Milepost 291

CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

The progress was slow, but DeVontay wouldn’t let the group stop until they’d put the compound at least half a mile behind them.

After leading them through the forest for a while, he decided it would be safer to travel in the open rather than stumble through the dark trees. After consulting Kiki, the group headed downhill in the direction of the river road, although DeVontay planned to stay well away from Stonewall. Some of the children were nearly at the breaking point due to fear and exhaustion, but promises of food and rest kept them moving.

They emerged from the forest onto a rise of meadow that was part of a farm property. A house and a few outbuildings stood near the road, the river beyond them sparkling like a silver ribbon in the moonlight. The low mist lay across it and seeped up the banks so that the opposite shore was hidden. They wouldn’t be able to see anyone coming from a distance, but DeVontay reasoned the group would also be difficult to see.

“Okay, let’s eat.” He dropped the bundle and was busy spreading the blanket over the high weeds while Kiki and the others gathered around. The blanket wasn’t large enough to hold all of them, but Kiki set the youngest children on it as others dug through the food.

“Sweet!” James howled. “Scored me a Reese’s Cup.”

“Hush,” Kiki said. “Someone might hear us.”

Stephen stood away from the blanket with the “big kids,” chewing a Slim Jim. Carole opened a bottle of juice and had the kids pass it around. DeVontay waited until all the children had selected something before he snapped the tab on a can of Vienna sausages and ate them with his fingers.

“Those stink,” Kiki said, helping the toddler with a strip of gelled fruit.

“Yeah, well, I didn’t have time to find any caviar, anchovies, or pickled okra,” DeVontay said. “What are you eating?”

“An apple. A girl needs to watch her figure.”

“Maybe you can put together the ‘Running for Your Life Workout Plan’ after all this is over.”

“Like this will ever be over.”

“I didn’t realize you were a pessimist. Not after all the sacrifices you’ve made for the children. You have to believe they have some sort of future for you to act the way you do.”

She shook her head. “You just do the thing that needs to be done right now. That’s all.”

“Surely you had your chances to escape. Or do what Angelique did and play your way into Rooster’s good graces.”

“You didn’t have to come back for us. You could have gotten away and left us for the Zapheads.”

DeVontay didn’t tell her that he’d considered slipping away with Stephen and leaving the group to fend for itself. He didn’t really deserve it, but he enjoyed the admiration that came from being a hero. Especially when expressed by an attractive woman. “That’s not my style.”

“How come you didn’t keep your gun?

“Because I’m starting to think if you live by the sword, you die by the sword. Not in some sort of Old Testament eye-for-an-eye thing, but because the Zaps seem to respond to violence. Like they tune in on it, absorb it, and reflect it.”

“That’s really weird.”

“Maybe,” DeVontay said. “I’ve been thinking about it. We assume they’ve somehow mutated so their brains are programmed to destroy us, but what if they’re actually just picking up on our own neurotransmitter signals? What if they’re responding to our emotions, even adopting them? A bunch of men with guns would throw them into a complete frenzy. They might not understand intellectually they can be killed, but they would feel the threat.”

“Like when they hear sounds and imitate them?”

“Sure. Maybe they’re learning. Back at the compound, when three of them were coming toward me, I didn’t try to run or fight, and they walked right past me as if I wasn’t there. Like they couldn’t even see me. They might operate on a wavelength we can’t begin to understand. We assume they want to kill us, but what if they’re only picking up on our fear? What if they smell it the way a predator smells prey?”

“Then we don’t have much of a chance,” Kiki said. “Because they scare the hell out of all of us.”

Stephen, who’d been playing with James, came over to them. “Are we going to sleep in that house down there?”

Kiki watched with interest, and DeVontay wondered whether he should consult her. He’d hoped to get farther away from the compound before the sun rose, but already children were yawning and a couple had curled up on the blanket to take naps. He was right about one thing: having the whole group tagging along had slowed their progress.

“What do you think?” DeVontay asked Kiki. “You know these kids better than I do.”

“It’s been hard on them.” She hugged the toddler close and kissed it on the head. “I don’t think they can go much further, and the more tired they get, the more likely things will go bad.”

DeVontay nodded. “Okay. Things have settled down a little. I haven’t heard a gun in maybe half an hour, and we haven’t seen any signs of the Zaps. That house looks better than trying to sleep out in the woods.”

“Maybe we should check it out first,” Stephen said.

“I need you here to guard the children.”

“Let the women do it. You might need some back-up.”

DeVontay grinned. Stephen was embarrassed about freaking out over the snake and getting separated from Rachel because of it, and now he seemed determined to show his bravery. There had been no sign of light or movement in the house, so DeVontay was confident it was empty. If he could build Stephen’s confidence, it would help all of them down the road.

“Give us twenty minutes,” DeVontay said to Kiki. “If we’re not back then, or if you hear gunshots or anything, take everybody back into the woods where we came out. Go deep enough that you can’t be seen from the road and wait until morning. Then keep heading north and keep the river on your right. Whatever you do, don’t head south to Stonewall, because I have a feeling the Zaps are gathered there.”

Kiki gripped his forearm and squeezed. “Just come back, okay?”

“That’s the plan. But you never know when you need Plan Z.”

DeVontay wondered if she’d give him another “hero’s kiss” but decided he didn’t want Stephen to see it. Especially since the boy probably thought Rachel was going to be DeVontay’s girlfriend. Stephen was too young to know how fast things could change when you were living from minute to minute.

DeVontay plucked out the last Vienna sausage and dropped it into his mouth, flinging the can into the weeds. “Hope you’re not an environmentalist,” he said to Kiki.

“Not any more. The environment’s doing better than we are.”

“That’s what I’m feeling. Save the humans before we worry about saving the whales.”

James was arguing with another boy about one of the candy bars in the bundle. DeVontay took the candy bar away and stuck it in his pocket, then said to James, “Stephen and I are going for a stroll, and you’re the man in charge until we get back. Think you can handle it?”

James dropped into a karate stance and delivered an air kick. “Hai-yah!”

DeVontay chuckled when the boy lost his balance and nearly fell over. “You’ll do fine.”

When he and Stephen were halfway to the house, pants damp from the weeds, Stephen said, “I wish I had a gun.”

“Everybody I’ve met that had a gun ended up dead.”

“Well, Rachel had a gun.”

“Look, I think she’s still out there somewhere—she’s tough and smart—but it might be a long time before we find her again. So the best thing we can do is keep moving until we get to Milepost 291 and find that compound.” DeVontay looked back up the hill, but the group was already lost in the darkness and thickening mist. “We’re just carrying a lot more baggage than I thought we would.”

“If we had a gun, Rooster wouldn’t have trapped us in that stinky old building. I would have shot him in the face.”

“Stephen, this isn’t some video game. These are people. They’re scared. And scared people don’t always act like they normally would.”

“Still woulda shot him.”

DeVontay fluffed Stephen’s hair. “I guess you’re scared, too. So am I.”

When they reached the edge of the yard, DeVontay had Stephen wait by a garden shed. “You know how to whistle?”

Stephen tried, but only a thin stream of hissing air came out.

“Okay, so much for secret signals. Let’s go.”

DeVontay made two complete circuits of the house, drawing closer with each step until DeVontay ended up peeking through each of the windows. “Looks good,” DeVontay whispered to the hiding Stephen.

He tried the back door and found it locked. He didn’t want to break the glass, so he tried the window beside it. It was unlatched, so he quietly slid up the lower half.

“Wait there,” he said to Stephen. “I’ll check it out and let you in.”

He crawled through the window, feeling his way in front of him, and decided he was entering the kitchen. He knocked over a jar of some kind and scattered utensils in a brittle clatter. Then he climbed off the counter and headed for the back door. A match struck a few feet in front of him.

In the bobbing orange orb of light, Rooster’s face was twisted with anger. The muzzle of his pistol seemed as big as a sewer pipe as it pointed at DeVontay’s chest.

“Eeeny meeny miney mo, catch a Zapper by his toe.”