Free The Harvesting by Melanie Karsak Page A

offered.
    “ Sounds good.”
    “ Layla, this is Kiki
Jones. She’s Lil’s and Orlando’s daughter—they didn’t make it. She
had an idea,” Tom said.
    Kiki’s eyes were red and swollen from
crying. Dark rings made half-moons under her brown eyes. “Well,”
Kiki started, “I did a project at college with short wave radios. I
might be able to get a radio up and running. Maybe we can see if
there are other survivors out there. But I need to see if there is
some equipment in the school.”
    “ Great idea,” I said,
smiling encouragingly at her, “take whatever you need.” She
reminded me of my fencing students. I choked down the wave of
despair that bubbled up as I realized they were probably all
dead.
    “ I can give a hand with
that,” Gary told Tom and Kiki. “I used to play around with the CB.
I have some stuff that might help.”
    “ Alright then. Let’s split
up. This group can go with Fred,” I said, portioning off the crowd.
“The rest of you will keep patrol. We need to set up a schedule,
get on rotating shifts. Jensen, can you put that together and let
people know when they are on patrol?”
    He nodded affirmatively.
    Summer waved at me. “I’ll come with
you to Mara Hunting Club. They have bulk food stored up there, and
I have a key,” she said, dangling a key chain in front of
her.
    “ Great, let’s go,” I
called and everyone moved out.
    Jamie, Summer, and I packed into my
SUV. Ian, Will, and Dusty headed out in Ian’s pick-up. We crossed
town and turned up Morrigon Hill. I sat in the back while Jamie
drove. Summer tried the radio stations. There was nothing but
static.
    “ How is it that everything
just stops?” Summer asked. “It all just stopped.” She snapped off
the radio.
    “ I haven’t seen an
airplane in days. Sky is completely empty,” I added as I looked out
the window. We passed a dense pine forest, the green leaves making
a thick canopy, the ground covered in pink needles.
    “ Makes you wonder, right?
How many man-made things out there are dependent on electricity,
oil, fuel? With no one around to push a button, what prevents
missiles from going off or dams from collapsing?” Jamie
questioned.
    “ I guess we’re screwed
either way,” I said, popping a cartridge into my gun. I rolled down
the window. “Slow up” I called to Jamie.
    An undead man plodded out of the woods
and into the ditch that led downhill toward town. As we rolled up
on him, he stopped and looked at the SUV. I leaned out the window
and took a shot. His neck snapped back as the bullet hit him
between the eyes, and he fell into the ditch.
    “ Christ, that water runs
downhill and into the stream,” Jamie said, putting the SUV into
park.
    I grabbed some medical gloves and
jumped out, handing a pair to Jamie. We pulled the gloves on and
went over to the body.
    “ Recognize him?” I asked
as we stood over the body.
    Jamie shook his head.
    We lifted the heavy man, carried him
to the bank, and dropped him into the forest. We climbed back into
the SUV.
    Summer was staring out the window at
the dead body.
    “ We need to tell people to
boil their water,” Jamie said as he put the SUV back in
gear.
    Summer rolled the window back up.
“Blessed are the meek for they shall inherit the earth,” she
recited absently, “the beatitudes, Matthew 5.5. Yeah,
right.”
    Neither I nor Jamie knew what to say.
We rode in silence the rest of the way to Mara Hunting
Club.
    When we got there, Ian’s truck was
parked at the very end of the long driveway. The club sat in the
middle of a large field. The shooting range was set down in a pit
with an earthen retaining wall. From the end of the driveway you
could see the roof above the shooting stand. The club itself was a
large log-cabin with arching windows that looked out onto the
field.
    What caught us all off guard was the
fact that there were cars in the parking lot. There was not another
town within an hour’s driving distance.
    “ Was there an event