Here's To Humanity

Chapter 10

Months have passed since I broke my leg, it's still a little painful to walk on, Keir thinks it didn't heal quite right. We were met by some people wandering, we were completely by ourselves for 34 days, 34 days without seeing another person. We had a few run ins with wild animals, not very fun, especially being bit by a couple wild dogs. My left arm has scars of teeth just above my elbow. We found some crutches which helped make me a little less defenceless and Keir could walk freely. We stopped at an abandoned motel along the side of a highway. It's windows were shattered and the doors off their hinges. We must have been a little to loud because that's when they found us, Dahmani, Amari, Ty and Cassidy. They had to get to a place called Greenhouse Port in Nova Scotia, considering we were only a few kilometres from the border of New Brunswick and Nova Scotia, we tagged along, just trying to find more people. They didn't allow us any weapons so we had to trust them, and trust was difficult before the world ended. Long story short, we got to their camp. Lots of people sat around the fence with their guns aimed at us. It was interesting, getting in. Question after question followed by tests, not academic kind of tests, but tests on logic and survival. We were all assigned jobs, I was put onto wall duty, Keir was put into the scouting and hunting group, Ty, Dahmani were also placed with Keir. Amari and Cassidy were placed into basic things like stock count and dealing with livestock. With wall duty we don't use guns, those are used for emergencies only, like seeing other people. We still keep hand guns at our side but we use bows, mainly compound but I have been stuck with a recurve, not to bad but a little harder to hold back for long periods of time. I'm always paired up with one young girl, I would say no older than fifteen. Everyday our shift starts at six and ends at twelve. Today I wait for her by the east guard tower. She approaches with her head held low and the snow cracking under feet even sounds upset, not crackling as optimistically when she would walk fast.
"You good Mattea?" I ask in a quiet voice, most people are still sleeping.
"Yeah, I'm great." She replies, when I met her she was already very sarcastic, similar to me. I ignore her sarcasm and we walk through the gates. We walk in silence, she's wearing a black coat, a red hat and red gloves.
"A penny for your thought." I say and look at her. She looks at me confused.
"What does that mean?" She asks.
"What's on your mind?" I ask in simpler terms.
"Nothing." She replies.
"Nothing, nothing at all. No thoughts on today, tomorrow," I pause and look at her, "boys?" I ask. She smiles, looks at me and looks away. "Ah." I say, finally getting her drift. "Boys are weird." I start off.
"No shit Sherlock." She says back shaking her head in agreement.
"Ok. So what's the situation?" I ask her, hoping I can give her some advice. I might be able to, I might not.
"What do you do if they says something but do something completely different?" She asks. I'm extremely surprised by her actually have a conversation and asking me for advice.
"Ok, well. How many times has it happened?" I ask, need more information before coming to a solution.
"Twice." She replies in a heartbeat.
"Well if it's only twice I wouldn't worry about it." I say looking down at her. She looks at me like she didn't get an answer, or at least the answer she wanted. "Keep talking to him. If he continues, ask him."
"What if it's a bad answer, like not what I'm looking for?" Her eyes show a little bit of remorse from asking the question.
"Then you'll know, you won't have to waste anymore time worrying." I say, it might be kind of harsh for a girl who only has a crush but it's true. When you have your answer it makes it that much easier to walk away, or at least forget about it. We walk for a few more minutes of silence but the whole mood has changed and there is a feeling of relief. I hope it works out for her and whoever. Who though? There aren't many teens here. I would probably be able to guess once I had the right information.

It's was around eight thirty when I looked at my watch last. Our shift seemed to be dragging on until we hear a scream from the trees. We both sprint into the forest chasing after the sound. The snow is difficult to run in and the ice doesn't help either. I look to my right and see two more guards that were on wall duty sprinting as fast as us. The scream happens again but we're closer. It's the scream of a child now. We get closer and see a moose running towards them. The only thing helping the mother and son are the trees. This moose isn't very large but still large enough to kill them. There is a dog barking at the moose, but anytime it gets closer it scampers away. I draw my bow back, not even thinking of my gun and shoot, it lets out a sound of pain but doesn't stop. The sound of gun fire beside me makes me jump and soon the moose falls and lays on the ground dead. The mother and son both look at us and then the moose in disbelief. The mothers brown hair is tied back and messy, the sons red hair is the same. The son clings onto his mothers thigh. They walk over to us and thank us. They start to walk away, quickly, like they are trying to get away from us.
"Where abouts are you traveling to?" I ask her she stops and turns around.
"Anywhere but here." She says.
"Come back with us, we have a camp." I invite them. Mattea looks at me funny. The mother nods and walks back to us. One guard whistles and twirls his arm in the air, looking back towards Greenhouse Port. Scouts come rushing out and run to the moose and they all do their best to carry it. Keir is among them, so is Ty but Dahmani isn't. I shrug it off and walk with the rest of the guards.