The Scattered and the Dead (Book 2)

by McBain, Tim

  On the coldest nights, the wind shrieked past the windows, whistling in the gaps between the siding and the house. The sounds shook him awake, and he couldn’t help but feel like it was intentional. That the night wanted him awake to make him suffer, to twist the cold blade in his heart.

  By the end of January, though, he’d hauled enough food from the neighborhood to regain some strength - mentally and physically. He felt like himself again. He was ready to venture further out, to ride his bike to neighboring towns and start stocking up again, to start thriving instead of merely surviving.

  Winter, it seemed, was ending. He’d made it. He’d learned from it.

  He sat by the fire and stroked the gray cat’s head. He was thankful to have survived, to have held on to what he still had, but it wasn’t good enough. He needed to do better.

  He needed to move on.

  Erin

  Presto, Pennsylvania

  176 days after

  The metal bucket swayed in Squirrelman’s hand.

  “Put the bucket down. Slowly.”

  Squirrelman lowered his arm to his side and bent to release the bucket handle. It banged lightly onto the deck. She heard him swallow.

  “I didn’t-” he started to say, but Erin nudged him with the gun again.

  “Shut up. Inside.”

  She wondered if he could feel her hand shaking where the pistol pressed into his back.

  He fumbled with the door handle before finally getting a grip on it. They passed through the doorway, and Erin kicked the door closed behind her with the heel of her boot.

  Izzy sprawled face down in front of the fireplace, motionless, one arm stretched out in front of her. Erin’s breath caught in her throat. Was she dead? Or just unconscious?

  Erin swiveled back toward the man in front of her, fingers tightening on the gun. She made sure to keep her finger off the trigger, though. She was going to kill him. But she had to be smart about it.

  Not in the house. Outside.

  In the barn? Behind the barn? Maybe in the woods would be better.

  Her murderous thoughts were interrupted by a voice.

  “I almost got- Erin! What are you doing?”

  Izzy’s formerly lifeless body sprang to action. The squirrel, which Erin hadn’t noticed before, followed closely, lured by the piece of food she was sure Izzy still held in her fist. She hadn’t been knocked out. She’d been trying to get that mangy thing to eat from her hand again.

  Erin kept the gun in place and leaned around Squirrelman’s shoulder. He was taller than she’d realized, towering over her by almost a foot. It was harder to tell when you’d only seen someone lying down, she guessed.

  “You’re OK?” Erin asked.

  “I’m fine,” Izzy said. Silverware rattled in the drawer as Izzy stomped closer. “Put the gun away!”

  Erin blinked twice, gritted her teeth together, and then lowered the pistol.

  Squirrelman’s head bobbed forward, his muscles going slack once the gun wasn’t pressed to his back. His knees wobbled, and he rested a hand on the counter as if to steady himself.

  “Marcus!” Izzy bolted to his side. “Are you OK?”

  Erin came around to get a better look at him. Marcus…. It was weird hearing a proper name after calling him Squirrelman for so long.

  Then again, he could be lying about his name. They had no way of knowing.

  His eyes were closed, and she watched his chest rise and fall gently, taking shallow breaths while he composed himself. His long lashes parted finally, blinking apart with his eyelids. He gave a slight nod.

  “I’m alright.”

  Izzy put her hands on her hips. “That’s Erin. She’s not usually such a psycho.”

  “Hey!” Erin felt her face pucker into a frown. She shoved the Glock into her coat pocket. “I’m the psycho that saved his ass.”

  Squirrelman — or Marcus, rather — met her eyes then. But only for a split second before he lowered them. He wouldn’t look at her directly after that. He kept his chin tucked, eyes downcast, only taking sideways glances at her. It reminded her of a dog showing submission to the alpha. Good, she thought. Then again, she felt kind of bad. Had she actually scared him that much or was it just an act?

  “I’m Marcus, by the way,” he said.

  “Yeah, I picked up on that.”

  She crossed her arms over her chest. Now what? What the hell were they going to do with him? No, better question: how were they going to get rid of him?

  “Hey, Erin. Do you wanna play Mall Mania with us? Marcus said he’d play.”

  Erin bit down on the side of her cheek to keep from grinning.

  “I’ll sit this one out,” she said.

  Let him play, she thought. One hour with that nauseating game, and he’d be running for the hills.

  Baghead

  Just outside of Little Rock, Arkansas

  9 years, 128 days after

  The first pedestrians took shape on the side of the road when they were two miles outside of Little Rock. Dark shapes in the distance at first, tiny and indistinct, though Baghead could somehow tell by their movements that they were human long before the rest of the details took form.

  The first group had been a man with a haggard beard carrying a toddler and a woman lagging a little behind them with two garbage bags dangling from the ends of her arms. The bags looked heavy, creased with wrinkles from the strain. The man’s eyes were wide, spooked.

  And in a flash they were gone, vanishing specks trailing away in the rearview mirror. It felt weird to gaze upon this moment in their lives, just after they’d likely lost everything in the fire, and go zooming on by.

  They seemed to multiply as they pressed forward. Teeming clusters of limbs and torsos, feet all twitching along the ground in conflicting rhythms, kicking up dust everywhere on both sides of the road. All the heads turned to watch the car pass. Some even raised one or both hands over their heads and gave halfhearted waves. The Delta 88 drifted over to straddle the center line, a pair of tires in each lane, to avoid the walkers.

  “Reminds you of watching CNN, don’t it?” Delfino said. “Looks like refugees streaming out of some hellhole country. Looks exactly like that, I think, but… I guess this is the hellhole now.”

  Baghead nodded, felt the canvas pull taut against the dome of his skull, its rough texture grating against his forehead as his head pitched forward for a moment.

  They fell quiet again and watched the people passing by. Tattered clothes adorned them from head to foot, sporting holes and flaps and frayed edges. Some of them hauled boxes, cardboard cubes hugged against their chests. Others lugged bags over their shoulders heavy enough to bend their spines into a slouch. Children clung to their parents’ arms and legs, perhaps frightened by the passing car.

  Baghead’s eyes flitted to the horizon, to the place where it looked like the wall of smoke plumed out of the ground. The black coils showed no signs of slowing, spiraling up and unwinding into the mass of darkness that hung up above the city.

  The smoke smell had taken on new notes as they drew closer to its source. What had seemed like a barbecue odor at a great distance had grown more and more unpleasant. First he had associated the acrid elements with burning sacks of garbage. Now there was an aspect to the aroma that Bags could only relate to that of burning hair, a stench that you didn’t smell so much as it attacked your nose. Melted human hair. A stink somehow animal and chemical at the same time. A hint of some rotten tropical fruit to it, too. Coconut, maybe.

  It made his lip curl a little, his nose wrinkle.

  He turned to face the backseat, finding the girl still subdued in slumber. How anyone could sleep with this stench in the air, he didn’t know.

  It surprised him, just a little, to see her hair draped around her face, clean and straight. He’d almost forgotten how they’d washed it, un-matting the wads of hair cemented to her head with coagulated blood. She looked peaceful enough now, eyes moving just a little beneath her eyelids. He le
t her sleep.

  “Getting close now,” Delfino said. “Hope this was the right choice.”

  The latter he said just above a whisper, almost to himself, Baghead thought.

  An overpass emerged in the distance, seeming to form in front of the black smoke in the shimmer of the heat, almost like a mirage hovering above the desert sand. And then the pedestrians became visible, even more of them flooding over the overpass. From his vantage point, Baghead could really only see heads and shoulders floating above the guard rail. There was something liquid about their movement, people all spilling out of the city, riding some invisible wave.

  “Damn,” Delfino said. “Guess there were more people living around here than I would’ve thought.”

  Baghead tried to fathom how many it really was. Maybe somewhere between a few hundred and a couple thousand, if he had to guess. It felt like a tremendous amount, an endless stream of them, but he didn’t think it was. Not really. It’d been years since he’d seen a writhing mass of humanity like this, which made it seem dramatic, but he didn’t think it was actually too many at all.

  A voice spoke up from behind him.

  “Where do you think they’ll all go?”

  It was Ruth, awake now and watching the human waterfall cascade down the hill from the overpass to the flat of the land.

  “They’ll find a place,” Baghead said. “They made it this far, right? They won’t just give up because of a fire.”

  He watched the girl nod in the rearview mirror, though the crease between her eyebrows seemed to suggest that she wasn’t wholly satisfied with his answer.

  When they zoomed under the cement bridge that held all of the people, Baghead held his breath. He didn’t know why, but it made his skin crawl, all of those people so close by. He didn’t feel physically threatened by them. At least he didn’t think that was what it was about. It was just overwhelming to be so close to the crowd, almost close enough to rub shoulders with them. Too much energy in one place, maybe. Too much suffering, perhaps.

  Too much something. That was certain.

  Steel girders ran above them, perpendicular to the roadway, and concrete embankments slanted down toward the car, all smooth and gray.

  That swath of ground shaded by the roadway above seemed to stretch out longer than it should, seemed to hold them there for a long beat. It felt like they were inside something, a living thing, though he couldn’t decide if it felt more like they were in its mouth or belly. He felt his heartbeat thrumming in his otherwise motionless torso, his pulse clicking away in his chest, counting down the seconds until he’d need to take a breath or pass out.

  And then the car broke free from the shadows, moving back into the light.

  The steel and concrete shrank in the rearview mirror, the dark hole within closing up in slow motion. Maybe that made it a mouth after all.

  Already he could see that there were less pedestrians this way. A few stragglers walking out of the curved exit to their right, and none, not one, further down the highway from that. That made this, he supposed, the point of no return, meaning everything from this exit on was probably on fire.

  But the Oldsmobile rumbled on, zooming past all of them, leaving them, turning each of them, slowly but surely, into dark specks that would disappear into the horizon. They weren’t gone. Not yet. But somehow this felt over already. Something had passed, had ended, the puzzle pieces glued into place for good. He didn’t know what that something was, but…

  Ruth turned to watch the last of them out of the back windshield.

  Erin

  Presto, Pennsylvania

  176 days after

  She waited until Izzy was asleep, snoring with the bliss of having played three games of Mall Mania.

  Something was definitely up with this Marcus character. That he could withstand three straight games suggested he was either insane or only had half a brain. He seemed to function alright, so she was leaning towards insanity.

  Erin unlocked the bedroom door and scooted out to the living room. She paused to light a lantern before proceeding to the pile of blankets on the couch. When Marcus asked what he should do with the original sleeping bag, Erin told him to toss it on Mt. Trashington. No one wants a sleeping bag someone almost died in.

  “Psst,” she whispered, looking back over her shoulder to make sure Izzy hadn’t awakened. For some reason, she felt like she was going behind the kid’s back.

  He didn’t wake up, so she tried again.

  “Hey,” she said and bumped at him with her knee.

  He rolled over, one of his hands coming up to rub at his eyes. He yawned.

  “Huh?”

  Seeing him yawn made her do the same. She shook it off and set the lantern down.

  “We need to talk.”

  “Did you just knee me awake?”

  “No. I nudged you with my knee.”

  “So you kneed me.”

  “I didn’t-” She sighed. No sense in getting distracted with petty arguments. She needed to get this over with. “You can’t stay here.”

  He sat up then, eyes flicking to the window. To the thick blanket of snow that covered everything.

  “I mean, you can. For now. Until some of this snow melts. But then… you need to go and find your own place.”

  “I had my own place. I didn’t ask you to bring me here.”

  Erin crossed her arms. Squirrelman had some big fucking balls.

  “Seriously? You were dying. I saved you. Don’t forget that, pal.”

  “Oh, I won’t, pal.”

  She glared at him.

  “You can stay until you get your strength back or whatever. And then you’re out. So don’t get too comfortable,” she said and got to her feet. She didn’t think he was going to say more, but just before she reached the door to her room she heard him mutter.

  “Good talk.”

  She was half-way to slamming the door behind her when she remembered that Izzy was asleep. She settled for turning the lock as contemptuously as possible.

  Where did he get off, giving her attitude? She’d literally fed him, clothed him, and kept a roof over his head.

  Whatever. It just made it all the more clear that she’d been right to tell him he needed to go. And go he would. She’d be sure of that.

  As was the case most mornings, Erin was roused not by the sun filtering through the curtains or the crowing of a rooster, but by Izzy jabbing an extremity into her back.

  The kid beat her out of bed, no doubt so she could pilfer more food to feed to the squirrel before Erin was there to put a limit on it. Erin had discovered a bag of birdseed in the barn, so at least she wasn’t using people food anymore. Izzy stopped at the locked door.

  “Why do you still lock the door?”

  Erin rubbed at the corner of her eye.

  “I don’t know.”

  “I mean, when you thought Marcus might turn into a zombie it made sense. But he’s obviously not a zombie.”

  “I said I don’t know!” It came out snippier than she intended, but really…. The least the kid could do was let her have a cup of coffee before she started in with this crap.

  “Do you still think he might be a psycho killer?”

  “No.”

  “Then why is the door locked?”

  “It’s just habit.”

  “You don’t trust him.”

  Erin didn’t say anything. Hard to deny the truth.

  “Is it because he’s black?”

  “What? No!” Erin sat up, throwing the covers aside. She shivered when the cold air hit her. “Did he say that?”

  Izzy shook her head and turned the door knob.

  “Why would you say that?”

  The kid shrugged and slipped through the door, leaving Erin to ponder this ridiculous exchange.

  When Erin reached the kitchen, Izzy was cupping a handful of sunflower seeds and watching Marcus fold and stack the blankets and sheets from his makeshift bed.

  “Izzy, come help me decide what�
��s for breakfast.”

  Izzy left the pile of seeds on the coffee table and joined Erin in the spare bedroom they used as a pantry.

  “Peanut butter and jelly on crackers or oatmeal?”

  Erin didn’t know why she even asked, really. She already knew the answer.

  “Peanut butter and jelly crackers,” Izzy answered.

  Erin handed Izzy a jar of strawberry jam. She pressed the top of the metal lid, bouncing the safety button up and down. After a few moments, she stopped popping the lid.

  “We should move the food somewhere else so Marcus can have this room.”

  Erin slid a sleeve of crackers from the box.

  “Marcus doesn’t need his own room.”

  “Of course he does.”

  A third voice came from behind them, startling Erin.

  “She’s right. I have to move on to my own house eventually.”

  “Why?”

  “I just do.”

  “But we won’t be able to play Mall Mania anymore.”

  “Yeah, we can. You can bring it over to my cabin anytime.”

  Erin’s head whipped around.

  “Your cabin?”

  He looked through his long eyelashes at her. She thought she detected more than a hint of smugness.

  “Yep.”

  Again, she waited until Izzy was asleep before confronting Marcus.

  “That is not what I meant.”

  “Sorry?”

  “You can’t just go back to your cabin. You have to leave.”

  “Leave what? The state?”

  “Well you can’t stay here.”

  He snorted.

  “Who died and made you Queen of Pittsburgh?”

  “Everyone.”

  A little smile appeared on his face, something between a smirk and a sneer.

  “OK, Your Majesty.”

  He tilted his head to the side, like he’d just noticed something.

  “You were one of those girls in high school, weren’t you?”

  “What girls?”

  “You know, the pretty girls that sit with all their pretty friends at lunch and pretend they’re better than everyone else.”