They would have been taken during the early morning hours, whilst I slept. That's the only explanation I have, other than they somehow escaped the town, possibly to join forces with more survivors. But why wouldn't they inform me?
Was it my blatant indifference? My refusal to participate in many of the communal gatherings? Was it something personal against my father? Or did they just forget?
I don't know who to blame.
Except for the fact that's not important right now. All I know is that I have to move.
Suddenly, a voice emerges. A voice that speaks the rational member of my conscience. A strong, exalted, wisened voice. My mother's voice.
Where are we going? It asks.
Anywhere but here, I reply.
But you don't have a plan. The others will be somewhere around here, probably just hiding from them. Think about it, Jen.
She does make a valid point, that what I'm doing is too drastic and irrational, but the majority of the evidence suggests staying here is no longer an option. If I want to stay human, that is.
I have to go!
Don't be stupid, you'll die!
I have no other choice, Paula.
Addressing my mother by her first name shuts her up, even though I determine the outcome of my decisions. Her voice will only encumber the need for escape.
I collect as many resources as I can from the bunker to fit into my old school backpack, and a weird feeling arises, a feeling of independance mixed with fear, that makes my insides bubble and heartpace quicken. After a minor argument with myself, I take the shotgun, fitting it into a makeshift holster that used to contain my Barbie drink bottle. Teddy finds a place in the pack, slightly squashed by the water bottles and food cans, but managing okay. He's there for my comfort, serving as a reminder of my little sister.
Already I can feel my eyes swelling with saline, and just as I'm about to leave, as I touch the side of the house to say a last astral goodbye, all the while my mother's sensible voice screaming in disagreement, tears begin to fall.
I head South, to the coast. Funnily enough, the sky above practically mimicks my emotions - an azure firmament ahead faced with an oncoming slaughter of dubious cloud from the East. A mild breeze leads me the way, guiding my hesitant feet across the sunbaked ground, towards the border of the Mexican Gulf. The trees communicate the voices in my head, the rustling of leaves fluctuating in waves of contention. I can feel the air grow heavy with my thoughts.
I follow the Louisiana Highway 49, keeping to the shade as much as possible. The Souls have an infinite amount of resources, which empowers their peace force with an impressive fleet of patrol vehicles and aircraft. They managed to clear the arterials of vehicles and repair bomb damage done to the road for their use. The cars run on some form of clean energy. I suppose they either discovered it here on Earth or brought samples of it over in their space capsules. As a result, excess carbon emission was brought to a standstill.
Time passes slowly, as it does anytime I'm alone. I concentrate on each step, feeling the shudder of impact resonate through my legs. Every thirty minutes I take a sip of water, however the profusion of sweat never recedes, and eventually I have to draw my unruly brown hair into a ponytail so as not to impair my vision. For hours I swat at gnats and misquitoes, my efforts useless in the growing midday heat. There is little shade provided on the highway; mostly swathes of dry earth extending in each and every direction. My mother's voice, which has now softened to a drawl, proclaims her disagreement with my decision, but has learned that nothing is stopping us from going on this journey. Instead, she pesters me about my plans when I reach the coast.
You shouldn't leave without a plan, Jenny.
I didn't have a choice.
Yes you did. Why didn't you listen to me? You yourself said that the docks were under surveillance.
I'm not looking for a ship at the docks, mum. There is bound to be at least one on the coastline.
But what if there isn't?
She has me there. What if there aren't any boats? And then there's the troublesome business of operating a boat. I don't know the first thing about nautical travel. I'll be fine on one with oars or an outboard motor, but short-distance travel won't be ideal. I need a navigation system, a means of durable travel; something that will get me as far away from Louisiana as possible. Away from the Souls. Away from my old life. Away from dad.
I cannot recall ever having gone hiking, especially on the open road, exposed to the torrid heat of the sun's hollow black eye. My feet are sore and my knee joints want to give out and my throat is crying for water, even though my half-hour break was but four minutes ago.
Its all I can do not to let out a sigh of defeat and sit at the roadside and feel helpless. Why was it that four hours ago, everything about my plan made sense, and now it makes no sense at all? Perhaps the reason was my being driven by instinct rather than cogitation. And now I am suffering because of it. Because of me. God, mother was right. She's always right. Why do I keep doing this to myself?
That's when the tears begin to brim, and anger flushes full. For a while I am able to turn in the other direction, back towards home, but the realisation that I'm too far out and the relentless needles in my legs send me crashing to the ground. I lie there for minutes on end, siping water and hating myself. Tears swell and roll down my sunbaked cheeks, and in fits of exasperation I bang my fists against the dirt and cry aloud, feeble at first but now in heated, heedless screaming.
"You're so stupid, you're stupid, you're stupid, stupid, stupid!" I shout repeatedly, until the words make no sense and my voice starts breaking.
Even mother's voice remains silent, leaving me lonely and dejected. I stare at the sky, watching as the clouds gradually overcast the brilliant blue in grey. The air smells of impending rain. Let it rain.
Let it hammer down upon my body as hard as stones, leave it bloody and broken and dying, awaiting the crows to flock, and my last wish for death shall be granted. I'm sick and tired of running. I want to be free. Free of Souls and scavengers and poisonous loneliness. As long as I'm in this cage of a planet, I'm merely a fish in a pool of alligators. A pool of ever-hungry alligators.
"Let me die," I choke out with a sob. "Let me go be with sister Lily and mummy Paula and daddy Henry."
Its not fair that they should die, and I be left to survive. Nothing good has come of it. It's just been one mishap after another, to the point where life has almost lost meaning to me. There is only so much I can do to convince myself to keep going. And this is it. I've had enough. Everybody who has ever cared about me has left, and in no good circumstance either. It's my turn.
I'm ready.
One of the stories my father used to tell me as a child was about a girl who looses herself in a dream, following
For the second time today, I wake to the glare of the sun, which upon its daily arc has moved but an inch across the sky. The sky itself has returned blue, absent of cloud - it hasn't rained, or maybe it has and I was asleep long enough to miss it, and for the heat to evaporate any trace of its existence. It seems as though I imagined the stormy front, perhaps a premeditated reflection of my mood, a matter of which I was not aware. Surrounding me is a vast mirage carpet, blurring everything in sight. Blinking and rubbing my eyes does nothing to improve my vision, but gradually my senses revert to normality, and I'm grounded where I first fell to the anhydrous earth. The voices are awake inside my head, wreathing and swirling around inharmoniously, trying to revive me from vertigo. Heeding their warnings, I sit up, feeling every bone in my body ache, the nerves screaming from compression. But my attention is fully drawn to the Soul standing in front of me.
His crystal eyes are trained on me, curious but anxious, as if expecting me to do something drastic. Behind him, a single patrol car idles by the roadside, the reflective silver doors ajar. My hand grasps the shotgun in my bag's side pouch. I rip it from its makeshift holster and direct it at my intruder's head. I can see fear flicker in his eyes, and he ceases his approach, about ten feet away.
"Back up," I say firmly.
He complies, and I stand on my two restless feet. Needles shoot through my legs, but I ignore the pain. The Soul seems tense, about as scared as I am; perhaps he is alone.
Good, a voice inside me says, now shoot him.
I hesitate.
What the hell are you waiting for? The voice urges. They took away your home and your father. All that you ever had. You hate them.
The Soul, trying to take advantage of my falter, slowly raises his hand, putting his wrist to his lips. Calling for back-up.
And then before I know it, I've pulled the trigger.
The shell rips through his head, leaving half of his skull and face intact. His right shoulder is gone, his arm hanging by a single tendon. A geyser of blood spurts from what remains of his neck, some of it splattering my face and clothing. The force knocks him backwards, sending his body flying. He lays dead still, a twisted, fragmented lump, fifteen feet away from me. It all happens so fast.
I throw up in disgust, ridding my body of vital water and food.
"Oh God," I splutter, turning away from the body.
I have the urge to sink to my knees as the picture world starts spinning uncontrollably and my body starts convulsing. It feels like my stomach has been forecfully knocked about my ribcage, hurling, twisting, compressing every anatomical construct of my being into spasm. My brain is much the same, rendered unable to process the reality before my eyes. Warm blood flows over my clothing. Blood on my face. Warm, thick, metallic-penny-blood in my mouth. And my voice utters its incomprehensible mantra, "Oh God, oh God, oh God."
Blood dribbling down the sides of my mouth.
Swallowing pennies.
This is it, I think. I've reached my tipping point into complete insanity. I am mentally disturbed. I am crazy. Psychotic. Maniacal. Insane. And to think all it took was a trip on the open road and a simple mechanical finger-flex over the trigger.
Keep moving, the choleric, impatient voice continues. Take his car.
I follow the voice with reluctance, shading my eyes from the bloody tangled mess in front of me. I don't know who to listen to anymore, and it feels nice to have someone else decide what to do for a change.
The road is a painting, a series of thick brushstrokes hardened charcoal-black in the midday heat, scattered with loose strands of bristle hairs and air-bubbles in the paint and the white paint blocks dividing the road in two. I get into the sparkling, shiny silver patrol car, my buttocks sliding into the hot leather seat. There is no key. Instead, there is a button to the side of the steering wheel, with the words 'ignition' printed on it in the colour of white-out correction fluid. I push it, and the engine roars into life. I remove my backpack, put it on the passenger seat and sink further into the leather, my foot eagerly hovering over the accelerator.
I was insane even before I shot the Soul's head off, even before I made for the coast. Before the nightmares and screaming. Maybe it all started after dad was taken.
Blood in my mouth. Swallowing pennies.
But where do I go?
Back home? Back to the little township in Louisianna? Back towards dad? How long will I make it before the Souls find me? Everyone else has vanished. Back home is a ghost town. I'll be alone. Poisonous loneliness.
No.
What about the coast? If I find a boat or a settlement there, then at least I have something to do. I am crazy. Unstable. Braincracked. I need something to keep my mind occupied. But what if I can't find a boat or other survivors? I'll be alone again.
No.
I've never shot someone before.
Swallowing pennies.
My eyes are crying blood. The Soul's blood. I frantically wipe at my eyes, fearing that the life of the Soul might somehow transfer to me. I wipe until my eyelids are bruised and my forearms and wrists are burning. Blood on my shirt. On my denim jeans. Blood in my mouth.
I close the car door and scream.
I open it for fresh air and close it and scream again.
Rinsing my mouth, I have to swallow the metallic blood with the water because I cannot afford to waste it. I study my face in the rear-view mirror. I am greeted by a wild, hideous mess somewhat resembling me. Blood on my face, blood on my eyelids, blood dried in my hair. I look in the glove compartment for any items of use. Nothing, aside from a peculiar grey cylindrical shaft. It sits comfortably in my palm, and I wonder if it's meant to be handheld. Is it a weapon? Some sort of communication device?
Drive, the voice says, Drive.
I place the cylinder back and shut the compartment.
Where do I go?
The voice answers for me; the coast.
And that's where I'll go.
Back before the world went to shit, I had a car license. The impatient growl of the engine is constantly calling for a higher gear, it's hot breath against my back. Gradually I begin to feel comfortable, in control of the vehicle. I think back to the days of humans, back to the days of summer, when my family and I would take a vacation driving around the coastline, camping out on beaches and sipping lemonade and singing to the songs on the radio. It was the only time mum and dad wouldn't fight, when they set aside their arguing for the sake of keeping our holiday as enjoyable as possible.
The sun, for brief, intermittent moments eclipses my vision of the road, or perhaps it is the dark swirling phantasm re-emerging to succumb me. I can't tell the difference between either. The road is wide and smooth, so I keep the accelerator to the floor, appeasing the lion behind me.
I think I understand why the Souls think us humans ruinous. How irrationality and emotion, while they compel us to acheive great things, can also destroy us. How a finger-flex over the trigger can change you in an instant.
Blood at the back of my throat.
Swallowing pennies.
Oh God.
Oh God.
Oh God.