by Tara Brown
My feet spring off the damp ground as I push my legs harder and harder. Branches whip past me as my eyes strain to see ahead to plan the route while my legs swiftly carry me.
My fingers claw as I climb the mountainous ridge, springing from each step and jumping to catch myself on the next piece of mountain. I wish my dad could see me now. He always hated how slow I could get when it came to heights. But now they don't bother me.
Nothing does.
I scramble up the mountainside until I'm at the plateau I need. Then I spin and stare, desperate to see my family below.
I scan the streets from the gate into the city, following the path I think they’d take. My eyes burn but somehow the focus sharpens and I'm able to see a little clearer. They are walking next to a golf cart with a flashing light, Kyle hugging Joey and helping her walk. She's sobbing into him, her entire face buried.
Tears flood my eyes but they block the view so I force them out and wipe them away. They walk for an eternity, slowly crossing the city with the weird golf cart.
I try to hear them but I can't, not a sound. I just barely see them as they turn into an older neighborhood. I don't know Boulder well but the houses and area don't appear too beaten up.
The man on the golf cart leads them to the door, opens it, and gives them the key. He welcomes them and offers a couple of bags of what appears to be food.
They shake hands and disappear into the house.
It's a cold view for a moment, my family gone into the dark house.
But then lights begin to flick on, dim lights.
And I see them again. Joey and the Littles are in a window on the second floor, she gripping her Old Kitty and staring like she did when Dad was on mission. We used to tell her he wasn't so far; he was under the same sky as she was.
My heart is in pieces and I suspect the nanobots can't fix what's aching.
Watching the house, like I’m watching over them, loses its charm after a few hours.
The sun is long gone, the sky is dark, and the lights of the little city create a glow that suggests the safety is real. They’re safe. It’s me that's in danger.
And there’s nothing on the side of the mountain to protect or sustain me. I have to leave.
Survival, and possibly the nanobots, forces me to get up and climb back down the mountain. My eyes draw to the city and the lights where my family is.
I can’t fight the need to see them, be with them, hold my sister, kiss Kyle.
I wish I was stronger, more like my dad. He left us all the time, he never looked back. He never stressed about it. He did his job.
I’m heartsick and thinking about a boy, like a dumb girl.
By the time I get back to the motel, they’re gone.
I close my eyes, listening, panicking a little until I hear heartbeats. One calm one, one rapid one, and one in the middle. It’s coming from one of the rooms so I sneak up the gravel path to the door, listening for a moment before tapping lightly.
“Lou?” Lee rips the door open. Her face is glowing with worry and possible exertion.
Furgus pushes her over and jumps me. I hold him close, letting him rub against me and nudge me. His need to nudge someone now that Joey’s gone is intense.
“They okay?” Harold asks from the bed where he sits calmly.
“Yeah, they just walked them to a house and gave them the keys and some food and left them alone. I honestly thought it was a trap or something, but you’re right. It’s legit. How is this even possible?”
“Building numbers. They saw those two strapping boys and knew they couldn't turn them away. Not to mention Erin, she’s got a look about her. The kind—well, she’s also a desirable citizen.” His cheeks flush as he avoids my gaze.
“Well, if any of them thinks Erin’s anything but a savage ass bitch, they’re going to learn it the hard way.” Lee winces. “She’s like a Venus flytrap.”
We all laugh. It sounds weird, exhausted and hollow.
“We need to rest, but I don't think we should stay here.” I point in the direction I sense we need to go. “That guesthouse we passed on the way down here, we need to go there. They’ll have beds and firewood and supplies, if they’re still alive. We can probably find a vehicle in this neighborhood before we go.”
“I’m so tired, Lou. Can’t we just sleep a couple of hours?” Lee moans. Furgus nudges her, forcing her to scratch his head.
“It’s a couple of minutes drive, we’ll be sleeping in half an hour. I just don't think we should sleep here, not this close to the city.”
“I agree, Lee. We need some distance. If they come here, which they might on patrols, we’re dead.”
“No, they’re dead and we’re running again,” Lee mutters and saunters over to the door. She does look dead on her feet, but this is the right choice. I know it.
Chapter 21
Finding a car was easy, finding the guesthouse boarded up with a sign about trespassers getting shot makes the sleep thing less than easy. Except for Lee and Gus, who are passed out in the backseat.
Harold and I are wide awake, looking more like our undead brethren by the second.
“I haven’t slept in days,” Harold grumbles into the dark car.
“Yeah, me either. I’m exhausted.” I yawn but for some reason my eyes remain open. I don't know if they’re being held that way by nanobots or if this is one of my new superpowers. If it is, I’ll end up a zombie anyway.
We drive back to Nederland and Highway 72. It takes us no time at all to get back on the highway we came down on, only now we’re headed south to a destination neither of us knows of.
We start the drive south in silence. Him staring out the window as the sun rises and me blinking away the sleepiness. My body won’t let me fall asleep driving. I’m almost testing it out at this point. I can’t close my eyes.
“Is that a helicopter?” Harold asks after a minute.
“What?” I turn, confused by his question.
"There!” He points to a silver chopper in the middle of a field near a farmhouse.
“Weird,” I add because I don't know why he cares.
“Did I ever tell you about my years in Nam?” He raises an eyebrow. “All the choppers I flew?”
“Oh shit, you can fly?” I turn the Corolla sharply and pull into the driveway of the farmhouse.
“I sure can.” He hops out of the car as I stop, leaving a dust trail behind us.
The dead grass and dark weather-beaten house suggest no one’s home, but I don't like taking chances, not when Lee and Gus are with us.
The helicopter gleams in the dawn light, as if it landed a few hours ago.
"Holy shit, the keys are in her,” Harold shouts at me as I glance back at Lee.
“Wake up, Sleeping Beauty.” I nudge her.
“What?” She fights to get her eyes open. "Where are we?” she grumbles and rubs her face. Even Furgus doesn't want to get up.
“We’re about to get where we’re going a lot faster.”
“Faster?” She blinks and stares out the window. “No.” She shakes her head. “No, Lou.”
“Dude, way faster than a Corolla.” I open my door and hers, letting Gus crawl over her.
“Gus!” She winces as he steps on her leg. “You weigh a ton!”
“Come on. We gotta get the dog in there.” I turn and walk after Gus who’s peeing on the leg of the helicopter. He pees longer than any dog I’ve ever seen. I didn't even notice how long dogs peed before Gus. He pees longer than humans do.
But he’s huge.
It makes sense.
With a happy doggy smile and a prance in his gait, he struts around the front of the farmhouse, sniffing the gardens.
“Come on, Gus.” I open the door to the chopper.
He tilts his head, giving me a look like maybe not, but then he does it. He gallops over and jumps in like it’s Dad’s truck and they’re going for a walk.
Lee’s harder to get inside.
“Lou, come on,” she gr
owls from the backseat of the car.
“No, let’s go. Harold has to start it, he needs us inside. Come on.” I grab her hand and drag her from the car.
“I bet this doesn't have the same safety features as the Corolla.” She bitches and climbs inside, sitting next to the dog in the backseat.
“Just go back to sleep.” I laugh and climb in.
Harold is messing with switches and doing weird things, flicking them on and off. He finally does something that sounds like the engine is trying to turn over. It coughs and struggles for a second before it starts.
I assume this means we’re about to get going, but it doesn't.
He keeps messing with things while I scan the fields. Nothing moves, just the grass. We’re alone here which is weird. Rarely have I seen places where the undead don't walk.
Finally, the helicopter jerks and I grasp the seat as Furgus whines in the back and Lee pets him nervously.
“Ready?” Harold asks.
“Ready,” I confirm. It’s a lie. I’m not ready.
“I don't want to be rude, Harold. But I don't want to die like this. So can you be super careful?” Lee asks, leaning forward. She’s never rude so I’m a bit shocked until I see her expression. She’s freaking out.
“Close your eyes and pretend you’re in a noisy massage chair.” Harold smiles back at her, reminding me of a sweet old grandpa, and winks at me. “Let’s do this.”
He’s weird.
I’m scared.
Gus is unsure.
Lee is shaking, even with her eyes closed.
The helicopter gets louder as he starts messing with it again, jerking us and lifting us slowly from the ground. He turns us a little, making my stomach do flip-flops, but the jerking and turning motion stops and noise and vibration take over.
Outside, the fields are blowing from the wind we’re making. The field gets smaller and smaller as we rise, moving forward slightly.
“There’s a bit of a breeze, we might have turbulence. But other than that, we’ll be fine,” he shouts at us.
My fingers are almost bleeding from gripping the seat so hard, but I manage to keep my self-control as we start actually lifting quite high. The ground drops and becomes so small I see the entire town of Nederland in the morning sun, including the huge body dump on the outskirts.
“Holy shit!” Harold shouts. “Is that all dead people?” He points where I’m already looking.
“I think so.” My insides ache. I can’t imagine seeing a pile of bodies like that up close. It’s horrifying enough from here.
I’m still shocked by how many died, even here in the middle of nowhere.
Even in Laurel.
We had our own bodies to clean up.
“We didn't pile them up and leave them back home. After you were taken to the city, we burned the bodies,” I mutter at Harold, realizing he can probably hear me even if I don't shout. “I didn't. I didn't help. I couldn't. I stayed up the hill, working in different ways, helping out around town. I couldn't burn corpses. Lee didn't either. Miles, Erin, and Kyle went. Mr. Milson did too. The mayor’s brilliant plan to take back Laurel. Get rid of the dead and start up the stores and businesses, pretend everything’s fine. Like a few hundred people could just suddenly start running a whole town.”
“He still wants to take back Laurel, instead of go to Boulder?” Harold asks as he turns us and we start flying away from the bodies.
“Yeah. He never mentioned the free city being so close to us. He made it sound like it was far like Washington. We heard North Dakota too. He never told us there were places we could live free of the zombies and protect our people. He was all about fixing our town.”
“Weird.”
“You were there still when he said the mail was running again, a bunch of dudes in cars taking news from town to town so everyone could assess the damage and take counts of who was alive?” I ask.
“Yeah, they rounded us up and took us shortly after that. There were only a few from our area, but you should’ve seen the ones coming in from the East with the military.” Harold shudders. “I’m fairly disappointed in everyone at this point. We’ve seen a lot of wars in our lives, a lot of racism and genocide and other disgusting ways of dehumanizing groups. I never imagined I would end up in one of those groups again.”
“Again?”
“My mother gave birth to me in a concentration camp outside Warsaw.”
“Oh my God.” I gasp as he flashes a blue mark on his wrist. It doesn't resemble numbers like I’m expecting.
“Tattooing a baby is apparently quite hard.” Harold sighs.
“I’m sorry.” I don't know what else to say. “And then you fought in the war?”
“Vietnam. We came to America after the war and I enlisted at eighteen. In 1964, I spent my first Thanksgiving away from home.” His eyes are filled with ghosts and the sort of stories ghosts star in. “My brother died there a few years later. He was taken prisoner and tortured to death.” He swallows something, maybe emotions. I know I’m struggling with them. He’s so old and frail on the outside but inside there’s fire. “I don't intend to die a prisoner, not after being born one.”
He’s right.
He’s exactly right.
I nod as my eyes glisten, threatening me with a flood.
We aren’t really different from the other humans, but they’re threatened by us. Something we can’t change. Same as we can’t change who we are. We survived something terrible, something many of their family members and friends didn't survive, and instead of being grateful, they want us dead. I don't understand why or how they could want more carnage, not after seeing things like that body pile.
Not after driving over the dead.
Not after we became the hunted.
No, they should embrace the changes in us and let us help them. We are part of them, whether they like it or not.
And like Harold, I have no intention of dying in a prison for something I didn’t do.
I didn't start this war, I didn't start the apocalypse, but if need be, I will help end it.
My bravery and my strength show their faces a little in the form of self-preservation.
I have to stay alive to get Joey and the Littles back.
I have to.
Chapter 22
A jolt wakes me from my sleep and hearing my mom screaming my name.
I gasp and spin to search for her as I come down from the dream and the weird effects dreaming about her always has on me.
The guilt I have over her death, both their deaths, will rot away with me forever.
“Lou!” Lee waves, running toward me. “Lou, come see!” She’s in the dusty sun, running on dirt, and waving her hands over her head like I’m a plane and she’s a crash survivor.
Furgus runs next to her, bounding with that sloppy dog face of his, tongue flopping to the side and all.
It’s like I’m still dreaming. They’re joyful and beaming with something in the sunlight.
Are they a mirage?
Am I in a pit?
Did we crash?
“Lou!” She gets close enough that I hear her exhales as if she were next to me.
“Yeah?” I say plainly, not shouting back.
She doesn't answer, she can’t hear me. This isn’t a dream.
“Lou, come see. It’s a ghost town, not a single friggin’ live zombie!” She’s huffing and puffing and I can’t imagine where we are. It appears desolate and dusty.
“It’s the outskirts of Vegas, and there isn’t a soul here!” She gets close enough and stops, waving me on.
“Where’s Har—”
“Weeeeeeee!” He cuts me off before his name can leave my mouth as he races by in a dune buggy of some sort, spraying dirt into the air. “Come on, Lou!”
Furgus runs to me, nuzzling and nudging me.
“Hey, buddy.” I scratch his head and let him snuggle against my stomach.
Lee jumps in the dune buggy with him and they’re off again, racing
along the hillside.
I stagger across the mound, stunned when I crest the hill. The abandoned city of Vegas is below me. There’s dirt dusting the roads and sidewalks and tumbleweeds stuck in every nook and cranny and almost every plant is brown.
The whole area is brown.
Except for the sand-colored houses that bring to mind something you’d see in Arizona.
My mouth falls open as I stare, lost and confused.
No humans move around us, except my friends and dog. Everything else reminds me of something out of a science fiction movie. The dirty hills haven’t completely reclaimed the city, but there’s a lot of cleanup that clearly isn’t happening. That and watering.
The grass that was once a lawn surrounding the houses is dry and weedy, the bushes are dead.
The dead are also an issue.
They’re everywhere, them and the birds in the sky.
Now that everyone is dust and bones, the birds are likely looking for the last bits of meat remaining.
I’ve never seen a field of bones like this before. The decayed in the mountains and wintery places lasted as bodies longer, frozen that way within a few weeks of dying.
But here, exposed to the wind and the heat and cold and animals, they’re not bodies anymore.
They’re becoming the dust I imagined for us all.
Creeping along slowly, I listen.
No heartbeats.
No dragging feet or moaning.
No survivors?
How is this possible?
How could a city as large as Vegas not have zombies or at least survivors?
The dune buggy swings around again and Harold stops. “Get in!” He grins wide.
Even Furgus is in now, riding next to Lee as though he was always meant to ride in a dune buggy.
I climb in, not thinking too much about the circumstances we find ourselves in or how odd my life has become.
I’m trying not to overthink anything as he starts it up and begins ripping through the empty city, steering to avoid the cars that aren’t in great shape and the large piles of blown debris, dirt, and bones.