by Rick Kueber
Mariah was very skilled at ‘roughing it’ and quickly made a tent out of the mosquito netting, tying it up to a low hanging branch and weighting down the edges with rocks and sticks. We had no blankets to put down beneath us, or cover up with and no pillows for our heads. It was uncomfortable, laying on the bare ground, but Daniel and I were becoming accustomed to ‘uncomfortable’. It was the new norm.
Avoiding the main road and choosing the narrow footpath through the jungle, our travel was slow and we stumbled across another village. Mariah knew it was there and had visited it with others from her village of Las Mangas. It was half as populated and was no more economically advanced. And, just like Las Mangas, we found it destitute, but its people happy and content with their lives. We also found several sick and dying residents, and like before, we helped them. It was our way of returning the favors of food and meager shelter for a few nights. By the time we made our departure, we were treated like walking miracle workers, but my mind always wandered back to the boy, Diego and George from the cancer center, and those from the cabin that weren’t lucky enough to escape the Takers... and Bobby, Elle’s brother. Every stinging cut from every crude knife felt like a small piece of some penance I was indebted to pay...perhaps for the rest of my life, however long that may be.
Our feet carried us away from the little walking path and into the overgrown wilderness. Mariah led us deep into the dark, lush rain-forests of the Pico Bonito National Park. She explained that, while it would add a few extra hours to our hike, it was unlikely that we would come across anyone. The path or the road that would take us around the park would have been a much more comfortable and less difficult walk, but the odds of being spotted by unwanted eyes was far greater... And so we walked, blazing a new trail, that would make it a simple task for anyone, with any skills, to follow.
The hike was difficult, the heat was stifling and the pesky insects were annoying us more than ever, but the worst part of our journey through the rain-forest was when we came across a small slow moving stream and all we could do was look at it and splash a little on us to cool ourselves down. We knew better than to drink from it. I did not want to deal with the horrible effects of Montezuma's Revenge again. It was midday when we came out of the National Park, but it would have been impossible to tell, if it hadn’t been for a border marker we happened across. The forest thinned a bit and the canopy opened up enough to give us our first view of the sky in hours and the air didn’t feel as thick.
Chapter 5
Going Coastal
“We’re going to come across La Ceiba.” Mariah’s voice was like warm honey. She could have said ‘I just stepped in dog poop.’ and it would have sounded heavenly.
“What’s La Ceiba?” Daniel asked curiously, thinking it might be some volcano or ancient ruins.
“It’s a beach town... More of a city really, so it has all of the comforts of civilization.” She glanced over her shoulder at Daniel and me.
“Probably better avoid that as much as possible.” I said, but Maria mistook my concern for sarcasm.
“Yeah, ‘cause none of us wants a hot shower and a cold drink.” Daniel chimed in.
“I’m serious.” I said as we meandered down the jungle path. The heat of the day magnified by the humid jungle air slowed our pace and gave us a better chance to talk. “Have you felt any earthquakes or tremors since you’ve been here?”
“We had some minor ones a while back, but they stopped completely.” She admitted. “Well, that is, they stopped until just before you showed up.”
“Those weren’t tremors. Those were Titans.” Daniel proclaimed.
“I think what he means is, the ones you felt before we arrived were ‘Titan tremors’. The others may have been Titans.” I corrected my young traveling companion and for that I received a look of displeasure and an over-exaggerated eye roll.
“So when you said they were so big they shook the ground... That was an understatement?” I could sense a bit of frightened tension in her question.
“They are massive!” Daniel said, having trotted ahead of us on the path. “You could fit the whole village in one corner. Heck, you could lose a place that size in side of one.”
“Seriously?” Mariah said, again assuming sarcasm.
“Seriously.” I answered. “Have you ever been to a pro-football game?”
“Nope.” She shook her head. “But I’ve seen a U2 concert at a football stadium once.”
“Okay. Well, without exaggeration, an entire stadium could fit inside of one of them.”
Mariah didn’t respond. I could see the wheels turning and her mind trying to wrap itself around the concept of something that massive also being mobile. We continued to walk along the path for a few hours, mostly in silence, and camped again as the day waned into a dusky and clouded evening. The heat of the long, early summer day cooked the world around us and the stillness of the night air offered little relief.
Before long, we stumbled across a road and followed it northeast towards the coast. The unmistakable smell of salty ocean air clued me in that we must be getting close to La Ceiba. I expected it to be a quaint, little coastal town, but when we began to reach the outskirts, I found it to be a rather large city. A hundred thousand, two hundred thousand... It was hard to guess how many people lived there before the invasion, but now, it was silent. From a distance, it seemed like a peaceful, tropical paradise, but the nearer it got and the closer we looked, it seemed eerily and suddenly abandoned like a ghost town that everyone had been snatched from in the middle of the night.
Staying along the outer borders of La Ceiba, we kept ‘out of sight’ and avoided entering the city limits. Mariah still didn’t truly grasp the weight of our situation, nor did she understand exactly why we weren’t headed into town for supplies like food and water. I suppose that hearing a story about the gigantic space Titans, alien beings of energy and their ability and desire to change everyday people into some type of zombified slaves and seeing it all first-hand were not the same. Stories were just stories and real experiences, well, they were real...and terrifying. As my mind wandered through these thoughts, almost as if on cue, the earth beneath us quivered. Perhaps the earth itself was shivering in fear.
“You feel that?” Mariah nearly shouted.
“Shhh!” Daniel hushed her.
“Titan.” I whispered and instinctively crouched down and my actions were mirrored by both Daniel and Mariah.
“We’re going to need some supplies. At least food and water for a couple of days, maybe longer.” She finally had her tone at a soft whisper.
“Why a couple of days?” I asked out of overwhelming curiosity. “I think we could carry more than that. I’ve packed a week’s worth before.” I thought back to my three person trip from the cabins in the woods to Barnhill.
“Because it will take two good days to sail from La Ceiba to the southern coast of the U.S. I’m going to shoot for Louisiana, but it depends on the wind, the weather, and how much I remember about sailing.” She winked and then started off again, this time being much more unobtrusive.
“Sailing?” Daniel seemed leery. “Are you sure that’s a good idea? Like, I’ve never even seen the ocean...”
“Where’s your sense of adventure?” She teased.
“We’ve had plenty of adventure. I can assure you.” I answered for Daniel. “And, I’ve never sailed anywhere in my life. If you have even the slightest concern or doubt, then maybe we should keep dry land under our feet.”
“You big wussy!” Mariah had grown bolder and much less timid during our short time together. “When we get to the coast, we’ll find a good vessel and then get our supplies and load up.”
“Uh, yeah... That sounds like a plan, I guess.” Daniel was as surprised as I was that Mariah seemed to be taking over our quest to return stateside.
“This is so exciting! It’s like we’re all in some action/adventure/pirate movie... And we’re actually going to plunder the town and steal a boat and sail
away to a distant shore.” She grinned uncontrollably.
“I totally get the excitement and the adrenaline rush you’re probably feeling...” I wasn’t sure how to finish.
“There’s a ‘but’ in there somewhere.” She halted, cocked her head to the side and slammed her hands onto her hips awaiting my response.
“I guess... I don’t know.” I still had no words to explain the reality. “What I’m trying to say is: enjoy it while you can.”
“You are such a buzz-kill.” She rolled her eyes in a semi-joking, over exaggerated way. “I know this is serious, but it’s still an adventure, right? Don’t you think that...” She stopped suddenly. “Ugh! That smells like something dead.”
“Probably more like someone.” Daniel burst out thoughtlessly and I shot him an angry look of disapproval.
“Do you know this city?” I sent the conversation on a different tangent.
“Not really.” Her jovial, adventurous tone was suddenly absent. “I’ve been here once. My family went deep sea fishing here. So I don’t really know it.”
“We need to find the shortest distance through town to the biggest store and then to a harbor, I suppose, where we can commandeer a sailboat.” My words came across as cold and calculated. I knew we were nearing the ‘critical path’ of our journey... the point when we would be putting ourselves at the greatest risk.
“I remember driving along the Congrejal River and we detoured a few blocks to a grocery store to get some drinks and ice before we went out fishing.” She searched her memory and as if a switch had been flipped, this was no longer a fun game of adventure, but a serious quest for survival. “If we can find the river road, I might recognize a landmark where we turned.”
***
We followed Mariah’s lead, which was not such a bad view, and though she had grown timid, she forged on. Finding the river road was easy enough and we walked with the sun at our backs, knowing that would send us east towards the sea. Mariah grew excited when she pointed out a small, upside down, wooden boat, painted baby blue with a faded yellow arrow on it, pointing the way to the marina.
“Left here. The grocery is down that way.” She was confident in her instructions, but when we turned the corner, she cringed and buried her face in my chest. In the middle of the road, not twenty feet away was the remains of a body, picked nearly clean by birds and other scavengers. “Oh God! Can we go a different way?”
“I don’t want to sound callous or heartless, but it’s not going to get any better.” I tried to prepare her for what I knew we might be faced with.
“Good chance it’ll get a bunch worse than that.” Daniel had a distant look in his eyes. His memory was drifting back to the decimation of his hometown of Independence, dragging his dead father back into his home, the streets strewn with rotting corpses and being utterly alone until Elle and I arrived.
“Daniel’s right. You need to be ready to face your worst nightmare. If you can’t stomach one dead body, you’ll never handle being surrounded by Takers. It’s not just dealing with a gruesomely murdered person, you have to be able to kill too.” My words were spoken softly, but their reality was hard and their edges were painfully sharp, like a piece of torn sheet metal, jagged, burred and dangerous to handle. “I can see the sign, I think. It’s just a few blocks.”
“Let’s get this done and get out of this town while it’s still quiet.” Daniel’s statement made perfect sense.
“Are you going to be okay?” I released her from my comforting hug. “Here take this. You need it more than me.” I pulled the 9mm from its holster and offered it to her.
“K... I can do this.” She reassured herself and with a shaking hand, took the gun from me. I gave her a friendly smile and for our own good, I casually pushed the barrel away from us and switched the safety on.
“Keep the safety on, until you’re ready to shoot. Just push it with your thumb, like this.” I showed her how easy it was to operate the safety switch while aiming the pistol and preparing to pull the trigger.
Daniel and I kept Mariah between us, but not behind us as we made our way down the eerily empty street towards the human remains that filled our eyes and nostrils with foul unpleasantries. By the way that our new companion nervously clutched the pistol with both hands, shakily holding it out in front of her, it was obvious she had never handled a gun or been in a truly dangerous situation in her life.
We stayed as far to the right as we could to avoid the body and even though it was a steamy day, I watched Mariah shiver as we walked by. Soon after passing it, we sped up and left it behind us as quickly as we could. The rest of our trip to the grocery store was uneventful, but we remained on point, anticipating the unexpected.
I had hoped to find some supplies for camping and maybe even ammunition and a rifle or two from the sporting goods section, but it was no mega-store. This was a no frills, no extras grocery store, but we did load up one carts with water and sodas, and two more with crackers, beef jerky, canned goods, soups and everything else we could find. We loaded a grocery bag with every lighter and candle from the impulse items near the check-out lanes. For a time, despite the rank odor of rotting meat that had been incubating in the sealed up store, Mariah and I forgot our troubles and actually were having fun. Goofing around and acting juvenile, we actually laughed and then something hit me.
“Daniel!” I spun around but he was nowhere to be seen. “Daniel!”
“What?!” He yelled from a few aisles away and I felt a wave of relief spill over me.
“What are you doing?” I said loudly as we searched the aisles for him.
“Nothing!” He grumbled. “What’s the big deal?”
Our carts passed one aisle after the next until we located him. I smiled, thinking I was seeing my young friend actually living a careless childhood moment. He had been robbed of his youth and forced to grow up, first by his cancer, and then by losing everyone he knew, including his family, to the alien invasion. There on the hard, composite tile floor sat Daniel with a package of Oreo cookies, barbarically torn open. He seemed younger than I had ever remembered as he feasted on their sweetness and I felt obliged to join him, tearing open a package of Chewy Chips Ahoy cookies. Mariah rolled her eyes at us and laughed, but her actions were hypocritical. Plopping down between us on the floor, she snatched up a couple of Oreos and shoved them in her mouth.
“Hey!” Daniel’s words were muffled by the half chewed cookies in his mouth. “Get your own cookies.”
“I can’t believe you just stuck two whole Oreos in your mouth.” I laughed at both of them.
“Wha?” She tried to speak with her mouth over stuffed with the tasty treats.
“Actually I’m impressed...and maybe a little turned on.” I teased. Her eyes smiled at me as she crunched away.
A dull thud came from behind us and we all jumped to our feet. I asked an obvious and rhetorical question. “You hear that?”
“Yeah, okay...” Daniel scooped up an armload of cookie packages and dumped them into the already full cart. “Let’s get outta here.”
“Dear Jesus!” Glaring over my shoulder, Mariah whispered very loudly and took a step backward.
I turned my head to see four Takers standing outside of the glass storefront, just standing there staring at us. I knew we were about to see exactly what Mariah was made of. She would either freak out, break down and have to be carried out by Daniel or me, or she would step up, grasp our reality and her survival instincts would kick in. Which it would be was anyone’s guess.
“Whadda we do?” She jerked the 9mm back into the ‘teen who’s going to die soon in a horror film’ position and flitted back and forth as if she expected the Takers to break through the glass, or come falling through the ceiling.
“Let’s look for another way out.” I kept my cool composure in an attempt to calm our disturbed friend.
“There’s doors by the produce section.” Daniel noted.
Mariah tucked the pistol into the waistline of her
shorts, double checking that the safety was still on, and we clumsily rushed towards the silver, double-hinged swinging doors, pushing our overloaded carts. Slipping through the stockroom and out onto the loading dock, we found one of the greatest things we never knew we would need; a ramp that let us get our carts to ground level. This area and especially the ramp were made for forklifts and flat carts, not grocery carts with small fickle wheels that didn’t even work well on the slick and over waxed tile floors inside of a store. Though it was a furious struggle at times, we managed to fight all three carts out onto the pavement.
“How far to the marina?” I hoped she would remember.
“Six blocks? I really don’t know. Not far? Maybe a half mile.” Her voice was frightened, confused and crying even though no tears fell from her eyes.
“Then let’s get the hell outta here.” I looked at Mariah with concern. “Lead the way.”
“Yeah... As quick as you can.” Daniel interjected.
I am sure we would have been a sight to see. Worn and stained clothing, Daniel and I both in need of a shave and all of us needing a haircut, pushing our loaded shopping carts down the alley behind the store like a gang of homeless looters. Turning the corner onto the main street, I remained a few steps behind Daniel and a full cart-length more behind Mariah. I was able to keep an eye out behind us and when I was looking forward, well, I’ll just say, she was ‘easy on the eyes’ and I wasn’t looking for Takers. Our carts rattled noisily down the street, echoing off of the houses and buildings in the silent beach town. Mariah stopped without warning and turned to Daniel and me with a smile.