My mind is filled with terrible images again, as night shadows fly around in my mind.
I can see Judy's face, as she sits looking at me. Instead of holding a gun, pointing at me, she holds out a flower, prodding it towards me, a gift of reconciliation. Her face is a picture of pleading, wondering why I killed her, she only wanted to be together again.
I feel myself moving fitfully in my sleep, but my eyes refuse to open, I cannot wake. I know it is a part of me that is demanding retribution of myself for what happened, but my mind, the intelligent part, dictates that what I did was survival, as disgusting as it was. I refuse to bow down to recriminations over what I had to do, and knew was right.
I wake, covered in sweat, breathing heavily. At last I escape the morass of fear and loathing that encompasses me. It is still dark outside, but I can see the edge of dawn approaching. Sleep no longer holds me, and so now is as good a time as ever to begin my preparations.
Time. It is a concept that no longer seems to matter, and yet it rings around my mind, wondering of its importance in the wasted world we no inhabit. I wonder if there are even working clocks around any more.
My body as always now aches and my head thumps. I take a drink from a flask of water; it is cold down my throat, but quenches my thirst and feels good. I sit a moment, trying to grow accustomed to the poor light, and see shadows dancing around before me. A thought occurs that perhaps I am suffering with a fever, or some other sickness, something that is most likely a death sentence. I have nothing for this, no medicine, no treatment. If I get sick I will need help, so I put it to the back of my mind to look out for new supplies.
Strange that in all her findings, Judy never had any.
I take a large satchel, one of the fine things that Judy had acquired. It is leather, well made and sturdy. I fill it with bottles of water, some dry food and plenty of ammunition, both for pistol and rifle. I feel secure now that come what may, I will have the resources and experience to cope.
Surely my clothes need some attention. The rags I am wearing are hardly suitable for the work I do, let alone what passes as shoes for me. As much as I need medicine, I certainly need clothes and boots. It is my first order of business, to see if I can buy some.
I take a small cloth pouch, and fill it with caps, possibly around two hundred. Should be enough to get what I need.
Standing takes time as my weary joints moan about having to lift me up again. At least now these complaints are not driven by hunger and thirst.
I walk out into the cool morning air once more, and ignoring all that is around my my walk towards the sellers. The area is quiet this early, but still some are milling around, setting up tables and adding goods.
'Hey, anyone around here sell clothes, or boots?' I ask one woman. She looks elderly, but spritely for her age. She looks up at me, as small as she is, there is fire in her eyes.
'Clothes, mebbe, not much, but no boots.' She says and laughs loudly, giggling like a witch. 'Boots are like caps galore... everyone wants them.' She continues, before looking away and continuing to tend to her stall.
It was as much as I feared. I shall have to forage for my own needs outside, as well as searching for this missing man.
I offer thanks, but she ignores me, intent only on her business.
As I walk out of the gates, I cannot help but feel nervous. The last time I did this I had someone to watch my back, and she herself was the supposed victim of slavers. I shiver, not only for the frigid air, but for the wonder of what is to come.
I walk, this time a path between the side of the river, and the way to the town I had benefited so much from. The ground is harder here, like walking on the slippery slope of a mountain edge. Grass grows here and there, looking weather worn and thin, with occasional cacti sporadically laid out in random order. As I progress, the greenery seems to thicken, as if it is an old run off from the river.
I hear a crunching sound, like gravel being misplaced. I think nothing of it, until I take a few more steps, and see something tiny but dark moving along the ground ahead. I stop for a moment, looking to see what it is, to allow my eyes to focus on the object. It seems to be a spider-like creature, fumbling around.
I step a little closer, and bend over, to gain a greater view. It looks like a nasty little thing, covered in black hair, but large eyes and fangs from the front that could certainly do some damage.
What shocks me the most is it seems to have part of a human hand wedged in between its left fang; the spider is carnivorous!
It is dragging the piece of flesh along slowly, from where I cannot see, nor where to. Strange. As I stand up I hear a crunch underfoot, and look down to see I have stood on one of the things. A hissing sound erupts as the spider bleeds out, a kind of dark green gunge.
The sounds of disturbing gravel erupts too, close to me, and now I see more and more of these spider things crawling out from holes all around. they seem to be approaching me, fast.
I skip, dance away and run further down the trail, glancing back to see a black river of spiders following me. They move fast, perhaps faster than I can. I panic, sprinting ahead, but the surging sounds of their encroachment drives my mind wild.
I am about to be engulfed in flesh hungry spiders...
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