The Survivor Chronicles (Book 2): The Divide (38 page)

His eyes opened and he blinked against the light filtering into the room around him. He didn't know where he was or what was going on as his eyes shifted to the woman sitting across from him. Something glinted in her hand as she leaned back from him. The answer to who she was completely eluded him as she rose and stepped away from him.

She lifted the thing in her hands before her as she eyed him with the same expression he assumed a rabbit eyed a coyote with. He wasn't entirely certain she was wrong to do so as he struggled to bring his fractured thoughts together.

CHAPTER 30

Al,

Somewhere in Mass.

"What the…"

Rochelle's voice trailed off as she leaned further back in her seat in a seeming attempt to try and blend into the upholstery. Al didn't blame her, he had the same urge but since he was sitting in the passenger seat he was completely exposed to the people gathered before the church. Most were on their knees with their hands folded before them and their heads tilted back to the sky as they sought answers, or forgiveness.

A sick feeling, like he often got when he ate too much ice cream, settled in the pit of his stomach. His mother had been religious; they'd attended church, had said their prayers and their blessings and gone to confession regularly. When he was young, Al had found peace in the church and had enjoyed going, but after his siblings died he'd lost most of his faith in God. His mother had found even
more
faith in the Lord, and Al had still attended church until he moved out and began to establish his own life. Nellie had nudged him back into the fold, and he'd tried to make her happy by going every Sunday, but he'd never been able to find the same simple joy in it that he'd found before the loss of his siblings.

Now, however, looking at these people he didn't think they were finding joy in their prayers; didn't think they were doing this because they loved God. In fact, he'd be willing to wager that at least half of them only stepped into a church once or twice a year, or didn't go at all. They weren't praying to God for guidance, they were praying for salvation, a salvation he wasn't sure was there.

A man stepped forward as Riley angled the car onto the sidewalk ahead of them. He slapped the roof of the vehicle as he shouted something unintelligible at them. Carl lifted his gun and placed it against the window but the man seemed undeterred as he continued to slap his hand over the moving vehicle and shouted words that Al couldn't make out.

"What does this fruitcake want?" John muttered.

His hands tensed on the steering wheel as he gripped it tighter. Al knew John would run the man over if it became necessary but he was really hoping that it didn't become necessary. Though it was difficult to grasp, Al shifted his gun into his wounded hand and pressed it against the window as the man's hand came down on the hood of the truck.

"It's the end of days!" the man yelled. Rochelle cringed away from the window as the truck continued to creep forward and the man came closer to them. "The apocalypse is upon us!"

Al was looking right into the man's crazed eyes now. His mouth was nothing more than a gaping hole with no teeth and a tongue that looked like it had been sucking on too many lemons. Al didn't know if the man was sick but he didn't think so. He suspected the man's lack of teeth, sunken cheekbones, bulbous nose, and reddened face were due more to alcoholism than what was happening to the other people in
this
world.

"Earthquakes, pestilence and plague!" Though it hurt, his hand clenched more around his gun as they drove further past the man. Rochelle jumped as the man's hand slammed against the sideboard. "A sky without a sun!"

"This guy didn't have many marbles to begin with and I think he just lost his last one," John said.

"What is he talking about?" Rochelle whispered.

"The signs of the apocalypse," Al reluctantly told her.

"I can stand on the side of the road and rattle off everything that has been happening to us too, but I've chosen not to be a giant pain in the
ASS
today!" John shouted at the man.

"John…" Al started to warn as the man's hand slammed against the back of the sideboard.

"God has
forsaken
us!" the man screamed as the truck moved beyond his reach.

Rochelle shuddered as she wrapped her arms around herself and huddled deeper into the seat. "Is he right?" she inquired.

"I don't see any frogs falling from the sky," John responded with a forced smile that looked more like a grimace.

"That's the plagues," Al informed him.

"What?" John asked.

"Frogs are part of the ten plagues of Egypt not the signs of the apocalypse."

"Oh." John maneuvered the truck back onto the road as they left the church and the people behind. "Is he right then?"

Al was silent as he pondered the question. Everything in him screamed
no
, that the man was completely wrong, but he couldn't shake the chill that was creeping through him. They had no idea what was going on, no idea what had caused the destruction of the world as they knew it. Perhaps it was God or the Gods, perhaps whoever or whatever ruled up above had finally had enough. It wasn't as if the human race had been doing a bang up job of running the place with all the murder, greed, war, abuse and waste they had bestowed upon the planet.

He rubbed the bridge of his nose as his head began to throb. "I don't know," he finally admitted.

"All those things he said, are they the signs of the apocalypse?" John pressed.

Al shook his head as Riley pulled the car to the side of a quiet road. He didn't know why they were stopping but he could use some fresh air. He had the door open before John came to a complete stop and was out of the truck before he shifted it into park. Al stepped away from the truck and tilted his head back as he studied the blood colored sun on the horizon. The sky around it was clear but how long before the clouds rolled back in and black rain began to fall; how long before it disappeared like it had when he'd thought there might have been an eclipse?

"Why did you stop?" John asked as he came around the front of the truck.

"I just needed to stretch my legs and that guy…" Riley's voice trailed off as her gaze drifted toward the sky. "
That
guy." She shook her head and turned away from them.

Rochelle stepped out beside him. "Was that guy right?"

"I doubt that man has been right about anything in twenty years," Carl told her.

"What are the signs of the apocalypse?" John was like a dog and he wasn't about to let that bone go.

Al finally lowered his head away from the hostile sun that was beating down upon them. His mind tripped back to Sunday school and all those times he'd sat in church. Even when he'd stopped wanting to be there he'd still been listening, but the answer to John's question eluded him right now.

"The four horsemen, war, pestilence, famine and death are the start," Carl said as he stepped away to light a cigarette and study the sky. "Earthquakes will follow, there will be plagues, the sky will turn dark, and the oceans will become blood. There's something about angels and trumpets too but I don't remember all of it."

"How do you even know that?" Riley asked quietly.

Carl shrugged. "I liked to watch all those doomsday shows, though right now I can't exactly remember why."

"Why didn't you mention this earlier?" John demanded.

Carl's eyes were piercing as he focused on John. "Because I was a little too busy trying to survive. Not to mention the fact that just about everything we listed can be caused by a natural disaster. Just because one guy is spouting off about the apocalypse doesn't mean that's what this is. Have you seen a bloody ocean or river…?"

His voice trailed off as he shook his head. Al knew where his thoughts had gone as the annoyance left his face, his eyes became glazed and his mouth went slack. Carl paced away from them as he began to mutter under his breath. The new shirt he was wearing had blood spots on the back of it but the bandages appeared to be holding up well.

"The lava," Riley stated. "That could be considered a river of blood, a different kind of river but still a river."

"It could be," Al agreed as she hit on what Carl had realized.

"There's no war or famine," Rochelle said.

"Yet." John tugged at his hair as he paced away. "But this isn't exactly a friendly environment for humans or plants."

"Pestilence," Riley said as she stared at the homes and trees surrounding them. "Those people, I would definitely consider that some kind of pestilence."

"That's for sure," Carl agreed.

"But honestly, it's the end of the world. No matter if it's the apocalypse, a super volcano a terrorist attack or an alien invasion. It
is
the end of
our
world. Nothing will ever be the same for us again," Riley said.

"But if it's the apocalypse aren't we all supposed to die?" John asked.

"We're all going to die anyway, but I plan on fighting to the very last second. So unless some guy rides up on a horse right now there is
no
point to this conversation. I'm not going to run around trying to find someone that has any idea about geology, or aliens or terrorist attacks. I'm not jumping on the religion bandwagon, I'm not going to cower beneath the sky or hide in a church. I'm not going to sit in front of a church and pray. Praying for forgiveness wouldn't do me any good anymore anyway."

"Riley…"

"It's fine Al," she interrupted. "It
is
fine. This world is what it is now and until we hear trumpets, or some guy from NASA tells me it was a species from Jupiter, I don't
care
what caused all of this. All I know is that it's done and the only thing I care about anymore is you guys, making it to Sturbridge, and surviving. So can we just focus on that instead of some toothless idiot spouting off on the side of the road!?"

Al quirked an eyebrow at her tirade but he had to admit that she was right. His skin didn't crawl when he looked back to the sky, but the red sun did cause a hollow pit to open within his belly. "Can we just go?" she asked quietly.

"Yes, yes we can," Carl assured her.

Carl nodded to them before turning and heading back to the car. Al stood for a minute to gather his scattered and chaotic thoughts. "If it's the apocalypse we're all supposed to die, right?" John asked again.

Al turned to face them. Rochelle was sitting in the middle of the truck, her face half hidden in shadow as she stared at him with large, frightened eyes. John was focused upon him as he leaned forward to stare at Al. "I don't know," he answered honestly. "I'm sure there are some of us worth saving."

Rochelle and John continued to stare at him before John finally sat back and turned the key over. The truck fired up and Al climbed inside and pulled the door closed. The roads passed by in a blur of burnt out homes, crumpled roadways and scattered people that all became exactly the same after awhile.

"I'll be," John said.

"We made it," Rochelle breathed.

Al turned his attention away from the study of the woods on his right to the windshield. Riley had parked the car next to a sign lying on the side of the road. The word Sturbridge was just barely visible under the leaves and dirt scattered over it. Al's shoulders slumped; he was struck with the overwhelming urge to cry as a single tear slid down Rochelle's face.

"My mom could be here," she whispered.

"If your mom is here kid we're
going
to find her," John said forcefully.

Rochelle grinned as she wiped the tear away and practically bounced on her seat. Al was having a hard time sitting still too as Riley drove the car past the toppled sign and made a right onto another road. John stayed close on the bumper of the car as they passed by a roving group of humans that didn't look like they would be hunting for food anytime soon, their bellies were badly distended and their faces smeared with blood.

"Awful," Rochelle whispered.

Al refused to think about what had caused them to look that way, he was certain he wouldn't like the answer. Riley pulled the car onto the sidewalk and parked in front of a crumpled house. Even from this angle he could see the slouch of her shoulders and the shake of her head as Carl rested his hand on her shoulder.

"Is this it?" Rochelle whispered. "This
can't
be it! This can't be where it all ends! We can't have gone through all of that…"

Her voice broke off; she inhaled a shuddery breath as she shook her head. Al took hold of her hand and squeezed it as he stared at the pile of wood that had once been someone's home. "Am I the only one expecting to see feet poking out from underneath that?" John inquired as he leaned against Rochelle and smiled encouragingly at her.

Rochelle smiled back at him tremulously but tears still shimmered in her eyes. "A toppled home doesn't mean the end," Al told her. "We've seen thousands of them recently and we're still going. There is no end here, there is only a beginning. We just have to find the start."

"Like a maze?" she asked.

"Like a maze."

"I'm really good at mazes."

"That is going to come in handy."

Riley and Carl had already climbed out of the car and were heading to the house as Al's hand fell on the door handle. He pushed the door open and stretched his legs. He didn't know how long they'd been driving but his legs and back protested the movement as he walked toward the back of the car and the rubble.

John was right; he did half expect to see a pair of red shoes poking out from under the remains of the asphalt shingles. His hand tightened around his gun as he glanced around the hushed neighborhood. It remained still, almost too still. Those people had found things to feast on but they were still out there, still lurking within the shadows hunting for their next meal.

He kept his eyes focused on the woods as the others inspected the debris for some sign or note that may have been left for them. "They may not have made it here yet," Riley said. "They could still be on their way. They could have run into even more complications than us."