6th Horseman, Extremist Edge Series: Part 1 (39 page)

Ian shows me some map of the East coast he’d
found. “I think we’re at the Oregon Inlet Bridge.” He points out
some of the landmarks. “See, the beach over there ends and starts
again over there. The only place with such a narrow inlet is at the
Oregon Bridge.”

“Get to your point.” I say, still feeling
nasty from being sick all night.

“We’re by North Carolina,” Ian answers. He
can see on my face that he needs to give me more. “Well, this map
has tide warnings and storm warnings all around cape Hatteras. It’s
where some currents collide to make big storms and even bigger
waves.”

“I hope you’re saying we’ve past that point,”
Hana says, joining us from below. She’s rubbing her head and looks
how I feel.

“No, but we can go inland from here to
Florida. Way easier that way,” Ian concludes. “It’s called the
Intracoastal Waterway. Safe and slow waters.”

“We’re not going anywhere without a new
boat,” I mention. “That might be more difficult with all those
puppets on the beach.”

“We’re only sitting on a sand bar. All we
have to do is dig ourselves out and wait for the tide to come back
in,” Ian says. “Should be easy.”

I grunt. My whole body feels twisted. I grit
my teeth and tuck the pain away. For the next four hours, me, Ian,
Hana, and Josh dive a few feet down to the bottom of the boat and
scoop out sand from under the hull. We move lots of sand. It’s not
hard at all, plus, the water is warmer. Over time, the water gets
deeper as the tide comes in.

Just after lunch, one of the puppets on the
beach wades out into the waves, coming right toward us, and keeps
walking into the water. I watch as its body disappears under the
water, and then its head. “We’re almost out of time!” I yell.

Just as I thought, more and more puppets
follow the leader. They don’t make good time, which is good. I
don’t have any energy left to crack skulls.

We finish digging out a channel around the
boat and climb aboard to dry off. Soon, the boat starts rocking.
Everyone cheers. Ben makes a satisfying lunch while Ian backs us
off the sand bar and into the Pamlico Sound. To the east is a thin
strip of barrier islands and to the west is North Carolina. Today,
the ocean seems to have forgotten the violent storm of
yesterday.

I hoist the two mainsails for Ian, and he
cuts the motor. The wind easily pushes us down the coast. He has me
and Hana ‘trim the sails’, as he calls it. When the wind starts
flapping the sails he tells us how to adjust them. It puts a new
perspective on sailing for me. I find myself actually enjoying
it.

Because of the barrier islands, the big deep
waves and the rocking of the boat are pretty much gone. I’ve
completely lost the sick feeling from the storm the night before,
which is good because I was close to taking out my pain on Ben’s
face. He wasn’t doing anything except being himself. Anyway, lucky
for him.

The next day the weather is still calm. I
think we just passed Harker’s Island at the far eastern shore of
North Carolina. I’d been trying to figure out the charts we found
of the eastern coast and I’m getting the hang of finding landmarks.
Ian helps some, but Josh is the best at what he calls ‘spatial
dimensions.’ I’m starting to see what he sees when he finds stuff.
I get Ian to tack toward land so I can see the landmarks.

I read the compass. We’re going west now. So
that means we’re passing through Bogue Sound. It’s pretty nice out
here. I let my hair down so it can blow and that makes my scalp
feel good. I pull out my assortment of weapons and clean them.
Tanis sits with me, his dog licking my feet every now and then.
It’s, like, kissing my ass or something.

The water gets pretty shallow. Ian orders
Hana and Ben to the front so they can tell him if he’s going off
the channel. I look at the map and the compass. We’re going
southwest now, probably by Myrtle Island. We’re at a weird spot
with lots of little islands around. The channel we’re in is pretty
deep, but it’s narrowing. As we coast around the island we see a
bunch of docks jutting out from the beach. There are houses on big
grassy lots right on the water, and lots of little motorboats
everywhere. Some have been sunk, but most are just rotting.

It’s still and quiet like it’s perpetually
five in the morning. I jog at that time, or used to, because it was
so quiet. I loved it. Now the feeling seems to be following me
everywhere I go. I’m not fighting anyone or anything on the boat so
I get antsy. Sometimes I hate how my mind plays games with me. I
like to be distracted. I expect everyone here to be asses or rude
or to need to be put in their place, but we’re all tired. No one
talks much and everyone is pretty much getting along. I can’t stand
it, but I can at the same time. Maybe I should go ashore and bust
some heads for a while to burn my motor.

Markus makes some kind of racket, and
everyone but Ian runs starboard. There are a bunch of sea birds on
the beach. They’re all dead, but lying in huge piles, like leaves
raked up after a windstorm has knocked them off the trees. I’m not
too into nature, but it makes me feel kinda sad. The virus got ‘em,
I think. That means that all other animals are vulnerable.

“So that’s why we’re not seeing many
animals,” Josh says. “They’re running scared.” Rice starts sobbing.
Kat barks at them. It’s strange how there are no puppets out here.
We haven’t seen too many since we freed the
Pioneer
from the
sand bar. I wonder if they’ve finally found something else to
chase.

Ian needs me. I go and sit by him with the
map.

“We’ve run out of shoreline to follow,” I
say. I point to the map and follow the channel ‘til it goes inland.
“We either go left up here out to the Atlantic, or we go right and
stay in the narrow channel.” I pull my hair up. The tightness of
the bun makes me think better.

“I don’t mind the channel, but we’ve been
motoring for over two hours because of how narrow this is. We’ll
burn more fuel this way.”

“We get more fuel,” I say without
hesitation.

“I agree. Lots of options in here. Out at sea
we’re more vulnerable to the weather.” Ian shakes his head. “I’ll
never forget that storm around Cape Hatteras.”

So Ian takes the channel. We keep the
mainsail up and motor sail to keep us going fast. I spoke too soon.
We pass under a bridge that’s got some puppets stumbling around on
it. They look like fisherman. Ben points one guy out. “Sucker’s
just walking in circles!” he says, laughing. Josh runs to see,
along with Hana and Tanis.

“So, if it’s not chowing on anyone or doesn’t
have anything to chase, it just keeps moving?” Tanis asks. “That’s
messed up.”

“No rest for the wicked,” Markus mumbles. I’m
not quite sure why he said that. Maybe it was his version of a
joke.

“Yeah, well, they’re not trying to eat our
brains,” Ben adds.

“That’s right,” Josh put one leg up on the
cushion. “They don’t seem to want to eat for sustenance. It’s more
about trying to tear open the skin and get those white root things
into our bodies to spread the infection.”

As we pass under the bridge, a fisherman
puppet looks at us. His empty stare locks in our direction. Then he
screams. We continue down the waterway. More and more puppets come
out of the brush and trees. They’re talking about us to every
puppet in earshot. We’re still going pretty fast, but my body goes
on alert. This is the other bad part about being in the narrow
channel. We can be seen.

Hana approaches us. “I’m thinking the channel
might be a bad idea,” she says.

“Scared?” I ask.

“Worried.”

“Let ‘em try somethin’,” I reply, then look
away.

An hour passes. The puppets are all around
the channel’s edge. They are anticipating our movements. One of ‘em
tries to jump off a small dock near us. It falls into the water
stupidly. Tanis yells something and Hana runs off. I look at Ian.
We’re finally alone together. “I heard you last night,” I say to
him.

Ian pretends to not know what I’m talking
about. “Hum?”

“You were fighting the storm and yelling at
the storm or God or somethin,” I say quietly. His cheeks turned
pink like a little girl. But I’d heard something come from his
mouth that I need him to clarify for me. “What was it you were
saying?”

“I was just freaking out. No big deal.”

“You have to tell me.” I lean close to him.
“Tell me. I don’t want to become your enemy.” I see him lock up.
His eyes get hard. My threat backfires. I tone it down. “I know
what you said. Just clarify it for me. I don’t want to tell the
others. Give me your side.”

Ian takes a deep breath. I can tell he wants
so badly to tell someone what’s on his mind. I usually wouldn’t
give a shit, but he said something that made me so damn curious.
He’d said he killed the world and if God wanted him dead, he should
be killed in that storm.

Ian runs his fingers through his jet-black
hair.

“Cough it up, man,” I urge.

“Nothing. It’s nothing. I just miss everyone.
Even the people I though I hated.”

I fold my arms. One way or another he’ll tell
me his secret.

“You’re getting too close to the edge!” Hana
yells. Ian corrects the boat. We’ve entered a very narrow channel.
He rubs his temples, fighting his mind. “First we have to
survive.”

“No shit,” I reply.

Three hours pass. I sit next to Ian in
silence the whole time. The sun is getting low in the sky. I look
at the map. I don’t really want to be stuck in this channel after
dark. It might make things more difficult.

We pass a bunch of houses again. These are
smaller and have tiny yards. But there are just as many small docks
poking into the water. This time the yards and the docks and the
shoreline aren’t empty. Hundreds of puppets are on to our scent.
Damn.

I stand and pace, feeling wound up. I can
hear those fucking things. We enter a large body of water. More
like a lake. Josh sits with me, trying to figure out where we are.
I think we’re passing through Everett Bay. We sail on but will have
to stop soon when the channel narrows again. Ian says we’ve got a
half tank of fuel and only five gallons left.

We approach a town. I think it’s Surf City.
We’re still in North Carolina! I wish we could go faster. Josh
climbs to the very end of the bowsprit. I guess he’s grown some
balls. He turns and starts yelling and flapping his arm. Hana runs
to him. My adrenaline spikes. Something is wrong.

Hana turns to Ian, relaying Josh’s scream.
“Stop the boat!” Ian flips the boat’s motor in reverse, slowing us.
The boat stops in the middle of the channel. There are thousands of
puppets along the shores. Everyone scampers up to the deck to see
what’s going on. The puppets look less and less like people and
more like plants. The white roots inside their bodies are growing
on the outside as well. One of the puppets steps over the edge of
the channel and splashes into the water. We’re approaching a narrow
part. But it looks okay because it’s a pivot bridge that is open
all the way.

The boat starts to turn. Its nose gets too
close to the edge. It clearly excites some of the puppets, like
creeps hangin’ outside a college bar at closing time. Ian puts the
boat in gear and starts moving forward. “I have to keep going. If
we’re not moving I have no control over the boat.”

We slowly start moving down the channel
again. The puppet crowd gets thicker and thicker. There are some
homes to the right and some small docks to the left. After a half
hour or so we approach a huge drawbridge platform sitting half in
the water. We get closer to the bridge. It had been blown to bits,
but there looks like a huge dog pile of puppets massing on the
twisted steel girders.

I try to figure out what they’re up to. Maybe
they are trying to climb over one another to get a glimpse of
us.