As they continued west, Larry and Shane saw two small skeletons heaped beside a charred post that might once have supported a mailbox; the bones black, carbonized, grinning bitterly at the warped pavement.
The nearer they got to Brace, the blacker the landscape became until, topping the last low rise, it became obvious that there was no township of Brace any longer.
21
The ashes were still hot in places, but it was apparent that the fire hadn’t broken out the previous day, touched off by the arrival of Wormwood. It was several days, if not a week old and appeared to have started in the northwest quarter of town, where the old fruit warehouses were stacked together. From there it had marched eastward, blown on the prevailing winds, through the center of town.
Seasoning in the sun for over forty years, the timbers of the drive-in burger stand had gone up as if eager to burn, leaving a fine, almost white layer of ash in its shallow foundation. Across the street, the market and drugstore had collapsed into one another, leaving a scorched pile of rubble.
Those who had come out to fight the fire had perished in the streets, their bodies baked black and then devoured to the bone. They lay where they had fallen, alone or in pairs.
For Shane and Larry, after Summertides, Brace was like another room in Helclass="underline" grayer, grittier, and completely desolate. There was no life within its borders: no people, no pets or livestock, not even scavengers such as birds or insects. The conflagration had consumed everything but brick and stone, leaving nothing for them to pull apart or bicker over.
When Larry let the engine die at the crossroads, all they could hear was the soft abrasion of the wind, rising and falling through the barren streets, rubbing and erasing what little remained.
The hardest part for Shane to digest was not the death and destruction, but the simple fact that they had no idea — none at all, in drawing up their plans — that Brace no longer existed. Six, maybe seven miles from Quail Street and they hadn’t a clue.
Before Wormwood, before the electricity went out, they would have been watching the fire on television before it had a chance to jump the roof of the first warehouse.
Since then, the world had gotten bigger. Much, much bigger.
Away from his parents, from his home, Shane was just beginning to realize the complications…
Brace had burned to the ground because cities and towns were no longer connected. In fact, the underlying glue that held civilization itself together was rapidly dissolving, and he suddenly remembered that Chicago, like Brace, no longer existed.
Without television, without electricity and the internet, what else might be happening in the world? There was no way to tell. How many other places — towns and cities whose names he’d known since childhood — had unknowingly slipped off the face of the planet?
Aside from bits of gossip or hearsay from people passing through those places, the only way to tell would be to travel there himself. And what were the odds, these days, of purchasing a plane ticket to New York or Washington, DC?
He might take a car or motorcycle, but would the roads be clear, or bottle-necked with frozen traffic? Would he be able to get fuel, or spare parts?
Under his own steam, how long would it take to walk or cycle to the East Coast? Three months? Six? A year?
He had no idea.
Each question posed ten more, each more complicated than the last.
Forget about travel for its own sake, or out of simple curiosity; instead, think about what was going to happen when May turned into November and a cold, hard winter descended?
This far north, it was going to get cold, it was going to snow…
Would the power be back on by then, or would he be living like a caveman, spending his days gathering food and firewood? Foraging the ashes and ruins by himself or with a small group of others, protecting their stores and their last remaining bullets like their distant, distant ancestors had protected a single spark of fire.
Without bullets the legions of infected would get a lot closer…
Eventually, they’d have to start killing them with clubs and spears, with rocks or their bare hands.
Which, of course, would dramatically increase the chances of becoming infected oneself.
These thoughts spiraled through Shane’s head as he looked out over Brace. At the fate of one small town that hardly merited a dot on the map.
“Well?” Larry sighed. What do you think? Fred Meyer?”
Shane nodded.
22
There were two ways to get to Highway 12 out of Brace.
The first was to go back the way they had come, riding east until they met up with the old highway and then turning south. It was likely the least obstructed and the least traveled route; unfortunately, it ended at Summertides and they had no desire to repeat that experience.
The other route led directly south, putting them in the eastbound entry lane within half a mile. Logic (and the impassable situation at Summertides) seemed to make this the obvious choice, but it was potentially slower and more dangerous as well. Being one of 2 or 3 westward evacuation routes from the city, it would not be unreasonable to guess that good old 12 might be something of a graveyard by now. All it would take was one bad accident to start a chain reaction that would put traffic at a complete standstill. Take those frightened people, all sitting in their cars with nowhere to go, add a disgruntled corpse or two, and what you got was a bloody snowball gathering mass and momentum as it rolled back into town, carrying whole families off with it as it went.
On the other hand, they might expect the lanes running east to be relatively clear, or at least passable. No doubt some median jumping had occurred, but how many people would actually risk driving against oncoming traffic?
Most would have sat obediently in their cars, confident in the knowledge that Highway 12’s four lanes narrowed to two at Norton, a scant six miles further on, which would have been cause enough for backup and delay.
“What about Autumn Creek Road?” Shane suggested, the two of them debating their options. “If we can make it across the river, it’ll take us right to Fred Meyer’s back parking lot.”
Larry considered it. Autumn Creek Road was a narrow, two-lane passage sandwiched between the river and a high, muscular ridge, the steep uniformity of the later broken by twisted gullies and rocky canyons as it rose westward from the city. There was a green belt of land running along the eroded base of the ridge, containing a few orchards and private homes, but because it was prone to flooding, it had remained sparsely populated.
“We’ll still have to take the highway for two or three miles,” Larry said, “and hope at least one of the bridges is passable… but I think it’s worth a try, depending on what we find along Highway 12.”
Shane nodded. “Let’s do it then.”
Larry smiled and kick-started the bike. “Aye-aye, Captain.”
They puttered past the ghostly ruins of the drive-in, searching for the road out of Brace. They passed it once then found it circling back, searching the area where Larry last remembered it. It appeared as a warped slab threading its way through a singed copse of cottonwoods.
A dead skunk lay just beyond the first bend, flattened down to a sunbeaten smell hovering over a flyblown matting in the pavement. As they passed it, Larry said something he didn’t quite catch; though Shane understood his pointing finger well enough.
The shapes of several cars and trucks loomed ahead, backed up along the east and westbound entry lanes and on both shoulders as well, as if patiently waiting for a ferry.