by Nathan Jones
When he found one in a large stand of trees he was happy to make for it, rolling into his sleeping bag well before twilight faded into darkness. He'd still made it a good distance that day, almost as far as the day before, and in spite of his exhaustion was buoyed by the fact that he'd reach Greenbush the next day a little after noon. He dreaded what he'd find there, but at the same time looked forward to his journey finally being over.
That night he was awoken several times by the sounds of engines, both vehicles on the interstate not far away and jets overhead.
Chapter Sixteen
Greenbush
If Trev had to describe Greenbush with one word it would be “creepy”.
To be fair it was a lovely little town, only a bit larger than Aspen Hill, overlooking one of the best beaches along Lake Huron. And that lack of any problem with it was the problem with it; aside from a few small signs of damage, Greenbush showed barely a hint of the chaos that had gripped the rest of the world since the Gulf refineries attack.
Most houses were in good repair, most yards showed signs of being recently maintained, and there were more than a few newly planted gardens sporting young plants pushing up into the sunlight. Vehicles were neatly parked in driveways or along the sides of streets, many recently washed, and there were even toys strewn in a few front yards or on driveways.
In spite of that there was not a single person to be seen. As if sometime not long ago, or even as late as this morning, the entire town had just up and dropped everything and walked away, showing every sign they intended to return soon.
One or two houses he passed had slight damage around the doors as if they'd been broken into, but it struck him as odd that there was no sign of looting or other violence. When he'd passed through the Utah and Salt Lake Valleys evidence of looters had been openly on display in the form of smashed windows, broken doors yawning open to the elements, furniture and clothes and other items strewn across front lawns as if tossed out windows, and destroyed vehicles. Not to mention all the fires that had raged.
There was nothing like that here. If Trev had to compare it to anything, it would be the area of Midvale where April's family had lived, evacuated by FETF to the refugee camp. Only there were no notices informing people of any evacuation here, and even in Midvale there'd been looters and signs of looting and destruction.
The most likely answer to this puzzle filled Trev with mounting dread as he pedaled faster for his family's house, only a street over from the beach near the northern outskirts of town. The reason there was no sign of looting was because, if it had happened at all, it had been done by well organized and disciplined soldiers. Professionals with no reason to engage in unnecessary destruction, and probably even orders against doing so.
Those soldiers had likely taken away everyone they'd found, including the more chaotic element who might've looted and destroyed these houses in the absence of anyone to defend them. Leaving the town pristine and eerily deserted.
Gold Bloc soldiers. Not only had the invasion already begun, but it was past the point of just aircraft flying overhead and vehicles on the interstate. If even a small, out of the way place like Greenbush had already been cleared in an orderly fashion then the enemy probably held most of Michigan at this point.
If the townspeople had merely evacuated fleeing ahead of the invasion then it was likely at least some looters would've risked staying to scavenge anything of value that had been left behind. Since he saw no evidence of that anywhere, it looked as if the soldiers' arrival had happened quickly enough to catch at least some of these people by surprise, forcing them to surrender and go quietly without even trying to defend themselves or their homes.
The Gold Bloc had moved with speed and efficiency here. He just hoped his family weren't among the people who'd been slow to evacuate.
A more idle thought in the back of Trev's mind was how Greenbush had avoided violence before the invasion, considering everything Aspen Hill had gone through over the fall and winter. There was no doubt that the town had avoided violence, showing every sign of a peaceful and possibly even prosperous community. But the curiosity passed quickly in the face of his worry for his family's fate.
Trev didn't waste any time stopping to look more closely at anything in town, riding straight on through to the destination he'd gone 1,800 miles to reach.
His parents' house looked just like he remembered it: a white four bedroom cottage with a brown roof, large enough to comfortably hold the family or host a guest if Trev wasn't visiting. The treehouse his dad and Jim had built together in the old hickory out front and the tool/firewood shed both looked in good shape, and the lawn here was mown as well. That suggested his family had enjoyed some free time from the grind of surviving to keep the place looking nice.
He parked his bike near the garage door and bolted up the stairs to the front porch. Rather than knock he simply tried the front door, simultaneously worried and not worried that it was locked. Then he tried knocking, heart in his throat as he waited for a response he didn't expect to come.
After about a minute of pounding he decided he'd procrastinated long enough, so he pulled his driver's license out of his belt pouch. He'd brought it with him in case he needed it for identification purposes, obviously not expecting to need it for driving even if he did have a car. It was just the tool for the job, since he'd found on a previous visit that the doorknob wasn't so great and the old card-in-the-gap trick worked just fine.
A moment later the door clicked open and Trev stepped inside, trying to pretend the eerie silence didn't alarm him. “Mom? Dad? Linda? Jim?” Silence. Trev stared around the empty living room of the obviously abandoned house, feeling his heart sink.
It had been irrational to assume his family would be here when the rest of the town was completely deserted. His parents weren't stupid; they would've evacuated before the Gold Bloc arrived. Probably before anyone else in town even thought of doing so.
But the mind was often irrational when it came to avoiding unpleasant truths. Like Matt in Midvale looking for April's family, Trev had needed to come see the house itself even though there was almost no hope his family was there. Besides, he'd come all this way to get here. There was no way he would've even considered turning around and just going back without finding out for sure.
Not even with enemy planes buzzing overhead and convoys driving by only miles away. He'd come because he had to, but now that he was here he was at a loss for what to do next.
With some effort Trev shook himself out of his sinking despair. As a first step he should search the house. That same trust that made him confident his family had evacuated long before they were in danger also let him hope that they'd left a message for him in case he came.
It turned out that message wasn't hard to find, since it was in the kitchen taped right to the refrigerator, in plain view among a jumble of other notes, inspirational and amusing magnet decorations, family photos, and a reminder whiteboard with an erasable marker hanging by its string.
“Trev,
If you get this I've gone out for milk.
Going to try Mercer Groceries.
Fond memories of my 37th Birthday present.
Love,
Dad.”
Trev read the note twice. Then, even though it could only be understood through context, he ripped it up and used the lighter from his belt pouch to burn it in the sink.
His parents were headed to Aspen Hill, location of the grocery store in question. They had a routine of going to the store once a week on Monday, so they'd either gone two or nine days ago. Possibly even earlier.
The last line was a bit more difficult to puzzle out. Obviously Trev remembered carving his dad a keychain in the shape of an owl when he was nine, but he didn't see what that had to do with anything. After a bit of thinking he guessed it meant his family was going to leave markers along the road in the shape of an owl so he could follow.
He only hoped they were visible enough for him to find, but not s
o obvious that anyone else would notice and be curious enough to follow them. Trev wasn't too happy about their decision to leave that kind of trail of breadcrumbs when Gold Bloc soldiers were swarming over the area. But at the very least it meant that even though he had to have gone a different way than them to get here, or he would've passed them on the road, they'd given him a way to follow and catch up.
It meant he could help them.
After the last of the flames from the burning note had died away Trev slowly closed his eyes, letting a tired but exultant smile spread across his face. This was the proof he'd been hoping for, washing away the last of the dread he'd felt when it looked like his family had disappeared without a trace and might've been captured by the invading soldiers. He knew they were safe, he knew where they were going, and he knew how to follow them.
Now he just needed to hurry up and do it.
In spite of his haste he lingered for several minutes after sweeping the ashes down the drain, looking at the pictures on the fridge. Many were ones taken after his family moved here and didn't include him, since he'd stayed behind for college. They showed Jim and Linda getting older and older over the years. He'd seen many of them on holiday visits, but some were completely new and he took a moment to look at those.
His sister had become a young woman. In the most recent photo he could find she was standing in the living room wearing a formal dress and smiling in nervous excitement, from the looks of it ready to be picked up by a date to go to a high school dance.
As for Jim, even as young as he was his little brother was already shooting up like a weed, giving some hint that he'd inherited the Halsson height that had only brushed Trev. One photo showed him kneeling next to the remote-controlled helicopter he'd gotten for his most recent birthday, getting ready for its first flight.
Although come to think of it Jim's thirteenth birthday was coming up in a month or so. And for that matter Linda's birthday had been a few weeks ago, about the time Ferris showed up in Aspen Hill. He'd completely forgotten about it with everything that'd been going on at the time. She'd be sixteen now.
The thought made him feel sad, thinking of all the things about the modern world he'd been able to experience growing up that his siblings would likely miss if things kept going the way they were. Like driving a car, high school, going to college, catching a movie with friends.
To take his mind off those kinds of thoughts he turned his attention to another photo that showed his family boating on Lake Huron, his parents smiling with their arms around each other's shoulders while Linda looked long-sufferingly at the camera as a grinning Jim gave her bunny ears.
It looked like a fun time, one Trev wished he could've been there for. He abruptly felt tears sting his eyes, fondness at seeing them all nearly overwhelmed by his fear for their safety in the face of the very real dangers they had to be dealing with in a world going mad.
He'd just have to trust they were up to the challenge.
As quickly as he could he gathered up the pictures and tucked them carefully into his pouch, taking up most of the remaining space. Then he headed upstairs up to his room, which doubled as a guest bedroom most of the time since he was rarely here.
It was also where he'd stored most of the stuff he didn't have space for in his dorm room. Which meant he'd be able to find a change of clothes, and also grab a pair of his old shoes that had to be in amazing condition compared to the ones he was currently wearing.
The room looked just like he remembered it, with no sign anyone had used it in his absence. Trev quickly made his way to the closet and began rummaging through the labeled boxes inside for anything useful. He didn't expect to find much, since he'd kept most of his preparedness stuff in Utah with him in case of an emergency. In fact most of this was stuff he wouldn't have been too heartbroken to discover had all been destroyed by water damage or given to charity.
A half hour later he'd sorted through his stuff for a few items worth taking, awkwardly bathed with a damp cloth and a bar of soap, changed into some musty but relatively clean clothes, and was ready to go.
As he headed for the door he gave his bed a longing look, more tempted than he'd expected by the thought of sleeping in a familiar place and giving his body a chance to rest after the brutal pace he'd put it though for more than two weeks.
When he'd first seen the house was abandoned he'd tentatively planned to travel at night to wherever it was he went next, which meant he'd have a chance to sleep until sundown. But that all changed after he saw his dad's note. He didn't have anything like Lewis's night vision goggles, so if his family had left markers for him to follow his only choice was to travel by day so he'd actually be able to see them.
Which meant that exhausted as he was, and as tempting as the thought of taking three steps and crashing into his bed sounded, he had no more reason to be in Greenbush. He also had an objective clearly marked ahead of him, and every second he spent in this abandoned house in an empty town was a waste of time.
Trev started down the stairs to the door, but in spite of his determination his shoulders sagged at the inevitability of it all. Time to get back on the road and go back the way he'd come.
* * * * *
After pushing so hard to reach Greenbush as soon as possible it was incredibly demoralizing to backtrack over the same ground. The landmarks that he'd looked at with a surge of excitement on the way here just served to remind him of his earlier anticipation and the fact that he wasn't close to done with traveling for the day.
On the plus side, the markers his dad had left couldn't have been more obvious or easy to follow.
The owl showed up frequently on signs in the direction he was headed, drawn in bright red permanent marker big enough to be visible almost as soon as the sign itself was. It was a simple shape, an oval body with little line feet and squiggly wings and two huge round eyes with dot pupils, enough to recognize what it was but that could be drawn in a matter of seconds as they passed.
It surprised Trev to realize how much he looked forward to seeing each one, and how happy he was when he did. They were personal messages from his loved ones, faithfully drawn for his sake alone. He tried to imagine which member of his family was the artist, and what they looked like scribbling the absurd image.
The markers kept his family in his thoughts and gave him a connection so strong he could almost imagine them plodding along the road just over the next hill, waiting for him to catch up.
Which wasn't quite accurate, since he'd already covered this ground today and hadn't seen them. He hadn't been looking for owls at the time, and anyway they would've been painted on the wrong side of the signs for him to see easily, but even so he thought he remembered noticing one or two along the way. At the time he'd dismissed them as just more graffiti.
Later in the afternoon he reached I-75 again. He was worried the owl would be hard to follow across the interstate, but luckily it had been plastered over signs all along the way they'd taken, much closer together than usual. In fact, those signs took him straight to the road he'd followed to reach 75 in the first place, once again leading him back the way he'd come.
That bothered him more than he would've cared to admit. He assumed his family was on foot and could only go so far a day, around 30 miles if they pushed and were in good shape. That meant he'd already covered about the same distance it would take them two days to cover. Depending on when they'd left last Monday he could catch up to them before dark.
Only it didn't add up. If they'd left two days ago he would've definitely passed them on the way here since they were going the exact same route. On the other hand if they'd left nine days ago they would've been leaving owls the entire way, and he definitely didn't remember seeing any before today, or maybe possibly a few yesterday evening that only his subconscious had picked up on.
He hadn't seen them, and he hadn't seen signs of them. Which meant they might not have gotten much farther than this.
Trev sped up to nearly as fast as he'd ped
aled running from the highwaymen a few days ago, fear overriding common sense and spurring him forward until his muscles burned fiercely and every breath rasped painfully in his throat and lungs. He was hurrying so fast that he barely noticed passing the final marker, and it took him longer than it should've to realize he hadn't seen another one in a while.
As soon as that fact penetrated his exhausted, panic-stricken brain Trev screeched to a stop, trying to drown out worry with irritation. For a moment he slumped panting over his handlebars, then he pulled out his binoculars and peered down the road.
This was the farthest he'd gone up to this point without spotting an owl, almost twice the distance between the last two, and there was no sign of any as far as his binoculars could see ahead either. On top of that he'd passed plenty of the kinds of signs his family had been using for markers, some sporting other graffiti but none with the red owl.
His fears about how far his family could've gone had been correct after all. The only conclusion was that at some point his family had left this road and he'd missed the clue alerting him to that fact.
A less pleasant conclusion hovered in the back of Trev's head, that maybe they'd been on this road and had gotten captured. He ignored that thought and pedaled furiously back to the last marker he'd passed. On the way he checked every sign he saw in case he'd missed the owl or it had been smudged or erased, but didn't see any hints of it.
When he got to the last marker he checked it even more carefully to see if it had any further information he'd missed, maybe about them turning down a nearby side road or driveway. But it looked just like every other marker he'd seen, and he had to fight his mounting panic as he tried to figure out what to do.
Trev checked every branching road for the next mile, going a few hundred yards down each searching for an owl. He also checked the road itself for signs of some sort of disturbance his family might've been caught in, but he didn't see anything like that either. In fact he didn't see anything at all to help him figure out what had happened, and despair was quickly starting to overpower his panic.