Dead Ones

Prologue 2: Journey

I arose with the sun on the all too comfortable queen sized mattress. I got my things ready for travel, doing one last sweep of the residence for anything else that might be useful to me. I would have taken the entire pantry with me if I could have, but I only grabbed a couple extra cans of food. I still wanted to keep my pack on the lighter side to make my travel as easy as possible. I exited the house, ran down the front steps, and took a right, starting to make my way down the street once again. I paused for a moment at an intersection to consult my map. With the path I had marked out, with a constant pace, it would take me two and a half days to reach my home by foot. That wasn't impossible, but the sooner I got home, the better. I looked around the intersection. Everywhere there were parked cars. All, I assumed, most likely still had a decent amount of gas inside. I was debating whether or not to hot-wire one and use it to travel. That would take the long trip and make it only a few hours. I had no traffic laws to obey. I could be going eighty miles per hour for all I cared. Rochester, New Hampshire was about a three hour car trip to Bangor. I decided against using a car. Although it would cut my travel time by a significant amount, it made too much noise.  Stealth was important. True I have been walking down the center of the road, but at least that way I can see everything around me. I preferred traveling by foot anyway. It reminded me of my time in the service. Carrying sixty pounds of gear over treacherous terrain. Baking in the sun on the always shifting, unstable sand. I remember my brothers in arms. All of us, exhausted and weighed down.  Every day was an adventure. We never knew when we would be getting shot at next. Being up North again was unfamiliar to me. It had been a while since my deployment, but it was a big change from sweating your balls off every day, to needing to seek shelter daily, especially at nighttime. It was not winter time, but temperatures barely passed seventy degrees during the day.  I folded and slid the map back into my pack. I rose from my kneeling position. I continued my trek for another couple yards, but paused again momentarily. A motivating sight met my eyes. I needed not to hot-wire a car, nor travel by foot for many days.  I gazed upon two wheels with a handle bar. A bicycle...

A bicycle would take the two and a half day trip by foot, to about a little over half a day. I approached it where it leaned against a tree. I grabbed both handles and stood it up straight. After disturbing the bike, and the tree it leaned on, something solid fell from the tree, hitting the sidewalk with a feint thud. It was an unsettling sound. A sound of that of an over ripe peach falling from its tree, splitting open when hitting the ground. A peach would be the best case scenario compared to what  had actually fallen from the tree. The stiff body of a rodent, a squirrel, had fallen from the adolescent tree. The poor creature seemed to have been dead for a while, but it seemed not from natural causes. The rodent had a decently large chunk taken out of its back. It looked like a bite mark. Something had taken a mouthful out of the poor creature. The anatomy of the rodent presented itself to me as clear as day as it laid next to my transportation. I could tell it had been there for quite some time, due to the smell and the aura of maggots that spilled out of the gaping hole in its back as it lay on the ground. I pushed the gruesome sight from my mind, mounted the bike, and pushed off. I started off a little shakily. It had been a decade since I had last rode a bike. I regained the skill quickly though. I hopped off of the sidewalk back into my usual place in the center of the road. I had about ten more hours of daylight. I will ride until I needed to stop for the night.  This part of the city, near the outskirts, a lot of the buildings seemed identical. It was bleak and boring. It was like I was biking on a treadmill, seemingly traveling distance, but my surroundings stayed the same. The only real differences were the different color and model cars parked on the sides of the road. The houses had some unique features to them, but their architecture was the same. Much like Levittown and Bristol in Pennsylvania. I grew up there. These homes however, were more like two story row homes. Most had stairs leading up to the door for the first floor due to there also being basements. I much preferred the rural areas of Maine. Not cities. I didn't like the busy streets and communities of homes.  In certain areas of Maine, it was your home, and your neighbor's home a few acres away. Nothing but trees for miles. The nearest anything from the house was about thirty minutes away in any direction by car ride. That's how I liked my living. Solitude. I guess that's why I am prospering so much right now. I preferred being alone, and right now, being alone is the only option I have. Being alone can get lonely at times though. I don't exactly miss human interaction, because people tend to be scum bags. I missed one person in particular though. I missed her company. Our conversations. Not just the romance, but the friendship as well. I missed her being a part of my life. I had noticed that I begun to let my mind wander again. I didn't mind it. I kept note of where I was going with the bike. I was riding on a winding road now. I had left the semi urban suburbs, and now was riding on a road that was on the side of a cliff. I had most likely crossed the border by now into Maine. A hill to my left, and a guard rail to my right, with a steep drop off. I disregarded my surroundings once more and began the second nature movements again, this time working the pedals. My mind went elsewhere...