What Survives of Us (Colorado Chapters Book 1) (15 page)

“We’ll be camping in the city tomorrow night,” Quinn commented.  “I figure if we make it west of Powers Boulevard, we’ll be doing good.  It’ll be slower going if we’re looking for food as we go, and water will probably be harder to find, so we’ll take as much with us as we can.  The horses are tired – I don’t want to push them too hard before we start heading up in elevation.”

They were both quiet for a while, neither one wanting to bring up what needed to be discussed.  Finally, Grace dove in.

“What if we run into more people like the Weavers?  People will be desperate – they may try to take what food we have, or take the horses.”

“I’ve been thinking about that.  If someone confronts us, I think we should run for it in opposite directions.  It might surprise them long enough for us to both get away.  How well do you know Colorado Springs?”

Just the thought of being alone in the city made her heart pound faster.  “I know parts of it, I guess.  The movie theater on Powers.  Chapel Hills Mall.  I can get to the zoo, and the World Arena.  And Memorial Park – we always go to the Balloon Classic over Labor Day weekend.”

“Okay, let’s go with Memorial Park – it’s just a few blocks south of Platte, which is what 24 turns into in the city.  So if we get separated for any reason, we’ll meet at Memorial Park, by the statue of the firefighter on the ladder.”

Grace listened as he went on, talking about making sure they both carried food and water just in case, talking about other water sources he knew of in the city, talking about finding supplemental feed for the horses.  She murmured her agreement occasionally, but mostly she drifted, not really paying attention to the content of what he was saying, comforted by the low rumble of his voice.  Had it really been just this morning that she’d woken feeling safe, secure, almost happy?  A deep foreboding chilled her, but it seemed selfish to mention it.  They both had enough on their minds without sharing imaginary fears.

Before it was full dark, they both settled into their sleeping bags.  The horses were tethered nearby – Quinn said they were better than watchdogs for letting them know if a threat was approaching – and the steady, soft whoosh of their breathing made Grace’s eyes droop.  She burrowed deeper into her sleeping bag, pulling it up around her head and burying her nose in the folds.  She could smell Buttons and the familiar and comforting scent of her own skin, and she dropped into sleep like a stone.

Grace slept dreamlessly until just before dawn, when a shout from Quinn ripped her out of sleep.  She sat up, wildly scraping her hair out of her face, hands scrabbling for a weapon, anything she could use as a weapon.  The horses were snorting and yanking on their tethers, and Buttons shrilled briefly.  Quinn shouted again, and Grace’s eyes flew to him.

He was thrashing violently, and he looked to be sound asleep.  “No, no, no, no, no!”  He muttered, then another shout:  “Gracie, no!  No!”

“Quinn!”  Grace hissed.  She fought free of her sleeping bag and scuttled to his side, dodging his flailing arms to grasp his shoulders.  She shook him hard.  “Quinn, wake up!  It’s a dream!  Just a dream!”

Quinn shot upright, and narrowly avoided slamming his forehead into Grace’s.  She lurched back, but he lunged at her.  He grabbed her arms, and his eyes raced over her, over and over again.  “Are you okay?  Are you hurt?”

“I’m fine, for heaven’s sake!”  Now that her heart was slowing, she was not appreciative of being yanked out of sleep like that.  “You must have had a nightmare.”

Quinn let her go, and rubbed his hands over his face, then into his shaggy hair.  “A bad one.  Really bad.” Before she could ask, he added, “I don’t want to talk about it.”

“Fine.”  Grace got up, stretched, then started to head around the barn to their designated “bathroom.” 

Quinn shot to his feet, nearly falling over in his frantic haste to get free of his sleeping bag.  “Wait!  Where are you going?”

Grace turned around and raised an eyebrow at him.  “Do you really want the details?”

“No, I mean…”  He hung his head, miserable, and the confident Quinn was gone, just like that.  Uncertain, self-conscious Quinn was back.  “Just don’t go far.  Be careful.  That’s all.”

Grace turned back around, disappointed and unnerved, and just plain irritated by both feelings.  “I’ll pee very, very carefully, I promise.”

They prepared breakfast in silence, and packed up camp the same way.  The horses were picking up on the strange discord between them, and shifted uneasily as they were saddled and loaded.  When they were mounted, Quinn sat silently for a
moment, staring at the mountains.  They were pink in the early dawn light, gilded along their crests with the rising sun.  Quinn turned suddenly to Grace, his face tight with anxiety.

“Let’s go back to the reservoir,” he said in a rush.  “I have a bad feeling about going on.  Let’s just…wait.”

Grace just looked at him, while Buttons shifted underneath her.  Finally, she asked, “Wait for what?”

Quinn sighed.  “I knew you’d ask that.  I don’t know.  Wait until it feels safer, I guess.  It doesn’t feel safe.”

“Nothing feels safe anymore,” Grace said quietly.  She debated whether or not to tell him about her own misgivings, her own cold foreboding.  Maybe it would be safer to wait.

             
But there was something unbearable about waiting.  Delaying the inevitable just made the inevitable harder to bear – Grace knew that for certain.  Better to forge ahead.  “I think we need to just get it over with,” she said.  “Waiting won’t change anything.  Unless we want to go a long way north or a long way south, we’ve got to go through the city.”

             
Quinn looked away again, back at the mountains, thinking.  She knew for certain he was calculating the miles against their remaining supplies, and she saw the moment he capitulated to her authority.  Without a word, he clucked Koda into motion, riding briskly towards the city.

             
Half-way between Peyton and Falcon, they crossed a north/south road that was blocked by a massive pile-up of vehicles.  Impossible to tell what had caused the accident, but the chaos had stretched for hundreds of yards on either side of the road as people attempted to go around, only to become mired in the water-soaked ground.  The same wet spring that had gifted Grace and Quinn with such abundant water on their journey had stranded these motorists.

             
They sat on the horses for a while, looking for any sign of movement or life.  There were bodies slumped in many of the vehicles; others had clearly been looted.  The line of cars, trucks and SUV’s stretched as far as they could see in both directions.

             
“Where did they all go?”  Grace whispered.  “After they got stuck here, what happened to them?  Did they continue on foot?  Or did they walk back home?”

             
“We haven’t seen anyone.  Most of ‘em headed home, I’d guess.  That’s human nature – they’d head back to what was familiar.”

             
Human nature.  Grace thought about that as they rode on, the good and the bad of it.  People could be heroic under stress, or they could be monstrous, and there didn’t seem to be any way to predict which way it would go.  Never in a million years could she have guessed the little-league-coaching Mr. Weaver would shoot at them.

They stopped only briefly for lunch.  By late afternoon, they had left the prairie behind and were riding through open spaces bordered by sprawling tracts of suburban housing.  The quiet, which had been soothing on the plains, was haunting here. There was a still quality to the silence that kept the hair on Grace’s neck prickling constantly.

The afternoon was aging into evening when they reached the junction of Powers and Woodmen.  Both roads were jammed with vehicles, and Quinn led them onto the overpass, winding between the silent cars and trucks.  On the far side of the overpass, he paused, reining Koda in and looking back at her. 

“We should start looking for a place to stay,” he said.  “According to the map, there’s a creek just west of Austin Bluffs and Woodmen, can’t remember the name of it right now and I don’t know if it runs on the surface, but…” 

His voice trailed off, and he frowned.  He looked all around them, his frown growing darker, cutting deep grooves into his face.  Suddenly, his eyes flew wide, and he stared at her in horror and terror.  “Gracie!  Ride!  Ride hard!”  He leaned over and slapped Buttons sharply on the rump.  “Go go go go!”

Buttons squealed and bolted, Grace clinging desperately as she tried to control her.  “What the hell, Quinn!”

The world around them erupted.  Booms and pops and men yelling.  Buttons jerked, then jerked again and screamed, and her front legs folded.  Grace flipped over the mustang’s head and landed on her back, skidding along the gravel at the edge of the road.  Buttons’ momentum carried her into Grace, her head plowing into Grace’s shoulder, and she struggled to sit up, struggled to breathe – why couldn’t she breathe? – and finally fought up onto one arm.  She stared down at Buttons and could not make sense of what she was seeing: blood coated Buttons’ neck and chest, and her visible eye was white and rolling.  She heaved a terrible, rattling groan just as Grace managed to suck in a breath of air.  She did not breathe again.

“Quinn!”  Grace screamed.  She tugged frantically at Buttons’ head, then ran a comforting hand down her neck and shoulder.  Her palm came away coated with blood and she stared at it, not processing, not believing, not accepting.  “Come on, girl, it was just a stumble, let’s get you up…”

Something plowed into her from behind, sending her sprawling in the gravel again.  It dug into her scalp, her cheek, her neck.  Grace smelled smoke, and sweat, and rot.  She struggled to get out from under the weight that was crushing her.  A wet mouth landed on her temple, then slid to her ear.

“Hey there, honey.”

Through the chaos, somehow, she heard Quinn.  Heard him, exactly as she’d heard him this morning, in the throes of his nightmare.  “Gracie, no!  No!”

              “Jack.”

             
Jack looked up from his attempt to tie his shoes without suffering total exhaustion.  Things were looking up; he’d made it through one whole shoe and wasn’t even breathless yet.  In the doorway, Layla was watching him analytically, her face wearing equal parts encouragement and concern.  Jack puffed his chest out with mock pride and held out his sneakered left foot.

             
“Check it out:  a 100% improvement over yesterday.”

             
Layla chuckled.  “I guess so.  Yesterday, just the socks wore you out.”  She paused.  “You don’t have to do this.  There’s no rush.  If people really need to see you, they can come here, so you can rest.”

             
“We’ve been over this.  If we’re going to survive, we need to start building a sense of community, and it needs to happen yesterday.  You said yourself that people are fearful and isolated, that they’re not responding to yours or Rowan’s requests to pull together.” 

He got his other shoe on, then paused for breath under the guise of looking at Layla earnestly.  She wasn’t fooled, he was sure.  “I’m not saying I have the magic bullet.  But if people are looking for spiritual solace, or if they’re ticked at God and they need to get angry and yell at someone, that’s a start.  If nothing else, some of them will want to show up just to see a real live survivor.  Maybe it’ll give them hope for friends or family that are far away and out of touch.”

              They had put the word out that Jack would be at his old church this afternoon, in spite of Layla’s misgivings.  He had regained his senses less than a week ago, and had only been up and around for three days.  Jack overrode her concerns with Rowan’s backing, citing his need to reconnect with members of his church, but there was more to it than that for him.  He needed to talk to other Christians, to ask them the questions he had asked Layla.  He needed to comfort and be comforted by people of his faith, to be reassured that they hadn’t, in fact, been left behind.

             
Layla stepped into the room and knelt at his feet, tying his remaining shoe for him.  “Let’s save your strength for the important stuff, shall we?”

             
When she was finished, she didn’t get up right away.  Instead, she settled onto her hip and looked up at him, her forehead wrinkled with care.  Jack could feel both her need to speak and her reluctance to do so.

             
“What is it?  Just say it.”

             
“Okay, but you’re not going to like hearing what you need to hear.”  She took a deep breath.  “All I ask is that you hear me out before you go all outraged fire and brimstone on me.”

             
Jack’s lips twitched.  “I’ll keep my hellfire reined in until you signal you’re ready for it.”

             
“For a pastor, you’re a real smart-ass.”  Before he could fire back, she rushed on.  “People are different now, since the plague.  Rowan has started cataloging the changes, with her brother’s help.”  Layla paused, scrutinizing him, then went on.  “I think you’re different, too, though you may not know it yet.”

             
Jack eyed her warily.  He wasn’t sure what she was talking about, but he had a feeling she’d been right – he really didn’t want to hear this. “Well, I’d expect all of us to be different.  We’ve all suffered terrible losses, the world as we know it is completely changed, our future is uncertain-”

             
“Stop.”

             
He did, because there was
power
in her single word.  Power that he didn’t understand, and that roused an instinctive fear in him.  She nodded slowly, never taking her eyes off him.  “You felt it, didn’t you?”

             
“You asked me to stop talking, so I stopped-”

             
“Jack.”  His softly-spoken name made him flinch like she’d slapped him across the face.  “Don’t waste time avoiding the new reality.  You can either talk to me about this now, or you can go out there with no protection or shielding whatsoever, and be completely overwhelmed.”

Weakened he might be, but not so weak that he couldn’t work up a solid sneer.  “Protection?  Shielding?  Those are New Age beliefs.  I don’t subscribe.”

              She had this way of just staring for several long seconds, her face calm and stern, her eyes cool and assessing; he was sure she’d used that stare to massive advantage as a teacher.  “Fine.  When you want to talk later, I’m going to be condescending and rub it in.  Just so you know.”

             
“Appreciate the forewarning.”  Jack slapped his thighs, and stood.  “Let’s get going.”

             
He was ridiculously excited just to get outside. He’d spent a little time on Layla’s tiny patio each day, and the sun on his face had been as invigorating as any spring tonic.  Seeing other people would do him a world of good as well – he owed Layla and Rowan his life, and he would never forget that.  Now, though, it was time for him to pick up the mantle that suited him best:  counselor, comforter, spiritual leader.  That, at least, hadn’t changed.  It would be so good to feel like his old self for a while.

             
In spite of himself, his thoughts returned to Layla’s earlier caution. Her words recalled the cascade of impressions, sensations and feelings, all of them startlingly vivid, that he’d been trying to process during the last week.  He’d noticed it most when Rowan or her brother Alder visited – it was as if he could
feel
what they were feeling, as if their emotions slid inside him to co-exist with his own.  He had always been extremely empathetic, but this went beyond that.  It was disorienting as the dickens.

He had assumed the shift in his perception could be attributed to his close brush with death – he had also been experiencing a sharp, increased enjoyment of everything.  Food tasted better.  Scents were richer.  And a simple flower could move him to tears with its beauty.  It seemed, though, that Layla was suggesting something different.

They stepped out the front door together and headed for Layla’s jeep.  They had been urging people to drive as little as possible, she had explained – every gas station in town was dry, and they would soon have to start siphoning gas out of abandoned vehicles.  Their destination was far enough away, though, to justify the fuel usage. 

Jack settled into the passenger seat, and pulled out a notebook and a pen.  “I thought I’d start a list of our needs, and keep adding to it as we talk to people.  Sometimes all people need is to know that their concerns are being heard to get them involved.”

Layla nodded.  “Good idea.  Put ‘Help for Rowan’ at the top of the list, would you?  As far as we know, she’s the only person left here with any kind of medical training, and she is worn to the bone.”

Jack wrote.  “Done.  What else?”

Layla slowed the vehicle, her mouth firming into a grim line.  She nodded in the direction of the passenger window; they were creeping past a small cottage much like Layla’s, where a man’s body spilled out the front door, holding it open.  He was face down, arms outflung, and his hands and skull had been cleaned down to the bone by predators of some kind.

Jack winced.  He had wondered if he would see bodies, had tried to steel himself against it, but maybe that just wasn’t possible.  Maybe it wasn’t even right.  It should hurt, after all, it should horrify him, to see a body so neglected.  He met Layla’s eyes and nodded.  “Care and burial of our dead,” he said softly, as he wrote it on the list.

Layla reached out and rested her hand on his shoulder for a moment.  A warm glow of comfort suffused him, a sensation like a hug, a backrub, a soft stroke on the brow.  Jack heaved a deep sigh and shut his eyes.  One of these days, he was probably going to have to ask her how she did that.

Layla removed her hand without fanfare.  “You should probably add ‘electricity and water’ next, though I don’t know how to get more specific than that.  I’m embarrassed to admit I don’t really know how they were supplied in the first place.”

Jack grimaced.  “I guess I’m pretty shaky on the specifics myself.  Our electricity is supplied by Colorado Springs Utilities, but we have a water treatment facility here in town.  Let’s see what Alder can tell us, see if any of the surviving community members have useful knowledge.”

He thought for a minute, then wrote on his list again.  “In fact, I think that should be one of our top priorities.  We need to understand what resources we have, and what we need to seek.  We need to know not just what people’s professions were, but what their hobbies are, what they might have learned to do as a kid or a teenager – that kind of thing.”

Layla smiled.  “I worked my way through college on my uncle’s fishing boat in Florida.  I don’t suppose that’ll help?”

“Well, other than the reservoir, we’re kind of land-locked here.”  Jack looked over at her.  “You never mentioned family.  When you talked about your charms, for the people you’d lost.  Is your family still in Florida?  Have you heard from them?”

“I haven’t been in touch with my family for years.”  Her tone was flat, without a trace of emotion.  More than that, he couldn’t sense a thing from her – she was like a concrete wall.  Before he could ask her about it, she gave him a tight, controlled smile and turned into the church’s parking lot.  “We’re here.”

She parked the jeep, then sat for a moment, looking at the small group of people who had gathered in the spring sunshine outside the church’s front doors.  Rowan and Alder were among them; Layla smiled and raised a hand in greeting, then turned to Jack.

“Okay, I know you don’t want to talk about this, but I can’t send you in there blind.  Just…be aware of what you’re feeling, and what comes from other people.  If you start to get confused or overwhelmed, let me know.  I can help.”

She was out of the vehicle before Jack could comment or question her, and he followed more slowly, giving himself a moment to process what she’d said.  How could she have known what he had been experiencing?  He certainly hadn’t talked to her about it.

As soon as he neared the group, he was rushed.  A woman he recognized as the mother of one of his youth group kids ran to him, arms outstretched, face contorted by grief.  “My Jenny,” she gasped as she collapsed into his arms.  “My Jenny.  My baby.  Why?  Why, why, why would God take her?”

Jack staggered both under the physical impact and the emotional one.  Her grief flooded him, terrible and bottomless.  As if Jenny had been his daughter, he experienced love for her, a love that had roots in her tiny newborn newness and had grown year after year into a rich and nuanced love, a love that recognized both human failings and the spark of the divine that had lived in Jenny’s beautiful soul.  Except now, where Jenny’s living presence had been was an awful, gaping, void.

He looked up, nearly blinded by the tears flooding his eyes, and an onslaught of
feeling
hit him in wave, after wave, after wave.  People were moving towards him, a few he recognized, many he didn’t, all of them emanating
emotion.
Grief, rage, courage, determination, misery, despair, hope, and fear, fear, fear.  He couldn’t begin to sort it all out.

He would have gone to his knees if Alder hadn’t shoved a shoulder under his armpit and wrapped an arm around his waist, while Layla gathered the sobbing woman into her own arms.  He met Layla’s gaze over the woman’s head, unable to hide his shock.  She shook her head, exasperated, muttering, “I tried to warn you about this.  This is me being condescending.  Here, Alder, can you help her?  Let me talk to Jack for a second.”

Alder traded burdens with her.  Layla didn’t try to hold him up physically, but when she locked eyes with him, he felt strength pour into him.  She reached out and grasped both his hands, and the sensation intensified ten-fold.  It seemed as if a sound-proof curtain dropped around the two of them, but instead of noise, the curtain blocked out the
feelings
that had been bombarding him.

“Listen to me,” she said in a low voice.  “This is what I meant – things are different now.  We don’t have time for a discussion – I should have insisted we talk earlier – but for now, you need to get your shields up.”

“Shields?”  Jack’s brain was spinning.  “As in Star Trek?  ‘Shields are at maximum, captain?’  Layla, what are you talking about?”

“I’m running interference for you now, but you’re going to need to learn to do it for yourself.  Close your eyes.”  He obeyed, too rattled to do otherwise.  “Envision a cone of white light that starts above your head and cascades around your body, all the way to the ground.”

He cracked open one eye.  “You cannot be serious.”

She squeezed his hands so hard he winced, and glared so fiercely he shut his eyes again.  “The white light is your shield.  It protects you.  It allows in only what you allow it to.  If you start feeling the emotions of others, you need to take a moment to re-envision the cone of light.  Do you understand?”

Jack nodded; he really didn’t know what else he could do.  Layla let go of his hands, and instantly, Jack was buffeted by
feeling.
By
emotion.
It was weaker this time, but still there.  Layla shook her head.  “Your shields are like swiss cheese,” she said.  “Imagine the light brighter, stronger, and more complete.”