Holly wished she could go closer, but the people were heading down from the ridge into the heavily wooded next valley, and soon the ruin was hidden from view. Was that a car? she wanted to ask, because the possibility meant so much. One fallen building with an ‘Exit’ sign was puzzling enough but two fallen buildings, the rusted remains of a vehicle, bows and arrows, and shrivelled people rising from beneath undergrowth . . .
She looked at the people, smiling as the short woman who had tended her glanced at her. The woman smiled back distractedly, scanning all around as they walked. The others seemed alert as well, including the two people walking on ahead who had to concentrate on their route. Apart from the four carrying her stretcher, everyone else constantly looked left and right, sometimes turning and walking backwards for a few steps as if expecting to be ambushed at any moment.
Holly didn’t know what this meant, but none of it seemed good.
She was amazed at just how silently they were able to move across the ground, and how quickly. Their feet were clad in leather, tied tight so that no loose flaps struck at the ground. They picked their way instinctively, avoiding loose rocks or fallen branches or twigs, and when they traversed a steep slope there was only the slightest whisper of undergrowth. Birds sang all around them, crickets scratched messages from their hiding places in tall ferns, something whistled low and continuously far away, and once Holly heard the patter of small, fast footsteps as an unseen creature fled the party. It was almost as if the land hardly knew that they were there.
The jacket worn by the man holding the stretcher’s front right handle had some sort of design on the back. It was a rough garment, its edges frayed and its seams held together by heavy stitching. Whatever was drawn on or sewn into the material had blended into it due to grime and time. Holly narrowed her eyes, squinting as a pulse of pain thrummed through her head once more, then looked away. She could not make it out.
The group paused abruptly and lowered the stretcher to the ground. Her carriers each unslung their primitive weapons – a bow and arrow, a crossbow, a short spear, a heavy spiked mace on a chain – and the several others arrayed around them hid behind trees or ducked into the waist-high ferns. The woman looked over her shoulder at Holly and held her hand out flat, pressing it down.
They waited like that for some time, motionless and silent. When Holly started feeling pressure on her bladder she closed her eyes and tried to will it away. She needed to pee but the feeling wouldn’t become urgent for a while.
A bird landed nearby, the size of a blackbird but with a dull orange chest and speckled white wings. One much like this had been killed by the eradicator and stored in the breach containment area, and Holly thought of Melinda and what had become of her. She’d been passionate about her work, and sometimes when they’d shared a drink and a chat together in the common room or each other’s quarters Melinda had been almost unable to contain her excitement about what they were doing.
She held out her hand, hoping that the bird might hop across to her. But it flew away.
One of the two men further ahead stood and ran, crouching, into the forest, disappearing in moments. No one reacted, or moved. The woman looked at Holly again and pressed her fingers to her lips.
Holly nodded, suddenly afraid. I want to be back in Coldbrook, she thought. And then a shape appeared through the trees higher up the hillside and slightly ahead of them. It might have been a ghost, a human figure standing motionless while the breeze made waves of its tattered clothing and hair. The hair was long and clotted with mud and leaves. Holly held her breath, and the moment stretched into a painful stillness.