They Walk (39 page)

“
I thought you said they had a working generator?” My dad asks me, as he takes hold of the stair railing and starts to pull himself up.

He and my mother both are watching me, and I’m grateful for the harsh light, since they probably can’t see the blush that is forming on my cheeks. I glance at Gabe, pretty much asking him if we should be straight with them. Of course my subtle look doesn’t go unnoticed, and my father is glaring at me when I turn back to him.

“
Maggie, what is going on here?”

Gabe’s arm around me gives me a gentle squeeze, and I sigh into him.

“
They did have a generator, yes. With it not being on, and the lack of cars outside, I’m guessing they might have moved on.”

“
What?” My mother screeches as she lifts her hands to her mouth.

My father and I hold an intense look, and I know he’s angry at me for not telling him right away. But when his face softens, he shares a haunted look with my mother who is still pretty upset. He pulls her into his arms, and her body quivers in unshed tears and I hate myself for saying anything. I know I would have only put off the inevitable, because we would know as soon as we go upstairs, but it doesn’t hurt any less.

“
It doesn’t mean that there is no one here though. Someone might have stayed behind or something and we won’t know unless we check things out.” Gabe says, breaking the silence.

My parents give Gabe a hopeful look, and I really hope we do find someone still here, and we could really use the moral boost. Besides, the clock is still ticking and we’re running out of time to just be scouring the city for the others.

“
If anyone is here, where do you think they would be hiding out?” My dad asks Gabe.

“
My guess would be Randy and Kelli’s apartment. It’s on the third floor and at the end of the hall.”

Nodding, my dad releases his hold on my mother so that he can take her hand in his and he turns to go up the stairs without a second look behind him. Readjusting his hold on me, Gabe passes the ax to my free hand so that he can just hold out the flare. And when he starts for the stairs, I force him to come to a stop instead. He turns to me questioningly, and I fix him with what I hope is a stern look.

“
I can walk on my own Gabe you don’t have to help me anymore.”

Now he is the one to fix ME with a stern look, but I hold my ground.

“
Maggie, you almost passed out again outside, and we have two flights of stairs to climb. You’re lucky I’m not throwing you over my shoulders.”

“
Even so, I have to do it myself, and I can’t be weak like this.”

His face softens then, and he gently touches my cheek with his fingertips.

“
It’s not being weak to accept help, it’s called being smart. Let me help you please, it would make me feel better.”

Sighing, I glance up to where my parents have paused on the stairs right before the light fades from the flare and are watching me. Knowing we don’t have time for me to argue here over something stupid, I look back to Gabe with a reserved look.

“
Fine you win, but only because I don’t want you to break your back over lugging my fat butt up the stairs. We might still need you to fight.”

Smirking at me, Gabe takes hold of my left arm again and positions it over his shoulder, while wrapping his right arm around my waist. Lifting up the flare in his left hand, he guides us up the stairs so that we are right behind me parents now. From the first step we climbed, I’m ever so glad I decided to let Gabe help me, because my head throbs at all the movement.

I try not to let it show how moving hurts, and when we are nearing the first landing, Gabe glances at me.

“
You don’t have a fat butt it’s more scrawny than anything, and I should know.” He says under his breath, so that I would be the only one to hear him.

I snort out a laugh, which I try to turn into a cough but it doesn’t work as my parents glare at us, when we finally step up onto the small landing. Gabe is chuckling now two, and I can feel my cheeks flaming. Leave it to him to break an uncomfortable silence with a crude comment. Well, maybe not crude, but certainly embarrassing, for me anyways. And for the record, my butt isn’t scrawny it’s more of a bubble butt in my opinion.

On this landing there is a door to the right and stairs still going up to the third floor on our left. The door is pushed opened just like the one downstairs, and this floor is equally as quiet as the first one. We quickly make our way up the set of stairs until we are at the third floor landing, and find that this door is wide open like the others. My parents step aside and let Gabe and I with the flare walk through the doorway first. The flickering light shines through the hallway, and again I’m filled with despair as I see that it really is empty up here.

When we are fully inside, my parents come in behind us and together we start down the hall and towards the open door at the end of it. I have the sense of that really long never ending hallway from the shinning, and I’m almost expecting those creepy twin girls to come riding down the hall with bloody tricycles. Thankfully they do not, and before we know it, we’re standing in front of Randy and Kelli’s apartment.

“
Are you steady enough to stand on your own?” Gabe asks me while staring into the dark apartment.

Nodding, I remove my arm from around his shoulder and take a slightly shaky step away from him. Not looking at me, Gabe uses his free hand and pulls out his hand gun, and clicks the safety off. Without waiting any further, he raises the gun and the flare both, and takes a step into the apartment. I walk in right behind him on unsteady legs, and hear my parents follow behind me.

From the light of the flare, I see that Gabe has stopped walking and is standing in the middle of the room that was once the living room. Now though, I see that the place is in shambles and the supplies that littered the floor before are all gone. There is an echoing silence as I take in the emptiness of the apartment, and I can’t help to notice that no one jumps out and says ‘surprise we’re still here’.

I have to finally be honest with myself, with the fact that we might not ever find my brother in time, and it’s my entire fault. As the others spread out in the room and search for what isn’t there, I walk backwards until I hit the back wall. I can feel my back shudder from the hit.

I’ll probably have a bruise, but I don’t care. Not about anything anymore. Feeling numb all over, I slid down the wall until I sit in a heap on the floor. I hear the ax bang against the carpet. I distantly realize that I’m still holding it, but oddly enough my fingers don’t relinquish it.

Chapter Sixty Seven

My arms and legs are limp, and all I can do is staring out at the empty apartment. My parents have too, come to a stop and stare wide eyed around the room, but not Gabe. He is looking through some paper’s that are littering a coffee table in the middle of the room.

“
We never should have left.” I say so softly I’m not sure I even spoke out loud.

But my mother turns to me with tears in her eyes, and I know that I have. She comes over to me then, and sits beside me on the floor.

“
Maggie, you guys did what you had to do. And we don’t know for sure if anything bad happened to them, maybe they just left for someplace else.”

I glance at her, but I don’t feel anything inside as I do. She might be right, but what can we do about it now anyways?

“
Besides, your father and I would still be stuck at Bates, if you guys thought our empty house meant the worst.”

I just stare at her in silence, because really what can I possibly say to that. I know she is trying to make me feel better, but it just feels like I was forced to choose between them without even knowing about it. Even if the others are hiding some place, we can’t do anything about it now. All we can do now is try to get to the border before the bombs go off. But as I sit here feeling as empty as the building, I have to wonder if we should all just stay here and give up. Not wanting my mother to see this on my face, I force myself to look away from her, and back to the room instead.

My dad is now helping Gabe search through all the papers on the coffee table and I wonder for a moment what they could be looking for. I don’t have to wonder long though, because Gabe holds up a manila envelope to my dad, and they are both grinning like banshees. Gabe turns to me then, and he looks the happiest he’s been in a while, and all I can feel is confusion.

Obviously I’ve missed something, and have no idea what is so good about a freaking envelope.

My mother gets to her feet suddenly, and rushes over to Gabe and my father. The three of them gaze at the envelope, and now I’m feeling something else, irritation.

“
It’s addressed to us Maggie, all of us that left here a couple weeks ago.” Gabe says too loud for my ears.

But when it registers what he said, the fog in my mind clears and I stare up at the three of them dumbly.

“…
Seriously?”

Still grinning, Gabe nods at me and I finally feel the giddiness that they are all feeling. Maybe they all did leave for some place better after all, and even better it seems they left something for us. Getting to my feet by pushing up along the way, I wave my free that isn’t still clutching the ax, towards the letter.

“
Well open it already.”

With shaking fingers, Gabe pries the crease of the envelope apart and pulls until the top is completely open. Holding it up and gazing inside, his grin gets even wider, if that’s possible. He then pulls out two sheets of paper, and the rest of us wait in anticipation to find out what it says. He quickly skims it before finally looking back up at us.

“
They did leave for someplace else. Apparently someone that lived here used to work for the county record office, and found out there were tunnels running under the city from the sixties.”

“
And?” My dad says, with an annoyed look.

My mother shushes him and smacks him lightly on the arm, whereas I can’t help to think, so what.

“
And, that isn’t the only thing under the city. There was a bomb shelter built and then boarded up after the city realized no one needed it. Randy says that they found out where the old entrance of it is, and after sending a scout, they decided to hide out there.”

Taking a deep breath, Gabe pauses, he holds up the other piece of paper that was in the envelope.

“
This is a map to where the entrance is, and Maggie, it’s down the street a ways at City Hall.”

I’m grinning now along with them, and I just can’t believe it.

Of all the places for them to flee to, it’s a freaking bomb shelter.

A bomb shelter!

It’s perfect that they are so close, and the entire better to get out of the line of fire when the actual bombs hit. My parents embrace one another, and I can see the tears of happiness in their eyes. Gabe turns and saunters over to me, and when he’s almost within touching distance he stops just shy of me. I gaze up at him, actually feel a twinge of hope that we’ll find Dan and everything will be okay.

“
We should get out of here, no?” I whisper to him.

Everything that happens next is like a blur to me, and before I know it, we’re back in the car and leaving the apartments. Lucky for us too, that there wasn’t any more of the dead for us to have to fight with. So the trip to the car was a fast one, and I may not have missed anything, all I know is I didn’t even argue when Gabe offered to help me down the stairs. With a newly lit flare in his one hand and the ax in mine, we quickly followed my parents outside.

I noticed that it was getting lighter when we went through the doors to the parking lot, and it’s getting closer to the end of the clock we’re ticking away on. Back in the car though, Gabe and I are up front again with my parents in the back, by the time I actually feel like myself again. I worry slightly that my headache is causing me to lose time, but I dismiss it, I just think I’m excited that things might be going our way for once. None of says anything, too worked up to know what to say I’m sure, and I just stare out the window and watch the closer we get to seeing my brother.

Gabe is pulling the car back onto the bridge now, and is already speeding through all the debris and heading in the opposite way we came in. The City Hall building is just a mile or so down the road and at the heart of the city. The closer we get, the slower Gabe has to drive, because the road gets more and more littered with things. About halfway there, I notice that there is something in the middle of the road up ahead. No scratch that, nothing something, someone’s and yes, plural.

“
Gabe, what is that?” I say in a rushed whisper.

The damn moose we got hit by the last time we were hear flashes in my mind and I squint my eyes and lean forward to get a better look. Gabe slows the car to a slow crawl the closer we get, and I finally have a very clear look for what is blocking our path into Auburn. Standing single file, are a group of men dressed in army gear.

But from the way they point their shotguns at us, and have ski masks on?

I don’t really think that they are affiliated with the military.

Chapter Sixty Eight

“
Shit.” Gabe says under his breath as he brings the car to a stop.