Ashen Winter

by Mike Mullin

  “You want to test fire one out the window?” I forced the shifter left and down for first gear, lifted off the clutch, and promptly stalled the truck again.

  Ben ignored my question, continuing to reload the shotgun.

  “He doesn’t shoot guns,” Alyssa said while I restarted the truck. “We took him to a rifle range for his tenth birthday. He was already into all things military then. He fired a .22, put it down, and left the range. He doesn’t like the noise.”

  “That’s . . . different.” I stalled the truck once more before I got it in first. Then I pulled out too fast and nearly ran over the corpse we’d left lying in the road.

  At last we were rolling down the road away from Anamosa—south, I thought. We’d made it away before Clevis could send a search party from the prison—though if the Peckerwoods sent anyone after us, it would be more like a search-and-destroy party. Ben put the shotgun back in the footwell. He rolled down his window and peered out, twisting his head to look behind us.

  “Is that shotgun safetied?” I asked.

  Ben didn’t say anything. I glanced at Alyssa. “How should I know?” she said.

  “Find out, would you?” I tried to shift into second gear and stalled the truck again. “God—”

  “Don’t cuss around Ben,” Alyssa interrupted. “He doesn’t like it.” She turned back toward Ben while I restarted the truck. “You remember your social interactions class, Ben?”

  He didn’t respond.

  “What are you supposed to do when someone asks you a question?”

  “I am supposed to choose an appropriate response.”

  “And what did Alex just ask you?”

  “Alex asked me whether I safetied the Remington 870 shotgun. I always check the safety before I handle any weapon. I always check the safety when I set a weapon down or pass it to someone else. I never disengage a weapon’s safety.”

  “That’s good.” I’d gotten the truck restarted, even managed to put it into second gear. Ben was hanging his head out the window. “Would you close the window, please?” I asked. “I’m cold.”

  Ben pulled in his head and started rolling up his window. “The deuce-and-a-half behind us is an A3, remanufactured under the extended service program between 1994 and 1999.”

  “Wait, you mean our deuce-and-a-half, right?”

  “No, the truck in which I am riding is an A2 with the multifuel feature and a manual transmission.”

  I cranked my window down and adjusted the mirror. A truck was racing toward us, gaining far too fast.

  Chapter 51

  “There’s a truck behind us!” I yelled.

  “I told you about the truck,” Ben said.

  “Is it the Peckerwoods?” Alyssa asked, craning her neck.

  “Who else could it be?” I said.

  “You should have killed Clevis.”

  She was probably right. I just grunted. The truck was whining loudly—I had crushed the pedal to the floor, but we weren’t going very fast. I pushed in the clutch and tried to shift to third. My hands shook from the adrenaline, and I wasn’t used to the shifter. I stalled the truck.

  “What’d you do that for?” Alyssa yelled.

  “I was trying to go faster!” I said, frantically groping at the starter button. Ben started a monotone moan. He was curled over, hugging his knees and rocking gently back and forth.

  Just as I got the truck restarted, there was a colossal crash as our pursuers rammed us. I was thrown against the wheel. The truck lurched forward, and at the same moment I threw it into gear and jammed my foot down on the accelerator.

  Alyssa started screaming, a high-pitched screech that was in no way helpful to our predicament. Ben’s moan grew in volume until they were making a cacophonous tenor/soprano duet.

  I glanced in the mirror just in time to brace myself as the deuce slammed into our rear end again. Instead of falling back to ram us again, they started to come around. I swerved, temporarily blocking them. But I couldn’t block them forever, and I couldn’t outrun them—I wasn’t a good enough driver. They were like a cat playing with a particularly inept mouse. Unless something changed, things didn’t look good for the mouse.

  “Give me the shotgun!” I shouted.

  Alyssa kept screaming, her hands up around her ears.

  I couldn’t see the truck in my mirrors, and the passenger-side mirror wasn’t adjusted right. I figured it must be on our right. I cranked the wheel over hard and heard a satisfying crunch. But seconds later, they reappeared in my left-hand mirror, still coming on strong.

  “Give me the shotgun!” I repeated. Alyssa didn’t respond.

  In desperation, I reached out and slapped her, hoping to shock her out of her hysteria. It was an awkward, backhanded slap since she was sitting right next to me and my right arm was stiff from the crash. I’d never laid a hand on a girl before—then again, I’d never been in a race to escape cannibals before, either.

  The truck was almost alongside us now. “Shotgun!” I yelled.

  Alyssa reached into the passenger footwell, pulled the shotgun out from under Ben’s feet, and passed it to me. My hand had left a pink imprint on her cheek.

  “Take the wheel!” I shouted. Alyssa gave me a blank look, so I grabbed her left hand and put it on the wheel. I flicked off the shotgun’s safety and twisted to aim out my open window.

  I was too short. My foot came off the gas pedal and our truck slowed. I squeezed the trigger as the Peckerwoods’ truck rocketed past us. The shotgun boomed, kicking me backward, completely missing the tire I’d been aiming at. On the plus side, the guy shooting his pistol at me from the other truck missed just as badly.

  My shoulder burned like it had been kicked by a billy goat. I could barely move my right arm. We were rolling ever slower, and the Peckerwoods’ truck was at least one hundred feet ahead of us. I transferred the shotgun to my left shoulder, holding it awkwardly, and leaned out the window. Would a shotgun even work at this range? I wasn’t sure. I lined it up on the back of the truck and squeezed the trigger left-handed.

  The kick knocked the shotgun right out of my hand. It clanged against the running board and fell to the icy road. I swiveled my head just in time to see it disappear behind us.

  “Crap!” I yelled. The Peckerwoods’ truck had come to a halt ahead of us. They were turning around, but the space between the snow berms was far too narrow for a U-turn. Instead, they’d started a laborious three- or four-point turn.

  Instantly I knew what to do. I dropped back into the driver’s seat and mashed the gas pedal under my boot. “Brace yourselves!” I yelled as I took the wheel from Alyssa.

  I lined us up on the center of the Peckerwoods’ truck, not that we could miss—they almost filled the road. It looked like I might be able to broadside them perfectly as they worked through their turn. It was just like a physics problem I’d had in high school—when two objects collide, the one going slower absorbs most of the acceleration and gets damaged the worst. I kept the pedal mashed to the floor.

  The guy in the passenger seat of the Peckerwoods’ truck had his pistol out, firing at me as we approached. I ducked under the dashboard. I couldn’t see a thing, but all I had to do was keep our truck straight. I heard the pop-pop of his pistol twice more.

  And then there was a tremendous crash.

  Chapter 52

  I was thrown against the steering wheel, but the lap belt kept me from flying farther. Our truck was at a dead stop. I slowly leaned back.

  The Peckerwoods’ truck was about forty feet ahead of us, upside down across the road. It was wrecked. The cover over the load bed was crushed so that the truck was tilted, its nose thrust into the air. Every window had shattered and the doors hung open. I couldn’t see any movement inside.

  Alyssa and Ben were curled over and squeezed together by their shared seat belt. “Are you okay?” I asked. Alyssa sat back. Ben’s eyes were glassed over—he looked dazed. A cut on his forehead was bleeding heavily. A trickle of blood snaked into t
he corner of his eye. He blinked twice and started screaming—howling, really—in a way I hadn’t heard since kindergarten.

  “Is he hurt really bad?” I reached toward Ben.

  Alyssa batted my hand away. “I got it. You touch him, you’ll just make it worse.” She turned back to Ben, talking to him in a calm, firm voice. “Ben, let me check your cut. I can fix it.” She was bent low but not facing him, sort of talking in his ear. She pulled off one of her gloves, balled it up, and started brushing it down his arm. He kept screaming.

  I saw movement in the Peckerwoods’ truck. The driver was hanging upside down by his seat belt. He slid out of the belt and started dragging himself through the door. He was bleeding and didn’t appear to be armed, but I didn’t want to hang around and find out for sure.

  I mashed in the clutch and pushed the starter button. The truck chugged for a moment and then roared to life.

  My right arm had frozen up. I had to reach across my lap with my left arm to operate the gearshift. I was shaking so badly that I wasn’t sure I could do it at all. Somehow I managed it without stalling the truck—maybe I was getting better at driving.

  Ben was still screaming, and Alyssa was still brushing him. “You have any bandages?” Alyssa asked.

  “There’s a first-aid kit in my backpack,” I said. She quit brushing Ben and pulled my backpack out from under the seat.

  The Peckerwood’s driver was now clear of their truck. I eased my foot onto the gas, and we slowly rolled forward. It didn’t look like our truck would fit around the wreck, but I didn’t want to turn around. For one thing, I was afraid more trucks might be headed our way from Anamosa. And for another, I didn’t know if I could manage a three-point turn.

  “Watch out,” I said to Alyssa, who was still rummaging through my backpack.

  “I found it.” She twisted and sat, clutching the plastic case that held my first-aid supplies. Ben was still screaming.

  I mashed the accelerator, racing toward the tiny gap between the wreck and the snow berm. The driver looked up in alarm and scrambled away on all fours. We struck the edge of the cab, barely registering the impact. The wrecked truck spun when we hit it, and we shot free, accelerating south away from the accident and the Peckerwoods.

  Chapter 53

  Within minutes, Ben quieted down considerably. Alyssa had a gauze pad in one hand, mopping his forehead. With the other, she was brushing him continuously with her glove. She talked to him in a patient, straightforward voice. “It’s okay. I’m going to put everything back the way it should be. You’re going to be fine.”

  “Ben’s blood belongs on the inside,” he said.

  “Yes, it does. I’m going to wrap your head up now to keep it there.” Alyssa had wiped away enough blood to expose a long cut along his forehead. She started bandaging it, using strips of medical tape to hold the wound closed and covering it all with gauze.

  We came to an intersection, and I turned left. I planned to drive east a ways then turn north, looping back to Anamosa by a different route. Once I got close, I’d head back to the prison on foot and give the truck to Alyssa and Ben. They could find their own way to Worthington. I had to keep searching for Darla.

  I squeezed the steering wheel tighter, wondering if Worthington was still even standing. Maybe Alyssa and Ben would arrive to find a town burned out and looted by the Peckerwoods.

  The truck was handling badly, pulling to the left. Or maybe I was doing it, trying to drive one-handed. I wasn’t much of a driver even when both my arms worked. The pull got steadily worse. The truck started listing to the left and making a rhythmic whap-whap-whap sound.

  “Something’s wrong,” I said. “I’ve got to stop.”

  “Okay.” Alyssa didn’t even look at me. “Does it hurt anywhere else?” she asked Ben.

  “Ankle,” he said.

  “How did you hurt your ankle?”

  “It got twisted in the straps of the backpack when we crashed,” Ben said.

  “I need to check it for you.” Alyssa ducked down into the passenger-side footwell.

  I let the truck coast to a stop and got out.

  The front left wheel well was crushed. Its edge had carved a deep groove in the tire, shredding it. Now it looked like the whole tread might fall off.

  The spare was obvious—it was attached horizontally just behind the driver’s door. I’d clung to a spare tire on a deuce like this one during my wild ride from Cascade to Anamosa. What I didn’t see was a jack.

  I’d never changed a tire before, but I’d watched my mom do it once. She’d gotten a little plastic case that held the jack out from under the spare. I looked all around the spare, even wormed under the truck on my back, but I didn’t see anything that looked like a jack. I went to look in the cab.

  Ben was stretched out on the bench seat. Alyssa bent over his left ankle.

  “How is he?” I asked.

  “His ankle is hurt. It’s swelling. I’m afraid if I take his boot off he won’t be able to get it back on.”

  “Don’t then. We might have to walk. And we’re still way too close to the wreck.”

  “I don’t know if he can walk.”

  “Wrap his ankle and foot in an Ace bandage. Over the boot. Try to immobilize it.”

  “Okay.”

  “Ben, do you know how to change the tire on this thing?”

  “Which thing does Alex mean?”

  “The truck we’re sitting in.”

  “Yes. The operator must loosen each lug nut from the damaged wheel but not remove them. Then the operator must use the hydraulic jack to raise—”

  “That’s what I want to know. Where’s the jack?”

  “In the toolbox.”

  “Where’s that?”

  Ben swung his legs off the seat and started to slide out of the truck. Both Alyssa and I protested, telling him not to move, but neither of us was in position to stop him. When his feet hit the road, he screamed and crumpled to the ice.

  I ran around the cab, ignoring the pain of my bruised right leg, but by the time I got there, Alyssa was already helping him up. Or rather, he was helping himself up, using Alyssa’s shoulder for support. She barely touched him.

  “Ben’s ankle is not functioning properly,” he said.

  “No, it’s not,” Alyssa replied. “Lie down on the seat, and I’ll wrap it up for you.”

  “Where’s the toolbox?” I asked.

  “Under the operator’s door,” Ben replied as Alyssa helped him back into the cab.

  I went around to the driver’s side. There was a metal compartment that I hadn’t noticed before between the running board and the door. I twisted the handle and opened the toolbox. It was freaking empty.

  Chapter 54

  “There’s no jack,” I told Alyssa. “We have to walk.”

  “Ben can’t walk,” she whispered.

  I’d sort of known that already. But we had to get away from here somehow. Maybe I could rig some kind of stretcher using the frame from my backpack and drag Ben along. But he was a big guy.

  The engine was still running. I’d seen people driving along the shoulder of the interstate on flat tires before. They never went very fast, and Mom said it was a bad idea, but I couldn’t remember why. Whatever—if it worked at all it would beat trying to drag a gigantic teenager down the road.

  The passenger door was still open. Alyssa and Ben were busy wrapping his leg, so I limped around the cab and slammed their door myself.

  I only stalled the truck once getting it in gear. It would move on a flat tire, but not fast. The speedometer never passed ten miles per hour. Still, it was far better time than we would have made walking.

  I had to fight to keep the steering wheel straight, which was tiring using only one hand. The truck moved like it wanted to crash into the left-hand snow berm. After a while, keeping it on the road became a real test of my endurance and willpower.

  At the first intersection, I turned right. I wanted to put several turns between us and the P
eckerwoods to make us harder to follow. I planned to loop back to Anamosa and find a way to get inside the prison to look for Darla. A couple of miles down the new road, I spotted a narrow, plowed crossroad. When I let go of the wheel, the truck turned left all on its own—a brief moment of respite for my aching arm.

  The numbness in my right arm started to wear off. Not a good thing—it was replaced with what felt like eight zillion angry bees swarming under my skin, stinging and chewing my muscles to hamburger. And to top it all off, I was exhausted. I tapped my left foot, bit my lip, and suppressed a few dozen yawns—all in a monumental struggle to stay awake.

  “I can’t do this much longer,” I said.

  “I’ll watch for a place to stop,” Alyssa said.

  “I’ve got to get back to Anamosa. You drive for a while.”

  “I’ve got to take care of Ben.” She turned away from me and resumed brushing Ben and talking to him in a low voice.

  She’d already wrapped his ankle—it seemed to me that he’d be fine on his own for a while.

  The first farmstead we passed was a burned-out husk. Few of the walls were standing, let alone any part of the roof that could shelter or hide us. A few minutes after we passed it, I heard a faint clang in the distance, like a bell ringing, but I couldn’t figure out where the sound had come from.

  The second place we found was different. The driveway wasn’t plowed, but the snow had been deliberately packed down. I couldn’t make out any footprints or tell what had packed the snow—there were no tire or snowmobile tracks.

  It was a typical Iowa farm: two-story white clapboard house, red barn, three corrugated-steel grain silos, and a big metal garage that had been crushed by ash, snow, or both.

  “Stop here?” Alyssa asked.

  “We should keep going.”

  “Ben needs rest. You do, too.”

  “I don’t like it. Looks occupied. But I can’t keep driving.” I thought about suggesting we camp in the truck. But we had no good way to heat it other than running the engine, and the gas gauge had already dipped under a quarter tank. I muscled the wheel into a turn at the driveway.