Rage: A Story of Survival

by Greene, Dane

  While waiting, I take a quick look around at the other members of our group. For the most part, they’re chatting away happily. The only exception is Brian. He’s staring intently at what looks like the gas station, and I see a look of worry on his face. It’s a little unusual, but I ignore it. At least I have a second pair of eyes watching the situation.

  Knowing Brian is watching, I let myself get lost in the group’s conversations. Before I know it, Jason and Dawn are back with the map. Everyone grows silent as Jason lays the atlas down. He flips through the pages and finds the one he needs.

  “Okay,” he says. “I found Garden Island. Looks like it’s pretty big. Somewhere a bit over four thousand square feet. It also looks like it’s uninhabited, though there does seem to be an old forester’s cabin. This place looks like it would work pretty well, but I do see another island here that might be better.”

  As Jason talks about Garden Island, I grow more excited. It sounds like the perfect place to me. Plenty of land to hunt or grow crops, and there’s even a cabin to weather the winter in. Top it all off with being one-hundred percent safe from Palemen, and it sounds better than a tropical resort. His last sentence sparks my curiosity, just as I’m sure it does for everyone.

  “There’s a sister island that’s called Beaver Island. It’s much larger and populated. It has docks and an airport. The infrastructure alone is a good enough reason to go there instead. We could build a future there, not just survive.”

  The others are quick to agree, and I know I’m alone in my desire to go to Garden Island. Part of the draw is the lack of people. My group is trustworthy, and every person we add to it is another variable, another way for us all to die. A whole island full of people would be a problem waiting to happen.

  Knowing that any disagreement I show won’t only be overruled but also lower morale, I keep my concerns to myself. If the time comes, I can always bring it up again. There’s only one concern I do decide to share. “Does anyone know what month it is?”

  I receive a few seconds of silence before Jason speaks up. “Yeah, it’s July something. Why do you ask?”

  “Winter. If we get caught in a city or pretty much anywhere that isn’t safe and winter rolls around, our chances of survival plummet. What I’m saying is that we have two months to travel to the island. That would give us about two months to get situated before it gets too cold to do anything but huddle up and survive. As long as we keep up our pace, I think four months is more than enough time. Unless someone is in opposition, I think this is our best option. If anyone has any other plans to bring forward, this will be your last chance.”

  No one says anything. With a distinct goal in mind, we start our work. We pack the equipment we need and leave the stuff we don’t on the roof.

  Our journey starts and the weeks move by quickly. We stick to interstates and country roads as often as possible. We go through towns when we have to but find most of our food from abandoned homes in the country.

  We rarely come across more than one or two Palemen in the country, and if it weren’t for the occasional town crossing, I think it’d be easy to forget just how bad things are.

  Our travel speed is acceptable, but we often have to go miles out of the way to avoid crossing towns and cities. The farther north we walk, the harder it is to stick to country roads. Eventually, we arrive at a city that would take weeks to avoid, so we decide to cross it. The city crushes our hopes of fast travel. The streets are filled with Palemen, and we can only travel house by house when there are openings. At this pace, it’ll take weeks for us to make it across town, which is a huge setback.

  After two weeks of painfully slow travel, we find ourselves stuck on the roof of a business in the downtown area. After being on alert for so long, trying to avoid drawing the attention of Palemen, we notice any change in the landscape immediately. That’s why I notice the cloud of dust coming toward us even when it’s miles away.

  From my vantage point on top of the roof, I can see outside of the town. The dust cloud is probably about a mile away and closing in on us quickly. It’s hard to be sure, but from what I can see, it looks like the dust cloud is being created by a car—and a crowd chasing the car.

  My gaze doesn’t leave the object, and as it comes closer, I become positive that it’s a car. Looks of shock and disbelief are on the faces of me and my party. We see the car and can tell it’s being chased by a horde of Palemen.

  Suddenly, I have a powerful urge to grab one of our hunting rifles. The compulsion to aim it is so strong that I can’t resist. As I focus the scope, I don’t see the car I was expecting but find my crosshairs resting on a random Paleman.

  Kill him now. My finger squeezes the trigger as I hear the voice of Chris in my mind. My vision fades, and I see myself from the perspective of my victim. Searing pain shoots through my mind as the bullet rips through my victim’s head.

  When my vision returns, I force myself not to scream. My vision is dark around the corners, so I struggle to my feet. I don’t need to give my party something to panic about. Whatever’s happening to me, I have to ignore it.

  Wanting to distract myself, I look out into the horde that follows the car. What just seconds ago was a running mob has quickly broken down into a disorganized mess.

  Someone in the car throws out several objects. I wonder what they are until I see the fiery explosions. The noise hits me a second later. The horde that was so recently pursuing the car is now walking in several directions. Several dozen Palemen lie on the ground, dead, their bodies helplessly mangled by the grenades. Palemen missing limbs and bleeding freely stumble around the dead bodies. Several wander around on fire, ignoring the flesh melting off their bones.

  There may be some survivors in that group, but my best guess is that no more than one-tenth of them will survive that attack. Gas cans and grenades are terrifying weapons against crowds, and I make sure to add the idea to my arsenal.

  With the threat of the horde gone, my focus moves to the car. It continues its movement, heading straight for us. Unsure of what might happen, I ready my weapon. As the car gets closer, I glimpse the people and items inside. From what I can see, the group is either an army group or heavily armored mercenaries.

  Not wanting to start a fight where we can avoid one, I hold fire and let the car move down our street. As it comes closer, half of me hopes it goes past us, and the other half hopes it’ll stop. When the car stops, I’m excited and scared at the same time.

  Watching with bated breath, I see a man step out of the driver’s seat. Aiming my gun at him, I ready myself but freeze when he pulls out a rocket launcher and aims it at the roof.

  “Lower your weapon or I’ll send you and anyone hiding up there straight to hell.” I briefly consider firing my gun but decide it would be beyond foolish. As I lower my gun, I see a smile on the rocket launcher man’s face, and a spark of recognition hits me.

  “Kent, is that you?” The man looks at me, and he’s obviously confused. He stares hard at me for a few seconds.

  “Aaron? What are you doing here? I hardly recognized you.” As Kent is talking, a Paleman walks around the corner nearby. Without missing a beat, Kent throws the rocket launcher into the car, pulls out a pistol, and fires. The Paleman drops to the ground, but several more come out from behind the corner.

  “Well, I would love to chat, but I think we need to get out of here. You’re welcome to come with me.” I make my decision instantly. Kent is an old friend. I know him well enough to know he’s trustworthy. Even if he isn’t going north, I think we could convince him to take us past this infernal city.

  Looking around the group, I see that everyone’s waiting on me, so I tell them to move toward the roof’s door. The others follow behind me as I open the door and start moving through the building. As I do this, I hear more gunfire.

  When I get out of the building, I see around ten Palemen approaching the car, some on the ground, some standing. Most of them are bleeding from bullet wounds. Now that I�
��m down here, I help get everyone in my group situated in the car, counting off as I do so. When I’m sure everyone’s in the car, I hop in myself. Fortunately, the car’s a large military jeep, and even though we have a decent amount of gear and people, there’s enough room for us.

  The jeep starts moving, and after a second, Kent turns around from his spot in the passenger’s seat.

  “Normally, I’d catch up with you, but right now my primary concern is how the hell you knew which of those creatures the general was. Your group fired one shot, and I don’t know if you have some insanely good luck or some other force on your side, but I want an explanation.” For a second, I think Kent must know about Chris. I want to panic but force myself to stay calm.

  “Kent, what are you talking about? What do you mean by a general?”

  Kent lets out a heavy sigh. “Sorry, I forget that you wouldn’t know what I meant.” Kent starts to explain to me what a general is. Apparently, some of the Palemen have a higher level of consciousness. He isn’t able to tell me why or how, but these Palemen are able to control and organize hordes of lower Palemen.

  The thought that there’s some organization among creatures we previously thought as devoid of intelligence is terrifying. Some of the things I’ve seen start to make sense. Apparently, the group that was chasing Kent’s party was led by a general, and I managed to snipe it. Pain still lingers from when Chris directed me, and I saw the death of the Paleman.

  The fact that some part of me was able to find the Paleman leader worries me. Whatever it is that lets a Paleman general control its soldiers has some sort of effect on me. While all this information rolls in my mind, Kent looks at me once again. I see a small seed of mistrust in his eyes.

  “Well, I guess I’ll chalk up what happened to a lucky shot. Either way, I appreciate you saving our tails. I’m not sure if we would have been able to take out that horde without you.” While we drive, we find out that Kent’s group stays at a base to the north. Luckily, it’s about thirty miles north of the city, and the car ride will take a few days off our journey. If we’re lucky, we might even be able to convince Kent to take us farther. We could make up the time we lost in that last town in a day if we used a car.

  As we drive, Kent and I catch each other up on things that have happened since the power went out. Kent doesn’t tell me much. About all I learn is that he got to the base after his family died. He won’t tell me any more about it, and I know better than to argue. Even though I don’t learn much about what happened to him, I don’t care; it’s nice enough to catch up with an old friend and tell him everything that’s happened to me and the group.

  As we get closer to the base, I start to become nervous, fearing that the people here will be unfriendly to outsiders. Once we’re there, my worries prove false. Kent immediately leaves us, saying he has to go get someone, and while we wait, several men and women come up and greet us, asking all sorts of questions.

  The people I see are used to fighting Palemen, but they’ve managed to hold on to their humanity and their community. Before long, I find myself happily chatting away with people, and it seems like only a minute before Kent is back with someone trailing behind him.

  The man behind Kent is about six foot two and heavily built. His hair is shaved, and he has a very militaristic air about him. Instantly, I know that this man is the leader of the camp.

  “So you’re the people who are taking one of my star soldiers away?” As the man speaks, I become confused, and the confusion must show on my face because the man says, “So Kent didn’t even ask you to join.” He laughs. “Sounds about right. You want to tell me what’s going on, Kent?”

  Kent looks at the man, salutes him, and says, “Sir, I’ve seen too much and am ready for some peace. These people plan to go to a place where I can find some silence. I hadn’t yet asked them if I could tag along, but since you promised me a car and provisions if I ever left, I figured they couldn’t say no.”

  The mention of a car shocks me, and I know Kent is right. Even if I hated him, the offer of a car alone is tempting enough that I’d let him join. With a car, we could reach the coast much safer and faster. I find it hard to believe that someone would just let Kent drive away.

  The leader nods and shakes Kent’s hand. They start talking about supplies, and I’m lost. This place will make it through what’s coming, and I briefly debate staying here.

  As I think about what Kent said, about wanting quiet, I realize that this would be a hard place for Evelyn to grow up. True, she would survive, but at what cost? Places like this have death surrounding them at all times. The people may be friendly, but when I look into their eyes, I see it. There isn’t a single person here who hasn’t drained the life from a Paleman, and I imagine several of them have grown to enjoy it.

  Once Kent finishes arranging things with his leader, several soldiers help load up the car with guns, ammo, gas, and, interestingly enough, C4.

  Once the car is packed and we load up, no one in my group hesitates for a second. I’m sure they don’t all trust Kent, but I know everyone came to the same conclusion as I did: travel with a car will go much more smoothly, and our chance of survival skyrockets.

  The next few days pass by more quickly than I could’ve imagined. Our traveling up to and into Chicago is smoother than anything that’s happened in a long time. It might have only been around half a year, but I’ve already begun to forget how convenient and easy everything used to be.

  Even the journey through the city is smooth. We run into very few Palemen or people. At first, I find it strange, but I quickly become overly confident. After hours of running into nothing in the city, I find myself falling asleep.

  I’m awoken when the car comes to a sudden stop and I’m jerked forward and thrown against my seat belt. My body slams back into the car seat, and I immediately force myself to look around, panicked. What I expect to see is dozens of Palemen gathered around our car. Instead, what I see is young children running around.

  I’m so thrown by this that it takes a moment for me to see that all of the children are carrying high-powered rifles or shotguns. Several of them are pointing the guns in our direction.

  I look into the eyes of one of the children, who’s aiming her rifle at me, and I can see she’s prepared to shoot us on the spot if she needs to. One of the children starts to walk forward. The boy looks older than the others around him. He walks with an arrogance that makes me feel like he’s this group’s leader.

  Kent, our driver, slowly lowers the car window, and the boy comes up to it.

  “You’re trespassing in the Orphanage. If you give us your weapons, ammunition, car, supplies, and food and come with us silently, we might allow you to live.” As I listen to the demands, my jaw drops. This kid wants to strip us of everything but our clothing, and then he might let us live. Anger swells in me and I find a part of me screaming for this foolish boy’s death. Fighting back my anger, I force myself to remember the promise I made to my father to keep everyone safe.

  Opening the door to the car, I slowly stand up with my hand in the air. As I do, several guns follow my movement; I look around and see that about half of the guns have their safeties switches on. All the guns are on me, but I think I can kill the leader before a single shot is fired. If I kill him, I bet half of these kids would run. The other half would hesitate, and I could scare them into letting us go.

  I start preparing to take out the leader when I hear shouting; a boy is running through the crowd, shoving people out of the way.

  “There are thousands of them! The boogie men are coming. Move the hell out of my way. I have to get to Ted.” The newcomer runs up to the boy threatening us—Ted, I think his name was. The boy tries to catch his breath, and after a momentary glance at us, he starts talking.

  “Ted, sir, I was scouting, and I ran into a group larger than I’ve ever seen. There are thousands of them. They’re headed straight for us, sir. I’ve never seen them act like this. It’s like they know where w
e are.”

  “They do know where you are, you little shit,” Kent booms behind me. “They’ve come to kill you off. I don’t know what you did to attract a general’s attention, but it was the stupidest mistake you’ve ever made.”

  I look at Kent and see that he must have gotten out of the car during all the commotion. What he says is rough, but I see it has the effect he was hoping for. Most of the children, who only seconds ago looked like they could kill us, now look frightened. Several of them have already lowered their weapons. Ted looks at us with anger in his eyes before turning to his runner.

  “How far away are they?” Kent asks.

  The runner replies. “No more than fifteen minutes. They’re moving faster than normal. I had to run as hard as I could to give you a heads up.”

  Ted looks at us and smiles. “Alright, it’s your lucky day. You’re free to go.” I stare at the boy and realize he’s being serious. Seconds ago, he was ready to strip us and send us to our deaths, and now he’s ready to let us be a distraction. Fed up, I’m about to say something when I hear Kent’s voice coming once again from behind me.

  “If you send us away, you’ll all die. If you let us help you, you might stand a chance of making it through this. We know how to kill generals, and I have a plan.”

  Children crowd around us, and I can tell they’re looking to us for help. Ted looks angry, and I think he’s going to say no. I only see a change in Ted when he notices all his people around us lowering their guns. They’re telling him with their actions that he doesn’t have a choice but to use our help.

  “Fine,” Ted says, “but after the fight, I want you the hell out of here.”

  Knowing we aren’t going to get a better offer, we start to discuss a plan, and slowly, one comes together. It’s risky but has a decent chance of working. Melany and Dawn will take the high ground in one of the surrounding skyscrapers, while Jason will man the battlements, which are the old subway rails. Ted, Brian, and I will act as a distraction for the front lines of Palemen.