EMP (Book 3): 12 Years Old and Alone

by Whitworth, Mike

  I took two days off after I finished the tunnel and just practiced with my bow and arrows during the warmer parts of the day. The snow had melted now, but the clouds looked like more was on the way.

  The bear meat was good. It’s funny how the gamey taste vanishes when you’re hungry. Besides, you get used to it. I wasn’t sure I could go back to eating bland old hamburgers. But I did want a change of menu.

  So, early the next morning, just before daylight, I slipped down to a spot where I’d seen a lot of deer tracks by the creek. Sure enough, in a few minutes a doe approached the creek. The first thing I saw was her nose peeking out of some bushes. Before the lights went out, I would have missed that. I stayed motionless.

  Soon the doe moved farther out from the bushes and paused, listening for danger. I was downwind. I wasn’t worried about her smelling me. I waited. Maybe five minutes later the doe moved forward and bent to take a drink. As her head moved downwards I drew and instantly loosed a chert-flake tipped arrow. The arrow struck the doe exactly where King had showed me. I was amazed to see the arrow pass right through the doe, feathers and all.

  The doe jerked and raised her head. I remained motionless. In less than two minutes the doe collapsed. I waited another fifteen minutes. When I checked, the doe was dead. Son of a bitch. I’d killed my first deer, and with a bow and arrow I’d made from scratch, just like the Indians.

  I knelt over the deer and thanked it for providing for me and Sackett. Then I set to gutting and skinning it. Yeah, I know. That part would have grossed me out too before the lights went out, but now it was no big deal.

  I sat at the fire on one of King’s wooden boxes. The tunnel took a bigger fire and more wood to heat with my escape tunnel finished, and it was getting colder. I’d lost track of the date but my best guess was it was mid-January. January was the coldest month of the year around here.

  My belly was full of venison, as was Sackett’s. Man, that dog could eat. As a matter of fact, I didn’t do so bad myself.

  I spent some time before I went to sleep working on some arrows, fletching them with feathers from a turkey I’d killed the day before.

  To survive, I always had to stay busy. But not just busy. I had to work on what was most important, like cutting up and smoking the rest of the deer tomorrow.

  Also, I was using up firewood faster now and I’d need some more before spring. I’d have to gather more over the next two weeks. I hoped the snow stayed on the ground because the sled pulled better on the snow.

  I could just dump the firewood down the escape tunnel, but I wouldn’t. Instead I’d do it the hard way, because I didn’t want to give my escape route away. I hadn’t seen another human since King left, but it wasn’t worth the risk. I just might need to use that escape route some time. I rubbed my bare feet against the bearskin and remembered the bear.

  I patted my full belly and thought to myself that I was getting the hang of surviving in the woods. Then it hit me. Every time I got cocky, something bad happened, a flood, a fire, a bear. What would be next?

  I took some time and thought about potential threats I might face. There could be another forest fire, but it would likely pass my camp by. I’d spent a few days looking over the terrain after King left, and I was pretty sure that I’d be safe in the tunnel during a forest fire.

  My camp was almost forty feet higher than the stream and located above the flood plain. I wasn’t worried about floods.

  All of the bears should be hibernating right now, so they shouldn’t be a problem. Then I remembered what King had said about dogs running in packs close to his town. The more I thought about it, the more I thought that a dog pack could be a serious problem if they found us. I decided that I needed to gate the tunnel so dogs couldn’t get in. That meant that Sackett would have to pee inside the gate at night, and maybe poop too, but he usually waited until morning to do that anyway.

  In the morning I would take some time to figure out how to gate the tunnel and where to place the gate so it wasn’t visible from the rock shelter or campsite.

  That got me to thinking about my stuff. It was time to move everything I stored under the rock shelter into the tunnel, just in case any people wandered by. I thought of the woman and her two children and wondered what happened to them. I didn’t want any more visitors like them.

  I also thought about earthquakes, but I didn’t think we had any big ones around here. Over near New Madrid, in the Missouri boot heel, there might be a big one someday. We learned about that in school, but none of my science teachers had ever mentioned that we might have one in this area.

  I remembered that King said that game would become scarcer as the winter proceeded. I needed to add to my supply of smoked meat very soon.

  Since the lights went out, it was never boring. I always had something to do and think about. I didn’t have time to be bored.

  Maybe that why I was so tired and slept so hard at night. That was probably why I didn’t hear whoever it was that left footprints along the creek sometime before I got up. But Sackett didn’t hear anything either. I didn’t know what to think of that.

  Chapter 13

  I was pissing when I saw the footprint. It scared me so bad I pissed all over myself. Shit!

  The print was big. It belonged to a man who was wearing waffle-tread boots. I looked around while I put my pisser away. I didn’t see any sign of the man.

  I pulled an arrow from my quiver and nocked it. Sackett seemed unconcerned. At least he didn’t piss himself when I showed him the print.

  I followed the man’s prints. That was easy in the snow. They led away from camp. Then I noticed the blood drops. Was the man hurt, or was he carrying freshly killed game?

  Ten minutes later I found him collapsed under a tree, face down in the snow. He was bleeding. I approached carefully and nudged him with the tip of my bow. He grunted and slowly tuned over. He looked dazed. He said “Osiyo.”

  “Osiyo,” I replied with the Cherokee word for hello.

  He smiled. “You must be Trevor.”

  “Who are you?”

  “I’m Al Kingcade.”

  “King’s son?”

  “Yes.”

  “What happened?”

  “It’s a long story, Trevor. Can you help me to your camp?”

  So I went and got the sled and me and Sackett dragged Al back to camp. I helped him into the tunnel and onto the bear skin.

  “Are you hurt?” I asked.

  “Yeah, Tolliver got a round into me.”

  “I know him. He was with your dad when I met him. I don’t like Tolliver.”

  “Neither do I,” Al said. “Especially now.”

  “Where are you hit?”

  “High in my back on the right side. I don’t think it hit a lung because I can still breathe good, but I lost a lot of blood.”

  I examined Al’s back. There was a bloody spot just where he said. I used some water from the canteen to wash it clean. There was a single bullet hole. I looked at Al’s chest. The bullet hadn’t passed through, so it must still be in there. I wished I knew more about first aid and medicine. Shit, every time I thought I was doing well, I found out I needed to know more about something else.

  “I don’t know what to do,” I said.

  “How deep is the wound?”

  I peered at the bullet hole. I had no idea how deep it was, but there was a lump a few inches away. Was it the bullet?

  “Might be,” Al said. “If the bullet hit bone, it just might be.”

  “What should I do.”

  “Cut the lump out, Trevor.”

  “Yes Sir.”

  So I did just that. It only took a few minutes. I sharpened the small blade of a yellow-handled pocketknife I found in the dead man’s trailer and then held the blade in the flames to sterilize it. I partially melted the handle slabs in the process but now wasn’t the time to worry about that.

  The bullet came out easy-peasy. I bandaged Al’s wounds and made him comfortable by the fire. I w
as amazed I’d been able to cut the bullet out. Before the lights went out, I don’t think I could have done it, as easy as it was. But, after skinning and butchering rabbits, deer, turkey, and a bear, it was no big deal. I wondered if the first surgeons, far back in time, were hunters.

  Al fell asleep after I fed him some venison. I sat there and worried about his wound. I remembered reading about Ötzi, the ice man who was found frozen in a glacier in Italy. He had been shot with an arrow in a similar spot and he had died. I didn’t want Al to die.

  I was also worried about Tolliver. Was he following Al? Was King safe? What about the rest of his family? I sat guard all night at the tunnel entrance with my bow. Sackett slept so hard he snored.

  It was just after dawn when I saw Tolliver. He was walking along the creek with a rifle in his hands. I think he was following Al’s footprints in the snow. If so, he’d soon be coming my way.

  I didn’t know what to do. I wished I was an experienced military guy, like the heroes in the movies. They always knew what to do.

  Sure enough, Tolliver soon turned around and followed the sled tracks toward my camp. I motioned for Sackett to stay back. I was afraid that Tolliver would shoot him.

  Could I kill a man? I wasn’t sure. I knew my bow was strong enough and my arrows sharp enough, I just didn’t know if I could kill a man.

  If I was going to survive this, I had to do something quickly. I believed Tolliver would shoot me as soon as he saw me. There was no time to retreat and get Al out through the escape hole. Besides, he wouldn’t fit. The hole was too small. It was just big enough for me or Sackett.

  Ten minutes later, Tolliver walked into the rock shelter with his rifle at ready and I raised my bow.

  When Tolliver saw me and started to raise his rife I loosed my arrow. He screamed and dropped his rifle. My arrow passed all the way through his side, but only hit two inches of meat. I nocked another arrow and, as he reached for his rifle, I put another arrow through his forearm. He screamed again and ran off into the woods, leaving his rifle behind.

  I retrieved the rifle and moved back into the tunnel just far enough to be out of sight.

  I’d shot a man, something I never thought I’d do in my entire life. Yeah, I watched war movies, just like every other boy my age. And I told my buddies I wanted to be just like whoever was the hero of the latest war movie and they told me the same thing.

  I was never sure how they felt, but I always knew I was lying. My adopted dad had been to war, and sometimes when he was drunk, he told me stories. I knew my dad was a drunk and a ne'er-do-well. He even got arrested once for stealing, but nobody, and I mean nobody, ever said he was a liar. I believed him when he said that killing another human being is the worst thing a man can do, both for the person killed, and for himself. For the first time I wondered if Dad's problems were the result of the war. That made me think more kindly of him. I wished he were here with me. He’d know what to do. I made my mind up to see if I could find him when I was older.

  After some time had passed, I looked at the blood trail Tolliver left. I’d been aiming at his heart when I hit his side. I figured he’d live. I was both relieved and disappointed at the same time.

  I went back into the tunnel and told Al what happened.

  “Trevor, we have to leave as soon as we can. Tolliver has five men with him. They were chasing me.”

  “What happened?” I asked.

  “Tolliver and his crew ambushed Dad, and the rest of our family, as well as our friends. I think I’m the only one left alive.”

  My gut felt just like I ate six pounds of jalapeño peppers and ten pounds of greasy sausage. I wanted to throw up.

  Al got to his feet and I handed him Tolliver’s rifle. Al looked it over. “It’s a Marlin lever action in .38 special. This is probably what Tolliver shot me with.”

  I gathered up what we needed. Man, I hated to leave the bearskin behind, but it was too heavy to carry. Al and I snuck out of the cave and hightailed it away from there as fast as we could go, well, as fast as Al could go. I could’ve gone faster.

  We made a cold camp almost eight miles from the rock shelter. I was afraid to build a fire. Al wrapped up in a couple of blankets, and I smuggled up to Sackett and put my blanket over both of us. I was really wishing for the bearskin when the cold woke me in the wee hours.

  I wondered if the wee hours shouldn’t be called the weewee hours instead. I always had to piss about then. I was still wide-awake when the sun rose. Al was asleep but woke up when Sackett grunted and went off to do his morning poo.

  “Do you think they’ll chase us?” I asked.

  “If Tolliver is able, they will. He’s a vengeful man.”

  “Why did he kill your family and shoot you?”

  “When Dad let Tolliver join our group, we thought he was okay. Over time it turned out he wasn’t who he said he was. He claimed to be ex-military and have serious skills that would help our group. He didn’t. But he wanted to be in charge from the first and became more and more insistent about it as time passed. Then he grew antagonistic and tried to make Dad out as incompetent to everyone else. I guess when that didn’t work, he plotted to kill us since we were all opposed to him being in charge.”

  “Who are the men with him?”

  “I’m not sure but I suspect two of them are from our group. Any others would be outsiders.”

  “All bad men?” I asked.

  “Very bad,” Al said. “Don’t ever give any of them a chance. Shoot first.”

  “I don’t like shooting people, even Tolliver.”

  “Well, these men will all take pleasure in shooting you, Trevor. Sometimes to survive, we have to do things we don’t want to.”

  I considered if I should even ask, but I had to. It was the contrary part of my personality that Mom had tried to whip out of me and failed. “Why did you guys hunt in the National Forest? Wasn’t that illegal?”

  “Only out of season. We always hunted in season.”

  “Oh.”

  “Why did you think otherwise, Trevor?”

  “Cause King knew so much about making traps and snaring deer and stuff. Isn’t all that stuff illegal?”

  “It is now. It didn’t used to be. Great Grandpa taught all of that, and lots more, to Dad when he was a boy. Our family has hunted and trapped in these woods from before the white man’s laws.”

  “Your people were here that long ago?”

  “Mostly, yes. My great grandfather was a full blood Indian. Dad said he was a Cherokee who married my great grandmother. Her people were among the first whites to settle here.”

  “Wasn't that unusual?”

  “Life is seldom predictable. It wasn’t for our ancestors, and it isn’t for us either.”

  Thinking about the lights going out, I said, “I see what you mean.”

  “In any event, we need to get moving. We need to get farther away from Tolliver and his men.”

  So we left our miserable camp and headed for the dead man’s trailer and to my stash of good stuff nearby. Sackett moved out like he was enjoying the exercise. I led, bow and arrow in hand, and Al came up the rear with Tolliver’s rifle held at the ready. Sackett didn’t appear to be paying attention to anything except the occasional urine patch where something had pissed along the trail, but I figured he was more aware than either of us.

  The next camp was better. We threw together a shelter of sorts and made a small fire. The little bit of warmth from the fire made a world of difference. I thought about cave men and how rough they had it before they discovered fire. I didn’t envy them one bit.

  About noon the next day Sackett’s ears perked up. We all stopped. Then I heard it. Voices, human voices. Someone was on our trail. Shit, I came to the forest to avoid other people and now it was turning into a fucking highway. Damn people anyway.

  “What should we do?” I whispered to Al.

  “We need to lose them. If it’s Tolliver’s men, we’re outnumbered.”

  “Shit, I wante
d another blanket,” I said.

  Al simply started walking away in a different direction. Sackett and I followed.

  I noticed that the going was getting rougher as we walked. Soon we were climbing a slight grade. Ahead of us was nothing but big hills. Folks called them mountains around here, but ever since I’d seen a movie about the Rocky Mountains, I called them hills, just big hills.

  In an hour we were climbing a rocky wall. Al had slung Sackett in a blanket tied over his shoulder. He was climbing with a gunshot wound and carrying a dog that weighed well over half what he weighed. I was seriously impressed. King had whelped a tough son.

  At the top of the rock face, Al dumped Sackett out of the blanket and we went back to walking. We were careful to walk on bare rock as much as possible.

  “Tolliver and his men aren’t trackers, so this may fool them,” King said as he hopped from rock to rock.

  “What about Sackett’s tracks?”

  “Can’t be helped right now. There’s a place ahead where even he won’t leave any tracks.”

  We camped in a small rock shelter that night. There was no longer any sound of the men behind us. Al said they didn’t want to climb the rock face and probably went around.

  “Do you think they gave up?” I asked.

  “No,” Al said. “I don’t see them doing that.” Al looked up into the sky. “The stars are blocked. I think it’s going to snow.”

  “Yeah,” I said. “In the early afternoon and it’s going to be a big snow.”

  “So you’re good with weather?”

  “King taught me.”

  “I’m not surprised. He talked about you a lot when he got back.”

  “Good or bad?” I figured it was bad, the way Mom talked about me to her friends. She didn’t think I heard, but I did. Kids always do.

  “Good, Trevor, very good. Dad really liked you.”

  “I liked him too.” I turned my head from the fire because my eyes were tearing up. I was sad to hear about King and his family’s deaths, even though I’d never met his family. As I sat there with only the snapping and crackling of the fire and Sackett’s snores disturbing the silence, I found myself getting mad at Tolliver. Suddenly I wanted him dead for what he had done.