Born In The Apocalypse (11 page)

Chapter 24

The next morning I went over to Trey’s house, and together we headed out to our trap lines.  It had been a long time since we’d been out that way, so chances were anything we had caught was inedible.  But we would have to clear them out, so off we went. 

As we reached the woods, I told Trey about my mother and what she wanted to do.

“Community?” Trey said. “Man, that’s crazy.  You ever been to one of those places?”

I shook my head.  I had seen them, but never went to one.

“Dad took me over to the one out west.  Can’t remember the name, ended with a ‘fort’ or something.  Anyway, it was all rules and regulations, and sharing everything, and people walking around just scared of their own shadow.”  Trey spat in disgust. “They made us check our weapons at the gate, and they meant everything.  My little skinning knife, you know the one with the red handle?”

I only nodded, stunned at what I was hearing.

“Well, they took that and never gave it back.  When my dad demanded it back when we were leaving, the men at the gate laughed in his face.  Couldn’t do nothing about it on account of them having heavy rifles.”  Trey looked at me.  “They didn’t keep it because they needed it.  They kept it because they knew they could.  When I look back on it, I think we were lucky to have left at all.”

Well, this wasn’t what I wanted to hear to help me change my mind about leaving.  As a matter of fact, it made sure I wasn’t going anywhere.  I couldn’t imagine having the knife my father gave me taken away. 

The day seemed especially bright as we made our way up the hill towards our lines.  The grass was much lighter green than it had been, a signal that the days were going to start getting colder.  I was going to have to lay in a supply of firewood before too long, something my dad used to do.  There were a lot of things I was going to have to take up now that I was the one to take care of the house.  But my first priority was to make sure we could eat, so I was out here.

The trees were quiet this morning, only making noise with their top branches.  The wind tried to stir things up a bit more, but the trees weren’t having any of it.  These were the old guard, the ones who were old long before we got here.  My dad told me that they were likely around when the first colonists decided to rule themselves, and they were here for the big war between the states.  There was respectable space between them, and I often wondered what they whispered to each other in the night. 

A quick walk through the woods got us to our trap lines, and every single one was full.  And every single catch was inedible.  That was what I was expecting, and I hoped the carcasses didn’t scare away the game to other trails.  Trey and I worked our lines for the better part of an hour, and we reset them with new grass.  I had to repair a couple, but other than that I figured it could have been a lot worse.

On our way back, Trey and I talked about the wave.  “What did you do with yourself?” I asked, using the knife my dad gave me to slice off the tops of weeds.

“Played cards a lot, read some books, shot arrows at some fool who kept shooting them back,” Trey answered. “Same stuff as last time.”

I laughed.  “Sounds like my house, only I was more productive since I made arrows.”

“I don’t miss as much as you, so I didn’t bother,” Trey said.

I laughed again, then got sober.  “I killed my dad.”

Trey looked at me, and his big brown eyes were sincere. “Sorry about it, man.  I know it was rough.  My dad said in his eyes you were a full-growed man to do that.”

I liked that a lot, knowing Trey’s dad, who I liked a great deal, was willing to count me as an equal.  It didn’t make me feel much better, but at least it didn’t make it any worse.

On our way down we decided to make a small side trip.  Neither of us had been out and about for the last several days, so we weren’t willing to just stroll back and go inside. Trey and I decided to pay a visit to The Simpson’s to see how they made out during the wave.  We followed the road up around the hill and walked along the edge of the forest.  The brush was impassable along this stretch with huge thorn bushes dominating the edge.  Several had reached out across the road, and we were careful not to get scratched. With all the Trippers that were walking around here, the last thing I needed was to get sick because of some stupid shrub.

At the entrance to the subdivision we turned in, and immediately I wished we had gone home.  Two Trippers were under the pine trees there and started crawling out when they saw us.

“Damn, man, what are we going to do?” Trey asked, hopping from one foot to the other. 

I looked at the Trippers, and all I could feel was anger.  I was mad at them for being what they are. I was mad because they were here, and my dad wasn’t.  I don’t know what I was thinking, I just acted.  I ran over to the nearest Tripper who was still on his hands and knees.  He was a young one, maybe a few years older than I was, and he was thin, very thin in his stained t-shirt and jeans.  I kicked him in the side of his head, knocking him to the dirt.  I kneeled on his back, keeping him on the ground, and stabbed him in the back of the neck with my knife.  The point slid in with nearly no resistance, and the Tripper ceased moving immediately. 

The other infected man, a larger person wearing what looked like a formal suit, charged from the right, growling with rage.  I waited until he was nearly on top of me, and then I dove out of the way, letting him trip on the body on the ground.  He fell forward, cracking his head on the big limestone rock that once was used as a sign.  He slumped to the ground, leaving a bloody trail down the rock.  I waited for a minute, then figured he had managed to kill himself.  I shoved the blade into the ground, then wiped it off on a relatively clean part of the Tripper’s pants.

I stood up to find Trey staring at me. His mouth was open, and his knife hung loosely in his hand.

“What?” I was a little put off by his face which seemed to be a mixture of shock and awe.

“Dude, where the…I mean, damn!  How the…okay, that was pretty cool.  God, are you nuts?” Trey managed to get out.

“What?  My dad and I trained for a while; he taught me a few things.”

“Where the hell was I?” Trey asked.  “How come you didn’t invite me?”

“You were on punishment, remember?”

Trey’s cheeks flamed.  “Right.  Remember that.”

We walked around the road, keeping out of the deep grass that grew on the side of the road.  We didn’t have our bows with us, although I would have taken my Colt had I finished the holster I was making for it.  I was copying a picture from a Western book, and it was taking time for the leather to cure and harden.  I knew how to tan hides, having learned from my dad, but that made the skins soft, and I wanted the holster to be stiffer. I had told Trey about the gun already, but I was wanting to show it later.  I knew he‘d go nuts, and I wanted to enjoy that as much as possible.

As we walked, Trey and I talked about the weapons we possessed.  I had my knife, and he had his, and we each had our bows, but we really didn’t have anything that would work in a close fight. 

“We need something that would kill them out of arm’s reach from us,” Trey said.  “Something that would be quick, and I’m not talking about our bows,” he added quickly as I opened my mouth.

“Not sure what would work,” I said, stepping around a large stone.  There was a long branch in the way, and I picked it up.  For no other reason than the fact I was holding it, I threw it across the yard in an attempt to hit a small hanging sign by the house.

“Me either,”  Trey said.  We stepped past the small brick ranch house on the corner, and neither of us tried to look to hard at the small pile of bodies huddled around the front door.  There didn’t seem to be any wounds on the people, so it wasn’t easy to see if they were Trippers or squatters.  Either way, it was creepy.

The road turned slightly, curving between two large trees, and we saw the Simpson’s house.  Right away we knew something was wrong.  There were about a dozen dead Trippers in the yard, their blotchy faces marking them as clear as day.  Nearly all of them had a crossbow bolt in their heads.  That would have been the work of Lucy’s brother.  He was pretty good with his bow and was able to reload much faster than Trey ever could.

Trey and I shared a look, and we approached the house very carefully.  The front door had been broken and was hanging off of one hinge.  I stepped very carefully around a dead Tripper, trying to be as silent as possible. 

Once both of us were in, I picked up a long pole that was one the ground.  It was about four feet long and looked like it might have been the bar from a closet.  Either way, it was a little comforting to have something other than my knife.

The kitchen was a disaster, with cabinets open and items thrown all over the place.  The sink was piled high with old food and trash and covered with ants. Trey and I looked at each other again.

“You ever been in here before?” Trey whispered.

“No.” I replied. “You?”

“Nope.  Kind of messy.”

“Yeah.”

We moved towards the center hallway, and there was a body on the floor.  It was a woman, and her face was pressed into the corner.  Her right hand was up against the wall, and there was blood all over the place.  Her back had been torn apart, and her neck was one shredded wound. It looked like someone had just torn chunks out with their teeth.  Her legs were at weird angles, and one of her calves showed bite marks, too.  She must have been bitten in the leg and fell here when she tried to get away.  They sure finished her here.

“Josh, that’s Lucy’s mother,”  Trey said quietly.

“Damn,”  I said.  I didn’t say it, but I was pretty sure Lucy was not alive in here.

We stepped further back and looked into one of the bedrooms. Lucy’s brother was lying on the bed, and it was pretty obvious how he died.  He must have retreated here and tried to hold them off by shooting them with arrows, but he couldn’t reload in time.  The Trippers got hold of him and his remaining arrows and used them to kill him with.  He had four arrows sticking out of his head and about ten more coming out of his body.  I had never seen Trippers use a weapon before, so I was kind of fascinated with what they had done.  But there was nothing left here, so we moved on to the next room.

The last room on the house was Lucy’s, and we found her there. She was curled up in a little ball in the corner, and by the amount of blood around her body, she must have died relatively quick.  Her back looked caved in on one side, and Trey took a closer look.

“They just kept hitting her.  They crushed her ribs and just kept going.  Chances are they beat her until they reached her heart. They just kept hitting her.”  Treys voice shook as he stepped away from Lucy.

I just shook my head.  Another life gone.  Another life wasted to these useless animals.  I felt so helpless.  There was nothing I could have done even had I been here to help.  They just don’t stop unless you put them down the first time.

“Come on, let’s get out of here.  This place is full of infection.  If we don’t wash, we’re gonna turn,” I said, stepping out the bedroom door and getting out of the house.  I tried to sound tough, but I just wanted to leave.  There was nothing here.  It was such a waste.  They had survived twelve years, lived through a bunch of waves, outlasted the looters and would-be warlords, and went down like this.  It made as much sense to me as my father’s death.

We walked out of the house, and Trey closed the door.  It didn’t matter if he left it open or not.  Eventually it would fall to the elements or some wandering people would take what they could use.  It was the way things were now.

Chapter 25

Trey and I didn’t talk much as we walked back to our houses. We just kept our thoughts to ourselves.  When we got to my fence, we split, and Trey looked back at me one last time.  “Think I have an idea for a weapon.  I’ll work on it and let you know.”

I shrugged. “Take your time.  I’m going to head out to the trap lines day after tomorrow and start things over again.”

“See you.”

“See you.”

I went into my house and hollered to my mom I was home.  She came out of the back room and wiped her hand over her forehead. 

“Hi, Josh.  How’s your lines?”  she said.

I was a little taken aback.  Mom never asked about the lines.  “About what I had expected.  We had to clear the carcasses and reset the lines, and with any luck they’ll start producing again like before.”

“How did Trey’s family handle the wave?”

I shrugged. “’Bout the same.  They’re all okay over there.”

Mom looked at me funny.  “What’s wrong, Joshua?  You look upset.”

I looked down.  I tried to hide the tears coming down my face, but I couldn’t.  When I spoke I barely made a sound. 

“The Simpsons are dead, Mom.”

My mother came over and put her arms around me.  I threw my arms around her and cried for what might have been a long time.  I cried for Lucy, I cried for her family, and I cried for my dad.  I just couldn’t help myself.  It just came in waves. “They beat them to death; just hit them till they died,” I said.

Mom never said a word, she just held on to me, rocking slightly from side to side, and whispering ‘It’s all right Josh.  It’s not your fault.  It’s not your fault.”

She held me for a long time, and when I finally cried myself out, she sent me up to my room to rest.  She promised we would talk later, but for right now, I needed to sort it out for myself.

I went upstairs and lay down for a while.  I must have fallen asleep, because when I opened my eyes again it was close to late evening.  I went back downstairs and looked for my mom, but she wasn’t in the house.  I scanned the outside from the second floor, since I hadn’t taken down the window covers yet.  It was good practice to leave them up for a while, since Tripper waves never seemed to be limited to just one.

I didn’t see my mother, and it was becoming a worry.  She was never one for venturing too far away from the house, and she certainly wouldn’t be wandering around the woods.  I went back downstairs and went out to the small stable to look in on the horse.  I let her out of the stall, and let her wander about the yard a bit.  I was going to have to figure out what I was going to do with her since I wasn’t a very good rider, and she was another mouth to feed.  I would probably give her to Trey’s family or just let her go.  Eventually she’d find other horses and become someone else’s ride.

I went back into the house and worked on my holster.  It was going to be a cross draw job; pretty simple, but effective.  I had read all about the gunfighters in my books, and while I would love to have a rig like theirs, low on the hip and ready to go, my world was a little more realistic.  I needed to be able to sit and ride my horse and the cross draw made more sense.

Right before it got dark and we would be in for the night, I heard the back door open.  I took my Colt with me and slipped down the stairs careful to make as little noise as possible.  I didn’t have to worry; it was my mom.  She was taking off her shoes when I spoke.

“Hey, Mom. Where’d you go?” I slipped the Colt into my belt behind my back, keeping it out of sight.

“Oh! Josh!  You scared me.  Goodness.” She ran a hand over her face, and waved the other one dismissively.  “I was over to see Trey’s mom.  She and I hadn’t talked in a while.”

“Oh, okay.  I walked the horse a bit.  I’m thinking of letting her go,” I said, wondering what Mom’s reaction was going to be.  I shouldn’t have worried.

“Sounds good, Josh.  Your dad would have wanted you to do that if you weren’t going to keep her,”  Mom said.

I nodded.  “All right, well, I’m going up to bed. It’s dark and I’m tired for some reason.”

“You’ve had a tough few days,”  My mother said.  “Things will look better tomorrow.”

I wanted to believe her, but something wasn’t right about this whole situation.  My gut told me something was wrong. But I had nothing but a feeling to go on.