Apotheosis: Stories of Human Survival After the Rise of the Elder Gods (17 page)

by Glynn Owen Barrass
 

They kept moving, the vagrant lifestyle proving the best way to survive in the Human Race’s twilight years. It was difficult to hide from the enemy, those things that filled the sky and stampeded through the deserted, broken canyons of the old cities. They worried at minds and sniffed out human flesh with snouts designed by no sane evolution. Travelling away from once-populated areas, through the overgrown countryside, had kept them safe so far. Archer was their leader, and had been since the group broke off from the corrupted, dying settlement they’d been a part of some months earlier. She kept them safe, had made good decisions when it came to surviving, and kept them moving, always moving.

The dissent began shortly after they found the farm.

It was meant to be a short stop: a search for food, water, and some new clothing. A day later, Archer sat in the dining room facing four stubborn group members who wanted a compromise, a big one, in their regular way of life.

The dining table, a large, dark wooden rectangle covered in a fine layer of dust, had been set with vases of wildflowers from outside. Archer stared at the flowers as those around her talked.

“For one, there’s a well here, a bonafide, working well with fresh water,” said Andy. Tall, thin, with long black hair balding at the top, he had a habit of working his lantern jaw even when he wasn’t speaking.

Archer nodded, looked at the water filling the glass vases before her.

“There are chickens, cows, an orchard…” said Sarah. She was short and dumpy looking, with wiry brown hair and breasts that sagged down to her navel. “I think we could really make a go of things here. We’ve already eaten the eggs.”

“And next we’ll be milking the cows,” Baker said. No one knew the man’s Christian name, he just went by ‘Baker.’ Tall, taller than Andy even, he was wide too, and red-haired. He had a chubby, friendly face, and of the three who’d spoken, he was the one Archer liked the most.

The other two made noises of agreement. The only person who wasn’t speaking sat at the opposite end of the table. Archer looked up, met her gaze. Rhian, face between the flowers: small, petite, and with big brown eyes. Her brown, shoulder length hair was still damp, recently washed with water from the well. The girl had been Archer’s closest friend and companion since they left the Templedog settlement, so the fact that Rhian had joined this little group of… usurpers, upset Archer a little, and riled her a lot.

A hint of a smile crossed Rhian’s face, and Archer’s anger melted some. She pulled her arms from under the table and pressed her palms against the dusty tabletop.

“Guys…” Archer looked at the other faces before returning her gaze to the table. Avoiding Rhian’s eyes, she stared at the flowers. “We’ve gotten by this long by being on the move, with only a few brief stop-offs to rest. It’s survival, plain and simple. And you want to change that over a couple of farm animals gone wild and a well that could run dry anytime?”

“The animals are fine, getting used to us already,” Sarah said.

Archer looked to her, finding the woman had folded her arms over her ample bosom.

Stubborn defiance there,
Archer thought
.

“We could always just put it to a vote,” Baker said, and this surprised Archer so much she found her cheeks reddening. She’d been sure Baker would be the first one to relent, next to Rhian.

“A democratic vote, yes,” Sarah said, and Archer felt the urge to punch the smile right off her face.

Baker had folded his arms too now. Archer bit her lip and tapped her fingers on the table. She looked to Rhian again, and found the girl’s eyes lowered.

“Well if democracy is what you want…” She paused her speech, but not her thoughts, considering her next words carefully. “Let’s go outside, get everyone together and make a vote.” Archer went to wipe her brow, which was beginning to perspire, but instead wiped the dust off her jeans, tucking her hands in the pockets so no one saw an action that might betray weakness.
Things will go downhill from here, I just know it
. The varicolored flowers, Archer just wanted to reach over and crush them.

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By a show of hands, there were nine people for staying, four for moving on (including Archer’s vote), and three that simply couldn’t decide. The vote took place at the front of the farmhouse, and three hours later, Archer sat on the porch and rued what she knew was an obvious mistake.

This place has seduced her people, and with what?

The farm had probably been something in its heyday, but now, abandonment and Mother Nature’s ministrations had taken their toll. The house behind her, a wide, two-story structure with whitewashed walls and a grey slate gambrel roof, had survived fairly well. There were a few broken windows on the first floor, with water damage and mold within those connected rooms. It had eight bedrooms that had pretty much been cleaned out of personal belongings. Archer guessed the people had left in a hurry, however, considering the odd book or memento lying around, or maybe they had just run out of room to take everything. It was good they hadn’t killed the animals before leaving, or not so good, considering this was one of the main reasons she was being forced to stay.

Two cars were parked up in the lot in front of the house: a large Black Cherokee SUV and a compact red Buick. Both were covered in dirt and bird shit, but one of her people had cleaned the windshields since they’d arrived.

She stood, cracked her neck, and began a slow walk, turning left to pass the corner of the house a minute later.

Behind the house lay a small orchard bearing two rows of apple trees with green fruit on their boughs. The ground around the trees was overgrown; the grass and wild weeds already above knee length. This continued past the orchard to the hen enclosure—well, enclosed no more, as when the original owners had left, they’d pulled down the wire fences and left the hens to run free around the farm. They still nested in the little wooden hen houses though, and from what Archer had seen, spent their days pecking around the orchard for whatever bugs lived in the overgrown grass. She saw some as she neared the orchard, one of the birds striding towards her as she walked.

To the southeast of the house, beside the orchard, stood a large rectangular dairy barn with terracotta paneled walls and a white, barrel-arched roof. There was a small square milking parlor at its rear which adjoined a tall grain silo the same terracotta as the parlor and the dairy barn. One of her group, Simon, said it was still half full. The cows, all ten of them, strolled around the farm, and where the fences to the surrounding fields were down, they wandered there too, living off grass and shitting everywhere they went, a little skinny but still alive and fairly well.

She paused just before the orchard, looking around at the remainder of their domain.

The rest of the farm, squared off in a whitewashed fence, contained overgrown grass, machinery gone to rust, that well, and an ever-present cow shit stink. Still, being the leader, she’d set a couple of her group to shoveling up the shit, mainly because she hated the smell, and secondly because it was a farm (and didn’t they need manure?). Thirdly, and this was only partly due to revenge, or so she told herself, Baker and Andy had wanted this farm, so there they were, cleaning it up by shoveling the shit.

Archer saw Baker appear beyond the orchard, walking around with a black sack in one hand and a shovel held up on his shoulder, and she wondered whether she should extend that duty to the fields surrounding the farm. Those fields, overgrown like the farm, flanked it on all sides except for the mostly wooded area to the east. It was nature’s realm now, she told herself, and they had no right being here. Archer turned back towards the house, avoiding the unwanted attention of the curious hen as she walked, when a holler appeared from the woods behind her.

She looked, squinted, and saw a shape gesticulating from the edge of the woods. Judging by the tan leather jacket, black jeans, and long grey hair, it was Reggie. Curious as to what he’d found, Archer rushed towards the fence, clambered over it, and began jogging across the overgrown field towards his position. As she approached, Archer saw some others who’d been wandering the fields also heeding his call, but she arrived there first.

“Reggie, what’s up?” she said, panting from the exertion.

The man had a piece of straw in his mouth, chewed it nervously as he stared at her, wide-eyed.

“You won’t believe this, no way you won’t,” he replied, and turned, rushing back into the woods.

Archer frowned and followed him inside, stepping across brown undergrowth and between the greyish swollen boughs into the shadows of the woods. After a few minutes of walking, she reached a clearing. Reggie stood there, plus Annie, a small, pretty Hispanic girl in a sleeveless, dirt-stained white blouse and cut off denim shorts. Behind them was a large, roughly circular ditch, dug fairly recently by the fresh look of the soil surrounding it.

“You wanna brace yourself Archer,” Annie said. Her eyes were wide, like a deer caught in headlamps. As Archer passed her, she patted the girl on the shoulder.

The contents of the ditch made her freeze mid-step.

She swallowed hard, and said, “What the fuck?”

Filled with black and brown matter, charred bones and skulls of human origin spotted the bottom of the ditch in grisly abandon. Skulls with gaping mouths, skulls where the tops were only visible in the muck, all had been smashed in. Ribs, hands… the skeletons looked like they had been torn apart. Before or after the bodies’ decomposition, Archer couldn’t hazard a guess. The smell hit her nostrils, a sour odor of smoke and ash, and she blinked away tears. There were a couple of blackened petrol cans in the ditch and tiny, charred remnants of clothing. The petrol cans matched the ones lying about the farm, and Archer thought of the hurriedly emptied house behind her.

“Ahem… what do you think?” Reggie said.

Archer shook her head and thought:
Trouble comes to paradise
.

Footsteps appeared behind her, no doubt those from the field catching up. This was good; she wanted everyone to see this.

“Tell the rest,” she said to Reggie and Annie, “and make sure everyone has a look.” Archer turned, avoided eye contact with the two just entering the clearing, and headed back towards the farm.

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Alone in the dining room, the white walled area, usually bright from the windows lining the east wall, had turned shadowy after she’d pulled the curtains closed. After what had been discovered earlier, the last thing Archer wanted to see was the farm outside.

A knock on the door made her pause her current pacing. Standing at the other side of the room, she approached the table and sat before saying, “Come in.”

The door opened, admitting Rhian, followed by Annie. The girls had formed a friendship. Sometimes, they seemed to get along better than Archer did with Rhian, but they were of closer ages, after all.

Rhian smiled, though it was a forlorn one. Annie closed the door behind them and they stood side by side. It appeared by their fidgeting that they were anxious to talk, but somehow reticent.

Annie broke the silence. “Everyone’s seen it. And, uh… Aaron stuck on some protective gear, fishing galoshes and gloves, and went inside the pit to explore.”

A great way to catch diseases
, she thought, and said, “So what did he find?”

“Eight skulls,” Rhian said. She stepped towards the table and pressed her hands against its surface.

There was silence for a few moments, then Archer said, “Eight skulls, and we have eight bedrooms in this house.” She would have smiled if the ugliness of the situation hadn’t been so great.
Those smashed in skulls. The people living here were executed.

Annie stepped forward to stand beside Rhian. “We’re scared, Archer.” At her words, Rhian nodded eagerly. “And we want out,” Annie continued.

Vindication, finally, and still Archer didn’t allow herself a smile.

People began entering the dining room not long after the girls. Soon it was crowded, and the arguments began. This time, Archer took a back seat to it all as words of anger, confusion, and fear bounced around the room.

“Whatever happened, it’s all over with now, isn’t it?” said Sarah, obviously refusing to accept that being here was anything but a good idea.

“Is it, though?” Ted said. Normally composed, his dark-skinned face was red with anger. Dressed in a faded denim shirt and jeans, the thin, shaven-headed man stood near the door and looked ready to bolt.

He had been one of the ones to abstain from the earlier vote, Archer noted.

“We should just pack up, leave already,” said Annie. She and Rhian had taken up positions flanking Archer at the end of the table.

“We don’t know what happened though, do we?” Aaron said. Standing at the other side of the room near Ted, he still wore the green galoshes and yellow rubber elbow gloves he’d worn for his excavation. Aaron’s face was pale and pinched looking, his normally shaggy blonde hair pulled back in a ponytail. His arms and legs were black with dirt.