When he reached the other side of the city, he stopped at a used car lot by the side of the road. An older Chevy pickup sat among the line of cars and trucks, and Jeremiah walked over to examine it.
The four wheel drive truck looked to have been used fairly well. It was dented and rusty, but Jeremiah liked the look of it. He walked around it and looked it over. The tires appeared to be in good shape, and wider than most, as well as being tall and aggressively tread. He looked in the corner of the windshield, noted the stock number, and headed in the direction of a small trailer at the back of the gravel lot. The trailer served as an office, and he knew that if the keys were to be found, that was where he would find them.
He stepped over the vines as he went, noticing that they were not quite as thick, or abundant, as they had been only a short way back. He hoped the keys would be there and that the truck would start. If not, he supposed, he could cross the street to a new car lot that he had noticed. He would prefer the old Chevy, but if there was no choice he would cross the street and take one of the shiny new pickups that sat on the lot.
He supposed he would even be better off taking one of the newer vehicles, but he didn't want to. Even the old Chevy was newer than any truck he had ever driven, and all of the newer trucks he had seen, seemed more like cars than real trucks.
He had marveled while walking through the downtown district at how many things had changed. He had been awed at the huge steel and glass architecture of the buildings, and equally awed at some of the abandoned cars and trucks. He wasn't sure what some of them were, cars? Trucks? He couldn't tell for sure. To him they were all strange and futuristic looking.
Jeremiah had made it barely into the fifties, and so it was understandable that he would be amazed at how many things had changed, in what seemed to him only a short span of time. Some building styles were the same, but the steel and glass structures seemed cold and alien to him, ugly even, he thought.
He found the keys on a small board in the cluttered office, and headed back to the old Chevy. He had to pump it several times before it would start, but it eventually had caught and started, with a large cloud of black smoke pouring out of the rusty tail-pipe when it did. Almost flooded it, he thought. The smoke cleared as the truck warmed up, and he sat and waited for the idle to fall off before he pulled out onto the roadway once more and headed out of the city of Oswego.
The truck was far better suited to the task of bumping over the somewhat smaller vines than the little car had been. A few short hours later he stopped for a rest in the town of Sodus at a small gas station.
He siphoned gas from the underground tanks, and scrounged a light lunch from the combination gas and food mart, dragged a beat looking aluminum lawn chair out from behind the station, and sat down to eat. He sipped at a warm beer as he ate. He hadn't tasted beer in forever, it seemed to him, and he enjoyed it even though it was warm. He finished his lunch and climbed back into the cab of the truck. It started without hesitation this time. He nosed it out of the small station and headed towards Rochester once more.
Ten miles down the road, as he passed through the small town of Williamson, the vines suddenly stopped. The line where they stopped was clearly drawn across the road, as if burned into the pavement. Jeremiah had stopped to look.
The green vines didn't just end as it had appeared from the truck, they did extend slightly over the line. On the one side the vines were green and healthy looking, and on the other they were burned and shriveled, as if the roadway had been so hot it had simply scorched the life from them. The line that resulted was surprisingly straight, and marched across the road in both directions. He had hated the vines, but it was unnerving to see them end so suddenly, and Jeremiah had climbed back into the truck and left, after looking for only a few minutes.
As he drew closer to Rochester the stalled traffic thickened, and when he reached the Webster exit a light rain began to fall, which slowed him down even more. He followed the muddy tracks that cut into the steep grassy embankment down to the road below the overpass. He slid the last twenty feet to the pavement, and proceeded slowly along the rain slicked street and out of the small town towards the village of Fairport.
He had just left the Webster town limits, when he noticed a fresh set of muddy tracks that cut across the road into a field on the right. He slowed the truck, and let his eyes follow the tracks into the field of standing hay.
A gray Lincoln rested in the middle of the field, at the end of the deep muddy grooves it had cut as it plowed through it. It had slued around at the end, and now sat facing the road. Jeremiah shivered as a cold chill crept down his neck and into his spine. He couldn't explain the feeling that had crept into him when he had spotted the car, but it set him on edge immediately.
He stopped, but did not leave the truck. Instead, he stared through the rain slicked windshield at the car. It appeared to have been abandoned after it became stuck in the field. The rain streamed across the darkened glass of its windows, and down the sides of the gray steel body. He fought the urge to get out and check the car. Someone could still be in it, hurt maybe, he reasoned. But he couldn't bring himself to check. He felt unreasonably positive that the car wasn't empty, and was watching him as he sat idling in the road. He put the truck back in drive and drove past, shaking off the chill that had passed through him, and sped up a little as he left the car behind in the muddy field.
When a set of headlights appeared behind him a couple of miles down the road, he stared at them through the rear view mirror so long, that he almost slammed into the rear of a stalled tractor-trailer in front of him. He looked up just in time, and managed to miss the truck, but slid off the road and into the front yard of an old, peeling green house.
He narrowly missed hitting the rickety front porch, and fought to bring the truck back under control as he shot past it. He goosed the gas pedal and the truck swung around, clipping several bushes that fronted the porch. But the truck was now angled toward the road. He gave it more gas and steered it back onto the roadway at last.
He looked into the rear-view as he gained the road, and he could now clearly make out the shape of the long gray Lincoln behind him. It was gaining, and when it reached the tractor trailer, it seemed to skim by on the outer edge of the road without slowing at all. Jeremiah jammed the gas pedal into the floor board and the old truck began to shudder as it picked up speed.
He glanced back, and as he did, the car blew by on his left in a spray of water that momentarily covered the windshield. Jeremiah instinctively released the gas pedal and jammed the brake pedal, while working the wiper switch. The old truck shuddered in protest and began to slide down the road.
The windshield cleared as the truck slowed down, and he watched as the Lincoln spun sideways in the road. It came to rest in the center of the road, blocking it from side to side.
Steam rose from the hot tires. Its black windows gleamed in the light rain as tiny rivulets streamed across them towards the ground; washing away some mud that still clung to the lower body.
Jeremiah drew a deep breath into his lungs as the truck slid the last few feet and stopped. He ended up still pointing straight, in the right hand lane, about twenty five feet from the car.
He reached for the rifle that had slid off the seat onto the floorboard, as his heart beat quickly in his chest. The passenger side window of the Lincoln slowly lowered as he watched.
The black glass gave way to a dark gray interior, and the young dark-haired man that sat behind the wheel of the long car slowly turned towards him. Jeremiah could see his yellow and crooked teeth, from where he sat in the truck, as he grinned. His heartbeat sped along crazily, and he fought to control the panic he felt rising inside him. He clicked off the safety on the rifle as he slowly eased it up onto the seat beside him. The dark-haired man continued to grin, and as he did his mouth opened wider, revealing more of the sharp, yet crooked and yellowed teeth it contained.
Jeremiah began to silently pray in his mind. Lord? He as
ked, Lord, what do I do? He felt no answer at all, but his mind brought forward the warning he had been given when he had last walked with God. "They will try to kill you," He had said. "They know." Jeremiah wasn't afraid to die, but he wasn't eager for it either.
The dark-haired man in the Lincoln raised one hand, thumb extended, and finger poking out, as if it were a gun, and aimed at him. It was almost funny, Jeremiah thought, looking at the raised hand. But the next instant, when the windshield on the passenger side cracked loudly, he was stunned to see a small hole punched through it when he looked. A nest of cracks ran away from it, and small crystals of glass glittered on the dashboard.
He quickly ducked, levered the door open, and dropped to the pavement. He raised the rifle to his shoulder, aimed, and fired. As he did he heard another shot, and felt a stinging sensation in his left leg. The right side of the dark-haired man’s face dissolved as Jeremiah's shot found its mark. He saw the spray of skin and blood hit the black side-window behind him, as the bullet shattered it almost simultaneously. The young man continued to grin with what was left of his face, he shot once more.
Jeremiah saw the flame lick from the end of his finger, as he dropped towards the ground. The shot missed, and he heard the Lincoln's engine whine as the tires began to bite into the pavement, producing a high pitched scream. Jeremiah dove back up from the ground, and shot once more at the car, that was now sliding around and heading for him.
He dove back into the truck just as the Lincoln hit the still open door, and tore it from its hinges. It flipped up over the already braking car, and clattered to the pavement. Jeremiah keyed the ignition, and jammed the truck into drive. The tires of the truck spun and began to smoke, as he mashed the gas pedal to the floor and tore off down the road. The car spun around behind him, and began once again to give chase.
Although the truck shuddered in protest, Jeremiah did not let up on the gas pedal. Instead he kept it jammed to the floor. The truck edged up and past eighty, before he eased off.
At just under ninety, the truck rattled loudly, and the large tires hummed as it sped down the road with the gray Lincoln seemingly welded to its rear bumper. Jeremiah used the stock of the rifle to smash out the rear glass of the truck, and fired twice into the windshield of the car. The windshield blew inward, and the car locked its brakes and spun sideways on the road.
The tires caught, and the Lincoln flipped into the air.
When the Lincoln landed it rolled several times before bursting into flames, where it came to rest in the middle of the road.
Jeremiah mashed the brakes on the truck, and slid to a shuddering stop in the road, craning over his shoulder, staring out at the burning wreck behind him. As he watched the gas tank caught, and the car lifted from the road with a loud, Whump! It clattered back down seconds later, scattering parts of itself across the rain slicked roadway as it did. Jeremiah stepped cautiously from the pickup, and continued to watch as the car burned.
He was still watching a split second later, in horror, as the dark-haired man crawled from the wrecked car.
The right side of his face was covered with new pink skin, and curls of flame and smoke leapt from his black clothing as he crawled out of the inferno and straightened to stand. The flames on his clothing seemed to flare up as if in anger, and then, within a space of seconds, die out altogether and disappear.
He glared at Jeremiah, and Jeremiah stared back, momentarily transfixed. As he watched, the skin of the young man’s face began to darken, no longer pink; it seemed to be healing over the wound from the rifle.
Jeremiah quickly reloaded the rifle, and as the man lifted his hand as if to shoot once more, Jeremiah shot it off. The dark hared man screamed and began to pound down the rain slicked road towards him. Jeremiah, surprised at how calm he felt, aimed carefully, squeezed the trigger, and the man’s head blew apart, flying backwards into the rain. It smacked onto the pavement, and rolled, as dark green fluid jetted from his neck and rained down around him, pattering to the pavement. The remaining hand flew upward, grasping for the head that was no longer there, then he stumbled and fell forward onto the road. Jeremiah watched for a second, before he turned,jumped back into the truck, and quickly started it.
Before he pulled away, he glanced into the rear-view mirror, back at the car. As he watched the body staggered to its feet and crawled back into the flames curling from the car. Jeremiah dropped the trucks shift lever into drive and drove quickly away.
He pushed the truck hard until he arrived in Fairport, and constantly checked the mirrors, expecting the car to reappear at any moment. It didn't, and when he almost lost control of the truck sliding around a stalled car in the road, he finally slowed down, afraid that he would wreck the truck, and end up dead, or dying on the side of the road, doing the man’s job for him.
He turned right at the four corners, passing a small gas station that sat there, and headed towards Rochester, still glancing nervously behind him. Just as he was leaving the Fairport village limits, he topped a small hill and glanced back once more. The car was nowhere in sight, so he pulled off into the parking lot of a small store and turned off the motor.
He sat for a moment, with the rain streaming in the opening where the door had once been, listening. He half expected to hear the Lincoln's engine roaring towards him. He didn't, the air was silent, save the thrumming of the rain on the steel roof of the truck, as it fell and splashed its way to the ground.
He slowly became aware of the pain in his left leg, as his heart slowed down and resumed a somewhat normal beat again. He stepped out of the truck to the ground, testing the leg. Dark blood covered a large area of the outside pant leg, just below his hip, and the blue denim fabric was shredded and burned.
The skin was spit open for a few inches, he saw, but the bullet had only grazed the upper thigh. He breathed a sigh of relief, and turned and walked towards the store. He took his rifle with him, and, glancing back at the road, listened carefully before he entered the store. Nothing.
Inside he slipped off the jeans and clenched his teeth tightly together as he sprayed the wound first with a disinfectant, then poured a full bottle of peroxide over it. He wrapped the leg with clean white gauze, and taped the flap tightly. It stung a great deal, but he was afraid of infection, and it wasn't likely he would be seeing a doctor soon, he thought.
He looked out the front glass doors when he had finished, still listening, then stepped outside. He had seen a small shopping center when he pulled in, to the left of the store, and set off towards it now, to replace the bloodied and torn jeans.
He picked up two complete sets of clothes, leaving the others where he had removed them in the aisle of the store. The blood had seeped into one boot as well, he discovered, so he replaced them with a new pair.
He walked back over to the store, and then back to the rear coolers. He was surprised to find them still cold, and was even more surprised to hear a small fan kick on as he pulled a cold beer from within.
He hesitated, then pulled out one more. He wasn't quite sure what God felt about drinking, it had never come up when they had talked, but he didn't feel it was a sin, or at least not a mortal one.
He walked back towards the front counter, went behind it, and sat down on the stool that was there, staring out the wide glass windows at the parking lot as he sipped from the can. The rain dripped and drizzled, letting up somewhat.
"Well, I made it this far, Lord," he said aloud. "I sure hope the rest of this trip ain't as bad as the last part's been."
He finished both beers as he stared calmly out the window at the rain. When he was finished he found a car in the parking lot that still contained a set of keys, started it, and drove the last few miles into Rochester. He kept checking the rear-view as he went. The car did not reappear, and after a while he relaxed a small amount, but still kept track of the road behind him with the mirrors.
Three blocks away from the downtown section, he was forced to leave the car behind and walk. He was not f
amiliar with Rochester at all, but wound through the streets and eventually found his way into the heart of the city.
A smile lit his face as he rounded the corner of a large building, and saw a group of several hundred people gathered in front of another building just a few blocks down. Other groups stood nearby, some large, some small. Jeremiah picked up his step as he walked down the street towards them.
~
It was close to nightfall by the time Jeremiah had found his way into the city. The overhead street lights were already glowing dimly and the sky was beginning to darken. The rain had stopped, and although the Streets were still slightly wet, the heat was already beginning to suck up the moisture. Several people turned to look as Jeremiah walked towards them, but none greeted him as he walked along the street. He limped slightly as he walked.
The street sign proclaimed this as Broad street, and he could see a small bridge ahead of him. Beyond the bridge the street ended at a stop sign. A much larger street, which he discovered when he reached it was Exchange Boulevard, rolled away in both directions. He rested at the stop sign, looked to the left and then to the right.
To the left there were small groups of people, all walking towards him, and when he looked to the right he understood why. His walking had brought him in at the back of the War Memorial building.
The side that faced Exchange Boulevard was crowded with people. Not really in any organized groups although there were still small groups of people within the large gathering, talking quietly among themselves but gathered together as if waiting for some event to start.
Police cruisers blocked both lanes of Exchange Boulevard and several uniformed police officers on horseback moved through the crowd. It seemed impossible to Jeremiah as he walked towards them.
Earth's Survivors: box set Page 181