Moriah

by Monchinski, Tony

  They kept their muzzles down at the ground. The guy from the house kept his up towards the sky. When they got close enough to him, they could see he was little more than a kid himself, a young man grown tall and awkward, thin. “What do you all want?” He tried to sound tough, but there was no mistaking the look of worry on his face.

  Kevin answered. “We want to talk to you about the boat we saw down at the dock.”

  “You’d need to talk to my uncle about that.”

  “Can we? Can you go get him?”

  “Nope.”

  “Why not?”

  “He’s gone. Won’t be back.”

  “That was him on the boat, wasn’t it?”

  The kid didn’t answer.

  “He left you here with the kids, didn’t he?”

  The young man took a step back, lowering the barrel of his rifle.

  “Stop!” Riley stepped forward, dropping her assault rifle, putting herself between the kid and the three men of Bear’s Army. She turned to them first. “Do you guys have any idea how threatening you sound and look to him?” To the young man she said, “And you, what’d you even come out of the house for?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Four people show up at your house with guns, so why’d you come outside?”

  “I wanted to see what you all wanted.”

  “What if we were bad people? You came out of that house, anything could have happened to you.”

  “Maybe.”

  “Maybe? And then what would happen to those kids?”

  “Who’s to say you’re not?” There was a blackened tooth in the guy’s mouth. “Bad people, I mean?”

  “Lucky for you, we’re not.” Riley thought about meeting Dee days earlier. She thought about the family she and Anthony and their friends had spied on their first day out of New Harmony, how they hadn’t made contact with them because they hadn’t wanted to alarm them. How they’d wanted to avoid a situation just like this one. “You’re just going to have to believe us.”

  “Your uncle,” asked Dee, “he won’t be back at all, or won’t be back until later?”

  “Why?” The kid still looked suspicious. “What do you want?”

  “We want to find out about renting your boat.”

  “Why?”

  “We want to get out of here,” explained Kevin. “Our friend is hurt.”

  “He don’t look so good,” the kid said of Bruce, who looked like he was going to fall over where he stood.

  “We’ll pay,” Kevin assured him.

  The kid looked at them, puzzled. “Where do you want to go?”

  “Out onto the water. The ocean.”

  “Why would you want to do that?”

  “We’ll pay,” Kevin told him again.

  “You said that. I told you, you’re gonna have to talk to my uncle.”

  “When’s he getting back?” Dee asked.

  “Tonight sometime.”

  “Then we’ll wait for him,” said Kevin.

  “Well, shit,” the kid said, “don’t think I’m going to invite you all into the house.”

  “We’ll wait over there,” Riley pointed. “In those buildings.”

  “Nothing in there but junk and some mice.”

  “Yeah, well we’ve got some people here who are pretty badly banged up. We can’t go far.”

  “Maybe you’re not bad people,” the kid weighed the situation. “But be honest with you, I’m not so comfortable with you this close to my sisters and brother.”

  “Look.” Riley laid it out for him. “There’s four of us and there’s one of you and some little kids. We’re not going to hurt any of you. We’re not bad people.”

  “We aren’t either.”

  “My name is Riley. And this is Bruce, that’s Kevin and the big, bald guy is Dee.”

  “I’m Elmore. You scared my sister Melissa something bad.”

  “We’re sorry about that.”

  “What’s that on your head, mister?” Elmore asked Dee.

  “It’s an Oakley Medusa headpiece.”

  “A what?”

  “It’s kind of like my hat.”

  “Makes you look somethin’ fierce.”

  “That’s the idea.”

  “Like a gorgon or somethin’.”

  As she had the day before, Riley turned to the three men she travelled with. “Someone’s got to tell him.”

  “Tell me what?” Elmore’s suspicion—recently abated—returned.

  “We’re being followed.”

  The kid waited for an explanation.

  “This person following us,” Dee warned, “he isn’t going to be friendly.”

  “And you’re telling me this because?”

  “Because of Melissa,” Riley said quickly. “Because of those other little kids you’ve got in there. Because of you, Elmore.”

  “If you’re so worried that you’re putting us in danger, why don’t you get out of here then?” Elmore nodded to Dee’s foot and the stained bandages above Bruce’s chest. “We’re already gonna have zombies dropping by.”

  “We’re sorry about that.” Dee meant it. “We really are. We’re going to put someone up in that water tower over there. Keep an eye on things until we leave. You have food for those kids?” He asked Elmore. “For yourself?”

  “Yeah. Why?”

  Dee gestured to Kevin. “Give him some.”

  Kevin knelt down on one knee, placing his AK-47 on the ground by his side. He opened his backpack and retrieved some freeze-dried packages. He held them out to Elmore. The kid made no move forward.

  “Just put them down,” Riley told Kevin. “Like I said, we’re going to wait inside over there. And you’re right, Elmore. If there are any zombies around here, they’re going to be showing up sometime soon. We’d rather not be out here in the open with them when they do. And that’s just one more thing for you to look out for with those kids.”

  “When your uncle gets in,” Dee requested, “can you tell him we’d like to speak to him?”

  “You bet I will.”

  “Okay, listen, Elmore,” Riley told him sincerely. “I’m sorry we got off the way…I’m sorry this played out the way it did. We really are not bad people.”

  He nodded.

  “Okay, Elmore,” she smiled at him. “You know where we’ll be when your uncle gets in.”

  * * *

  “Bruce,” said Dee. “This doesn’t feel right, us leaving you here.” Dee leaned on Riley while Kevin, bent over with his hands on his knees, caught his breath. Kevin had lent Dee a hand hopping from the buildings to the base of the water tower, a task that—with the distance and their assorted injuries—took them the better part of an hour.

  “Yeah, well,” Bruce rasped. He’d volunteered to climb the tower. Dee’s leg and foot wouldn’t allow him to do it. Kevin was the only one among them who, if he had to, could pilot the boat. Without speaking to it, each man felt for Riley and what she had gone through these past weeks. They didn’t want to put her up on the tower by herself. So Bruce had said he’d go, that he was the best shot, that he had the sniper rifle, that the rest up top would do him good.

  “Wait.” Kevin straightened, sliding out of his pack. “I’ve got something for you.”

  “Your side bothering you, Kevin?” Riley asked.

  “Only when I breathe. Here, Bruce.” Kevin pulled two milky, twenty-centimeter tubes from his bag. “Glow sticks,” he explained as he handed them to Bruce. “Bend them to make them light up. You need help, place one where we can see it up there.”

  “You’ll be able to see this?” Bruce sounded skeptical.

  “With Dee’s minocular. They stay lit for six to eight hours.”

  “Whoever that is following us,” Bruce stared up the ladder to the catwalk that circled the water drum. “I’ll see him from up there a long time before he sees me.”

  “If he’s still following us,” Riley said, though she had no doubt whoever was on their trail would still be.

/>   “Stay alert up there.” Kevin looked up at his friend, who was drenched in sweat.

  “I’m planning on it.”

  “Bruce,” Dee told him. “It’s something you can’t handle, fire a shot.”

  “Believe me, I will,” The hint of a smile passed over Bruce’s worn face.

  “Here, take another canteen.” Riley handed him another.

  “Thanks.”

  “Whether the uncle is back or not,” Kevin promised, “by morning one of us is going to come and get you.”

  “Well, I’ll see you when I see you then.”

  “Bruce?”

  “Yeah, Dee?”

  “You see that thing following us? Just shoot it.”

  Bruce raised the sniper rifle before slinging it over his back for the ascent. “That’s what I was thinking.”

  * * *

  They watched Bruce climb and when he reached the catwalk he waved down to them that he was okay. Leaving him to his perch, Kevin and Riley supported Dee and the three headed back to the erstwhile strip mall. It took them another hour and by this time the sun was well into its descent. They spent the remainder of the daylight finding a suitable place to sleep amid the mess that constituted the interior of the tumbledown stores, settling on a suite of rooms on the second floor. The stairwell creaked and protested under their feet and parts of the roof and corridor wall were open to the elements, but the floors of the rooms they chose were solid.

  They prepared a meal and ate it. Kevin borrowed Dee’s minocular several times, focusing on the water tower, squinting against the glare as the sun sank on the horizon. Bruce’s figure was lost to them on the other side of the structure. No glow sticks shone.

  When Kevin gave him back his minocular, Dee swept it from the tower to the house across the grass from them. A little kid’s face loomed large in the eyepiece. Dee lowered the field glasses, the child clear to him from this distance. He waved to the boy, who raised a hand tentatively in return before disappearing inside the house.

  Riley asked the question that was on all their minds. “What are we going to do if the uncle doesn’t want to let us use his boat?”

  “We’re going to have to take it,” replied Dee.

  “I’d hate to have to do that to Elmore.”

  “We can always ask them to come with us.”

  “You two,” scoffed Kevin. “Inviting everyone along. What is that about?” Then, soberly, “We need to get Bruce looked at. He’s not doing well.”

  “We will,” Riley vowed.

  Shortly after the moon rose, the first zombies appeared. Dee, seated at the window, eyeing the terrain, spotted them first.

  “I’m going downstairs.” Kevin picked up a section of pipe discarded on the floor. “Take care of this.”

  “Don’t go alone.” Riley stood to join him.

  “You sure?”

  When she nodded, Kevin held out another length of piping to her. She took it, noting it was the longer of the two, which meant she wouldn’t have to get as close to the things as he would. She thanked him.

  “Be careful,” Dee told them.

  “You sure you’re up to this?” Kevin asked her as the rickety staircase creaked under them. Riley assured him she was.

  They stepped out into the night with the dead things in it. The zombies were clearly visible, the moon showing all. Kevin raised the pipe and pointed with his index finger, indicating the zombies he would dispatch.

  Riley crouched down in the grass and approached the two undead she had been allotted. Neither seemed aware. The closest of the two was looking elsewhere and she thought about calling out but did not. It wore a barber shop’s backward cape. Riley’s pipe connected with the back of its skull. It staggered forward a step and began to turn towards her, obviously bothered. Now she had its attention. The other’s, too.

  Riley swung harder, knocking the zombie to the ground.

  She walked to the next beast, which was doddering towards her, its arms extended. Side stepping its reach, she cracked it in the face. Its nose caved into its head and it hit its knees, an undead penitent. Riley struck it once more, leaving a visible dent in its skull. The zombie slumped over in the grass and shuddered. Riley prodded it with the pipe. It shook but did not rise.

  Kevin joined her. He’d taken out his three targets and was breathing heavy, holding his side.

  “You okay?” she asked him.

  The creature Riley had first laid out was crawling towards her on its elbows and forearms. Kevin bee-lined to it and braced a foot on either side of its torso, bringing his pipe up over his head. “Sometimes—” whack “—these things—” whack “—are pretty tough—” he bludgeoned it a third time and it lay motionless. “There.”

  Riley looked away from its demolished head.

  “No wonder,” Kevin remarked, staring into the mess atop its neck. “Thing had a steel plate in its skull.”

  Riley’s second zombie had stopped trembling.

  “It’s dead,” she said as Kevin put his foot on the back of its neck.

  “Better safe than sorry.” He crushed its skull as he had the first. “While we’re out here,” Kevin said as he stepped away from the corpse, “I’d like to talk to Elmore.”

  Riley called out to the house, hailing the boy. He came out into the night with his rifle.

  “What you want?” It was a question, not a threat.

  “They’re coming now,” Kevin warned him. “Thought we should tell you.”

  “Yeah, I saw.”

  “You stay inside with your sisters and brother,” said Riley. “Don’t go outside for anything, okay?”

  “You don’t have to worry about me.”

  “We might have to come out here once in awhile,” Kevin added, “deal with these things.” When the boy nodded, Kevin asked him, “What’s out there? On the water?”

  “Some islands a ways out. Nothing between here and there but a bunch of wrecks.”

  “Any of the islands inhabited?”

  “You mean do they have people living on them?”

  “That’s what I mean.”

  “There’s one, old woman lives on it with her dogs.”

  “An old woman and her dogs? She all alone?”

  “For years now. Her family’s all gone. My uncle used to go out there, check on her once in awhile. Make sure she was okay.”

  “No zombies out there on that island?”

  The kid didn’t answer immediately and when he did—“She’s an old lady, but she knows what she’s doing”—his answer didn’t seem to address Kevin’s question.

  Riley asked him if there were zombies out on the islands.

  “Not that I know of.”

  “Then how come you guys stay here? Why wouldn’t you have moved out to one of the islands by now?”

  “My uncle prefers the mainland. Zombies ain’t so bad when you know how to deal with them.”

  “Hey, Elmore, listen up,” Kevin’s voice grew very serious. “You remember what I said about someone following us, right? You keeping an eye on those kids?”

  “Yeah. And thank you for that food. They enjoyed it.”

  “You’re welcome.” Kevin unfastened his pack and retrieved several more freeze-dried pouches. “Here,” he offered. Elmore stepped forward this time, accepting the packages from Kevin’s hands.

  “I thank you again,” Elmore said. “My uncle should be back in soon. He never stays out past dark too long.”

  “Well, we’ll talk to him later on then. Or tomorrow. Goodnight.”

  “Goodnight.” His blackened tooth clear in the moonlight, Elmore smiled before returning to his house and his wards.

  * * *

  Dee observed their melee with the undead and their conference with the kid from the window. He had not been able to hear the conversation so they related the salient points mentioned. When they told him about the island and the old lady, Dee said, “Her dogs, huh?”

  “The kid’s all right.” Kevin dismissed what had earlie
r posed itself as a possible threat.

  “I believe he is, Kev. But if the uncle doesn’t want to work with us, we’re still going to have to take the boat.”

  “Dee, if we just take their boat, these people are screwed.”

  “So hopefully the uncle will be willing to work with us, Riley.”“Wonder how Bruce is doing.” Kevin stood looking out the window. “Better view of the water tower in the room next door.”

  “There many Zed under the water tower?” Riley found herself wondering if the undead could climb.

  “Can’t really tell from this distance.” Dee motioned futilely with the minocular. “Even with this.”

  “Better view in the other room.”

  “You want to move to the other room, Kev?”

  “Yeah. Let’s move over there. Have a better bead on Bruce, still be able to see the house.”

  “Somebody give me a hand?” Dee asked. “Please?” Riley went over to him, reaching down and helping him up. He braced himself against his FN-FAL until he could stand, then propped the rifle with its under-barrel chainsaw against the wall near the window, toothed blade up. He draped his arm around Riley’s shoulder, his other hand around his minocular and hobbled along on one leg as she supported him from the room.

  Kevin gathered up their packs and rifles but was unable to lug Dee’s assault rifle on top of all he already carted. He left the room, thinking he’d come right back and get it.

  The store they moved into occupied a corner of the strip mall and—as Kevin had promised—provided a better view of the water tower while the house across from them remained easily seen. They placed their gear down and spent some time at the windows, scrutinizing the night.

  * * *

  Kevin was snoring quietly and Riley found herself entertaining morbid thoughts. Her mind wandered back to the first city she had visited here in the Outlands, the numbers marked on each façade speaking to the corpses within. The adult skeletons on either side of the child’s bones, all in the bed. The man or woman alone in the port-a-potty. The barn. The barn. She sat up, banishing that show of horrors from her mind.

  Moonlight shafted over Dee’s features at the window where he kept watch.