Born in the Apocalypse 2: State Of Ruin (14 page)

Chapter 35

We traveled for a few hours that first day, then I spotted a farm to try and spend the night in. It looked unoccupied, and I didn’t see any evidence that anyone had lived there for a while. There was no garden, no windmill, and no trampled grass from livestock or people. It was just a lonely home in the middle of a lonely stretch of land. There was a small pond situated near the home, and I could see a small slide on a platform floating in the middle of it. It was kind of sad to think that once upon a time that pond was a place kids played and enjoyed their summers.

Getting to the farm was pretty easy; we just left the highway and walked down a hill. I had found that the highway had a fence running along for most of the way, but the fences dropped away around bridges and overpasses. There were a lot of corpses along the fences, Trippers that got themselves stuck and eventually the elements did them in. God knows how long that took, given what was needed to kill them in the first place. In my imagination, I saw hundreds of Trippers stuck in the fence, then lightning struck, scrambling whatever circuit they had left in their brains permanently.

The house was in decent shape. It looked like it had been abandoned somewhat recently, although I wasn’t much of a judge of such things. The interior was a little dusty, but there wasn’t any sign of struggle. I wondered if this family had moved south to be with the communities I had found.

I put Judy up in the large outbuilding behind the house. It wasn’t a barn, technically, but it was large enough for a few horses. I managed to pull in some grass for her and fill a small bucket with water from the pond.

For the remainder of the day, I just cleaned my guns, sharpened my knife, and tended to my bow and arrows. From the porch of the house, I could see for miles in any direction, and didn’t see any threats. I went to sleep in a small bedroom overlooking the farm’s yard.

I awoke with a start, staring into a leering face.

“Morning, sunshine!” The face pulled back to be replaced with a fist headed towards my nose.

I jerked my head to the side, and within the same movement, I drew my knife from its sheath, slashing the intruder across the chest with the blade. The knife was sharp enough to cut deep, and I was pretty sure I felt the knife scrape the bone of a couple ribs.

The man drew back with a scream, staring down at the blood pouring out of the huge cut across his chest. He fell to his knees as I scrambled out of bed, looking for more threats. The man grasped his chest and tried to pull a gun out of his belt, but I moved faster. I literally slapped him across the throat with my knife, opening him up a second time. The man gurgled as blood poured into his lungs, choking him. He fell over and died as the life drained out of him all over the floor.

I flipped my gun belt around my hips and grabbed up my rifle. I went to the windows and looked outside. Four more men were out there, mounted and waiting. I cursed when I recognized one of the men. It was Mort Piker.

I stayed back in the house to avoid being seen, but there was no way to get downstairs safely. If they decided to burn the place, I was in serious trouble. I had to get out and get out now.

I went to the back of the house and looked out the windows. The porch roof was under the windows here, so that would have to do. I slipped out the window, moved lightly across the roof, then dropped to the ground. I stepped away from the house backwards to be able to see both sides, but no one heard me and no one was coming.

So far, so good. I had a thousand questions running through my head. Why in hell was Mort Piker here, of all places? It made no sense that he might have trailed me down here. Was he looking for revenge? I would have thought he’d have learned his lesson and let well enough alone when I got away from him the last time.

I wasn’t looking for a fight right now; I actually had something to live for and look forward to. The thought of Mort Piker being here started a small seed of anger that sprouted into a full-blown rage the longer I thought about it.

I slipped into the tall weeds that surrounded the house and kept going back, making sure the house screened my movements. I could hear some shouting and then there was a long pause. I didn’t hear anything else as I moved around, staying low to the ground. I was trying to circle around them, and try and take them from the rear, as surprise usually won the day.

As I moved, I cursed myself for sleeping so soundly, or for thinking I was safe anywhere. I should have bunked out in the outbuilding with Judy; she would have alerted me to anyone coming near.

As soon as I thought about Judy, I suddenly got worried. I wouldn’t put it past Mort to kill my horse in revenge for me killing his man. I moved faster, staying low and hoping that I judged the distance right.

I heard more shouting now; this time, it was angry and demanding.

“Andrews! I know you’re in there! I don’t know what you did with my man, but you’d better get out here before I set fire to the building where your horse is! You want her to burn? Show yourself!” Mort shouted.

I could hear him clearly to my right, which meant I had gotten behind them. I stood slowly, coming up with my rifle raised. Three of the men were on their horses still, while a fourth was doing something over by the outbuilding that housed Judy. I could hear her whinnying, being upset over the voices she was hearing outside.

“Have it your way, Andrews! Light her up!” Piker shouted.

The man over by the building struck a match, and was holding it to a bottle that held some kind of fluid. I aimed at him first and fired.

I didn’t bother to see where I placed my shot, I just saw him go down out of the corner of my eye as I shifted my aim to the men on the horses. They were twisting around and bringing up their guns. I fired rapidly, sending shot after shot into the men who had tracked me, who would kill me and my horse without a second thought.

All three men went down, but not after a couple got shots off.  One bullet flew past my face while I felt another tug at my arm, and their horses ran off a few paces. I didn’t know if I had killed anyone or if they had ducked for cover. I went down to one knee and fumbled rounds out of my pocket and into the magazine tube of my rifle. When I had refilled it, I got up again and went forward, keeping my sights on the men on the ground.

I went over to the man by the outbuilding first and one look showed me he was done. The bullet had entered his chest and exited his back, and if the wound hadn’t killed him, then the amount of blood he had lost surely had.

Three men lay on the ground, and only one was moving. I went over to them and saw two were dead, and the third one was one his way. It was Mort Piker, and he was trying to hold closed a wound in his side. Another wound was in his chest, high up.

“God damn you!” Mort cursed quietly. “God damn you!”

I knelt down next to him. I looked over the wound and saw that there was nothing I could do.

“Why? Why did you hunt me? I was far away. None of this was necessary,” I said.

Mort lay back and stared at the sky.  “You shamed me, made me look weak in front of my men. You killed my men,” Mort whispered. “Swore to kill you.”

I shook my head. “Stupid reason to get yourself killed,” I said. “I was done with you, never wanting to set foot in your territory again.” It didn’t make sense to me, to track someone so far just for revenge.

Chapter 35

Mort sighed, and I saw he was gone. I left him there as I rounded up the horses. I let Judy out and the five of them got used to each other. I went through their packs and found several things I could use. I put their guns in one pack on one horse and the usable supplies on another. I let another horse carry my supplies, since Judy could use the break.

I rode out with a string of horses behind me. They fell in line pretty well, but the travel was a little slower. I had to stop more often, and as the day went on, I had a bit of a time figuring out what the heck I was going to do with them. Trying to find a place for one horse was tough enough. Finding food and water for five more was a tall order.

I was reluctant to give them up since horses were valuable, but the more I thought about it, the more I figured maybe the best thing to do was to strip them of their tack and set them free.

I got off Judy and began taking the saddles and bags off the horses. I took them one by one to the other side of the fence by the road, where there was plenty of grass and water. I saved one to use as a packhorse, since I seemed to be accumulating more stuff than I could carry on Judy. She was a young horse, maybe two or three years old. She stayed close to Judy even off the rope, so I figured she’d be a good companion. She was light tan color, with a star of white on her forehead. Her mane and tail were a darker brown, and she was a good walker. I decided to call her Missy. Not for any particular reason could I tell you, but that was the first name that popped into my head. She seemed like she would be named that.

We moved on and the horses I had freed followed for a time before drifting off. I didn’t worry too much about them. Trippers wouldn’t bother them and anyone finding them would keep them safe.

We kept walking, and worked our way up I-57. It was about as uneventful as I could hope for, at least for the time being. I had looked at my map and knew there were at least two large towns that would present interesting problems. I was a little concerned about how Missy would handle a Tripper. I knew Judy would kick the hell out of them if she didn’t just ignore them, but Missy was a different animal. She wasn’t as old or as wise as Judy, and I wondered if the older girl would teach the younger one how to behave. God knows Judy never listened to
me.

We passed Johnston City without incident, but from my vantage point, I could see that the city had been hard hit. There were cars wrecked all over the place and several buildings had scorch marks. By the look of things, the Trippers had had their way with this place and turned it upside down.

“Hello, who’s this?” I asked, speaking to no one in particular. Up the road, a lone man was walking towards us. He shuffled a bit to the side, and by the way Judy’s ears had gone up, I knew it was a Tripper. I reached back to grab my bow when Missy suddenly went a little nuts. She pulled at her lead rope and I had the option to either let her go or get pulled off Judy. I decided to let her go and she ran forward, charging the Tripper.

Missy plowed into the man, knocking him off his feet and propelling him backwards. She jumped towards the fallen Tripper and landed on him with both front hooves. She quite literally pounded him to pulp.

When the Tripper was quite dead, Missy trotted back to us like nothing had happened. I took up her lead rope again and we started forward.

“Good girl,” I said. Judy had nothing to say on the matter. I made sure we walked through some heavy grass to clear her hooves of the Tripper’s blood as we moved past the town.

The day wore on and we kept moving. The next big city in our way was West Frankfort, and I figured we would likely leave the highway and head a little ways around the city to keep out of the way of any Trippers that might still be in the area. I was actually stunned I hadn’t seen more, but I wasn’t about to argue the point.

Around evening, I figured it was time to find a place for the night. We climbed off the road and onto a small bridge that crossed I-57. I wasn’t looking for anything fancy, just a place to spend the night.

The first place we saw had a collapsed roof, which was of no use to anybody. The second looked all right, being a small ranch house with an attached garage. I walked the horses around the yard and house, and when Missy didn’t seem agitated, I figured it would be safe enough to enter.

We settled in for the evening, and after the horses were put up, I circled the house and used a branch to sweep over our tracks. I wanted to make sure if anyone
else
was tracking me for any reason, they would have a hard time finding us.

I made sure the doors on the house were locked and I found a small room to lock myself in. I was tired of being surprised.

Chapter 36

In the morning, I checked around and saw a couple sets of footprints in the grass around the house. I was surrounded by deep weeds, tall grasses, and trees. But I knew somewhere out there was a Tripper at best, a looter at worst. I checked on the horses and they were glad to get out of their confinement to taste the grass outside.

I took my bow and climbed up onto the roof to have a look around. If I could see the trail, I might have an idea as to where they went, and more importantly, who they were.

Up on the roof, my view didn’t improve much of the surrounding area, but I could see that someone had walked around the house and then went into the woods. There were no trails towards the garage where the horses were, so that told me this was a Tripper.

Easy enough to call out. I began to sing a song, one I had heard my father singing many times. It was a song about sailing away, and love lost. I liked it well enough, and it worked most of the time.

When I reached the part about looking for a woman, a Tripper stumbled out of the woods. It was a large man, wearing what looked to be a formal suit of some kind. His face was red from blotches, and his eyes were deep and dark. He swiveled his head back and forth, looking for a threat, and I whistled once to get him to look up.

As soon as he did, I put an arrow into his eye, killing him. I dropped down to the ground to retrieve my arrow when another Tripper came out of the woods. This one was shorter than the original, but he was faster. I didn’t have time to get my arrow up, so I tossed my bow to the side and pulled my knife. I didn’t want to risk a shot with my gun so I waited with my knife. When the Tripper raged towards me, I lunged suddenly, driving the knife into its eye. The bone crunched underneath as the steel punched through to the brain. His hands gripped my shirt briefly as he fell, then let go as he left this world.

I kicked him loose and waited for a moment, trying to hear anything else coming through the weeds. After about ten minutes, I figured we’d seen the last of them for now, and I also figured we’d be moving on shortly.

We hit the road an hour later and I was glad to be moving again. The horses seemed to want to be moving as well. As we went, the miles dropped away and I spent as much time walking as I did riding.

The highway was empty, save for the occasional car abandoned by the roadside. The miles walked their way behind us as we moved from sunrise to sunset. The worst thing I saw in two weeks of travel was a dead dog on the side of the road. In the distance from the road, I saw several farms that looked like they were occupied. I saw many that had livestock in the yards, and one even had sheep.

I found homes and businesses to spend the night in and had no trouble whatsoever. I began to wonder about the Trippers and where they might be. If I had to place a guess, I would think that my easy days were about over. On the other hand, I could look forward to easy travel when I came this way again.

By the end of the third week, I was approaching the outskirts of Champaign, and by the map I referenced, there was supposed to be over eighty thousand people who once lived there. Using the Tripper math Kim had taught me, which was take the general population, divide it by half, divide it by half again, and you may have the number of people who survived. In this case, it was twenty thousand, but when you added in attacks, you had to figure a ten percent survival rate. So if my numbers were right, I was looking at over seventy-six thousand Trippers somewhere in the near vicinity.

I kept the thought in my head that a lot of time had passed and the Trippers may have moved on to greener pastures. Then again, they may have decided they liked each other’s company and stuck around to wait for a dumb traveler with two horses.