Ceara walked into the kitchen, sat at the table wondering what to do next. She could just stay here but food would run out, and the power wouldn’t last forever. She went back out calling Maximus. He came running, “You need to get inside, I don’t want you out here at night.”
They went back in the house and the lights flickered, “Ok, I guess we get to go out one more time, we need to check the generator.”
She had heard it running when she had buried the dog so now she had to go fill it up with the gas she had taken out of the shed. Ceara had no clue how much gas the cans held but one was still full and the other was about half full. She carried the one over to the generator, took the cap off and started to pour in the gas but stopped. She had no clue if this was like a car and needed turned off before you filled it, or what if this wasn’t the right gas or if she did turn it off and filled it up could she restart it? “Screw it, I’ll let it run out and then we can use candles or something, we need the gas for the car anyway.”
Maximus barked and Ceara wasn’t sure if it was in agreement or not. They put the gas back by the shed and went back inside; the next twenty minutes were spent looking for candles. Ceara went to her dad’s office looking for matches, candles or a flashlight and found a mag-lite flashlight, “SWEET!”
It even had good batteries in it. A little more searching she hit the jackpot; there in his bottom drawer was a gun. Ceara knew nothing about guns but hell it was a gun, she looked at it trying to see if it was loaded. “Hmmm… how do you know if it has bullets?”
She wasn’t stupid enough to look down the barrel but she had to figure it out. She did find the safety so as long as that was on she thought she could mess with it to figure it out. The search got her the flashlight, gun, a box of bullets that said 9MM Luger, she assumed that was the brand, and a few packs of matches. Her dad had been a closet smoker so he had matches stashed everywhere.
Ceara went and fell on the couch after setting everything on the coffee table; the TV was still playing snow. She grabbed the remote and flipped through looking for anything, which was when the power went off for good. She tossed the remote onto the end of the couch by her feet then pulled one of the couch pillows under her head, she was hungry but that would wait, right now she just wanted to sleep.
The morning was chilled and Ceara had forgotten to close the windows, she sat up stretching and closed the living room windows. She made her way to the guest bathroom and relived herself and climbed in the shower, she figured this would be the last of the hot water but didn’t care. She stayed in there till the water ran cold then climbed out and went to her old room looking for clean clothes. She found several of the outfits she had left there from visits, and then she headed for the kitchen where Maximus was pacing. “You’re hungry too huh?”
He wagged his tail and ran around to the pantry door barking. Ceara went to the pantry to find Princess’ food, “Well at least we know you will eat.”
Looking around in the cabinets she found a large bowl and filled it with dog food. She set it down and started looking around for what she could eat. She found bacon and eggs in the fridge, the bacon smelled funny but the eggs were still in date so she fried a couple up on the gas stove, thankful her parents had never upgraded it to electric. She found bread but it was moldy, there were cans of veggies and some fruit cocktail. Her mom was a firm believer in stocking up of can foods. There were a few home canned foods too but they were all in glass jars, Ceara didn’t want take that stuff with her. That was when she figured out she had decided to leave, she didn’t know when she had decided it but it felt right.
Ceara found an empty Poland spring water bottle and filled it with tap water; she took the half full one off the base and finished filling it too. Making her way around the house she found her dad’s hunting backpack that was better than what she had, so she took it. She packed her clothes, some food, a few candles, and the gun. She hadn’t been able to figure out if it was loaded or not yet, so no use carrying it on her if she couldn’t use it. She went out to the car and filled the tank with the half-filled can of gas from the shed. Putting the other can in the trunk; Ceara loaded the water into the back of the car. Walking back in the house Maximus was laying in the sun, “I guess we need to take your food too huh?”
She grabbed the bag of dog food and headed back to the car. When she came back in she went down the hall toward the master bedroom looking at the pictures on the wall and the ones on the floor, she found the last family portrait they had taken. Ceara shook out the broken glass and pulled the picture free of it’s frame. They all looked so happy, that was taken a couple years ago but it would serve to remind her of the family she had and not what they had turned into.
Ceara walked to the door, “Come on boy, I know I ain’t the best at this shit but I think I got us enough to live for a little while.”
As she walked down the porch she grabbed the shears, she couldn’t use the gun yet but she damn sure could use these. Maximus jumped in the car as soon as she opened the door, she climbed in setting the shears in the back seat. They pulled away from the house not sure where they were headed.
The roads were both good and bad, at times even the back roads were blocked by stranded or wrecked cars. Ceara had to pull off the road several times just to get past them. She was coming up to a major road block at AR-77 North and Interstate 55. The highway patrol had the ramps onto 55 blocked also the bridge over it to continue on 77. Several cars were piled up in front of the patrol cars, Ceara could see several cars that had tried to get around the road block. She slowed to a stop looking around for any deaders, but she couldn’t see any.
Ceara put the car in park and looked at Maximus, “Ok, we are going to get out and look around. I know I told you this before but NO BARKING! Last time you didn’t listen, this time I swear I’ll leave you if you get them coming after us.”
Maximus wasn’t listening, he needed out to relieve himself. She opened the door and slid out, Maximus jumped out running to the first car marking it. He ran around doing the same thing on several cars, and then ran back to Ceara. She patted him on the head and began looking into the cars as she walked past them. There would be no way for her to move all the cars, she wondered if she would have to turn around.
Ceara got to the patrol cars without seeing any deaders and Maximus seemed to be ok so she thought things were somewhat safe. She started going through the cars and found a couple guns and a bit of water, in one car she had found a cooler. Ceara had jumped in the back seat pulling it to her and flipped open the lid to find it full of water and molded ham, bologna and cheese. Spotting grocery bags on the floor board, she pulled them up onto the seat and found several bags of canned food and chips, the last bag was full beef jerky.
Whatever she decided, move forward or turn around; those would be going with her, but she had to make that decision first. Crawling back out of the car she looked around for Maximus, he was nowhere to be seen. She went back to the patrol cars, looking across the bridge to see a road block on the far side too. Ceara went across and found a Ford four runner with keys in it, but her dad had always said never trust a Ford so she kept looking. Off on the edge she saw what she wanted and ran toward the Jeep Wrangler hoping to find keys but what she found was a man with a gunshot right between his eyes but no gun.
Ceara wondered where the gun was and if the man had really shot himself, it didn’t look like it was point blank range. She looked around thinking that if the person that fired the shot was still around then she would have been shot already. She focused back on the man in the jeep and saw the ignition empty, she did a heavy sigh, she didn’t know how to hot wire a car so the jeep was out. She looked around for supplies in the jeep and found little more to use, Ceara turned to leave but something caught her eye. She looked back to the floorboard and saw the keys; they were by the dead man’s foot. Ceara thought he was trying to get them out of the ignition to get away from whoever shot him.
She reached in and grabbed the k
eys, they had several keys and a Texas Longhorn’s key chain, but the jeep key was pretty obvious. She stepped back looking back to where her car was, she would bring everything over and load the jeep before pulling the man out.
A little over an hour later she had the jeep loaded with her gear and the stuff she had gotten out of a few of the other cars, she had even found a map with a national park circled, the very same park she was heading too. She thought she knew the way but the map helped and she was not about to leave it behind.
Elephant Rock Park had been where her dad had hauled her and her mom kicking and screaming every year until she had moved out. Ceara thanked god now because she knew just what part of the park she wanted to go and have some of the amenities like running water.
Once everything was loaded she didn’t have any other thing to do but pull the man out of the driver’s seat. Taking a deep breath as she pulled open the door, she didn’t think the man had begun decomposing, but the smell was horrible. She grabbed his arm and soon found that the clothes had hid the decaying form. The man’s arm ripped off with a nauseating sound, Ceara gagged as she tossed the arm aside. Reaching back in not sure how to get him out now, what if something else ripped off? Ceara ran around to the passenger side and jumped in, she began kicking at the man to push him out but he wouldn’t budge, Ceara was in tears, “GET OUT GOD DAMN YOU!!”
She kicked several more times before she saw the seat belt, reaching over she quickly released it and the man just fell out of the jeep with a sickening plop. Wiping her brow feeling like an idiot, she climbed over to the driver’s seat and started the jeep. She threw it into reverse and pulled away from the man’s body, then threw it back in park. That’s when she saw the gas gauge, it was on empty. She hit the steering wheel, “Well, Fuck me!”
Maximus suddenly jumped in the jeep causing her to scream, “Damn it Max don’t do that!”
She laid her head on the steering wheel as she killed the engine again, “We ain’t going just yet, we need gas.”
Ceara had thought about just finding another car but this was the only jeep and she would need it to get through some of the off road things she knew she would be doing. If she was going to get gas she would have to siphon it out of some of the other cars. Most cars ran on unleaded but a few trucks she thought ran on diesel so she would avoid any trucks, but how would she even begin? She climbed back out of the jeep and looked around wondering if any of these cars even had much gas.
Ceara knew from all the movies she had seen that she needed a garden hose, but she only needed a part of one. Well right now she didn’t even have a full water hose or a knife to cut it up. “Okay first things first, look for some kind of hose. Most cars wouldn’t be carrying a hose in the trunk so she focused on trucks, hoping one was coming from a landscaping job. Glancing over the bridge she saw a dead Mexican man on the highway, she knew it was racist but she hoped he was coming from mowing a yard. She grabbed her gun and headed down the on ramp to scavenge through several of the trucks.
In one truck she found a tool box, she had no clue how to use most tools but she had time to learn or she hoped she did. Ceara could hear her father’s voice from several years ago, “Ceara you are going to wish you had listened to me one day. I’m trying to teach you this stuff ‘cause one day I ain’t gonna be around to do it for you.”
She thought he was crazy trying to teach her how to do crap with her car and how to fix stuff around the house, hell in truth she simply thought he wished he had a son. Ceara didn’t realize how right he was till that second. She set the toolbox on the shoulder and got back to looking for the hose. Leaning into a truck bed looking around, tossing trash and beer cans aside, suddenly a hand had her ankle. Ceara grabbed a rail that had been welded to the bed of the truck pulling herself into the truck bed. She spun onto her back in time to see the deader reaching for her again; Ceara leveled the gun at the girls head and pulled the trigger. Nothing happen, she quickly flipped the safety and tried again, at least now she would know if it was loaded.
The girl’s head exploded causing the blood to splatter on Ceara. She crawled her way to the other side of the bed, lying a hand on just what she needed, a water hose. Terrified to get back out of the truck bed she just sat there; Maximus came trotting up sniffing the dead girl’s body growling. “You’re a bit late”
Ceara thought with Maximus there it was safe to get out. She climbed out very much on guard again, she had known better than to believe it was safe. Finding a knife on a decayed man or what she thought was a man, he was to decomposed to really know, it was what she had always heard was called a Rambo knife.
She found what she needed and didn’t want to stay here any longer than needed, the sun was setting and night without cover with deaders around wasn’t a good idea. She grabbed the hose and cut a long section then headed back up to the vehicles on the ramp with the knife, hose and toolbox. The tools came in handy almost immediately, several cars had locking gas caps and Ceara had used the screwdriver to pop them open. The first was disgusting, Ceara had grabbed her gas cans from the jeep and went to a larger car hoping it held more gas, after popping the cap she slide the hose down the tank and sucked on the hose for a few minutes, then decided she must not have it in far enough.
Pushing in as far as she dared wanting to make sure the other end would still reach the gas can, she started sucking on the hose again thinking it would take longer because of how much hose was in the tank. Suddenly she had a mouthful of gas and was gagging letting gas just run onto the road. She moved the end into the can as she continued to spit gas out.
The idea that the larger car would have more gas was not true; it ran out before her can was even half full. She had to do this process several more times before the jeep tank was full and both cans were too. Soon her and Maximus where driving away, she wanting to get at least to the Missouri state line before finding somewhere to sleep, they pulled over in an empty field and she slept for a couple of hours but the thought of deaders walking up kept her from truly sleeping.
Pulling back on the road she made it to Elephant Rock Park the next afternoon, part of the park looked like someone had blown up some of the area that made Ceara wonder if this was a good choice. She thought deaders must be around or no one would blow up things. The first camp site’s bathrooms were gone, all that remained was rubble. Making her way further into the camp she found a spot and threw the jeep into park, “Well I guess this is home for now.”
She opened the door and Maximus bolted out before she could, “Well jeezes manners”
Maximus was marking all the trees, but stopped sniffing the air, “What? Do you smell one of them?” He growled, taking off through the trees leaving Ceara no choice but to follow.
Chapter 8 - Charlie:
Charlie silently stirred his stew. It was hot and steaming, hell the old man even had salt n pepper. Taking small bites and savoring every bite he told Alden his story complete with being an orphan all the way through to killing his surrogate father. Tears came to his eyes as he told that part. Trying hard to hide them from, what to him, seemed like the toughest son of a bitch Charlie had ever met.
The old man hadn’t given Charlie any reason to really think that other than he seemed to know a lot about camouflaging things and he knew how to make a small fire that was warm but didn’t put out a lot of light or smoke. He also made the best cup of coffee Charlie had ever tasted. “Sir, I want to thank you for being so nice to me. I really haven’t seen anyone since the shit went down. especially after…..”
Charlie paused as Alden looked to him, “Since when what” he asked?”
Charlie went on and told him about the story of Humansville and the three army helicopters. He watched as Alden sat there listening almost as if Charlie was recounting a high school football game. To him he was showing little interest at all.
Alden looked up, “Three you say?”
“Yes” Charlie replied, “they came in the form of a.”
Alden cut him
off, “A VEE?”
“Yeah”, Charlie replied, “Then the lead one came back around and hovered over my van.”
“That’s typical cover three. If the lead one had seen anything or one of the others had seen you pop up while the lead was blinded, you and I wouldn’t be having this little chat. They’d fried your van and your ass.”
Charlie swallowed hard. “You mean I was right, they meant to kill me?”
“Yeah kid, but don’t take it personal, it would have just been your turn.”
Charlie got up and walked around inside their little camp shaking his head. “Look Sir,”
Alden held up a hand, “Son let’s get something straight right here and now. You can call me Alden or Al or Mr.Godfrey. But son, I was an enlisted man in the Army, so I worked for a living. Don’t call me Sir. Besides, it makes me feel like your grandpa and I damn sure never been to Topeka.”
Charlie shot him a look then continued, “I mean, I thought the government was supposed to protect us not kill us.”
Alden grinned as he sipped his coffee, “Yeah…. Well, that was then… this is now.”
“Goddamn … err I mean geez,” Stopping as he remembered his Catholic upbringing, looking down, “Sorry about that.”
Alden looked up from his coffee, “bout what?”
Charlie just looked at the old man, thinking maybe he was right. The whole world as he knew it was changing right before his eyes. Manners seemed to be a thing of the past as would be polite graces and everything else he’d been taught. Charlie never had a problem cussing when he was by himself, but Carl had taught him when he was around other people he should always watch his language. Charlie poured another cup and offered Alden some. Alden raised his cup but before it was full he put his hand up, then took a small flask out of his vest and poured some liquid into the coffee.
Surviving Day By Day (Book 1): So it Begins Page 8