Chapter 9
The man who climbed from the tunnel would not have been recognized by his own mother. His clothes were torn in several places, his hair disheveled. He was missing one of his front teeth. But the most remarkable thing was the blood staining his arms, the front of his shirt, his face. Too much blood to be his own. A deer crawling away from an encounter with a semi truck could not have looked so grisly.
If his mother had been there, and if she had been able to stomach the sight long enough to see past the blood, she would have noticed the eyes next. They were flat and dull, lacking depth. They shifted side to side, listless, not searching so much as drifting with the leftover energy of an adrenaline high.
Though the sun was already half-hidden behind the horizon, he raised a hand to ward off the reddish light. For a little while he stood there, a dazed survivor of an unknown accident, unable to make sense of his sensory information. His mind was a carousel that spun his thoughts in circles. His hand, which clutched a meat tenderizer still dripping blood, kept twitching like a decapitated snake. His lips tried to form words.
Sometime later (he knew it was later because the sun was now completely gone), he lowered his hand, turned, and began walking again.
The dead body of a horse stretched across his path. He contemplated the animal’s glassy eyes and the bullet hole in its gut. Some instinct ordered him to splatter the horse’s brains on the road. After all, the animal might only be pretending to be dead. It might spring to its feet when his back was turned, falling on him with its powerful hooves.
Instead of obeying this instinct, however, he lifted his eyes and beheld the rest of the carnage strewn across the road. Clearly some great battle had been fought here. The bodies of both horses and men lay in pools of blood on the asphalt, a scene frozen in the gray twilight.
The man was still studying this battlefield when he noticed movement among the pines flanking the road. Reluctantly, as if obligated to satisfy his curiosity, he crossed the road and shuffled into the trees.
A glow of blue surfaced, then bled into the shadows.
“Who’s there?” A young voice, thin, frightened.
The meat tenderizer in the man’s hand began to twitch.
___
How long she had been wandering among the trees, blind and directionless, she could not remember. The forest was eternal. The jagged, fissured bark hemmed her in, met her at every turn, led her around in circles. She had taken to breaking off pieces of bark from the trees to mark them, but it was little use. Every time she felt such marks on the surface of a tree, she doubted whether they had been made by her or some creature before her. Maybe she was really feeling the scar left by an angry bear, or the scrape of a moose’s antlers.
When she heard the first footfall, she pretended it was only a pine cone landing in the soft litter of needles that covered the forest floor. Then came another, crackling the dry needles underfoot, and she knew something was following her. Maybe it was the bear that had marked the tree, or the moose. Or maybe it was one of the people she had heard fighting down at the road. She hoped it was not one of those people. An animal, if it meant her any harm, would deal with her quickly. It might even be painless. But she doubted a human would show her such kindness. She had learned long ago there was no more dangerous animal in the world than man.
“Who’s there?” she asked.
The stranger did not answer. She could hear his breathing, however, a sound that whistled slightly against his teeth. He stank of mud and blood and urine.
“I don’t have anything,” she said. “Why don’t you just…just go, okay? Leave me alone.”
She crossed her arms, as much to keep warm as to take a defensive posture. She was thinking of Allen Renfrew, the man who had adopted her as his own after she was taken from the parents who had never really wanted her. That, at least, was what she had always told herself about them, because it was difficult to reconcile their treatment of her with any blush of true affection.
She imagined that Allen was standing in the invisible space at her side, his own arms crossed over his chest. From a holster at his waist hung a six-shooter, like the Peacemaker John Wayne used in the movies, and his hand was just itching for an excuse to draw.
She knew, of course, this was no more than a flight of fancy, a ploy to distract her mind from how utterly helpless she was. But it felt just real enough for her to wonder whether the blow to the back of her head, which had caused her blindness, had addled the rest of her brain as well. Who knew what loose parts might be rattling around up there.
Another footfall crunched the needles.
“Just leave me alone,” she whispered as the pain in her head increased, thrumming with every pulse of blood. It felt like the onset of a bad headache. “Just—” She did not finish. She felt suddenly dizzy, and as she tried to take a step back, the world - that panorama of color and beauty, reduced to smudges of gray and red by her blindness - revolved around her, and then the ground rose and she felt the prick of pine needles against her arms.
___
When she woke, someone was dragging her by the arm across the forest floor.
I know what this is, she thought in a voice too calm to be sane. This is when the girl gets dragged off by the inbred cannibals living deep in the mountains of West Virginia. I know because I stayed up with Cassie and Pam when mom and dad thought we were asleep.
Cassie and Pam, however, were no longer around to share the view with her. She had the theater to herself for this particular horror-fest, and she could not decide whether she was terribly lucky or terribly unlucky to be unable to see it.
She flailed and kicked her feet. No use. She screamed as loud as she could, as if she might scare her attacker away. Same result.
She took a deep breath, gathering her strength for one desperate tug. Maybe if she went limp, she would trick the creep into lowering his guard. (It had to be a guy, right? Stalkers were always men in the movies.)
Just as she was about to pull, her arm fell limp to the ground. She rolled away, trying to gain some separation before he grabbed her again, when she encountered a wave of delicious heat spreading along her body.
“Fire,” she whispered in a wondering voice, overwhelmed by the primal comfort of one of mankind’s oldest companions. She reached for the fire, which her damaged eyes rendered as a dull reddish orb. She didn’t care whose fire it was. So long as she could enjoy its heat, it might as well belong to her.
She hugged her knees, imagining a big black pot with carrots and potatoes and onions bobbing at the top, the water just beginning to boil. Maybe all the stew lacked was a bit of meat, and why not girl? Girl tastes pretty good, doesn’t it? She might be scrawny and stringy, sure, but her organs would do in a pinch, wouldn’t they?
She almost expected to smell the cramped, toe-jam odor of three salivating trolls. But when she took a quick breath, the only thing she smelled was smoke—smoke and the savory scent of what could only be meat.
Maybe, she thought darkly, I’m not the only kid going for a dunk today.
Despite her fear, however, she could not ignore how wonderful the scent of meat was. It came at her like a refreshing wind riding up from the sea. Her mouth quickly filled with saliva.
Something warm and greasy was shoved into her hand. She raised it to her face, smelled, and just that quickly her appetite took over. She tore into the meat, not caring where it had come from (Horse, her mind told her, you are eating a horse!), happy to let her stomach dictate the marching orders for a while. When was the last time she had eaten? Sometime before being separated from Victor in the sewer tunnels. They had probably shared a small, pitiful breakfast before hitting the road that morning.
It certainly hadn’t been anything as delicious as this.
After eating enough to dull the edge of her desperate hunger, she sat back and licked her fingers, warm and content as she had not been since losing Allen. The strange man was breaking branches several feet away. Whatever he mig
ht be planning, she felt a blooming confidence it did not involve eating her.
Unless he’s just fattening you like a pig, she thought.
Shut up, shut up, shut up!
“My name’s Jenny,” she said. “Who are you?”
Moments passed. She gave up on expecting an answer, but that was okay. She was warm, fed, no longer wandering the forest in circles. Whoever this man might be, whatever his intentions, he had saved her. He had earned the right to be reticent, even if he was a total creep.
The stranger cleared his throat. When he spoke, there was that slight whistling sound again.
“My name,” he said, “is Meatloaf.”
Chapter 10
The blind girl named Jenny and the strange man who called himself Meatloaf stayed by the fire until morning. Jenny was not much rested by the time gray light filled the forest; even though she drifted in and out of consciousness through the long, wind-howling, tree-rattling night, she was much too cold and uncomfortable to fall into a proper sleep, despite the fire.
She started many times during the night to the sound of fresh branches crackling in the flames. She pictured the sparks flying upward, mere pinpricks of light in the drenching darkness. Mostly she prayed. She believed there was a God, not because she had been told so, but because there was too much purpose in the world, too much pattern, for there not to be a creator. If the brightest minds in the world could not even create a new species except by merging two existing species together, how could anyone believe the world’s most complex ecosystems had evolved by chance?
But believing in the existence of something was one thing. Believing in the goodness of something was entirely different.
And trust? If you believed someone had the power to wipe away every tear and solve every problem, and that person stood by while the world crashed and burned, where was the trust supposed to begin?
How about bringing back all the dead plants, God, so people can eat? How about we start there? And Allen, don’t forget Allen. I don’t care if he’s already dead. I want to see him again. Why don’t you just bring him back? Is it because you have better things to do, like pitting countries against one another? Are you sleeping? Bored? Did I catch you in the bathroom?
When she was tired of stirring up her own bitterness, she would sigh and return to the pleading form of her old prayers.
Please don’t leave me alone. I’m so afraid.
Please help me to find some good people.
And this one most of all:
Please, just give me a sign you’re there.
The last one she repeated again and again, waking and sleeping. Please give me a sign. Was that so much to ask? Just a wink, a smile, a little Everything is gonna be alright nod? Why, if God truly cared, did he remain so aloof?
She could hear the young preacher with the shiny black shoes patiently explaining to her that God did not cause her parents to treat her badly, he merely allowed it.
But that was just as bad, wasn’t it? If a mother allowed her little girl to ride her bicycle into the road, she was just as culpable as if she had stooped behind the bike and pushed. It was like getting into a car accident and saying, I didn’t do it. I took my hands off the steering wheel and the car just crashed itself.
She was beginning to think God had been keeping his hands in his lap a little too long now.
When morning came, Meatloaf cooked steaks in the embers of the fire and they ate a silent breakfast. Jenny lowered her sunglasses and felt sunlight on her face. She wanted to soak it in, let it chase away the shadows of her mind. Nothing made sense any more—not like it did before. She used to have Allen around to ease her doubts and show her how to find meaning in their new life.
Now it was just her.
The blind girl and the mute sociopath.
She heard Meatloaf rise and walk into the forest. At first she thought he had gone to fetch firewood. That was the next thing to do, wasn’t it? Get the fire going again? Sit around eating steaks and hoping someone would come rescue them? She had made a lean-to with her father once. She thought she might be able to do it again, sight or no sight.
A terrible thirst ambushed her as she waited. Her tongue turned to ash. Her throat felt like it was lined with clay. The thirst and the cold tag-teamed her—if she’d had to decide between a bottle of water and a thick sweater, she probably would have sat down and cried.
“Meatloaf?”
She rose, her knees aching as her legs unfolded. A twig cracked and she moved toward the sound. She had, by this time, developed a tried-and-true system for blind movement. She would totter a few steps, slowly swinging her legs forward and holding her forearms protectively in front of her face. Balance was the key. She could stop herself from moving too quickly if she kept her weight centered rather than pitched forward.
“Where are you going?” she called. The sound of his steps was like a thread she held in her mind, afraid that if she let it go she might never pick it up again. It did not occur to her that she had been terrified of this stranger just the night before. All that mattered was that he might as well be the only other soul in the entire world, and she was desperately afraid of being alone again.
She paused, listening. She couldn’t hear him any more.
“Good morning.”
She started.
“Did I scare you?” he asked. He was standing only a few feet away. His voice was different from last night—more lively, a note of humor buried in it. The sound frightened her a little.
“I know who you are,” she said, more as a point of conversation than accusation. “You followed Victor and me into the sewer. Your name is Oswald.”
“Don’t call me that,” he growled in a voice as dead as roadkill. “Don’t ever call me that.”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to make you angry.”
He began walking again. His pants made a swoosh-swoosh sound as they brushed together.
“Where are we going?” she asked as she caught up with him. Instinctively she reached out and caught the elbow of his sweatshirt.
“What are you doing?” he demanded.
“I’m sorry. It’s just—Victor let me hold onto him so we wouldn’t get separated.”
Meatloaf was silent for a few moments. “Victor let you do it, eh?”
“Mmhmm.”
“Then why would I mind?” His voice beamed with joviality. “Victor and I are pals, did you know that? We had a good long talk shortly before we parted ways. He and I have an understanding.”
Jenny felt a strong suspicion he had just winked at her.
“Yes,” Meatloaf continued, as if Jenny had asked for an explanation, “Victor and I are very close. We made quite a team back in town—his brawns, my brains. You should have seen how he dealt with those dastardly cannibals. Almost makes me want to cut his face off and wear it on mine!” He chuckled.
Jenny resisted the urge to shiver. “Where is he now?” she asked.
He stopped walking. She nearly bumped into him. Suddenly one of his hands was cupping her cheeks. “Girl,” he said jovially, “that’s just what I mean to find out!”
He released her face and they started walking again. The morning was cold, raw. What month was it now? October? November? Late enough in the season for snow, she thought disconsolately. Snow used to be a treat, an excuse to drink hot chocolate with marshmallows and sleep by the fire beneath a thick blanket. And then there were all the things to do in the snow: tunneling, making snowmen and snow angels, having snowball fights with Allen.
Now the snow symbolized nothing more than shivering limbs and chattering teeth.
“You asked where we’re going, little girl,” Meatloaf said after a little while. “The answer is, we’re almost there. Can you feel the ground sloping upward? Can you feel the fake grass beneath your feet?”
“What is it?” Jenny said. She had noticed that it felt strange.
“This, my dear child, is what people once called a “golf course.” That name is dead now
, of course, like most other names.”
Like your real name, Jenny thought, but did not say. She knew by now she had been saved by a madman, and she decided her best course would be to go along with whatever he said. Eventually, she hoped, they would find other survivors. At that point, he would probably be as happy to get rid of her as she would be to escape him.
For now, however, their trains ran along the same track.
“So what do you know about my good friend Victor?” Meatloaf continued in that same falsely-happy voice. “Is he a good man?”
“Sometimes,” she answered, thinking of the country store where he had abandoned her while she was sleeping. He had come back later to rescue her from the wolves, sure, but for a time he had been willing to leave her behind. She might be able to forgive that, if she ever saw him again, but she could not forget it.
The Shadow Walker (The Last Colony Book 2) Page 7