The North (#wattys2016)

Chapter 4

Kate Dawson and Kenny Howard were on sentry. Overhead, a moonless sky only amplified the bleakness of the smoldering cityscape. I longed for the constant hum of traffic or a police car’s siren; any one of those million or more noises that used to be the soundtrack of the city seemed like they never existed at all. Silence was our best defense and when we talked to one another, it was always muted or hushed whispering – if we could have willed ourselves to become invisible, we would have.

Somewhere out there were other survivors. Somewhere people like us were clinging to one another, fighting to see another morning or draw their next breath. I imagined that most would emerge from their hiding places in the same way a mole or a ground squirrel would come out of its den to search for food. Always moving quickly. Always keeping a sharp eye for predators.

Hope probably hadn’t even occurred to other survivors.

I threw the pair a wave as I climbed up the staircase and strode through the tower doors. Kenny was scoping out the area around our position with a set of night vision goggles and Dawson was poking through a foil ration bag with a plastic fork. She was wearing a thick black hooded sweatshirt that hung loosely over her combat pants. Around her waist was an olive drab web belt containing a holster with a 9 mm automatic, a water bottle and the large pouch she kept her first-aid kit stored in. Her auburn hair was tucked underneath a Boston Bruins ball cap, a thick ponytail hanging down onto her shoulders through the back.

“Hey,” I said with a wave. “Anything weird out there tonight?”

Dawson gazed up from her ration pouch and nudged Kenny in the ribs. “I got nothing … what are you seeing, Kenny?”

He pointed to the parking lot of what used to be an office supply shop about a block and a half away. “If you count the pack of feral cats attacking that creep across the road as weird, then yes. Cats are fair game for the living dead so you’d think they’d have high tailed it out of here long ago.”

“Cats are hunters,” Dawson said, shoveling another mouthful of what appeared to be ravioli into her mouth. She glanced up at me. “If feral house cats are attacking the creeps then I’m all for it. You should be in bed, Dave.”

“Go team mittens,” I said with a snort. “Also I can’t sleep so I decided to see how you guys were doing. Anything on the radio?”

“You mean anything from Sanctuary Base,” said Dawson. “We know about it and before you decide to flip out all over Mel, she’d left the radio on short wave and we heard a series of beeps – like someone keying a handset or something.  She got all excited because she thought it was this Sanctuary base and so naturally Kenny and me asked her what the hell she was talking about so she told us. You were in the can.”

I made a disapproving grunting sound. If Kenny and Kate knew about the radio broadcast then there wasn’t any point in keeping it under wraps. “Shit … anyone else know about it?”

“Sid and Doug are asleep until their shift at 0400,” said Kenny. “We should tell them so we can figure out our next move. It’s something, right?”

Kenny Howard had a shock of bright red hair on top of his head that seemed to glow in the darkness. The pale skin on his face was dotted with freckles that climbed down from his cheeks onto his skinny neck. He was wearing an army issue sweater with rolled-up sleeves and a pair of combat pants worn away at the knees. His carbine was slung over his right shoulder and there was a plastic coffee cup dangling from a belt loop on his waist. On his right forearm was a homemade tattoo that Mel had done for him using the ink from a Bic pen and a sewing needle. It was comprised of two words done in a reasonably fancy font and wasn’t half bad for an amateur job: “Still Alive”.