by AJ Rose
“I like my creature comforts, just like the next guy, but the only thing that bugs me is my missing iPod. Otherwise, I never got hooked on coffee, and two changes of clothes sure does simplify things. No black-tie dinners, no political trips to see the president. No vacations where Mom and I find something fun to do while Dad spends all day in meetings. Plus, we always traveled abroad. I would never have gotten to see this much of our country if it weren’t for the nature hike.”
“But you’re rich,” Jason spluttered. “How can you not be bothered by sleeping on the ground and having no hot water for showers?”
“Have you seen the stars at night?” Elliot asked, his head on a swivel as they crossed the bridge. It was a toll bridge, but the swing arm had been smashed through, and no one attended the booth, so they walked on by as if seeing busted windows and destroyed cash registers was normal. Hell, it was becoming normal, the more towns they went through. “No light pollution to hide them, and there are so many. So beautiful. Money doesn’t get you a view like that.”
“It would if you had a cabin in the mountains or your own private island,” Tim said.
“Money doesn’t work here anymore,” Elliot said dismissively. “And frankly, I’d give away what was in my bank account if people wanted it. Money makes people insane, and the stupider the money, the stupider the people. I’d rather have experiences, and lemme tell you, this is a hell of an experience, walking across the country. I’d have never had the guts.”
Ash was pleased they all seemed to be getting along, but he kept sweeping their surroundings. Something felt… foreboding. Like a pall of expectation descending along with the sun, and once the light faded, they’d face worse than they had all along. It was almost like being watched.
They reached the other side of the Missouri River, and Ash breathed in relief. “Where do you guys want to stay? We have to get south of town, but maybe we could find a nice rural farm to settle on.”
“Works for me,” Jennifer said, and the others gave various noises of agreement.
“Why don’t we stay along the river? There’s good tree cover, and not a lot of houses on the bank,” Elliot suggested, studying the landscape from their heightened vantage point. “We get farther inland, it might be more populated than we realize.” He pointed to the north, where several buildings were visible along the banks in the fading light.
“We’re not far from Omaha, are we?” Aaron asked.
Ash shook his head. “About twenty miles south. Should be far enough.”
“I like the trees idea,” Jennifer said. “Feels more protected.”
“Fine with me,” Ash agreed. “No fire tonight, though. Attracts too much attention.”
Moving off the bridge, they turned south and were soon walking along the frontage road, scoping out possible places in the trees where they could fit five tents. Camp setup was a quieter affair than usual, and before long, they were eating cold canned vegetables and dried hunks of deer meat.
Just as Elliot stood to go to the tent he shared with Ash, a greenish dot flashed in the underbrush.
“Elliot,” Ash whispered harshly. “Stop where you are. Charlotte, get Riley.” Elliot froze, and Ash moved to his side, pulling the gun from the small of his back and flexing his fingers around the grip. He heard Riley ask what was going on and his mother shushing him.
“What?” Elliot asked, voice barely audible in the swish of leaves overhead. The wind picked up. If Ash’s mental count wasn’t off, it was May 5th. He wondered if the weather was about to get bad, but that wasn’t what had stopped him. He didn’t dare take his eyes off the spot in the bushes. It had looked like light reflecting off the eyes of an animal.
Slowly, he approached, and a low growl emanated from the foliage. He stopped, waited, then started forward again. A flash of movement had him pointing his gun, and when the branches parted and a dog emerged, he didn’t lower it. The growl changed to a whine as the dog lowered itself to its belly, watching him with interest and fear. In the deepening twilight, it was difficult to tell what kind of dog it was, other than it was fairly big and had matted white fur. Knowing how quickly temperament could change, Ash kept up his guard, but Elliot moved around him before he could hold him back.
“Elliot!” Ash cautioned, and the dog bared its teeth even as it whined.
“You’re scaring it, Ash,” Elliot scolded right back, kneeling a couple feet in front of the dog and holding his hand out, palm down, waiting for the animal to brave a sniff. “It’s okay,” he soothed in the dog’s direction. “We’re not going to hurt you.”
“That dog lunges, you bet your ass I’ll hurt it,” Ash retorted.
But it didn’t lunge, and as it belly crawled toward Elliot’s outstretched hand, the clink of a tag and collar rang softly.
“Someone’s pet,” Ash murmured, lowering the gun. He stayed alert but was no longer trying to assert dominance.
When the dog sniffed at Elliot’s hand, it whined again and then licked his fingers. Elliot sank them into the fur on top of its head and gave its ears a good rub.
“Yeah, good doggie,” he cooed, and the animal rolled to its back and bared its soft belly for scratches. “Ash, it’s fine. It’s just scared. Probably hungry,” he said as his hand moved over the dog’s ribs.
“You feed it, it won’t go away.”
Elliot ignored him, sitting so he could get both hands involved in the scratching. “Have you got a flashlight? It has a tag.”
Ash didn’t want to leave Elliot unprotected so he asked over his shoulder for someone to get him a light, and when they did, he shined it on Elliot’s hands.
“Rabies vaccine dated last month, and a name and phone number. I doubt the owner’s name is Ghost, though.” At the mention of its name, the dog thumped its tail. It still watched them, but with less wariness than before. “Are you a boy dog or a girl dog?” Elliot asked as if Ghost would answer, and his belly scratching took on more vigor. The dog tipped farther onto its back, and Ash redirected the light.
“Boy then,” he said.
“Checking out the goods?” Elliot laughed.
“Well, you wanted to know.”
Elliot stood and the dog came to his feet and shook the leaves and brambles from his fur, then sat and panted. “Looks like a German Shepherd, but he’s white. Never seen a white one before. Ghost is a fitting name.”
“Okay, petting zoo time is done. We should turn in,” Ash said, tucking his gun away and going back into the camp with Elliot right behind him.
And Ghost behind Elliot.
They looked at each other, and Ash groaned at the look on Elliot’s face. “No.”
“Oh, come on! We can’t just leave him out here. He’s domesticated. Who knows what happened to his owners. What if they got pulled into military service and had to abandon him? He’s on his own now, and he’s clearly a nice animal.”
“He’s also another mouth to feed. We don’t know if he’s got a temper, and if he’s good with kids or not.”
Riley giggled, and they looked over to find Ghost licking his chin where the boy sat perched on a downed tree. Elliot gave Ash a “See?” look and held his hands out in plea.
“I’ll take care of him. We can let him hunt on his own, and we’ll make sure he doesn’t get hurt.”
Ash knew he was going to cave. Elliot asked for virtually nothing, and the cow eyes he adopted now were nearly lethal. If Elliot looked at him like that in bed, Ash would be doomed. Still, he hesitated.
“I’m not convinced he’s the sweet beast you think. He growled at us when we first approached.”
“Because you had a fighting stance and were prepared to put him down. He immediately calmed down and submitted when it was clear you were in charge. That doesn’t have to change.”
“Please, Uncle Ash,” Riley asked, getting in on it and throwing his arms around the dog.
Ash gave Elliot a droll look as if to say see what you did? “If he bites someone, we don’t have a lot of medical supp
lies for that sort of thing. A dog bite could kill someone in these conditions.”
“We have antibiotics from Pennsylvania,” Elliot reminded. “It would make other people we run across think twice before messing with us.”
Ash’s resolve broke. Good points. “Okay, okay. He can stay. But he’s your dog. Your responsibility.” Elliot threw his arms around Ash with a heartfelt thank you, forgetting they were in front of everyone. Ash detangled him before he got bold enough to do more, patting his shoulder with a wink. “You’re welcome.” Then he turned to the others. “No more strays, okay? I think we get any more bodies with us, we’ll have a hard time crossing country with any sort of stealth.”
“Agreed,” Brian said, clapping Ash on the shoulder as he walked past to resume his seat on a tree stump.
“Dogs can hear and smell better than humans, so maybe he’ll alert us to trouble before we stumble on it,” Charlotte offered. Her expression said she thought Ash was a sucker, and she was trying to hold back laughter.
“Ugh. You all suck,” Ash grumbled. When Elliot dug in his pack, Ash watched in amusement as he emerged with his shallow food dish and took one of the condoms of rainwater they all had tied to their backpacks for when they weren’t camping near a water source, pouring half of it in the dish and setting it at his feet.
“Come here, Ghost,” he called, and the dog did, drinking noisily until the water was gone. “That’s all you get for now.” Then he held out a couple of strips of dried deer meat, and the dog wolfed them down.
“Don’t give him too much,” Ash admonished.
“I won’t.”
“You’re washing that bowl, too. And eating out of it.”
Elliot glared at him, though the corners of his mouth turned up. “Well aware, you tyrant.” His tiredness seemed to have dissipated, and Ash smiled at him fondly.
“I’m turning in,” Jason stood with a yawn.
They bid him goodnight, and others began to peel off. As Jennifer stood, she gasped, her hand going to her belly, which had just begun to swell. Ash had overheard enough conversations between her and Charlotte to know she was about four months pregnant, which he remembered from his sister meant she was past the danger zone. Well, as past it as possible in these conditions.
Aaron was immediately by her side. “What’s wrong? What happened?” He grabbed her wrist to take her pulse, but she yanked away so she could spread both hands on her baby bump.
She laughed. “Oh my god!”
“What, what?” Aaron demanded, confused by her contradictory startled and happy reactions. Then she grabbed his hand and pressed it along the left side of her stomach.
“Baby moving?” Charlotte asked with a wide smile.
Jennifer nodded.
“Oh my god!” Aaron exclaimed, touching her stomach reverently. “I can feel it! It’s like tiny shivers.”
“Feels like I’m hungry, and my stomach is rumbling, but not quite the same way,” she said, beaming at Aaron. She threw her arms around his neck and kissed him for all he was worth, oblivious to the others.
“Uh oh. Someone’s getting lucky tonight,” Tim said with a smile.
“Lucky bastard,” Jason said as he crawled into his tent. “I miss girls.”
No one acknowledged him, and when Jennifer let Aaron go, she waved them all over so they could feel. Ash indulged her, the tiny hiccup beneath his palm only remarkable when he considered that was a human being in there.
“Congratulations,” he murmured, then resumed his place on his tree. It was his turn for first watch again, and when the excitement wound down, everyone but Elliot turned in.
Elliot hunkered down beside Ghost and gave him a good long belly rub. “Glad you’re a boy, dude,” he said, making Ash chuckle. “Wouldn’t want to deal with you having puppies. Hopefully Jennifer will have an actual hospital to go to when her time comes.”
It was cold comfort that their planned timeline should have the woman in proximity to normal medical care, but Ash knew as well as any of them, plans derailed. After the last month, he was flying by the seat of his pants, like the rest of them.
“Why don’t you get some sleep? Aaron will spell me in a couple hours.”
“Okay,” Elliot said. He stood, wiped his palms on his jeans, and looked around to make sure everyone else was inside their tent. Then he came over to give Ash a lingering kiss. “Thank you.”
“For what?”
“For everything,” Elliot said simply, kissed him one more time, and disappeared into their tent. The dog tried to follow him in, but Elliot was stern. “No, Ghost. Lie down out here.” Ghost whined but did as he was told, putting himself at the tent door with his face pointed outward as if he intended to keep a watch of his own.
“I like him a lot, too,” Ash agreed in a whisper. “But hands off. He’s mine.”
Great. Getting territorial with a dog. I’m losing my edge.
The night sounds were quiet, though Ash thought perhaps there was a rumble of thunder in the distance.
* * *
* * *
That’s not thunder, Ash thought with an upright jolt. His abrupt awakening jostled Elliot, who mumbled and rolled over while Ash listened intently.
The dog loosed a low growl outside their tent, and before long, Aaron spoke through the zipped opening.
“Ash. Wake up. I hear something.”
“I’m up,” he said, grabbing his pants as Elliot sat up and rubbed his eyes.
“What’s going on?” he asked.
“Stay here,” Ash ordered as he put his shoes on bare feet and left.
The night was warm and a little windy, and he tilted his head to listen over the rustling leaves. Maybe the dog’s growl was what had woke—
The thought broke off as a low rumble carried by on the breeze. Trucks. Diesel trucks.
“Military,” he hissed at Aaron. “Pack up. We have to move.”
They scrambled everyone and tore down the campsite in record time, all of them wide-eyed with fear and urgency. They didn’t waste minutes stowing everything neatly in their backpacks, and as Ash grabbed his pack, he also grabbed the bag that held their tent, walking off with both in his hands.
“To the trees,” he said softly, and as one, the group melted into the shadows, not stopping to see who drove down the frontage road as the rumbling noise got louder. Once in the shadows, they briefly slowed long enough to stow the things they carried, but moving was an absolute must. Even the dog seemed to sense the need for quiet expedience, sticking close to Elliot’s heels, his ears perked and listening, but otherwise silent.
The stand of trees they stumbled through wasn’t wide, and they broke out onto the front lawn of a large house. Scrambling for cover in a small cluster of trees to the north of the house, they spotted a road, and just as they began to move in that direction, more trucks drove by.
“Shit,” Ash muttered, and they crouched and watched. Ever since Aaron had mentioned “recruit” trucks, Ash was worried they’d get caught up in some kind of attempt to flush people out of hiding. So far, they’d managed to avoid that almost entirely, ever since the hospital incident when they’d sought help. That had just proven to Ash they’d have to help themselves. But against the military, they were a woeful underdog. He didn’t know how far he’d go to keep from being split from Charlotte, and he didn’t want to think about it. So they just had to not get caught.
When the rumble faded around a curve in the road, Ash motioned for everyone to keep up with him as he dashed onto someone else’s property. Lack of lights made it impossible to tell if the dwellings were occupied, so they avoided windows and ran in the shadows. A few minutes later, when they reached open farmland, they stopped to catch their breath, and Ash pulled out his GPS.
“Shield me, please.” He waited until Elliot, Brian, and Aaron blocked him from view of anyone who might look their direction at the wrong moment while the GPS was on. “This has us going up on the outskirts of Omaha until we pass it and then following the
Platte River, but there look to be more people along that route.” Why would Marvin put us among more people when his directions had clearly avoided them before?
If they hadn’t been surprised out of their tents, he’d have called Marvin to clarify, but they didn’t have time. He made an executive decision.
“We’re deviating from Marvin’s coordinates. We’ll try to squeeze between Lincoln and Omaha like we did Akron and Canton. Those were a lot closer together, and we made it okay, so this should be fine. When we get past the Platte River, we’ll swing back north where there are fewer towns. Should be able to cross into Wyoming where there’s a break in the Rockies. There’s literally nothing there. We’ll skirt I-80, and then we should be home free. In an area with power, we can rent a car. Anyone have money?”
“If we can get to an ATM, I’ll get you whatever amount you need,” Elliot promised.
“Good, then we can drive the rest of the way. We’re not fugitives, so there’s no reason plastic won’t work. I don’t think,” he qualified.
“We can try,” Elliot said skeptically. “But with a gas shortage in the east, there’s bound to be rationing in the west.”
“I didn’t think of that, but there has to be a way,” Ash said in a clipped tone. “We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it.”
“Let’s just get out of here and worry about the promised land later, shall we?” Charlotte whispered.
Ash didn’t like referring to the GPS often, the screen a beacon in the dark, but he didn’t see many options. To conserve battery, he turned it off and tucked it in the hoodie he’d thrown on in haste rather than trying to shove it in his backpack, which he’d filled so quickly, there wasn’t the usual amount of room. They struck a path through the field, watchful for movement. Every few hundred yards, Ash took another peek at the GPS.
As they carried on, he wondered if maybe they were doing it wrong, walking during the day and sleeping at night. It wasn’t easy to see where they were going, but their chances of detection were minimal once they got away from the Missouri River. After a couple hours of walking, they stopped for a rest and something to eat.