The Remnants of Yesterday (18 page)

55

“RUN.” I SCREAMED the command at the top of my voice.

J.T. who up until now seemed a little dazed, regained some of his will. He turned and fled, following the others toward the road. I waited for him to pass me and then did likewise.

Behind us, I heard the creatures let lose a shriek of rage. I chanced a glance backward, and saw, to my horror, that they were almost upon us, their huge jaws open and ready for the kill. The lead beast still had blood on its teeth from the attack on Irene, and I had no desire to add to that.

“It’s no good,” Clara yelled, a note of panic in her voice. “We’ll never outrun them.”

“Just keep moving. Head for the trees, it will be easier to lose them there.” I had my doubts about that, but it sure beat being pursued in the open where we were sitting ducks.

“No.” J.T. pointed toward the school bus. “The bus.”

“We’ll be trapped.”

“Trust me. The bus is our only chance.”

“It won’t work. Remember what we told you yesterday?”

“Dammit, just trust me. I can get it going.”

“You’d better know something I don’t,” I said to him, then, to the rest of the group, “do as he says. Head for the bus.”

We veered left, abandoning our prior route. When we got to the bus, J.T. pushed past us and reached out, gripping the passenger door release. As soon as it slid open, we piled inside and yanked the door back in place.

The nearest creature hit the door with a loud thud.

“That was too close.” Darwin fought to regain his composure. He gulped down air, his face beet red.

I went over to the window and peered out.

The beasts prowled around the bus like sharks circling a hapless swimmer. Every once in a while one of them approached and sniffed, examining the vehicle, then circled once more.

“They’re looking for a way in.” I hoped the concertina passenger door was sturdier than it looked. The door had already withstood one direct assault, but who knew how many blows it would take before it gave up the ghost.

“Let them look all they want. We’re getting out of here.” J.T. slid into the driver’s seat. He reached into his pocket, and then cursed. “Damn.”

“What?”

“The ignition key. I don’t have it. It’s back on the desk in my cabin.”

“Great. Just freaking great.” Darwin punched the closest seat. “We’re dead. Good job.”

“It wouldn’t have started anyway,” I reminded him. “Cars don’t work anymore, remember?”

“I already told you, it does work.” J.T. spun around in the seat, looking at me. “We decided to go swimming the other day. There’s a natural spring a few miles up the road. The bus wouldn’t start. The battery was dead. We charged it up and the damn thing still wouldn’t turn over.
One of my guys is,” He stopped and corrected himself, “or rather was, a genius with anything mechanical. He took the starter out, a few other bits and pieces, poked around under the hood for a few hours, and somehow got it going again. Don’t ask me how.”

“You don’t know what he did?”

“Not exactly.”

“So we can’t replicate it on another vehicle if we come across one that actually does have a set of keys.” I felt like I was the playing the lead role in some bizarre comedy show. Here we were, with possibly the only working vehicle in thousands of miles, and we didn’t have any way to start it up. Worse, the only person who might know how to fix another vehicle was missing. If there was a God, he was surely laughing his ass off right then.

“Let me take a look.” Clara elbowed past me and approached the driver’s seat. She motioned to J.T. “Move. I need to get in there.”

“Huh?” He looked at her, surprised.

“Let the dog see the bone.” Clara almost pulled him from the seat, before taking his place.

“What are you going to do?” I asked. The bus shook as one of the beasts barreled into it. I glanced nervously toward the sound of the impact, half-expecting to see the side window shatter.

“I’m going to get us out of here.” She adjusted the seat forward to reach the pedals. “I need something flat, like a screwdriver.”

“Where are we going to get one of those?” Darwin said.

“Under the rear seat.” J.T. took off down the bus. “There’s a small toolbox.”

“That’s lucky,” Emily said. “I don’t suppose you have a couple of shotguns back there too.”

“Not likely. Just the toolbox. We’re not
that
lucky.” J.T. was heading back down the aisle with a blue metal toolbox. He put it on one of the seats, opened it and took out a flat-ended screwdriver. “Will this do?”

“Perfect.” Clara snatched the tool and went to work, pushing the blade into the space between the ignition tumbler and plastic steering column casing. She grunted with the effort and pried back on the screwdriver.

There was another crash and the passenger door buckled inward. “Better hurry,” I said, eyeing it nervously.

“Almost there.” She continued to work on the casing.

“Here they come again.” Darwin was at the window. He scooted backward just as the bus took another huge hit. A long, zigzagging crack appeared in the glass of the window closest to the door. “One more hit like that and the window will go.”

“I know.” Clara pushed down on the screwdriver, standing and putting all her weight into it. For a moment nothing happened, and then the casing broke away with an audible snap. “Got it.”

“Better make it quick. It looks like we’re about to get hit again, and I’m not sure we can take another one.” One of the creatures had backed up, turning, ready to
charge. The other two lingered near the bus, as if sensing they were about to gain access.

“Give me one moment.” Clara pulled at the wires leading to the ignition, tearing them from the unit. “There are three wires. We just need to connect these two like this.” She twisted two of the wires together. The dash lit up. “Good. Now we need the starter wire.”

“Careful,” I cautioned. “We don’t need you electrocuting yourself.”

“Well duh.” Clara held the third wire between her thumb and forefinger and sparked it against the other two. The engine turned over but didn’t start.

“It’s working.” Darwin exclaimed. “Do it again.”

Clara touched the wires together a second time. The engine coughed, sputtered, then fell silent.

“Damn.” I glanced out of the window. The creature lowered its head, making straight for the weakest point on the bus, the dented passenger door. “Hurry up.”

“I’m going as fast as I can.” Clara touched the wires together a third time. The engine turned over once, twice, and then right at the last moment, just when it looked like we were doomed, it sprang to life.

“Hell yeah.” Darwin pumped a fist in the air. “That’s more like it.”

Clara pushed the bus into first and rammed her foot down hard on the accelerator. “Hold tight.”

The vehicle lurched forward just as the charging beast reached it, but instead of hitting the door, the creature missed and slammed into the back of the bus just behind the left tire. There was a dull thud and the bus slid sideways, the wheels refusing to grip for a moment. Then we were screeching from the clearing, our tires kicking up mud and grass into the faces of the pursuing beasts.

56

WE JOLTED AND bumped down the dirt road, the trees whizzing past. Clara was surprisingly adept at driving the bus, steering it with relative ease despite the occasional curse word whenever the wheels dropped into a pothole or lost traction on the loose soil.

“We did it.” Darwin pumped his fist in the air. “Holy crap we got away. I thought we were toast for sure.”

“And we have a sweet ride to boot. No more walking for us.” Emily put her arms around him and planted a big wet kiss on his cheek. I wondered just how close they had gotten last night in that bedroom. Probably not as close as Clara and myself, but there certainly did seem to be a change in attitude between them. They were closer somehow.

“Hey,” Clara spoke up from the front of the bus. “A little appreciation for the mastermind of this great escape would be nice.”

“Sorry, you’re right.” Darwin looked apologetic. “Good job J.T.”

“Jackass.” Clara scowled. “Next time I’m leaving you behind as a light lunch for the slathering monsters.”

“You can try.” Darwin flopped down in a seat Close to the back of the bus, with Emily by his side.

J.T. perched on the edge of a seat half way back, looking shell shocked. I understood how he was feeling at that moment. Just twenty-four hours ago, he was leading aerobics sessions for his team. Now they were all gone and he was on a school bus fleeing for his life. It was a hard thing to comprehend, as we all knew first hand.

“Where does this road go?” Clara asked, keeping her eyes firmly rooted ahead. She gripped the steering wheel so tight, trying to stop it jerking around every time we hit a bump, that her knuckles had turned white.

“Hey, J.T.” I walked down the aisle and nudged him. “Where are we?”

“What?” He looked up at me.

“Where does the road go?” Sooner or later we would end up on paved roads, which would enable us to move a bit faster, but would also present new problems. There would be other vehicles. Most of them – the ones that might present an issue – either wrecked or abandoned. If the going got too tough, we may have to ditch the bus and start to hoof it again, and I didn’t like the idea of that. Much better to know where we were, and avoid the main arteries altogether.

“It links up with Route Twelve.” He shrugged, a weary gesture of resignation. “After that it depends where you want to go.”

I suddenly realized I had no idea which direction New Haven was in.
The bus didn’t have a GPS, not that it mattered. Given the state of current communications, there was no chance a GPS unit would work even if we had one. That left one option, an old-fashioned paper map. Only we didn’t have one of those either. “We need to find a gas station, pick up a map as soon as possible. Exactly how far are we from twelve?”

“Five, maybe six miles.” He turned toward the window, sullen, his face reflecting in the glass. On that face, I saw confusion and misery. “I can’t believe you left her there to die like that.”

“There was nothing we could have done for her.” I placed a hand on his shoulder. “It was what had to be done.”

“It was murder,” He shrugged my hand away. “Murder pure and simple.”

57

WE REACHED THE paved road in no time. Thankfully, there were very few cars around, at least on this section, and those that we did come across were either off to the side, or only blocked one lane. The one time we found a mini pile up of three cars, we simply slowed down and nudged the closest vehicle forward with the nose of the bus until we punched a hole through. It seemed to work just fine, but that could have been pure luck on our part. I was not optimistic about our chances with a larger mess of cars, or if we ran across a sixteen wheeler.

Now and again, we passed a house, a few of which looked like they might be working farms, with large barns attached, and equipment sitting idle. Not once did we see any signs of life. The landscape was eerie in its emptiness. I toyed with the idea of pulling over and searching the houses for useful items, such as food, water, sleeping bags, and blankets, but there would always be more houses, and after our latest encounter with the beasts I didn’t want to risk running into more of them, or any Crazies that might be lurking around.

Now that we were on pavement, I settled into the seat to the right of Clara, across the aisle behind the passenger door. J.T. was still in a world of his own about half way back. Darwin and Emily took a seat together at the back, next to the rear door. Under other circumstances, I would have made a joke about that, but now was not the time or the place, and I was in no mood to fool around.

“How much gas do we have?” It occurred to me that we would need to either refuel at some point, or abandon our escape vehicle. With no prospect of getting anything else running, that would mean we were back to walking, something I was not keen to do. How we were going to get gas into the bus if the fuel pumps had no electricity was another matter. We could worry about that when we needed to.

“Half a tank.” Clara glanced down at the fuel gauge for a moment, then returned her eyes to the road ahead. “I have no idea how far that will get us. I can’t imagine this thing gets good mileage.”

“I’m sure it’s horrendous. I’d be surprised if we get six to the gallon, especially on these roads.” I remembered an old truck my father used to own. It was a guzzler, getting about nine in the city and eleven highway. This was a much heavier vehicle, and judging from the cloud of diesel fumes that I could see spewing behind us, it wasn’t exactly running lean. “It should have a pretty big fuel tank though, at least sixty gallons, so that should net us about a hundred and fifty miles if we’re really lucky.”

“How far away is New Haven?”

“If we were on the Interstate, maybe a hundred and seventy miles, give or take,” I said. “but we’ll need to take back roads all the way, with the main roads impassable, and that will up our distance considerably.”

“So we’ll run out of gas before we get anywhere near.”

“Unless we can somehow fill up.” I leaned forward. “But the big problem is that we don’t know where we are right now. We’ll need to get a map or we may end up miles out of our way.”

“Well that much I can help you with.” Clara eased up on the pedal, slowing the bus. “Look.”

Up ahead, on the right, we were approaching a building. It was set back from the road, with parking for six or seven cars at the front and another parking area to the side. A few cars occupied the closest spaces to the door, one with its door wide open, but there was no sign of life. As we drew closer, I could read the lettering above the door.

GIBBS GENERAL STORE

Est. 1958

Hand stenciled signs hanging in the windows advertised local cheese, beer, and farm fresh eggs, all of which sounded great, except the cheese and eggs were, no doubt, long past their prime since they were festering in a building without power. Beer though, even warm, sounded like a good idea.

Clara maneuvered the bus to the side of the road and into the gravel parking area, brought it to a halt, and applied the parking brake. Then she fiddled with the wires until the motor sputtered and died.

I jumped from my seat and descended the two steps to the door, looking for a handle to open it. “How does this thing open?”

“I don’t know,” Clara scanned the dash, looking for anything that might operate the door. “I don’t see anything.”

I pushed on the door but it did not budge. “Maybe those creatures broke it when they rammed into it.”

“Maybe.” She looked up, noticing a lever above the windshield. “Hold on a second. Maybe this is it.” She pulled on the lever. The doors swung open with a quick whoosh of air.

It was time to shop.