The Last Days (10 page)

He started to reach for the keys in the ignition when something pink flew by his head and out the window.

Kimmy giggled.

“Kimmy!” Kelly said sternly.

“Dad threw his shorts out so I wanted to throw mine out too.” She giggled.

“Mike, would you please go get your daughter’s pants.” Kelly said. “Your Dad’s pants were wrecked. He couldn’t wear them anymore. There was nothing wrong with your pants.”

Mike smiled to himself as he got out and picked up Kimmy’s pants. He had never had any doubts, but if he did, her behavior left no doubt that Kimmy was his daughter.

Kimmy pulled her shorts back on as Kelly shook her head and Mike started the RV.

The rumble of the engine rattled half the boards that still clung to the sides of the barn.

The RV slowly moved out of the barn and down the dirt drive way out to the road. Mike stopped at the road and looked both ways before pulling out onto the blacktop.

Dust stirred up by the wheels drifted past the RV and across the road.

They hadn’t gone more than a half mile, when Kelly reached out and grabbed Mike’s arm. When he looked at her, she pointed out in the field on their right. Two bloody grotesque heads rose up above the weeds in the field to watch the RV drive by.

“My God. I never got a good look at them last night. Is that what they all looked like?” Kelly spoke slightly above a whisper, glancing back to see that Kimmy was busy playing and hadn’t seen anything.

“That and worse.” Mike replied.

Any hope Kelly had that last night was just a bad dream, had just been dashed.

Route 64 appeared across the horizon in the distance.

Mike felt some relief seeing the interstate in the distance. Getting off the local roads around Carter Caves Sate Park would be the first big step in getting away from this place.

As the RV crested a small knoll, Mike saw the little BP Station they had stopped at on the way to the park. He took a quick glance down at the gas gauge. The tank was three quarters full. Not quite enough to get home. If he could top off the tank, that might just do it. Hopefully he would have other opportunities to get gas along the way home, but with what had happened so far he didn’t feel comfortable assuming he would be able to fill up the RV somewhere else along the way home.

Things were calm right now, he decided to take this opportunity.

He slowed the RV.

“What’s wrong?” Kelly asked as she sat upright in her seat at the change in the sound of the engine as the RV slowed down.

“I’m going to stop at that gas station up ahead.” Mike replied.

“If the power is still out you won’t be able to get any gas.” Kelly said.

“There are some cars there. I have a hose in the back. Maybe I can siphon some gas out of the cars.” Mike answered.

“You’re going to steal gas?” Kelly sounded surprised. “You could get in trouble.”

“If stealing gas would get us arrested, fined and put on a bus and sent home.” Mike smiled. “I’d call the police and report us right now myself.”

Kelly’s eyes lit up. “Did you check your phone?”

“No. I forgot all about that.” Mike said as he pulled into the station.

Kelly stared at the building and the cars that sat around the station. The building was a whitewashed concrete structure. Blood was smeared across the front and sides of the building. The white blocks magnified the red smears making them appear to glow brightly against the white background. The front window of the station had been smashed in and only jagged edges sticking out from the frame remained.

The door was gone. It might be inside somewhere, but from the RV they couldn’t see if that was the case.

The most disturbing thing was the cars. They sat at haphazard angles in the parking lot. Blood covered the car’s windows and the outside of the doors. The bits of flesh and clothing that clung to the jagged remains of the windows told the story of someone smashing the windows and dragging the passengers out through the windows.

The blood that covered the parking lot by the cars meant once out of the cars, things had not gotten any better for the people that had been forcefully taken from their vehicles.

Kelly turned her head from the scene in front of them and she looked at Mike. “Why don’t you try your phone?”

Mike pulled his cell phone from his pocket and flipped open the phone. Mike still had an older model cell phone. He never had any interest in getting one of the new smart phones. He hated talking on the phone. The people who had to talk on their phones constantly, while driving or in the movies, drove him crazy. Most people now days talked on their phone on a trip to the grocery store more than Mike had talked on the phone over his entire life.

Mike looked at the screen. The power indicator showed the battery was at full charge. It should be, if you never used your phone it should never need to be charged more than once or twice a year, like Mike did.

He looked for the bars that would show the signal strength. He had one bar, almost.

“Do we have a signal?” Kelly asked anxiously.

“Yes and no!” Mike replied. “One bar lights up for a second then it disappears.”

“Try calling your brother. Maybe it will be enough.” Kelly said hopefully.

Mike punched in his brother’s number and waited. The phone beeped then returned to a dial tone.

Mike tried it again. The same thing happened.

“The call won’t go through. The signal keeps dropping. I guess that blinking bar is saying we have a signal for a few seconds then it drops. Then it does the same thing again.”

Mike looked at the screen. The number 6 lit up in the top corner of his screen. That meant he had six messages.

He hit the call log button to go to the incoming call records.

“John called me six times the last two days.” Mike said as he hit the number 1 to listen to his voice mail.

The phone beeped and then he heard a dial tone.

“I can’t get any of the voice mail either. The signal doesn’t last long enough for anything to be transmitted.” Mike said.

“But the signal lasted long enough for your phone to receive the list of messages.” Kelly thought out loud. “Maybe it would be enough to send John a text message?”

“I don’t know how to text.” Mike protested.

“I’ll walk you through it.” Kelly replied. “Hit the big center button on your phone.”

Mike was getting impatient. He had already spent more time messing with the phone then he had intended. It worked or it didn’t. If it didn’t you moved on and tried again later. Phones were just a waste of time.

“OK. I hit the big button.” Mike said. “Now what?”

Kelly leaned over and looked at the screen on his phone. “Hit the text icon on the top right. OK good. Now hit contacts and when you see your brother’s number hit that. OK, good. Now just type a message and push send.”

“That’s it?” Mike asked sounding surprised. “That wasn’t too bad.”

Kelly smiled. “If you would text people, you wouldn’t have to waste your time talking to them on the phone.”

“Hmmm. I never thought of that. Maybe I will give that a try.” Mike said as he started to type a message on the screen. The small keys were definitely a pain and he grumbled under his breath as he typed.

After a minute he asked. How’s this. ( I c u cld 6x. wk sgnl cnt gt msg. Tht I wld try tx. If u rcv, tx me bk. R u ok.  All hell broke loose here.  Mike. )

Kelly looked at Mike’s texting short hand as he read his message and she smlied.

“I see you called me six times. My signal is weak. I can’t get your messages. Thought I would try texting. If you receive my text, text me back. Are you OK? All hell has broken loose down here. Mike.”

“Do you think he can read your shorthand?” Kelly asked.

“I don’t see why not. He can read my letters and cards. This doesn’t look any different to me.” Mike replied.

Kelly smiled. “Sounds OK to me.”

Mike pushed send. A few seconds later the screen flashed message sent.

“The message went through.” Mike grinned. “Now what?”

“When he answers your message, your phone will beep, then you can open the text box again and read it.”

“OK good.” He sat the phone on the dash. “I’m going to go out and see if I can get enough gas out of those cars to fill our tank. You watch my back and listen for John to get back to us. I want to get us out of here before whoever made this mess decides to come back.”

“Can I help?” Kimmy called from back in the RV. Mike looked to see her sitting on the floor in front of the couch.

“No you stay here and help Mom keep watch.” Mike said. “You can help me with a few things later.”

“OK.” Kimmy replied disappointed.

Mike looked at Kelly and smiled, then went outside.

Mike stopped at the back of the RV and pulled out the small hose he kept in the rear under coach storage area.

After looking around the corner of the RV, he walked quietly towards the front of the building. He didn’t have a gas can but hoped to find one inside. All the gas stations he was familiar with always sold gas cans.

With each step his shoes made sucking sounds as he lifted his feet from the blood that covered the parking lot. At first he tried to step around the blood, but soon gave up. If he was going to go inside the building, there was no way around it. He just stepped carefully so he wouldn’t slip and end up on his butt. He had already tossed one pair of shorts, it looked like his shoes would soon follow. He couldn’t afford to throw away much more.

He finally stood near the front of the opening where the door and window had been.  The smell coming from inside the small building that held the checkout counter and a few small racks of supplies and snacks, was powerful.

He stood at the side of the window frame and slowly looked inside. When he was sure nothing was going to come flying out at him, he stepped in the center of the window frame and scanned the entire scene in front of him.

The inside looked like a dozen people had exploded. The walls were covered with blood and pieces of unidentifiable flesh. All except one piece, it was in a shoe that rested on top of the one and only gas can in the station.

If Mike didn’t want to top off the tank in the RV so bad, he would have turned and walked away.

After what he saw at the campground last night, he thought this kind of thing would never have the same effect on him again.  He was wrong. The coffee and bagel he had for breakfast shot over the window frame and splashed on the broken glass inside on the floor.

Kelly saw Mike throw up and could only imagine what he had seen inside the station. She had to turn her head for a moment to keep control of herself. With the gross smell here at the station, it wouldn’t take much for her to lose her breakfast too. She turned back to watch Mike. She only wished he would hurry.

Mike drained the last of the gas into the RV. He had gotten lucky when he checked the old Ford pickup truck. It had a full tank of gas. He got all he needed from the truck’s tank. He felt guilty at first, he had never stolen gas before. The amount of blood in and around the truck let him convince himself that the truck and the gas no longer belonged to anyone that still had use for it. Just to ease his conscience, Mike left a gallon of gas in the tank. If the owner was still alive and made it back to his truck, he wouldn’t be stranded because it was out of gas. He would have enough to go find more gas or to put some distance between himself and anything that might be chasing him before the gas ran out.

Mike took one more thing from the truck before he left. He had spotted a rag under the driver’s seat. After he stowed the hose and the full gas can in the RV, he used the rag and a splash of gasoline to clean his hands and shoes.

Mike got in the RV and sat quietly for a minute. Yesterday he had seen people get brutally killed. He had watched a friend die in front of him. He had seen the dead come back to life. Come back to the moving was probably more accurate. Today he had stolen from the dead. Mike wasn’t a real sentimental guy, but this was a lot for him to come to terms with in such a short period of time.

He wasn’t a prude or an obsessive do-gooder. He was a normal nice guy. He wasn’t an angel by any means, he had done his share of trouble making over the years as a kid.

But there were certain things that were right and there were certain things that were wrong. There was always a clear line that one would never cross.

The last twenty-four hours someone had moved the line. They had erased the line completely as far as he could tell.

The idea that now anything goes was scary

Mike started the RV and pulled out of the gas station and drove toward the interstate.

Kelly could see Mike was upset. She sat quietly and looked out the window.  She would give him a little time. They could all use a little time.