The Survivor Chronicles: Book 1, The Upheaval (25 page)

“Can I help you?” he demanded gruffly.

“We were hoping to find a police or fire station,” Al told him.

“Three miles that way.” He pointed back toward the blaze.

“Both of them?”

“Yep,” he replied as he slid his thumbs into the waistband of his jeans.

“There’s a bad fire over there.” Mary Ellen’s voice was resigned.

“That’s all there is,” the man informed her briskly.

“Do you have a map?” Al inquired.

He nodded toward a rack near the coffee pots. Al went to search for a map of Massachusetts as Mary Ellen remained with the man. “That fire might spread here soon,” she warned him.

The man shrugged, his eyes were pinned to Al as he searched through the rack. “I’m not staying here for much longer anyway.”

“Have you seen any other people?” she asked eagerly.

“Nope, you’re the first since it started. Where you from?”

“Rhode Island.”

For the first time the man showed something other than anger and distrust as his shoulders slumped and he seemed to deflate like a balloon before them. “This is happening there too?”

Mary Ellen nodded sympathetically. “We think it may be everywhere, or at the very least the Northeast, but we haven’t found anyone who knows anything. It’s chaos out there and I really wouldn’t stay here for much longer.”

The man nodded as Al made his way back toward him with a map and a case of water. “How much?” Al asked.

“Take it; I don’t think I’ll be around to sell many of those anymore anyway,” the man told him.

“Thank you.”

“How far away is that fire?”

“Not far and it’s moving fast.”

The man nodded and grabbed a set of keys off the counter. “Time to go.”

Mary Ellen held the door for Al as he stepped outside; he was dismayed to see smoke curling over the horizon once more. He watched as the man waddled toward a large SUV, pulled himself inside and started the vehicle. He had just abandoned his store, but even still he waited until Mary Ellen and Al drove out of the parking lot before leaving too.

Al pulled the map out and unfolded it before him. “There are a couple of places where they might be establishing shelters, but if your daughter has been to the stadium and likes it there, that might be the place she’s drawn to.”

Mary Ellen nodded. “She’ll look for a little familiarity amongst this mess.”

Al wouldn’t mind a little familiarity too. “Foxboro bound we are, then,” he told her with a smile.

CHAPTER 18

Xander

Foxboro, Mass.

Xander’s cheek was pressed against Riley’s as her slender body shook and heaved from the force of her sobs. The sounds she made were heart wrenching. Even if he hadn’t been swamped by his own melancholy, her sorrow would have been enough to make him cry. As it was, he couldn’t hold his own tears back.

Gone. His sister was gone. In the blink of an eye, from the space of one heartbeat to the next, her life had been snuffed out as effectively as a birthday candle. She’d been there with them one instant, and the next… he had lost her.

Since he was two years old, Carol had been a part of his life. He didn’t know a world without her, wasn’t entirely sure how to navigate one that didn’t have her in it, and he couldn’t bring himself to stand up and face it right now. All he could picture was the chubby child with blond curls that had toddled after him, sucking her thumb as she dragged her dirty doll across the ground. A toddler he’d been instructed to protect and take care of, a toddler who, though she had annoyed him, had also fascinated him. He’d loved her, had defended her when she was teased, had protected her.

He’d just failed her.

His arms clenched around Riley as she began to gag and choke from crying so violently. He patted her back, attempting to soothe her as he struggled through the grief and guilt trying to drown him within their dark depths. What was he going to do? What were any of them going to do?

Bobby hadn’t moved since he’d collapsed beside them. He was unbelievably pale as he stared at the area where Carol had been. There was a vacancy in his gaze that terrified Xander, because he felt that same helpless feeling trying to take control of him. No matter how relentlessly they fought, they were still going to die. It was too brutal and cruel, and none of them had ever endured this kind of adversity before. In fact, every other difficulty he’d ever encountered was child’s play compared to this. Girls, school, peer pressure, crashing his car… it was all nothing.

Everything he had ever known was nothing now, mere cinders of the burnt remains of his life.

The things that had so occupied him before faded from his mind as he stared at his friend and clung to Riley. Lee had moved away from the crater, but he was still too close for Xander’s liking.

They could sit here and wait for death, or they could stand up and fight to survive. He had to make a choice.

Bracing his hand behind him, he wrapped his arm around Riley’s waist and strained to lift the two of them to their feet. Lee glanced at him, opened his mouth to say something but ended up closing it. What was there to say?

Xander leaned against a tree, fighting against the tears that still threatened to fall as he turned Riley around. Tears streaked her reddened face; her eyes were already bloodshot and puffy. She was gasping for breath as her shoulders heaved.

“Riley, listen. Listen to me. You have to get it together.”

Her vivid eyes were unfocused; she leaned into him, wrapping her arms around his waist as she pressed her face into his chest. For years he’d yearned to hold her, but not like this. Never like this. Xander hugged her back as her tears wet his shirt. “Riley, please. I need your help now. Please.”

Her sobs increased, it was a battle to keep his fear and anguish at bay. The unraveling was there, just beneath the surface, trying to undo him. Judging by the look of Lee and Bobby though, if he fell apart now none of them would make it.

He grasped Riley’s face, pulling it out of his chest as he wiped the tears from her cheeks. “This isn’t what Carol would want Riley.” She took a hitching breath; her eyes flickered as they came briefly into focus before fading again. “She would want you to survive, and if we’re going to survive, you have to pull it together.”

Tears slid down, but she seemed to be focusing on him a little better, seemed to be seeing him again. “Okay?” he asked.

“She’s gone,” Riley croaked.

Xander shuddered at the reminder. “I know.”

He barely got the words out past the constriction in his throat. It took all he had not to start crying again, but if he gave into the urge they would never get out of here, and right now getting his friends out of here was what was keeping him going.

“
Xander…”

Her lower lip began to quiver. He pulled her against him, hugging her close as she embraced him. She had stopped crying though, and simply seemed to desire another person to hold.

He looked to his friends but they were both motionless. He couldn’t carry all three of them out of here. “Bobby, Lee, we have to go.” Bobby looked dazedly at him; Lee simply appeared terrified at the thought. “Now. We have to go now.”

“But, it’s… it’s… ah… It’s death out there, Xander,” Lee stuttered.

“It’s death here too.” He pressed Riley closer before reluctantly releasing her. She made a move to grab at him again but went still as her hand fell limply to her side. She seemed to have regained enough control to be able to stand alone. He watched her to make certain that she wouldn’t collapse again, but when she remained unmoving he was reassured that she would be okay.

He walked over and knelt before Bobby. “You have to get up, Bobby. Come on.” He grasped hold of his friends arm, and though Bobby rose with him, that awful vacancy didn’t leave his gaze as he stared numbly at Xander. He was terrified that Bobby would never come back to them, that something had broken inside of him and he would forever be this strange, deadened shell of a person he had once been.

Xander released Bobby and hurried past Lee.

“What are you doing?” Lee demanded taking a hasty step toward him as Xander hurried to the hole that had claimed his sister.

“I have to see.”

It was the last thing in the world he wanted to do, but he had to make sure that Carol wasn’t alive. The not knowing would drive him crazy for the rest of his days, even if today was that day. He approached the crater with care, nervous that it would give out beneath him as he leaned over the edge and peered into the dark depths. He was terrified he would find his sister’s body, broken, battered, beaten beyond recognition. There was simply nothing but a yawning abyss of death and misery.

He retreated from the hole, feeling almost as hollow as that encompassing darkness. Riley was staring expectantly at him as she twisted her hands before her. He shook his head at her, unable to form the words that would crush her again. To her credit she didn’t fall apart again.

“Let’s go,” he said briskly, he had to do something before he completely lost his mind.

“Go where?” Lee demanded.

“Same as before, we go to the stadium.”

Though he didn’t know how he would face his parents if they somehow, miraculously, had survived this disaster, and had even more miraculously managed to make it home. He didn’t hold out much hope for that, though. Not anymore. All he hoped for now was to somehow keep himself, and the others, alive. He’d failed his sister; he wouldn’t fail again.

He was moving past Riley when she stretched out and brushed his arm. He looked questioningly at her but she was silent as her fingers slid into his and she clasped hold of his hand. Her eyes were wary as she watched him, seemingly worried that he might rebuke her or release her. That was something she would never have to worry about from him. His hand tightened around hers as he tugged her gently along, moving back toward the edge of the woods, and the homes beyond.

He stopped at the edge of the forest to survey the darkened homes. He didn’t trust that they were empty.

Riley's hand trembled within his, sweating slightly in his grasp. He could feel the calluses from softball that ran across the base of her fingers. “I don’t think we should go out there.”

He glanced back at her. Though she was more composed, her eyes still shimmered with unshed tears. “We’re not going to,” he assured her.

He stayed within the tree line, but hovered near the yards that bordered them. A driving sense of urgency built within him as it propelled him onward. They had to get to the stadium, it was something he could attempt to do, perhaps even something he could succeed at. The piercing reminder that he had failed Carol was like a knife to his chest, and he could barely breathe around it.

He avoided the highway, choosing to stay within the woods, away from other people and the main areas. He knew this area well. From the time they were fifteen, he had snuck out of the house to meet Lee, Bobby and a few other friends. During the summer, if there was a concert they would like to hear, they went to the stadium. Not having been the first ones to do it, they’d found a well-worn path in the woods that led down to the railroad tracks and eventually the stadium. They’d sit at the edge of the woods and listen to the muffled music. Most of the time it had been difficult to decipher what was playing, but the thrill of being out, without their parents knowing ¬¬– and the occasionally smuggled alcohol – made it more than worth it.