominously dark in the weak firelight. I thought I’d enjoy holding it, but I didn’t. I kept thinking of the man I saw shot in the street and how a spray of blood and brains came out the other side of his head.

  But I was glad it was there, just in case. I touched it every time I heard a noise and it took me a long time to get to sleep. Sackett snored through everything.

  When daylight visited us again, I was still sleepy, but not so sleepy I didn’t hear the voices. They were coming toward us.

  Chapter 5

  I hastily packed my gear and me and Sackett hid in the bushes. I kept the pistol in my hand even though it wasn’t loaded at the moment.

  I watched as a man and a woman came up the trail. The man was wary, constantly l
ooking around, but he didn’t see me or Sackett. The woman seemed to be the lost in space type, but she saw us.

  “Boy, come on out of the bushes. We won’t hurt you.”

  The man spun towards me, holding a black rifle, but he didn’t point it at me.

  “Where is he?” he asked the woman.

  She nodded in my direction. “Right up there. See his shirt?”

  “And his face.” The man lowered his rifle. “Come on out, Son. Are you hungry?”

  I thought about it for only a few seconds, then I stuffed the pistol into my pack, stood and said, “Yes Sir, I could eat an elephant.”

  “Well come on then. We can give you a meal.”

  I went back to the trail. Sackett followed me. He wasn’t wary of these people at all.

  “Beautiful dog,” The lady said. “What’s his name?”

  “Sackett,” I said.

  “Like in the Louis L’Amour books?”

  “Yes Sir,” I said.

  “My name’s Mark Templeman and this is my wife Linda. What’s your name?”

  “Trevor.”

  “I see you’re a man of many words,” Mark laughed.

  I shrugged. When you grow up on the wrong side of the tracks you quickly learn that talking too much can get you in trouble.

  “Well, follow along then. We’ll find a place to fix breakfast in a bit. We haven’t eaten yet. We like to walk up an appetite in the mornings.”

  I followed them and Sackett followed me. Once I saw two pairs of boot prints enter the main trail from a side trail. They were fresh. Now I ain’t no expert tracker, but, since the lights went out, I'd been trying hard to notice every little detail and I was getting better at it. I didn’t think the Templeman’s saw the footprints.

  A mile later, the man stopped and said, “This looks like a nice spot.”

  Sackett nudged me and looked upslope. I patted his head.

  “You mean right here on the trail?” I asked.