After The Fall Of 2012- The Complete Story With Alternate Ending (1309 hits)
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Submitted by frankthebear (View user info) at 2007-06-24 16:37:36 EDT
Well gang, here it is. All 74 pages of it. For those of you who read the story and liked it, this is for you. For the rest, eat shit and blow bubbles.
What follows is the complete story with several important revisions. Some things have been added, some things have been moved around, and some things have been removed. Also I've finally gotten around to adding the alternate ending I promised.
So here it is, dear reader, for better or worse.
Enjoy!
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After The Fall Of 2012
I've been alone for a long time. It must have been at least seven months since I've seen another person. He was a wanderer like me. We camped out together in a ruined cellar talking about the old days. He had been a third grade school teacher. He said he missed all the happy children. I couldn't think of anything to say. He talked for hours about the smiling faces and the youthful enthusiasm. When it was my turn to talk about myself, I found there wasn't much to say. I had been a drifter of sorts, like now, never holding a job for very long, never finding any kind of job where I fit.
The next morning, before we parted ways, he asked me how I was dealing with being on my own. I told him I was doing okay, I had just visited friends a couple of weeks ago. He told me I was the first person he had seen in about a year, and if I ever found myself alone as long as he had been, I should keep a journal to keep my thoughts in order. It was good advice and I thanked him as I shook his hand and watched him walk away.
And now I've been alone long enough that the silence is almost painful at night, I've decided to start a journal. Finding the paper was the hard part, but I found some in a school of all places. I had a little laugh at the irony. Well here goes.
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We thought we were so smart. We thought we were so prepared. We were wrong. The scientists were so proud of their telescopes and computers. They were confident they would see any space born threats. The government had all the nuclear weapons they could want, and enough rockets to send them anywhere. It was back in 2012 that we learned too late how ill equipped we really were.
The scientists saw it coming, an enormous meteor the size of Australia. A massive slab of rock soaring through space. It was coming straight at us, and the general consensus was to destroy it before it destroyed us first. The governments of the world worked as one for the first time ever. There was hope kindled in every heart, we would save ourselves, and we would have worldwide peace for the first time. At approximately 12:05 pm eastern, July 8th, 2012, the rockets were launched. Two thousand nuclear warheads carried the hopes and prayers of the world.
The rockets intercepted the meteor two days later. The scientists reported the total destruction of the meteor. The world celebrated for days. Then the celebration ended. There was a gross miscalculation. We were so desperate to destroy the meteor, no one considered what would happen after, and because everyone was celebrating, no one was watching the skies. The meteorites started falling all over the world. At first people thought it was pretty, then they realized it was death. Showers of burning meteorites rained all over the world. Whole cities went up in flames overnight. In the span of seven days, it was over, and the world was silent. We called it The Fall.
The first year after The Fall was the hardest for the survivors. Those who had managed to seek shelter during the catastrophe now had to survive off the ruined land. There wasn't much to go around and fighting quickly broke out. I remember the riots over food and water. All traces of humanity was gone from the peoples eyes. There was only hate and desperation. I would look down on them now, but I was one of them. I had sometimes thought I was hungry before The Fall, it would be an hour or two before dinner and my stomach would grumble a little, but now I knew what true hunger was. The constant hollow ache, the weakness, feeling myself dying slowly, so slowly. I now know what dog tastes like.
For arguments sake, since no one really knows the death toll, one might say maybe 20% of the worlds population had survived The Fall. During the first year, another 5% failed to adapt, dying in the fighting, or from sickness, or injury, or starvation, or just plain accidents. After The Fall, there were always more dead bodies to find. The survivors wandering around the ruined streets in a daze. Again, I was no different.
Imagine walking down a dark flight of stairs that you're well familiar with. You've used these stairs all your life. Suddenly you step down but the last stair isn't there anymore. You find yourself falling thought space where there had always been a sure foothold before. That was what The Fall was like, one day the world was as it always was, then it was suddenly gone.
I remember The Fall clearly. I was one of the lucky ones who found shelter in the fortified cellar of a bank. It was an old abandoned fallout shelter left over from the 50's. There were only four of us there that week. No one else was lucky enough to find our refuge. There was room for so many more... After The Fall, we emerged from the shelter and went about the business of survival.
One of the four, Stacy, died a month later. She broke a leg, and with no doctors, it became gangrenous. The other two, Wendal and Greg, went off together with a small band or survivors. They settled a small village together. I stop by once or twice a year to catch up. We stay up late every night drinking and reminiscing about the old days. They've both found their happiness. Sometimes I envy them.
Only four years after The Fall, mankind had not gotten very far. The Fall had reduced the world to the technological dark ages. The devastation had left very little that still worked or could be fixed. Small communities had gathered here and there, never with too many people. They survived by farming and raising animals. These people's whole world was in those small villages. It would mean several days of dangerous travel to the nearest neighboring village.
Roving bands of raiders still plagued the villages, sometimes taking one or two villagers with them to keep their gene pool fresh. But rudimentary civilization wasn't good enough for some. There were the wanderers, people who didn't like to settle too long in any one place. People like me.
Over the past four years, I've had several run-ins with other wanderers. Most of them are amiable enough, willing to live and let live, but there are a few who would just as soon gut you and steal your boots. I made a good friend of one of them anyway. He doesn't like to talk about Before too much, but boy can that guy drink! We even traveled together for a short time, and we had a pretty good time, so we decided to go our separate ways before we got sick of each other.
In general we all try to avoid each other, the world's a lot bigger now and there's more than enough space to go around. We wanderers have adopted a nomadic lifestyle which suits us, drifting like the breeze wherever our fancy takes us. Personally I prefer the warmer climate of the south. I always hated winter.
Surviving alone was the hardest transition at first, but as in all other things, the more I did it, the easier it got. I tried keeping a dog for a while, just for company, but I soon got tired of him. He was just another mouth to feed, and his jokes were terrible. I spent a summer with a caravan to make a little money, not that I really needed it. The trip was mostly because of the caravan master's daughter had taken quite a liking to me, and as I like sex, I took a liking to her. Inevitably her father found out and I had to leave. Quickly.
Sometimes I wonder how I've managed to survive all this time. I managed to stop myself wondering "why." I once read somewhere that survivors of disasters often go through a guilt phase, wondering over and over why they survived when others "more deserving" died. After four years, I've learned that there is no fairness to life. There is no rhyme or reason, no "time to go," people just live for a while, then they die. I've made and lost many friends since The Fall, they died in different ways, and there was no preventing it. So I disconnected with the human race for a while. I wandered here and there, seeing many things, and meeting many strange and interesting people.
Once I met a cult that went on endlessly about the end of the world. How these were the end times and Jesus was coming to bring judgment to the sinners, that fire would rain from the heavens and the faithful would be called home to Glory. I politely voiced the fact that The Fall had happened four years ago, the fire had already rained down, and yet the world was still here. That if they were the truly faithful, why were they still here? I was escorted out of the village and told never to come back. Well if waiting to die makes them happy, who am I to shit in their cereal?
So I wandered some more, and my only companions were my sword and my shot gun. I've had plenty of practice with both, and I was pretty good, as many raiders could attest if they were still alive. But it's the Dregs that are the worst. The Dregs are the people who have gone feral, living like animals, totally wild. I prefer to avoid them when I can, because if they see you, they go get their pack and hunt you. Killing one or two isn't enough to discourage the others, you have to kill them all, and I just don't have the stomach for all that blood.
Before The Fall, I would have denied that I could ever kill anyone, but now it's just a fact of life. I would have been appalled, I would have said that killing after so many had died was wrong. Well maybe it is. But the world has changed a lot since then, and it's kill or be killed now. Sad really...
The Fall was the worst thing that ever happened in my lifetime, and yet, it was also the best. Before The Fall, I was always dissatisfied with the way the world worked. Politics and pollution, money, pointless laws and restrictions, too many people, Donny Osmond... Just kidding. But now for the first time in my life, I am truly free to decide the course of my life. I'm not tied down to a job, a family, bills, debts, or the laws of man. I can go where I please when it pleases me, I can do what I want when I want to: I am free. I miss my parents and siblings, my nice safe life before The Fall, but I would miss this life too. Go figure.
Anyway, my hand is starting to cramp up from all this writing, and I'm ready to get some sleep. It seems the teacher was right, the night isn't so lonely all of a sudden. Maybe I'll write some more tomorrow, if nothing else, it'll keep me from going crazy for a while. What was the old joke about how a brain is like a parachute? It only works when it's open? Yeah something like that, trying to remember and put things in order will be good exercise for the old noggin.
End of entry.
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Three weeks later...
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Someone's been trailing me for three days. I thought I had lost them in the last ruined city, but they found me again. I'm not too sure who they are, and I wasn't too interested in finding out anyway. Curiosity isn't a good trait to have in the wasteland, there are enough things that could kill you without going around looking for them. I've been wracking my brains for days trying to figure out who would want me enough to send out trackers.
Hopefully they weren't sent by the caravan master to tell me I'm the father of his daughter's baby. I'm definitely not the kind of guy to settle down with a wife and kids. As I'm writing this, I'm holed up in an old sewer tunnel. It's caved in about twenty feet back, but the open end seems stable enough. I also found the remains of a campfire near the back, so I figured it was safe, but no fire for me tonight. Even a dry wood fire will make enough smoke to be seen by moonlight.
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I remember going camping with my father and little brother. Well I suppose "camping" isn't the right word for what we did. My father had a friend who owned a small cabin on the side of Mount Kearsarge in New Hampshire. We would park the truck by the river at the base of the mountain, cross the river on foot, and hike up the old logging road for about an hour before we came to the cabin.
Apart from a wood stove, the cabin was the definition of roughing it. No power, no radio, no other lights but oil lamps and candles. Water came from the stream nearby. That was all. We'd shoot soda cans with the .22, swim in the stream, and just generally relax. My brother and I would explore around the cabin, catching newts and other various unwary critters that young boys find fascinating.
There were times since The Fall when I considered going back to the cabin, but it's a long way back to New Hampshire, and it's just too damned cold in the winter to settle on the side of a mountain in the northeast. And again, I'm not the settling type.
I guess I'll try to get some sleep.
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They found my hiding place. I heard them stumbling on the rough ground in the dark outside. I quickly gathered up my things and slipped out of the tunnel. Looks like no rest for the weary tonight. I suppose I ought to just confront them and find out what they want, but not at night, and not when there are three of them and only one of me. I passed an old SUV earlier this evening, I guess I can hide in there until morning.
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The next morning...
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The tables have turned. I've been watching my would-be hunters. I truly lost them last night, got some sleep, and headed back to the tunnel. They were camped in the sewer, lighting the fire I hadn't dared to start. Now that I've had a good look at them, I know I was right to hide from them. These are bounty hunters. They have the option of bringing in their marks dead or alive, but they usually opt for "dead." No need wasting food and water on an extra mouth on the way back, when it's just as easy to kill your target, sling the corpse over the back of a horse, and save money on supplies.
In my experience, all bounty hunters are scumbags, and they do more harm than good. There were only three of them, I could snipe them from where I was hiding since it was only about fifteen feet away, kill two and make the third tell me who had hired them and why. I unslung my shotgun and checked the safety and made sure it was loaded with slugs. I took aim and waited for one of them to move away from the others. Pretty soon one of them did. A late riser and obviously needing to take a leak, he left his boots and weapons by his bed roll as he made his sleepy way to a cluster of bushes. Perfect.
I took aim and squeezed off a shot. One bounty hunter's head disappeared in a red spray. I quickly pumped a new shell into the chamber and shot again. The second hunter fell to his knees clutching a ragged hole in the chest. The third hunter tried to run back to his guns.
"FREEZE!" I shouted. He stopped dead in his tracks. "I've got a bead on you, so don't make a move." I said, standing up and making my way cautiously down from my hiding place.
"Now you're going to tell me who hired you to find me, and why." I said.
"I-I never h-heard the guy's n-name," the hunter stammered. There was a large wet stain spreading in the front of his pants. I almost felt sorry for him. Almost. "We were in the town of Fireside when we saw the wanted poster in the tavern. There was a picture and a description that matches you. The poster just said to inquire at the bar. We did and we were shown into a room in the back. Whoever hired us didn't tell us anything about the job, just find you and bring you in alive."
"Well thank you very much," I said, and blew his head off. I searched the bodies and their bags and soon found what I was looking for. The wanted poster. I held it up to the light and, sure enough, there was a hand drawn picture of myself. Not too bad either. I folded it up and slipped it into my own bag. I then took their supplies and started south. It would take me about three weeks to get to Fireside from here. Someone had a lot to answer for...
End of entry.
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It's been hard to find the time to sit down and write lately. I'm still three days away from the town of Fireside, but I feel like I'm being watched and followed, even when I have a clear view all around me. I've been sleeping badly, waking up to the slightest sound, and having disturbing dreams of running from a mob of people with no faces. I hope I can find some answers in Fireside and get the bounty off my head. I'd prefer it if avoiding people was a choice, not a necessity.
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Two days later...
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I'll be in Fireside in the morning. I'll spend the rest of this evening disguising myself. Nothing too elaborate, but a shave makes a hell of a difference. At first I was reluctant to shave off my beard, clean shaven men were a comparative rarity nowadays, and it might attract more attention than some other kind of disguise. But finally I decided a clean shaven man would be less likely to be considered a filthy wanderer.
That was another part of my disguise: I had to try to clean my clothes. I usually carry no soap, in the wasteland there's no one to tell you that you smell. Luckily I found the old deserted shell of a convenience store. There wasn't much left, but after a little digging I found a few old Bic lighters that still had some fuel in them, and buried deep down, amazingly, was a box of soap. The soap was mostly destroyed by time and moisture, but there were a couple of bars in the middle that had somehow survived intact.
So now I sit here in my (kinda) clean clothes and finish this page. In a minute I'll sharpen my knife and try to shave with it. I hope I don't botch it too bad, it would be a cruel joke to have survived all this time only to end up killing myself trying to shave.
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The next morning-
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I arrived at the outskirts of Fireside fighting the temptation to keep rubbing the side of my now shaven face. I did a pretty good job considering I don't have a mirror, and the nicks had already scabbed over. As I made my way into town I was relieved to find I was not the only traveler arriving in town. There was a foot sore caravan throwing down their packs and stretching with a chorus of groans. There was a group of merchants riding in a slave drawn cart full of various wares.
I hate slavery, I always have. When my business in town is done, I'll try to take them with me and bring them to my friend Wendal in Folly. He was one of the people who hid in the bank vault with me during The Fall. He's the head of his own small village now, and whenever I free slaves, I usually bring them there. Wendal's always happy to take them in, there's plenty of room, and more people means more can get done.
I made my way to the tavern and let myself inside. I'd never really been interested in "westerns" when I was a kid. I'd seen "Silverado" and "Magnificent Seven" and even "The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly," but that was about it. Walking into the Fireside Tavern was like stepping into one of those old movies. I miss popcorn. There was sawdust on the floor to soak up spilled drinks and spilled blood. Over in the corner sat an old man trying to coax a tune out of an old guitar. I think the guitar was winning.
Up on the "stage" there was a couple of local girls trying to dance along to the music. I only spared them a glance, because next to the door was what I was looking for, a bulletin board. There were several notices tacked up advertising upcoming events in the tavern, a few job openings, and the wanted posters. There were only three, two of them were other wanderers I'd met during my travels, and mine was right in the middle. I pulled down the poster and took it to the bar. I slapped it down without a word and waited. The bartender picked it up and, also without a word, motioned that I should follow him behind the bar.
He lead me to a door that opened to a dark room. He stepped back and gestured that I should go in. When he closed the door behind me and my eyes started to adjust to the dim light, I could see it was an office, and seated an a large desk in the middle of the room was the shape of a large fat man sitting in an equally large and fat arm chair.
"So you're interested in hunting this mark are you?" he asked in a jowly, fat voice.
"That's right," I said, "Can you tell me anything about him?"
"That's none of your business," he said with a quiver of fat annoyance. "All you need to know is that I want this guy alive, and if he's not, I'll make sure you die too, only not as fast!"
Now I've heard this kind of bullshit before. Overfed losers trying to talk tough and acting outraged at the idea of anything less than absolute obedience and respect. Whatever this guy's reason for putting a mark on me, I wasn't going to pussyfoot around with him. I calmly pulled out my shot gun and pointed it at his head.
"I asked you a question, Fatty. Now are you going to answer me, or am I going to have to smear your thick head all over the wall?" This was clearly unprecedented. I don't think anyone's ever questioned the fat man's authority before. He started to shiver and sweat and stammer. "Slow down Porky, I don't want you having a heart attack before I get some answers. Now why are you looking for me?" At this his eyes popped open.
"Y-YOU!?" he nearly toppled over backwards in his shock. His fat hands fumbled to the desk top where I could now see a gun was lying amid the clutter. I reached out and snatched it before he could get it. He slumped back in his chair and looked fatter than ever. Sweat was pouring down his cheesy face. "Talk," I said.
"O-Okay, I work for The Pack, they're taking over the country now, and they want people like you out of the way."
"And why do they want people like me out of the way?"
"We've noticed that you have a bad habit of killing our people and getting in the way of our business. Now why don't you just put away the gun and give yourself up? I'm gonna get a big bonus when the Boss hears I was the one that caught you!"
The idea of personal glory seemed to make him blind to the fact that he was unarmed and asking a man with a gun to surrender. I pumped a round into the chamber and slowly brought it up to point at his face. Visions of glory vanished from his mind instantly.
"Now for the $50,000 question: Why the hell should I turn myself in to a slug like you?"
End of entry.
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I emerged from the Fireside Tavern and stood squinting in the sunlight that dazzled my eyes that had adjusted to the dim light inside. So now I had my answers: the fat bastard was positioned by the raiders who called themselves The Pack. They had stationed agents in all the local towns and villages to oversee the slave trade and control the local economy.
Merchants and traders had only just started doing good business in the past year and commerce was starting to pick up again. Now it looked like the raiders were trying to stake a claim on the new business. And they had put out hits on anyone who was known to openly defy the raiders. I admit I have made it a habit to go out of my way to kill raiders before. Sometimes I didn't have to go very far out of my way to find them, and sometimes they came to me. Now it was time to pay for all.
But that's not to say I'm deluded enough to consider taking on The Pack single handed. First of all, no one knows where their main base is hidden. Secondly, I'd need a small army for that, and there just aren't enough people available who are willing to risk whatever they've managed to scrape together in the past four years. I can't say I blame them, but it still leaves me in a tough spot. I figured the first thing I needed to do was get as far away from Fireside as possible. I was only joking about the fat bastard having a heart attack. I didn't expect him to go ahead and actually have one.
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That night...
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I made about fifteen miles today, but tomorrow I'd better try for twenty. If that fat bastard was connected to the raiders, it's only a matter of time before they start searching for me, and I want to have a good head start. As near as I could tell, my only option at the moment was to get myself a posse and start striking raiders camps one at a time. It shouldn't be too hard at first. It should certainly be an unexpected move on my part.
Meanwhile I needed to hole up somewhere and get some sleep. I stumbled around in the semi dark until I found an old pile of junked cars. I made myself a fairly comfortable bed in the trunk of a burned out Thunderbird. My grandfather used to have one of these. I pulled the lid down and fell asleep.
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I had a dream that disturbed me for days after. I was back in the bank vault during The Fall. Wendal and the others were there with me. Then one by one they got up and walked out of the vault. I tried to call out to them to tell them to stay with me where it was safe, but I couldn't make a sound. Finally only Wendal and myself were left. But as he was about to leave he turned and started to close the door. I couldn't move or make a sound. "You're going to die alone," he said before the door shut and locked me in, alone in the dark.
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I awoke with a start and it was all dark around me. I panicked and thrashed out with my arms, knocking open the lid of the trunk. The early morning sunlight streamed in and I lay back breathing hard. Only a dream, only a dream I kept thinking to myself.
I packed up my gear and climbed to the top of the car pile to get a look around. Back in the direction of Fireside I could see a dust cloud rising up from the road. Only a large group of people could raise that much dust. I decided to get moving in case it was the raiders. I turned north. I needed a place to hide out until I had a more solid plan and maybe some better resources. I decided to go back to New Hampshire. It was mid-winter now, so by the time I got there it would be early spring.
As I walked I remembered again the cabin on the side of Mt. Kearsarge where my father used to take me and my brother camping. That would be a good place to make for, if it was still there. If it wasn't, no matter, there had to be hundreds of places like it to hide out in. The White Mountains were lousy with cabins and hunter's lodges. There had to be at least some that were still usable.
It also occurred to me that I could visit my old house. In the four years since The Fall, I had never been home. I wondered if there was anything left. Any of my things still there. My books or old clothes, my swords and knives, my porn. Just kidding. I could still find that anywhere. There was even the slim possibility that some of my family had survived all this time and I could see them again. Best not to get my hopes up too much. But still...
End of entry.
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Two weeks later...
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I've always had an active imagination, and I had a habit of day-dreaming while I was walking along. Different scenarios would play out in my mind, and often I caught myself saying my part of the scenarios aloud. Sometimes I would be traveling south with the Fellowship of The Ring, discussing possible routes with Strider, or battling orcs outside the smashed gates of Minas Tirith.
Other times I would be piloting my X-Wing fighter in a space battle with imperial TIE fighters in an assault on the Death Star, or taking on Darth Vader with my lightsaber that was always wielded with expert skill. These daydreams sustained me and kept me from boredom, although they probably didn't say much about my state of mental health. At night I would sit beside the camp fire and whittle. I had made a couple of pipes to smoke weed with, but at the moment, I was trying to carve a little flute that didn't look like it was coming out too well. No matter, I can't play anyway.
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Two months later...
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It's been a long road, but after four years, I'm finally home. All in all, I was surprised at how much still remained. Massachusetts was a mess, as expected. There wasn't much left after fires and looting, but New Hampshire was virtually untouched. I didn't see anyone as I made my way up the remains of I 93 and onto I 89. Manchester was a desolate wasteland of burned buildings and charred craters. I stopped by the old mall, but one look around told me there was nothing left. I passed Concord without bothering to look around. I was only twenty miles from my parents' home in Warner and I wanted to get there as soon as possible.
The next day I arrived in Warner and hope left me. There had been a fire and half the town was gone. I could easily see where my parents' house had been from the highway. All that was left was a pile of half burned wood and drywall in the crumbling remains of the foundation. If my family had survived The Fall, they wouldn't have stayed here. Mt. Kearsarge rose above Warner, but I passes it by for the moment. I was only another twenty miles from my old place in Newbury. I camped in the park-and-ride on the edge of town and started early the next morning.
As I walked along I listened as hard as I could, but there was nothing to hear but bird song and the occasional chatter of squirrels. I had seen no signs of human habitation anywhere. Late that evening I arrived at Newbury harbor on the side of Lake Sunapee. I camped again in the shell of the old police station where I found some shotgun shells that still seemed good.
The next morning I came home. I was a little surprised to see it still standing. The front door was standing open and the yard was a small jungle. I went inside and looked around sadly. It was dark and filthy. Animals had been in and out of the house for who knew how long. I climbed the stairs and went into my old room. Everything was exactly the way I remembered it.
It was almost surreal, like going back in time. Over in the corner hanging above the tv was the portrait of myself, a memento from my days in the drama club in high school. On the stand in front of the window was my sword rack. The walls were covered with posters and every other available surface was cluttered with my old action figures. They were going to be worth a lot of money one day I remembered. Not anymore.
I ran a finger over the dusty tops of my DVDs and looked at a few of the titles, beloved movies and cartoons that I would probably never be able to watch again. I went to the closet and saw all my shirts hanging as I had left them. I pulled a couple out and laid them on the edge of the bed. Everything had a damp, musty smell.
I then went to my book shelf. I pulled out "Lord of the Rings," "Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy," and "The Stand" and put them on the bed next to my shirts. I also pulled out "Support Your Local Wizard" by Diane Duane. I opened the front cover and found an old hundred dollar bill I kept for emergencies. I put the bill back and replaced the book on the shelf.
Hanging on the wall by the door, a forgotten treasure, my Tom Anderson "Pantera" claws. Kind of like Wolverine's claws fixed into handgrips that resembled brass knuckles. I took these down and set them on the bed with my shirts and books. Next I selected my Nodachi sword from the rack, one of my old favorites. Finally I took off my travel worn boots and put on my old boots that had been left against the wall behind the door.
I laced them up, trying to keep from being overwhelmed by the memories and emotions whirling around in my head. I pulled my old back pack out of the closet and repacked all my traveling supplies and my shirts, books, and the claws. It was time to leave. There was nothing left for me here anymore. Out in the yard I took a last look at the house, then I turned and walked away, never to return.
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Two days later I arrived back in Warner and started my approach to Mt. Kearsarge. Hiking up the mountain had been a popular field trip activity for schools. Good for a days exercise, a couple leisurely hours to hike to the summit, lunch in the clouds, then another hike back down. I had stopped by the grocery store back in town where I was lucky enough to find a trove of canned goods, and in the hardware store next door I found some camping gear like a folding hand saw and a shake-charge flashlight.
I waded the river with some difficulty as it was swollen with the spring run-off, and two hours later, I reached the cabin. It was a little run down, but nothing I couldn't fix up. I might have to hike back down to the hardware store to get some tools, but that could wait. I busted the lock off the door with the butt of my shotgun and went inside. I was pleased with the overall condition. The wood stove was a little rusty, but still usable. The old mattress was obviously ruined with mold and eaten away by rats or other nesting animals, so I dragged that out first and left it in the woods.
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That night I sat at the rough wooden table and filled my pipe while listening to the soft crackle of the flames in the wood stove. Fortunately for me, people in New Hampshire liked smoking weed, and grew plenty of it in the woods. Now I was safe for the moment, comfortable, and I had time to think. It was time to give some thought to the problem with the raiders...
End of entry.
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Six weeks later...
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I had been staying comfortably in the cabin on the side of Mt. Kearsarge for over a month when trouble finally found me. The Dregs. The feral people that lived like pack animals, hunting other people like wolves. Savages who had forgotten their humanity in the bloody aftermath of The Fall. I had often wondered how they could have changed so much in only a couple or years. How they could have gone from intelligent human beings to mindless bestial creatures of pure rage. Now I knew why there were no human settlements anywhere in the area: The Dregs had hunted them and driven them all away.
I was sitting by the small stream that ran down by the side of the cabin, I was busy cleaning my gun when I noticed a rustling in the bushes about fifty yards away. A cold rush ran down my back. I quickly reassembled my shotgun and reloaded it. Suddenly with a savage cry, a naked man, covered in filth with long tangled hair, burst out from the bushes and charged at me. I waited a second but he seemed to be the only one. When he was about ten feet from me, I pulled the trigger and blew his head off.
I quickly ran inside and gathered up my things. When there was one, there were always at least a dozen others. When I came out I realized there were more than a dozen. A lot more. It was hard to count heads, but there had to be at least thirty of them, crouched down like dogs, or slowly circling the cabin, snarling and watching me with hungry eyes.
I pumped a fresh round into the chamber and fired off another shot into the air hoping to scare a few off, but no such luck. The Dregs were almost mindless in their determination in the hunt. I knew that I would have to kill them all if I wanted to walk away alive, but the idea didn't have much appeal. If only there was a way of creating a diversion so I could make my escape. But what could I do?
Then it came to me: fire. With nothing better to try, I ran back inside the cabin and opened the door of the wood stove. There was still a good bed of coals from the previous night. I grabbed the camping shovel and scooped out a good amount. I came back outside slowly, trying to balance the small pile of coals on the shovel. The Dregs had moved closer while I was inside. I held up the shovel, hoping the concept of fire was not lost on them. It was.
With a sigh I threw the coals into the bushes and long grass near the cabin. Immediately there was a small blaze that began to quickly grow. This got The Dreg's attention. They began to scream and run around in total confusion. I watched for my opportunity to slip away and soon it presented itself. I made a dash for the path and started to run downhill. Unfortunately a small group of Dregs saw me and chased after me. I was about halfway down the side of the mountain when I slipped on a patch of mud and went rolling over several rocks and small fallen branches.
When I came to a stop I painfully picked myself up and checked for injuries. Nothing too serious, but I had banged up my left knee pretty good, so running was no longer an option. I got up and began limping as fast as I could down the path. Already there was a lot of smoke blowing down the mountain behind me, and I could see many birds and other animals running downhill on both sides of the path.
In all the confusion and noise, I guess it was no wonder that The Dregs caught up with me without my notice. As I limped along, I was hit from behind and bowled over with a heavy weight on my back. I looked over my shoulder and saw the face of a young female Dreg, her face covered with dirt and ugly with savage rage. I elbowed her in the head, knocking her off long enough to get to my feet. There were three other males with her and they had me surrounded.
With no other choice, I reluctantly pulled out my shotgun and started firing. The first went down looking stupidly at where his right shoulder used to be. The second bought himself a little time by slipping on loose stones and dodging my shot. I quickly pumped in another shell and nailed him with the second shot. Now there were only two left, one male on his feet, and the female still on the ground in a daze.
I pumped another shell into the shotgun and took aim, but before I could pull the trigger, the male lifted his head and sniffed the air. The smoke was very thick now and it was getting a little hard to breath. With a leap, he charged off into the trees, leaving me with the female.
I started to head down the path again when she lifted her head and looked me right in the eye. I was about to turn away when, with a shock, I recognized my sister, Alecia.
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The forest was burning all around us, but she was crouched down by the first of The Dregs I shot when they caught up with me. She was making a low moaning cry that I could only assume was the sound of her mourning the fallen. She then dipped her fingers in his blood and smeared some on her cheek like war paint. But when she turned back to me, instead of attacking, she cautiously crept over to me and lay down at my feet. I was totally flabbergasted by this.
Looking back on it now, the only theory that makes any kind of sense was that I killed what I can only assume was her mate, I had somehow claimed her as my property according to whatever social hierarchy The Dregs possess. But I didn't have time to ponder this at the moment. The flames and smoke were threatening to overwhelm us where we stood.
"Come on!" I said to her and grabbed her arm. She flinched but didn't pull away. I got her to her feet and, still holding her arm, led her down the path as fast as I could on my injured knee. Only when we came to the river did she offer any resistance. I guess she had been taught or conditioned to never cross the river, perhaps it marked the edge of their territory. In any case, I was crossing and so was she. Reluctantly she allowed me to lead her across, then we could slow down a little, with the river behind us to slow down the fire.
About an two hours later, we arrived at the ruins of our parent's house. I had thought maybe bringing her home might spark some memories, but my sister seemed completely oblivious to her surroundings. With some free time now, I rolled up my pants leg and looked at my knee. It was heavily bruised and starting to swell, but it looked like it would be okay, although there would certainly be some stiffness for the next few days. I pulled out one of my shirts and tore it into strips to wrap my knee.
With first aid taken care of, I turned my attention to Alecia. Her long blonde hair was tangled and matted with filth. Her once fair skin was heavily tanned and freckled from constant exposure to the sun. She had always burned easily as a child. She was also nude, so I pulled out another of my shirts and, after some persuasion, managed to get it on her. The shirt was at least long enough to serve for the present.
After a rest and something to eat, which Alecia accepted with all the grace and charm of a dog being fed scraps under the table, we hit the road. I decided to make for the coast and then go south, so that by the time autumn came around, we would be far enough south to avoid winter. As we walked I talked to her constantly, reminding her of one fond memory or another, trying to reach her, but as I talked, she just walked along beside me in silence.
She won't or can't calk any more. I pondered this as we walked along. What could have happened to her? How had she ended up like this? Would she ever snap out of it and be her old self again? I had no way of answering these questions and she was unable to tell me.
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We made camp that night on the side of the highway. There was an old SUV abandoned by the side of the road, and after pulling out the old trash left in the back, it served as a weatherproof shelter. I didn't think my sister would consent to get in, but when I climbed in the back, she followed me without a sign of fear. I pulled down the hatch and lay down to sleep.
I had another disturbing dream that night. I stood in front of my parents house as it used to be. The house was in flames and I could see my parents and sister looking out at me from the living room window. They seemed to be calling for me to help them, but I just turned around and walked away.
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The next morning I awoke to find my sister asleep beside me, curled up like a cat. I tried to get up without disturbing her, but she immediately woke up and looked at me with fear in her eyes. She grabbed my hand and held on tight.
"I'm not going to leave you," I said, laying my other hand over hers. I don't know if she understood me or just my body language, but she let go of my hand and seemed to relax. "I promise I'm never going to leave you alone again," I said. She cocked her head slightly to the side like a dog.
My dream of the previous night was very clear in my mind, and I knew exactly what it meant. It was my fault she ended up like this. I had abandoned my family in the aftermath of The Fall, and the only thing I could do to make up for it was to stay by her side and protect her now. No matter what.
End of entry.
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Three weeks later...
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Alecia still won't talk, but she's started responding more when I talk to her. I still hope to one day bring her back to her old self, but I've accepted that it might take a long time. Again and again I tried to figure out how she could have ended up like this, And that thought led me to wonder how any of The Dregs ended up the way they were.
Certainly one of the most puzzling changes brought about by The Fall was The Dregs. In only four years, they had completely lost all traces of their former humanity, living in the wild like a pack of wolves, hunting anything in order to survive, even other humans. And how my sister ended up as one of them I may never know, unless she ever tells me herself.
We had traveled south and east making towards the seacoast. I intended to make for Hampton first and then go south from there towards Folly, taking it easy and generally spending time with my sister in hopes of getting her to talk to me. We stopped off in Concord on the way, where we found a massive crater from The Fall. Everything in a ten mile radius was completely blown away. But the mall still stood intact, although it had been heavily looted in the past.
There I was able to find some clothes for my sister, but I had to help her to get dressed. I tried to get her to put on shoes, but she made it clear this was not an option. I figured it wasn't a big deal. She had been running around barefoot for the last four years, her feet were probably as tough as leather anyway.
The next issue to address was food. There had been several grocery stores in the area, but if the mall had been looted as much as it was, I was sure the food had gone quickly as well. Still I had to provide for my sister as well as myself now, so I had to check.
Sure enough the first store we went to was cleaned out. In fact it looked like people had set up a residence inside, but it was long abandoned. The next two stores were also no good, but finally we found one that still had some canned goods and packages of beef jerky in the back store room. I loaded up as much as I could fit into by back pack and we returned to the highway.
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The next few days were uneventful. We walked and I talked to my sister about things we had done together in the past. I wasn't sure if she was really taking in anything I said, but she seemed to at least listen to the sound of my voice. At night we camped wherever we felt like, I prepared dinner while she would sit and stare into the fire. We slept under the stars or in abandoned cars if it was raining, and every morning I woke up to find her curled up close beside me, sometimes snuggled up against me.
And that's how it was for about three weeks. We didn't see any other people, human or Dreg. Occasionally we would see deer, or a few stray dogs or cats. One day we saw a pair of foxes playing in a field. Before I could stop her, Alecia ran out into the field and chased the foxes. At first I thought she was trying to catch them, but after a while I realized she was just trying to join in the fun.
For a minute I just stood there in shock, but before I knew it, I found myself laughing. Whether because of how funny she looked or from sheer relief, I don't know, but a feeling of hope grew in me then. She was still human enough to appreciate fun, perhaps that was a way to help her regain whatever she had lost that made her become a Dreg in the first place. Eventually she came back, grinning almost like her old self.
"Have fun?" I asked with a grin of my own. She didn't respond but I could tell something was happening between us. That glimmer of hope swelled up again. I knew I could reach her eventually. One day she would be my little sister again, not this strange, wild girl standing in front of me with mud on her feet and grass in her hair.
"Well come on, then," I said and started down the road again. She trotted along beside me, still grinning from ear to ear.
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Three weeks later...
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We stood on the beach under the hot summer sun. Seagulls were soaring on the breeze overhead, occasionally squawking to each other. Alecia was wandering around checking out some seaweed that had washed up on the shore. Hampton had been nearly demolished. As near as I could tell, a tidal wave, probably caused by The Fall, had washed over the town and leveled most of it. There had still been no signs of human habitation anywhere. Once I found the remains of a camp fire, but it had been rained on at least twice so there was no telling how old it was.
Feeling it was safe for the moment, I stripped down to my shorts and jumped into the water. It was slightly warm and refreshing. I turned to look back at the beach and I saw my sister watching me with a look of concern on her face.
"Come on in!" I called but she didn't move. I waded back up onto the shore. "It's all right, don't be afraid," I took her hand and gently tried to pull her towards the water but she resisted. I decided it was best to not push her too fast, so I let go of her hand and backed up into the water up to my waist, showing her it was safe. "See? It's okay." I splashed a little water at her.
Seeing me standing in the water seemed to convince her it was safe to follow me, so she slowly came near the water. At that moment a wave washed up. She retreated up the beach in near panic, but I decided to remain silent and let her work it out for herself.
She looked at me as if trying to determine if I was playing a trick on her. I stood there watching her. Slowly she approached again, this time with a little more confidence. I held out my hand to her without saying a word. Finally she stepped into the water and came to me.
"See? It's all right," I said taking her hand. It took another fifteen minutes or so, but she finally started to get over her fear of the water and have a little fun. We splashed around for a while before getting out to dry in the sun. Besides relaxing and having a good time, I had managed to get her cleaned up a little. I made a mental note to try to find a comb and a pair of scissors and do something about her hair. It was less muddy but still very long and tangled.
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That night we camped on the beach. I lit a fire and made dinner as usual. I also decided to try a new tactic. As I was stirring the soup, I started singing a few songs that I remembered she used to like. The effect was startling. Her head snapped up from watching the fire and she looked at me with a strange look in her eyes. I noticed this but gave no sign that anything was out of the ordinary.
After a moment she turned her attention back to the fire, but now there were tears in her eyes. I kept singing while watching her closely. After a while she lay down on her side and went to sleep. I felt disappointed that there had been something happening but it had passed. Still I felt encouraged. I was starting to get to her. I felt strongly that if I kept trying, there would be a breakthrough. I went to sleep, with hope that tomorrow she might show more improvement.
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That night I dreamed that I had lost her somehow. I wandered through a burned forest calling for her, but there was no answer. Suddenly she stepped out from behind a tree, but it was my sister as she used to be before The Fall. "You'll never find me!" she said in a teasing voice. Then she giggled and disappeared behind the tree again. I ran to the tree and looked behind it, but she was gone.
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The next morning dawned clear and bright, but something was wrong. I awoke expecting to find my sister curled up beside me as usual, but she was still on the other side of the fire pit where she had gone to sleep the night before. I tried to not be too disappointed by this. I figured she had been too tired from the activities of the day before to wake up in the night and come over to me. I hoped this was the case. My dream came back to my mind and I wondered if I really would ever find the part of her that was my sister.
End of entry.
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Six weeks later...
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We traveled south without incident for nearly a month. Much to my dismay, my sister had pulled away from me somewhat. It was rare now that I would wake up in the morning to find her curled up beside me like she used to. I tried and tried, but I couldn't figure it out. All I could do was keep talking to her and try to make her remember who she was.
Because we had been taking it slow, it took us a lot longer than it normally would for me to reach Folly. I had come to the conclusion that I could make no further progress with my sister's rehabilitation on my own. What she really needed was to see other people living and interacting with each other. At least I though so.
Also I remembered Wendal making mention once of a psychologist who had settled in the village. I was almost ashamed of myself that I didn't think of him sooner. Of all the luck to know of a psychologist in this day and age, and I go and forget all about him when I could use his help more than anything else.
But first I had to do something about our appearance. We were both filthy and smelly from the long weeks on the road, and neither one of us had had any kind of bath since our stop at Hampton beach. As we passed through one small town, I looked around until I found a drug store.
After much rummaging through the debris, I found scissors, a comb, shaving razors, a small hand mirror with only a small crack near the edge, a crumbling bar of soap and a bottle of shampoo that had not completely dried up.
Next we wandered around until we found a small river that was deep enough to bathe in. Cleaning myself was no issue, but I doubted I could convince my sister to give herself a good scrub while I went away to give her some privacy. Still it was worth a try.
"Alecia, are you going to be able to wash yourself?" I asked without much hope. She cocked her head to the side slightly, like she did any time I tried asking her a question. It was comforting to know that she knew I was asking a question instead of just talking to her, but it seemed she still didn't or couldn't understand me. I tried demonstrating how to soap up and rinse off, but when I handed her the soap, she just sniffed it then looked at me.
Well I knew what I had to do. With a sigh and as much of a professional attitude as I could muster, I got her undressed and helped her wash, which she took with surprisingly good grace. I figured it was no different that any family member who had ever had to wash an invalid loved one. At least I didn't have to force her.
After the initial cleaning, it was time to do something about her hair. I had added some water to the shampoo and let it sit a while to re-hydrate. Now it was ready to use. I began washing her hair, and this time she started to get fidgety, so I sing to her and she quieted down.
After about an hour, I had finally gotten her hair clean, combed out the tangles, and cut it down to a manageable length. After she was dressed again, I felt a pang of sadness looking at her. She almost looked like her old self, but the girl looking at me from her eyes was a completely different person. I held up the mirror for her to see her reflection. She gazed at it with rapt attention. I handed it to her and she absently sat down while staring at it. It must have been the first time she had seen her reflection in four years. And certainly the first time she looked like who she once had been. As I watched her, I saw she had tears in her eyes again.
"Alecia?" I called her name softly. She looked at me, and for a second I could have sworn she was about to say something. Then she let the mirror fall to the ground and wandered away a little to investigate some flowers growing by the river. I shook my head sadly and picked up the mirror. I went to the water's edge and had a proper shave. I figured it would be good for her to see me more or less as I used to look. I resolved to show her as many familiar things as I could. Something had to spark her old memories.
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Two days later we arrived at the village of Folly. The name was Wendal's little joke. He said it was folly to try to re-create the ways that we had lost in The Fall. The sentries let me pass without question. My history with Wendal was well known to everyone in the village and I was always welcome.
Alecia began to get nervous as we passed more and more people. Out in the fields, several people saw me pass and waved a greeting at me. Most of them were former slaves I had freed and sent here. I waved back and continued on my way. Alecia started to walk closer by my side in obvious anxiety. I held her hand and talked to her as we made our way into the center of the village.
"This is the home of two good friends on mine, Alecia. I promise we'll be safe here." She gave no indication that she understood my words, so to help her relax I started humming a little tune for her. It seemed to help, so I kept it up as we approached Wendal's house.
Apparently word had gone ahead of us, because Wendal was standing outside his front door waiting for us.
"Alan! Welcome back!"
"Thanks Wendal, it's good to be here."
"I'll bet. I've heard rumors that there's a mark on your head."
"Yeah, that's why I had to go into hiding for a while."
"And who's this little number?"
"Wendal, this is my younger sister, Alecia."
Wendal held out his hand to shake, but Alecia pulled back and half hid behind me.
"Sorry Wendal, but she's had some...problems, and she's not really herself."
Wendal gave me a searching look for a moment. "All right, come inside both of you. I can see there's something you don't want to talk about in public. I'll have Laura fix up something to eat."
Wendal led the way into his house. The village of Folly had been rebuilt on the ashes of another town that had been burnt during The Fall. The houses were small, more adequate than anything else, certainly nothing to be called luxurious, but all that mattered to the villagers was that it was home.
Inside we were shown to a small living room. Wendal's three-year-old daughter, Ashley, was playing with a pair of kittens. Alecia had always loved cats. After a moment of hesitation, she slowly went over to sit on the floor near the kittens. "Hi!" said Ashley with a big smile. Alecia didn't answer, but a hint of a smile crossed her face in return. "You wanna play with kitty?" asked Ashley, handing over one of the kittens. Alecia took the kitten and just held it for a moment, watching it with a look of real happiness on her face.
Wendal and I stood watching this for a moment until Wendal's wife, Laura, came in with a tray of sandwiches and instant coffee. I sipped it and suppressed a grimace. I guess that stuff never goes bad, since it was never good in the first place. I thanked her as I accepted my share.
"Do you want anything to eat, dear?" she asked Alecia, but got no response. Alecia was totally absorbed in the kittens frolicking on the floor.
"Don't worry about it, Laura, she'll come over when she's ready." I said. Laura shrugged and went off to begin preparations for dinner.
"Now then," said Wendal, setting down his coffee. "What's the big secret? Why didn't you ever tell me you had a sister somewhere?"
I didn't answer for a moment. I looked down at my cup and tried to find the courage to admit my guilt. Wendal's question brought on a wave of guilt that I never knew I had until now. I tried for nearly a minute to find some way to explain it that wouldn't make me look like a total asshole. Finally I just blurted it out.
"I didn't know she was still alive. I never even went to find out in all this time since The Fall. I was off taking care of myself while she was left to fend for herself. I wasn't even looking for her when I found her, it was an accident. She's been living with The Dregs."
"What?! She's a Dreg?" I had never seen Wendal so genuinely shocked.
"Yes. She's a Dreg, and it's all my fault. I should have gone straight home after The Fall. I should have been there for her. But I wasn't. I don't know how she could have ended up like this, and I don't know if she'll ever be her old self again."
"No one can ever go back to what we used to be," said Wendal gently. "The Fall can never be undone, the changes can never be unmade. The people who survived are not who they used to be, and never will be again. The world isn't what it used to be, and never will be again. All we can do is survive, adapt, and try to keep moving forward."
I sat quietly trying to absorb the wisdom of what he said. Wendal sipped his coffee quietly and gave me time to think. Over on the floor Alecia and Ashley were rolling a ball of string for the kittens to play with. Both the girls were off in another world for all they knew or cared.
"Wendal?"
"Yes?"
"Is that psychologist still living here in town?"
"Doc Thayer? Yes. He lives over on the South End. I was wondering when you'd ask about him. It's getting late now, but I'll bring you and Alecia over to see him in the morning. He should find her fascinating if nothing else."
"I'm not concerned with whether or not he's fascinated, I just want to know if he can help her."
"That remains to be seen."
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That night we all sat down to dinner together, a real home-cooked dinner. Alecia and Ashley sat side by side. One might think they had been friends for years, or even sisters, what with how well they got on together. Alecia didn't talk, and Ashley didn't say much, but between them there was more communication that I had managed in the time since I had found her.
After dinner the girls were sent to bed together. Wendal, Laura, and I sat up for a few more hours catching up. I gave Wendal the copies of "Lord of the Rings", "Hitchhiker's Guide", and "The Stand." We discussed the raiders and their slow spreading influence on the traders. Wendal suggested several places I could go to look to hire mercenaries to help me get rid of the raiders. Then Laura asked me about Alecia, so I had to tell it all again, but this time it seemed easier to tell. Laura agreed that I should take Alecia to see old Doc Thayer in the morning. If anyone could help her, it was Doc Thayer.
A bed was made for me on the sofa in the living room, and after looking in on Alecia, who was snuggled in bed with Ashley, I went to sleep. And as far as I can remember, I didn't have any dreams that night.
End of entry.
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The next morning I awoke to find the kittens sleeping on my chest, and Alecia sitting on the floor beside the sofa staring at them.
"Good morning," I said to her. She turned her attention to me for a moment, then went back to watching the kittens. I picked them up and set them on the floor so I could get up. I could hear Laura in the kitchen making breakfast. Wendal came into the room carrying Ashley who was yawning and rubbing one of her eyes with the side of her tiny fist.
"Where'dja go?" she demanded of Alecia. Alecia surprised me by getting up and going over to greet Ashley. Wendal set Ashley down and she gave Alecia a hug. At first I didn't think Alecia would know how to handle this, but she surprised me again by returning the hug. The girls then sat down to play with the kittens again.
"She seems to be adapting nicely," said Wendal, sitting down on the sofa beside me.
"I know," I said, "I had a feeling she would respond more if I brought her to a place where she could see more people."
"After breakfast we'll go see Doc Thayer."
"Good, because I'm all out of ideas."
One of the most important rules of survival is: eat what you can when you can get it, because there's no knowing when, or if, you're going to be eating again any time soon. On the road, Alecia and I ate mostly canned goods and beef jerky I had found in the ruins of various grocery stores. Being able to sit down to a home cooked meal was a real luxury after so many weeks of the same thing every day.
We all sat down to bacon and eggs, home made toast, fresh berries, and coffee or milk. Alecia still ate with her hands, but she watched everyone else using their forks with interest. After breakfast, Wendal, Alecia, and I set out for Doc Thayer's house on the south end of town. As we walked Wendal asked me about what I'd seen as I traveled. I told him some things as they came to mind, then I told him about my journal. He said he'd like to read it when we got back to his house.
After only one day in the village, Alecia was already more comfortable seeing so many other people. She walked along at my side, still holding my hand, but not cringing and trying to hide behind me as she had the day before. We passed one yard that had a chicken pen, and she pulled me aside so she could look at them for a minute.
At last, after many stops for Alecia to investigate one thing or another, we came to a house built by a small stand of trees on the edge of town. There we saw a man in his middle forties sitting on a rocking chair on the front porch. He was smoking a hand carved pipe and deeply engrossed in an enormous book.
"Good morning Doc!" called Wendal. Doc Thayer looked up from his book and smiled as he stood up to shake hands with Wendal.
"Good morning to you, mayor! What brings you down to this end of town?"
"Doc, I want to introduce you to some very special friends of mine. This is Alan and his sister Alecia."
"Good morning," I said shaking his hand.
"Likewise," he responded with a pleasant smile. Alecia didn't come forward, but she didn't try to hide either.
"So Mr. Mayor, how may I be of service today?"
"Well actually I think Alan should explain, can we go inside?"
"Of course! Come on in!"
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Doc Thayer led the way into his house. It was smaller than Wendal's house, but it was definitely comfortable. Doc Thayer had salvaged several cushy armchairs that were still in fairly good shape. Over in the east wall was a small hearth with a fire burning in it. Near a doorway leading to another room was a book shelf that nearly groaned under the load of books Doc Thayer had stuffed it with. It was the house of a man with simple, yet elegant taste.
Doc Thayer gestured us to the chairs gathered around the fireplace and sat down as well.
"Now how can I help you?" he asked me. I explained to him how I had accidentally discovered my sister living among The Dregs in New Hampshire. I told him about her behavior and how it had changed since I had started traveling with her.
"But now I think we've come to an impasse. She's gotten a lot better, but she seems to have stopped making progress. She still won't talk and I'm just afraid she never will again." Throughout my story, Doc Thayer sat and listened without interruption. He puffed his pipe and looked thoughtfully at Alecia. Alecia sat gazing at the fire, seemingly oblivious to what was going on.
"Well," said Doc Thayer after I had finished, "First I must say that it's extraordinary that you happened to find her by chance. I also find it remarkable that you've managed to inspire any recovery in her at all. As far as I know, no one has ever managed to bring a Dreg out of the wild before."
"What are The Dregs anyway?" asked Wendal.
"The Dregs are, in a word, unfortunate," said Doc Thayer. "The Fall was, as you know, a catastrophic calamity that has fundamentally changed the world. Some have applied the name to mean not only the fall of devastating meteors, but also the fall of civilization as we know it. Perhaps even the fall of mankind. Perhaps you are familiar with post traumatic stress disorder? Well what it boils down to is this: when the human mind is exposed to trauma so severe that it simply can't cope, the brain will, in affect, shut down.
"The symptoms can vary greatly from case to case. Sometimes the symptoms manifest themselves in the form of what is known as 'shell shock,' usually found in soldiers who have survived intense combat, sometimes it can manifest in the form of amnesia, where the mind is so traumatized that it will simply block out the memory of the trauma altogether. Quite often the severity of the symptoms are directly influenced by the severity of the trauma.
"In the case of The Dregs, the trauma of surviving The Fall, witnessing the end of the world, as it were, and seeing the aftermath, was simply too much. It was too much to cope with, and their minds just couldn't process that kind of monumental change, so the rational and intelligent part of their minds retreated, leaving a more primal part of their minds in charge to take care of the business of survival. Sadly this applies to your sister.
"I wish I could give you some good news regarding her condition, but I've never seen or heard of anyone rehabilitating a Dreg. Post traumatic stress disorder has no easy cure. Some people need years of intense therapy to overcome it, some people can, in time, learn to live with it, and some people are never able to.
"All I can say about your sister is that if she has shown this much recovery in such a short amount of time, there is every possibility that one day she will recover enough to begin dealing with the trauma of The Fall. If that time comes, she may very well regain the capacity of speech, and then the real healing can begin. For now I suggest you keep surrounding her with familiar and comforting things that she can relate to. Keep talking to her, sing to her, encourage her to remember happy memories that you share.
"And you're welcome to bring her back any time if you need my help. What little I can do for her is always at your disposal."
Wendal and I rose and thanked Doc Thayer for his time. We walked back to Wendal's house in silence. I had a lot to think about and Wendal kept his peace. When we got back to the house, I produced my journal from my bag for Wendal to read. Laura came out of the house with a basket of laundry saying she was taking Ashley with her down to the stream and would Alecia like to come too?
Ashley ran over and took Alecia's hand and led her away. Laura and I exchanged a smile at how well the girls got along together. I sat on the porch and filled my pipe as I watched them walk away to the stream that ran through the middle of town. After a while Wendal came out and sat down on the porch with me. I passed him the pipe and we smoked in silence.
"Alan," he said after pipe was empty, "I read your journal from beginning to end."
"And?"
"It's very good."
"Thanks. When can I expect my Pulitzer?"
"I want you to keep writing. For me."
"What?"
"I'm not going to leave this village for probably the rest of my life Alan. I have a family and responsibilities to see to. There's always something else to demand my attention. That's why I want you to keep writing this, for me as much as for yourself. This journal could be very important one day, and I want you to be my eyes and ears out in the wasteland. I want details, I want names, I want all the information you can gather for me."
"How come?"
"I have a feeling that one day this journal will be very important to a lot of people."
"Okay, now I know you're stoned..."
"I'm serious Alan! As the leader of this village, I'm responsible for the safety of every one of these people. I have to know what's out there and how it could affect these people lives and safety. And I can send that information to other villages in other places that are vulnerable. This problem with the raiders isn't a passing thing. They're going to keep gathering more weapons, more influence, and more power."
He handed me my journal and another blank notebook.
"Do this for me Alan."
"All right then, if it means that much to you. But what's all this stuff about it being very important one day?"
"Well who else has been writing a book about the early days after The Fall? Maybe one day we'll get things going again, rebuild and start to prosper again, then this journal will be an important piece of history."
"You're being stoned again."
"All right be that way. Just keep writing and take care of it."
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The girls came back about two hours later, soaking wet up to their knees and grinning like only the very innocent can grin. Laura had appropriated the assistance of one of the local boys to carry the basket of wet laundry for her, and I notice with disproval they we was watching Alecia with more than simple curiosity.
When she was growing up, I would often offer to kill any boy why showed interest in her. It was always considered a family joke, but as her brother, I was very protective and wanted her to stay my baby sister forever. Oh well, things change. Boy do they change.
Wendal told Laura to go sit down and stop working herself to death all the time. He and I hung up the laundry while the girls went inside to get out of the sun.
"So what's Greg been up to?" I asked, "I haven't seen him around."
"He's been out foraging for parts," said Wendal. "He says he wants to try to hook up generators to a water wheel in the stream to make electricity. I sent along ten other guys to keep him out of trouble. He should be back in a couple of days."
When Wendal and I came in, I found Laura had given Alecia a fresh change of clothes. When I had taken her to the mall back in Concord, I had dressed her in a t-shirt and a pair of shorts. She now wore a sun dress that came down to her knees. Laura had combed her hair and tied it back. My heart ached for the girl that used to be my sister.
Alecia came over and surprised me with a hug. I hugged her back, thinking about what Doc Thayer had said. No matter what, I would never give up on her. My sister was in there somewhere, and I was going to find her again.
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That night the dreams came back. I was in the burnt forest calling for Alecia again. Once again she walked out from behind a tree, only this time it was further away.
"You're never gonna find me!" she said with a giggle. She then stepped behind the tree and vanished. I ran around the forest calling for her, and I could still hear her giggling, but I couldn't see her anywhere...
End of entry.
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One month later...
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Two days after we arrived in Folly, Greg and his party returned from the wasteland leading a cart made from the bed of a pickup truck pulled by two horses. He ran over to shake my hand and began asking all kinds of questions about where I had been and what I had seen. After he talked my ear off, I got him to show me what he had found.
There was an emergency generator he had found in the basement of a hospital. He and a man named Dave, who had been an engineer before The Fall, believed they could rig up a waterwheel to turn the generator and make electricity for the village. I helped them as much as I could, but I was never very good at tech stuff.
Later I questioned his party members about any news of the raiders. They said The Pack had taken over fifteen villages so far, and were well on the way to taking more. Greg's party had had to move carefully to avoid attracting attention. So far Folly had not been discovered by the raiders, but one mistake could change all that.
But I had learned all I really needed to know: the problem with the raiders was not going to go away, and dealing with the problem wasn't something I could put off any longer. I had hidden long enough, now it was time to do something proactive.
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Every day in Folly seemed to bring Alecia a little closer to the person she used to be. She still wouldn't talk, but she had begun to actively respond to when I talked to her. If I asked her a question she gave me her full attention. If I asked her to go get something for me or to go do something, more often then not she would understand and do it.
And when I didn't have Alecia with me, Ashley demanded the rest of her attention. They had become fast friends in the time they spent together, and it was this friendship that made my next move easier to make. But I put it off as long as I could.
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At last I took Wendal and Greg aside one day and told them what I intended to do.
"Wendal," I said, "I'm going to have to leave soon to do something about the raiders. I can't keep running away from them. Alecia deserves to have her brother at her side to protect her, but I can't protect her as long as the raiders are looking for me, and it's not fair to her if I keep wandering and take her with me."
"What do you intend to do?" asked Wendal.
"How can we help?" added Greg.
"I need maps, I need supplies, and I need to leave Alecia here." I said.
"Of course she can stay with us," said Wendal.
"I still have some maps and things from when I went out last month," said Greg. "And I want to come with you."
"Greg! Your place is here!" said Wendal.
"I'm sorry Wendal," he said, "but I can't stay here and sit on my hands while Alan's out there risking his life for all or us. We all survived The Fall together, and we have to take care of each other. You're going to take care of his sister, and he's going out to fight the raiders to protect us, what does that leave for me?"
Wendal didn't answer. I know he felt the same way I did. Greg was only nineteen and had his whole life ahead of him. Neither of us wanted him to put his life on the line needlessly. All the same, he had a good point...
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Greg and I made plans and gathered supplies for the road. What maps there were we studied and made copies. Laura and Susan, Greg's girlfriend, worked together to make "Follyknockers," a thick, dry biscuit that lasted for weeks if kept dry.
Of course anyone who had ever eaten Follyknockers could explain their longevity easily: no one was very eager to eat them if they didn't have to. I was reminded of the descriptions of "cram" from The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings: "...it was plain and mostly served as a chewing exercise."
Finally we were ready to depart. I had been told that there were mercenaries living out west, former Army squads that had survived The Fall and had become independent militia for hire. Good men and women who still served what was left of their country in whatever way they could. If I was to find any help against the raiders, they were my best bet.
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The morning sun was bright but still cool as we made ready to leave. Before we started, I took a walk with Alecia.
"Alecia," I began slowly. She turned to look at me. "I have to go away for a while." I waited to see if these words had any impact. They did. She clung to my arm and made a moaning sound of negation in her throat. She looked up at me and real dismay was in her eyes. I hugged her and went on.
"I know I promised I would never leave you again, but there's something I have to take care of before I can keep that promise. I'm going to leave you here with Wendal and is family. I know you'll be safe here until I come back." I felt her shudder in my arms, and I realized she was sobbing silently. I just stood there and held her for a while, then we headed back to the house.
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Wendal and his family were waiting for me with Greg and Doc Thayer. Doc Thayer had come to visit Alecia regularly to check on her progress. He had become a good friend, and I felt secure in leaving Alecia here under his guidance and Wendal's protection. Greg had brought along a mule to serve as a pack animal, I think he had named it Artemis or some other fool thing.
I shook Wendal's hand, gave hugs to Laura and Ashley, and finally to Alecia. Susan grabbed Greg and kissed him long and hard. Finally she released him and, with tears in her eyes, went to stand with Laura. Then I checked my shotgun, made sure my sword was in easy reach, and made sure my claws were securely strapped to the sides of my thighs. Greg had a 30.06 slung over his shoulder and two long daggers strapped to his belt. We both wore trench coats with thick liners to protect us from the oncoming winter months.
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Greg and I struck out due west and after we left the last of the farming fields and cattle pastures behind, we were back in the wasteland. The going was alternately easy and difficultly. During The Fall, most of the Earth's surface was bombarded with a heavy rain of meteorites that had left the land pock-marked with craters.
Some were shallower than others and we could walk straight across them without too much difficulty, others were very deep or even filled with water and we had to go around. As I made my way down the seacoast with Alecia I hadn't seen too many craters, but that was mostly because the massive tidal waves had filled most of them in.
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We traveled west as straight as we could for several weeks. Once in a while we saw, far off, bands of raiders on horseback riding across the wasteland, leaving one small village for another. We traveled mostly by night to avoid being seen. So far we had been lucky, but that didn't make me let my guard down.
Greg quickly proved himself a capable traveler, and showed potential to be a pretty decent wanderer. He was good for a full days march, knew where to find clean water as well as I did, and didn't complain when there was hard going. He also knew when to shut up and move along quietly.
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Survival seemed much easier when there was someone there to watch my back. Mostly though I appreciated Greg's company at night, when the silence used to seem almost painful, and often I was afraid to fall asleep in case an animal came along and decided to find out how I tasted.
. Most of the time it was just the two of us, but one night we came across another pair of travelers taking shelter from the rain under half an old bridge. They invited us to share their fire and their dinner. We didn't have much to offer in return but Follyknockers.
It was that night that I learned a vital component of survival was not just knowing how to live off the land, it was having a sense of humor.
The older of the two guys, who called themselves Mutt and Smut, handed me a piece or roast dog meat on a stick, then sat back and asked: "Either of you guys ever hear the story of King Grizzlebeard?"
Greg and I shook our heads no.
"Well, the story goes like this: Once upon a time there was this Princess, and she was a pretty little thing, but she was also a royal bitch. Every year on her birthday, her father, the King, invited all sorts of Princes and Kings from all over the country to try to marry her off and get the little bitch out of the house.
"Unfortunately the Princess was incredibly spoiled and also a cunt. No one was ever good enough for her, and she sent every Prince and King running in fear, because she'd just rip into 'em, making fun of them for one reason or other.
"Well one year, the Princess was on a roll and had run off every Prince and King that had come to ask for her hand that year. All except one. A King who had a long and shaggy beard came last to ask her hand. The Princess made fun of him and called him 'King Grizzlebeard.'
"But this time she had made fun of the wrong guy. He turned to her father and said 'King! I'll marry your daughter!' Well this shocked everyone, including the Princess, but her father had finally had enough of her shit too, so he made her marry King Grizzlebeard.
"Grizzlebeard took her back to his homeland and brought her to his castle. But instead of making her his Queen, he put her to work like she was a common maid. Now of course there was much bitching and complaining from the Princess, and there was plenty of whining and woe-is-me-ing, but the King just told her to shut her trap and get back to work.
"Finally after a whole year of this, the Princess had learned humility, and was grateful for everything she had. Then, seeing that the Princess had learned her lesson at last, the King made her his Queen, and they lived happily ever after.
"Now then, have you boys guessed the moral of the story?"
"Uh, be grateful for what you've got?" guessed Greg.
"Nope, that ain't it, guess again."
"Is it that it's important to have humility?" I guessed.
"Nope, that ain't it either."
"All right what it the moral?" I asked.
"Never trust whitey!"
That kept us laughing for three days.
End of entry.
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One month later...
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Sometimes I have to sit back and laugh at how much we used to take for granted. We had electricity for light and warmth, but we only stopped to appreciate it when it wasn't working. We had cars, trucks, and motorcycles to speed us to any destination in comfort; we had simple yet important luxuries like indoor plumbing.
But the one thing I missed most now was a telephone. We took it for granted how easy it was to pick up a phone and call anyone, anywhere in the world at any time we wanted or needed. I thought of this and wished I had a phone to call Wendal to ask about Alecia.
Greg and I had been on the road together for a month, working our way westward, and every day my thoughts were with my sister. I knew I did the right thing when I left her behind in Folly, but since I discovered her continued existence, something had changed in me. I sat considering this one evening as I was making the fire and Greg was off gathering water.
Before I found Alecia, I was totally focused on myself, and the rest of the world could go to hell for all I cared. Now here I was on my way to hire a small army to lead against the raiders in hopes of freeing the land of their control. But beneath all that, my goal was still mostly selfish; I only wanted to get rid of The Pack so I could live in peace with my sister. And if anyone else benefited from my actions, so be it.
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Greg and I slowly made our way across the Midwest, and as we went the land changed around us. There were many more craters and destruction to be found, and we hadn't seen any sign of human habitation in weeks. For that matter we hadn't seen any animals at all, except our mule. All the land seemed dead and empty.
Whole cities had been burnt or obliterated in The Fall, and often we could look in any direction and see the horizon. It was a desolate and lonely country. We tried to keep it from getting to us, but it was getting harder every day.
As a wanderer, I've gotten used to traveling alone in the wasteland, and Greg's company, although necessary, was starting to wear on my nerves. It wasn't anything specific that was bothering me, I just wasn't used to having someone around so much.
Fortunately for both of us, Greg was pretty perceptive, and he could tell his presence was only tolerated. He became uncharacteristically quiet and thoughtful. I suppose a part of it was seeing first hand how much had been lost in The Fall, but mostly it was because he could see me trying not to snap at him in annoyance. I made a mental note to clear the air and let him know it wasn't his fault.
In the meantime I kept my eyes open for any signs of the raiders or mercenaries. When Wendal told me about the mercs, I asked him where I could find them, he said "Just head west, and they'll find you."
So we headed west, and so far, they hadn't found us. I was starting to get anxious by now, because a whole month had passed yet we had accomplished nothing, and all the time I knew the raiders would surely have been busy, conquering one village after another.
I was also starting to worry because winter was coming on fast, and that's no time to try to live off the land, especially in this land.
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"Well Alan," said Greg one morning, "It looks like we're running low on food."
"I know," I said, "If we don't find the mercs soon, we're going to be in trouble. We haven't seen any animals to hunt in weeks, and we haven't passed a town or city that wasn't a burned out shell or a crater."
"What are we gonna do?"
"The only thing we can do: press on and hope that we 'get found' in the next couple of days."
We packed up our things and started walking again. The sky was overcast and there was a chill wind blowing. I took comfort that Alecia would be someplace warm and safe this winter, not living naked in the forests of New Hampshire.
Come to think of it, how the hell did The Dregs survive living naked in the winter? Winters in New England could be harsh under the best of circumstances. Maybe The Dregs migrated south in the winter like birds.
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A week later, we were found. We were leaving the ruins of a small town, disappointed that all the stores and houses had been looted and there was nothing to eat. As we walked down the main street, ten men and women in military uniforms burst out of the surrounding houses and shops and trained their rifles on us.
"Drop your weapons!" shouted one of them, a young man of about twenty-five. Greg and I slowly unslung our guns and set them down.
"Take off the blades, too!" We obediently took off our swords and knives, and I pulled my claws from their sheaths on my legs and set those down as well. As soon as we were disarmed, four of the men came over and tied our hands behind our backs and gathered up our weapons.
Without a word, we were led away to a house off to the side of the street. Inside we were taken through the kitchen and down a narrow flight of stairs into the basement. Then one of the men knocked on a section of wall, which opened revealing a tunnel that led to the sewers under the main street.
We were led down several turns of the sewers until we came to what I guessed was a pumping station. A man in his mid fifties came over and one of our captors whispered something into his ear. He nodded and turned his attention to us.
"I am captain Hiller, United States Army." he said, "State your name and business."
"Captain," I said, "My name is Alan, this is my friend Greg. We're actually here looking for you."
"What for?"
"Have you ever heard of the raider called The Pack?"
"Yes I have. My scouts have reported that they've been staging a takeover of the eastern territories. But what do you have to do with them?"
"They've put out a hit on me."
"Really? Now why would they do that, I wonder?"
"I used to make it a habit to kill raiders whenever I encountered them."
"Well that was a foolish thing to do. You should have expected them to retaliate. So you have a hit on your head, what does that have to do with us?"
"I want to hire you to help me get rid of them."
"Which ones?"
"All of them."
"WHAT?"
"I want to wipe them out. I was a wanderer, but now I have someone who needs me to take care of her, and I can't settle down to do that if I'm always looking over my shoulder."
Hiller looked at me for a moment, then nodded to one of the guards standing behind us. I felt a knife slip between my bound hands, a quick jerk, and the ropes were cut.
"I can see there's more to this that I thought." said Hiller. "You'll forgive me if I don't return your weapons right away. In the meantime, you'll be fed and made comfortable while I look into other matters that demand my attention, we'll talk more later."
He left the room, the soldiers around us snapped to attention and saluted him as he passed. Greg and I were taken back to the house we came in through, there we were shown upstairs to a spare bedroom that had been cleaned and made useable.
Soon a young man came in with a couple packages of freeze dried rations. After weeks of Follyknockers, we were prepared to eat anything, and the rations weren't that bad.
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Later that evening, I was brought back to see captain Hiller. I was surprised and a little annoyed to see he had my journal on the table beside him. Couldn't a guy get a little privacy anymore? He saw that I noticed the book and handed it back to me.
"Well Alan, I must say that's quite an account you've written. And I now have no reason to doubt your intentions. It's one thing to talk to a man face-to-face and have to sift through his bullshit, but reading his private thoughts is far more convincing.
"To be honest, I was going to take the job anyway, The Pack are becoming a problem that we were going to have to deal with eventually anyway. But now I know your real motivation, I'm going to take the job for free."
"You are?"
"Yes. For two reasons. One: you want our help so you can do your duty to your sister, and I respect that."
"And the other reason?"
"You obviously don't have a pot to piss in."
"Thanks," I said, grinning in spite of myself.
"Don't mention it. Now then, there's work to be done. We start out first thing tomorrow." He called over a young woman and gave orders to pack up and be ready to move out at first light. Another young man came over and gave me back my weapons and Greg's.
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The next morning we were woken up early and had a quick breakfast of rations before starting back east. Greg and I marched along near the front of the column a few feet behind Captain Hiller and his Lieutenant, the young woman from the night before. I think I heard Hiller call her Banks.
We found ourselves marching next to a man about my age who introduced himself as Stebbins. Stebbins had just joined the reserves when The Fall hit. He had wandered around aimlessly for about six months before he met Captain Hiller. He then told us about the lands further west. It was lucky we stopped in Hiller's town after all.
If we had continued further west, we would have entered the quarantine zone. When the governments had used up the nuclear arsenal destroying the meteor, a lot of debris had been irradiated. Everything between the Great Lakes and the Rocky Mountains was a radioactive wasteland.
Captain Hiller had been considering moving east soon anyway since the prevailing wind currents were blowing from the west, carrying the fallout with it. There were even rumors of Dregs who were mutating from the radiation. I didn't want to think about that, so I quickly changed the topic, asking about Banks.
"Don't waste your time there, pal. Banks is all about captain Hiller. But if you like, I can introduce you to Hopkins. She's pretty cool, but she's made it she doesn't want to hook up with anyone in the troop. Band of brothers and all that shit. Chicks huh?"
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That night I was introduced to Beth Hopkins, who was actually very charming, and I think we hit it off. When it was time for bed, Beth invited me into her tent. We made love, and it was good. After, she fell asleep with her head resting on my chest. I lay awake for a little while, thinking about what was going to happen when we came back east.
I felt sure Hiller would want to stop in Folly to gather supplies and information. I just hoped that by bringing strangers there, I wasn't inviting disaster. I thought of Alecia and hoped this would all be over soon. I also hoped Beth would do that thing with her tongue again if I woke her up...
End of entry.
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Six weeks later...
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We made better time getting back to Folly than I expected. Captain Hiller's troops seemed to know the land intimately, and they found the smoothest path through even the most devastated areas. Stebbins said they had sent out scouts to explore and gather supplies, and they knew the lay of the land for many miles around.
This explained why Greg and I hadn't been able to find any food anywhere. So we marched by day, and I spent my nights with Beth, and in this way we made it back to Folly in just under six weeks.
We were challenged by the guards, but when I came forward and explained that they were with me and Greg, we were allowed to pass. People everywhere stopped what they were doing to watch the soldiers marching through the town in formation.
Soon we came to Wendal's house, and as before, he was waiting outside to greet me. Alecia was with him and, when she saw me, she ran over and threw her arms around me. I held her tight, it was so good to see her again.
"How have you been?" I asked.
"Good! Alan good!"
I stepped back in shock. "You can talk?!"
"Well not entirely," said Wendal. "She's been learning a little at a time since about two weeks after you left. I think she tried to speak just to ask where you had gone. It was Ashley who's been teaching her."
"That's incredible news!" I said.
"Alan where?" she asked.
"Where have I been?" She nodded. "I had to go away to find some people to help us take care of a problem. Which reminds me, Wendal, this is Captain Hiller. Captain Hiller, this is my good friend Wendal, the mayor of Folly."
Wendal and Hiller shook hands and I went for a walk with Alecia. It seemed Laura had found some new clothes for her. She wore a pair of faded jeans and a sweater, although she was still barefoot. We made our way out to one of the unused fields near town.
We sat down and Alecia picked a few flowers while I told her about my journey.
"Alan stay?"
"Yes sweetie, I can stay with you for a while now." She grinned and hugged me again. I didn't have the heart to tell her I would be leaving again as soon as Captain Hiller gave the word.
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That evening there was a party in honor or Captain Hiller and his troops. I introduced Alecia to Beth, and they seemed to be getting along, although I caught an undercurrent of jealousy from Alecia that she had competition for my attention. Needless to say, Alecia was always by my side again, with Beth sitting by my other side.
I looked around and saw Greg sitting with Susan on the other side of the fire pit. I was happy for Greg. He was a good kid and any source of happiness in the world after The Fall was a reason to celebrate.
Soon Lieutenant Banks came over and told me there was about to be a meeting and I was wanted. With Alecia tagging along, I followed Banks over to where Wendal was sitting with Hiller.
"Alan," said Wendal, "Captain Hiller and I were just discussing plans about how to take on the raiders, what do you suggest?"
"Well," I said, accepting a drink from Laura with a nod of thanks, "What I was thinking of doing was to find out where their main camp is and start hitting them a little at a time at night."
"You mean guerrilla warfare?" asked Hiller.
"I suppose." I said. "I don't really have any experience in warfare or strategy, that's half the reason why I needed your help."
We spent the next half hour drawing up plans and discussing various strategies for surrounding the raiders and wiping them out. Alecia sat quietly by my side and listened with interest.
"The only real problem is we don't know where the raider's camp is hidden," said Wendal while Captain Hiller was putting the finishing touches on the plans.
"Don't worry about that," said Banks, "Tomorrow morning I'm sending out some of our best scouts. They're each going to go to the nearest towns and wait for the raiders to make an appearance, then they're going to follow the raiders back to their base. And then we'll have them."
With all aspects of the plan worked out and agreed on, the meeting was adjourned and I decided to call it a night. Wendal gave me a small house to use as my own. It was a strange feeling having a house after four years of homeless wandering. While Alecia and Beth were making themselves comfortable, I just kind of stood in the living room and tried to get used to the feeling of having a home. A place I could always return to. A place to call my own.
I shook my head and went into the bedroom where Beth was in bed waiting for me. I slid between the sheets and into her arms. Perhaps I'd get used to it. I supposed I'd have to. I owed it to my sister to settle down and take care of her.
Maybe in the morning things would start to feel more natural.
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The next day Hiller's scouts departed for the three nearest towns, Fireside, Cratersville, and Willowhall. There was really nothing else to do but wait. To keep busy, I spent some time helping Greg work on the waterwheel and the generator, but we were having some problems getting it to all come together. It was Stebbins who helped us get everything put together. Wendal came down to the river when we were ready to run the first test.
We lowered the wheel into the stream, and slowly it began to turn and pick up speed. Stebbins had left a couple of wires exposed to run the test, their stripped ends less than an inch apart. We all watched the wires, hoping to see them arc. Sure enough, after a few seconds, there was a spark, a puff of smoke, then a steady arc of electricity bridging the gap between the two wires.
There was a loud cheer from the crowd watching the experiment. We raised the wheel again and congratulated Greg and Stebbins. That night there was another party, and Greg immediately began planning another salvaging expedition to find useable power lines and lights for the village. In less than five minutes he had about twenty volunteers willing to go along and help.
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The next two weeks seemed to fly past. It had been a mild winter and spring was coming on again. I was glad to see Alecia and Beth had bonded. At first Beth was reluctant to share a house with a Dreg, but after a couple of days, when Alecia had made no attempt to go for her throat, Beth accepted her and even started treating her like a little sister.
Meanwhile Hiller and Banks had settled their troop on the western edge of town and were waiting for their scouts to return. And with the help of the troop, various changes became apparent. Irrigation ditches in the fields were improved. Houses were fixed up and made more secure. The village guards were instructed in new security methods. There was a rumor going around that some of the villagers were going to start a petition to let them stay.
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Greg and his party had returned with three carts full of salvaged power lines and incandescent lights, which they immediately began installing around town. There were also plans to go looking for another generator in case the one we had broke down.
Alecia and I went to visit Doc Thayer once a week. She was more animated and open than ever, but there was no trace of her former personality and her speech was a mental struggle. It was just as Wendal said: changes had happened because of The Fall, and they could never be undone.
Beth had moved in with me with Captain Hiller's blessing, but he made sure to remind her that she was still a part of his troop and had responsibilities. I myself was finally starting to get used to having a home. But every once in a while, I would stare off into the distance and find myself missing the open country. I guess there would always be a wanderer's spirit in me.
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At long last, Hiller's scouts returned. Wendal and I were summoned to Hiller's house again. The scouts had caught up with the raiders in Willowhall, three days travel southeast from Folly. There they learned that The Pack's base was down south in the ruins of D.C. We immediately began preparations to start out in three days.
End of file.
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Three days later...
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I wanted this business over as quickly as possible so I could return to Alecia and keep my promise. There had been tears and anger when I left Folly. Her vocabulary had improved very little, but she knew enough words to tell me exactly what she thought of my promises.
I tried to explain that this was something I needed to do first, but she ran away back towards town. On the day we left, she made a brief appearance from the doorway of our house. I gave her a hug which she tolerated more than anything else. I promised her that when I came back, it would be for good. She didn't reply.
Every night since then, I've been having the dream of looking for her in the forest, only now I couldn't see or hear her at all. Before, she peeked at me from behind the trees and I could hear her laugh, now I was all alone in the forest, running around and calling her name.
Then, when I woke up in the early hours, I felt that I had truly lost her. All that was left was this strange, wild girl who looked like my sister. I knew then that the part of her that was my sister was dead. There, in the dark hours before dawn, alone, I wept. No matter what happened after, no matter what was accomplished, I had failed her.
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I never considered myself much of a patriot, but when I saw the ruins of D.C., I felt the sting of tears in my eyes. The enormity of all that was lost came crashing down on me in that one instant. All that I had seen in my years of wandering had been nothing compared to this.
Before I had only seen various, isolated parts of the country that had been destroyed. Now I was looking at what had been the heart and soul of the country, and a little part of me curled up and died inside.
Captain Hiller and his troops stood silently by, and I could tell they were experiencing similar feelings of loss. On the side of the road, before the ruins of the nation's capitol, we mourned and honored the memory of our country with a moment of silence.
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"All right," said Cabbott, one of Hiller's scouts. "We observed the raiders congregating near the White House, so we should set up our recon near there to confirm their location."
"Good," said Hiller. "After that we start picking off out-going groups just outside of the city. That will buy us time, since they won't be expected back for at least a week or two."
"So where do we make camp?" I asked.
"From what information we've gathered," said Cabbott, "They usually start their rounds by going to Fireside in the north-west. So we should make camp on that side of the city, then we wait."
"Sounds good to me," I said, shifting my shoulders inside the body armor Captain Hiller had given me. I just couldn't get used to the feel and weight of it.
Captain Hiller posted Cabbott and Smith, the other scout, with orders to retreat for camp as soon as a group started out. The rest of us cautiously made our way to the east side of the city. There were massive craters and the burnt remains of houses and buildings everywhere.
The broken stumps of trees were scattered on the ground like Lincoln Logs; blown away by the shockwave of landing meteorites. There was nothing but devastation all around us, and not a sound except a few birds here and there.
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We made camp under half an overpass that had fallen and made a perfect lean-to. There we did the only thing we could do: we waited. Beth and I usually sat together outside our tent, not talking much, just being together and taking comfort from the other's presence.
It was almost a week later when the first group of raiders departed from the city. Cabbott and Smith came running back to camp just after sun-up, reporting that a group of twenty had just set out. Captain Hiller shouted out his orders and the troop quickly got ready and moved out to intercept the raiders.
I marched in formation beside Beth and Stebbins. We came to a clearing that offered plenty of cover all around. Captain Hiller gave us the hand signal to spread out and hide. About fifteen minutes later we saw the raiders approaching at a leisurely pace. Four of them were driving horse drawn carts, probably for carrying back appropriated goods. Bastards.
I thumbed off the safety of my shotgun, loaded with deer slugs with about twenty more in a bandolier across my chest. Beth and Stebbins checked their M-16's. Beth, Stebbins, and I made our way around to the raiders left flank and waited for Hiller's signal.
It was a slow hell waiting for the raiders to move into position. Sweat trickled down my back and under my borrowed body armor. Beth reach over and squeezed my hand, as much to reassure me as herself.
The first of the raiders came into range. I raised my gun and took aim, waiting for the signal. Soon all twenty were in the "hot zone," but still the signal didn't come. Was something wrong? I tried to locate where Captain Hiller was from my hiding place. There! He was watching the raiders intently, and I could now see he was waiting for them to be in the very center of the perimeter.
"NOW!" he cried, springing up from his hiding place and firing his rifle. All around the clearing Hiller's troops and myself all broke cover and charged at the raiders, neatly cutting them down. It only lasted for a few seconds, but everything seemed to slow down and take at least ten minutes.
The raiders were taken completely by surprise and didn't have a chance to fight back. Captain Hiller ordered the bodies taken away and disposed of. We took the horses and carts back to the camp site. The carts were burned and the horses were cooked. It was encouraging to have a victory feast after so many days of anxious waiting.
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Two days later, another group of raiders were returning to the city, and we almost weren't ready for them. A soldier by the name of Wilkes, who was on watch that afternoon, came running back to camp calling for the Captain. We scrambled back to the clearing, which someone had dubbed "Ground Zero," and took our positions.
It was a bigger party than the last one, probably joined by another group or two on the way back to their base. I did a quick count and estimated there was about forty. We were clearly outnumbered, but we still had the element of surprise.
"I don't care what happens or who's giving the orders," I whispered to Beth, "You stay down and shoot from cover, you got me?"
Beth smiled and gave me a quick peck on the side of my mouth.
"You just look after yourself, mister," she whispered back, "I happen to be very good at my job, thank you very much!"
"Good has nothing to do with it. One stray shot can make all the difference, and you know it."
Whatever reply she had was cut off when Captain Hiller gave the signal and started firing. Before I could do anything, Beth had broken cover with Stebbins and was charging down to Ground Zero.
"Dammit woman!" I growled following her while firing at the raiders. All around me there was chaos. Gun shots, screaming, smoke, and dust. I shot any raiders I could see until my gun was empty. With no time to reload, I slung it onto my back and drew my sword.
In all the confusion I had lost track of Beth, but I was forced to think of my own safety when I suddenly found myself confronted by three raiders who had managed to break through the line of Hiller's troops. Only one had a pistol, so I had to try to take him out first. I rushed at him with my sword aimed at his heart. He fired his gun and I felt like someone had hit me in the ribs with a pillow wrapped around a sledge hammer.
I followed through with my thrust and killed the raider with the gun. With no time to pull my sword free from the body, I let it go and drew my claws. Now I knew full well they were never intended for actual combat, but I was hoping intimidation would count for something. It did.
The raider's eyes popped at the sight of them, and I knew in any other time and place, they would have burst out laughing. Not that I gave them the chance. With my strongest attack, I drove the claws into each of their throats. A few moments later, it was all over. I wiped the blood off my claws and sword and put them away. Then I turned to look at the carnage.
The raiders had been killed, but so had a lot of our troop. There were also several wounded who didn't have much chance of surviving without extensive medical attention that just wasn't available. I walked around the field looking for survivors. It hurt to breath, but I didn't have time to think about it. Where the hell was Beth?!
End of entry.
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That night...
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Of the thirty soldiers in Captain Hiller's troop, twelve had been killed and four had been injured badly, leaving only half our force left to fight. I found Beth lying on the field unconscious with a bad gunshot wound on her left arm. Hiller's medic, a young woman by the name of White, said it was likely the arm would have to be removed.
The troop was quiet that night. Many good men and women had been killed in the attack on the returning raiders, including Stebbins. I sat beside Beth in our tent and wiped the sweat from her brow. Her arm was heavily bandaged and she was feverish. Captain Hiller had made the rounds, visiting the wounded and survivors. I admired his ability to bring confidence among his troops, even after such a disastrous turn of events.
White also made her rounds to check on the wounded. I don't know if she got any sleep that night, I know I didn't. I had seldom felt so helpless since the early days after The Fall. I knew there was nothing I could do for Beth except be there with her. White said it was too risky to attempt to remove the arm until her fever went down, the shock could kill her. The raiders were going to pay for this I thought grimly.
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I dreamed I was alone in the middle of a barren wasteland. I turned around to see Alecia, Beth, and Wendal standing together about a mile away. They turned and walked away, leaving me behind. I tried to run after them, but it was like trying to run through thick mud. As hard as I tried, I couldn't catch up with them, and they moved farther and farther away until they disappeared over the horizon.
I awoke with a start and looked over at Beth. Her breathing was steady and even, her brow was dry, and her face had lost the feverish red color. I breathed a sigh of relief and went to find White.
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The next day, I went with what was left of Hiller's troop back into the city. Cabbott and Smith had reported only a few raiders had been seen around the base. It was possible we had killed off a larger portion of their numbers than we thought. Captain Hiller and Lieutenant Banks had decided it was time to put an end to this now. Banks called over a man by the name of Lyman.
I had seen him around before, but had never talked with him. I now noticed he carried a large back pack. He unslung it and opened the top to reveal an incredible amount of explosives. Hiller gave orders for Lyman to go with Cabbott and Smith and plant the explosives around the base. We would then get to a safe distance and blow them all to hell.
We moved into position around the remains of the White House. We could see three raiders on sentry duty. Lyman and the scouts moved off to do their part while I stayed with Captain Hiller.
"So this is the end of it all, isn't it?" I asked in a whisper.
"Nearly." he said. "It's likely they have more than one way out of their base. We have to spread out and wait for any survivors to emerge from their rat holes."
"I just wish this were all over so I could go home with Beth."
"So do I. I haven't had an opportunity to mention this before, but I was glad she chose you."
"Why's that?"
"Remember, I read your journal."
"Oh yeah, my journal. Wendal was making a big deal about that too."
"He's wiser than you give him credit for."
"He said it would be important for a lot of people one day. That it would stand as a chronicle of the early days after The Fall or something."
"It very well might. But I wasn't talking about that. Remember what I said when we first met? I told you reading your journal was the best way to determine your character rather than questioning you in person and sifting through the bullshit."
"Yeah I remember."
"Banks of course thought it was planted and we should kill you and your friend rather than take chances."
"She did?"
"Yes. She can be a little paranoid sometimes, but after everything that's happened in the past four years, I can't really blame her. Nevertheless, I had to take precautions. I wasn't lying when I said I had been considering moving against the raiders. They're destroying everything that the people of this country are trying to rebuild. The United States government may be gone, but me and my people swore oaths to protect this country, and those oaths still stand.
"I followed you back to Folly, and I watched you all the way, and after as well. In everything you did, your responsibility to your sister was your first thought. And I saw how happy you and Beth were. She's an excellent judge of character, and she liked you right away."
"I don't know what to say."
"I know. You say less than you mean. That's just your way."
"So what are you getting at?"
"I just want you to know that I was right to trust you."
"Thanks, I guess."
At that moment, Lyman and the scouts came back.
"Charges are set all around the building, sir." said Lyman, saluting Hiller. "All told, we only saw about thirty or forty around the building."
"Good," said Hiller. "Everyone's in position, detonate the charges."
"Yes sir." Lyman pulled out a small remote control with a telescoping antenna. He flipped a switch and a red button lit up. He pressed the button and a second later there was a huge explosion. We looked at where the White House had been, only to see a massive cloud of smoke and dust.
We waited. There was silence. We waited some more. Still silence. I looked at Hiller and saw a look of concern starting to cross his face.
"Did we get them all, you think?" I asked.
"It could be. But I still want to search the perimeter to make sure no one escaped the blast. Cabbott! Smith! Go around and have the men search the area. Manholes, houses, everything."
"Yes sir!" They said and ran off.
I turned my attention back to the smoking ruin of the White House and looked for any signs of movement. Was this really the end of the raiders? Could I finally go back to Alecia and keep my promise? Or was it only the start of worse things to come?
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We found no trace of surviving raiders either in the ruins of their base or anywhere else in the city. We returned to camp to make ready to return to Folly. I still couldn't believe it was finally over. When I got back to my tent, Beth was awake and demanding to know what happened. I told her about the explosion and that we found no survivors. She seemed disappointed there hadn't been any fighting.
"You're in a bloodthirsty mood today, aren't you?" I asked, sitting beside her and kissing her.
"You would be too if your arm was nearly falling off!" she said, playfully pushing me away with her good arm. "What did White say?"
"About what?" I asked, feigning ignorance.
"About my arm, you big dope!"
"She said...it might have to come off."
"That's not funny, Alan!"
"I'm not trying to be funny. That's what White said. There's hope it could heal in time, but it might have to come off."
I hated having to say it. For only a brief moment she had been happy. Now the worry of losing her arm would hang in the air like a bad smell.
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That evening we broke camp and departed, glad to leave the ruins of DC behind us. There were too many memories and ghosts of the past lingering there. In a few weeks, we would be back in Folly, and at last I could settle down with Alecia and start rebuilding our lives together.
End of entry.
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Two months later...
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During the search for surviving raiders, we found a stable with about twenty horses housed inside. They were fey and skittish from the explosion, but we soon got then calmed down. They would be a great help when it came to transporting the wounded back to Folly.
Wee took it slow and took frequent rest stops on White's orders. White announced that Beth's arm was not in any danger of infection, and the odds of saving it were good. This news brought us a great deal of relief. So with a lighter heart, we made our way back to Folly, envisioning the celebrations to come.
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We crested the hill and looked down at the village of Folly, only Folly wasn't there any more. There were dead bodies littering the ground everywhere. The houses were burnt out shells. I and Captain Hiller's troops ran down to the village to find out what happened, but we soon found out. Scattered amid the bodies of the Folly citizens were those of the raiders.
Frantically I ran around looking for Alecia. Wendal's house was a smoldering pile of ash, and I soon found the bodies of Laura and Ashley nearby. Wendal was soon found near the stream that ran through the middle of the village. I wandered around in a daze looking at the carnage.
Here was Greg, probably died trying to protect his water wheel and generator. There was old Doc Thayer, his pipe lying just beyond his outstretched hand. I placed the pipe in his hand. Dozens of familiar faces lying in the dirt looking up with blank eyes, expressions of terror and pain in their faces.
But nowhere did I find a trace of Alecia. It was possible she had run away and hid when the attack began. My hopes lifted at this thought, but then it occurred to me she could have been taken by the raiders and was, at that very minute, being tortured or worse. I sank to my knees in my despair. Then I felt a hand on my shoulder. I looked up to see Beth standing by my side, giving the only comfort she had to give.
"She's not here," I said. "She's gone."
"I know Alan. We'll find her."
"I'll do more than find her. I'm going to kill every one of those raiders until there aren't any left. I hunt them to my dying breath. No matter what else happens, I'm going to keep my promise and protect her!"
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All that day we gathered up all the dead and laid them in a pile. The raiders were left to rot on the ground. That night we burned the villagers of Folly, and with them went the last trace of anything resembling a home for me. I stood silently watching the fire until morning. Then I went back to our camp to prepare to go to war, alone if need be.
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Beth wasn't happy when I told her she had to stay behind. I wasn't too surprised.
"What do you mean I can't come?" she demanded.
"Did you forget you're hurt? I want you to stay here with the wounded and get better."
"While you go off and get yourself killed, is that it? Damn it Alan! If you cared for me half as much as you do for Alecia...Oh God, I'm sorry!"
"Don't be," I said, going over and holding her close. "It's because I care for you so much that I want you to stay here where I know you'll be safe and waiting for me."
"Oh God Alan! I hate what's happened to the world! Why did things have to change so much?"
"I can't answer that, babe. Things changed and they can't be unchanged. All we can do is try to pick up the pieces and move on as best as we can."
"Where did you hear that from?" she asked, pulling away a little and looking up at me.
"Wendal." I said, slightly surprised at how hard it was to say his name without having to choke back tears. "He was a good friend and a good man. Did I ever tell you how he and I met? No? During The Fall, he, Greg, a girl named Stacy, and myself all took shelter in an abandoned fallout shelter in the basement of a bank.
"Stacy died shortly after, but the rest of us found our way here and settled the village. Then I took off on my own. I was a wanderer, always looking out for myself. When I encountered any raiders, I killed them, and that's what started all this. I found Alecia by accident, I wasn't looking for her. I was just hiding from the raiders until I came up with a plan. Once again, I was just thinking of myself.
"If I had gone home after The Fall, I would have been there for her when she needed me most, and she wouldn't have ended up as a Dreg. Once again something terrible happened to one of the people I care about most because I was only thinking about myself. Everything terrible that's happened to us lately is all my fault.
"That's why you have to stay here. If something happened to you because of this mess I started, I'd never forgive myself."
She laid her good hand on the side of my face and kissed me. "All right Alan. I promise I'll stay here and wait for you and Alecia to come back. Just don't make me wait too long, okay?"
I smiled a little. "I promise."
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The next morning we awoke to a pleasant surprise. Several villagers who had escaped during the attack came back. From them I learned that the raiders had followed one of Hiller's scouts back to the village, and posing as a traveling map maker, learned that I was hiding out here, and had brought my sister to live here.
My worst fears were confirmed then. The raiders had taken Alecia because of me. They then told me the raiders had headed west, and that one of them had left a map nailed to a tree outside of the village. He handed it to me and I unfolded it. It was a tourist's map of Chicago.
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I left that afternoon, alone this time. Captain Hiller told me he didn't have sufficient troops to mount a full scale assault on the raider's main base, but he would stay here with the survivors and try to put things back together again. I shook his hand and thanked him.
"Is there anyone else I can go to for help," I asked.
"There is one other regiment I know of that you might be able to get help from," he said, reaching into his pack. He pulled out a small black box and handed it to me.
"What's this?" I asked.
"I've received word of a Sergeant Braddock who's gathered a small army somewhere in western New York. If you run into any of his people, ask to see him and then give him the box. He and I went to college together and this is my class ring. He'll recognize it and help you."
"Thank you Captain Hiller. I'm grateful for all you've done to help. I hope one day I can replay the favor."
"Just wipe out those bastard raiders and we'll call it even."
"I will." I tipped him a salute which he returned. I kissed Beth good-bye, then started walking west.
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It felt strange being on the road alone again. It was the quiet that got to me. I had endured the quiet for over four years before I settled in Folly with Alecia. Now I found myself having to get used to it again. As I walked along, I would hum or sing some of Alecia's favorite songs, but always it came back to the quiet.
I passed by Willowhall a few days later without stopping. Willowhall was held by the raiders now, and I would find no welcome there. I had never gone very far west before my journey with Greg. I had no knowledge of any other towns or villages where I could get supplies or information.
When Greg and I had gone to find Captain Hiller, we had passed no settlements, and had found very little to eat. As it was, I had very little food in my pack. I would have to be careful with it, and hope to do some hunting along the way.
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I passed through an abandoned town a week after leaving Folly. It was surprisingly untouched by time. The grocery stores and mini-marts were cleaned out of anything decent to eat, but I found a copy of the Rand McNally road atlas. I sat in the clear morning sunlight on a swing in the playground of the local school and plotted my course.
According to the atlas, I estimated another two months travel in a straight line until I reached Chicago. The only unpredictable element was how long it would take me to find Sergeant Braddock's troop in New York. I had heard rumors that most of New York state had been obliterated in The Fall.
I figured the best place to look would be by the shores of Lake Erie, probably near Buffalo. From there I could pass by Niagara Falls and come to Chicago from the north, across what used to be Lake Michigan before The Fall. It was still a journey of at least a two and a half months, but I didn't have any other choice. I put the atlas in my pack and, with my thoughts on Alecia and Beth, went on my way.
End of entry.
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Two months later...
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I think I have a serious problem. I've been on the road for a month, following the trail of the raiders as they made their way to Chicago, and for the first time, the solitude is starting to get to me. I'm having trouble thinking clearly, and I'm pretty sure I've been talking to myself. My first real clue that something was wrong came when I found a dog rummaging through the remains of some animal that had obviously been dead for at least a week.
Normally I try to avoid wild dogs, they can be unpredictable and violent, but this one seemed happy to see me and, without permission or consent, started following me. Now in a human, this behavior would be considered rude, but from a dog, it's just plain obnoxious. Still, any company is better than going crazy, so I threw him a chunk of a Follyknocker, and started to call him Bill. And apparently this is when I first started to notice I was having issues.
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"You know Bill," I said a few days later, "It seems like being a dog is a pretty sweet deal. You don't have to worry about relationships, or wiping your butt when you take a crap. But I gotta tell you, your conversation skills are lacking." Bill just trotted along beside me without comment.
"As a matter of fact," I said with a little annoyance, "I don't recall you even introducing yourself properly. I was the one who started calling you Bill. What's your real name anyway?" Still no response from Bill. "I mean for all I know, your name could be Fred, or Wally, or even President Hoop. I like that, I think I'm gonna call you President Hoop from now on, if you don't mind, that is." President Hoop didn't seem to mind.
Five minutes later, a full five minutes later, I stopped dead in my tracks and realized I had been having a conversation with a dog. An ugly dog at that. I tried to chalk it up to the loneliness, but that only made matters worse. I had been a wanderer for over four years after The Fall, and I had never been so affected by the loneliness before. I resolved to start writing again and avoid conversation with President Hoop.
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In going through my notes again, I had to admit, my writing kind of sucks. Some of my earlier entries were pretty vague and, to my surprise, formulaic. My mind, stressed as it was, couldn't help but have the strong impression that some untalented hack was making up my life as he went along, leading me along by the nose to whatever cruel fate seemed interesting to him at the time.
But that's just crazy. Isn't it?
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One night I received a rather nasty shock. For the life of me, I could not remember where I was going, or why. I quickly took out my journal and read it all again. Of course. Alecia. And Beth. I couldn't believe I had forgotten about either of them. What was happening to me? President Hoop was lying beside the fire, finishing his portion of the goose I had found earlier.
"I'm forgetting about Alecia!" I yelled at him. "Why didn't you remind me?! Is it really so much to ask?! You don't have to do anything else around here you know!" President Hoop looked up at me for a moment, then went back to his goose. "Oh sure! You can hog up all the food I find, but you can't pull your weight and help me remember what I'm doing out here!" I rolled over and went to sleep angrily. The next morning I apologized and we went on our way again.
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It was during this time that I actually retreated into my daydreams a little. Only the old fantasies of Jedis and Frodo were replaced battles with whole armies of raiders, which I took on single handed and killed all without mercy or injury. Pure nonsense I realize now, but a guy can dream, can't he?
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Three days later I still hadn't seen any signs of other people. I made camp on the median strip on the highway near a massive traffic jam. It looked like there had to be at least thirty cars and trucks. As I was getting my fire started I happened to look over to see a dead crow.
The crow looked as if a cat had half eaten it and then lost interest. As I looked at it pondering what cruel fate had brought it to this half-eaten end, I heard a small, peeping sound coning from nearby. I followed the sound and soon found a nest built in a broken mirror of a pickup truck. In the nest was one of the ugliest things I had ever seen: a crow hatchling. It was crying shrilly for food.
I looked back at the dead crow and quickly came to the conclusion that it was the hatchling's mother, probably killed while defending the nest. Moved by pity, I looked around and found a clump of grass nearby. I started to pound on the soft soil with my open hands for a moment, then started to dig.
Soon I found several fat worms, attracted by what they must have thought was the sound of rain beating on the earth. Stupid invertebrates. I brought the worms back over to the nest, broke them into small pieces, and fed them to the hatchling.
Soon it was full and went to sleep. What the hell, I thought. I carefully lifted the hatchling out of it's nest and slipped it into a pocket in my jacket. That was how I met Inky.
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Another month later and I had passed through most of western New York. I had seen no sign of Sgt. Braddock and decided I probably wasn't going to. I took out the ring that Captain Hiller had given me. Inky, perched on my shoulder, made a grab at the shining ring as I held it up in the sunlight.
He had gotten big fast. I had to stop two to three times a day to find worms for him during the first couple of weeks, but now he was big enough to hop around on the ground and catch his own food. He'll be ready to start flying soon, I mused.
I absently gave him a light knock on the beak, so he contented himself with gnawing on a button on my shirt. As I stood there looking at the ring, I experienced a moment of clarity such as I hadn't felt since I started on this desperate venture.
As far as I could tell, I now had to take on the raiders single handed and somehow rescue Alecia at the same time. I was glad I was able to think clearly, if only for the moment. I put the ring away and brought out my map again. For all the good it'll do me, I thought bitterly.
The land had been changed dramatically in The Fall. Lake Michigan had been hit by a meteorite and had drained away, leaving a barren waste like a flat plain where once a massive body of water had been for thousands of years. As things now stood, I would have to cross that barren waste without being seen and somehow infiltrate the raider's base to find Alecia.
I didn't bother making any kind of plans yet since I had no idea what to expect when, IF, I ever got there.
"Well guys, what do you think?" I asked President Hoop and Inky. I received the usual answer: silence. "That's what I thought you'd say."
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Fate can be a cruel mistress, but she can also be unexpectantly generous. A few days after I gave up hope for finding any more fresh water, I came across an overturned Pepsi truck. I climbed up on the top to find the side door locked. I blew off the lock with my shotgun and pulled open the door.
The contents were a jumbled mess. Many bottles and cans had long since broken open and dried up, but there were also many bottles of water. I opened one and took an experimental sip. The water was piss-warm, but still good. Feeling better about things in general, I took as many water bottles as I could fit into by back pack and went on my way. President Hoop lifted his leg and pissed on one of the tires before following.
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By my best estimation, which was suspect at best, I hoped to make it to Chicago in another three or four days. In the meantime, I tried to teach Inky how to fly with about as much expertise as Steven Hawking teaching a toddler to walk. The best I could do was walk out into a field with tall grass and toss him up into the wind.
After a few tries, he fluttered his wings and took to the air. I was so proud of my little guy! I was also happy that after a few minutes, he came back and settled on my shoulder again.
"Good job, Inky!" I praised him.
"Kee! Ob Kee!"" he croaked.
This blew me away. I had never heard of a crow learning to talk, but as I had been speaking to him, and President Hoop, almost constantly since I adopted him, I supposed it only made a weird kind of sense. After all, in a world gone mad, a talking bird is nothing.
I then began trying to teach him other words as I walked down the road with President Hoop trotting along at my heel. All in all, for a homeless wanderer, I felt like a pretty lucky guy. I only hoped my luck would be in when I came to Chicago.
End of entry.
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The next day...
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I spent a night at Niagara Falls. I stood at the railing overlooking the falls and just kind of spaced out a little. Ever since I had taken out Hiller's ring, I had been enjoying a period of lucidity that was a blessed relief after the weeks of, well, dementia I suppose it could be called. Or at least the nearest thing to it. Looking back on it, I could only describe it as my mind was slowly unraveling.
Inky and President Hoop had gone off on their own a short while ago, probably foraging for food. Just as well. I only had a few Follyknockers and two packs of beef jerky left in my pack. For the present water was no problem so I just watched the falls. A meteorite had taken out nearly half of the falls, performing drastic cosmetic surgery, leaving a ragged section where once the falls had spanned unbroken across the cliff.
Here was just another reminder of what was lost or changed that could never be healed or made as if it had never been. After a while I realized I was crying a little. I wiped away the tears and turned away. I had always considered myself an existential creature, living in the moment without a care for the past or the future, but just lately these things were always on my mind.
As I walked the desolate miles between the ruins of Folly and Chicago ahead, images of the past had crossed my mind one after another. Then just as quickly the past would be replaced with thoughts and worries about the future. What-if's and if-only's occupied my waking mind, while at night they were replaced with dreams of being in darkness, searching and calling for Alecia to no avail.
By this time I had completely given up hope of finding Braddock and his army. New York was behind me now, and for miles in every direction was only ruin and destruction. Massive craters and charred corpses of cities and towns were all this land had to offer now. Barely enough to provide for a bird and a dog and one forlorn wanderer. Nothing that an army could live on.
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One morning I came to a drastic point. I woke up from the worst dream yet. One by one, I saw all the most important people in my life walk past me slowly. There was my parents, Wendal, Greg and Stacy, Laura and Ashley, the caravan master's daughter, Beth, and Alecia. I stood silent and unmoving watching them pass me by. Then I noticed they were all walking towards a crater that seemed to have no bottom. One by one they turned to look at me before plunging over the edge into the abyss.
I awoke to find myself sobbing like a lost child, and in that moment of weakness, I considered casting it all away. I could just gather up my shit and leave it all behind me. Go south where there were green fields and freedom from doubt and responsibility. And in that moment Alecia's face seemed to float in front of my eyes.
Could I really just drop it all and live with myself? Was it a possibility at this point? What about my responsibility to Alecia? Could I forsake her now, after all the promises I made?
But the new thought of escape would not be silence so easily. That wasn't Alecia anymore. She wasn't really my sister anymore. I could forsake her and Beth and just disappear. But then I came to my senses. How could I even consider such a cowardly thing? How could I walk away from my sister, no matter how much she had changed.
To do such a despicable thing would be to truly become a monster. All of my sins came back to haunt me in that moment. The killing, the fucking, the years of selfish disregard, the fact that I never went home to check on my family after The Fall.
All these things swirled around in my mind and I nearly cried out from the weight of my guilt. If I were to abandon Alecia now, the weight of my guilt would crush me, snuffing out any hope I had left to find redemption.
That was a new idea: redemption. It was long past the point of no return now. One way or another, I had to see this through to the end. Then, and only then, could I find redemption. This thought gave me a strange thrill.
I had sinned in my time. Many, many times. I had done what I knew to be wrong with no thought of what would come after. I was already a monster, only I hid behind the false pretense of good intentions. Was there any hope for a monster? Perhaps. Perhaps not. But there was always redemption. Through penance.
And I knew what my penance was: To go on to face insurmountable odds. Not with any hope of saving myself, but to save Alecia, so she could have the chance at happiness I had denied her by not being there when she needed me most.
I gathered up my things, called over President Hoop and Inky, and with renewed purpose, I began the last stage of my journey to Chicago.
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When I came to the edge of the former Lake Michigan, I felt like how Frodo must have felt when he got his first look at the plains of Gorgoroth in the land of Mordor. It was flat and empty as far as the eye could see, the ground was like a desert, dry and cracked and barren. Here and there the monotonous view was broken by piles of trash that might have been dumped over the sides of passing boats. In fact off in the distance I could see the rotting hulk of a boat leaning on it's side.
Far off in the distance I thought I could make out the city of Chicago on the far side of the plain. I looked up at the sky and judged there to be about four more hours of daylight left. I unslung my pack and checked my water supply. Only two bottles left.
"Well boys," I said to Inky and President Hoop, "It looks like we can expect though times ahead. If anyone feels like they want out of this little expedition, now's the time to speak up."
The boys did me proud and kept their peace.
"All right then, it's time to finish this."
"Fuckin' A!" cawed Inky. He's a good boy.
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After night fall, I decided to keep going. I figured my chances of approaching the city unnoticed would be better under cover of night. But Inky already had his head under his wing, asleep, and President Hoop was lagging behind. Reluctantly I looked around for a place where I could bed down for the night and be out of sight. Nothing. Finally I just said fuck it and lay down where I was.
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The next day, I finally arrived at my destination. Chicago loomed up in front of me like a pile of jumbled spikes. The Fall hadn't brought the city down, but it had come pretty close. Skyscrapers of steel and stone leaned this way and that at drunken angles. Large gaps were between the buildings from falling meteorites. Other towers were burned structures of steel beams and broken windows. And somewhere in there, Alecia was waiting for me.
I checked my shot gun and sword. My claws were strapped to my legs in easy reach. I had added a knife to my belt, a gift from Beth. Swallowing my fear, I made my way into the dead city. I hoped I could find one or two raiders alone and follow them to their base. I even entertained the idea of killing one and stealing his clothes, then walking casually into their base as one of them. What the hell, I thought, it worked in the movies.
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Sure enough, before long, I had the good fortune to see a small patrol before they saw me. I hid behind a pile of garbage, but President Hoop walked straight over to them. I watched from my hiding place, fearing the worst. But my fears were, for now, groundless. One of the raiders, surprised but smiling, called to President Hoop and scratched him behind the ears.
President Hoop then turned towards me and barked, as if to tell me it was okay to come out. Idiot.
"Whatcha barking at, boy?" one of the raiders asked him, pulling out a gun. His partner pointed in my direction and they started to walk towards me, following President Hoop as he walked right over to my hiding place. Now I remembered why I hated dogs.
I unslung my shot gun and prepared to do some quick shooting. There was a chance the gun shots would attract other patrols, but I had no other options. I was raising my gun and preparing to shoot the first raider that came around the garbage pile when Inky took off from my shoulder and flew over their heads.
"Just a dumb bird." said one of the raiders. They went back to their rounds. I made a mental note to treat Inky to a huge worm dinner. He had undoubtedly saved my life. President Hoop, on the other hand, was likely to be impeached for his incompetence in the line of duty. But since there wasn't time for a formal hearing in the field, I decided to let it go for now. Here at least was my chance to follow the patrol to their base.
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After about three hours of cautiously sneaking around, the patrol finally led me to their base. It was a fortress built around an entire city block, high walls of salvaged junk went all around it, and as far as I could see, there was only one gate. It was getting dark by this point, so I felt safe sitting down in my hiding place behind another pile of garbage and observing the place. I pulled out one of my two remaining water bottles and sipped it as I munched a slightly stale Follyknocker.
After an hour it became apparent that I had my work cut out for me. Except for the patrol I followed, the gate only opened once more to let another patrol enter, and they were only admitted after bright lights were shown on their faces to identify them. There was no way I would be getting in through there.
I quietly got up and started away to find a place to sleep for the night. As I crawled along to stay below the line of trash on the side of the street, my hand came down on a large metal grate in the sidewalk: the subway! If I couldn't get into the raider's base through the front door, I would enter from underneath. It was just crazy enough to work.
As quietly as I could, I crawled my way around the corner and started looking for a grate I could open that wouldn't be heard from the base. It was on the next block down, but I found a subway grate that I could open and climb down through. After bringing President Hoop down, I pulled out my shake-charge flashlight and started heading back in the direction of the raider's base. Suddenly I felt sure nothing could stop me.
End of entry.
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The next day...
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As near as I can tell, I must have spent nearly 24 to 30 hours watching and waiting for an opportunity to come up out of the subway tunnel into the raider's base. During that dark time, I was forced to put down President Hoop. He was showing too much interest in a passing group of rats and one of them bit him on the nose.
After about 12 hours, his nose started to swell up and bleed. There was no question in my mind that the bite was infected badly. I patted him on the head and said good bye as well as I could to a dog, then I drove my sword through his heart. He gave out one pitiful little whimper, then fell over dead. Another senseless death in my wake.
Now at last there was a lull in the passing sentries above, so I carefully lifted up the grate and looked around. My luck was in: there was no one in sight. I quickly pulled myself up and replaced the grate. Inky was perched on my shoulder, and as quiet as I was, for a wonder.
I dashed into a shadowed corner and started to plan my next move. The base was built around one mostly intact apartment building. Fearing discovery at any moment, I crept over to look into one of the ground floor windows.
I was looking into an empty room, molding furniture piled carelessly in one corner. Through the room's open door I could see out into a hallway that stretched on down the length of the building. As I didn't see anyone moving around, which was starting to concern me a little, I crawled in through the window. I had made it safely into the heart of the raider's base.
I sat still and listened for any sound of movement. After a few minutes I could hear the sounds of approaching feet coming down the hallway. I hid against the wall by the door and waited.
"...pain in the ass."
"Hey, orders are orders. Russell wants her kept alive."
Her? Were they talking about Alecia?
"You wouldn't think so the way he's always beating on her and fucking her brains out."
"That's none of our business. Now let's go get her food, and remember to watch her. The bitch can't reach us but she sure can spit."
The raiders had a laugh at this and passed by my hiding place. It took a great deal of control to not rush out after them and rip out their throats. I had to wait for them to lead me to her. Then the killings could take place. And I wanted to have a word with this Russell before I left...
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What happened next was the most dangerous thing I had ever had to do. I cautiously followed the two raiders by slipping into one room after another, always hoping that I wouldn't see anyone looking back at me as I peeked around each doorway before entering. Once again I found it concerning that the place seemed so empty after all the raider's I had observed from the subway grate outside.
With a feeling of apprehension that I couldn't quite shake off, I made my way through the building after my unwitting guides. Soon they came to a room near the back of the building where there were massive piles of supplies of every description, including, I noticed with a pang, military gear and weapons, some of them blood stained. I had a hunch I knew why I hadn't met Sgt. Braddock.
They gathered up some food packets and a bottle of water, then passed through another door in the back of the room. I made myself count to 20 before following. When I came to the door I saw it led down a stairway into the basement. From below I could hear the two raiders talking indistinctly and laughing. I went down the stairs.
There were more piles of boxes and supplies down in the basement. I followed the sounds of the voices around a large stack of cigarette boxes to find them standing over a huddled figure on the floor in the corner. I drew my claws and crept forward.
"Here ya go, sweetie!" jeered one of the raiders, pushing the food and water with his foot. The huddled figure stirred and reached out a shaking hand. The figure looked up and, like back in New Hampshire, locked eyes with me. Alecia was naked, her body and face were bloody and bruised. One of her eyes was blackened and there was fresh blood around her nose.
"ALAN!" she cried.
The raiders started to turn around to see what she was looking at, but by that time I had crossed the distance in three large strides and gutted them like pigs.
"Alecia!" I said, throwing down my claws and helping her to her feet. There was a thick collar around her neck that was chained to the wall. I turned to the raiders and searched them quickly. Sure enough I found a ring of keys on them and soon had the collar unlocked. She threw her arms around me and held on tight.
"I'm here now. I'm here." I said over and over again, just holding her and wanting to keep her safe like this forever.
"Who are we, Alan?" she said, her voice muffled by my shirt. I was shocked by her sudden use of a full sentence. "Who are we? Who are you? Who am I!? What does any of this mean!?"
"I...I don't understand. I'm your brother, you're my sister. We're a family. We always have been."
"But we haven't!" she said, pushing me away suddenly. "Maybe we were...like that...before, but I'm not who you used to know! And I don't really know you!"
"What are you saying?"
"I don't even know! When you found me, you killed my mate. You made me yours, so I followed you. But you didn't want me, not like he did, and I didn't understand. I still don't! Nothing makes sense, and now I'm here, and The Man here made me his the way you didn't. And now you're here to kill him and take me away again, aren't you?"
"Well...yes. I have to. You're my sister and I promised to protect you." I was completely floored by this conversation. Nothing that had happened up to this point could have prepared me for this.
"'Protect me!?' YOUR'E going to protect ME!? And who's going to protect me from YOU!? When The Man comes to me, he hurts me, then he mates me, but the only thing he says is he's hurting me because of you! He hurts me because of what YOU'VE done!" Inky ruffled his feathers at this outburst, as if to say he didn't approve of all the damn noise.
"Alecia, you don't understand! When I get you out of here, I'm going to explain everything to you, but right now, we have to go! If 'The Man' finds us here, he'll kill us both!"
This seemed to get through to her and she quieted down. But I had a feeling I hadn't heard the last of this. But I would happily endure her rage forever as long as I knew she would be safe. I looked around and found some spare clothes that fit her well enough. She grabbed them angrily and pulled them on with barely concealed contempt.
I started to retrace my steps back through the building, but we didn't get far before I heard footsteps approaching. I ducked into an empty room and helped Alecia climb out through a window. As I pulled myself through and landed next to her, Alecia grabbed my arm. I looked at her and she pointed over my shoulder.
I turned and could see across the "courtyard" leading to the front gate. Wherever the raiders had been when I came in, they were back and doubled in number.
"What are we gonna do?" Alecia whispered into my ear. I looked around at the ground and soon found what I was looking for: another subway grate about fifteen feet away. It was full night and very dark. If I had any luck left, there was a chance we could slip through the shadows and reach the grate and escape.
I motioned for Alecia to follow me, holding a finger against my lips to tell her to be quiet. Slowly, very slowly, we crawled along on our bellies towards the grate. Any time there was any noise from the courtyard, we froze and looked in the direction of the sound, sure we had been discovered at last.
Finally we reached the grate. I looked over at the courtyard and, for the moment, no one was looking in our direction. I lifted the grate and pulled it aside.
"Okay," I said, gesturing to Alecia. "Climb on down and then we can get out of here."
"I don't wanna! It smells bad!" she said in a half whimper.
"I know sweetheart, but it's the only way out. It's only a little way to the next opening, then we can come back up to the street and get away. Now trust me, and hurry."
Alecia reluctantly climbed down into the subway. I passed Inky down to her then followed. I pulled the grate back into place, took out my flash light, and led the way. And not a moment too soon. From above came the sounds of shouting and running feet. Someone had found out Alecia was gone and her keepers killed. I put an arm around her shoulders and gave her a reassuring squeeze before leading the way to freedom.
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The morning sun never looked so good. We had gone nearly half a mile before we found another opening leading up to the street. We then made our way out of the city, heading south to avoid crossing Lake Michigan where there would be no cover now that the raiders were on the lookout.
We traveled for about three hours before morning finally came. We took shelter in a crumbling gas station on the outskirts of a small town that had been nearly demolished by a falling meteorite. I rummaged through the debris and soon found some unbroken cans of soup. We ate it cold and then settled down for the day to rest.
Alecia hadn't said anything since we left the raider's base the night before. When I tried to talk to her, she would pretend to ignore me. Eventually I gave it up. There was nothing helpful to say anyway. I told her we would spend the day here, and travel by night until we got back to Folly. At the mention of Folly, Alecia's face seemed to brighten.
"Will we get to see the little girl and the lady again?" she asked.
"Do you mean Laura and Ashley?" she nodded. "I'm sorry Alecia, but the raiders killed them when they came to take you."
"While you were gone again." She accused. I could only nod once. There was no point denying it. Once again I had failed in my promise to protect her, only this time it had cost much more.
So much more.
End of entry.
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The next night...
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"Once upon a time there was a brother and a sister who lived happily with their parents in New Hampshire."
"Get to the point."
"Hush! I'm telling this story and I'm going to tell it my way."
"Fine, just get on with it!"
"Once upon a time, the brother and sister lived ordinary lives. Then one day a terrible thing happened to the world. The brother was away from home that day looking for a job."
"That sounds familiar..."
"The sister was at home with her parents getting ready to go to her senior prom."
"What's a senior prom?"
"A dance."
"Dance?"
"Yeah. Her whole class from school were celebrating their graduation with a formal dance. They all wore fancy clothes and spent the evening dancing."
"Oh. I guess I understand."
"Good, now let me 'get on with it' as you put it."
"Okay okay!"
"After the Terrible Thing happened to the world, the brother and sister were separated. They had no idea if the other was still alive. But instead of going straight home, the brother spent his time trying to survive, as I'm sure the sister did too."
"I don't know what I did then."
"I know, and it's not your fault. So the brother started to wander across the land, while the sister stayed near her home and, somehow, became a Dreg."
"Is that what you call me?"
"It's what people call the kind of person you became. You and all those you were with. The sister lived like a wild animal and survived in her own way. The brother, on the other hand, remained mostly the same. He was selfish, although he didn't realize it. Everything he did was for himself and, as the years passed, he went further and further from home, never once thinking he might be needed."
"What kind of things did you do?"
"Well the sad thing is, the brother didn't do anything of any importance. He just wandered from one place to another, just taking care of the daily business of survival. Now as selfish as the brother was, he meant well, and whenever the opportunity came up, he would do good, as he saw it at the time. He would free slaves and kill the raiders who made the slaves."
"Are the slaves like The Dregs?"
"No. The slaves were ordinary people who were taken from their homes and forced to work and serve others. The Dregs were ordinary people who were changed by the Terrible Thing, living wild and free with no memory of who they used to be."
"Like me."
"Yes, like you. So the brother kept going on his way, killing and surviving, until the raiders started to notice that someone was interfering with their business and killing their people. So the raiders sent out word that the brother had to be found and brought to them for judgment and punishment. The brother managed to escape for a while and went to the only place he could think of to hide: he went home.
"When the brother got home, he found that everything was changed or gone. He saw that his parent's home was gone, and there was no sign of his family. So he went up a mountain to hide. While he was up on the mountain, he was attacked by The Dregs. He managed to escape from them by starting a fire, but before he was able to get away, he was attacked again by a few more Dregs.
"The brother was forced to kill a couple of The Dregs in order to get away safely, and that's when he discovered that one of The Dregs was his sister."
"I remember that now."
"I should think so. It was at that moment that both of their lives changed again. The brother and sister had found each other again, only now they didn't know each other. The brother tried everything he could think of to remind the sister of who she used to be, but nothing worked."
"Is knowing who I 'used to be' a good thing?"
"The brother thought so. He was very sad that his sister didn't know him anymore."
"I know who you are!"
"Yes, but the sister didn't remember knowing her brother before the Terrible Thing."
"Will you stop talking like that!?"
"Patience. The story is nearly over. The brother took his sister to stay with good friends to get help. The friends took them in and gave them a home. Then the brother had to leave the sister again to put an end to the raiders who were after him. He wanted to get rid of them so he could live with his sister in peace."
"You still left me behind. It doesn't matter why you went."
"But it does matter! It matters a lot! I- the brother wanted to make sure his sister would be safe. And as you now know, the brother failed in a big way. He only managed to get rid of some of the raiders, and while he was doing that, the rest of the raiders found the sister and took her and killed their friends.
"The brother knew he no other choice but to follow the raiders alone to get his sister back. He felt guilty that he had left her behind again, and that she was in trouble because of the choices he had made. The brother traveled for a long time before he finally found where the raiders had taken his sister.
"The brother rescued his sister and escaped with her. And now the brother is taking his sister home."
"We don't have a home any more, Alan. You know that!"
"That's not true. Beth is waiting for us in Folly."
"There is no Folly now! The raiders destroyed it!"
"They destroyed most of it, but a lot of people escaped the attack, and I'll bet that when we get back, a lot will have been rebuilt."
"But what's the point? The raiders will just come again. And this time they'll kill everyone, including us!"
"We won't stay there to wait for them. When we get back, I'm going to have Captain Hiller and his troops move everyone to a safer place. We're not going to run away from the raiders any more. If they come after us, it'll be the last thing they ever do."
"And then what? If we survive all this, and if we actually manage to get rid of the raiders for good, what then?"
"That, my dear sister, remains to be seen. If I had my way, we'd finish rebuilding Folly and settle there together, like I hoped we could before."
"And what if I don't want to stay with you?"
"Than it was all for nothing."
She didn't say anything else. The moon came up over the horizon and bathed us in a pale light as we made our way back east.
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The next few weeks seemed to pass by like a dream. We slept in the day and traveled by night. Inky sat on my shoulder some of the time, and on Alecia's shoulder the rest. She had taken an instant liking to him, and often spoke to him like he was another person, their conversations punctuated with an occasional "Fuckin' A!"
We passed through an endless string of deserted and ruined towns, taking whatever we could use whenever we could find it. The food and water was a problem for a while, but we managed. I was able to find the overturned Pepsi truck again and we took all the water we could carry.
We eventually came back to the eastern states where there was still thriving forests full of deer and wild turkey. And at last we finally came back to Folly. There had indeed been some repairs done and as we passed into the town, I was relieved to see a couple hundred people who had survived the raider's attack and returned.
We came to a pavilion of military-green tents, and there we were met by Captain Hiller, Lieutenant Banks, and Beth. Beth ran to me and hugged me tight, tears running down her face.
"Thank God! I was starting to think you weren't coming back!" she said happily. She then went to embrace Alecia while Captain Hiller came over to greet me and shake my hand.
"It's good to see you again." he said, "I'm glad you were successful in rescuing your sister."
"There's no time for that now, Captain," I said, "The raiders will be on their way soon. We need to pack everything up and get out of here as soon as possible."
"You didn't finish them off? What about Sergeant Braddock?"
"I never found him. Which reminds me, here's your ring back." I handed over the ring with a slight pang. I had carried it for a long time and I had felt it was like a good luck charm.
Hiller and Banks turned to give the orders to bug out. I went back to Beth and Alecia.
"So how's your arm?" I asked after she released me from a long kiss.
"It's starting to get better," she said, holding it up and gingerly making a fist. I could see the arm looked white and frail. "White only lets me take it out of the sling for a few hours a day to get it back in shape. But never mind that now, what's happened to Alecia? She's talking now, but she seems so...different."
"It's a long story. She was abused by the raiders, something else they have to answer for. In the meantime I want you to spend some time with her. She needs someone she considers stable for now, and I'm afraid I'm not what she has in mind."
Beth looked hard at me for a minute. "What happened between you two?"
"It's hard to explain," I said, running a hand through my hair trying to find the words. "Something happened to her between when she was taken and when I came for her. She has more understanding about what's going on, and what she understands right now is that she was hurt because of what I did."
"But Alan, that's not true at all!"
"Isn't it? Every horrible thing that's happened to the two of you since we met is because of the stupid things I've done! If I had only left the raiders alone, they never would have had reason to destroy Folly to get to me. You wouldn't have been hurt like this, and Alecia wouldn't have been taken and ra- hurt so badly."
"They raped her?"
"I...yes. From what I heard, she was used badly and often. And it's all my fault."
"Alan," Beth framed my face gently with her hands, making me look at her, "You can't keep taking all the blame for everything on yourself. How could you have known any of this would happen? How could you have known that Alecia would get drawn into all this, or that you'd even find her at all?
"All the what-if's and if-only's in the world can't change what's happened. For all we know, Captain Hiller would have moved against the raiders on his own, and I could have been killed, or taken and used the same way Alecia was.
"The point is: you're just one man, and you can't carry the weight of the world on your shoulders. You're not alone anymore. You have me by your side now, and you have Alecia too. You also have Captain Hiller. You have friends who will stand by you till the end."
"I...I just don't know what to do any more! Everything you say sounds fine and good, but nothing can take away my guilt. I am responsible. I never went home after The Fall like I should have. I should have been there for Alecia.
"Perhaps things would have been different if I had. Perhaps everything would be different if I had gone home. Maybe it's just self-absorbed bullshit, but sometimes I look around at what the world's come to and I can't help seeing things that reek of the stupid things I've done."
"So what are you saying? Everything would have turned out better for everyone if you weren't around? Do you need a guardian angel to show you what the world would be like without you?"
I couldn't help but laugh at this. "Of course not. You're right. I'm just tired. Tired to the bone. All I want now is to know you and Alecia will be safe from the repercussions of my actions."
"No one can be sure of that nowadays. But for now at least, you're going to bed, and I want you to stay there until tomorrow morning. I'll look after Alecia. By the way, you have a bird on your shoulder."
I looked at Inky, perched patiently on my shoulder. He gave my ear an affectionate nibble, lifted his wings, and flew over to land on Beth's shoulder. "That's just Inky. I adopted him."
"That's...lovely," said Beth, obviously resisting the urge to shake him off.
"Inky!" I said, "Go find something to eat and stop bothering people!"
Inky ruffled his feathers but stayed on Beth's shoulder.
"I guess he likes you," I said. "Don't worry about him, he doesn't bite, and he has enough manners to not shit on you."
Beth half shrugged, then led me to her tent. Alecia was already there, curled up and fast asleep. I lay down beside her and was soon asleep myself. When I woke up the next morning, I found that she had moved to the other side of the tent.
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The next day, Captain Hiller's troops and the surviving villagers had made ready to depart. Hiller had pulled me aside and asked me where I intended to go.
"We should make for Fireside first. Everyone hates the raiders, and the best chance we have of getting rid of them for good is to rally the people. If I'm not out of my reckoning, there must be at least two thousand able bodied people between Fireside, Cratersville, and Willowhall.
"If we come riding into town with guns blazing, we can take the posted raiders by surprise and free one town at a time. When people see that something is finally happening, I think they'll throw in with us."
"That's a good plan," said Hiller. "I just hope it works."
"So do I."
-------------------------------------------------------
So Captain Hiller's troops, the surviving villagers, Alecia and myself, all left Folly. All told there was about three hundred of us. More than enough to take any band of raiders in a fair fight. It took about two weeks to reach Fireside. Everything went just as planned. We rode into town on all the horses we had. There were only eight raiders posted in the town, and like mindless sheep, they all poured out of the tavern and lined up across the street. We shot them down like ducks in a shooting gallery.
After the raid, the Mayor came out to talk with us. We explained our plans and intentions and he quickly pledged any help he could offer. By this time the whole town had turned out to listen. When the Mayor agreed to help, a cheer rose up from the crowd.
We stayed the night In Fireside, then moved on towards Willowhall with another five hundred people in our rag-tag army. In Willowhall there were ten raiders posted, and they were dispatched almost as quickly as the ones in Fireside. Again we were met with the Mayor and increased our numbers by another four hundred.
Now that the endgame was started, I felt my redemption was at hand. I would eradicate the raiders and go home to Alecia. Even so I was surprised at how easy it was. The raiders had had it too easy and they were complacent now and slow. If we had asked, we could have had the entire population of both Fireside and Willowhall in our army, but Captain Hiller told the Mayors to keep enough people to protect their towns.
By the time we got to Cratersville, we were twelve hundred strong. We rode in slowly, and escorted the five raiders out of town. Another three hundred brought our numbers up to fifteen hundred, and now we were ready.
I told Beth and Alecia to wait for us there. They would have plenty of protection. Beth held me tight and didn't let go for a long time, Alecia didn't say anything and barely looked at me when I came to say good bye.
"I wish you wouldn't make this harder than it already is." I said.
"What do you want me to do?" She demanded angrily. "Cry? Beg you to stay? Forget about it. That's all I've done since we met. If it means anything to you, I hope you don't die."
With that she turned around and stormed off. Beth came and gave me another quick kiss.
"Don't worry, I'll talk with her. Take care of yourself and come back soon!"
-----------------------------------------------
"You realize of course that we're making history, don't you?" asked Captain Hiller with a grin, riding his horse beside mine.
"Perhaps. But don't forget that history is written by the winners." I said. Hiller laughed.
"With an army of fifteen hundred people who are fighting for freedom, I don't think the raiders are going to stand much of a chance. How many did you think there were in their base?"
"I can't say for sure. It's a pretty big base and it seemed pretty full most of the time. If I had to guess, I'd say there must have been at least a thousand, in the base and scattered around the city."
"And you say they have military issue weapons and gear?"
"That's right. I suppose you realize that the gear probably belonged to Braddock."
"That had occurred to me. But in this day and age, you can't be surprised by such things. I'm sad that I'll probably never see my friend again, but that's life."
We rode on in silence. I was starting to notice that I had a peculiar knack for ending conversations with uncomfortable silences.
-------------------------------------------------------
We didn't have to go far before the final confrontation took place. Our army was entering a large field when the raider's army entered by the other end, almost like we were meant to encounter each other here, to end it all one way or another. Both armies stood still on either end of the field, waiting.
Finally one man at the head of the raider's army tossed his gun to one of his fellows, then rode forward slowly with his hand held up in token of parley. Captain Hiller and I also handed our guns over and rode out to meet him.
"My name is Russell Cobb. I'm in charge of The Pack."
Captain Hiller introduced himself and then me.
"Ah!," said Russell with a grin, "So here's our little troublemaker! I suppose you know I've been waiting to meet you for quite a while now?"
"So I've heard," I said shortly, "But your business was with me, not the people of Folly, and not with my sister."
"Ha! Your little sister! Yes, I've heard a lot about you from her! At first she didn't like to say too much, but I finally got her to...open up!" He laughed again, watching my expression closely.
"I'm going to kill you," I said matter-of-factly.
"Is that a threat?" he mocked.
"We'll see." I said, then turned my horse and rode with Captain Hiller back to the front line. I took back my gun and flicked off the safety.
"Keep your cool, Alan," said Hiller. "He knows exactly what he's doing. He wants you mad so he can have his fun with you."
"Don't worry about me," I said, wondering at the strange, husky quality of my voice, "I'm cool." In fact, I felt cold. Cold and ready. Here was the man who had brought so much pain and misery to the people close to me. Here was the man who had ordered the deaths of my friends and the destruction of my new home. Here was the man who had hurt my sister. And for that especially he would die.
-----------------------------------------------------
Later on I never knew how long the battle lasted. I asked others but never got the same answer. Some said only about a half-hour, others said it was at least two hours. What I do know was it lasted just under an eternity. At a yell from Russell, the raider's army charged. Captain Hiller held up his rifle and cried out in answer. Our army charged.
In the middle of the field the two armies clashed like two great waves in opposing tides. I fired my gun empty, reloaded, fired it empty again, and cut my way through any raiders I could see, all the while looking for Russell.
When I was out of shells, I threw my gun aside and drew my sword. The blade flashed in the sunlight as I jumped down from my horse and wove my way through the fighting. I had never used a blade with such skill before, and I still don't know how I did it. My arm seemed possessed by some spirit of wrath that knew what it was doing better than I did.
Then, suddenly, I found myself face to face with Russell. He also had abandoned his gun and drawn a sword of his own.
"Well here we are at last, Alan!" he shouted over the noise of battle around us. He still had a grin and he was covered with blood. I dimly realized I was also covered with gore. With a savage cry, I attacked. Whatever happened around us after that, I have no idea. Suddenly it was as if Russell and I were in a vast empty space. In all the universe, there was only the two of us, engaged in mortal combat.
Russell was a large man and the strength of his sword strokes nearly knocked me over. I tried to out-think him, but where I was cold before, now my brain was on fire. I was seeing red. Never had such a killing rage taken me before, but as it had served so well thus far, I decided to let it take me.
We exchanged minor wounds, turn and turn alike, neither feeling the other's blade. Blood oozed from nearly a dozen cuts on my arms and legs, but I didn't back off or slow down. Russell was also bleeding freely from his own set of cuts and wounds, equally persistent in his attack.
In the end, it was almost too quick the way it ended. All I knew was that my arm was still moving with a will of it's own, when suddenly it stopped. I shook my head and blinked away the red haze. I saw now that my sword was thrust through his neck. His mouth opened and closed like a fish, he was trying to say something, but his vocal chords were obstructed by my sword.
He collapsed into the dust, dead. I looked around me and saw that the battle was winding down. The raiders were still putting up the best fight they could, but they were outnumbered, and soon it was over.
-----------------------------------------------
That night we camped on our end of the field. White tended my wounds, then White went off to see to others. We had lost about four hundred or so, the raiders had been utterly wiped out. The next day the dead raiders were stripped of anything of value, then piled up in the middle of the field and burned.
After that we turned away from the battle field and went home.
--------------------------------------------
Three Months Later...
--------------------------------------------
Folly had been nearly rebuilt. Captain Hiller and his troops, after going on a long trip to remove that last posted raiders from the surrounding towns, had decided to settle there in retirement.
Beth and I built ourselves a little house and furnished it with things we found on foraging expeditions. The survivors of the battle all went back to their homes in Fireside, Cratersville, and Willowhall, and within weeks, sent many people to help with the restoration of Folly.
I happened to encounter a man who used to carve tombstones before The Fall. I asked him to erect a monument to the people of Folly who had been killed during the raider's attack, and when it was finished, I placed it where Wendal's house had stood.
I became the new Mayor of Folly, and the next year, Beth gave birth to twin boys. We named them Wendal and Greg. And as time went by, Folly slowly grew into a thriving community, and everything seemed to be going well, except for one thing: Alecia.
After we all returned to Folly from the battle, she and I had it out. There was a lot of screaming and hurt feelings, and in the end, Alecia made me build a small house for her own, and she would rarely speak with me. Then after the twins were born, she came over once to look at them, said good bye to me, and left town.
I stood in the doorway with Beth and watched her walk down Main street with a large back pack slung over one shoulder and a rifle over the other. The last thing I noticed before she walked out of my life was that she was still barefoot.
"There she goes," I said quietly. "I failed her and I don't think I'll ever see her again."
Beth didn't say anything, but she pulled me close and held me for a while. Then we went inside and had dinner, put the boys to bed, then went to bed ourselves. In the night, I lay awake with Beth asleep beside me. I thought back on everything that had happened since The Fall. I had done stupid things, but I had also done good things.
I had accomplished what I had set out to do, I had saved my sister and set her free. If she never forgave me for it, I couldn't be blamed any more. I would be here if she ever changed her mind. I had failed her in some ways, but I had finally earned my redemption. At last I was able to forgive myself. And so I turned over and went to sleep.
The end.
===================================
Alternate Ending
===================================
It seems like I've been in here for months. Years even. The guard just gave me back my journal. He said I should write everything I can think of tonight, because tomorrow it'll all end.
Well what's left for me to say? In the battle with the raiders, a second army of raiders had come out of the woods from behind our army and we were crushed. The women were taken and, for all I know, are somewhere in this building being forced to service the raiders as Alecia was. The rest of the army was killed on the field. Except me.
Russell stopped his men from killing me because he wanted to make an example of me. So I was taken here, beaten, and left in the dark. As I'm writing this, I'm looking at the dull pencil they gave me. Should I use it to end it now? Could I?
No. I would love to deprive them of the satisfaction of a long, drawn out death, which is what I'm expecting, but I'll face it and endure every second of it as I can. I failed. The monster wasn't good enough to find redemption. Now there is only penance...
The end.
User Reviews
Submitted by BeforeEmily (user info) at 2007-12-16 17:24:34 EST (#)
Ranking: -2
Longer than the "A Song of Ice and Fire" series.
Submitted by TheBrad (user info) at 2007-12-16 17:12:41 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
Awesome. i read it in one sitting on my cell phone.
Submitted by rob_berg (user info) at 2007-12-03 04:44:54 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
Good on ya.
Submitted by HurtByTheSun (user info) at 2007-10-31 12:44:42 EDT (#)
Ranking: -2
WHAT THE FUCK?
http://moid.org/ed/The%20Best%20Story%20Ever.txt
Submitted by BlazinBull (user info) at 2007-10-17 14:27:09 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Very good story, kept me entertained at work and never a dull moment, didn't get bored of it, so that's great. Good story, insert 100 pages of more detail and you got a book.
Submitted by NotVoltron (user info) at 2007-06-28 03:50:37 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Yes!
Not sure how i feel about the ending yet, but I'll re-read it.
Submitted by ghola (user info) at 2007-06-25 20:48:54 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
seriously not reading all that
Submitted by precision (user info) at 2007-06-25 16:07:19 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by Zebra (user info) at 2007-06-25 13:08:46 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by DirtyHarry (user info) at 2007-06-25 11:28:30 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by lover101 (user info) at 2007-06-25 10:01:46 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by yermom (user info) at 2007-06-25 09:34:26 EDT (#)
Ranking: 1
I read the whole series, and have to say that I was quite disappointed with both endings, they both seemed rushed like you weren't really into writing them anymore.
Submitted by Flapjacksupreme (user info) at 2007-06-25 09:12:01 EDT (#)
Ranking: -2
I honestly can say that I haven't read a single one of these, but it seems that everyone else enjoyed this, you LARPing virgin.
Submitted by RabiedRooster (user info) at 2007-06-25 08:55:33 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Have you ever heard of Afterworld.Tv from YouTube. It's pretty much the same story as this. They have the end of the world which they call "The Fall". They even have a group of bandits called "The Pack". Now im not saying you copied their idea because they may have copied your's or it may just be a big coincidence, but hey ho i thought id let you know.
Submitted by TheUniter (user info) at 2007-06-25 07:46:01 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Submitted by iddqd (user info) at 2007-06-25 07:04:20 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
i didnt read it, i never will, but posting something of this insane size on uber is worthy of a +2.
Submitted by EmissionImpossible (user info) at 2007-06-25 05:23:25 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
You are lucky I have no life and could read all that.
Submitted by particle_man58 (user info) at 2007-06-25 04:55:36 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
This was an awesome story, glad to see you've accomplished what you set out to do. This would make such an awesome movie. You try and get it published someday, maybe a studio would pick it up.
The first ending is definatly better than the alternate.
Submitted by czwij (user info) at 2007-06-25 02:53:45 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
saved for later.
2012 - the fall
by frank the bear.
you need a new pen name, it will look stupid on a book or in theatres.
How bout;
Franz von Brunn.
now THAT's presence
Submitted by kuroneko_sama (user info) at 2007-06-25 00:17:42 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
liked the first ending better,
but i can appreciate the braveheart version too
though id suggest avoiding it in the way of why you hated samurai x: reflection so much
Submitted by Bohme (user info) at 2007-06-24 23:35:13 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Read this entire thing in one sitting, that alone is worth +2.
Submitted by Merlina (user info) at 2007-06-24 20:43:02 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
I read.
And I liked.
Submitted by redskieslookfake (user info) at 2007-06-24 19:59:00 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
I can't read that now
Submitted by earth_collapse (user info) at 2007-06-24 18:40:16 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Let me see your film resume.
Submitted by PhillipTheGreat (user info) at 2007-06-24 17:06:01 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Um... I didn't read this.
Submitted by a_little_more_time (user info) at 2007-06-24 17:02:47 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
WTF im not reading all that