Blackbird's Fall (3 page)

Aiming the gun at her mother’s head, and closing her
eyes, she pulled the trigger. The bullet being fired had her ears ringing, but
it was the sound of her soul breaking that was the loudest.

She fell to her knees then, her sobs body-wracking,
her breath stalling, and Maya wished that fate wasn’t a scornful bitch. She’d
lost the only family she had in this now miserable world, and the thought of
facing the destruction of civilization alone was too much to even think about.

Sherman butted his head up against her arm, and she
ran her hand over his smooth body.

“It’s just you and I now, boy,” she said and started
crying harder.

Even when
the world is the darkest, you have to remember that you aren’t dead.

The words her mother used to say to her rang through
her mind, and she knew she couldn’t let this destroy her. There was already
enough carnage in this world, and it would only be getting worse. She had to
stay strong, not just for the memory of her parents, but for herself as well.

Chapter Three

Two weeks
later

In the two weeks since Marius had left the bunker
and ventured out into the world, he’d killed a handful of infected. But it
wasn’t the infected that kept him up a night, plaguing his thoughts. It was the
fact he’d also had to kill a “healthy” human, one who had tried stealing his
pack while Marius had napped in the forest after a long day of walking.

It was that death that had him exhausted because he
couldn’t sleep at night. Every time he closed his eyes he saw the other man’s
eyes widen as Marius plunged the blade in his gut. He didn’t have any other
options, though, not when a knife had been pulled on him, too.

This was a new world, one where it was kill or be
killed, stay alive or be a corpse.

He set up camp in the middle of the woods, far from
the road he’d been traveling on. It was safer that way, better to stay hidden
from the infected, and anyone that wanted to steal his shit and cut his throat.

The fire he’d started was small, the smoke slight as
it rose up to the treetops. He sat on an overturned log and reached for his
backpack. He was running dangerously low on supplies, and hadn’t found anything
to scavenge. The few houses he’d passed had been ransacked and all supplies
taken. And the stench of death had filled them.

Things had gone downhill in the last two weeks, the
infection spreading far quicker than any of the scientists had anticipated. In
the beginning people hadn’t understood what was happening, hadn’t realized that
their loved ones that had the virus were not the same. They’d tried to help
them, tried to bring them back.

There was no going back.

So, in the beginning the infection had spread like
wildfire, especially in the parts of the city thick with population.

He grabbed a can of beans out from his pack, and
pushed around the remaining supplies he had. He needed to find a place that was
more secure, a place where he could live, grow his own food, survive.

Marius had wanted to help people, to come to the
surface and see if he could rectify, in some small way, the damage he’d been a
part of, but there was no help he could give. The ones that weren’t sick were
crazed, untrustworthy, and the infected were to the point their bodies were
rotting at a frighteningly quick rate.

He took out his hunting knife, the one he sharpened
every night, making sure it could cut through flesh like it was a scorching
knife going through a stick of butter. Puncturing the top of the can, he cut
enough of it that he could pry the lid open. With no utensils, because that was
the least of his worries, Marius started eating the beans with his fingers,
scooping them out and staring at the fire.

The wood crackled as the flames licked at them, and
his thoughts moved to a world that had been clean, free of infection, where
everything had been taken for granted. He’d taken so many things for granted.
He was sure everyone had. The little things that he’d once had, the things he
hadn’t really paid attention to that made life easier, seemed like a treasure
now.

He had wanted to do so much with his life, had
wanted to get married, have a family, and provide for them.

Family.

It had been the one thing he hadn’t really had while
growing up. It was one of the reasons he’d gone to school, saturated himself
with everything scholastic. That way he didn’t have to think about anything or
anyone, didn’t have to realize he was really alone.

After eating Marius made sure his shit was packed up
in case he had to make a quick getaway, and then he laid out a blanket in front
of the fire. Staring at the flames as he lay on the material, his head resting
in his hand, all Marius thought was how maybe he should have stayed in the
bunker with Brandon.

But no, he knew he couldn’t have stayed there. He
would have been ready to tear out of his skin, and he and Brandon would have
probably gone after each other because of cabin fever.

Closing his eyes, letting sleep claim him, Marius
let the world vanish around him as the only peace he ever felt—the one he found
when dreaming—swept over him.

****

It had taken Maya fourteen days and nights to
finally reach where she’d been headed. Her car had run out of gas halfway
through the trip, and it had taken triple the time frame it normally would have
because she’d had to walk the rest of the way. But she’d kept to the back
roads, not about to cut through the city even if it would have shaved some time
off her trip.

The city was just too dangerous, and she’d heard,
when the radio had still been working, that the cities were overrun with
looters and infected. In those thickly populated areas the disease spread
quickly, taking the lives of those that used to be “normal”.

The road hadn’t been hard, and she had only seen one
infected, but that was one too many, especially with the image of her father
and lifeless mother to haunt her dreams. What she’d been more afraid of were
the healthy humans that now had the run of a lawless land. Rape was probably common,
she assumed, given the fact the population was diminished so much. Women had to
be a commodity now, too, or at least she figured so from any post-apocalyptic
movies she’d seen.

The images in her head of women being taken as sex
slaves, used by various men for their own sexual gratification, had everything
inside of her on alert, fearing everyone and trusting no one.

She’d stayed to the trees, walked during the day,
and had camped at night in any “safe” place she could find. Maya was tired, her
feet had blisters on them, and she was filthy. But she was alive and finally at
her destination, and that’s all that mattered.

Maya had been deep in the woods for the better part
of a day, and the wired gate that went around the house, which had been put up
when she was just a child by her father, still stood strong. She needed that
gate to help her in keeping this place, her new home, safe.

Before all of this had gone down with the infection,
her family’s plan had been to come to this exact place. They’d waited, stocked
up on supplies, weapons, not knowing how long the infection would last, or if
help in the form of their government—the ones that had unleashed this hell on
Earth to begin with—would come. They’d bided their time until things calmed,
were taken care of, or at least they’d hoped on the latter. But her father had
then been bitten shortly after everything, and their plans had changed
drastically.

Everything’s
different.

The two-story log cabin had been built before she
was even born by her grandfather, was sturdy, protected by the forest and gate,
and was her new home. But they’d come here when things had been okay in the
world.

She was high in the mountains, miles from the town
below, from civilization, and she felt her safety rise tenfold. The house
itself had a natural well, a fully stocked pond—or she hoped it was still
stocked—and sat on three acres. The woods surrounded all four sides of the
house, and in the back she knew there was a functioning greenhouse. Yes, this
had been their retreat, where they’d needed to be in order to stay alive and
wait everything out.

But she was here now, and she had to make things
right if she wanted to see this through. She wouldn’t be someone’s whore, and
she wouldn’t be a walking corpse. She’d stay alive.

Maya reached for the loaded gun strapped to her
thigh, and advanced on the house. She needed to make sure it was safe before
she went inside.

Moving around to the side, she grabbed a handful of
pebbles and crouched behind some thick foliage. Maya tossed them toward one of
the windows, and crouched even lower to the ground, waiting to see if a healthy
human would come out, or if an infected would stumble toward her because of the
noise.

She waited for several minutes, and then tossed more
pebbles to the window. After silence and nothingness greeted her, she was
confident that the home was vacant, but still held her gun at the ready.
Standing, she adjusted her bag on her back and shoulder, and breathed a sigh.
She was here, her new home.

“Come on, Sherman,” she said and whistled for her
dog, who came trotting out of the woods and stopped beside her. She reached
down and stroked his head, knowing that she could make this work, could
survive. She didn’t have a choice, but she could make the best of it.

Chapter
Four

Marius
pushed away the overgrown branches, held a firm grip on his knife, and was on
alert. It had been several weeks of him trekking north, not coming across
anything but a few infected that he’d taken out swiftly. He knew they were no
longer human, knew that even if they could feel anything, which he highly
doubted, he was putting them out of their misery.

The
sun was going to set in the next hour or so, and he didn’t feel confident in
setting up camp. What he needed to do was get to higher ground, maybe ascend to
the mountains. But that logic would most likely have him getting further away
from supplies, if there were any to be found.

There
might be lakes higher up, ones with fish.

His
stomach clenched at the thought. He was now surviving off crackers and the
little water he had left, and if he didn’t find some substantial food soon he
didn’t know how much longer he could last.

For
the next forty-five minutes he climbed higher and higher, going over rocky
terrain before it smoothed out and became softer with fallen leaves, patches of
flora, and the trees surrounding him. Sweat covered him, and he kept adjusting
his bag on his back. The sound of a twig snapping in the distance had him
stopping, holding his breath, and turning to survey the land. The trees were
thick, blocking out a lot around him, but he listened, trying to hear anything
out of the ordinary.

There
might be animals scurrying about, but he didn’t take any chances. Reaching at
the small of his back, he pulled out the handgun he had tucked there, and kept
scanning the area. The animals didn’t seem to be affected by the infection, for
whatever reason, but that was good news for the healthy. That meant they could
still hunt and find food in the wild.

When
he didn’t see or hear anything, he turned back around and started moving up the
mountain again. The air was getting thinner, and with the exertion he was
putting out it made breathing hard. And then the land leveled out, the trees
thinned, and he was walking comfortably. For another twenty minutes he trekked
through the forest. It was then, as he reached a cleared out valley, that he
saw a large farmhouse.

Fencing
was all the way around it, thick wire fencing that would do well at keeping out
the infected. He could also see from this angle a pond in the back, possibly
stocked with fish, or so he hoped, trying to stay optimistic. A small
greenhouse was close to the house, and there was even what looked like a coop
and stable, but he didn’t see any animals within them.

He
held his breath as he saw a woman walking toward the greenhouse. She had long,
black hair, and as the wind picked up it brushed the strands around her
shoulders. It had been a long fucking time since he’d seen a woman. Just as he
went to step over a fallen log, the sound of something running toward him from
behind filled Marius’s head.

He
turned just as something crashed into him, sending him to the ground. The air
left him as his head cracked back and landed on a rock. Lights danced in front
of his vision, and he groaned. The weight atop him was heavy, crushing him to
the ground, but Marius couldn’t afford to be knocked out, couldn’t afford to be
vulnerable.

He
blinked to clear his vision, and saw a man sitting on his chest, his beard
having pieces of debris in it, his face filthy, and his eyes wild. He was
searching Marius, and then turned him to try to get his backpack off. That’s
when Marius snapped out of it and started fighting back. The guy was big, but
Marius was bigger, even malnourished. He used all his strength to push the man
off enough that Marius could stand and face him.

Marius
breathed out, shook off the dizziness that assaulted him, and reached down to
grab his knife that had fallen from his hand. He had lost his gun in the
process of getting knocked down, and wasn’t about to waste time trying to find
it, not right now at least.

The
man stood, his eyes still holding that frantic, crazed look, and came toward
Marius. He attacked him again, grunting, trying to grab for his pack. Marius
pushed him off.

“I
don’t want to hurt you, but I will.”

The
man chuckled humorlessly. “This world is all about hurt anymore. You either
learn to take what you need to survive, or you deserve to die.” And then the
man came after him again. They fell to the ground, grappling for control,
rolling around and trying to gain supremacy. Marius didn’t want to hurt anyone
unless it was life or death, but he knew this was one of those situations.

And
just as he was about to protect himself with the knife, doing what he had to,
the bearded man pulled back enough Marius saw he also held a blade. Before
Marius could react the guy stabbed him in the side. He howled in agony, his
eyes watering instantly as pain consumed him.

Marius
just reacted then. He lifted his arm and plunged his own blade in the asshole’s
gut. The man grunted, fell back, and held onto his stomach. When he lifted his
head and stared at Marius, all that was reflected back was insanity. The
bearded man turned and left, stumbling over the debris on the ground.

Marius
rose, grimacing as pain slammed into him from the movement. He held onto his
side, and then looked down. Blood covered his hand. He lifted his shirt up, saw
the three inch knife wound, and knew that if he didn’t get it cleaned and
stitched up he’d bleed out. He was already losing too much blood.

Stumbling
forward and out of the woods, he walked into the clearing, his head feeling
dizzy as he tried to focus. The woman stepped out of the greenhouse, a basket
in her hands, and her gaze on the ground. He reached out, tried to open his
mouth to tell her not to be afraid, that he needed help, but a wave of nausea
and dizziness slammed into him harder than before. Marius stumbled forward,
bracing his weight on one hand as he crashed to the ground. And as he lifted
his head, trying to get her attention, he knew that he’d probably die out here
in this field.

****

The
world doesn’t stop for anyone. It keeps spinning on its axis, the days turning
into nights until it becomes one endless routine. Even if destruction is
happening all around, the world is still there. When civilization falls the
ones that dominated are now at the mercy of the elements, of fate. Once the
highest tier was gone nature took control again. The flora regained its rightful
place, spreading out, taking over the land that was once populated with human
life.

Maya
wiped the sweat from her forehead. The sun was especially hot for an October
day. She thought about how far she’d come, how much the world she once knew had
changed, deteriorated. She’d been here for a few months already, and was
acclimating well to being alone, well, as much as one could be used to that.
The isolation, silence, and loneliness still ate away at her at times, even if
she had Sherman to keep her company.

She
held onto her basket tighter, the little woven one that held the herbs she’d
just picked. Her basil was thriving, and although it was still on the warmer
side, the weather ideal, she kept everything in her greenhouse once fall
started.

Maya
headed back to the main house, the two-story farmhouse that sat on three acres
of wooded land. It was high in the mountains, away from civilization, from the
small town below. She rarely ventured out anymore, relying on what she could
grow, what she could get from the land, and the food she’d found stocked in the
cellar.

Firewood
was abundant to help keep her warm during the cold nights, and the well gave
her fresh water. After the last few months of being alone, of relying on
herself and seeing how she could survive, Maya felt confident in the way she
lived.

She
walked toward the house, a soft wind blowing. Leaves had already started
falling, and the scent of autumn was thick in the air. She hadn’t seen a human
in far longer than she could even remember, hadn’t seen an infected in longer
than that. But that was good, because both the healthy and the infected could
be dangerous to her.

Being
this high up in the mountains, away from anything remotely reminding her of the
world she’d once lived in, could have a person thinking that the world wasn’t
completely gone. She’d stayed up here, hoping, praying a cure would come for
the infected. At least she was trying to stay positive, even if in her heart
she knew the end was probably not going to be happy.

But
depressing topics, ones that reminded her she was utterly alone in every sense
of the word, and having no other human contact, having no one to speak with or
hold, made Maya’s thoughts go to things like her family was gone, and that she
could die at any moment.

She
continued to make her way toward the house, the wind picking up again, and the
sun shining down. This high up the air was cooler, and with fall already here,
and winter fast approaching, she was trying to make sure she was stocked up
enough to survive the cold. It would be a damn shame to have gone through all
of that, lost everything, but make it here safely only to die because she’d
frozen or starved to death.

Maya
pushed her hair off her shoulder, glanced around the property, and as she
trailed her eyes back toward the house something had her stopping mid-stride.
Her heart starting pounding in her chest as she tried to make out what the dark
form was on the ground. It wasn’t moving, and she couldn’t tell if it was an
infected or a healthy human trying to sneak up on the house, trying to be
stealthy.

But
as the seconds ticked by and there was still no movement, she started to
realize it couldn’t be an infected. They would have been able to smell her,
would have made noise because their frantic need to feed would have taken over.

Setting
the basket on the ground slowly, she kept her eyes on the form, but then
started scanning the surrounding area, making sure no one was hiding in the
woods. Everything seemed so still, so silent. Grabbing the strap of her father’s
shotgun she always had hanging over her back, she started moving toward the
house, trying to keep close to the structure. She also had a knife strapped to
her ankle and another strapped to her thigh. She couldn’t be too careful.

The
closer she got the more the adrenaline pumped through her veins, giving her a
boost of energy, making her ready to run or attack. She was close enough now
she could see it wasn’t an infected on the ground, or at least it wasn’t one
that had the signs of rotting. But she was still cautious, still had her gun at
the ready. Creeping closer, she heard Sherman inside barking. He probably
sensed something wrong, but Maya was glad she’d left him inside. She didn’t
want anything happening to him. He was all she had left now.

And
then she saw the blood that covered the man’s side, saw that his face was
ashen, and his breathing barely even noticeable. Going closer, she cleared her
throat.

“If
you make a move I’ll shoot you, and believe me, I’m a decent shot.” The warning
was for her as much as it was for him.

But
the man didn’t move. His dark hair was longer, unkempt, and he was filthy from
head to toe. He’d been on the road a long time, she could gauge as much. When
he didn’t move at her warning, she went closer, and then crouched beside him.
Holding the gun out and pressing it to his head, she gave another warning, just
in case.

“If
you’re playing possum I suggest you cut the shit now or you’ll have a nice hole
in your head.” She sounded and was acting far stronger than she really was, but
she couldn’t be too careful in this fucked up world. He didn’t move or even
twitch, not even with the gun to his head. Keeping the barrel at his temple,
she looked around, and tried to see if there was anything in the woods.

Silence
greeted her.

Maya
was convinced enough he wasn’t playing dead, so she took the gun away from his
head and looked down at his wound. She assumed she’d see a bite mark, but when
she pulled the t-shirt up it was to see a large gash.

A
knife wound.

This
was fresh, because no way he would have been able to trek all the way up here
from town with a wound like that.

Maya
stood, aimed the gun at the woods, and started sweeping it back and forth,
ready to shoot anything that came out. But as she stood there for long moments,
barely breathing so she could hear, she had a feeling she was alone. Whoever
had done this to him wasn’t here anymore, and the sooner she got back inside
the better.

Looking
down at the stranger, she thought, for only a second, that she should just
leave him here. She wasn’t a nurse or a doctor by any means, though she could
patch up a few things, but this man could be a rapist for all she knew, could
have been bitten and infected. The longer she stared at him, the more her
compassion grew. She couldn’t just leave him here, couldn’t go inside and let
him die out here. At least if he died inside she would have tried her best to
help him, and could have a clear conscience.

Slinging
the gun across her back again, she reached under his arms and started dragging
him to the house. He was heavy, a tall man, and getting him to the front door
was a pain in the ass. But when she was finally in the house, she took a step
back, breathing hard, and looked down at him. He hadn’t so much as made a move
or sound, and she feared he wouldn’t last much longer if she didn’t try to
close and heal the laceration.