by Maira Dawn
Once Skye entered the Jeep, Jesse felt stress rolling off her in waves. She bit her lip as she jumped onto the seat and locked the doors.
The clock blinked to life when Skye fired up the Jeep's engine. Jesse’s mouth dropped. Not even ten minutes had gone by. So much had happened so fast.
Skye backed the car out of the snarl of stopped traffic. From the right side, a group of about twenty Sick came out of the woods. She closed her eyes and slowly shook her head.
"What am I doing?" she mumbled.
Skye braked the vehicle and watched the Sick amble out of the forest for a moment. She stared down at her trembling hands and turned to Jesse. He looked at her before staring out the car window at the Sick. He’d never seen them this close before. They were uglier than he’d imagined.
Skye pulled on Jesse’s shoulder and soon wrapped him in her embrace. Her silent tears hit him above his collar. There was none of the noisy mess that usually accompanied weeping, only the tiny splashes on his neck. Jesse was as still as possible, wiggling only when he couldn’t help himself.
Dylan told him that some women cry a lot, especially when things get rough. They weren’t sure if Skye cried more than other women—neither one had spent a whole lot of time with the opposite sex—but compared to the three men, she did.
Dylan also told Jesse Skye seemed to appreciate a hug when she cried. That was weird to Jesse because when he cried, he wanted everyone to leave him alone. But that is what Dylan said, and he didn't like hugs either. Jesse wasn’t sure why Dylan told him all this but reckoned it was because they would deal with a lot of crying women now.
Once Jesse thought he could no longer breathe, he pulled away and waited while Skye wiped her face. "What are we gonna do now?"
Skye put her arm on the steering wheel, wincing as she did so, and looked in the rearview mirror then out the front window. It was a miracle she and Jesse had gotten away.
There was still over half of the trip to go, if they continued on, and no indication it would be any easier or any safer. Her heart sank as she faced the reality she may never reach her family, never see them again. Skye squeezed her eyes shut.
The Coles were right. She had trusted the brothers to show her skills, but she had not believed them in so many other ways. Why had she though she knew better? She didn’t.
She heaved a heavy sigh as she turned back to Jesse. "We're going back. I was wrong, and they were right. We’ll never get through this. We shouldn't have left."
Tears ran down Skye’s face as she put the car in gear and drove over the bumpy median and away from her family.
25
In Front of Me
We have to be close. Dylan peered around every hill, as far down the road as he was able when he rounded each bend. But he would see nothing and around the curve he and Wade would go again.
At last, far below, Wade pointed out a small bright-blue speck moving in the men’s direction before the mountain swallowed up their view.
Dylan brought his nail to his mouth and chewed. One of two things, it's not them, or it is and there's been trouble.
Dylan and Wade raced around the mountain, tensing with each curve. It appeared the blue speck would never get closer.
Skye and Jesse hadn't driven far when the two noticed a little black dot moving toward them on the hilly road. Skye sighed and wiggled a little higher in the seat. How she wished the dot was red—Dylan’s beat-up truck.
She glanced at Jesse. “Whoever is in that car must be flying. Every time we come around the bend, they're closer than I expect them to be.”
“Um.” Jesse craned his neck as he kept an eye out too.
Skye burst out in a cold sweat. The last thing they needed was another problem. All she wanted was to make it back to the cabin, safe and sound.
Her white-knuckled hands gripped the steering wheel as her eyes scanned the road. "We don't get out of this car, no matter what. We just drive right by it."
Jesse quickly shook his head in agreement. One hand clenched the door, the other the seat. When it got close enough, he said, "It's a truck."
Skye nodded and loosened her clenched jaw. A tension headache was building. Skye and Jesse watched the black truck barrel around the bend and face them. Skye sucked in a quick breath and moved her hands to the top of the wheel, determined to barrel past them.
Dylan slowed the truck, relief washing over him when he saw Skye and Jesse were both in the car. Skye started to pass Dylan and Wade then her face brightened. The Jeep screeched as she slammed the brakes and threw it into park.
Before Skye jumped out of the vehicle, Dylan knew there had been trouble.
Skye and Jesse ran to Dylan. He opened his arms to both, surprised the action almost seemed normal. The boy only wanted a pat or two before moving on to Wade. Dylan’s brother clapped Jesse on the back and plied the boy with questions. But Skye stayed with Dylan, her hands clinging to the sides of his shirt. When Dylan laid an arm on Skye’s back, she winced.
Something protective welled up inside Dylan‘s chest. “What happened?”
“We're fine. Just fine,” Skye mumbled into Dylan‘s t-shirt. The words weren’t convincing since tears soaked his shirt.
With gentle hands, Dylan took her by the arms and held her away from him. “Do you see all this ain't getting better now? You can't go wanderin off.”
Skye tried to dry her tears, but her hands couldn't reach her face, and Dylan wasn't letting go. "Sometimes I have trouble seeing what is right in front of me."
Dylan scoffed. "You’re tellin me!”
"I'm an idiot, okay? I should’ve waited. Now stop yelling at me and let me go."
Dylan removed his hands. He brushed back a bit hair that had fallen in Skye’s face. “I'm mad at ya now.” Skye made a little face at him, and he said, “Hey, you're the one always sayin it’s better to notify others of our mood.”
“I’m mad at you, going off in the woods like that.”
Guilt sliced through Dylan, and he hung his head. “I apologize for that. It wasn’t one of my finer moments.”
Skye uttered a watery chuckle and sniffed.
It was the sniff that did it. Dylan's anger at Skye faded away as fast as springtime snow in a warm morning sunrise as he looked down at her red, tear-stained face. His reaction startled him. That little sniff and I’m done for.
Dylan wanted to pull Skye back to him, but instead he stepped back and crossed his arms. He dropped his gaze to the ground. Friends, just friends.
When Skye followed suit, Dylan tipped his head to look at her down-turned face. “I’m mad at myself for not bein here. It won’t happen again.”
Skye nodded. “I appreciate that, but it’s my fault too. I left, and I should’ve stayed until you got back.”
Jesse’s waving arms attracted Dylan’s attention, and he turned to listen to the boy’s story. "...was holding Skye real tight. She couldn’t get away. Skye looked at me, and I knew she was thinkin something. I waited, like Dylan said. When the big man tried to put Skye on the car, she pushed on it real hard, and the man tumbled backward. Then I took my knife and I—“
Skye held up a hand. "That's enough, Jesse. It's all over now."
Jesse sighed and flapped his arms. "But I want to tell Dylan how I hamstringed the guy like he taught me. I hamstringed him real good."
"What is the boy saying?" Dylan’s voice as hard as steel.
"Nothing. We're fine." Skye tried to reassure him, but Dylan wanted the whole story.
"I want to hear this." Dylan gestured for Jesse to continue. Skye sighed and turned away.
Jesse relaunched into his story. This time, Dylan heard it from the beginning and something dark surged in him. He looked at Skye and felt sick she’d had to endure the man’s touch.
Dylan felt strong and weak at the same time. Strong because he would take care of this, weak because he wasn’t there when she, when they needed him. How did he let that happen? Anger returned and swirled white-hot through him.
Skye followed him with her eyebrows drawn. "Where are you going?"
Dylan slammed the vehicle door shut. "I'm gonna kill them."
26
A Mistake
The blood rushed from Skye’s face as Dylan looked at her and repeated his words, his voice becoming more resolute as he spoke. "I'm gonna kill them. Those men touch you, the boy, like that? They die."
Skye studied Dylan’s clenched jaw, the vein at his temple and his whitened knuckles wrapped around the steering wheel. He was barely controlling himself. She expected anger, but this was way more rage than he had displayed before. As the jolt of Dylan’s words wore away, Skye became just as determined to stop him as he was to go.
Skye stepped up on the running board of the truck. "No, no! Look at me, look at Jesse. We are fine! There will be no killing today."
“You gonna let them get away with treating you like that?” Dylan practically roared as he waved toward her. Clearly, there was no doubt in Dylan’s mind that he and Wade needed to handle this. “There ain’t no police here, maybe even no law. If we don’t take care of this, no one will, and these men—they’ll do it again. There is no mistaking that.”
But Skye wouldn't be swayed. "No one got away with anything. One guy won't ever walk the same. The other, well, he hit hard. He may never get up. The third guy isn't going to do anything without their help." Skye half-explained and half-pleaded her case.
Dylan gave one quick shake of his head before settling himself further down into his seat and reaching for the ignition. "I'm killin them."
"No!" Skye's voice was shrill as she grabbed his arm.
"You think you can stop me?" He shook himself from her grasp.
Skye bit the inside of her cheek. She needed to stay calm. One of them had to use some self-control and it wasn’t likely to be Dylan.
Skye took a deep breath. "I know I can't stop you, Dylan. If you want to kill people, you will do it. But it isn't like hunting. It’s not the same—killing animals and killing people."
"I know what it's like.” Dylan’s gaze flashed from Skye to the front windshield and stayed there. His jaw tightened.
Skye stilled for a moment. She hadn't expected that. "Okay, then, I'm asking you not to go. I can't—I can't have another death on me. I can't live with that."
"It ain't on you, it’ll be on me." Dylan's scorching anger cooled for a second as he gazed at Skye. He twisted the steering wheel until it protested, and his voice lowered from a roar to a growl. "You gonna let them rape and murder all up and down this road? There ain't no way to stop guys like them but kill them. What else are you gonna do?”
“We aren’t certain they have been or will do this again. But I hear you, I really do, but I--I can't kill people like that. This is a longer discussion, for another day, when we are not emotional."
Skye reached out and laid her hand gently on his upper arm. " Please, Dylan." Skye turned to search for his brother. "Wade?"
Wade leaned against the long side of the truck during the conversation and now turned away from her. He jerked a finger toward Dylan. “Him. One hundred percent. Those men’ll be gearing up for another round as soon as they’re walkin.” Wade raised his hands in the air. “But hey, I’m not gettin in the middle of this argument. I’m not the one romancin the girl. But if she’s all worried about this, maybe just rough ‘em up a bit.”
Dylan looked from Wade to the front window of his truck for a moment before shaking his head and heaving a sigh. "All right, we'll go and just make 'em wish they hadn't touched you. Make them not want to touch anyone ever again." He started the ignition. Wade jogged over to the passenger side.
Skye reached over Dylan and turned the truck off. If Dylan went, he wouldn’t stop at a beating, not in this mood. Dylan closed his eyes refusing to look at her .
Skye held her ground. ”No. It was my fight, and I took care of it the way I wanted. I could have killed or maimed them. I didn't. It's done. I want to go home." Skye lightly pushed on Dylan’s shoulder so he would seek her face. "Please, just take me home."
Skye and Dylan’s eyes locked, and she watched Dylan’s anger melt away when she called his house home. When Skye saw his demeanor change, she lowered her gaze. But Dylan wasn’t done, he brought a hand to her jaw and waited for her to look at him again. “You’re makin a mistake. The only reason I’m listening to you is because I can’t take how you’ll feel when it’s done. But it will be done at some point. Those men—they’re gonna die. Leaving them here, it’s a mistake.”
Tears flooded Skye’s eyes. “Perhaps. But as we know, it isn't the first one, and I doubt it will be the last I will make."
“It burns me to let them go. This shouldn’t be ending in a question.”
She raised her hand and laid it on top of his. “Thank you.”
Skye took advantage of Dylan’s hesitation, afraid he would change his mind, and arranged the cars. “Wade, do you want to take my car and let Jesse drive some? He needs more practice." Then she hopped into the truck with Dylan.
Dylan sat for a moment one arm over the steering wheel as he studied Skye. ”You're too softhearted, and it's gonna be the end of you.”
Skye gazed at Dylan but didn't answer. Perhaps he was right, and she was making a grave error. Skye pressed her lips together. If she acknowledged that, he'd see it as permission to go after the men, so she kept silent.
Skye chewed the inside of her lip. If she found out those men hurt other people when Dylan and Wade wanted to stop them right here, she would never forgive herself for that either. This was just one of the many moral dilemmas ahead if the world never righted itself again. But she wasn't ready to be someone's jury, judge, and executioner. Not today. Even if someone else was doing the actual execution. She couldn't help it, that was the way she felt. Without a doubt, though, this would be something that would be argued out another day. It was unavoidable.
Talking Man watched as Skye banged the door of Dylan's truck shut and both vehicles drove south. He made a note of that for when he and the boys came back later. Not a mental note, he said the words out loud.
"South. And she's got muscle too."
Calvin had always been a talker, with others or alone. He claimed to be one of the best salesmen on the east coast because of it, though his wallet wouldn't have said the same thing.
Calvin, and his buddies, Tony, and Pete had wrecked havoc on the Sick and the healthy alike along this stretch of road. From the Sick, they took whatever supplies they could, whether that meant their deaths or not. From the healthy, they took everything else.
Their wicked spree left many starving, broken and dead. But today a woman and a child brought their streak of fun to an end. That outraged Calvin.
"How dare she? How dare that woman think she and that boy have any say in the matter? This is a new world, and we decide the rules."
Before the AgFlu, Calvin's many silent imaginings had been just that. He'd kept them to himself and a handful of like-minded people, typing the words he could never utter out loud in a private Internet chat room. As he'd sat in that darkened corner of his living room, he'd never dreamed he could ever act on them. But how things had changed. Now he was a king, and the world—it was his for the taking. Take it he would.
No woman would get in his way. He would make sure she knew her place in the reboot of this world.
He seethed as he got back in the car he used to follow her. He'd say he'd been fortunate to find a car that had the keys in it so quickly, but he didn't see it that way. To Calvin, it was more as if it was meant to be.
"She didn’t even suspect I was on her tail.” He laughed as he turned the car around. His mind was already surging with how he would punish a woman like her.
Now, he neede
d to go scrape his friends off the pavement. Then they would make a plan.
27
Hurry
The car was silent. Dylan’s anger had returned and now wafted off him as if it were a heat wave. Skye kept quiet. It was better to let him have his space, anything she said would likely cause an argument. She gazed out her window blindly letting the blur of trees go past without notice as she tried to put away the events of the last few hours. It wasn’t easy both because of the tears that threatened to fall and the increasing aches of her body.
Skye changed her tactics and instead tried to relax and drown herself in the overcast fall day, the sunlight muted by fog sitting low on the ancient mountains. Every so often they would drift through a small, seemingly deserted town as they wound their way back through the landscape.
A wire fence ran alongside the road, and Skye lazily gazed at it as they drove. When she saw one, then another, and finally a horde of Sick at the barricade, Skye wiggled herself up in her seat.
"Dylan?"
"I see 'em.” He slowed the truck.
The Sick were a pitiful lot. Their arms stuffed through the holes in the fence, they reached out to the vehicles that Dylan and Wade drove for help. Their sad eyes pleaded even as their mouths uttered incomprehensible sounds of confusion, anger, and pain.
Skye gasped and turned away. Is this how her family would end up? There was little she could do but pray that wouldn’t happen to them.
Dylan stared at the horde, his shoulders sagging, then banged his fist on the steering wheel a couple times. “This day.” He shook his head. “We can’t even do anything for them.”
“There is food and water in the car. We won't need it anymore now," Skye offered leaving the decision to him.
Dylan rolled down his window, waving Wade and Jesse‘s car up beside him, and explained what he planned to do.