Dux Bellorum (Future History of America Book 3) (57 page)

"How much gas we got?" he asked softly.

"Quarter tank," replied Ted.
 
"It's probably enough to get us through the night at this pace…the road's opened up a lot.
 
But I don't know…"

"Should we stop now, then?
 
While there's still a little light left so we can find some more gas or supplies for tomorrow?
 
If nothing else, I think we could all use a good stretch."

Ted considered this for a moment as he weaved between two cars that looked like they had driven through a furnace.
 
The vehicles had been reduced to black frames sitting on the remains of what used to be wheels in the middle of the road.
 
As they drove carefully around the charred carcasses, Erik got a glimpse of a something person-sized slumped over in the driver’s seat.
 
Not for the first time, he was thankful the van had no windows.
 
The kids didn't need to see that.

Hell, I didn't need to see that.

"Okay, looks like there's another clear stretch coming up,” Ted announced, his voice loud in close confines of the van.
 
“There's a break in the trees up ahead—might be some kind of farm or something up there…we can scout it out and see if we can find some gas."

Erik felt the muscles of his neck and shoulders tense for a moment.
 
"Feels kind of exposed without trees on both sides of the road…" Erik observed, eyes on the colorful canopy of leaves surrounding them.

"Trees provide cover, yes," replied Ted, "but that works both ways.
 
Every one of those trunks on the hills around us
 
gives someone with a weapon cover to pick us off.
 
Open space," Ted said, motioning with his left hand toward the gap in the trees they approached, "provides no cover.
 
We stay in the middle of the open space, it's going to take someone with a lot of skill to sneak up on us."

Erik nodded.
 
"Fair enough, but someone with a scoped rifle will still be able to hit us."
 
He couldn't shake the itch between his shoulder blades, but he was getting used to it.
 
He focused his thoughts instead on the task at hand.
 
Get out, find some gas, find whatever they could use, then get back to the van and keep moving.
 

We're only a handful of hours away now…just have to get across Pennsylvania and the New York backcountry.
 
He closed his eyes.
 
That's it.
 
We're so close...

The van slowed, tires crunching on gravel along the southbound shoulder.
 
The brakes squeaked for an instant before they came to a complete stop.
 
Ted shifted into park and shut the rattling engine off.

Erik cracked his window and rolled it down an inch to listen.
 
Outside the only thing he heard was the breeze rustling leaves across the road and birds chirping back and forth, gathering in preparation for the approaching night.
 
A dog barked off in the distance, the sound comforting yet lonely.

"We're really out in the country now," muttered Ted.
 
He looked at Erik.
 
"You want me to go this time?"

"Daddy was that a wolf?" asked Teddy from the darkness at the back of the van.

Erik grinned.
 
"I'll go.
 
I think you have other things to keep you occupied on the home front."
 

After one more look around the immediate vicinity, Erik opened his door, wincing as it squealed in protest.
 
He stepped out of the van and shut the door as quietly as he could, eyes scanning the tree-covered hill on the north side of the road.
 
The ground sloped at a gentle grade and the trees grew so thick he couldn't see anything but shadows beyond 50 feet.
 

There could be a whole army hiding up there and I'd never see them.
 
Erik slung the M4 over his shoulder and made his way to the double doors at the back of van.

Brin hopped out, carrying two plastic fuel cans salvaged from their minivan.
 
She handed one to him.
 
"Here, you take one and I'll take one."
 
She reached back inside and took two screwdrivers from Lucy's outstretched hand.
 

Handing one to Erik, she said, "There's a ton of tools in there, but without light I can't tell what we have.
 
Lucy found these," she said slipping a screwdriver behind her belt.
 
"Let's get going, the sun's setting pretty quick."

Erik nodded his thanks to Lucy and left the doors open so they could get a little light in the van.
 
He slipped his own screwdriver in his pocket and walked off behind Brin.

In the fading light of day, Erik watched wife as she moved forward, full of confidence and strength.
 
He wanted to wrap her in a hug and take her away to a safe place—away from the chaos and death and insanity of the world.
 
The sway of her hips as she walked made him think of more pleasant times.
 
Lazy days spent in bed back home in Florida, waking to the sound of a rainstorm and snuggling back under the covers.
 

I miss those days…

"Get your eyes off my ass and come up here," she muttered.
 
"I feel naked out here without a gun.
 
How strange is that?"
 
She snorted.
 
"I used to hate the sight of those things…"

Chapter 59

Reconciliation

B
RIN
DROPPED
TO
THE
pavement and slithered under the rear bumper of the first car they came across—a dark little hatchback that had been customized to the point he couldn't tell the make or model. She put her gas can on the ground and aimed the head of the screwdriver at the car's tank before smacking it a couple times with a rock. On the third hit, the driver sank in.
 
She pulled it out and a thin trickle of gasoline dribbled into her container.
 

"This one doesn't have much," she muttered, brushing the gravel off her hands.
 

Erik grunted as he looked around. He didn't see any movement other than leaves shimmering in the breeze. "There's nobody out here. I'm gonna walk across the road to that car over there," he wheezed, gesturing toward the truck on the other side of the road.

Erik squatted down behind his vehicle and did the same thing Brin had, only he punctured the gas tank on the second try. The truck had a decent amount of gas—it came out in a steady stream.
 

"This one's got a lot more," he called over his shoulder.

Before his container was half-full, Brin walked over, her feet crunching on loose gravel. She handed him her half-empty container so he could make the switch as his filled. The tangy smell of gas burned his nose.

Erik stood and brushed his hands off, leaning against the truck's dented tailgate.
 
He surveyed the area again in the gathering gloom of dusk.

Tall oaks and white birches, interspersed with green pines surrounded the area. Bright golden leaves fluttered on the breeze while brown and red ones swirled in little eddies along the sides of the road. On the other side of Brin's car, the road gave way to a gentle slope covered in knee-high weeds that led down toward a wide field, run wild with what looked like soybeans. The small green leaves rippled in the breeze.
 
Here and there a random taller plant stuck up.

"Is that corn down there you think?" he asked, pointing in the gloom.

Brin grunted on the way back to her car.
 
"Could be…I have no idea.
 
The only corn I know comes in a can.
 
It’s too dark to see, anyway."
 

The whole scene gave the impression that someone had planted crops earlier in the year and had made at least an attempt to tend them throughout the summer.
 
It must have been some time since the field had seen the farmer.

Erik switched containers as the gas continued to leak out of the truck. Brin emerged from her car clutching a backpack. She held it in the air like a trophy, then moved around to the driver’s side and opened the trunk.

Erik couldn't help but smile as his wife rummaged in the trunk. A garbage bag, food wrappers, a pair of boots, and an umbrella soon piled up on the ground next to her.

Other than the sounds of Brin scavenging in the car across the street and the gas dripping in his container, there was absolute silence around him. Erik took a deep breath and smelled the sweet scent of fall on the breeze.
 

Time to get to work before it's too dark.

He opened the driver's door and found hasty leavings: bits of paper, a scribbled note that looked like it had once been taped to the steering wheel, some food wrappers, and a soda can. The small truck contained little else of value.
 

Erik watched the last of the gas drip into the red container. He yawned. There were a few more cars up the road and around the corner, there could be who knows how many more. They might find a few bits of food or maybe a water bottle somewhere out there. His eyes returned to the field across the road.
 

Somebody farmed that.
There had to be a farmhouse nearby. The gears in Erik's mind started spinning. Without electricity, the farmer probably couldn't get fuel to run his equipment. Without machinery, the fields had to be left unattended. Would someone be out there now? Maybe something happened to the farmer? There might be a farmhouse somewhere on the other side of the field just waiting for someone to move in.

Shelter, food, probably water too. He couldn't imagine any self-respecting farmer living without a well and the means to power it. He licked his dry lips at the idea of clean, fresh water and stores of food put away for a long winter.

Brin walked over to him. "You okay?" she asked, handing him her newfound backpack. "I just finished telling you I found some candy bars, road flares, and a sweet multitool along with some gloves and other stuff…"
 
She stared at him. "Earth to Erik?"

Erik looked over her head and watched the wind ripple through the leaves in the field across the street.
 
"I know…I'm sorry…I was just thinking…" he whispered.

"Clearly," Brin said sourly. "You totally missed that joke I made about the pizza…"

Erik looked down his wife. "What pizza?"

A smile threatened to pull up the corner of her mouth. "Never mind."
 
As quick as it appeared, the half-smile vanished.
 
"You get much gas?"

Erik stepped aside so she could see both full containers on the pavement beneath the truck. The amber liquid continued to drip from the wounded gas tank. "We should take the gas back to Ted."

Brin nodded. "It doesn't look like much, does it?" she asked, picking up one of the 5 gallon jugs.

As they strolled back toward the van, Erik pointed at the field. "What if we just stopped right here?"

Brin did just that.
 
She peered up at him. "You mean stop right here?"

Erik turned, careful not to splash the open container of gasoline in his hands. "I mean, look at the field right there. Right in the middle of nowhere.
 
We haven't seen anyone recently—there's not even that many cars on this road. We're
definitely
out in the country."

"Yeah…" Brin said noncommittally.
 
"So?"

Erik took a step toward the side of the road, closer toward his imagined farmhouse. "Okay, so hear me out. What if on the other side of those trees over, past the field—what if there's farmhouse somewhere?
 
Farms usually have a well, right? I mean, everything in this part of the country's older than dirt. Somebody's probably been living here since the 1700s and farmers usually have food stocked up for winters and—"

"Hold up," Brin said, raising a hand to interrupt him. "First, you’re not supposed to talk that much.
 
Second, are you telling me you think it'd be a good idea if we just
stopped
and tried to find a farmhouse in the woods?"

"Well, yeah…maybe,” he whispered.

"You want to just to stay here? You're giving up on New York?" she scoffed.

Erik paused, unable to find the words to express his emotions. He clenched his jaw in frustration. "Nothing I've done has turned out right."

Brin stepped up next to him. "What?
 
Stop whispering."

Erik shot an angry glance over his shoulder at her. "I said, nothing I've done has turned out right on this trip. I've been pushing us so hard to get north—maybe too hard.
 
Maybe we shouldn't go any further.
 
Before something worse than Lindsay spraining an ankle happens..."

Brin sighed. "Erik, this is not your fault…"

"Isn't it?" he asked rounding on her. "
I
was the one who pushed us to head for my parents place in New York.
I
was the one who got us captured by the Russians.
I
was the one who suggested the minivan in that little podunk town in Georgia."
 
He kicked at the dirt.
 
"And
I
was the one who pushed us so hard through the Carolinas that Lindsay got hurt and almost died!"
 

"Erik…"

"Everything I do is pushing us toward New York and it seems like everything we encounter is telling me that's a bad idea. I'm starting to get the feeling we should stop." His eyes returned to the field.
 

"Think about it—what are the odds that right in the middle of nowhere we find
this
.
 
We haven't seen anyone for hours
,
then there's suddenly a farm.
 
Right here.
 
It might be abandoned—"