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It wasn’t a long trek. It was less than a quarter-mile. But, it was all uphill. Steep, dark, and rocky uphill.
When we got to the snug little cabin shared by Cheryl and Susan, we saw a light burning in the upstairs window. I held up my hand, indicating that we all should stop...none of us had the breath to say it. We stood in the front yard of the cabin, heaving air into our lungs.
All of us except Richie. Show-off.
My breathing finally returned to a semblance of normal. I said, “Wait a minute. Let me try something.” The other three nodded. I shouted, “Susan! Susan, are you in there?”
The curtains fluttered in the upstairs window, and then Susan’s face appeared. She raised the window and called, “Paul? Is that you?”
“It’s me, Susan. Can you come down?”
“Give me a minute, and I’ll be right there,” she said, and closed the window.
The cabin that Susan and Cheryl shared was just a bit larger than ours. It had one more outbuilding that we did, several more solar cells than we had, and an extra windmill. These ladies liked their electric comforts.
They had spoken of getting married soon, since the laws against it had been mostly repealed. I was not looking forward to telling her about Cheryl.
The porch light suddenly snapped on, and the front door opened. Susan came out onto the porch dressed in jeans, boots, and a flannel shirt. Her long yellow hair was tied into a ponytail. She was almost forty, but looked to be in her late twenties. She was a gorgeous woman.
Susan was also a worried woman.
“Oh, Paul, I didn’t know you were coming, can you help me? Cheryl went to the city on a shopping trip early this morning. I went for a hike this afternoon, and I got back around dusk. Cheryl’s Jeep was parked in the garage, but she’s nowhere to be found! And this bug thing was all over the news on the satellite channels, and I’m worried sick about her! You haven’t seen her, have you?”
Here it was. Do you have any idea how hard it is to break someone’s heart the way I was about to break Susan’s? And I couldn’t ask any of the others to do it. She was my friend, and my neighbor, and it had to be me.
I took each of her hands in each of mine, and I looked her directly in the eye. “Yes, Susan. I’ve seen her.”
A huge look of relief appeared on her face. “Oh, thank God!” she said. “Where did you see her, Paul?”
I hesitated. “She was down at my place, Susan. I found her in my bathtub.”
She looked puzzled. “Your bathtub? What was she doing at your place? What’s wrong with our bathtub?”
I looked over at Michael, then Richie, then Bobby. They all looked away as I looked at them. “Susan, what...uh, how much...what do you know about these bugs?”
With a confused look, she said, “I know that they’ve wiped out most of the eastern two-thirds of the country. They’re all over Europe, Canada, South America, and parts of Russia and China. They’ve been spotted in Israel and Egypt, too. They’re genetically mutated, and they were released by some Islamic crazy group.”
I was shocked. I didn’t realize that the release had been worldwide. That was scary.
“What else, Susan?”
“They’re stopped at the base of the Rockies, and other mountainous areas. It seems to be too cold for them.”
“What do you know about people infections?”
“Well, no one knows how the infections first started, but they say that when a person is infected, they lose control of their speech centers, their eyes turn a milky white, and seem empty, like there’s no one inside. They said that the reason for that is that the eggs have hatched, and are feeding on portions of the brain, heart, and other organs. Just before they die, they vomit up blood, bugs, and more eggs, and then they...” She stopped abruptly. She had been watching my face, and must have seen something there...like the truth about Cheryl. “Oh, God,” she said in a very small voice. “Paul, no. Not Cheryl. Please, God, no, not her. Not sweet Cheryl.”
I held her hands tightly, and nodded.
Susan grabbed me, buried her face in my shoulder, and began crying hard. She was crying as if she had lost her soul. Or, perhaps, just her soulmate. Her sobs were loud and were wrung from the deepest part of her. I held her as tightly as I could, and rubbed her hair to calm her, comfort her, and help her through her grief.
Michael, Richie, and Bobby stood quietly, looking everywhere and nowhere, obviously feeling embarrassed to be witness to this poor woman’s terrible grief, and feeling helpless, not knowing how to offer comfort to her.
After I let Susan cry for a few moments, I couldn’t shake the feeling that we needed to get back. That we should begin fortifying, that the mountain wouldn’t stop the bugs forever. I eased Susan a few inches away from me so that I could see her face as I spoke. Her eyes were puffy and red, and her face was wet from tears.
“Susan,” I said gently. “We need you to come with us, down to my cabin. I can’t leave you up here alone, and we can’t defend both cabins as well as we can defend one.”
“No-o-o,” she cried painfully. “I can’t just leave, Paul. Her soul is here! Her memories are here! Oh, my God, her scent is still probably on her pillow! Paul, what am I going to do without her?” She began crying that soul-tearing cry again.
“Susan. Susan, I’m begging you. I don’t want to lose you, too. Please come with us. Phyllis will be so happy to see you, and so will the kids. Please.”
After a couple more sobs, finally, Susan nodded. “I need to pack a few things first. Okay, Paul?”
“Sure, honey. We’ll wait for you here.”
She nodded, and slowly made her way back into the house. Once she had gently shut the front door behind her, I turned to the others.
“Gentlemen,” I said quietly, “that was the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do.”
Bobby came up and put a hand on my shoulder. “Paul, I’ve had to do that several times as a cop, and it never gets any easier.”
We all sat, either on the porch steps, or the rocking chairs that decorated the porch. My mind was a whirl of things, flashing by at breakneck speeds. Susan and Cheryl at our cabin for a picnic, Ralph throwing up blood and squirmers, barely escaping the city, getting Cheryl out of the cabin before she blew, being grateful for my wife and children....it all flashed through my head.
I can’t say what the others were thinking, but they seemed as “checked out” as I was. They all had blank looks on their faces, and were staring at faraway places.
The shot made us all jump out of our reveries.
It had come from inside the cabin.
If my eyes were as wide as the other three sets, I looked very surprised. With me leading the way, we all burst into the cabin.
“Susan!” I yelled. “Susan!” When there was no answer, I told the others, “Look around down here! I’ll look upstairs!”
I skipped a stair here and there as I ran up them. I threw open the master bedroom door.
I saw Susan.
She was sitting on the bed, sobbing quietly into her hands. A revolver was on the floor at her feet.
The relief I felt made my knees weak, and I almost lost my balance.
“I couldn’t do it,” Susan whispered. “I held the gun to my head, and squeezed the trigger. But something made me move the barrel away from my head. I couldn’t do it.” She buried her face in her hands and began crying quietly again.
I went over to her, and bent down to pick up the gun. I tucked it into my back waistband. I sat down beside the grieving woman, and pulled her close to me.
“Susan, please don’t do that again,” I whispered. “Cheryl wouldn’t have wanted you to waste your life, just when the rest of us need you the most.”
We rocked back and forth until Michael and Bobby came to the door. I nodded to them, and pulled Susan to her feet.
“Come on, sweetie,” I said gently. “Let me help you pack a few things.”
She wouldn’t raise her eyes from the floor. But she nodded, and took my hand. Within a matter of minutes, we had her packed.
We headed back down the mountain.
###
PHYLLIS HAD THINGS going great when we got back to the cabin. She had a bucket line leading from the milk delivery van to the freezer outbuilding. They were moving butter and ice cream to the walk-in freezer. The milk was placed on the floor of the outbuilding, after all available space had been filled in the cabin’s refrigerator. The ice chests that Michael and I had loaded had been filled, too.
Phyl saw us, and left Millie in charge of the brigade to come over to us. She hugged Susan, and took her over. Phyl smiled at me over Susan’s shoulder, and I smiled back.
Richie wandered off to find Teresa.
The RV had brought two other kids with it, so, along with Keith and Clarissa, were all huddled together on the front porch.
“Well, I’d say this qualifies as the most stressful day ever,” I said.
“You ain’t kiddin’, Paul,” agreed Bobby.
“Did you guys register what Susan told us? That the creatures were all over the world?” asked Michael.
I nodded. “Yeah. I heard. Scares the shit out of me, too.”
“What was it she said? That mountainous areas were too chilly for these bugs?” asked Bobby.
“This time of year, the average nighttime temperature is in the forties. I think I read somewhere that normal insects can’t move around much in temperatures that low. Maybe that’s what keeps them out of the mountains,” I said.
“Well, that’s great for now,” said Bobby. “But what happens when the sun comes up, and the temperatures get warmer?”
“We’ll have to cross that bridge when we get to it, I guess,” I replied. “Meanwhile, you said you had an idea about all that stuff you brought, Bobby. What’s your idea?”
“We build a moat,” replied Bobby.
“A moat?” asked Michael.
“Yeah, I don’t get it, either,” I said.
“Here, I’ll show you. Let me...oh, there’s a good one,” said Bobby. He walked a few steps away and picked up a stick. “Come over here to the light.” He led the way over to the area directly in front of the milk truck’s headlights and squatted down. He used the stick to draw a circle. “Okay, Paul, this is a circle surrounding our little haven here. If all of us pitch in and dig a good sized trench all the way around the area, we could shore up the sides with the wood. Dig the trench fairly deep, around a foot or so, and put the wood in so that it forms a ‘V’. With that, we’ve formed a trough. Once we have that done, we pour concrete into the trough. It hardens, creating a moat all around the cabin and the outbuildings.”
“Well, that’s great, Bobby, but what good would it do? We could fill it with water, but that won’t stop the bugs from just stepping...or flying...over it,” I said.
Bobby shook his head and laughed. “We don’t fill it with water, Paul”
“We fill it with gasoline,” said Michael, matter-of-factly.
Bobby smiled and pointed at Michael. “Bingo! We fill it with gasoline when we know the bugs are coming. Then all it takes is one little match, and poof! We’ve got a barrier that no bug is going to cross.”
I thought about it. It was a good plan. Mostly.
“What happens with the bugs that can fly?” I asked. “Won’t they fly right over the trench?”
“Sure,” said Bobby. “But we have flamethrowers for them. And if the juice in them runs low, maybe we can fabricate something with the gasoline and something that sparks. Like a flint, or something.”
I thought about it. Not bad. Not bad at all. And we had to have something going to keep all of the idle hands going...something to work for that would protect everyone. I nodded, slowly at first, then faster. “Good plan, Bobby. We’ll start tomorrow. We’ll have to finish it soon, or the cement will harden inside the truck, and won’t be any good to us at all. Or the ground will freeze solid. Yep, tomorrow it is. We’ll tell everyone later. I only hope that we have enough digging tools.”
Bobby smiled. “I covered that, too.” He pointed to the police cruiser. “Inside are five picks, and five shovels, along with sledgehammers, regular hammers, nails, even a big roll of thick black plastic – the kind they use to landscape with. We can use that to line the wood and keep the concrete in place to harden.”
“You’re impressing me, Mr. Policeman,” I said.
“Hey, protect and serve, Paul. Protect and serve.”
Michael asked, “When are we going to tell everyone?”
I shrugged. “Why not now?”
Both Michael and Bobby nodded their agreement.
I stood up, and called everyone to gather around. Everyone came, and stood in a rough circle around the three of us.
“Bobby, here, came up with an idea for us to offer more protection for this place against the bugs. I’ll let him explain.”
Bobby explained the plan to everyone, and asked if there were questions. There weren’t.
I took over. “So, we’re going to start on this project first thing in the morning. We’re also going to organize a rotating watch, to look out for bugs.”
Ben, one of the men that came in the RV, said, “Hey, who made you the boss here?”
Voices in the group died down to silence. All were watching me, since I was the one that had been challenged.
Ha! Challenged! Already!
Quietly, I said, “I did. It’s my cabin, Ben.”
“It’s my cabin, Ben,” he said with a mocking voice. “Well, I just don’t feel like digging dirt on your property, Paul. And I don’t think I’m going to, either. Whatcha gonna do about it?” Ben stood with his hands on his hips, chest thrust out, playing the role of Big Billy Badass.
I was surprised how calm I was inside. I walked over to the man and looked into his eyes. “Then you go down the mountain.”
Ben leaned over until our noses were an inch apart. He said, “Make me.”
He hadn’t noticed that my shotgun was barrel up, leaning toward him. The click, when I turned the safety off, was very loud in the yard.
“Trust me. You’ll can leave on your own two feet, or you can be carried down the mountain,” I said. “I won’t risk lives to play nice.”
In the light from the headlights, I could see a line of nervous sweat pop up across his forehead, and most of the color drained from his face. Slowly, very slowly, Ben leaned back, away from my face. The barrel of my shotgun followed him.
I raised my voice. “That goes for everyone! This place is not a democracy, this is my family’s cabin! I’m more than happy to provide you with room and board, but safety is everyone’s concern, and I’m the final say when it comes to that. Like some of your parents may have told you when you were teenagers – if you’re under my roof, you’ll play by my rules. If that’s too much for you, then the road there also leads down.”
I paused for emphasis. “Everyone, and I mean me, my wife, my kids, and you, will take turns digging, keeping watch, and assembling this trench tomorrow morning, beginning at seven.” I turned to Ben and gave him a stern look. “I mean everyone, Ben. Even you.”
He didn’t like it. Oh, he didn’t like it. But, he had no other choice. With a grim set to his lips, he nodded.
As I walked away with Bobby and Michael, Bobby said, “You’re not done with him. You know that, right?”
“I know,” I replied tonelessly.
###
PHYL AND I FINALLY got everyone bedded down. The children had their own rooms – boys in one and girls in the other. The two young people from McKelvie’s were assigned to those rooms, too. That took up two of the three upstairs bedrooms.
The third upstairs bedroom was given to whoever wanted it. The same thing applied to the couch, love seat, and chairs in the living room. We didn’t have enough pillows, but we had plenty of blankets, and the fire was kept warm.
Phyl and I had the master bedroom, and we shared it with Michael, Millie, Bobby, Billy, and Susan. They all had sleeping bags, provided by Michael, who had snuck them into the room early. They were part of the supplies he brought from the sporting goods store.
A couple of people that came in the RV chose to sleep there to alleviate some of the crowding in the cabin.
We arranged a watch schedule that had two people on duty at all times, for two hours for each watch shift. Phyl and I took the first watch. Bobby and his brother Billy would take the second, with Michael and Millie taking the third. Oddly enough, Richie and Teresa had volunteered for the last watch. They called themselves “the dawn patrol” and promised to wake us at six.
Phyl and I had settled down in the rocking chairs on the porch. I reached over to take her hand.
“It’s been a rough day, hasn’t it?” she said.
I smiled and nodded. “It sure has.”
“How are you, Paul? How are you really?”
I thought for a minute. “Surprisingly, I’m okay. Maybe the shock is delayed, and hasn’t sunk in yet, but, right now, I’m okay.”
We rocked for a few minutes, comfortable with each other’s company.
“Would you have shot that man if he hadn’t backed away?”
Without hesitation, I said, “Yes.”
We were silent for a few beats, and then she said, “I think you should have shot him anyway. He’s only going to be trouble.”
I sighed. “I know. But, I like to think that people are basically good, and want to help. I just want to give him his chance. If something happens later, then I’ll boot him out.”
Suddenly, a number of jets flew east over the mountain. The noise startled us as they passed over. By the time we had scrambled off of the porch, they were off in the distance. We could see the lights on at least three planes, and we saw what looked like missile contrails below them, reflected in the moonlight. Visibility from our position on the mountain was about twenty miles, so we were able to watch the contrails dip just below the horizon. We saw the flash of the explosions, and, a several seconds later, we could actually hear the pounding bass of their sound, almost like fireworks going off in the distance.
Phyl grabbed me when we saw the flash of the missiles, and held me tighter when the sound came to us.
I held her close, and reassured her. “They aren’t nuclear. Just powerful missiles. We’re safe.”
We heard the front door close behind us. Bobby and Billy had come outside.
“The sound of the jets going over woke us. I hope you two don’t mind if we join you,” said Bobby.
“Yeah, can’t fall asleep anyway,” added Billy.
“Sure! The more, the merrier,” I said.
I pointed off in the direction that the missiles had exploded, and explained what we had seen.
“Wow. So the military can still fight back. That’s good news!” said Bobby.
“Maybe. As long as they don’t use nukes, it’s good news,” I replied. “But I still think we’re mostly on our own.”
“You’re probably right,” agreed Bobby.
As we all watched, the jets passed over their target again, or, at least, we thought it was the jets. This time we didn’t see any missiles. But we saw the flashes. The planes we saw were dropping bombs, and the flashes came fast and furious.
I wondered if all of that would have any effect on these creatures, and I said it out loud.
“Sure, it’ll kill some...won’t it?” pondered Billy.
“Oh, I hope so,” said Phyllis. “I hate to think of what will happen if it doesn’t.”
“But killing some won’t kill them all,” said Bobby.
I sighed. “No. No, it won’t. And I’m wondering if they’ve grown as large as they’re going to get.”
“Oh, now there’s a worse thought! What if they grow to the size of elephants or something?” said Bobby.
“Or worse,” said Billy.
“That’s the trouble with genetically engineering things like those bugs,” I said. “Unless you’ve really tested them out, you have no idea what surprises they have in store as they develop.”
The four of us pondered that for a while as we watched the bombing of the creatures.
Bobby asked, “Paul, do you have satellite TV?”
“We do.”
“I think we should be watching the news channels, if any are still broadcasting, and see if there’s anything new that we should know about.”
“He’s right, Paul,” said Phyllis.
“I think so, too, but the TV is in the living room. We’d wake up the entire house,” I replied.
“What about the one in the bedroom?” asked Billy.
“Same thing,” I said. “We’d wake Susan, or Michael, or Millie. Or all of them.”
“Can you move the bedroom TV to your study?” asked Bobby. “No one is sleeping in there.”
Phyllis looked at me, and nodded.
I said, “I believe we can, if the satellite cord will reach. If it won’t, we can drill a hole through the bedroom wall. It’s right next to the study. But, let’s wait until tomorrow, okay? I don’t want to wake everyone.”
“Good enough. We can do that when we aren’t digging,” said Bobby.
We watched the bombing a bit longer, then Phyl and I went to bed.
