The Last Orphans (4 page)

Lifting
her chin and blowing into her lungs, the metallic taste of blood on her engorged lips drew vomit up into the back of his mouth. Swallowing hard and trying to stay focused, he compressed her chest thirty times and blew two more breaths into her. He kept doing CPR until sweat burned his eyes and her ribs cracked under his palms with each compression. His arms went rubbery, and spots swam in his vision. Shane leaned against the dash to keep from collapsing. Panting, he stared down at her. Her tan skin had turned a pale gray color, and her swollen tongue protruded between her lips.

Silent t
ears welled in his eyes and spilled down his cheeks. He cried for her, for Granny, and for his mother. Death stole too much from him. Fresh anger erupted in tiny fires throughout his body, growing into an inferno that made him grit his teeth and caused a red haze to close in on his vision.

He slammed his right f
ist into the roof of the truck. Bits of the insulation exposed by rips in the old headliner rained down from the impact. Following with a left fist, the sheet metal reported a loud thunk and more of the crumbling headliner fell. He threw another right fist, punching again and again, yelling until his throat hurt. When his arms gave out, refusing to push his bruised knuckles up into the ceiling of the cab anymore, he collapsed and hugged his aunt in his arms. Sobbing into her damp, black hair, Shane’s voice was hoarse as he begged her to wake up. Pressing her tight against his chest, he tried to will life back into her limp body.

She was dead
. Gone forever.

Light faded from the
gloomy heavens as Shane climbed over his aunt and out of the passenger side of the cab. Ominous green clouds still choked the sky, but the air was calm and quiet. He walked a few yards away and turned around, staring absently at the wreckage and wanting to die. The truck door hung open, his aunt’s swollen feet sticking out. Crippling numbness overtook him, pressing in on all sides, as if he were being buried in wet cement. It invaded his mind, drowning his thoughts, and leaving only dejected questions that no one could answer. What was he supposed to do now? Why did he have to still be alive when everyone he loved was being taken from him?

“Help!” A girl’s
hysterical voice ripped through his viscous daze like a bullet through a soda can. “Can you please? Help!”

The voic
e was pitched with agony and grief, but also very familiar.

Shan
e pivoted, the weight of his aunt’s nightmarish demise making it hard to move.

Two girls ran
up the Douglas’ long, gravel driveway toward him. The taller one’s tangled, blonde hair billowed behind her. She wore cutoff blue jeans and a baggy, white T-shirt with crimson paint smeared across her chest. She dragged a shorter version of herself by the hand behind her as she ran. It took a second for Shane to register who it was.

“Kelly?
” he shouted, his voice hoarse with shock. Struggling to break free of the catatonic state threatening to turn him into stone, he jogged heavily down the driveway to meet her.

“They killed my dad and my mom!” she shrieked
, her eyes wild and her gaze darting like she expected some horror to jump out of the fields and attack her. “They went berserk and trampled them!”

“Wait—
slow down.” Shane grabbed her shoulders to steady her. Her distress tore his mind away from the despair seeping through every part of his body, starving him for breath and welding his joints together. “Who killed your parents?” He realized the red on her clothes was fresh blood.

“The cows,” sh
e cried, collapsing into him. “Dad went out in the pasture to herd them into a paddock, and they killed him.” She hugged Shane, pressing her face into his shirt and weeping.

Kelly’s little sister looked up at Shane,
her tear-streaked face slack with confusion and grief.

“What about your mom?
” Shane whispered, afraid to hear the answer.

“She was standing by the fence,” Kelly replied without taking her face out of his shirt. “After they got Dad, they turned and ran through the wire like it wasn’t even there.
It was horrible. Then the dogs attacked my grandfather and killed him too.”

Kelly leaned back and looked up at him with
wide, wet eyes. “Why is this happening, Shane?”

“I d
on’t know.” He looked down the hill at the Douglas’ farmhouse. Wretched bewilderment coiled around him, a python tightening its grip for the kill. “Something’s gone wrong, bad wrong.”

“What should we do?”

Having been content with dying moments before, Shane’s mind hadn’t come to the answer yet. He didn’t have a clue. Turning his attention to her bloodshot, wet eyes, he didn’t have the heart to tell Kelly that. He stared at her for a long moment, trying to think of something. Scanning the field around them, his gaze stopped on the road.

“
We’ll have to go to town and see if we can get some help,” he said, at a loss for any other ideas.

Putting his
arm around Kelly’s waist and leaning into her for support almost as much as she leaned into him, he led her up the driveway. The green clouds hung low and heavy overhead, and an ominous bolt of lightning arced beneath them. This was one of the most picturesque stretches of Route 2. It twisted over rolling hills and past the straight, modern fences. Mature oaks separated the fence from the road, allowing a broken view of the green pastures of the Douglas’ farm. But at the moment, it looked like Hell on earth.

Shane remembered the pastor at the church his grandmother made him go to preaching about the Book of Revelations, and wondered if this was the beginning of the end.
Maybe his aunt and Granny were taken to heaven, spared from the horrible things yet to come. Had he and Kelly been left behind because they weren’t good Christians? Had they already sinned so much in their short lives as to incur the wrath of God? If so, why would Kelly’s little sister still be here? Shane always understood that the children would be spared in the apocalypse. 

“What happened there?” Kelly
asked between sobs once they got to the road, pointing at the flipped rig with the brown-and-white Ranger entangled in its undercarriage.

“There was an accident,” Shane replied
, his voice trembling. “Stay here for a minute. I’ll go get the truck.” Although she no longer sobbed uncontrollably, tears still streamed down Kelly’s face. He didn’t want her to see his aunt, figuring it would only make matters worse.

Shane used a tarp he found
stowed behind the seat of the truck to cover his aunt’s body and then tugged her out of the cab. The bee venom left her swollen and stiff. Her skin felt cold and damp, with fluid leaking from thousands of puncture wounds caused by the stingers. Shane wanted to puke and cry at the same time when he touched her, but he managed to keep it together, knowing he had to help Kelly and her sister.

He cradled his aunt
, uncertain what he should do with her body. Leaving it on the side of the road seemed wrong. She wasn’t heavy, but Shane’s legs grew rubbery and the world began to spin around him. Rushing to get her out of his arms, he lifted her up and lowered her into the back of the truck. She rolled in and made a horrible thud as she settled onto the metal bed. Guilt adding to his list of torturous emotions, Shane tucked the tarp around her and placed rocks on either side of it so it wouldn’t blow off while they drove.

Climbing into the cab from the passenger side, he held his brea
th and turned the key. To his limited relief, the truck’s engine roared to life.

It took a couple
of tries, going from reverse to drive, to get the Ranger dislodged from the belly of the semi, and then Shane backed down the road to where Kelly and her sister waited.

“What were you doing?” Kelly asked after she’d climbed in and shut the doo
r. She’d stopped crying, but her eyes were red and moist. Her voice was weak, just audible over the growl of the engine. Her little sister sat in the middle, looking up at Shane with a heartbreaking expression.

“Uh, the truck was stuck against the rig. It took a few minutes
to break it free,” Shane replied, sensing he didn’t answer her question.

“What did you put in the back?” Kelly clarified
, slipping the seatbelt around her sister.

“My aunt,” he whispered
, glancing down at the little girl and back up at Kelly.

Horror flashed through
Kelly’s blue eyes, but she seemed to understand Shane wanted to spare her sister the details.

Shane steered the truck into the
ditch, so they could get around the overturned semi and back up onto Route 2. Coming by the front of the big rig, he caught a glimpse of the cab. Dead crows lay on the ground and dangled from the grill and off the mirrors. The front window of the cab hung in a sheet of thousands of crystals. It reflected the last of the diminishing light, fractured and peeling away from the driver’s half of the cab and lying folded across the hood.

Visible through the opening, the driver
was limp, suspended by his seatbelt at the same odd angle as the broken windshield. His dripping face hung in shreds, his blood painting the wreckage. A solitary crow perched on the steering wheel, pecking at the holes where the man’s eyes should be.

Sick from the sight but still numb from his aunt’s horrific death, h
e looked away from the dead man and focused his eyes on driving. The cushion sank to his right. Kelly’s little sister was pushing her hands down into the bench seat, raising herself up to see. He leaned forward to block her view and gunned the pickup onto the asphalt.

Bringing the truck up to speed, he smiled
down at the little girl the best he could, hoping to put her at ease. “What’s your name?”

She looked up at him for a long moment, her eyes glistening and sad.
It seemed hopeless. How could he cheer her up when he was suffering so much inside? She blinked, her lower lip puckering out like she might start bawling, but her eyes stayed fixed upon him and she answered, “I’m Natalie.” 

“Now that’s a pretty name if I’
ve ever heard one,” he said, struggling to sound normal and failing miserably.

“It was my
mommy’s mommy’s name.” She spoke a little louder, though so quiet he could just hear her over the engine. Even still, her voice sounded sweet and innocent, like little glass bells ringing.

“That makes it even more special, doesn’t it?” Shane replied.

“I guess so.” She gave him a feeble grin, and the weight pressing in on his chest seemed to lessen. “Kelly calls me Nat. You can call me Nat too.”

“
Well, alright.” Shane cleared his throat and winked at the girl. “I think I will.”

Five minutes
later, they came across another accident. Shane slowed the truck as they approached. A little, red Honda’s smashed front end was reaching up a broken telephone pole. At least thirty dogs surrounded it, barking and growling like they’d cornered a coyote. Some stood on the roof and the hood, all their attention focused on whoever sat inside.

Dread washed through Shane. But perhaps he w
as wrong. There were lots of red Hondas in town. Driving closer, Shane could see her, fighting a dog sticking its head through her window and biting her arm. Her long, blonde hair was painted with blood, glued to her face so she was barely recognizable, but there was little doubt in his mind now. Shane’s brow sank over his eyes, and he bit his lip so hard it bled. Without another thought, he aimed the truck at the dogs.

“
Don’t!” Kelly sounded terrified.

“What?”
Shane yelled, the truck twenty yards from the dog-bristled Honda.

“There’s nothing you can do
, Shane,” she said firmly, pulling Nat into a hug so she couldn’t look out. “Please, don’t!”

Swallowing the
hard lump forming in his throat, Shane pressed the accelerator. He slammed on the brakes as he hit the dogs and the truck smashed at least ten of them, their yelps so loud it made his ears ring. The truck came to a rest a foot from the driver’s side door of the wrecked car. The dogs that survived his attack returned their attention to the Honda, climbing onto the hood of the truck to get a better angle on the driver. Her guttural screams carried over the vicious barking and yelping of the dogs.

Shane
slammed the truck into park and thrust the door open as hard as he could, batting the dogs on the other side.

“No
, Shane!” Kelly yelled.

“
I can’t just leave her.” He jumped out, pushing the door shut behind him so the dogs couldn’t get into the cab.

Shane
grabbed a big German Sheppard by the skin of its back. He recognized a sticker on the window of the car, and the last bit of doubt as to who was inside vaporized. Mrs. Morris—his best friend’s mother. After throwing the dog across the street with all his might, he leapt onto the truck’s hood and kicked, punched, and tossed dogs aside, unleashing his bottled rage. They yelped and whined when he hit them, but not a single one tried to bite Shane. They kept pushing their way toward the Honda, toward Mrs. Morris. Over the complaints of the dogs he battled, Shane heard her screams grow weaker.

He made it
through the pack of dogs to the car and found a pit bull latched on her neck. Shane punched the dog with all his might in the side of its skull, yet it didn’t let go. He straddled the determined animal, crushing in on its ribcage with his knees, and shoved his thumbs into either side of its jaws. Ms. Morris went limp, and the dog’s grip relaxed. It jerked and bucked out of Shane’s grasp and slid off the hood of the pickup onto the ground.

Like someone
flipped a switch, the dogs went from agro to docile. They backed away from the car and sniffed around with their heads hung low, seeming remorseful about having killed the woman.

Shane looked
at Mrs. Morris, or what was left of her. A black Labrador pushed its bloody snout under his hand, wagging its tail like it wanted to play. Disgusted, he jerked his arm away and kicked the animal off the hood. He stood alone atop the Ford, his blood boiling as he looked at the dogs. They poked around submissively or sat on their haunches and returned his hateful gaze with innocent eyes and wagging tails—friendly, lost pets that wouldn’t harm a soul.

Without warning, t
hey perked up and turned their attention toward the south. They took off barking like they’d seen a rabbit, heading up into the pasture and over the hill. Stupefied to the point of madness, he watched them go.

“Shane
,” Kelly called from in the truck. “Can we please get out of here?”

His eyes fixed on
Mrs. Morris’ disfigured and lifeless body in the Honda. She was one of the sweetest people Shane had ever know, always smiling and trying to feed him when he went to Aaron’s house. Everyone on the football team thought of her as a second mom, and Coach even let her be on the sidelines during games.

One
massive sob rose up from his feet until it encompassed his entire body. A pitiful, jerky sort of yelp came from between his quivering lips, and then he fell silent and motionless, his shoulders drooping and his chin on his chest. A tear burned on his eyelid. The crippling numbness he’d experienced after his aunt died returned, a heavy cloud of gloom smothering his senses and emotions.

“
Shane?” Kelly’s concerned voice cut through his morbid stupor once again, muffled by the truck’s cab. “You alright?”

He
tore his eyes away from the corpse and looked down through the windshield. Kelly held Nat’s head in her lap, her shirt pulled over the little girl’s face so she couldn’t see. Kelly’s eyes were wide and her skin blanched white. Considering what she’d just seen, her level of composure was a testament to her fierce determination to protect her sister.

Sha
ne glanced back at Ms. Morris and climbed off the hood. How would he tell Aaron? Was he even alive? Getting into the cab, he put the truck in reverse. The Ford rocked left and right. There was a sickening, wet, crunching sound as it rolled back over the dogs he hit on his way in.

Shifting to drive, h
e steered toward town. Nat whimpered, still lying on Kelly’s lap. Shane stared blankly out the windshield, and the violent deaths played over and over in his head as he drove. Each recollection seemed to strip away a chunk of his soul, drawing life out of him.

When he gazed in the rearview mirror, he saw the blue tarp flapping in the truck’s bed behind him, his aunt’s foot exposed.
He slowed down to keep her covered, and to prevent running into any other wrecked cars, which they encountered more frequently as they approached town. The green clouds overhead thickened and blocked the moon. Lightning danced across the sky every few minutes, illuminating the dark and hilly countryside in nightmarish snapshots, and leaving spots swimming in Shane’s vision. When he blinked at the glare, the mutilated dead were there—the truck driver with no eyes, his aunt swollen to the point of bursting, and Mrs. Morris bloody and chewed to shreds by the dogs.

“
Can we go home now?” Nat pleaded, startling Shane out of his melancholic reverie.

Kelly glanced at Shane, her brow squeezed
with sadness. Her blue eyes were wide with concern and her skin was pale with shock.

“
No, sweetie. We have to go into town,” she said, a tremble in her voice. She used a finger to push the hair out of Nat’s face, and Shane remembered doing the same for his aunt less than an hour ago.

“But won’t Mommy and Daddy be
mad if we come home late?” Nat sounded oblivious to the fact that her parents were gone, though she’d watched them die. Perhaps her brain forced her to forget as some sort of defense mechanism. Shane was heartbroken for the girl but also jealous of her amnesia. “They yelled at you when you came home late last time.”

“It’s okay this time
, Nat,” Kelly said. She sniffled and cleared her throat, quashing some of her emotion and maintaining her role as big sister. “Mommy and Daddy want us to take a field trip with Shane.”

“
A field trip.” Nat brightened a little. “Are we going to the zoo?”

“Maybe. But for
now, I want you to lie down and rest.” Kelly patted her thigh. “You can’t have much fun if you’re a sleepy, grumpy bug.”

Nat s
tretched out on the seat and put her head on Kelly’s lap. “I hope Mommy and Daddy don’t miss us too much while we’re gone. Maybe we should call them later.”

“That sounds li
ke a good idea, Nat.” Kelly’s voice was weak and shaky like she might burst into sobs, but she kept it together.

The
exchange filled Shane with pity, and he gained even more respect for Kelly. Because of short chats he’d had with her at church and school, which usually left him feeling like a peasant talking to a princess, he knew there was more to Kelly than her looks. But the attractive blonde cheerleader was stronger than he’d ever imagined. Shane pulled his shoulders back, shrugging off some of the despair. Her sense of duty caused him to cling to his purpose—keeping Kelly and her sister safe. It was the only thing that could save him. The blessed distraction seemed to help blood flow in his veins again and made it easier to breathe.

Petting Nat’s head, Kelly hummed a lullaby. She sniffled again, and Shane lean
ed over and opened the glove compartment, pulling out a small box of tissues. Giving him a grateful look, Kelly took one and wiped her eyes, and then continued to hum to her little sister. A mournful undertone in her sweet hymn tore at his chest. It reminded him of when he had fallen asleep on his aunt’s lap at the hospital, that night when his mom passed. She had petted his hair and hummed to him much like Kelly was to her sister. He was thirteen then, and was certain his mother wouldn’t die. Shane had prayed so much that he just knew there was no way God would take her. But he did. And now all this.

“What happened back there?” Kelly asked
in a hushed voice after Nat fell asleep.

“The d
ogs… they did what the cows did,” Shane replied, not having the stomach to get too descriptive. “The odd thing is that they didn’t attack me, even when I kicked them away. The same thing happened with the bees and my aunt. I was with her the entire time, but I didn’t get stung once.”

“Bees?” Kelly asked nervously.

“Yeah,” he replied with a faltering voice, surprised he could even talk about it. “And hornets, wasps, yellow jackets, and everything else with wings and a stinger. There must’ve been millions of them.”

“I’m
sorry, Shane,” Kelly whispered.

“
Me too.” He glanced at her. “I mean, about your folks.”

They rode in
stunned silence. Shane navigated the Ranger around cars entangled with farm animals and with other cars, the drivers all massacred in their seats or trampled on the asphalt just outside their vehicles. Kelly attempted to find answers to what was happening by searching the internet with her smart phone. She couldn’t keep a signal long enough to complete a web search, but didn’t stop trying after most people would’ve given up. Shane sensed she was using it as an excuse not to look out the windshield at the carnage they encountered every few minutes. She finally gave up and tried to call her friends, her eyes focused on Nat in her lap. Her phone continuously rang or she’d get a busy signal. As with Shane’s earlier efforts, no one answered.

“This thing is useless,”
Kelly said after a half hour, shoving it into her pocket.

“Maybe all this weird weather is messing
with the reception.” Shane squinted at another bright flash of lightning. It fractured the darkness with its blinding jaggedness, illuminating a tractor in the middle of a field to his left. In the split second the world was lit up, he saw a man slumped in the seat. Shane’s stomach twisted. The farmer was dead. He’d seen lots of death, but somehow the tractor alone in the field with the man dangling over the steering wheel seemed to hit harder than the last few he’d encountered on the road.

“
The cows didn’t go after Nat and me either,” Kelly mused. “It’s like the animals only want to kill the adults.”

“Somebody out there has to know what’s going on
,” he whispered, reaching down and clicking on the old radio.

The Christian station Granny usually listened to came on, a prerec
orded program about a drug addict who was born again playing. The numbness caused by all the death Shane had seen retreated at the sound of another person’s voice. His heart raced and perspiration beaded on his face. He needed to know what was happening, what made the animals and insects go mad, but he also feared the answer. The little boy in him wanted to go home and crawl into bed, where he would pull the sheets over his head and wait until all this passed. The young man in Shane knew hiding wouldn’t resolve anything. He had to face whatever evil was out there, causing the creatures to kill. Searching for news, he turned the dial up through the stations.