The Long Dark by B.J. Farmer (reading women .TXT) 📕

I noticed Quill, on many occasions, while Duane spoke, stealing glances at me as he droned on about hope and a merciful God. I really think she was there as much as anything because I didn’t take part.  She was there because Duane and Avery protected her – protected her from me. Which was a bit odd, considering Duane’s outrage over her the first night we arrived.

It’s a bad deal, really, the whole damn thing. I almost did kill her. Not that I couldn’t or wouldn’t. I just didn’t. I was in the process of pulling the trigger when Avery called out to me. Sadness, disappointment, and anger reverberated through his words. I hesitated long enough to see his face. His look along with Quill’s will forever leave my memory branded with horrified faces and the moment, right or wrong, where I destroyed years of trust, where Avery and I were concerned.

Even if I had been affiliated, God and I probably wouldn’t have been on speaking terms after that. Probably better off, I wasn’t. Less guilt to feel, I guess.

Aside from the issue with Quill and as a result, Avery, things were going well. Over the last several days, we settled into what almost felt like normal life. Normal as could be expected, anyway. We had food and drink to last several more weeks. We had learned how to shoot, clean, and reload our guns. Avery had really taken to the shotgun. He could disassemble it, clean it, and have it back together in a short minute.

Avery had dug into learning Korean but was growing frustrated by the difficulty of translating the longer messages. He suggested that software scrambled the longer messages just enough that the context was jumbled. I asked him it was a dialect issue. Maybe the Korean in the North was different than what was being taught in the book. His answer was typical Avery. “We can understand Sam, even though he butchers the English language.”

I guessed that it was a valid point.

He had, however, translated most of the short ones, which weren’t very helpful. They reiterated many of the things we already knew about the Order, like the infighting and general chaos caused by the Grays and the disagreement about how to deal with them.

One of the most interesting bits was what wasn’t written. Donald had received numerous messages in the hours before we got to Barrow, but he hadn’t replied to any of them. He had gone silent. Obviously, that didn’t make sense, because he had had the phone on him when we killed him at the radar base. So, either that wasn’t Donald, which seemed more likely by that point, or he had talked directly to the people who had sent him messages (some of which were nasty – like the ones calling him a traitor). There was no way of knowing.

Loud beeping awoke me from my ruminations.

“What the fuck?” Avery said as he pushed several combinations of buttons on the phone. “It is dead – FUCKING DEAD!”

The door nearly came off its hinges as Sam busted in. He gulped for air as he yelled, “Get your stuff, ready, boys. Shit’s ‘bout ta get real!”

“What?” I yelped, as I quickly came to my feet.

“Some of ‘em Order fellers and a bunch of damn Grays is unloadin down ‘ere by the generators. ‘Ey gonna be on us in just a couple minutes.”

Seconds later, something metallic smacked against the door. “Barricade the--” Before I could finish, Quill covered her ears and screamed in pain. “It’s over there! It’s over there! Please, it’s over there! Please, get it – get it!” She cried out, pointing towards where the metallic sound came from.

A thunderous rumbling of footfalls off in the distance made Quill’s unexplainable sudden discomfort less relevant. “Get ready!” I yelled.

The first wave smacked against the entrance. We hurriedly turned over two of the larger dinner tables for cover, as the sound of flesh pounding on the exterior walls multiplied exponentially. There were no gunshots, just bodies slamming, fist-pounding, and feet kicking at the walls. It wouldn’t do the Order any good to kill their own weapons. Nonetheless, I knew if we killed enough of the Grays, the gunfire would come soon enough.

A pane of glass fell to the floor in a crash. Hands protruded through the empty space, teeth chattered, as Grays violently sniffed at the air.  I turned my attention towards Avery. I just needed to make sure he was okay one last time before the Grays got inside.

He was tending to Quill, who up until seconds ago, was trying to escape Avery’s grasp, trying to get at some object outside. At that moment, though, she was lying almost paralyzed with fear or exhaustion or some other cause I wasn’t aware of. He made sure she had plenty of cover between the two overturned tables. I saw his lips moving, but the din was so loud, I couldn’t make out what he was saying. In that short moment, I felt complex feelings welling up. I had grown so accustomed to it being just he and I that I felt sad that I might not get to say goodbye to him, but I also felt something akin to pride watching him care for someone else. I thought about yelling out to him that I loved him, but Sam’s shouts took precedence.

“I need some extra ammo, son,” Sam repeated. I slid him the bag we had stored most of the ammunition in. He quickly grabbed several magazines and then pushed it back to me. I took what I needed before sliding it to Duane.

Duane was a mess. He dropped a magazine at least three times before he finally fumbled it around enough that it fell into his back pocket. His eyes were wide as he managed a nod in my direction. I think Duane hadn’t taken us seriously up until that moment about just how bad things really were. I had mixed feelings about him to be