White Wasteland, Jeff Kirkham [ebook reader with highlight function TXT] 📗

hadn’t been spotted by vagabonds. He let out another deep sigh and lingered for a moment, grieving the fate of the Hollands.

He cinched the sternum strap on his backpack and trudged east across the fields paralleling Highway 12. Even walking the dirt roads near the interstate could lead to a confrontation. With only a slight crescent moon, he couldn’t travel at night yet, which would’ve been his preference.

Fortunately, the crop land of eastern Washington was crisis-crossed with irrigation canals. Walking in the deep irrigation ditches seemed the best compromise between speed and security, even though the route wasn’t always direct. He could pick his way along the frosty, ice-pocked bottoms of the empty canals and generally follow the highway toward the unwavering base of the Blue Mountains. The farmlands of Eastern Oregon beckoned beyond, but the climb might take his life. He gave himself fifty percent odds.

The agricultural communities on the other side of the mountains called to him. Not just for resupply, but as a chance to prove his worth. As Sage moved along the gridwork of frozen canals, he pictured himself as an ancient, wandering young man; cast between huddled caverns and riverside hovels. At the dawn of time, teenage males probably wandered these same wildlands in hopes of finding a cluster of humanity that might welcome their hearty hands and willing souls. If, perchance, a young lady caught the eye—one who hadn’t yet been claimed by a seasoned, mature man—so much the better. Young men had probably always burned with a desire to arrive, to contribute and to mate, and it had propelled them into the frozen unknown for aeons.

He could contribute to a community. If he could feed himself, as he had these last two months, he could help feed others. He ran his hands through his lengthening, brown hair as he journeyed away, forever, from the Holland farm. His ultimate destination would be Utah, but he would mount a mighty struggle against the space in between.

Sage recalled the promise he’d made to his dad, the last time they’d spoken over the phone. It seemed like years; another lifetime ago, but it’d only been six weeks. He’d promised his father that he would do whatever it took to survive. Somehow, his old man had known the journey would crumble into a gauntlet of terrors. The world had only just begun to burn at that point, but his dad must’ve sensed it falling into a pit of chaos that would devour cities and render men down to blood and grease.

In that nearly-forgotten world of telephone calls, before the collapse and while still a rebellious teenager, Sage’s word hadn’t meant a hill of beans, so he hadn’t considered his promise overmuch at the time. He’d broken his word to his parents more often than he could count. Now, after all he’d survived, he made good account of his promise, every word. He would claw a living from the nap of the earth in order to survive, but in the ice fields of winter, he wasn’t fool enough to believe he could do it alone.

Those lonely young men who dwelt in caves and hunted wooly mammoth had undoubtedly learned the same lesson as Sage in the stoney swales of eastern Washington: foraging alone through the winter was a death sentence. Cooperation was the first, elemental tool of survival. Without the ties that bind men to clan, Sage would forfeit his promise to his dad, and surrender his ghost somewhere on the snow-bound plains of Oregon or Idaho. He’d learned enough to be useful, but survival would require much more than skill. He must wrap himself in the threads of civilization—find a tribe, a town, or a family with a fighting chance of survival, and then ally himself to them.

The entire region—the eastern onion fields of Washington—had been too close to the pandemonium issuing from Seattle and Portland. The frank physics of the internal combustion engine and the size of a tank of gas doomed the Hollands and their farm, along with every hearty family between the Cascades and the Blue Mountains. The death throes of the old, broken society plowed them under. Sage had no choice but to cross over the towering dam of earth that’d held off the blood tide from Seattle. The tsunami of feckless men and their huddled women couldn’t venture beyond the limits of a tank of gas, but with his new knowledge and his backpack, Sage likely would.

Beyond the Blue Mountains lay a mystery. Sage regarded the snow caps in the distance, peeking over the ledge of his irrigation canal. It’d take him a week to reach the foothills, and he knew he could survive that far. He had less confidence in the five thousand-foot climb over the snow-socked crags, but what lay beyond offered him a chance to reconnect with real people—and to resupply his backpack.

Sage glanced over his shoulder, hurrying away from the red and orange painted sky. With the icy hands of sunset already pawing at the back of his neck, he searched for a nighttime refuge. He wouldn’t have time to set many snares before sleep, but he would try a few. His own tracks in the light snow, overlaying the tiny tracks of the rabbits, might betray his passing, and attract the human carrion-eaters. He would craft a way for his tracks to lead away from his sleeping den.

He sighed again, the only complaint he allowed himself these days. Everything in this new, ancient way of life required meticulous consideration. He wondered how many calories he burned just thinking about it all: minimize threats, conserve energy, and reap life-force energy from the land. Survival was a colossal pain in the ass.

He smiled against his internal bitching. He’d been alone for a long time, and his mind, he supposed, had subdivided into several personalities in order to argue with itself.

Good God, he swore. He’d give his left nut for someone to talk to.

He swept a too-long lock of dark hair