Aftermath

by Mark Lukens

  “Where did you poison them?” Kate asked, but as soon as she asked the question, she knew the answer: one of the places in town where they held big events—the Fosters’ farm. It still felt like someone was squeezing the breath out of her, and her stomach was suddenly nauseous.

  “Some started turning,” Lisey said. “So we had to take them by force. A few of us were attacked. We found some who were dead. Half-eaten already. But those of us who hadn’t turned, we used tractors and trucks. We gathered the others up. We poisoned them. As more of us turned, we poisoned them. We planned to do that until there were only a few left, and then we’d drink the poison when we showed the signs, when God began to take our souls in the Rapture.”

  Kate was sure she was going to throw up now. Was that the rat poison in her food and water already affecting her? She saw front-end loaders carrying dead people down the streets of her town to the Fosters’ farm, half-eaten people, and the rippers they had killed. Then they had burned the bodies, laying the newly poisoned on top of the ashes and charred bones of the previous bodies. The fires brought any nearby rippers, the smoke and smell of cooking meat enticing them. They came and they feasted on the new bodies, ingesting the poison. Maybe they even drank from a poisoned trough of water.

  “Isn’t it beautiful?” Lisey asked, clapping her bony hands together, her smile wide, tears dancing in her squinted eyes. “The Rapture is here. For all of those who didn’t believe, the Rapture is finally here to prove to them that Judgement Day is at hand.”

  Kate’s mind was racing. What was in rat poison? Arsenic? Normally she could have looked up the information on her cell phone in a few seconds, but that wasn’t a possibility now. She searched her memories, thinking maybe it was arsenic in rat poison, or something like it. And didn’t arsenic taste and smell like almonds? She’d heard that somewhere before, or maybe she had read it in an Agatha Christie mystery. Or maybe it was cyanide that tasted like almonds. And couldn’t cyanide be made from apple seeds and cherry pits?

  “What about you?” Kate asked carefully. “Did you poison yourself at the end?”

  Lisey looked horrified at the thought of it. “Oh no. No. That would be suicide. That’s a sin. What we were doing wasn’t a sin. You don’t think it was a sin, do you?”

  Kate didn’t answer her question. Instead, she asked: “Did you poison my mother?”

  “She was turning, Katie. She wasn’t your mother anymore, just like Bud wasn’t my husband anymore. Your momma wanted this. We all did.”

  Kate saw her mother in the last stages of turning, being force-fed poisoned food or water, a funnel shoved down her throat, or being injected with a needle. Then another even more horrible picture flashed into Kate’s mind: her mother’s half-naked body piled up with other townspeople, her eyes half open and staring up at the cold, blue sky—their bodies full of poison, bloated with it, their skin doused with it, waiting for the rippers to come.

  “They were animals by then,” Lisey said. “Rabid animals by then. Their souls are with God now. Up in Heaven. Your soul will be there one day.”

  Kate had to know. She had to ask the question. “Lisey, did you just poison us right now?”

  Kate didn’t glance at Brooke, but she could imagine the child’s eyes widening in shock.

  Max and Petra stared at Lisey, waiting for her answer.

  Lisey looked like she’d been slapped. She put her hands on the edge of the table, pushing her chair back a little. Her wild eyes darted to each of them, and she inhaled a rush of air like she couldn’t catch her breath for a moment. “You think I would do that? Kill you? Murder you?” Her voice was rising in anger.

  “Lisey, I had to ask,” Kate said, trying to keep her voice firm but calm. She’d had to deal with students in her office, students angered about their grades, students on the edge of flunking the semester, on the verge of losing it or breaking down. This was the same tone of voice she had used with her students, compassionate but authoritative and reasonable.

  “If I wanted to kill you, I could have just shot you outside. Why would I have invited you into my home if I thought you were rippers, if I thought you were animals?”

  “It’s okay,” Max said, relief flooding his face now that he was fairly sure he hadn’t been poisoned. “Let’s all just relax.”

  “Relax?” Lisey practically screeched. “Little Katie over there just accused me of trying to murder you.” She stared at Max for a second like she was seeing him for the first time.

  Max shrank back a little.

  “And who are you?” she asked Max. “I don’t even know you.” Her eyes narrowed. “But I can tell that you’ve waged in sin your entire life. I can hear it in your voice.”

  “Hold on a minute,” Max said, his voice suddenly low and stern.

  “You’re an abomination,” Lisey said to Max and then looked at Kate. “What kind of people did you bring into my home?”

  “Lisey . . .” Kate said.

  “Are you with him?” Lisey screamed. “Are you with the Dragon?” She jumped up from her chair, knocking it back, the legs scraping across the wood floor. The shotgun was in the corner where she had left it when she’d come into the dining room to sit down. “Oh Katie, don’t tell me you’ve sold your soul to the Dragon.” She started to turn toward the shotgun.

  Petra jumped to her feet and pulled Kate’s pistol out from under her jacket where she’d been hiding it. “You just hold it right there, lady.”

  CHAPTER 53

  “Let’s all just try to calm down,” Max said. He’d seen Lisey eyeing the shotgun in the corner of the dining room, about to go for it. She had made all of them leave their weapons on the back porch, but she had her shotgun handy. Thankfully Lisey hadn’t searched them and found the gun Petra had been hiding on her. And Max was thankful for Petra’s suspicion.

  Lisey was still on her feet at the head of the table, her chair pushed back almost to the wall, her untouched bowl of stew and glass of water in front of her on the table.

  Max wasn’t sure if Lisey had eaten any of her food or drunk any of her water. As soon as Lisey had said that she and the other townspeople had poisoned the ones turning into rippers, he’d thought that she had poisoned their food. She said she hadn’t, but could he believe her? Paranoia was taking over.

  “You don’t move,” Petra growled at Lisey, aiming her gun at her.

  But Lisey’s eyes weren’t on Petra, they were on Kate. “Don’t follow the Dragon,” she told Kate. “Don’t believe his lies.”

  “You’ve seen him in your dreams, haven’t you?” Kate said.

  “We all have, Katie. He’s the antichrist. Just like the Bible prophesized.”

  Max looked at Kate, noting the expression on her face. Max wasn’t a believer in this stuff and he thought Kate had already established herself as a nonbeliever—it was why she had run away from her family and this town in the first place. He’d run from his own family’s strict fundamental ways. After Max had left home, he’d learned that not all Christians were fundamentalists, but there were extremist groups in all religions. And he sensed that Lisey was definitely one of the extremists. He could feel the hate coming from her, a hate he had encountered so many times in his life.

  But even though Kate said she was a nonbeliever, Max could tell she was entertaining the idea of the Rapture, of an antichrist rising to power, forcing his followers to accept the Mark of the Beast.

  “His followers have to accept the Mark of the Beast,” Lisey said. “The Dragon is gathering up all the resources so no one can buy or sell without his say so, without taking the mark.”

  “Hoarding resources,” Petra said. “Kind of like what you’re doing here?”

  Lisey’s eyes met Petra’s eyes. “It wasn’t only me. Everyone in town did it. We all agreed on it. We were all waiting to turn, for our souls to be taken. Helping the others along, destroying their bodies after they were gone.”

  “Until there was only one left,” Max said. “You.”

 
; Lisey looked at him.

  “How come God hasn’t taken your soul to Heaven yet?” Max asked her. Part of him hated that he was being so mean to this woman, who obviously had some mental problems—either she’d cracked after the Collapse or she’d always been a little off her rocker. Kate would know that better than him. But he also felt a sinister pleasure in pointing out this little fact to her in case she hadn’t thought about it.

  “God has a special plan for me,” Lisey said. “My business on this earth isn’t quite finished yet.”

  “What business is that?” Kate asked. “Us?”

  Lisey didn’t have an answer for her.

  “If this is the Rapture,” Max asked Lisey, “then why didn’t he take you? Or any of us?”

  That wicked smile was back on Lisey’s face, that gleam of insanity in her eyes. “He didn’t take you because you’re a sinner. You’re an abomination.”

  “What about Kate?” Max asked. “She’s not an abomination like me. Why is she still here?”

  “She turned her back on us. On her family. On God.”

  Max heard Kate’s slight inhale of breath, but he didn’t look at her; he kept his eyes on Lisey. “What about Brooke? Why didn’t God take her? She’s just a child. You’re telling me that she’s a sinner?”

  Lisey shrugged.

  “And all of these others who’ve been turned into rippers. All of their souls have been taken by God? All of them have gone to Heaven? Wouldn’t that leave a bunch of atheists and people of other religions around?”

  Lisey was growing frustrated, her mouth a thin line.

  “You’re immune to this plague,” Max said. “Whatever the hell this plague is. That’s all.”

  “No I’m not.”

  “You’re immune just like we are. You’re not going to turn.”

  “Yes, I am,” Lisey snapped.

  Max could see Lisey’s future now, hiding away in this house with her stores of food and water, waiting and praying for the symptoms to come, for her soul to begin leaving her body. Maybe she had saved a little of the rat poison for herself, and when she went completely crazy, she would believe the first symptoms of the plague had started to happen; she would use those imagined symptoms as justification for killing herself. Or she would eventually be overrun by a horde of rippers or even a gang of survivors, robbing her of her food and killing her.

  “Enough,” Petra said. “This is all a waste of time. You’re never going to convince her.”

  Max didn’t say anything—he knew Petra was right.

  Everyone was quiet for a few seconds.

  “Here’s what’s going to happen,” Petra told Lisey. “We’re going to take some of your food and supplies. Then we’re going to leave. We’re not going to hurt you unless you try to attack us.”

  “Stealing from me,” Lisey said, nodding. “That’s about what I’d expect from the likes of you.”

  “It’s not your stuff,” Kate snapped. “It was my parents’ stuff. The Bennetts’ stuff. The town’s stuff.”

  “We’re not taking everything,” Max said. “Just enough to last us a month or so. Probably only put a dent in the supply you have. You’ll still have plenty. When we load up our truck, we’re driving back down to Kate’s house.”

  “If you come near us with your shotgun, I’ll shoot you,” Petra told Lisey. “I might wound you, or I might do worse. A wound right now might be a death sentence anyway.”

  Lisey locked eyes with Petra.

  “You understand everything we just said to you?” Petra asked her.

  Lisey nodded, the hate still burning in her eyes.

  “Good,” Petra said and looked at Max. “You and Kate start boxing up some stuff. Don’t take anything that she might have tampered with, including those jugs of water. Get Brooke out to the truck, too. I don’t want her in here if this lady wigs out. I’ll cover our host here until you guys are done.”

  Max looked at Kate and Brooke. “Come on. She’s right. Let’s hurry.”

  CHAPTER 54

  That was the most Kate had heard Petra say at one time. Kate was afraid Lisey might rush Petra, force her to shoot her. It would be a way to Heaven without having to kill herself, but in a way she would be killing herself by making Petra shoot her—and suicide was a mortal sin to her. But who knew how warped Lisey’s mind had gotten by now? Kate just wanted to get Brooke out of the house before bullets started to fly. Brooke had seen enough horrors already; she didn’t need to see a woman shot to death in her own home.

  “You’ll pay for this,” Lisey called after Kate as she ushered Brooke out of the dining room and into the kitchen. “You’ll take the Mark of the Beast and then you’ll be damned like the rest of them. The Rapture has happened and the only way into Heaven now is through the Tribulation! You have to suffer first!”

  “Come on,” Kate whispered at Brooke. “Let’s hurry.”

  Brooke looked spooked, her eyes wide.

  “We need to get her to the truck,” Kate whispered to Max.

  “Let’s all grab something first,” Max said.

  Kate wanted to argue, but Max was right. It would be a waste of time not to carry something out with them.

  “Take these,” Max said. He grabbed a box of canned goods and handed it to Kate. Then he handed a twelve-pack of sodas to Brooke. “You think you can carry that?”

  Brooke nodded, carrying the twelve-pack by the cardboard handle.

  They hurried out to the SUV, carrying their boxes. Kate kept expecting to hear gunshots from inside the house at any second. She also stayed alert for any noises outside. Even though they hadn’t heard any rippers so far, the smell of the smoke and burnt bodies could bring them at any moment.

  Max opened the back door of the truck for Brooke, and then he opened the back hatch. After he had unloaded their boxes in the back, he got into the driver’s seat and started the truck. “We’ll pull up closer to the house,” he told Kate.

  Kate sat down in the passenger seat.

  “We’ll make two or three more trips,” Max said. “That should be good enough.”

  “We need to grab some batteries, medical supplies, and bathroom supplies,” Kate said.

  “Yeah, good idea.”

  “I’ll look through the rest of the house while you grab some more food and drinks.”

  Max nodded as he parked as close to the house as he could, backing the truck up to the back porch door.

  Kate turned around and looked at Brooke. “You wait here.”

  “I can help,” she said.

  “Who’s going to guard Tiger?” Max asked.

  The cat had already stepped onto Brooke’s lap as soon as she’d sat down, purring loudly. Maybe he was afraid of being left alone again.

  Brooke nodded. “Will you find some cat food for Tiger?”

  “I’ll try,” Max said.

  A moment later, Kate was back inside the house. She entered the dining room. Petra still had her gun aimed at Lisey. They were both sitting down now. Lisey’s eyes darted to the archway like she knew she was being watched. “Your momma and daddy would be so proud of you right now,” she told Kate. “They always hated you for running away like you did.”

  Kate knew Lisey was lying, trying to come up with the vilest things should could, but her words still stung. And even though she’d read her mother’s letter, there was that nugget of doubt that Lisey was feeding right now.

  “I’m going to look around in the rest of the house,” Kate told Petra, ignoring Lisey.

  “Look for boxes of shells for the shotgun,” Petra said without turning around to look at Kate.

  “I don’t know what kind of shells it takes.”

  “If you find any ammo just put it on the counter near the back door and I’ll take a look at it,” Petra said with some impatience in her voice.

  Kate entered the living room, looking around. There were piles of clothes and shoes, boxes of jewelry. It looked like Lisey was in the middle of moving and was getting ready to have a big g
arage sale. The house was huge and there was plenty of room for the town’s goods.

  Kate felt like she was forgetting something as she walked through the aisles of boxes and bags, like she was overlooking something. She didn’t feel good about what they were doing, and she never would have imagined doing something like this, but it was a necessity now. Like she’d told Lisey earlier, all of this stuff in her house wasn’t hers.

  Upstairs, Kate looked through the bedrooms, the bathrooms, and the closets. She found a few boxes of buckshot, a small collection of hunting knives. She found a backpack for her and a smaller one for Brooke, both of the packs dark and without any designs on them. She added the boxes of shells and bullets to one of the packs. She also added stuff from boxes she found in the bathroom: three bottles of antibiotics with names that she recognized, cough syrup, elastic bandages, a box of nitrile gloves, antibacterial creams, a small sewing kit, bars of soap, bottles of shampoo, a few washcloths, toothpaste and toothbrushes still in the packages, a pack of disposable razors, a bottle of cologne and perfume.

  She needed to make herself slow down. She was grabbing stuff as fast as she could and shoving it down into the backpack. She felt like there was a ticking clock in her mind. It would only be a matter of time before Lisey threw herself at Petra. At least Max had taken Lisey’s shotgun and thrown it out in the yard as far as he could; maybe that would buy them a little time when they left. Unless Lisey had another gun stashed somewhere.

  The pack was getting a little heavy, but still easy enough to carry. She looked around the bathroom, still feeling like she was forgetting something. She wondered what Lisey was going to do, wait for more rippers to come so she could poison them? She had burned the last of the bodies, but maybe there were more bodies in town for her to collect, rippers that had been recently poisoned that she hadn’t collected yet.

  Kate couldn’t worry about Lisey. She would never accept their help; she’d made that clear enough. Kate wished she could help her, she wished they could all help each other, but Lisey was too far gone now.