Ravaged Land - A Post-Apocalyptic Novel (19 page)

“This isn’t over,” he spat back. “I’ll find you. A tough mama like you with a real man like me, not some stupid little boys,” he said actually spitting on the ground near his feet. “That’s who will be repopulating a world like this. I’ll find you!”

“Get the fuck out of here before I lose my patience.”

“You heard the lady,” Ryan said backing me up. I could tell he wanted to pull his trigger, he didn’t want to let this guy out into the world where he could come back. Maybe by doing so he’d be saving another girl out there, but that just wasn’t the kind of person he was.

The man got on his bike, kicked it to a start and sped off on his excessively noisy bike. I re-wrapped my head and put my sunglasses on as if nothing happened. I couldn’t tell if I was in some kind of shock or if I was just proud of how I handled myself for once. All I knew was that I didn’t want to pass out again.

“Are you all right?” Owen asked.

“I’m fine.”

“Are you sure?” Ryan said in mild disbelief.

“Yes,” I said holding my head high, but my hands were shaking uncontrollably. I hadn’t realized how bad it was until I couldn’t even manage to get my gun back into my waistband. Owen gently took the gun, checked the safety and carefully tucked it into my waistband.

“I’m sorry I made you take me with you, I didn’t mean for this to happen,” I said wondering exactly how angry they were going to be with me, it had been entirely my fault after all.

“Ros, this could have happened without you here, he would have just bothered us about something else, maybe threatened us for our guns or supplies. Just happened you look the way you do, a noticeably beautiful woman, heck, he probably hasn’t seen a woman in a while is all and couldn’t help it. After all he let his guard down pretty easily,” Ryan said.

Owen smiled at him and then at me, he chuckled, “Aww shit, how did I not see this sooner,” he grinned and hit Ryan on the arm.

“Shut up,” I said.

Ryan grinned back.

“No, no, no! It’s great you guys really it is!”

“Seriously?” I glared at them both. “I was just almost kidnapped, raped and kept as some biker mama, and you guys are like mental high-fiving? Really?”

“Sorry,” Ryan said walking over to me. He wrapped his arm around my shoulder and planted a kiss on my forehead, now that Owen had figured it out, he didn’t have to hide it around him. “I’m very lucky,” he added on a more serious note.

“You know what? Good for you guys.” Owen half hugged us both and started leading us off towards home taking an alternate route just in case the biker was watching us from a distance. Or because maybe the noisy bike could have alerted someone else and they’d come poking around. I didn’t think the biker was watching or we would have probably heard his bike a mile away. The route he took was longer and seemingly random. We weaved in and out of yards and through various structures hoping that if anyone was following we’d lose them pretty easily, keeping our group and home safe. I started breathing normally again when I saw the back door to our house.

“Really are you all right?” Ryan asked.

“I mean yeah I am, but he had a gun pointed at you, I didn’t have much of a choice about any of it,” I said sounding sappy.

“I get it,” he said probably thinking about how badly he wanted to have pulled that trigger, “I’d have done whatever it took too.”

When we got to the house Owen went inside closing the door behind him giving us a moment of privacy. Although I wasn’t sure if he had done it intentionally or not, either way I welcomed the moment with Ryan because of what happened. Maybe some time with him would help me relax and feel safe.

Ryan and I moved closer to the house so we wouldn’t be seen if someone was peeking out. I rested my back against the wall and he had his hands pressed against the wall on either side of me. He took his glasses off revealing his beautiful blue eyes which sparkled in the sunlight. I took mine off to look at him, but the instant mine were off my face he was pressing his lips to mine passionately.

“I can’t let anything happen to you,” he said in one quick breath. He smoothly slipped his hands behind my neck taking care to avoid my almost completely gone bump. He tilted my head towards his and kissed me again.

I wanted to say something in return but the kisses erased all words from my mind, I couldn’t think of anything to say, it would have just come out gibberish. But I felt the same, I’d protect him with my life. He took a small step backwards letting his fingertips trail down my shoulder and then my arm, taking my hand into his.

“Want to help us with the roof repairs?” Ryan asked.

I nodded excitedly. Ryan had probably just wanted to keep an eye on me, but I was happy to be helpful regardless. I figured he was just anxious about leaving my side right now after what happened with the biker. At least I could feel useful, and I doubt I’d find a way to screw it up.

Chapter sixteen.

After we had re-hydrated and gotten something to eat, Ryan, Owen and I had made our way up to the roof to try to seal the problem areas. Even though I was still sweaty from earlier, I hadn’t bothered to wash up since I knew we’d be out in the heat for awhile. Owen brought up the supplies. Seth and Sienna had helped by holding the ladder and being our lookouts in case someone came along, but they probably just wanted to be outside for a while. If anyone came our way they were on strict orders to quickly remove the ladder, hide it as best and quickly as they could, alert us and lock themselves inside. We’d hide on the roof until it was safe again.

Most of the problems with the roof were noticeable and likely a result of the tornadoes that had passed by in what almost seemed like a lifetime ago. The others we had to guess at and we put down extra sealer in random spots that looked questionable for good measure. It only took us about an hour to complete the repairs. We wouldn’t know if they would work or not until the next rainfall. Ryan was half way down the ladder when Sienna screamed.

I looked down over the edge carefully to see two of those dog beasts ferociously lunging towards her, she had no protection whatsoever, no gun, no knife, nothing. “The dogs,” I said to Owen, and he started down the ladder as soon as there was enough room so he wouldn’t be climbing down on top of Ryan.

She screamed again. I watched everything from over the edge of the roof wishing there was something I could do. I drew a blank, even if I had my gun I didn’t think I would have been able to even use it well enough to help. One dog stood back as if watching the back of the more aggressive dog while he threatened Sienna with his sharp teeth. It snapped at her, but missed. Ryan was almost off the ladder and he already had his gun in hand. It all had happened so fast. The bigger, more wild dog leaped at Sienna. All she could do was cover her face with her arms, but Seth had dodged out in front of her. He saved her by blocking the dog and taking the blow himself. After a minute she uncovered her eyes wondering why the dog hadn’t slammed into her, only to see what I had seen. The big dog was on top of Seth, biting and pulling at the flesh on his arm.

I covered my ears after Ryan shot the dog the first time, the second shot was muffled through my hands. I scrambled down the ladder, “Stay up there,” Owen scolded when he noticed the ladder shaking and me descending. The dog wasn’t giving up on Seth, Ryan shot again and again, the dog whimpered and stopped, it cried out in pain looking at the other dog. The second dog stood there watching the first dog, growling but not moving. Owen and Sienna rushed to Seth once Ryan pointed his gun at the second dog.

No one had been holding the ladder when I resumed climbing down and it started to tip with me on it. I fell maybe three feet and blacked out for maybe a second or two when I hit my head on a small rock. Like the clumsy girl I am, I re-injured my previous head lump. Ryan turned to help me up and in the brief second he did, the second dog leaped at him knocking him to the ground. He bit him hard in the forearm and Ryan yelled out. I picked up Ryan’s gun, got the safety off and pulled the trigger. The first bullet grazed his ear and the second got him in the shoulder and the third in his foot. My hands shook a little but I just pointed at the dog and shot. I didn’t aim at anything in particular. My only thoughts were to hit the dog and kill the dog.

“He got you?” I said knowing the answer.

“Not bad, just a scratch,” he said grinning. He stood up, took the gun from me and shot the injured dog point blank. He sent me inside to tell Dean what had happened. Owen, Sienna and Ryan helped Seth inside since he couldn’t stand on his own. After I told Dean, we gathered various medical supplies we had stocked up in the basement and some clean towels.

I opened a first aid kit and spread out the bandages, gauze, peroxide and a bottle of water on top of a clean towel. When they brought him in they put him on the kitchen floor, since he was bleeding pretty badly. At first, I was overwhelmed with all the cuts, I didn’t know where to start. I felt frozen in place and no one else was moving either. But then something in my head clicked and I started to act even though I felt a tear trickle down my cheek.

“Scissors?” Someone handed me a pair of small scissors from the first aid kit and I cut open his shirt. “Cut off his pants,” I said handing the scissors to Owen.

I carefully pulled the cloth away from his torn up skin, trying to avoid touching the wounds. Seth was in and out of consciousness, when he was present he was muttering gibberish, he looked to be in shock or something. “Seth? Seth! Are you OK? Do you know where you are?” I asked loudly as I started cleaning the first and the worst cut I found. The cuts in his skin were unusual but honestly I wasn’t all that familiar with wounds, they were bubbling as if he had carbonated blood. I didn’t say anything, but I looked across his limp body at Dean who was working on his arm copying what I had done. The confused look on his face showed he too had noticed things didn’t look like they should.

After Dean and I finished up cleaning his front side, Owen helped us gently roll him over. We started to work carefully and quickly on his back. The wounds on his back were bubbling the most as they’d been open the longest, that seemed to make some kind of difference. The skin around the wounds were so dark and bruised that they were almost black. Once he was all washed and bandaged up Owen, Ryan and Dean carried him to the couch trying to keep him as steady as possible, then he passed out. I looked at Ryan’s arm in the kitchen, it wasn’t nearly as bad, but he had a cut a few inches long, not all that deep but it still needed tending to. The blood he had seeping out wasn’t bubbling that I noticed, but I cleaned it just as well as I had cleaned Seth’s.

“His wounds need to be looked at, treated somehow, stitches and antibiotics,” I whispered to the others in the kitchen when they gathered around to see how Ryan was doing, “Like from a professional,” I added.

“And where would we take him Ros? The ER? Everything is gone. Most people are gone. The odds of even finding a doctor or a nurse are astronomical,” Ryan said throwing his hands into the air frustrated with the situation.

“I know all that, but that doesn’t mean that there isn’t a doctor somewhere!” I was almost shouting at him. Everyone knew he needed a doctor the problem wasn’t convincing them, the problem was actually finding one and soon.

We all turned when we heard movement on the sofa. Seth had woke abruptly, his eyes were stretched wide open and his pupils were abnormally dilated. He started screaming and clawing at himself and the bandages. Owen rushed to him and held down his arms while Ryan and Dean held his legs but he was strong. They struggled to keep him down. I tried looking at him to make eye contact to calm him, try to talk to him so he’d relax and realize where he was but he never looked at me. Even when his eyes had appeared to be focused on me, it was more like he was looking through me as if I wasn’t even there. Wherever his mind was right now, it wasn’t in this living room. Maybe somewhere inside he could hear me, so I kept trying to calm him telling him it would be all right.

He dropped back down almost as suddenly as it came on. I brought the supplies over to the couch and treated the wounds he’d reopened from his clawing while he was out. Every few minutes he’d whimper or try to say something, but never fully woke, thankfully. I happened to rest my hand on his head as I got up and noticed his temperature was too hot, well hotter than Seth normally was even when he was hot.

“Do we have a thermometer anywhere?” I asked.

“I’m not sure, Seth organized all that stuff down there, but it is possible we grabbed one at some point,” Owen said.

We’d checked the bathrooms when we first went through the house and organized what we wanted to keep so we knew there wasn’t one here unless the boys had brought one back.

“Let’s go check,” Ryan said and everyone went down leaving me alone with Seth.

I sat there holding his hand stroking the back of it. I figured it had to be my fault that this happened, “I’m sorry Seth.”

His eyes popped open at the sound of his name. He didn’t blink, nor did he freak out. Seth just stared straight out past the ceiling it seemed. I didn’t let go of his hand but my heart-rate increased with every missed blink. Then he slowly turned his head so he was staring at me.