On a sparrow's wings

Chapter 5 - Treading the wasteland once again

  After Anastasia caught up to Michael, she slowed her pace and they walked along the river, following it downstream.

“So… where are you headed?”, Anastasia asked as she struggled to follow the rough and patchy path that was laid before them.

“Why are you still here? Didn’t I tell you to f**k off?”, Michael rumbled as his boots stomped in the mud near the river and on to rocks and pebbles.

“You did, but I decided to come anyways. And besides it’s dangerous to go alone.”

“For you, sure.”

   After a few moments of silence Michael spoke, “You owe me for that guard.”, he turned around and faced her. His eyes were stern and they felt heavy on her.

This man speaks in money, and I have to speak his language if I want to get anywhere. She pulled out an old can without a label and opened it. It was filled with cigarettes.

  Anastasia didn’t smoke but that’s not why she carried them with her. During the first few years of the apocalypse people used a barter system. They didn’t have the organization nor enough settlements for people to use a currency so the barter system worked fine enough for them. But after every adjusted and settlements popped up all around a desire for a currency rose because bartered stocks were unreliable and people didn’t know if what they were getting was worth what they were giving. So during the fifth year it was decided that cigarettes were to be used as currency. As they were easy enough to find and more could be made. And besides a lot of people picked up the taste for them after everything that happened. Anastasia and Ethan had used them to buy supplies from market settlements from time to time. What Anastasia had wasn’t that much but it still wasn’t a sum to be spit at. She had been saving for something nice from the market settlements but this was more important.

  She pulled out five cigarettes, “I will give you more if you tell me where you are headed?”

Michael pondered for a short while but ended up taking the cigarettes, “Chicago.”

“Business or pleasure?”

“There is no pleasure left in this world.”, he turned back around and kept following the river.

“Just because the world kinda ended doesn’t mean you can’t still have fun.”

“I am not a little girl, I can’t afford to have fun.”

“Neither am I, but if you are not happy with your life than what’s the point? I mean why wouldn’t you change it to something you actually like?”

Michael ignored that and the following time she tried to talk to him so she decided it was pointless.

  Her dad had told her about Chicago. He had used to work there before they moved when her mom got pregnant with Ethan and they settled in Joliet. He had always described the city with nostalgia. He had grown up there and he had promised to take her and Ethan some day when she was older. That day never came. But on the bright side she would finally see it. When she was with Ethan they never went to big cities, “They are too dangerous. The people are almost as bad as the greys there.” he had told her. And if Michael was any indication than he might be right. But yet she was still excited, she had know only Joliet all her life. And a few other small cities that they had visited to loot. She hoped Chicago was better than them. Even with their little interactions with other people she had heard the rumors that people had started to rebuild Chicago and some other major cities.

  She didn’t know what to expect but she hoped it would be something cleaner and more stable than what she was used. Maybe they have beds, and running water, and real food? The thought of food that wasn’t canned was enough to make her mouth water. The only time she had eaten anything that wasn’t in a can or a tin was when Ethan managed to catch a rabbit. But he managed to burn it and it tasted like charcoal. And the beds she could use a bed that wasn’t rotten or a bedroll. her back ached like hell the first few months of the apocalypse but she adapted and now her back was hard. But still a soft bed would be nice. And running water she could barely allow herself to hope. She had taken baths in so many streams, rivers and lakes that showers seemed so foreign to her by now. But it would be nice to shower in private and without the danger of greys or wolves.

  After some walking Anastasia decided she could maybe still get to know Michael better, or at least make him less hostile to her.

“So Michael, got any friends in Chicago?”

“No.”

“You’ve gotta have some friends there. I mean-”

“You can follow me like a retarded little rabbit all you want but keep your stupid thoughts in your head.”, Michael didn’t look at her, he said it in his usual rumbling.

Anastasia did shut up but that made her more curious. She had never met a man like him, most people couldn’t wait to tell her everything about them but not Michael. She decided to make it her mission to find out what made him that way and how she could fix him.

  She always managed to fix problems when she was little. When her mom and dad would argue she would always find a solution that satisfied both of them. They both knew about it but none of them wanted to admit defeat and suggest it to the other. Anastasia had no problem with doing that and she liked to see the faces people made when she presented the solution, faces of relief and a little joy. And that little joy was what she liked the most. It was so innocent and pure that it filled her own hearth with joy.

  They kept going downstream and the moon had risen to the middle of the night sky. They could hear the noises of wolves and greys around them. They had to make camp. Luckily for them they came across a gas station. It had vines, trees and bushes growing all around it, almost covering it in leaves and branches. The fuel dispensers’ hoses were covered in small mushrooms, they stuck to the ground as if glued to it. The taller branches slowly swayed in the night wind, their leaves were collecting into a bundle of brown and yellow on the ground and on the roof of the gas station.

  “Nature is beautiful.”, Anastasia exclaimed as she took a deep gulp of the night air.

Michael took one last puff of his cigarette and extinguished it onto a tree that was growing on the side of the gas station, the fire hissed and a black mark was left upon the bark. He proceeded to break of a few of its branches and use the ladder to climb to the roof. Anastasia sighed went over and hugged the tree.

“I am sorry mister tree.”, she then followed him up the ladder.

  The roof of the gas station had a carpet of brown and yellow leaves and some of the branches poked into it. But it was dry and if you were to move the leaves you could make a makeshift bed. And from here nothing could hide the night sky. Although the stars weren’t showing, it was still better than looking at the holes in the road.

  Michael broke off a few of the branches that stuck in the roof and the leaves that were on the ground, and built a small campfire. He sat on the floor and leaned against the parapet. He pulled out a can from his backpack and cracked it open with his knife. He ate from it, chewing loudly at the little pieces of meat that floated in the stew.

  Anastasia layed on the parapet with one leg on the inside to support her weight. The night wasn’t cold enough for her to need to huddle  near the fire. Although with winter approaching it was getting colder. Ethan had a plan when winter did come and the snow covered the ground but I didn’t tell Anastasia. He knew what to do to survive so Anastasia trusted him to make plans. He was always better at organization than her. She usually did what came to her mind first, which usually got greys chasing after them, but every so often they would find a hidden stash of food or some secret shelter. And it was because of those rare moments that she continued to follow her gut. Ethan’s method was more steady and reliable but the highs of Anastasia’s method were always higher, although the lows always lower.

  Anastasia lifted her head slightly to look at the sky and she put her hands behind her head. The sky would have been black if it weren’t for the small milky white dot that was the moon. It’s light barely touched the ground. When Anastasia would look the light of the fire would only illuminate a few feet from the roof of the gas station. The rest was black. From time to time she could see little eyes move through the forest, some were red, some yellow and some blue. Watching her, curiously from the edge of the forest, from the safety of their home. She was a guest in their territory and her survival depended on their desires. Their kingdom of branch and bush that remained unaffected from the greys, still prospering and taking over the one of man.

  She turned her attention to Michael. He was still eating that stew with some kind of meat, beef or mutton she thought. He slurped the stew and chewed the meat loudly. He didn’t seem to care much that she was looking. He stood there interested only in his food and the small fire that was beside his feet. After he was done with his food he pulled out another cigarette and lit it. He even smoked rudely, he took big puffs of smoke in his cheeks and let them out wherever he pleased, not much caring if there was someone there who didn’t wish to smell the smoke.

  She felt a chill rise in her lower back and she shuttered. She moved over to the campfire and sat on the opposite side to Michael. He threw another branch and a handful of leaves into the fire. It hissed when the leaves entered it and grew slightly larger. Michael poked at the charred leaves at the bottom of the small fire with a stick, moving them about until their charped shapes disappeared into the fire.

  “Why Chicago of all places?”, Anastasia tried to start up a conversation with Michael again.

“Work.”, replied Michael in his usual rumbling voice, he took a puff from his cigarette.

“Yeah but there is work in a lot of other cities. What makes Chicago so special to you?”

“Nothing.”

“Well it can’t be nothing. I mean big cities are a lot more dangerous, right? Why not go find work in Delta or in The Battery? They always have work there.”

  Delta and The Battery were two settlements near Coal City. They were one of the bigger settlements and they were expanding a lot recently which led to a need for people to work there. It didn’t pay very well but it was fairly safe and the there was also room for growth. her and Ethan did some jobs there a couple months back but they decided their chances were better on their own when they got into some trouble with a couple of guys there.

  After a couple of moments of silence Anastasia asked again but Michael stood silent once again. That annoyed Anastasia. Why won’t he talk to me? She wanted someone to talk to. The questions she asked weren’t even personal or hard to answer. He refused to answer like a small child that wanted to annoy her. But she will get through to him, she promised it to herself. One way or another she was going to get him to talk to her. But not today, she felt a yawn coming and her eyelids felt heavy. All that tracking had made her tired and she fell asleep.

  She dreamt of a black fox running through a green field. Wherever it ran through the ground cracked and turned red and then to a grey goo. When Anastasia tried to walk through it her feet fell through the soft grey goo and removing them from it proved difficult. She tried her best to follow the fox but it was too fast, it flew through the field like a lightning and Anastasia was moving like a snail behind it. It jumped and galloped through the field leaving only the grey goo that Anastasia struggled to walk through. Eventually the fox stopped on top of a hill but the hill didn’t crack nor did it turn into the grey goo. Instead it shined brightly as if she was staring at the sun.

  She put her arm in front of her face and continued going. She didn’t understand why but she wanted to, no needed to go there, something was comepling her to. She stomped through the grey goo when she heard the croaking of a raven from somewhere around her. She looked around and noticed the raven standing on one of the branches of the only tree in the field. It had also not turned grey, retaining it’s usual brown bark and green leaves. The raven croaked once again and looked at her.

   “Dark, dark, dark.”, the raven echoed at her.

“What?”, Anastasia asked the raven.

It repeated the words and flew straight into her eye. Anastasia woke and screamed. She hadn’t had a nightmare in a long time. Ironically they had went away with her mother. She never liked them, as a kid they would be filled with monsters chasing her and dark rooms. She had never had one like this and it felt weird.

  She noticed Michael was missing and the fire smoldering. He left me? She quickly went over to her backpack and checked it. At least he didn’t take anything. She put it on and went down to the road. She decided not to give up so easily and that she will find Michael and make him talk to her and share. Even if he didn’t want to.