Page 32 of The Pale Rider
“There’s nothing quite like riding Meremoth when he’s totally unleashed.”
“You’re insane,” I hissed.
“And you’re still alive, Speedy.”
Well, fuck. He had me there.
Chapter 19
T
he rest of our ride out of Washington State was pretty uneventful with Aeron as my guide. He had the apocalypse nailed down to a T. Our route was carefully planned for the most part. Aside from the town he found me in, we didn’t stop in any significant nasty gang territory, and when we stopped in a Rage Head infested town to sleep, Aeron had his own booby traps to keep us safe.
We had to make more supply runs as our stash from the supply closet was running low, but we worked well as a team. We didn’t luck into any more undiscovered closets, and we only snatched mystery cans after that. Aeron said the supplement hadn’t been added to the water supply in a long time, but it still wasn’t safe to risk taking a shower in some places we stopped at that still had running water.
Taking a shower became this huge luxury, even if the water was cold. I had precisely three pairs of panties to last me for the entire apocalypse, and I don’t even want to talk about how long I had to wear a pair before I got to wash them again. I had long abandoned the bra Aeron grabbed for me. It was the apocalypse, and I was saying I didn’t have to wear that awful thing.
As for Aeron, as much as I thought he was an asshole before, I liked him now. I could see why I made friends with him in that chatroom and agreed to follow him to Mexico. I still had no ideawhyI was disappearing to Mexico, but I could see why I liked the guy.
My memories were still coming in pieces, and they weren’t really pieces I could use. I knew that before all of this, I worked as a tattoo artist in this little shop in Los Angeles. My shop only did custom work, and some of my art won awards at tattoo conventions. I still had no idea why a tattoo artist was so crucial to the apocalypse.
My nightmare dreams were still coming. The man from my dreams who left me at the lab played a prominent role, but I could never see his face in my nightmares. I could tell that I loved him in the first dream, and I didn’t want him to leave me at that lab.
As much as my four-year-old self loved him in that dream, whenever he showed up in my dreams, I knew deep down that I hated this man. Aeron said the man was my father. All he would tell me about this man was that I grew up in New York and confirmed I hated him. Aeron said I ran away from him when I was fifteen. I ran as far as I could get. I hopped on a bus to California and had myself legally emancipated when I was sixteen.
I could feel it even now when I thought about my dreams. Iloathedmy father. Aeron wouldn’t confirm or deny, but I knew he wasn’t dead. He was pure evil if he let those people do those things to me as a child. He was probably alive and kicking. Evil people were like cockroaches and difficult to kill. He probably has his own gang like Scooter did and was raping and eating people. I couldn’t remember much about him, but I just got this vibe based on what I could remember that he’d resort to that and not feel bad about it at all.
Aeron looked so relieved when I remembered something. I think he wanted me to remember more than I did, and I wanted my memories back more than anything. He would get so excited and try to fill in what he could. He would start talking, then realize he might tell me too much and clam up.
Apparently, my memory loss was like Meremoth. It shouldn’t have been possible, and I’d never heard of anything like it before. All Aeron would confirm was that it wasn’t natural, and I wasn’t ready to hear it yet. My working theory was that someone had cross-bred a horse with some sort of weird DNA and created some kind of super horse like Meremoth. I was pretty sure someone brainwashed me before they put me in a coma, so I wouldn’t remember. Why Aeron couldn’t tell me that, I had no idea.
I breathed a sigh of relief when I saw theWelcome to Californiasign. Aeron said I was born in New York, but it felt like I was coming home. Sure, the sign had been vandalized, but I was back. Aeron pointed to one of the symbols on the sign. It was a bloody eye.
“The Forsaken run California now. It’s a tight run ship. They’ve got people in every city. They’ve granted me access to the border, but we must present you as we did in Gabriel’s Haven. I know California is your home, but shit has changed. They don’t let anyone in that hasn’t been vetted now. California is one of the remaining states that survived, and it’s all because people came together to make it so. They have some pretty harsh policies here. If you aren’t contributing or you cause trouble, they banish you. They put a bag over your head, drive you out a way, and just leave you.”
“Remind me not to piss them off.”
“Just follow the rules. Don’t steal, don’t kill, and if they give you a job, do it without complaint. Everyone pitches in, and they look down on taking more than what you are given.”
Meremoth approached a wall that was similar to the one around Gabriel’s Haven. This one was even bigger. Did they build a wall around California? Just like Gabriel’s Haven, we were greeted by guns first. A head popped over and glared at us. Aeron wasn’t recognized on sight this time.
“What do you want?”
Aeron reached in his bag and pulled a white cloth with a red eye painted on it.
“I’ve been given access, but she hasn’t. She’s from Los Angeles. We are just passing through. We are hoping to stop by her old apartment, and then we will be on our way.”
“Supposing her apartment is now occupied. They might not want her in there, and we don’t like violence.”
“It’s not occupied. I worked that out directly with Jade.”
“Ooh, fancy. How do we know your friend doesn’t intend to cause trouble?”
“I’ll vouch for her. You can call Jade, and she’ll vouch for me. As I said, we are only passing through. We don’t intend to stay. I just need to get her to her old apartment.”
The man at the gate whipped out a satellite phone. I guess to call this mysterious Jade. Did Aeron have a satellite phone to call his team? I’d never seen him with one this entire time, but he said he’d spoken with them. Why would he hide a phone from me? Who was I going to call, anyway?
The man at the gate wrapped up his conversation, but he still looked at us like he trusted us about as far as he could throw us.
