After Everything Else (Book 2): Creeper Following, page 4
Later, she lay alone in a slightly musty tent Bob had produced from a storage bin under his trailer. For the first time in what felt like forever, she was able to enter a meditative state. Her prayers first led her to a place of near silence. She lay perfectly still, aware of each sound of the night around her slowly fading until she was alone, at peace. She felt the presence of the Lord around her, surrounding her. But then the presence seemed to gather together, to focus. She knew the Lord was aware of her, and she had always felt the presence of the Lord, but there seemed to be a special attention to her now. As she became more aware, the meditative state left her. She came to her senses in the darkened tent. She lay awake for a long time, thinking about what it meant, what had happened. When she came to the realization that her understanding was not required, that what was going to happen would happen whether she understood her role or not, she was able to relax. She would do what she felt was right, what she thought God wanted. She drifted off to sleep to the sound of peepers down by the lake, the little frogs’ chorus competing with the sound of the wind in the pines and the calls of the night birds.
Chapter 6 – Chase
Chase awoke at once, instantly alert. Something was wrong. He felt unprotected, exposed; something was missing. When he sat up, he realized why. The windows were down. He looked around, confused, but when he observed the trunks of the trees of the forest surrounding the Suburban, the evening’s sleeping arrangements came back to him. Marilyn, despite his protests, had decided to sleep in the little one-man tent Bob had loaned her. Fearful of her safety, even though there had been no evidence of creepers in their time here, he had left the windows down. He had considered staying awake all night to listen for anything that might come, but exhaustion and a full stomach had claimed him. The fresh night air had held him under until he had awakened to morning taking place all around him. The birds were singing, and the sun was slanting through the pines with a green and golden light. If there was any morning to be happy after everything that had happened, this was it. Then he looked over at Sonya, who was still sleeping curled deep in her sleeping bag.
He worried about her. When Marilyn announced her intentions, Sonya had paled and her eyes had grown large. Sonya had walked away, but he had seen her reaction. He wanted to ask her what was wrong, but he knew. The thought of sleeping outside, of being exposed, just like she had been on the sign, was causing her to have a panic attack. Marilyn noticed, and she had followed and talked to Sonya. Chase listened as Marilyn explained that she needed her space, she needed some solitude, and that she might not be able again to have it for some time. Sonya had nodded solemnly, but when she and Chase climbed into the Suburban for the evening and they had burrowed into their separate sleeping bags, she had moved hers closer over to his, even though they had extra room for a change.
As he watched her sleeping form, she rolled over and sat up as suddenly as he had. She turned to him, panic in her eyes, then embarrassment. She looked away, and he looked away as well, embarrassed also, even though he wasn’t sure why. They squirmed around to face each other, legs stretched across the cargo compartment, backs against the sides.
“Weird, huh?” Chase said. “Waking up to fresh oxygen rather than choking on dirty socks and carbon dioxide.”
“Yeah. For a minute….” Sonya didn’t finish the thought. She started again, “So today we get the directions from Bob to get out of this state, finally. Let’s try to get going by noon at the latest. If we stock up somewhere and get some food ready before we go, we can drive for six, seven hours before we need to start looking for a camp. We can ask him about that.”
“Yeah, that…and something else, too. He talked about those other people. The ones at the church in Eufala. I think we should go see them. There’s some people from Florida, and, well…I just want to see people.”
“People like the Chief?” Sonya suddenly looked angry. “Chase, I’ve got only one thing in mind. Find my father. All this other stuff, all these other people? Think about where I am, Chase. The Chief and his crew almost killed me. I like Bob well enough, but I bet if we stayed here two more days, you and Marilyn would be trying to talk me into staying. I’m going, and I’m going straight to Florida, straight to Ocala, I’m going to find my Dad’s truck, and maybe my Dad. Then I can go visiting people in churches in Eufala, or hang out with Bob in the woods here, or start the country over again, but sure not with the Chief. So that’s where I stand.” Chase watched as the anger died in her. “That’s my plan. And having you and Marilyn along is great, but if you left, I’d…” she swallowed, “I’d just keep going. To Ocala. I know I’d probably die between here and there. But that’s what I have to do.”
Chase scooted around until he was sitting beside her and put his arm around her. She had bathed last night in the lake. Her hair smelled like strawberries from the shampoo she used. “I’m going to Ocala, too,” he said. “I’m in. But I think we should stop by and see those folks from Florida. I guess there’s even the chance one of them could be your dad.” She looked up at him, doubt written plain on her face. “I doubt it, too, but I think we do need to be looking for people. Groups of people. There’s not many of us left from what I’ve seen. If he’s alive, somebody may have seen him or heard of him.”
She dropped her eyes, and then looked out onto the forest floor where Marilyn’s tent stood in the distance. He watched as the doubt on her face faded and was replaced by reluctant hope. She nodded once.
Breakfast was ridiculously good, Chase thought. Bob had eggs. He had raided a coop he had found at a farm on his last supply run. He said the number of chickens was declining, but he was debating trying to figure out a way to get them all back to his camp. He just hadn’t made the effort yet. Marilyn seemed happy, scrambling the eggs with chopped bits of the venison and some wild onions she had found. Sonya sat quietly, wearing a look of quiet determination. Chase could read her body language: yes, this is nice, but we are leaving. Bob was happy, too, or at least as happy as he seemed to get.
When he gave them the map he had marked and the handwritten directions, though, he looked a little bit more like his old self: sad, but thoughtful. “Follow these directions, and you’ll be in Florida by sundown, if you don’t choose to stop before that. If you could get to the interstate and it was clear, you could shave three, four hours off that time, but you’ll be back-roading. You might stop somewhere and pick up a chainsaw. Nobody’s clearing the roads. Grab a towing chain or a strap, too. That Suburban is big enough to pull most things off the road. There’s a good hardware store on the edge of Eufala. I’ve been in already and took care of the black-mouths that were trapped inside.”
“What if we’re not going to go see those people in Eufala?” Sonya asked defiantly.
Bob looked surprised. “You don’t have to. But the best way is to skirt Eufala anyway. You don’t want to see them, should be easy enough to avoid them. If you did want to go see them, it might be kinda tough. The church they’re in is on kind of a peninsula out on the lake. They’ve lined up buses and big trucks and blocked the creepers out from one side of the peninsula to the other, even pulling some of the trucks out into the water. The creepers don’t seem to be too eager to go swimming. But there’s a lot of creepers there, outside the wall they built. Mostly just standing there, watching the people on the wall. The church people have got a way in and out, some drainage tunnels that come up out beyond the creepers. They go out for supplies time to time. I’d say if you did want to go by, see if you can get their attention from a distance. They’d probably come out and get you.”
Once they had cleaned up after breakfast, Bob gave them some venison he had smoked overnight. They packed themselves up and prepared to leave. The parting was awkward. Sonya’s eagerness to leave made Chase uncomfortable. Bob had invited them in, seemed to enjoy their company, and seemed sad they were leaving. And Sonya was pushing them on. Chase found himself irritated with her even though he understood what was motivating her. When they finally got the Suburban back on the asphalt, Bob sat on his ATV at the side of the road. When Chase last saw him, he was still sitting, still waving. Chase felt terrible.
Chase explained to Marilyn that he and Sonya decided to stop and see the people in Eufala. He told them he also planned to stop and grab a chainsaw, a tow chain, and anything else he could think of at the hardware store Bob had mentioned. Marilyn looked up for it, but Sonya was still silent.
After they had driven a few miles, carefully following the turns and forks designating in Bob’s instructions, they saw the first creeper they had seen since stopping on the forest road. It stood at the side of the road in a patch of shadow. Chase believed it had been a man, but there was no way to determine age. It wore jeans, the ragged remains of a t-shirt, and despite all odds, still wore a cap on its head. Chase wondered about that. Surely at some point the creeper had been in one rough situation or another, some situation that would have caused it to lose the cap. Was there enough left of the original personality to cause the creeper to cling to the hat, to replace it when it was knocked off? Chase didn’t like the thought that there was anything left. That would open up the possibility of traces of consciousness, of an awareness of their current state.
The creeper had large chunks of meat missing from its arms and chest, and ragged flesh hung from its neck and face. As he approached it, it began shuffling toward the Suburban and Chase watched in horror as the movement caused skin to peel from one arm. The decaying flesh dropped to the pavement. Mercifully, they were past the creature quickly. But Chase knew they would be seeing more of them. Many, many more.
Chapter 7 – Sonya
Bob’s directions had been good, and the back-roads fairly clear. There was still the occasional vehicle across the road, but surprisingly few of these. The creepers had been scattered, with only one showing up every mile or so, and alone they weren’t much of a threat to a moving vehicle. They made pretty good time, but Sonya wasn’t in a hurry on this first leg of the journey. She wanted to get to Florida, she wanted to find her father, but she wasn’t sure she wanted to go through Eufala. The idea of meeting more people and the general bad feeling she had filled her with a dread she couldn’t shake.
They found the hardware store Bob had suggested easily. The glass of the front door had been broken and replaced with a piece of plywood. Two creepers lay motionless on the ground outside. Marilyn and Chase went inside to find the items, each carrying a rifle. Sonya stood guard at the front door with her pistol, ready to call for them if creepers started showing up outside. She stood just inside the doorway, Honey sitting at her feet, straining to hear Marilyn and Chase as they walked the dark aisles, eyes restlessly scanning the surroundings. The empty parking lot gave her a good range of vision. She could see creepers wandering nearby streets, but none seemed to have noticed them and their activity at the hardware store. They all seemed to be heading in one direction. Sonya wondered where they were going, but as long as it wasn’t to the hardware store, she didn’t really care. She decided the parking lot was her safety zone. If one creeper stepped onto the parking lot, or if Honey started showing signs of a creeper nearby, she would call for Chase and Marilyn. But none of the passing creepers paid any attention to her, and Honey ignored them as well. They showed a strange sense of purpose, plodding, dragging, or shuffling past, heading in the same direction.
Behind her in the shadows of the store, she could hear the cart Chase and Marilyn had pushed inside. It had one bad wheel and rattled at every step. If there were any creepers inside the building, they would easily be able to find the pair. She heard Chase’s low voice, and then Marilyn replied. They seemed to be discussing possible items. She could make out an occasional word: chainsaw, fuel mix, chain, pry bar, shovel. She wondered where Chase was going to put all the stuff. With the three of them and their sparse belongings, Honey, and any food supplies, the Suburban was crowded. Two days before Chase had taken some straps from the military surplus store and attempted to put some of their more durable supplies on the roof, but often had to stop to re-secure them. Something was going to have to change, Sonya thought.
Chase and Marilyn seemed to be taking forever. Finally she heard the rattle of the cart coming her way, and then it stopped. The heavier rumble of a larger cart began, one of the platform carts. The sound grew louder, but she kept her eyes on the parking lot until they were close. When she turned, she saw a very large cart, loaded with boxes.
“Chase, there is no way we can get all that in the Suburban. No room to sleep, no room to sit. What are you thinking?” Sonya asked. She didn’t care that she sounded like a nag. She wanted to load up and get gone, and he had dragged all this stuff out.
Chase brought the cart to a stop next to her. He looked at her calmly. She felt herself getting angrier. He was trying to figure out how to deal with her. She didn’t want to be dealt with. She said nothing. She wanted to walk away, she wanted to go somewhere where he couldn’t look at her, where she didn’t feel like a petulant child. Then he pushed the cart to the back of the Suburban and the first thing he took from the cart was a box with a picture of a metal cargo rack that went on the back of an SUV. Wordlessly, he opened the box and began to put the rack together. Sonya walked to the front of the vehicle and stood with her back to them, arms wrapped around herself. The front of the Suburban stank of creeper, even though they hadn’t had to hit any recently. She heard Marilyn ask Chase if he needed help but he told her he didn’t. When Marilyn walked to where Sonya stood, Sonya’s first impulse was to turn away. Instead, she held her ground, keeping her eyes on the pavement at her feet.
“What is it, Sonya?” Marilyn asked.
“Does Chase know I’m not mad at him?” Sonya asked first.
“He knows. We both know. But something is wrong, and we both know that.”
“I have a really bad feeling. About visiting the people at the church. I don’t know why. But I don’t think I can stop us. I don’t even know if I should try.” She stopped and looked at Marilyn. Marilyn was scanning the parking lot, keeping an eye out, and didn’t look at Sonya. Sonya realized that Marilyn was beautiful. Anyone looking at her would see it. But Marilyn didn’t know it, or maybe it wasn’t important to her. “We’re going to have to go through it, I think. Everything is saying we should go there, and all I have is a feeling, but that feeling isn’t that we should avoid it. It’s just that it’s not going to be good. Do I sound crazy?”
Marilyn turned her gaze on Sonya. “No. I feel that way sometimes. I think everyone does. It’s the idea of something new, something different, some change. Is that what you are feeling?”
“Kind of, I guess. But more than that. I know about being afraid of change. This feels like that, but a little more, too. It’s not just anxiety. Do you ever feel like there’s something more going on now?”
Sonya watched Marilyn’s face, and something registered there, but Marilyn said, “No, not really. God’s will is all that is going on.”
Sonya waited for Marilyn to say more, but that seemed to be it. She took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “Come on. Let’s see how he’s doing.”
An hour later and a couple of more trips into the store, the rack was mounted. It was also immediately full. Chase had grabbed two big durable plastic boxes with lids and loaded those, and on top of the boxes he had put yet more of their gear. He had found some cargo webbing and mounted it on the top of the Suburban and filled that as well, running straps through it and then through the windows of the Suburban. “It’s not pretty,” he said, “but it will work.” Sonya and Marilyn helped, and Chase gave them suggestions as they worked. Sonya was surprised by how well they worked together, but then thought back over the short time they had been together. When Chase had an idea or a plan, he often asked them about it. He didn’t tell them. He listened to them as well when they disagreed or had an alternate plan. He guided them, but he didn’t tell them what to do. Because of that, Sonya felt like she wanted to do what he suggested. She trusted him and his judgment.
When they climbed into the Suburban, Sonya claimed the back seat. Chase started the engine, but didn’t put the vehicle into gear. He turned in his seat to face Sonya. “Okay, Sonya. I’m going to leave it up to you. Marilyn and I would both like to go see the people at the church. I think they might have information that would help us. Marilyn probably has her own reasons for wanting to go see them. But you don’t want to. I respect that. This isn’t a democracy, and it isn’t a tyranny. If you really don’t want to go, we head down the road. Say the word.”
“We have to go see the people,” Sonya replied. “I’m not sure why. I doubt they know any more about anything than we do. I’m afraid we’ll lose Marilyn, and maybe I’ll even lose you. But we need to see them. And they need to see us.”
Chase stared at her for a long time. She looked back levelly. She fought an impulse to look away. He nodded once, then turned back and put the Suburban in gear. She wanted to reach out and grab the hand that was draped across the back of Marilyn’s seat. But she didn’t do that. Later, she wished she had.
Chapter 8 – Marilyn
Marilyn was stung by Sonya’s words, but she understood. Sonya always seemed to be ready to take off on her own. Marilyn had known people like her before, people who had lost someone, people who were sure they would be abandoned and left on their own. Marilyn didn’t bother to try to reassure Sonya that she would be there for her, that she wasn’t going to lose them. Words wouldn’t make a difference. Actions would.
