Meteor (13 page)

It was time to go. As Troy sat, his hands twirling his half-empty coffee cup, he had made his mind up. Being inside the bunker had taken a serious toll on everyone and now that the safety of the place had been compromised, there was no longer the need to tolerate such close quarters.

Another trip outside, this time armed with both an evil-looking hunting knife and a rifle, had proven that radiation levels outside were decreasing while inside they were still rising. Mary had recently begun to complain of blinding headaches. Everyone’s nerves were on edge after the dismal news last night.

“Hey Caleb? Brandon?” Troy called up the stairs, where the boys were sharing Brandon’s headphones to listen to a shared favorite band and using the last pack of batteries in doing so. Both young men joined Troy in the kitchen and waited for him to speak. There was an air of expectation in the bunker.

Troy had lain awake for most of the night, staring up at the ceiling while Mary snored softly next to him. She had tried her best to soothe him before falling asleep, running her hands over his still-flat stomach and offering to do more while kissing his neck.

He couldn’t focus on her attentions and just held her tight for a few minutes before giving her a pained look and turning away. She had pulled the covers up as Troy made a mental pro-con list in the dark.

“We can’t stay here much longer,” Troy said to the anxious faces before him. “It’s time for Plan B. About twelve miles from here there is hunting land with a few cabins scattered around. I think I can find at least one of them. I’ve hunted out there with Ken a couple times. Dress warm and bring the gas masks just in case. We’re going on an expedition to find a new home.”

Half an hour later, all three men were ready to leave. When they said their goodbyes at the metal door of the bunker, they looked like a normal family just leaving for a day of leisure, maybe playing basketball or hunting deer. The only giveaway that these were not ordinary times was the ominous black plastic mask dangling from each man’s fingers.

Just minutes before they left, Caleb had asked Mary to unwrap his hands and replace the bandages with smaller band-aids, claiming he couldn’t defend himself with the huge boxing mitts she had given him. She reluctantly fulfilled the request, telling him to be careful and fretting over all the gunk he was going to pick up while they were out. His wounds turned Mary’s stomach even after a few days of healing. It was the exposed tendon on his left hand that was worst. She tried to suppress a shudder as she pressed the adhesive bandage down to cover the raw skin.

“Please be careful,” Mary said, hugging Troy tight to her chest. There was nothing else left to say. She had already voiced all of her protests to Troy and been quieted with his calm reasoning. She knew they couldn’t stay here and most likely wouldn’t be safe at their old house. It seemed, though, like she had never lived anywhere but the bunker. She tapped her foot against the floor nervously as he hugged Cordelia and even Hannah; she had certainly become part of the family now. Troy nodded and slung his rifle over his shoulder.

“Love you guys. We’ll be back before dark,” he said.

Mary slammed the door shut after they walked out and twisted her wedding ring in relentless circles around her thin finger.

The stolen pick-up had half a tank of gas, plenty to get them to the dirt road leading to the gated hunting grounds and back. Troy warned the guys that they might have to hike into the woods a couple of miles if the gate was locked. He remembered with a smile the day Ken forgot the key and they had to trudge uphill in ankle deep mud after three solid days of rain.

A pang of regret hit Troy as he thought about how he had refused Ken any help a few months ago. Things change, he told himself, shaking off the sadness. Mud would not be a problem today. The acid rain that had fallen the first few weeks after the meteor crash was now nonexistent. Its effects could be seen in the dry withered brush lining the road however.

Under the distilled sun, the colors of the world had been leeched out. The asphalt disappearing beneath the truck’s tires remained whole and smooth. As the miles passed behind them, Troy found himself meditating on this one remaining perfection in the world. It seemed to be a remnant of a forgotten civilization. The rough black tree trunks and crunchy brown grass that lines the road told a more complete story of the meteor’s impact on this area of the world. Desolation was the backdrop for Troy and his party’s excursion.

The truck bumped to a stop in front of a large, metal gate. Driving around would be impossible, as trees and vegetation grew in close to the edge of the gate, and two lengths of barbed wire fencing unspooled between rough hewn posts as far as he could see in either direction. “No Trespassing” signs were posted every few feet along those sharp wires. Low limbs scratched at the roof of the truck’s cab as Troy shifted to park and cut the engine.

Before leaving to scout out a new location to settle, Troy had plundered through his garage and selected a large pair of bolt cutters to take with them. He now pulled them from the bed of the truck and gave them an experimental snap. Months without use had dulled their blades but he was fairly sure they could still cut through a basic lock.

All three men approached the closed gate and kept a wary eye out for any movement in the trees. Brandon appeared particularly jumpy this morning. Troy gave him a questioning look and said, “What’s wrong, bud?”

“I’m just thinking about mom, Cordelia and Hannah. I hope nothing happens to them while we’re gone.”

“They’ll be fine. The door is locked and they have the incinerator if anyone tries to get in.”

‘I know. I just feel bad for Hannah. She was crying last night and told me she’s so scared. She misses her family so bad. She was really crying hard too, Dad. I patted her back but it didn’t help.”

“All you can do is be a good friend, son. Girls like it when you just listen. Sounds like you did your best. She’ll be fine. She’s smart and strong. Like you and Cordelia,” Troy reassured his son. He hefted the bolt cutter to his shoulder. “Come on, let’s get this show on the road. The longer we stand around talking the worse the air in the bunker gets.”

“Do you think they’re all right for real?”

“I do, Brandon. But we need to get on with this so we can get back to them. I don’t like them being alone any more than you do.” He turned from his son.

The first definite sign of extra trouble was the bear trap. Expertly camouflaged in the tall brush growing around the base of the gate, it was someone’s idea of an enemy deterrent. Troy had only just dropped the bolt cutter to swing by his side when the handle sprung the trap and sacrificed the lower third of one of its thick wooden grips. The metallic clang was loud in the hushed forest, even dampened by the thick grass as it was.

The impact caused Troy to lose his grip on the tool and it landed with a small thud on the hard-packed ground. He jumped back, startled and took three stumbling steps to right himself.

“Glad that wasn’t my leg,” Troy joked weakly, releasing a quick breath and bending over with his hands on his knees.

He examined the bear trap closely. It was a doozy. Spiked with iron claws at least four inches long it looked to have enough force to indeed fracture a man’s tibia. Troy briefly considered tossing it into the truck bed for later use but then remembered the point of their trip. If things went well, the plot of land on which they stood would become their new home and the bear trap might be useful right where it lay. It had certainly almost proved effective at keeping him from opening the gate. So Troy left it and turned his attention back to the locked gate, stepping lightly over the ground now, searching for any other signs of sabotage.

Caleb and Brandon had both gone pale at the harsh snicking sound of the trap and now stood looking at Troy as he continued to the gate. Brandon was the first to follow and by the time he reached his father’s back, Troy had dispatched both heavy duty locks securing the hunting land. They were in.

Driving slowly down the dusty and rutted road, Troy felt the first tingles that something was not quite right as they passed a desiccated corpse lying on the ground. A freezing wind blew grit against the side of the truck, making a rasping sound that grated on Troy’s already frayed nerves.

“What’s that?” asked Brandon, gesturing out the passenger window.

In the distance, an open field stood under a copse of trees. Under regular circumstances it would have been a beautiful spot. If the sunlight had been strong enough the grass there would have been dappled with gold and shimmered, as the wind blew the leaves of the tall tress surrounding the large patch of land.

Brandon, of course, had not pointed out this place’s potential splendor but rather was curious about the towering piles of garbage littering the landscape. Industrial sized black trash bags covered the ground for a radius of fifty yards and looked to be stacked taller than Brandon himself. Loose bits of paper and cardboard swirled around this landfill in the biting wind.

“Looks like a garbage dump.” Troy stopped the truck in the center of the washed-out road and put a pair of binoculars to his eyes. “There are people here. This is their designated landfill. I don’t see anyone from here but the cabins are still about a mile down the road. I don’t know if we should turn back or take the chance they’re friendly.”

“Maybe we should go the rest of the way on foot. Be a little sneaky. They’ll hear us coming in the truck but we could probably circle around in the woods and not be seen,” Caleb suggested.

Troy nodded and scanned the horizon through the binoculars once more. “Here, check behind me. Make sure there’s no one around.”

Caleb took the binoculars from him and stepped out of the truck. As the day wore on the temperature dropped noticeably but Caleb did not seem bothered by the chill. His coat flapped in the wind and his newly shorn hair lifted from his scalp in rhythmic bursts as he did a full three-sixty to check their surroundings.

“I got nothing,” he said.

“Okay. I guess we head out. I don’t have a better idea at this point. I just hope we’re not walking into a civil war.”

With their heads up on high alert for any movements in the woods, the trio slung weapons over their shoulders and walked in a single file line towards the hunting cabins. Brandon scuffed his feet with every step, kicking small pebbles and puffs of chemical-laced dust up around his boots.

‘Stop that, son. We need to be quiet. We are most likely in danger here,” Troy said through clenched teeth. He sighed and reminded himself silently that Brandon was just a kid. He had expected more of both his children in the last six months than anyone ever should. They had all been through Hell, just not as many layers of it as other people thanks to Troy’s preparedness.

Fat lot of good being prepared was doing him now. He had a bunker rapidly filling with unbreathable gas and toxic radiation levels while the world was beginning to shake itself apart thanks to multiple earthquakes.

Troy was lost in thoughts along this vein as they crested a small hill. Thirty yards to their left stood the first hunting cabin, nestled in a thick stand of trees. Troy silently gestured for Caleb and Brandon to get off the road. All three men sunk down into an awkward, loping walk until they had reached a blackberry bramble growing tall and stout only a few feet from the cabin’s back porch. Through the thorny bushes they watched for a long moment and saw no motion behind the cabin’s curtained windows. No one came or went and no sounds were heard from inside.

“I don’t think anyone’s in there,” Caleb whispered.

From directly behind their heads came the click of a gun being readied and a deep, male voice whispered, “You’re right, we’re all out here.”

“Put your guns on the ground and your hands on your heads,” said a different voice, not unkindly but in an authoritative voice. A voice that was accustomed to being obeyed.

Troy, Caleb, and Brandon looked at each other, unsure. Troy gave a slight nod of his head and they placed their guns gently on the ground, moving slowly. Three sets of hands crept up to lace fingers behind three heads and a long tense moment passed where nothing else happened.

Troy sensed rather than saw the man behind him lower his gun as he approached him. He felt hands haul him up by his left bicep and push him roughly into the blackberry bushes. Two other men followed suit with Brandon and Caleb until all three trespassers were facing who they assumed to be the residents of the cabin.

“Here’s what’s about to happen. You gentlemen are going to leave. Immediately if not sooner. You came here in a vehicle?”

No one answered. The man pursed his lips and asked again, “Did you come here in a vehicle?”

“Yes.”

“Good, faster exit that way. My associates and I will escort you back from whence you came and you will stay the hell off our land.”

“We need a place to stay. We have to leave the place we’ve been living because it isn’t safe any longer.”

“Not my problem.
Don’t
you have a home to go to?”

“It’s not safe either, man. Do you know what the neighborhoods around here look like? Scorched earth. Burnt up corpses on the ground. Too out in the open, not enough security.”

“Yea, I know. That’s why my crew and I are here. But, like I said, not my problem.”

Troy wished he had the bear trap from the gate in his hand right then. He thought to himself that he would take the far end of the heavy chain in his hand, swing the long-toothed jaws in circles like a lasso until it had enough velocity to break the heartless man’s own jaw and knock him on the ground. Troy imagined the moment of impact with mingled joy and regret that it couldn’t come true. The man’s voice pulled him from his reverie. “Let’s go.”