Tipping Point (Book 2): Ground Zero

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Tipping Point (Book 2): Ground Zero Page 4

by Rain Stickland


  “Hey, if I’m making one, you don’t have to worry that you’ll end up with any bruises. I’ll take out my frustrations on inanimate objects. Anyway, was Kirk teaching you to use his bow?”

  “Yeah. I’ve been coming here for a while now. I guess you didn’t notice.”

  “I haven’t been noticing anything anyone does, Billy. Don’t take it personally. I have a lot on my mind. Speaking of which, I just came over here to spend some time with my friends so I can zone out for a bit. Don’t take that personally either. I just really need some time and space right now to relax.”

  “I was heading back to the house to get Gowan anyway. I can’t bring him here when I’m firing arrows at a target. He might get hurt, or he might bump me so that someone else gets hurt, you know?”

  Cameron just nodded at him. The Doberman her mother had rescued, along with a bunch of ferrets, had attached himself to Billy. They were fast friends now, but like a lot of dogs he was a little too enthusiastic sometimes.

  Billy left her to her thoughts finally, and Cam walked cautiously around the end of the house, rather than going up on the porch to the door. She took a quick look to see if Kirk was firing at the target, but when she saw him yanking arrows out of it to replace in his quiver, she relaxed and walked toward him, smiling as she spoke.

  “Dude, have I got some crazy shit to tell you!”

  3 ~ FINDERS KEEPERS

  “There are a hell of a lot more people alive than I’ve been expecting,” Mac said, worried that it might impact their safety at the farm. Some of the people had come running outside when they’d heard a vehicle driving past, while at other homes curtains were wrenched aside so they could look out to see what was going on.

  “You make it sound like it’s a bad thing,” Neil replied.

  “It might be. If they’re desperate, and there are enough of them, it could be a very bad thing.”

  “If they survived the winter, they have their own food stores, and they’re probably going to be putting in gardens again very soon. You don’t really want people to die out completely, do you?”

  “They have just as much right to survive as we do, but they may not have what they need to put in new gardens. A lot of people bought new seeds and seedlings every year, in order to start up their gardens. Most don’t know how to save their seeds, and most seeds were engineered so people couldn’t get seeds from fruits and veggies anyway. Not to mention the fact that if any of these people know who you are, and where your cabin is, there’s a good chance they’ll try to get to your place to help themselves to a working vehicle. In addition to our food,” she said.

  “Leaving the farm was a risk. We both knew that. I can’t guarantee those people we passed don’t know who I am, but none of them seemed familiar to me, and we’re already pretty far away from the cabin. It’s a very long walk. All we can do is wait and see. In the meantime, could you try to concentrate on the job at hand, honey? I’d like to get these panels off the roof before one of us falls twenty feet,” he said rather curtly.

  “Sorry,” she muttered, irritated by his tone even if he did have a point.

  “It’s a damn good thing we brought two ladders, cowboy, because these panels are heavy. It’s definitely going to take the both of us to get them down,” she finished, her breath coming out in a woofing sound when she momentarily took the weight so Neil could get positioned properly on his ladder. Once he had, he took the weight so she could do the same. Between them they guided the PV panel to the ground, a step at a time.

  “We should have brought some rope. Are we taking all of these?” Neil asked.

  “We probably should, though I’m not feeling really enthusiastic about it right this second,” she replied, as she stood on the ground and stared up at the eavestrough far above their heads.

  “Well, let’s get the next one, and we’ll take it as it comes,” Neil decided.

  It took them two hours, with a number of breaks just to be on the safe side. By the time they were done, Mackenzie’s arms and legs were trembling. Each panel had taken them fifteen minutes, but now they had eight of them on the ground, ready to be put in the truck.

  “Maybe we should have gone for the mattresses first. That would have been better cushioning than the blankets we brought with us,” Mac said with some concern.

  “Not much we can do about it now,” Neil said, shrugging. “Whoever’s driving will just have to be careful, and we’ll head straight from here to the furniture store by the Pentecostal church. We can take a look for marine batteries on our way to the library instead. Probably a bunch where the boats are docked by the town bridge. I’m not sure what you hope to find in the library, though. You’re talking about some fairly obscure technology. Most people didn’t know about it before the grid collapsed, so I can’t see the library in Huntsville having any books on it. Hell, you’ll be lucky if they have a book explaining solar energy.”

  “Oh, I know. I don’t really expect to find anything, but even having books on diesel engines will be a big help to me,” Mac replied. “I only really understand gasoline engines. When someone starts talking about glow plugs, I’m lost. The only reason I know it’s possible to convert to using vegetable oil, is because of some stuff they had on the news about it years ago. Besides, I still need the books on boating and sailing. I was thinking they might have a section with marine maps, too, seeing as there are so many lakes and waterways around here.”

  She tilted her head to the left, stretching out her neck, and then to the right. She was already tired and sore, and wasn’t looking forward to hauling boxes of books out of the library, but it had occurred to her that she’d like to conserve some of those books. Anything to do with medicine, food preservation, agriculture, science, or technology could turn out to be a big help to them, and she loved books just for their own sake. She hated to think of them being left to rot.

  They arrived at the furniture store without incident. First they stacked four queen-size mattresses inside Neil’s large horse trailer, and stowed the photovoltaic panels between. They added a couple of twin mattresses on top, and it wasn’t until they had finished standing up the remaining four twin-size mattresses in the trailer, that trouble came calling.

  The shuffling gait had the unwelcome thought of zombies popping into her brain, but she shook her head to clear it. This was nothing more than severe malnutrition. At his first, nearly incoherent words, however, she felt the first flicker of fear and disgust. Neil stilled for a second, but then began to circle around to the driver’s side of the truck.

  “Eat you,” the disheveled stranger said, his voice a harsh, gasping sound. Apparently he hadn’t been talking a lot lately, or someone had tried to strangle him at some point.

  “Dude,” Mac began, while backing up. “You’re not gonna eat me. You might be starving, but I can give you some food. Real food, not human. We carry emergency packs with us.”

  “No. Eat you.”

  The light of madness in his eyes made her think further conversation was probably pointless, but she needed to try. She really didn’t want to have to hurt the guy, though killing him might be a mercy. He’d obviously taken in more than he could handle, and it sounded as though part of what he’d taken in was human flesh. She understood survival, but he seemed to prefer eating humans to regular food sources now.

  “You’re not going to eat me, or anyone else. I can give you real food, but I’m not letting you gnaw on me no matter how hungry you are. If you try, I’m going to have to hurt you. You don’t want that, do you?”

  Her hand was on the grip of her gun when he lunged jerkily toward her, his halting steps slowing to a stop when he saw her brandishing the weapon. He was apparently sane enough not to directly challenge a bullet. At least not by himself. It wasn’t until she began sidling toward the passenger door of the truck that she saw the others.

  “Neil,” she said softly.

  “I see them,” he responded just as quietly. “We need to go. Now.” So saying, he pul
led open his door. Mackenzie continued to brandish the Glock 22, giving Neil time to get the truck started and in gear.

  “Mac! Get in the fucking truck!”

  She wasn’t arguing. Her pulse racing, she leapt in. He was pulling away from the warehouse-like store before she’d even closed her door. When the door-latch clunked into place, she yanked at her seatbelt, causing it to jam on her first attempt.

  “For fuck’s sake,” she snarled, forcing herself to pull the belt slowly the second time. Patience wasn’t one of her virtues at the best of times, and with panic added to the mix she wanted to scream at the belt mechanism.

  “Okay. So that just happened,” Mac said breathlessly, as she settled back against her seat with her heart still fluttering. Neil let out a chuckle at her choice of words.

  “Yup. It sure did. You still want to head to the electronics store in the mall?” Neil glanced at her as he waited for her response. Mackenzie took a moment to consider the issue.

  “Cameron’s right. We need those cameras. Our security has gaps. And, after seeing those freaks, I like being vulnerable to outsiders even less than I did before,” Mackenzie replied. She shuddered and wondered how long it would be before she felt like eating again. She considered herself a pragmatic sort, and knew she was just as likely to resort to cannibalism as anyone, if her survival were at stake. But she was pretty sure she’d never start preferring that to other food sources.

  “Well, at least they weren’t moaning about brains,” Neil quipped. Mackenzie snorted. It probably wasn’t the least bit funny, but she’d always been the sort to think of strange things as an adventure rather than a frustration.

  “Probably the closest thing humanity will ever come to actual zombies, I suppose. I’ve never been a big believer in zombie apocalypses. Then again, there were those bath salt drugs that had people trying to eat other people while they were high on them. We’ve done some pretty nasty stuff to ourselves as a species.”

  “Well, zombies aside, how do you want to do the mall thing? I’d prefer to go in together, and stay in visual contact, rather than one of us outside waiting with the truck. Especially after seeing that bunch. I’m not too keen on either of us running into a group like that while we’re alone. What do you think?”

  “I think you’re right,” Mac said. “It’s a different set-up from the library, with outside doors everywhere, despite most being the employees-only kind. Just too many ways in and out for a person outside to know what’s going on. So, we go in together. I think with the library we can both go in to make sure it’s empty, and then you can stay with the truck since I know what I’m looking for. Good thing we brought the headlamps, though. Both those places are going to be pitch black inside. What do you want to bet the glass doors at the mall will already be broken?”

  “Nothin’ doin’. I’m keeping my money. There’s no way that place wasn’t raided for food, what with the grocery store being attached. It has its own set of doors if I remember correctly, but there would’ve been other items worth looting in the main part of the mall. Thankfully security cameras wouldn’t have been high on anyone’s looting wish-list, but that’s assuming the local stores even carried them for sale. I’m betting most of the people were dead within the first month in town, with the exception of those who considered other people a food source.”

  Mac didn’t respond. She hated to think of all the people that had once lived in Huntsville. It had been a beautiful town. Too damn crowded in the summer with all the tourists, or terrorists as she and her friends had called them, but beautiful all the same. Well, at least there were no crowds now, and tourism was a thing of the past. Aesthetically-speaking, Huntsville could still be considered beautiful. Just really empty, with a lot of long, brown grass no one had been able to cut at the end of the previous summer, which had withered during the winter months.

  The sadness crept up on her. It wasn’t until that moment that she’d realized how much of the beauty of the town had come from the people living there, peacefully enjoying small-town life. Since she’d spent such a large portion of her life avoiding people as much as possible, the sentiment caught her completely off guard.

  “Why is it that it’s only now, when people are either dead or crazy, that I’m starting to think they weren’t so bad after all? I guess I’m like everyone in that respect, not appreciating something until it’s too late. It’s not just that, though. There’s a rhythm that’s missing in the world now. Kind of like someone blowing air across the top of an empty bottle, rather than a whole band playing. I think we were supposed to be a part of this world, but we went too far with it, and now we’re not playing the part we should have played,” she finished softly.

  “Honey, that’s just what humans do. We overreach. And it’s not just with bad things, either. Even when we’re doing something for a good cause we overreach, like with activism. People would go too far with it, alienating others who might have been a help to their cause. Humans just aren’t that reasonable or rational, and we sure as hell don’t think ahead very much about the consequences of our actions. Or inactions,” he added ruefully.

  “Ain’t that the truth. At any rate, you were right not to bet against me. Looks like both big sets of doors are broken. It’s a good thing, too. I want to make as little noise as possible. Hopefully the sound of the truck hasn’t caught anyone’s attention. Thankfully that furniture store is such a long way from the mall.”

  Neil pulled up to the doors and turned off the motor, while Mac looked up at the big signs over what used to be Zellers, before the large department-store chain had gone belly-up. Walmart moving into Canada had certainly had an impact on their bottom line.

  “I always wondered what they put in here after Zellers crapped out. It’s not easy finding big-name stores to take over those giant leases. Target took over some of the stores in the cities, I know, but then they pulled out of Canada. I’m surprised to see Winners and SportChek here, though. There aren’t even a lot of Winners stores down in the bigger cities.” Winners was a clothing store that sold new, but discounted, name-brand stuff. She’d seen cashmere for a fraction of the cost in some of them, but their stock wasn’t consistent. Neil just shrugged.

  “I was just thinking it was too bad they’d only have summer stock,” he said. “Not that it’s getting all that cold these days. We sure as hell don’t need down parkas anymore.”

  “Well, we’ve got everything we need for clothing anyway, and that’s not what we’re here for. I mean, if you see something in the electronics store that you think will be useful, by all means grab it, but I don’t want to be spending time looking into the other stores.”

  “What about the new arrivals?”

  “What? The ‘Spring Collection’ you mean?”

  “No,” Neil said, and snorted out a laugh. “I meant the new arrivals at the farm, doofus. Fashion wasn’t a concern of mine even when it might have mattered to someone, much less now when there’s no one to impress. I was thinking that the kids in particular might be outgrowing some of their clothes sometime soon. Never mind shoes. We could grab a few boxes of cross-trainers from SportChek. They might have some sporting goods that would be useful, too.”

  “Hmm. Maybe. If we’re quiet, and constantly checking to make sure we haven’t attracted any visitors, we should be able to grab some boys’ and girls’ clothes. Pyjamas and underwear, too. Katherine’s got the whole puberty thing going on, so I’ll get some bras for her in different sizes. Seeing as it’ll take a few trips to get stuff, that gives us the opportunity to keep watching for unwanted company. We just have to make sure we do everything together.”

  “Alright,” Neil said, giving a nod.

  “Let’s get the cameras first then, just in case. We can keep going back in for other stuff, but we get only the truly necessary stuff first. And, of course, I’m pretty sure there’s a book store in here, too.”

  “Alright, fine. Let’s go before all my hair falls out from old age.”

  “Yo
u’re right. We should go. I’m pretty sure it’s already thinning,” Mac said with a smirk, laughing outright when he growled at her. She slipped out of the truck with a smile on her face, reaching behind her seat for the metal pry-bar. She closed the door as softly as she could, and once Neil had done the same she stood there listening for a few moments.

  “Sounds clear,” she said softly. Putting her free hand on the grip of her Glock, she headed toward the second set of broken doors, Neil walking softly beside her. Once they had stepped through the metal framework of the doors, they both paused to listen again. There was nothing. Not even wild animals had come foraging in the mall, apparently, which meant the humans had cleaned out every scrap of food, including anything in the garbage bins that was fit to eat.

  She glanced questioningly at Neil, who nodded back at her, and without speaking they headed straight for the electronics store. It had originally been a Radio Shack, but they’d been bought out long ago by a big chain conglomerate. The roll-down security bars had been bent, but surprisingly they hadn’t been forced open. Mac figured it was likely people were more concerned with food than diodes, headphones, or circuit boards by that point. Without power to run any of the items, they were nothing more than paperweights to people who were starving.

  The pry-bar made short work of the lock that latched into the floor, though it made a terrible screeching sound that Mac was sure would bring people running. She motioned for Neil to turn off his headlamp, and turned her own off to wait for any response to the noise she’d made. When no one appeared, they cautiously pushed up the roll-down bars and then spent a few minutes listening again, hardly daring to breathe. The silence stretched endlessly, with no echoing footsteps or shuffling feet to intrude upon it.

  When nothing changed, even in the air currents, to indicate that anyone else might be present, Mac stepped past the threshold of the store and turned her headlamp back on. Neil followed suit. The storage room in the back was unlocked, and though there was very little inventory in there, they found plenty of empty boxes they could use to pack things in for carrying. They had a couple in the truck, but they needed those for their trip to the library later.

 

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