Away From the Sun (26 page)

“Where are we?” Gene asked, popping his neck from side-to-side.
 

Jerome looked down at his map. “A little town called Ledbetter. The nearest bigger place is Sudyka. It’s about sixty miles away.”

“Is that where we’re headed?” I asked.
 

Jerome nodded. “I was thinking we could stop here and see if there’s a place to rest and get supplies. Maybe even gas.”

“Looks empty,” Gilbert said, nodding toward the town.
 

It did look empty, though each of us knew that it probably wasn’t. There was a main street that cut through the middle of the town and several side streets with rundown shops and restaurants. It looked much like all the other places we had been over the past two years, but there was always a chance of finding gems like full tanks of gas or storerooms filled with canned goods. One time, we even stumbled upon an underground bunker that had been built for an occasion such as the outbreak. We found the owner moving around in his house up above. He apparently never made it to the bunker because he was already a greyskin. After we killed him, we used his bunker for more than a month. It was the best month I could remember. It was safe and had plenty of supplies. But with five of us, the supplies ran out, and we were forced to move on. Every time we went on trips like these, we always hoped to find another underground bunker situation, but we had never found one since.

Jerome handed each of us a small lighter and a pouch of smoke bombs, and everyone knew what it meant. It meant we were splitting up. The smoke bomb wasn’t a bomb at all. It was about the size of a cherry with a tiny string hanging out the side. When lit, it would silently let off a cloud of colorful smoke that would rise high into the air, sending the others in the group a specific message. And it was perfect because with no noise, greyskins were rarely attracted to it.

I looked through the colorful pouch. A blue smoke bomb meant that one of us had found a lot of supplies and the rest of the group needed to help them. The green smoke bombs meant that there was an excellent place for shelter—maybe not quite as awesome as the bunker, but something worth staying in for a few days at least. (The green ones were hardly used.)
 

The yellow ones told us that we needed to be cautious about the area. Usually it meant that there were greyskins nearby but they were avoidable.

Red meant that help was needed—danger. If red smoke went up, that meant the others had to get there as fast as possible because someone was trapped or about to die. The only problem with this one was that sometimes a person didn’t have time to light a smoke bomb. But if that was the case, gunshots were enough of an indication.
 

Then there was the last color code. None of us have ever used it before. We’ve never had to. But if there was a combination of red and yellow, it meant that someone was trapped, but there is no way to help. Get to the vehicle and leave.
 

Go on without me.
The thought sent chills up and down my spine.
 

All-in-all it was a pretty good way of communicating and it had worked well for us in the past. The only flaw was that it was useless at night, but when I mentioned this to Jerome, he simply said that if we were dumb enough to split up at night, we would deserve to get eaten. That made perfect sense to me.
 

We went through the town on foot. I had a knife strapped to my belt and a rifle slung over my shoulder. The others carried various sharp or blunt weapons, with guns as a secondary. My natural instinct was never to go to the knife first. I hated getting close to the greyskins, but I knew it was stupid to fire off a weapon when there could be more of the undead nearby. Guns were always a last resort.

The town, Ledbetter, was almost too small for splitting the group, but it was just big enough that we wouldn’t be able to search the entire town before day’s end if we stayed together. The buildings were dense and closed in, which I hated. The closer the buildings were together—the smaller the streets—the harder it was to see what was ahead. Every corner posed a threat. And greyskins rarely made any noise if they weren’t alerted to another presence, so walking up on one by accident was likely. The only way out of that was to strike before the greyskin could.

We didn’t get far before Jerome turned around and ordered each of us to go in different directions and meet back at the vehicles before sunset.

Jerome, Gene, and Amy all headed in their own directions. Before Gilbert could go, I reached for his hand. “I just wanted to make sure we’re good,” I said.
 

He nodded. “We’re good.”

“If I light the red and yellow, you’re going to ignore it right? You’ll come anyway?” I asked with a grin.
 

He smiled back at me. “How will I know it’s yours?”

“Because I’ll be the last one to the vehicle.”

“If you’re lighting the red
and
the yellow, then it sounds like you don’t
want
me to come and save you.”

I lifted an eyebrow. “Save me? Believe me, if I light the red
and
the yellow, you won’t want to try. I’ll be dead by the time you get there. But I fully expect you
to try.”

He let go of my hand and shook his head as he started to walk away. “Remi, if you throw up the red and yellow, I’m out of here.”

I rolled my eyes at his joke as I started to walk away.
 

Little did I know, he wasn’t joking. Not at all.
 

One Year Ago

I didn’t find anything for several hours and the sun was setting quickly. I was glad, though. I was ready to leave the crummy little town. There had been no smoke in the sky, so that was good news
and
bad. Good because no one had been attacked. Bad because no one found supplies or shelter.

I was getting sick of days like these. The endless search for food and supplies was getting to me. I wanted to be a part of a town or settlement somewhere. We had come across them before, but most of the time they wouldn’t accept newcomers. The world was too harsh to trust outsiders. Besides, most places were probably too crowded as it was. And depending on the location, we probably couldn’t have earned our keep. Most of the settlements were just biding their time until they ran out of food. Then they would have to move on too.

But at least I’m not a greyskin,
I thought to myself. It was pretty bad when to cheer myself up, I had to say ‘
at least I’m not a rotting corpse that walks around trying to eat people.’
 

The town was dirty. Piles of trash littered the streets. There were broken windows, no doubt from the looters at the beginning of this mess. It looked like it had been ransacked early on. I wish we would have known it would be like that. It made the day a big waste of time.
 

I was on the road, headed back toward the vehicles when a cloud of yellow smoke started billowing upward toward the sky. I stopped suddenly, taking note of the direction. I first hoped that it was an accident, because it was coming from the direction of the cars.
 

I was about to make a right so I could go around the entrance to the town and approach the cars from the back, but a pillar of yellow smoke wafted through the air in that direction too.
 

Now I could only go in the opposite direction, or to the left. Obviously I was going to try and get to the cars, but I stopped short when I saw red smoke.

I cursed to myself as I pulled out my knife. Someone was in trouble. The last person I had seen go in that direction was Amy. I started with a slow jog. I wanted to get there quickly, but there was no way I was going to be reckless and sprint. Anything could jump out at me. It would only take one bite or scratch and I would be a greyskin myself. I stayed sharp. We’d been in this situation before. All Amy needed was some help and we would get her out soon enough.
 

Problem was, I would be the first one there. It looked like I was probably the closest person. At the start, it would be only two against any number of greyskins. My biggest fear was that Amy might be in an impossible situation that would normally require both red
and
yellow smoke, but she would be too afraid to light both, putting the rest of us in a no-win scenario. I shook the thought from my mind as I ran forward. It didn’t matter. If there was only red smoke, then we were going to help each other.

I made it about two blocks when from out of nowhere, my ears started ringing. It was weird and annoying at first, but then it got louder and louder. It became so loud that I had to stop. I reached my hands to my ears, but nothing would stop it.

Louder.

It got so bad that I fell to my knees. It felt like someone had lit the inside of my ears on fire. All I could hear was ringing and it sent a sharp pain through my head. I almost screamed out—and maybe I did, but I couldn’t hear it.

Then, as quickly as it had come, it stopped. I opened my eyes and found myself lying in the middle of the street. Sweat dripped from my face as I looked up. My heart was beating so fast. But I could hear.
 

What was that?
I thought to myself.
 

But I was quickly distracted when I heard noises all around me. Grunts. Screams. The chomping of teeth, the growling of the greyskins. It sounded like they were right next to me. I could hear someone swinging a weapon, groaning with every attempt to take down an enemy.
 

“Where are they?” the voice asked out loud. It was Amy.
 

I called out softly. “Amy, where are you?” I looked all around, but I couldn’t see anything. It sounded like she was right next to me, but the pillar of red smoke was at least four more blocks away.
 

“No!” Amy said. “No! No!” Her cries were replaced by gargling noises. It sounded as if there were ten greyskins on top of her. The sound of chomping, struggling, the need to breathe…it was all next to me, yet I knew it was coming from where the red smoke was.
 

“She’s dead,” I said to myself. “Amy is dead.” There was no reason to go after her. If I did, I just knew that I would be killed as well.
 

I reached into the pouch that Jerome had given me and pulled out one of several yellow smoke bombs. I lit the fuse and threw it as far in Amy’s direction as possible, hoping the sight would keep the others away from the area.
 

I turned toward the opposite direction to head back, but I was stopped by more noises. I could hear the sound of quick footsteps. I turned my head slightly and I heard a scream. All of this sounded like it was right next to me. I started running away from all the smoke. It seemed that a herd was moving through the town, and we were running out of places to go. And for some reason, I could hear every detail of it.
 

I knew that going away from the cars was the right move, but it was hard to do. Somewhere behind me, I could hear voices. I tried to search them out, turning my head until I could hear them clearly.

“What happened to your leg?” I hear Gilbert ask in horror.
 

“I was bitten,” Gene answered.
 

“Me too,” Jerome said. He cursed loudly and I could hear him spit on the ground. “What about you?”

Gilbert spoke next. “I’m clean. How did this happen?”

I looked around me for a second. What was going on? Why could I hear this? It didn’t make any sense.

“There’s red and yellow in the distance,” Gilbert said.
 

“That’s where Amy was headed,” Jerome answered.
 

I could hear sobs coming from Gene. I couldn’t imagine what it felt like to know the virus was in me—to know that today was my last day.
 

It might still be,
I thought.
 

“Gene and I are going to draw the greyskins away from the vehicles,” Jerome said. “You need to take one and get out of here as soon as you can.”

“But Remi’s still out there,” Gilbert said.
 

“Probably not,” Jerome said. “We’re surrounded here. You have to go!”

I was going to listen to the rest of the conversation, but I could hear dragging footsteps coming toward me from around the corner. One quick look and I saw about a dozen greyskins trudging toward me. They were so far away that I had plenty of time to run.
 

This time I sprinted.

I felt sick. We had just lost three in our group. At least Gilbert was still alive. At least I know he will come back for me. But the sounds of all the footsteps brought doubt to my mind. Down every street, around every corner, I could hear the grunts, the teeth. I could hear the hunger of the greyskins. I was surrounded. I looked all around me. The only way out was up.
 

I ran to the closest building. It was probably five or six stories high. I prayed that there wouldn’t be any greyskins inside as I burst through the front door. I closed it behind me quickly and tried to lock it, but I couldn’t find one, so I headed straight for the stairs. I ran so fast, I felt like I was up there in two seconds. I was glad to see that there was a door at the top of the stairs, giving me access to the roof. I was counting on that. The door opened easily enough, but I was disheartened to see that there was no way for me to latch it shut. I turned my right ear toward the steps, listening for any sound of the greyskins, but it looked like I got far enough ahead of them that they never noticed I went into a building.
 

A sigh of relief passed by my lips, but the moment of triumph didn’t last long. I moved toward the edge of the building and could see the cars in the distance. There were more than a hundred greyskins surrounding the area. I wanted to throw up. When I saw Gene, Jerome, and Gilbert only a block or so from the herd, I pulled my gun forward and looked through the scope. I could hear their labored breaths, and with the scope, I could see clearly the damage that had been done. There was a large, gaping wound at Jerome’s shoulder and Gene’s leg was missing a big chunk. Gilbert still looked healthy.