Authors: Jeremy Laszlo
Digging through the kit, I try to find something that will work for the time being, something that will help me cover the wound. I find a roll of wraps and some gauze, along with a few bandages, but this isn’t going to do anything for me. I hold them in my hands and look at the destroyed portion of Noah’s face and know that if I put bandages over his face, it’s not going to stop the infection that’s inevitable. I’m not even sure we’ll have the antibiotics to help him stand a chance until scar tissue forms, and even then, his mouth will be exposed. His gums are going to fester, his mouth will dry out. I feel a sinking feeling of despair in my stomach and I know that there’s nothing I can do that’s substantial without suturing his face. I need to get somewhere that I can do that and I need to get there quickly. I look at the flap of skin hanging down from his jawline and I know that I might be able to suture it back into place for part of his cheek, but everything is so ruined that it’s going to be a hack job, no matter what I do for him. I look at the ruins of his face and feel a cold shiver.
“We need to find someplace now,” I tell Greg. “Get me somewhere that still has windows.”
“That’s a tall order, Val,” Greg says with a grumble, trying to shield his eyes from the dust and wind. “It’s not like we’re driving through a metropolitan hub right now. There’s nothing around for miles. If we’re lucky we might find something in an hour or two.”
“Every second we spend on the road,” I snap at him, “is a second that Noah is closer to dying. I need to find someplace now.”
“Can’t you do anything right now?” Lexi glances over her shoulder.
“Not while the truck is moving.” I put a hand on Noah’s shoulder, looking at his eyes fixed on the ceiling of the truck as his whole body trembles and shivers. “Hang in there,” I tell him confidently. “We’re going to find something soon. We’re going to find something and we’re going to get you fixed up the best we can. I promise you.” I hear a voice deep within my soul chiding me for making promises that I can’t keep. It’s right, but I can’t help but lie. I will try my hardest, but sometimes my hardest just isn’t good enough.
Chapter Eighteen
Atlanta is a fading memory, a nightmare that has passed with the coming of dawn, but as I look ahead, I don’t feel like dawn is approaching. To the west, the sky is roiling slowly, building with a heated intensity that ripples and pulses with flashes of bright light amidst the amassing, black clouds that look more menacing than any clouds I’ve ever seen before. They look like titans poisoning the heavens as they claim dominance of the sky, blackening the horizon and drawing closer as the day begins to fade, passing into the memory of Atlanta and all the horrors we’ve left behind in that ashen necropolis. I look at the storm front, wondering what’s going to happen when that wall of darkness hits us and the lightning pierces the shadows, striking the earth and the deluge continues to scrub away what little proof there still is that man once ruled the earth. I look at the sky and feel a shadow looming over my heart and mind. Storms are not just showers that bring us flowers anymore. Storms are havoc and chaos. I don’t want to experience it here, out in the open.
Without vegetation to keep the soil rooted in one spot, locked in by the clinging fingers of plants, anchoring everything in its designated spot, water will flow, ripping earth free and carrying it away. Eventually, everything will wash away, even the stubborn rocks that stand for ages. Once all the dirt and soil is gone, all we will have is the rocks, and then the seas will claim the locations once held by soil. Soon, the earth will be a primordial waste of jagged rocks and merciless oceans. I fear that if there are enough storms, there won’t be enough soil left to rebuild upon. I look at the darkness and I feel a sense of dread inside of me. I feel a sense of worry and terror that rises higher and higher on the list of thoughts that dominate my time. I hate this feeling. This is hopelessness. This is the great sorrow that has consumed our once thriving earth.
As for the world that remains, all I see is the vast, rolling emptiness that is gray, black, and completely unappealing in every sense. I remember how magical road trips used to be, how exciting and adventurous they once were. I remember being excited to get onto the road and explore the mountains and see the Great Plains. But now, it’s just a vast, sullen waste that has nothing to offer, no stories except for the perpetual, dark tale that we all know far too well. I don’t want to hear that story any more. I don’t want to hear tales of humanity crumbling amidst our own greed and vanity. I don’t want to see signs of ruin and war. Everything is such a burden upon my mind that it’s hard to focus. How my father did this is beyond me. How did it not drive him mad? Maybe it did. I don’t see how it couldn’t. This world has a way of getting under the skin and biting down on the tips of every nerve ending.
When we come to the edge of the sprawling neighborhoods, I try to get Greg to pull over, but reason has him by the reins and refuses to let him go. He was right and still is right for having not stopped, but I want him to. I want him to stop and give me a chance to save Noah, but the neighborhoods are silent, dark places. We can see behind the windows, sickly faces staring back at us with a few boards nailed against the window frames to keep them inside. The flesh-eaters are penned in the buildings like kennels. The zombies have been rounded up and locked in the houses that weren’t burned.
It’s almost as if people change with enough time and loneliness. Processing the sight of them is beyond comprehension. I don’t understand how it happens. How does a person go from being a normal, everyday person to a flesh-hungry cannibal in search of those not like themselves? And how do they tell each other apart? Why is it that they only attack when their comrades are injured? Is it blood that makes them feral and mad? I just don’t get it.
It’s the end of the world. This is all supposed to be terrible and horrifying. I get that. I know. I understand it completely and yet, I understand nothing. I have to let it all just wash over me. I have to stand by the stream and navigate it, not understand it. Life doesn’t owe me any answers.
I hold the compress to Noah’s face. With trembling, pale hands, he tries to do it himself, and barely has the strength. He doesn’t have the endurance to manage it for long. He’s completely defeated by his injuries and although I can see it, he is still clueless. I don’t even expect him to survive, let alone hold his own compress. After just a few moments his hand slips and dangles freely, I half expect him to be dead. He blinks his eyes and I see that he is fine, giving him a smile. He has yet to offer me a smile or even a glance. I just want to know that he’s aware that we haven’t abandoned him, that he’s not all alone. He has people in his life that still love him and care for him. He’s not going to die out here. Not yet.
I watch Lexi as she feeds the baby again. My nephew is extremely unhappy. In fact, I don’t think that I’ve heard him not screaming since the attack on the truck. I watch her feeding him, looking at his bald, little head. He’s so small, so feeble. I’m afraid that we’re not going to be able to keep him safe. It would take one angry hand, one miniscule slap, or claw at his tiny body to end him. What if the windows on the side of the truck had been attacked, broken, shattered and they came for her and my nephew? It would have taken just one of them to rip him out of her hands. I feel my heart speeding up at the thought of those things getting hold of such an innocent being. What a horrible life he’s going to have. He fills me with so much hope, but I pity what he’s going to have to experience. He’s going to have to endure so much. I feel selfish, keeping him alive. It’s a dark thought, but one that deserves being explored. Would he be better off?
Greg drives as fast as he can, but the truck is not faring well. I fear that it’s not even going to make it much longer. It feels like it’s falling apart right beneath me, like everything is rattling free, tinkering across the street as we’re driving at what feels like twenty miles per hour. I look out the window and the world seems to be moving by in slow motion. It’s toying with my nerves, threatening to make me go insane. It all feels like a gross conspiracy to get at me, to kill Noah and leave that hanging over me for the rest of my life as well. I keep the compress against his ravaged face and refuse to let that happen.
I feel like everyone in the car sees the dot on the horizon that causes the air within the truck to change with a strange mix of tension and fear. We look at it and stare, watching it approach with a strange suspicion inside of our stomachs, mixing with the doubting anticipation that we’ve all come to feel as normal when we see something that looks remarkably close to hope.
Honestly, it makes me sick just looking at it. Overall, it’s just a nightmare looking at things anymore. I can’t win no matter what I do. If I look at something good, it makes me nervous and cynical. If I look at something bad, I’m expecting death and the worst of everything. There’s no winning. So I look at the structure we’re approaching and feel like I’m in some sort of nightmarish limbo. It’s like standing over a bomb with a pair of wire cutters, waiting to see which wire will cause me to explode and kill everyone in a ninety mile radius. I hate this. I hate all of it.
The house stands alone. The earth around it is twisted, swirled and dragged away by water that has already poured down upon the property, molding the earth into something entirely different. The top soil has shifted, looking like an artist with a brush has repainted everything. There are no trees, no bushes, nothing that makes the land look like it’s anything but a vast, barren expanse with no rise or fall, no definition at all. I look at it and I see only the house. The paint is chipping, the windows are coated with dust, and the shingles have started being ripped off by the winds and the storms that have assaulted this land. I look at it and I feel nothing but an emptiness in the pit of my stomach. This is what the devil’s house would look like, if he still lived on this earth. The exposed wood is gray, old and aged beyond recognition. It reminds me of an old barn out in the middle of nowhere that has been cursed to stand forever before the sun and the elements.
As we draw closer, I expect to see a barn or an old tractor out there with the looming house, but there’s nothing. All there is in the vast expanse is a three-story house with a porch wrapped around it like a skirt. Greg veers the truck off the road and heads toward the house, drawing us closer and closer to it. I worry that there might be someone else in it. There’s nothing around and all we can see in the distance are foothills and a distant, blackened forest. If there is anyone out there seeking sanctuary, then they would inevitably see this house and come to it. It would draw them in like licking flames in the darkness, calling to them.
But we need the house. We need it or Noah isn’t going to make it. Noah can’t possibly survive this if we don’t get him into someplace safe from the dust and the wind. I need to get him in someplace where the wind and the dust hasn’t completely covered everything and the house looks like it has all if its windows intact, something that’s miraculous to say the least.
The truck comes to a stop and instinctively, Greg kills the engine. I feel my heart seize up at the sudden silence that wafts over us. No vibrating, no rumbling, no sound of any kind and as I look at Greg, he glances over at Lexi and then back to the house, like I’m completely gone.
“You really just killed the engine?” I ask him with an extremely unhappy tone.
“Yeah,” Greg says with a shrug. “No reason to waste gas.”
“Were you listening to the engine?” I ask him with a furious tone. “What are the odds that we’re just going to get the engine to happily start again?”
“Probably pretty good,” Greg says with a furrowed brow. “What’s wrong with you? We’ll get the engine to work again.”
“There’s got to be someone inside,” Lexi says distantly, almost morbidly as she wraps up my nephew and hands him over to Greg. “There’s probably someone inside watching us right now. If there’s anyone inside, then we need to go in hot.”
“What is that? Military jargon?” Greg frowns. “Look, we don’t know anyone is in there and why did you give me your baby?”
Lexi shoots him a cold look. “You’re not able to run in your current state, which means Lexi and I are going to have to go clear the house by ourselves. You’re going to have to stay here with the baby and Noah. If anything happens, we’ll run back and you’ll start the engine and get us out of here.”
“Leave me a gun and I’ll cover you if you’re getting chased out and shot at,” Greg says, while we both watch Lexi scraping up the shotgun from the floor of the back seat. She opens the glove box and pulls out a box of shells before taking the time to load the shotgun, feeding it a full five rounds. I count them as she slips them in one at a time, like nails for a coffin. I’m so distraught by the fact that there’s so much death hanging around me now. It’s just something that I just can’t get used to. Behind my back, I feel the Sig’s handle.
“You can’t shoot at whoever is attacking us with a baby in your arms,” Lexi says coldly. There’s something in her voice that makes me feel like she’s the one who has officially taken charge of the situation. “Besides, Noah and my son can’t take care of themselves without you. So you’re in charge of taking care of the wounded and innocent. So go ahead and just sit right here and do what you need to do and keep your complaints to yourself.”
Greg looks at her with a scowl plainly on his face. He’s absolutely infuriated by her tone, and his face reveals every last little dark emotion that he’s feeling. It’s almost humorous to see him so worked up by her. Something has happened between the two of them and she has gotten completely under my man’s skin.
I kick open the door, giving Noah one last look, trying to reassure myself that he’s going to be alright before I abandon him. The wind has picked up and doesn’t feel necessarily cold or biting, but rather thick and unsettling. I look at the house, watching the passenger door in front of me swing open and Lexi drops out onto the dead earth, pumping the shotgun and approaching the house with deadly intent. She tries to give off the impression that she’s strong enough to do this by herself, but I know she isn’t. I’m not a fool. As she walks, she holds the shotgun ready, listening to the howling wind. I look back at Greg who is watching her nervously. I hate the look in his eyes.
Drawing my Sig, I follow her toward the house.
The door is slightly agape, casting a shadow across the wall, deep and forbidding. As we approach the door, armed and nervous, I notice immediately that the doorknob has been blown off. It looks like the work of a shotgun, scattering the wood particles, shredding the metal from the door so that only a splintered hole remains, telling us that whoever entered here last was determined to get to whoever was inside. It’s a bad sign and I immediately grip my pistol differently, switching the safety off and taking a long, ponderous swallow. This isn’t good. I don’t trust that we’re going to enter the house and not find bloodshed all over the interior of the rooms. I await to find the carnage, but the house within is not at all what it seemed.
Maybe it was abandoned and the doors were all locked. Maybe the person who blew off the handle wasn’t here to kill someone but rather just wanted to get inside of the house to take shelter from a storm, like we are. The wind howls over us as we enter the house. I’m scared. Lexi nudges the door open with the barrel of the shotgun. I half expect a man in a ski mask to be waiting for us on the other side, but all we’re greeted with is the hallway leading back to the kitchen and a staircase leading up to the second floor. Lexi takes the first cautious step past the door, that thankfully doesn’t scrape or creak open like some cliché horror movie door.