TWENTY-ONE

 

Bill and Graye headed off to the south while West and I headed east.  Now that I had figured out I could be around West again without attacking him, I had agreed to let Gabriel put him back in our scouting group.

The sun beat down on us with an intensity that was beyond miserable.  Had I felt pain like the rest of everyone I was sure my sunburned skin would make it beyond uncomfortable to move, much less go on an entire scouting operation.

West and I walked silently through the woods, eyes searching the tree line.  Birds chirped in an annoying afternoon chat.  Insects hummed.  But there were no other sounds.  No traces of any Bane.

“Clear?” West whispered, clutching his rifle tightly in his hands.

“Clear,” I said as we finished sweeping around the perimeter of the gardens.  West waited at the bottom while I scaled the biggest nearby tree.  When I reached the top, I shook its branches with as much force as I possessed.  The entire top half of the tree swayed.

One hundred yards away I saw a figure wave at me.  They knew it was safe to come work.

I dropped down to the ground and straightened my pack.  We had to be more careful than ever these days.  The Bane obviously knew where the gardens where and must know we would be nearby.  It wouldn’t be too difficult for them to track us down now, using the gardens as a trap.  That was why we scouted the area every morning first, before a small crew came to tend.

Not that there was much to tend anymore.  The heat wave wasn’t letting up and everything was withering away.  Soon there would be nothing left.

West and I set out to the north again.

“What do you think is going to happen to us now?” West said quietly as we walked.

I didn’t answer for a moment, trying to collect my thoughts.  “Eventually we’re going to have to move.  Sooner than later.”

“Why do you say that?”

“It’s obvious.  We have supplies for a while but winter is coming.  We don’t have enough to last that long.  We’re going to have to move where it’s warmer or we’re going to starve to death,” I said as I stepped over a log.  “We have natural resources here, animals to hunt, but it’s not going to be enough to sustain everyone through the entire winter.”

West was quiet for a while.  “Have you talked to Gabriel about this?  You’re right, but he’s going to have to be the one to initiate it.”

“I will,” I said as I readjusted my grip on the shotgun in my hands.  “The problem is, how do we move that many people without being spotted by Bane?  How do we move that many supplies at once?”

“That’s a good question,” he said quietly as his eyes jerked to the right.  A squirrel scampered down a tree.

I briefly considered shooting the animal.  I decided against it.  With as little meat it would provide it wouldn’t be worth the ammunition.  As if on cue, West’s stomach let out a rumbling growl.  I chuckled.

“Okay, we’ve seriously got to bring back some food.  I can’t take the starvation rations anymore,” West said in exasperation. 

“When we’re ready to head back we’ll look,” I said as I started the climb up the low hills that looked over Eden.

I was grateful we didn’t see anything the entire day.  While it was boring to be walking endlessly through the woods, it was better than running into something we didn’t want to.  As we started back in the direction of Eden, we kept our eyes peeled for anything to eat.  I sensed there was something West wanted to talk to me about, but had been putting it off the entire day.  And now he had to be quiet if he wanted to eat.

The woods were silent as we moved, as if sensing we were on the lookout to take something home to Eden’s bellies.  Something to the left caught West’s eye and he drew his bow and an arrow before I even caught sight of what he had seen.  The arrow sliced through the air and the next second we heard a scream.

A human one.

We were both bolting through the trees without a second’s hesitation, my mind running through the possibilities of what we might find.  Surely not Bane.  They didn’t feel pain and therefore would never scream.  Could it be Bill?  Graye?  Everyone else knew better than to wander this far from Eden on their own.

He was slumped against a tree, clutching at his left shoulder.  He had already broken off the shaft of the arrow.  His eyes were squeezed shut in agony.  He bit his lower lip to hold back the scream.

“Holy…” West breathed as the man came into view.  I didn’t recognize him.  “I thought it was a deer or something.  What is he doing out here?”

We both dropped to the man’s side, his eyes flying open in delirious confusion.

“You’ve been shot with an arrow,” I said, my voice calm and even.  “We have a doctor at our camp.  I am going to have to pull the arrow out or it will cause more damage as I move you.”

The man’s green eyes opened wide, searching the sky for things only he could see now.

“West, help me,” I said as I placed my hands on the base of the arrow that was still embedded into his chest.  “This is going to hurt him.”

West shifted forward, placing his hands on the man’s shoulders, being careful to stay clear of the wound.  In one swift movement, I yanked the rest of the arrow out.  The man screamed in agony.

“We need something to stop the bleeding,” I said as I tried to recall what Avian would do in a situation like this.  West slid off his pack and pulled his shirt off.  It was damp with sweat but it would work.  I pressed it into the wound and together we secured it with a length of rope from my pack.  Another scream leapt from his throat as I picked him up, gathering him securely in my arms.

“What was he doing out here?” West asked as we jogged through the trees.  We were still far from Eden.  So much for getting food for tonight.

“On the run maybe?” I said as I glanced down at him.  He’d had only the clothing on his back.  I hadn’t seen any provisions with him, no tent, no food.

It took us nearly an hour to get back to Eden.  Even my arms weren’t strong enough to carry him by myself the entire trip and West had taken half the load.  The man had turned a pasty white and he shivered violently, despite the blazing sun above us.  He bled through West’s shirt.  My left arm was covered in his blood.

Avian was in the medical tent when we stumbled into it.  He set the notebook down and jumped to his feet. 

“Who is he?” Avian asked as he pulled on a pair of gloves and removed West’s bloodied shirt.  He started cutting away the man’s own t-shirt.  He barely even whimpered as his wound was jostled.  Until Avian began cleaning it.  Then he screamed.

“He was just in the woods.  We didn’t realize it was a person,” I said as I moved out of Avian’s way.

“I thought he was a deer,” West said, his eyes looking tortured.  “I couldn’t really see anything.  Something moved in the trees and I just shot.”

“Where’d he come from?” Avian asked.  He threaded a needle.  I watched with wide eyes as he started sewing the man back up.

“We don’t know,” West said quietly.  “Is he going to be okay?”

“A chest wound like this is serious.  It’s close to his heart and his lungs.  There are a lot of major blood vessels in that area.  I can’t repair the internal damage so there’s a risk that even if the bleeding stops on the outside, it may not stop on the inside.”

West’s face blanched white.

The man opened his eyes, which rolled around in his head.  “My wife,” he said.  His voice was rough sounding and then I noticed the tears rolling back toward his ears.  “My son.  They found us.  I…was out.  They got them…had to run.”

We all looked up at each other.  Avian dropped what he was doing and opened the box that contained the CDU.  Less than thirty seconds later he had it charged up and calibrated.  The man jerked away as it was pressed to his bare arm.  His eyes continued to roll around in his head.

Organic, but dying quickly.

“Where did you come from?” I asked, leaning over him.  His eyes remained unfocused.

“He may not be able to speak right now,” Avian said as he cut the threads of the stitches.  “His body is going into shock.”

“Where did you come from?” I asked again.

“E… east,” he barely managed to whisper.  “Been running since… day before yesterday.”  He then started coughing violently.  Red splatters coated his lips.

“His lung has been punctured,” Avian said in despair as he took half a step back and rubbed his hand over his hair.

“He’s not going to make it,” I said quietly, looking back down at the man.  Avian shook his head.

“I killed him,” West whispered, backing up to sit on a stump.

“You didn’t know,” I said, glancing at him.  “You were trying to feed us, keep us alive.”

“He’s obviously not food,” West’s voice was hoarse. 

 

Two hours later, the man whose name we didn’t even know, took his last shallow breath.  Avian checked his pulse and pronounced him dead.  Gabriel instructed Bill and Graye to bury him on the outskirts of camp.  After it was done, Gabriel, Avian, West and I gathered back in the medical tent.

“They’re getting close again,” I said as I paced the length of the tent.  “Attacks don’t usually come from the east.  It’s just mountains for miles and miles.”

“Graye was right,” Avian spoke.  “They’re getting more and more aggressive.  This man probably lived in a cabin somewhere with his family.  They tracked him down.  We all know what they did to the gardens a few weeks ago.”

Gabriel rubbed at his beard, deep in thought.  I wanted him to say something, to tell us what to do.  But he didn’t seem to know what to say.

“We’re going to have to leave,” I spoke when he didn’t.  “We have a few months of food left but it won’t be enough to last us through the winter.”

“Where would we go?” Gabriel asked.  I saw something frightening in his eyes that I had never seen there before.  A loss of hope.

“It would have to be south,” Avian spoke up, his eyes coming to my face. 

“Exactly,” I said.  “If we can get somewhere warm enough we should be able to scavenge for food until we can figure something else out.  I think it would also be wise to go southwest.  Heading east first will take too much time.  The trucks we have might not make it very far and it could take months just to hike over the mountains with all of our supplies, if or when they break down.  By then winter will claim the rest of us.”

Gabriel nodded his head, his brain seeming to start to work again.  “I agree but going west won’t be easy either.  We leave now and we’ll be crossing nothing but desert in the heat of summer.”

“Do we wait?” West asked, the first he had spoken since the meeting began.

“We risk the Bane pressing further in on us if we wait,” I pointed out.

“We risk the desert heat claiming us if we go now,” Avian said, sitting forward, resting his elbows on his knees.  “Temperatures can get close to 120 degrees out that direction.  Without massive amounts of water, no one would last long.” 

We seemed to be at a standstill.  What was the right thing to do?  The safest thing?

“I say we take it to everyone in Eden,” West said.  “We have to let everyone know what is happening.  They have to be figuring it out for themselves anyway.  Let’s let everyone decide what to do.”

“I agree,” Avian said as he sat back again.

Gabriel nodded, his eyes thoughtful.  “Fine.  We’ll call a meeting tonight after dinner.”

West and Gabriel exited the tent to spread the word.  I stood rooted and closed my eyes.  I counted backward from ten to help push out the feelings of loss and despair I didn’t know how to deal with.  A warm hand slipped into mine, immediately enhancing the calm I was looking for.  Without opening my eyes, I raised our hands to my face and rubbed the back of Avian’s hand against my cheek.  I could sense Avian’s eyes on my face and could feel the worry rolling off of him.

I wanted to reassure him that everything was going to be okay.  I wanted to tell him that we were all going to make it out of this.  I wanted to tell him that I knew exactly what to do.

But I couldn’t do any of those things.  I didn’t have any answers.

I finally opened my eyes and looked into Avian’s.  His eyes burned as he looked down at me.

It took everything I had in me to let go of Avian’s hand and stepped outside into the dying light.

You can’t have both.

Avian was right.  Even though I didn’t know how to handle feelings like this, I knew what I had been doing was wrong.  I couldn’t have both.  It was unfair to them.  And it was tearing me apart.

 

Someone had to sit out and keep watch during the meeting so West volunteered.  The rest of us gathered in the center of camp.  I watched them as they assembled, saw the way the lines around their eyes were tighter, the way their breathing was just slightly shallower.  Everyone was on edge.

Our already slight frames were all the more thin.

“Thank you for coming tonight,” I was surprised when it was Avian who took control of the meeting.  I glanced over at Gabriel.  He sat to the side of Avian, his eyes on his hands in his lap.  His face looked empty.  “You are all aware of what happened a few weeks ago.  I know everyone has been thinking about it but it is time we actually talked about things and what this means for our future. 

“We will run out of food in the middle of the winter.  We have enough for everyone for a few more months but with most all this year’s harvest gone to ash we will not make it to next spring.

“Add to that fact that the Bane have become more aggressive.  They’re using weapons now.  We can’t go into the cities anymore.  They have been pushing further and further into the country.  Just today a man passed away who was on the run after his family was attacked.  He came from the east.  We’ve never heard of them pressing in from the mountains like that.”

Avian cleared his throat, his eyes dropping to the ground.  I realized how hard this must be on him, having to be the one to finally bring this to everyone’s attention.  He was strong in a way I had never realized before.  He may not have been as physically tough like Bill and Graye were but he was a rock, a foundation for the rest of us.

“It has been proposed that we need to move,” his voice broke, just a tiny bit.”  “I don’t think there is any other choice.  The natural resources we have will not carry us to spring.  We’re going to have to go someplace warmer.  Southwest.

“The question is when and how to move,” Avian said as he looked around at our fellow men and women.  “If we leave right now we would be crossing the deserts in the hottest time of the year.  And yet if we don’t leave now our supplies will become all the more depleted.  And we risk being found.

“It would be incredibly dangerous to move any way we do it.  If we leave all at once it will be easier for Bane to spot us.  At the same time, there is safety in numbers.  We can have our best scouts with us all at once.  If we move in smaller groups it will be easier to stay hidden, to keep a low profile.  But each group could have no more than one or two of our most skilled scouts.  It also splits all of us.  There’s the risk that we might not all ever be reunited.  Without electronic devices it will be difficult to stay in contact and reconvene. 

“It is up to you.  We won’t force any decisions on you.  This affects all of us.  The choice is yours.”

Everyone was silent for a long while.  How was anyone supposed to make this decision?  There were pros and cons to each choice.  There was no clear decision to make.  Each carried the possibility of destruction, with being wiped out in one big cluster or the chance we would never be a group again, a family.

“We could go in two sets,” Graye spoke up.  “If we split right down the middle, one group could go in a few weeks or so when things will start to cool slightly.  We could leave messages for the group to follow, traces the Bane won’t pick up on.  Leave a trail for each other to the new location.  The last group will bring the rest of the food.  We have the two trucks, if we camouflage them well enough, we should be able to bring enough supplies.  At least until we run out of fuel.”

The group was quiet for a bit, mulling over Graye’s idea.

“That seems reasonable to me,” Avian finally said.  “Eve?  Gabriel?”

“It seems a viable option,” I answered.

Gabriel simply nodded his head.  His behavior was disturbing.

“All those in favor of Graye’s plan?” Avian asked, turning his eyes over the group.

The majority of hands, including mine, went up.  After a few hesitant and thoughtful seconds, the rest of them went up as well.

“It is agreed then,” Avian said with a nod.  “We will make preparations.  I think until then our priority should be to hunt as much as possible and gather as many other resources as we can find.  Traveling would be hard under normal circumstances, but considering the conditions we have been under these last few weeks, it will be even more difficult.  We will need food to keep up our strength.  Our survival has become all the more challenging.”

A flurry of mixed emotions was tangible as everyone left.  I watched their faces as they did, Wix, Victoria, Morgan.  Each of them had different thoughts behind their eyes, but there was one unifying one: we had to survive.