Infinity's Reach (6 page)

Mr. Armstrong nodded.

“And let’s see who’s been hurt from the explosion and get them some medical help.”

While the rest of us watched helplessly, Ms. Pittman, our math teacher, arrived with something in her hands. It was a battery-powered bullhorn that she had taken from the gymnasium. She gave it to Mr. Armstrong, who suddenly realized that he had a duty to perform.

“Girls…STUDENTS! Come over here please!” Mr. Armstrong’s voice echoed across the lawn, cutting through the sense of panic that had plagued the school. The other students began walking and running over to where the five of us stood outside the administration building. He continued beckoning, and the girls continued coming in clusters of two, three and four. As they approached, it was as if just the presence of Mr. Armstrong in his suit was enough to reassure them that everything would be okay.

In the meantime, Dr. Wiseman grabbed three other teachers and disappeared into the smoke and wreckage that surrounded the helicopter. They slowly brought body after body back with them, some alive and some obviously not. They lay them out on the grass outside Miller Hall as Mr. Armstrong began talking.

“Students, I know that things look desperate, but we really don’t have any information. So let’s not start jumping to any conclusions. The first thing we need to do is get organized. Let’s organize ourselves according to year. Freshmen over here, then sophomores, juniors and seniors. Now gather into your respective groups.”

I looked for Finn and Devin, and discovered that they were once again standing aside, over by the tennis courts with Kimmy and Marcie. For a minute, I was torn between Mr. Armstrong’s direction and my loyalty to my friends. Loyalty won out, and I slunk over to where they were standing.

“Devin has a great idea!” Finn said, her face beaming. I turned to Devin, expectantly.

“My dad and I have a cabin up on Cape Cod with a sailboat,” he said. “We can go hide up there until this is all over with.”

I stared at Devin, so sure of himself, with three girls beaming behind him, then turned to Infinity.

“Finn, what about your father? It must have been pretty important if he sent someone to come get you. Don’t you think he’ll be worried?”

Infinity shook her head. “He’s too busy to worry about me.”

“What about our parents?”

Marcie and Kimmy shrugged. “My parents live in Chicago, and Kimmy’s mom is in Europe,” Marcie said. “Where are your parents, Ellie?”

I cringed. “Miami.” There was no way I could get to them, unless what had happened here was only happening here. But what had Dr. Wiseman said? I turned to Devin.

“What about what your father said, Devin? He said that the whole Eastern Seaboard was unsafe. Guys, we’re at
war
.”

Devin smirked as if he were sharing a great secret. “That’s the beauty of this. Cape Cod is secluded. No one will come looking for us there.”

“And how far away is that? Two hundred miles at least. How are we supposed to get there? Walk?”

“There must be a hundred bicycles stored in the basement of the dorm,” Infinity said. “We can ride bicycles.”

Devin shook his head, that annoying little smirk still on his face. “I have a better idea.” He gestured toward the stables that stood behind the tennis court.

“Horses,” Infinity breathed. “The school has ten of them.”

“And we will need all 10 to make it to Cape Cod. Each of us needs two so we don’t wear them out too quickly.”

We agreed to go back to our dorm rooms and gather what belongings we needed. Devin instructed us to take only what was absolutely necessary, and then meet him behind the stable in an hour. I kept an eye on what was going on on the front lawn, which was pretty much nothing. Mr. Armstrong kept waiting for someone to show up from the government to tell him what to do, and when that didn’t happen, eventually he sent two teachers off on bicycles.

In the meantime, Infinity and I gathered our stuff. I didn’t have a lot, and Finn took Devin’s word literally, leaving a lot of cool stuff behind. We packed our clothes and few personal items. Marcie and Kimmy, on the other hand, showed up with three suitcases each, looking like they were ready for the limousine to arrive. That resulted in an argument with Devin as to what was practical to take with them on a horse.

When we got that resolved, it was time to put saddles on our horses. I knew that Infinity loved horses, but I merely tolerated them, and Kimmy and Marcie were about as comfortable on a horse as they were mud wrestling. Devin was nice for once and helped them get the blankets on their horses, and then their saddles. He showed them how to cinch them tight so the saddles wouldn’t fall off, and I smiled as I knew that neither Marcie nor Kimmy would remember his instruction. Finally, we were all packed and ready to go.

Just as we got on our horses, with the spare ones on a leader behind us, the door opened. Ms. Pittman stood in the open doorway, her mouth open.

“What are you kids doing?” she asked.

In response, Devin kicked his horse in the ribs and charged through the doorway. Ms. Pittman dodged the oncoming horse and fell to the ground, letting out a little squeal as she fell. The rest of us followed Devin, and I looked down at Ms. Pittman on the ground as I passed. I worried about her being hurt, but realized that we were at the point of no return.

Devin took us down a path that led away from the front of the school and through a break in the fence in the back that I suspected he’d used many times before. It was a beautiful April morning, and if we hadn’t already seen what we had this morning, I could pretend that it was simply a day off from school, a day for a getaway with my friends.

Except that I knew the truth.

We weren’t taking a leisurely horseback ride. We weren’t even students at an exclusive private school for girls anymore.

We were refugees, running for our lives, looking for any opportunity we could find to stay alive.

We had discovered a solution to our lack of transportation. But in the back of my mind, I wondered how long our clever solution would last.
  
Back to ToC

7. howls in the night

ELLIE: EASTERN TENNESSEE: DAY 715

I paused. The night was filled with the sound of crickets and running water from the river. A pale sliver of moon jutted over the distant hills, and the stars littered the night sky.

“Go on,” Infinity urged me.

“That’s…that’s all I remember,” I muttered, feeling ashamed.

“Well, that’s a start,” Infinity said. “More will come later, I’m positive.”

“Hope so,” I said. “It got me wondering what happened to Obstinate—I mean Damien.”

“You mean, was he the one who led us to the camp with the soldiers.”

“Well yeah, but like Evangelist said, it was two years. A lot could have happened.”

“Well, you wish you could remember more. I wish I could remember anything.”

“Like you said, it’ll come,” I said. “You do remember your dad, and that’s good. I have a hard time remembering my mom and dad. Mostly just stuff from when I was little.”

My words were followed by the sound of a howl. I had heard coyotes before, but this was different. It came from something larger, and the hairs on the back of my neck stood up.

“What’s that?” Infinity said.

“Just a coyote,” I lied. “He’s probably miles away from here.”

Another howl broke the stillness, and then another, and then a third. We looked at each other through the darkness.

“That’s no coyote,” Infinity said.

“Sure it is,” I said. “I’ve heard them before lots when I went camping.”

“You said you went shopping, not camping.”

“My dad took me camping when I was little.”

Another howl soared through the air, followed by something surprising. A cough. It was the sound of a human coughing. And then a laugh.

We looked at each other again. Whoever they were, they weren’t afraid to make sound in the darkness, unlike Infinity and me. We stared at each other for a long time. Finally I broke the silence with my whisper.

“What do we do?”

I could see Infinity’s silhouette in the darkness and she didn’t move, so I could tell she was thinking. When the howls began, the first thing I had wished for was a campfire. Now I was glad we didn’t have one. The real question was who was out there, and whether they knew where we were.

“We have the advantage of a high spot,” she whispered back to me. “We lie still at the edge and look to see what we can see. If they’re coming toward us, I guess we run.”

“Run?” I repeated hoarsely. “Run where?”

Infinity shrugged and I cringed. I was liking this plan less and less.

We pulled away from our sleeping bags and slid on our bellies to the edge of the plateau where we’d camped. We looked out at the grassy slope toward the river and the forest on the other side. I tried to control my breathing so that I wouldn’t make any more noise than necessary and watched the area below.

For a long few minutes we saw nothing. Even the howling had stopped. Then Infinity pulled at my sleeve and pointed to our left at the edge of trees two hundred yards away. I saw dark shapes coming out of the trees, some looking like people standing up, while others moved on four limbs, like animals. One capered around as if it were a monkey. I watched as they left the trees and counted, ten, then fifteen, and finally nineteen figures.

“Friend or foe?” I whispered.

In response, one of them threw back his head and howled again, and two others responded in kind. One of the figures standing up made a gesture and others unhooked those on all fours from a line of some sort. Immediately, six of the shapes on all four came galloping across the grass in our direction. They covered the open ground with amazing speed. The others trotted behind.

“I don’t think they’re friends,” Infinity muttered, and slid back to the camp, away from the edge. I followed.

“What do we do?” I asked.

“We run.”

I started to stuff my sleeping bag into my backpack, but Infinity stopped me.

“Leave it.
Run
,” she hissed.

I watched as she ran off the hilltop in the opposite direction from the howling figures. I hesitated, then ran after her.

The hill had been surrounded by low green grass in the direction we had arrived from. But the backside of the hilltop was covered by scrub brush with sharp spines that came up to our waist. It was one thing to wade through the brush during the daytime, but to do it in almost total darkness while being chased was unnerving. More than once I found myself at a dead end, surrounded by heavy brush and small trees that I couldn’t get through, and had to back up and try again. After ten minutes of wading through the brush, I realized that I’d lost Infinity.

“Finn!” I hissed. “Finn!”

“Over here,” she said. I followed her voice to the left and discovered that she was standing on a levee with a raised trail that must have been used for irrigation at one time. I climbed to the top and saw only darkness on the other side.

“Thank goodness we’re out of those bushes,” I said quietly.

I was rewarded with the sound of howling again, back in the direction we’d come from, and much closer this time. Infinity shoved me and we began running again.

It was a lot easier going on the top of the levee, but a full day of hiking in our condition had worn me out. I ran as fast and as far as I could, but soon I knew I was exhausted. I looked ahead of me and saw Finn’s feet scuffling along as well. We would have to come up with another plan before they caught us.

Infinity slowed to a stop, and I stopped too. I looked ahead of us. The irrigation canal that we’d been following disappeared, the dike we were standing on dropping below our feet. Beyond, about 20 feet away, we saw that it continued. But we’d have to climb down the embankment, mixed with dirt, boulders and broken concrete, and then back up the other side.

“Finn,” I gasped. “I can’t do it. Just let them take me back to the camp.”

“I don’t think those are soldiers,” Infinity said through heavy breathing. “I think those are the crazies Flo talked about. I’m not sure what they would do with us.”

“Crazies?” I echoed. “I don’t want to know. Come on, let’s go.”

I climbed down the broken embankment with Infinity at my heels. When I got to the bottom, I saw that a small road was off to our right. Beyond that was a small sign that read: “Despond, Tenn. Pop. 322.”

“This way,” I said over my shoulder, and stumbled down the road toward the small town.

It wasn’t much of a town. Harmony had been a wide place in the road; this one didn’t even merit a wide place. What it did have was water.

The road took us up a rise, and then down the other side into a small valley. At the bottom of the hill, in the valley, was what was left of Despond. The town, as far as we could tell, had been abandoned long ago, mostly because the town’s dam had broken and flooded the valley. The road we were on dropped down into the town center and disappeared into water. I didn’t hesitate as water met road, but began wading into the darkness.