2 DAYS LATER. BRIDGE ON THE LITTLE WABASH NEAR WYNOOSE, NEW STATE OF WABASH (PCG) OR ILLINOIS (TNG). 5:12 AM CST. THURSDAY, AUGUST 21, 2025.
By morning twilight,
Pauline thought she’d gained some ground, after the dogs and men
had flushed her in the middle of the night; she’d started out
almost in bowshot of them, diving out the broken window of the
abandoned Subway when she heard them, but she’d doubled around and
lost them, zagged over to another road, and probably put a solid
mile between herself and them.
The gray light let
her see the sign: ENTERING WYNOOSE IL.
Her heart
sank.
When she had gone off
with the tribe, on their way out they’d sacked and burned Wynoose.
That was when they chained me, after I tried
to run away.
If I had known, one mile before we came here, back then .
. .
If I had realized where I was the first day we were at
Montezuma . . .
If I had just kept moving after getting away . .
.
She’d rather have
gone around Wynoose, but she needed that bridge. The Little Wabash
is much smaller than the Wabash, but in this hill and ridge
country, the Little Wabash’s channel was often narrow and its
current swift, and if she got in trouble trying to swim it, she
didn’t have any energy or strength left to recover.
Twilight brightened.
Many charred buildings gaped, their insides gone, but with
concealment for fifty men behind those black, ruined
walls.
She passed among the
dreary black shells of Wynoose at as much of a run as she could
manage. Thick, leafy trees closed in around the road, dense and
still black as if some of the night had stuck to them, but a pale
red light was reaching down to the road.
She was hurrying down
the slope to the bridge when the arrow struck her calf. She cried
out and staggered; another arrow flew through the space where she
had been.
She broke the arrow’s
shaft off with both hands (oh God no oh God
don’t shoot me in the ass), leaving its point in her calf,
and tried to run on, despite the searing pain shooting up her leg.
Another arrow passed an inch from her head, but she was going to
cross this bridge, cross it, one more river to
cross—
She heard them
running behind her, and the click of the dogs’ toenails on the
pavement. She was going to take at least one fucker with
her—make them kill me now, not what they did
to Steve Ecco.
The bridge deck was
under her feet now, the other bank just a sprint away, if she could
only sprint instead of hobble. She heard the man’s breathing behind
her—
A flash from the
opposite bank, a thud and moan behind her. She gained a step on her
pursuer; another flash. The other man behind her
screamed.
She heard a clatter
of dog claws on the bridge behind her, and then a yelp as something
sailed past her; more yelps, and she realized someone over there is throwing rocks at the dogs.
She hobbled forward, and a man burst out of the brush by the
opposite bridgehead and ran toward her, still chucking rocks, his
slow-to-load gun slung over his shoulder.
The dogs yipped at
each other, broke, and ran; prolly dog-ese for
“I didn’t sign up for this.”
The man raced past
her, but she knew by the coonskin cap who it was. She looked back
and that tripped her. Sitting up, she watched with satisfaction as
Freddie Pranger finished off the first, unconscious Daybreaker with
a hatchet blow to the forehead. Pranger walked up to the other one,
who was still clutching his torn belly, planted his boot on the
man’s neck, and as the man shrieked “Please!” Pranger whipped his
hatchet over his head and brought it down in a deep chop into the
back of the man’s skull.
Pranger wiped the ax
on the dead man’s pants and hurried back to Pauline. “Was’at all’at
was chasing you?”
“Yeah.”
“Well, then, let’s
fix you up and get you home.”
Poor old Freddie
looked so bewildered when she started to cry, but she couldn’t seem
to stop to tell him it was okay.