Alone (8 page)

The rats had eaten some of the smoked meat he had left at the super store and the remainder he had packed into metal trashcans. Every where he went, he saw rats and mice. Cats were becoming scarce and several dog packs were roaming the countryside.

One day while in the barn, he realized that he did not have enough hay to provide for the animals during the coming winter. He visited nearby farms and discovered a small amount of hay stored there. He decided that he needed to put up hay for the animals. He studied the equipment he found and read thru some of the books he had taken from the library. Unfortunately, he could not find explicit instructions on how to put up hay. He was able after much trial and error to attach a mowing device to a farm tractor and was able to cut the hay fields. He found a baler in one barn and spent the better part of a day learning how to use it. He finally got the hang of it and was able to bale all the hay he had cut.

Jason would spend most of the day racing around the baler and barking at it. He would then find a shaded spot and watch for a while before getting back up. Loading the hay was a nightmare. He had no one to help so he had to move the truck, get out, throw a bale or two onto the bed, climb into the bed and stack the bales and then move the truck again. Day after back breaking day he loaded hay. He filled his small barn first and then began filling the neighbor’s barn. He would remove all the bales from the truck and then carry each bale into the barn and stack it. Each night he would drop exhausted into bed.

The seeds from the hay stuck to his skin and seemed to find their way into his clothing. The sweat dripped into his eyes and his hands quickly blistered. Jason spent the days roaming the fields and spooking the quail and chasing crows. After 2 weeks of dawn to dusk work, he completely filled his and the neighbor’s barns with hay. There were still bales in the field to be picked up, but he had had enough. As he finished putting up the last bale, he discovered that the neighbor had a gasoline powered belt that would carry the bales from the ground into the hay loft. He spent several minutes kicking himself for not finding it sooner. Think of all the work that would have saved. All of the trips hauling bales up the ladder into the loft. With a grimace, he hobbled back to the truck and he and Jason drove home. Once there, he collapsed into bed and slept the day thru. When he awoke it was late evening and he was starved. He ate and collapsed again. For the next few days, he and Jason stayed at home. He caught up on his sleep and did some more reading. It was while he was recuperating, that the rat battle took place.

He had been reading a book and had found a reference to a home electric station. The idea intrigued him. With the generator running all the time, he had been forced to devote some portion each day to filling the tank and bringing fuel to the farm. If he could find another way to get power, it would help. Sooner or later the generator would fail and eventually he would not be able to replace it and he would be without power. He decided another trip to the library was in order. Early the next morning, he and Jason headed into town.

“Jason, let’s ride.” He said as they walked out of the house. Jason immediately began to prance and bark.

“You would think with all the trips we’ve been taking that it would have lost some of its excitement for you.” He said as he stumbled around the dog. Jason was right in front of him and was continually crossing and re-crossing his path.

They finally made it to the truck and started to town. As was their custom whenever they went out, they traveled a different road to town. This gave them a chance to check on the surrounding countryside. As they traveled, Ralph noticed that nature was beginning to reinsert itself into the surroundings. Weeds had grown up to the edge of the road and in some places vines had grown across the road. Cracks and potholes were also beginning to fill with weeds.

“Won’t be long before you could stand in the center of the road and not realize it.” he said after crossing a particularly overgrown section of road.

“Some of these back roads are going to be impassable by next year.”

Reaching the center of town, he had parked the truck in front of the library and went inside. The place smelled musty and he found mold growing on some of the books. With the humidity high, mold had infested the library. He flipped the flashlight he carried on and went to the card file. He flipped through the cards and found several books on generating electricity at home. He noted the numbers and continued flipping thru the cards. He found books on candle making, tanning, leather craft and weaving. He gathered all of the books they had and moved them into the truck. He decided to pick up some books for pleasure and spent considerable time browsing the library. When he finished he had taken enough books to last the winter. Since it had been several weeks since they had visited the town, he decided to look around while they were there.

“Jason.” he said “Let’s see if there is anything here we need before it all ruins.”

Jason perked his ears at the sound of his name and when Ralph had finished speaking, he gave a small woof and headed down the street. Ralph followed, peering into store windows as he went. Like most small towns in America, this one had seen better days. A lot of the downtown stores were empty. Most of the business places were offices. There were still a few stores here and there. Some held no appeal and he didn’t give them a second glance. A few he stared into the windows and then moved on. He stopped at a clothing store and got some shirts and socks and underwear. In the storage room at the back of the store, he found several heavy winter coats and several pairs of winter gloves. He found a coat that fit and several pairs of gloves. He laid these in front of the store with the shirts and socks and continued looking around. He heard Jason barking and glanced around to find him. Jason was standing on his hind legs and leaning against a store window on the opposite side of the street. The small store had been a bakery and Jason was peering inside and barking furiously.

“What’s got into you? There can’t be anything in there that we can use.”

Ralph crossed the street and approached the store.

“What’s wrong boy?’ he said as he peered thru the dirty window into the store beyond.

What he saw sent him recoiling in horror. The floor was moving! It was heaving and squirming. In disgust, he forced himself to look again and this time realized that the floor was not moving, it was completely covered with rats. Big rats, small rats, living and dead rats filled the entire store. They were fighting each other either for food or for escape.

“Let’s get out of here.” he said to Jason and he turned to go.

Jason dropped from his stance, swirled around and then froze. A deep growl issued from his throat and the hair on his back stood up. Ralph slowly turned and looked down the street. There, between them and the truck, stood a pack of dogs. There were eight or nine of them and they too were frozen in place. They were filthy and several appeared to have been hurt. The leader was the same pit bull that had attacked the house many weeks ago. All of them were lean and gaunt. He could plainly see their ribs through their mangy fur. They stood staring at each other as Ralph quickly tried to decide what to do. He had left the riot gun in the truck. He had the pistol on his side, but didn’t know how accurate he was with it. In a split second he promised to practice daily with it if he got the chance.

Ralph slowly moved his hand to the pistol. The dogs growled and began slowly advancing. Jason’s growling became more frantic and he took one step toward the pack.

“No!” Ralph said quietly. “Jason. Stay! They’ll tear you apart.”

The words seemed to calm Jason and he stood still. Ralph got the gun out of the holster and aimed at the lead dog. He squeezed the trigger and nothing happened.

“The safety!” he said.

It was at that moment, the pack attacked. Ralph flipped the safety off and fired the pistol. The thunderous noise echoed among the buildings downtown. The first couple of shots were high as the recoil threw off his aim. Bullets flew and ricocheted all around. The dog pack stopped abruptly and milled around in confusion, then several dogs fled. Several dogs had fallen and lay dead. Ralph continued to pull the trigger until the pistol was empty. When the final echo died away, Ralph saw that two of the dogs lay dead and one was yelping off into the distance. The big pit bull was gone.

“With a shudder, Ralph dropped to his knees and threw his arms around Jason. Jason was trembling and a small whine escaped him.

“That was close. Let’s get out of here.” Ralph said as he stood.

He took a couple of steps and then heard a strange noise. It sounded like bacon frying. He looked around but could not immediately see the source of the sound. He looked behind him and in horror saw that the front glass of the bakery was covered by cracks. A ricochet must have struck the glass. Even as he watched the glass continued to crack. Small pieces of glass began to fall. As if they knew that escape was at hand, the rats inside the building had piled up against the glass. As he turned to run, the entire window collapsed and a brown wave erupted from the building.

“Run Jason!” he shouted as he turned and raced away.

Jason was right behind him as the flood of starved rats poured out of the building. Whether by design or by fate, the flood turned toward the dog and man and flowed rapidly after them. Ralph and Jason raced for the truck and they had almost reached it when the dog pack raced around from their hiding place on the far side of the truck. Caught in the middle, both Ralph and Jason froze. The rats surged around them and the dog pack attacked. Reaching down, Ralph grabbed Jason and threw him into the bed of the truck. Jason began barking furiously. Ralph tried to run, but his legs were covered by rats and they were biting through his pants. In seconds they would reach his skin. He struggled toward the truck and at that moment the pit bull smashed into him. The impact knocked him toward the truck and he was able to grab the side and pull himself into the bed. Slapping and pulling, he got the rats off of his legs and spent the next few seconds stomping the rats as they ran around crazily. Jason snapped and Ralph saw him bite several rats. He would grab one, madly sling his head and drop the dead rat then reach for another. Suddenly they were no more live rats in the truck. Looking around, Ralph saw a vision of horror that would haunt him until he died.

The dogs in the pack were covered in starving rats. Several dogs tried to break away and run, but they were quickly overwhelmed. The rats were everywhere. There must have been thousands of them. Several large mounds of rats scattered the area and he saw the mounds move as the dogs beneath tried to escape. But they couldn’t. There were too many rats and hunger was making them fierce. He saw rats attacking each other and saw wounded rats being devoured alive by others. He heard the whine and cry of the dogs as they were smothered by the tide of rats. The large pit bull was one of the last to go. Snarling and fighting to the last, it too was smothered beneath the thousands of rats.

In disgust and shock, Ralph and Jason stood side by side and watched the carnage. They were atop an island of calm in a mad sea. Ralph realized that as soon as the rats had finished the dogs, he and Jason would be next. He quickly opened the rear window and reached into the truck for the riot gun. He had a full magazine and several spare shells in his pockets. He turned to Jason and pushed him to the rear window.

“Get in there boy. We’ve got to get out of this place.”

Jason looked into the truck and then back at Ralph. With a woof, he jumped into the cab. The window was too small for Ralph to quickly follow and he did not want to be stuck halfway in when the rats attacked. He pumped a round into the chamber and leaned out of the truck bed. He noticed that the mounds of rats that covered the dogs had grown smaller. Rats were spread out all around the truck as they search for something to eat. The large mass of rats was slowly shrinking as more and more rats scuttled off. Aiming the shotgun beside of the driver’s door, Ralph fired into the mass. For an instant the ground was clear and then the rats flowed back into the space and began devouring the dead and wounded. Seeing this Ralph decided to change his tactics. The noise did not seem to deter the rats at all and their numbers were so great that he didn’t think he would be able to shoot a spot clear enough for him to jump out of the truck. He raised the shotgun toward the main mass of rats and fired. Again and again he fired, blasting large holes into the mass of rats. Each hole quickly filled back up but he noticed that the outlying rats began to turn and head back into the main body. They were heading for fresh food. The smell of fresh blood was driving them to a frenzy. They stopped at nothing to get to the fresh meat. Ralph emptied the magazine and jacked a spare round into the chamber. He looked over the truck and could now see patches of bare ground spaced among the piles of writhing rats. With a shout, he leaped from the truck, opened the door and climbed inside the cab in one continuous motion. A single rat followed him into the truck but it was swiftly dispatched by Jason. Shivering uncontrollably, Ralph started the truck and sat frozen behind the steering wheel. His skin crawled as he replayed the feelings of the last few minutes. After a while, he became aware that he sat in an unmoving truck surrounded by rats. He gave a shudder and drove down the street. Hundreds of rats were killed when the truck ran over them and they too were quickly devoured. As they drove off, the rats continued their feast.

After a mile or so, Ralph slowed and stopped. He was shaking uncontrollably and was laughing hysterically.

“Got to get a grip.” he said glancing feverishly around.

He could still feel the rats tearing into his clothing. He got out of the truck and peeled off the tattered jeans. Bites covered his legs and several bled freely. Jason limped out and Ralph found that he too had suffered several bites.

“We got out of that by the skin of our teeth. Didn’t we boy? “ he said as they sat together beside the truck. Realizing that he still held his tattered and torn pants, Ralph threw the jeans away in disgust and together they climbed into the truck.