The Colony

by Kathleen Groger

  Happy stinking birthday.

  Exhaustion stabbed behind my eyes. I rested my elbows on the table and buried my face in my palms. I couldn’t stop the graphic images looping through my mind. Bugs. Raspers. Dead bodies.

  The media had called it the Great Discovery. Yeah, it was great all right. But I had no clue what the finding of a huge-ass cache of oil in the Gulf of Mexico had to do with what happened. The TV anchor had said man’s greatest question had finally been answered. He’d promised to tell me the breaking news at five, but Mom had texted me—be home soon—from her art class and…and everything had gone dark. Then came the days of earthquakes, the sounds of people dying, no more electricity.

  And then the Raspers invaded.

  More like the Sucky Discovery.

  I still didn’t know what made some people turn into Raspers while others died. They weren’t zombies or vampires—not that I believed either existed—and there was no way for me to get any answers.

  Night descended, plunging the world into darkness. I lit a candle and cleaned up with baby wipes. God, how I wished I could take a shower and wash my hair. But the water had dried up, at least around here. I wasn’t sure about everywhere else.

  I dressed in my standard uniform—jeans, tee, gray hoodie, gun belt, and hiking boots. I was ready. I had to move on. The Raspers were closing in. First thing in the morning, I would take off on my bike to somewhere new. Somewhere with fresh water, and Rasper-free.

  I grabbed a soft, cotton blanket and wrapped it around my shoulders, then dropped onto the couch. I set my gun on the cushion and stared at the flat screen TV. It didn’t work anymore. Nothing did.

  My eyelids drooped. Maybe I could sleep, just for ten minutes. I stopped fighting and let exhaustion win the battle. Dreams of my parents, friends, school, and normal life swirled into a jumbled mosaic.

  A crash echoed outside the house, jarring me from sleep. I leapt from the couch, my mind racing as my body went on full alert.

  The next few seconds blurred together. I grabbed my gun. Blew out the candle. Slung my bag over my shoulder. Dashed to the living room wall and, keeping my back against it, forced myself to take deep breaths.

  Fully awake, I crept along the wall toward the window. I slid the blinds aside with the muzzle of the gun and peered out, but the darkness made it impossible to see anything.

  The Raspers had to be out there. Every other time I’d spotted them, they’d traveled in groups of two or three. The guy today had been an anomaly in more ways than one. The others had tracked me somehow. I shouldn’t have stayed here, but it was too late now.

  I eased my way up the wooden stairs, hugging the wall, making sure not to touch the cooking oil I’d poured down the middle. At the top, I went into the young boy’s bedroom. His laughing face smiled at me from pictures all around the house. The construction truck mural that covered one wall of his room gave me an idea.

  I crossed the carpet, placing the dump trucks and other vehicles the kid had owned all over the floor. If the Raspers made it this far, the truck obstacle course might trip them. At the very least, it would give me a warning they were close.

  Another thud resonated outside. If the buzz of everyday life still existed, I probably wouldn’t have heard it, but since silence consumed me, noises were easier to detect.

  I opened the door to the full-sized stairs that led to the attic, and stopped. A wave of stale air choked me. Without giving in to the urge to cough, I closed the door and made my way up the stairs.

  Winding my way through the maze of boxes and old furniture, I moved to the far corner by the full-sized window. I peeked out. Nothing. I doubted they’d left. Somehow, they knew I was here. I’d been an idiot to think I was safe.

  A pounding filled the air like they were outside, banging on the first floor windows. I tensed, afraid they’d break into the house any second. I crouched against the wall, my spine aligned with the corner.

  Sweat beaded along my skin. I yanked off my hoodie, tucked it in the bag, and removed an extra gun, setting it in front of my boots. My Glock weighed down my left hand.

  Silence once again blanketed the night. I yearned to know what they were doing. Why hadn’t they broken the glass and busted in? Maybe they had. Crap.

  My knees ached so I shifted my weight to the right. I counted backward from sixty over and over. A few minutes of absolute quiet ticked by, then my patience detonated.

  The Raspers wouldn’t have left. Not if they knew I was here. What the hell were they doing?

  The adrenaline started to fade and my eyelids grew heavy. I tapped the muzzle of the gun against my cheek. The metal reminded me what I had to do: survive.

  Time seemed to stand still, but only a few more counts of sixty slipped by. I was fighting a losing battle with exhaustion when the crash of glass broke the stillness. Blood roared in my ears. What had they broken? A window? The storm door?

  I checked my arsenal and readied myself.

  Random images flew through my mind. My mother’s face as she painted one of her pictures. My father’s SWAT uniform when he shoved his service Glock in my hands, then screamed at me to get in the basement. The ground shaking. Flashes of light accompanied by terror-filled screams. Days and days and days of darkness.

  There was no way I was ever hiding in a basement again. No more playing the victim.

  A thud brought me back to the current problem: Raspers coming for me.

  Seconds turned to minutes. I waited, the gun shaking in my hand. I rested my arm on my knee to steady my aim and patted the knife strapped to my calf.

  A crash and a muffled groan told me the toy obstacle course had tripped them. Shit, that meant they’d made it past the oil on the stairs. The moan of the attic door grabbed my heart and catapulted it into my throat.

  I moved to one knee, gun ready to fire.

  Two more steps then they would be visible. A sliver of light from the moon cut through the window, illuminating the target area. I wanted to scream and run, but it would just attract more Raspers. My bladder threatened to release.

  A shadow reached the top of the stairs.

  I brought up my right hand and steadied my left.

  A figure stepped onto the attic floor.

  I bit my lip, then squeezed the trigger.

  2

  My ears rang from the shot, and a pain-laced shout filled the room.

  “Son of a…”

  I heard the words, but they didn’t process. The Rasper should be dead. How had I missed? A male figure took a few steps forward. I raised my gun.

  “For God’s sake, don’t shoot me again.” The guy clutched his left hand to his upper right arm. “I’m not one of them.” He continued his slow shuffle.

  “Stop.” I pressed my back tight to the wall and aimed the gun at his chest. “You’d better stop if you don’t want to die. I won’t miss a second time.”

  “Please listen to me. Listen to my breathing. It’s different from them. We don’t wheeze like they do. I know you’ve heard them.”

  I did know the wretched sound, but he gasped in pain and it was difficult to be sure.

  He took another step closer. My weapon wavered. Everything I knew told me to shoot again and not take the risk. Raspers were tricky. But damn it, he was right. He didn’t sound like the bastards. Their breathing resembled a death rattle, like any minute they would take their last gasp. Not that I’d ever been lucky enough to have one of them stop because they ran out of air.

  “Who are you?” I needed to see the color of his skin to be sure. I reached into my bag and pulled out the flashlight, but I kept the gun trained on him. Deep down I wanted him to be a normal guy. The last human I’d seen was my dad and that had been four months ago.

  The guy sighed. “Adam. My name is Adam Solomon. Yours?” His words were forced and clipped.

  I shined the light on his face and he shielded his eyes with his hand. He looked to be about my age. And his skin didn’t look yellow. He seemed normal. Well, except f
or the blood oozing down his arm. Had I just shot—grazed hopefully—another human? No. I couldn’t have. Wouldn’t have.

  “I’m Val.” That sounded so stupid. I know I just shot you, but let me introduce myself as you bleed out.

  “Please, Val. Help me.” He slumped to the floor, knocking into cardboard boxes.

  I lowered the gun, but tightened my grip on the flashlight. Before all this happened, I trusted everyone and would be the first to help someone with a problem. That’s how my parents raised me, but the last few months changed me. Toughened me. Hardened me. I’ve done things I never thought I’d ever do. Rule Number One—Trust No One. It was the key to my survival. Since the Raspers seemed to be developing, this could still be a trap. If I were smart, I would finish him off now. It was the safest option. It could be the difference between living and dying.

  But could I kill a wounded guy? I could if it was me or him, but I didn’t know if I could do it in cold blood.

  “Uh, hello, don’t worry about me. I’m doing great.” The sarcasm didn’t cover the pain in his voice.

  Sarcasm. Raspers didn’t use sarcasm. Their speech pattern came across more staccato, almost formal, like English wasn’t their native language. With every passing second, I doubted he was my enemy more and more.

  And I’d shot him. Great.

  “Answer this first. Why are you here? What do you want?” I pointed the gun at him just in case he was playing me.

  “I. Followed. You.”

  I hadn’t imagined someone watching me earlier. A small comfort, but I should have seen him. “Why?”

  “Because…you’re not one of them.”

  My heart skipped a beat. My rational side told me to hug him. But the side that had become less and less rational wanted me to run. Now.

  Adam sat bathed in a shaft of light from the window, his shirt stained crimson. I lowered the gun again and shoved it into the holster. Before I could stop it, a crazy sounding giggle escaped from my lips. I was probably stupid for putting my gun away.

  “Can you stand?”

  He nodded. “I think so.” His voice seemed forced and blood soaked his arm.

  I pulled a T-shirt out of my bag. “Let go of your arm for a second.”

  He stared at me and then lifted his hand, allowing me time to press the shirt onto his wound. It looked nasty in the faint light. He needed a doctor and I was anything but.

  “Hold it there.”

  I helped him stand and then directed him down the stairs to the kitchen, where I pulled out a chair. “Here, sit.” I lit three candles to provide enough light, but not so much as to draw the attention of a Rasper, and double-checked his skin. No yellow tinge. “How did you get in?”

  “Back door. I broke the little window, unlocked the door, and tripped over the wire.” He wobbled to the right and I hoped he wouldn’t fall off the chair.

  “Why did you make so much noise breaking in? You could’ve just knocked.”

  “The damn things were after me.”

  “They’re out there? Right now?” I ran to the door, relocked it, and stared, but couldn’t make out anything in the darkness. I brushed my palm across the butt of the Glock.

  “I think I lost them. I knew you were here. I thought I’d be safe, not get shot.”

  “Your own damn fault. You shouldn’t have broken in.”

  He glared at me like he wanted to scream about how much it hurt, but was too much of a dude to do it.

  I took out my first aid supplies. The bullet had grazed the top of his arm above his bicep, destroying the sleeve of his black T-shirt in the process. Blood oozed from the wound and stained his skin. My first thought was to stitch it up, but there wasn’t anything to pull together, and besides, I didn’t have a sewing kit.

  His gaze shifted from the calendar on the wall to the bottle of saline in my hand. “What are you going to do with that?” Droplets of sweat ran down his face.

  “I’m going to clean your wound so you don’t get an infection. I’m sure this will sting like hell, though.”

  “What?” He shielded his bloody upper arm with the palm of his hand.

  “It’s got to be cleaned before I bandage it.”

  Adam’s eyes widened. In the flickering light, I caught how green they were and how his dark brown hair grazed the top of his shoulders. Despite his pasty skin—thanks to my bullet wound—he was more attractive than I’d first thought.

  I set the saline down and removed gauze from my kit. He tracked my movements as I took out a pair of stainless steel scissors. “Do you have another shirt?”

  “Why?”

  “Because I’m going to cut this one off you.” I opened and closed the scissors. I could do this. Or so I hoped.

  “Yeah, okay.” He said the words, but the blank look on his face told me otherwise.

  Why didn’t he have any supplies?

  I stepped closer to him. So close, only inches separated our bodies. He could have a knife. He still might want to hurt me. I brought the scissors to his faded cotton T-shirt and my hand trembled. I was too close. I backed up, thrust my hand behind my back, and shook my fingers a few times, but I couldn’t get the nervousness to release its grip on my hand.

  “What’s wrong?” His breathing was even shallower than minutes ago.

  “Nothing.” He was the first human I’d seen in forever, but I couldn’t trust him and I was more freaked out than I’d ever been. I wasn’t telling him that.

  I stepped forward, slipped the scissors into the fabric, and sliced it apart. The material fell away, revealing a super toned chest. Adam had definitely hit the gym before. God. He needed a doctor and I was checking out his muscles. What was wrong with me? Licking my lips, I stepped back from him again, grabbed the saline, and pulled the blood-soaked shirt away from his arm with a sickening rip. Yikes.

  My rules flashed repeatedly in my brain. Careful to keep a small distance so my legs didn’t touch his, I stepped closer and tipped the bottle toward his wound.

  “Okay, well, here we go.” I could do this. I chewed on my lower lip and poured the saline onto his bloody skin.

  Adam grimaced and grabbed the side of the chair. His face paled to the chalky whiteness of a corpse.

  I blew a wayward strand of hair out of my face and kept pouring. He looked on the verge of passing out. Leaning closer, I tried to see if I had cleaned it enough. More blood seeped out of the angry bullet track and onto my hand.

  “Hang on. I almost have it cleaned.” At least I hoped I did. A little more, then I dabbed the wound with gauze until the bleeding stopped. Heat flared from his skin. It was hot. Too hot. He couldn’t have an infection yet. Could he?

  Adam’s eyes glazed over. He was going to pass out. I lightly slapped his cheek.

  His head lolled to the side, but he straightened. “Damn, that hurt.”

  After setting the saline back down on the table, I held up a tube of ointment. “This might burn like a bitch.”

  I spread the cream on his jagged wound, making him wince and close his eyes. I bandaged him with gauze and wrapped surgical tape around his arm. When I was done, I eyed my handiwork. Not bad for my first time playing doctor.

  “All right. I’m done. Hopefully, you won’t get an infection.” I took a step toward my stash of bottled water to rinse his blood from my hands.

  Adam looked at the bandage.

  “If you want, you can sleep on the couch in there. It will be daylight in about an hour. Once you rest, you can head out.”

  “Val?”

  I stopped and faced him. Our eyes met. Pain—and something else—flashed across his face.

  “What?”

  “Thanks.”

  “For what? Shooting you?” Maybe being alone had made him a little crazy too.

  He blinked back at me. Had he gone into shock? What had Mr. Cheeves said in health class about the signs of shock? Clammy hands? I couldn’t remember.

  He stood and teetered as if he was trying to walk a tightrope. I stepped
forward, but he held up his hand. “What I meant to say was, thanks for not killing me.” He stared at my arm.

  I stuck my hand over my stomach. “Are you feeling okay?”

  He tilted his head to read my rules. “Why did you write that on your arm?”

  I rubbed my hand across my arm. A smear of his blood marred the words. I cringed. I had to wash my hands. “Why?”

  He shrugged. When he winced, I could tell pain had shot through his arm. “You have to trust some people.”

  “No, I don’t. Until you stalked me, I didn’t even know anyone normal still existed. I mean I hoped, but…” I clamped my mouth shut and glanced away from his talk-to-me-I’m-a-good-listener face. I grabbed a package of wipes and scrubbed until my skin was raw, but clean.

  “You’re not alone. There are more of us who have survived.” He took a step closer.

  “Then what are you doing here? Why aren’t you with them? Where are they?” I fired the questions at him, but my brain lobbed conflicting messages when he didn’t answer right away.

  It made me dizzy to process what he said. Other people lived. Normal people. Not just Raspers. No.

  I’d been alone for months. Yet, he stood in front of me telling me everything I believed true was false. Maybe it was all a trick. Trust no one. The rule was Number One for a reason. Maybe I’d seen too many scary shows—that is, when television had worked—but I didn’t take chances. Not anymore. A part of me wanted to believe him. Part of me wanted to fall into his strong arms and cry. I wanted to trust him, but my brain resisted the idea. Had I really and truly thought I was the only one? Maybe my mom might still be alive…