7 The Last Woman Standing (Part 3)

Carley Thomas

With a small sigh, I turned back to walking. Our close-knit huddle in the storm was no longer a necessity so we spread out to walk at our own pace. The storm had left a thin layer of red dust over everything for miles. Any trail we had left behind us was wiped clean, leaving nothing but empty stillness in its wake. It was unsettling. No noise. No wind. Nothing but us, wandering alone in the wilderness. Coping with that was unique for each of us.

Maria hummed to herself, unfamiliar tunes that I'd never been able to place or follow. Nate and Tony both developed a nervous tick of sorts. They would pop their knuckles or tap rhythmically on some part of their pack. Darian never seem to have any difficulty with silence and simply walked along without expression. I'm not sure much of anything bothered him.

I was still a little rattled. Between the storm and seeing things in the city, I wasn't really up for conversation. Honestly, I think everyone was a little edgy and I wasn't too keen on getting snapped at again. I tried to stay focused on putting one foot in front of the other, demanding that my racing heart slowed to the same pace, but that uncomfortable feeling that I was being watched still crawled over my skin. Even the hair on the back of my neck felt like it was standing on end.

"Keep up, Carley. You're falling behind." Nate was looking back at me, his goggles now pulled back atop his head so I could see his expression. He was concerned. It was that same look he had given me more than once before and I hated it. I had to prove that I could take care of myself.

As I looked around, I realized that I really had fallen behind. I had drifted from everyone except Darian but he was the sort to always stay behind us to watch for danger. My feet didn't want to move faster even as I tried to push them to catch back up to the others. It was surreal and strange, like I was caught in some sort of bubble and couldn't escape.

Suddenly, my pack was lifted off my shoulders in one fell swoop. It wasn't until that moment that I realized just how heavy it was. Darian stepped up beside me, easily slinging the bag over his shoulder. He said nothing but gave me an encouraging smile and matched my pace. Whether it was the weight of my pack or something completely unrelated, I found the uncomfortable feeling fading away now that I was free of the bag. I could walk a bit faster and the tingling in my neck vanished almost as quickly as it had come.

"Thanks," I mumbled as we caught up to the others. "I guess I packed more than I thought from camp."

"Here." Darian handed me his water bottle in response. "We're all borderline dehydrated and that doesn't help, either. Just don't overload yourself next time. Being this close to the city, you really don't need to get sloppy."

He was right. I was letting my guard down too much. If something came up, I'd probably be the last to react. If I was the last to react, I'd probably end up dead. The thought crossed my mind that death might actually be better than trying to live in a world so harsh but I quickly stamped it down. I couldn't think like that. Not now.

By the time we made it to a suitable campsite, we were all exhausted. The city was still visible in the fading sunlight but it was no longer looming ahead of us like some gaping monster. Instead, it sat more towards the west of us, blocking the last bright rays of light as we set up camp.

Maria and I stayed off to the far side of camp from the guys, watching them build up a wall of sorts with whatever they could get their hands on. Rocks and debris made a decent barrier against wind and predators. We usually only had our packs and the occasional scrub brush to use as protection in the night so the luxury of something more substantial was well worth the effort it took to build it. Of course, we still needed to keep a watch in shifts through the night. Walls, no matter how good or poor, were never a guarantee to keep anything out.

"No fire tonight," Nate stated as we all started to find our own patch of ground. "We don't want to draw unwanted attention." None of us complained outwardly but it was fairly obvious that that none of us were thrilled about running a cold camp. Darkness gave the advantage to everything except us. Even with some of the odd changes we had noticed over the last few years, night vision for us was still just as pitiful as it had always been. While fire certainly gave away where we were, it also helped us to keep things out. But no one challenged Nate's decision. Even Tony managed to follow along without grumbling.

Darian had dropped my bag off in the small area that I had claimed so I laid out my supplies for a quick inventory check. There were four full containers of water in addition to the empty bottle on my hip, really only enough to last a few days, and two tins of dry meal from one of the plants we had discovered that was similar to wheat. That was not where I wanted to be on rations. Water was not easy to find and food was sometimes even more difficult. As I glanced around camp, it looked like were all in the same predicament. I doubted we could make it to the far side of the city before rations ran out.

The rest of my pack was mostly rope and makeshift climbing gear interspersed with various containers and blades. It was all the necessities of life out here. I kept a few other knick-knacks from our travels as well. There was a hairbrush and a small piece of mirror that I shared with Maria. Not that hygiene was much of a requirement but it was something to make this crazy world feel almost normal. Maybe it was because I still remembered things from before the war that I seemed to find value in what others saw as junk.

Darian claimed first watch, as usual, so I set out my sleeping mat. It was little more than a thick blanket, folded double to give a bit of padding, but it was enough to make sleeping on the hard ground more comfortable. I left the sharp and less forgiving items of my inventory out near my mat and folded everything else into my bag for a pillow. Twilight had crept into camp and the long shadows in the purple gloom sent a chill running down my spine. As tired as I was from the day's events and my early morning, my eyes didn't feel heavy at all.

I settled down on my mat as true darkness fell over the camp, pulling part of the blanket up and over my shoulder to ward off the cold air. I tried watching the hazy outlines of my companions for a while, thinking the monotony might drive my eyelids closed, but I soon rolled onto my back to watch the stars. Nights after a storm were always strangely clear, as if the sky itself had been wiped clean just like the landscape. The tiny pinpoints of light almost looked close enough to touch as they twinkled in the endless expanse of nothingness.

As my mind finally began to drift towards sleep, I couldn't help but ponder those stars. We were all so insignificant in the grand scheme of things. Just knowing that there were giant balls of burning gas surrounded by planets like our own made our tiny band of five people seem so very small. What if we never got to see the greater picture? What if we were forever sentenced to stay this small? I remembered from school that there had been technology that put us on the moon, that explored above and beyond even what we could see in the night sky. So why didn't that change things?

I liked to think I was pretty good at reading people and understanding how they thought. I had been really good at it in the Underground and it had saved my life more than once with Nate and the others as well. But when I thought back, I couldn't seem to wrap my head around the idea that people would choose to destroy everything for the sake of petty squabbles rather than chase a dream of discovery. It just didn't make sense.

I rolled the question over in my mind until it just sat still. Maybe I wasn't thinking of it in the right terms yet. I considered my companions and what I knew of them. Did they see wonder in the stars like me? Had they dreamed of things beyond themselves before? Did they still dream? I wasn't sure. Even in that moment, I realized that my own thoughts and dreams had faded over time. Marveling at the stars was only a brief interlude between fearful days and hectic sleep. I was as caught up in the past as anyone.

As my eyes began to drift slowly closed, the thought occurred to me that all my silly wonderings didn't much matter. When it came right down to it, I knew that I would never reach the stars. Reality had to set in sometime. It was no different than Nate looking for survivors in a dead world. After four years, he had to know that we were all that was left. He had to know that this was our last journey northward. Maybe that was the real reason we were detouring. Maybe he knew that it was his final chance to find others before we stopped travelling for good. The thought brought a sad smile to my face as I fell asleep. I guess we all had our own delusional dreams.