Liam followed the man that had just entered the woods. They walked through the wet bushes until the man stopped in front of a cavity of a wall of rocks. Liam looked from the darkness of the hole to the guy in the beanie.
"What am I doing here?" he broke the silence.
"You need rest?" the man queried.
Liam narrowed his eyes. He was not sure if the person in front of him was to trust or not. He was an intuitive type of person and he could not, for the time being, sense an inimical energy radiating off from the guy. He then put his backpack down on the floor of the cavity.
"You dug this all up?" he asked.
"No, it was already there when I stumbled here last night," the man replied. "You don't really remember me?"
"Um, no, not really."
"You crashed your cycle into my shin."
"Oh." Liam nodded, looking at the gray sideburns of the man. "Oh, yeah, I remember you."
The man sat down beside him. "I'm Rico, by the way."
"Nice to meet you again, sir."
"Amid chaos."
Liam pursed his lips.
"Have you been all alone?" Rico took off his beanie. "Where are you from?"
"The suburbs have already fallen, sir." Liam took a mouthful of water, then sighed. "I'm off to see my father."
"But you were heading out northwest. The road will lead you to the city."
"Yes, sir, I'm going to the city."
"Well, in case you don't know, those so-called Neo-Cimmerians in this area came from there."
"Well, my father is there so."
Rico clicked his tongue. "You'll die there, kid. There aren't many of us left, you know. How did you even know your father is still—"
"He's," Liam stood up while putting on his backpack, "alive, sir. Thanks for earlier, by the way."
"Kid, you won't get there."
"You'll die on the road, I swear."
"Hey!"
Liam ignored Rico, then walked over the thickets and later reached the road. He stopped at an alley and rested for some minutes. Despite the chilly winds, his skin was flooding with sweat not because of the thick clothes he had on but of the tension he got whenever hearing shrieking voices dittoed through the speechless lanes. He heard a creaking sound from the side and saw a door opening. The strong acrid odor coming out of the opening made him feel like throwing up. He spat his slimy saliva out and covered his nose with the hem of his undershirt.
As a greyman passed by the alley, he panicked and ended up entering the stinking building. He shut the door and held his breath. He inhaled again and the odor in the area grew more vexing in the nose as seconds passed. There were no spots of light in the room, so Liam could not do anything but walk the anonymous floor. He gripped his bat and held it in front of him as if he was in a medieval duel. After turning to his left, his fist bumped into something soft and viscid. He brought his face towards the thing and as it touched his nose, his stomach lost its grip. He retched liquids out to the floor. His eyes grew watery as the tangy aftertaste dwelled in his mouth.
He stopped moving when a series of footsteps echoed in the distance. He stepped back until his backpack hit the wall, his respiration getting heavy. He noticed a ray of light piercing through a small opening of the window, so he paced towards it and creaked the window open. He jumped over the powdery windowsill and, not knowing there were steps on the outside of the building, tumbled down until he was on the sidewalk already.
He then treaded the rows of concrete-enclosed gardens and ended up entering a telephone booth. After sliding the door close, he saw a group of greymen walking in his direction. He was not sure if one of them saw him, but as they got closer, he knew he screwed up. Pairs of wide eyes met him and he just froze in his position, not knowing what else to do.
"Shit," he said under his breath.
"Hey."
Liam looked around him after hearing a familiar voice.
"Down."
Liam lowered his sight and found Rico crouching by the booth--beyond the greymen's visual reach.
"Leave the booth right after the blast," Rico said.
Liam just wrinkled his brows in confusion, but later got the implication. After a loud explosion caught the greymen's attention, he skedaddled out of the telephone booth and ran after Rico. They turned to the adjacent street, then went through a narrow alley. Rico hopped onto a large garbage bin and slid the fire exit ladder down. They then climbed the ladder and reached the balcony of the second floor of the building. They sat down against the railings, their eyes closed and chests moving back and forth.
Liam sighed while seeing Rico looking daggers at him. "What? Why?"
"You were almost . . . dead," Rico let out.
"But I'm not."
"You reek of . . . spoiled meat or something, disgusting."
"I thought they were human bodies hung on the ceiling." Liam closed his eyes. "It was a meat stock room. Anyway, what was the explosion?"
"Just lit a random car." Rico stood up and checked the inside of the apartment through the windowpane. "It feels like we're good in here."
Liam was not convinced enough that Rico was trustworthy. He knew that the man looked like a genuine guy and he had just saved him earlier. There were questions in his mind he wanted to ask Rico about, but they, he thought, might be taken as an offense.
"Why did you help me, sir?" he said with a serious tone.
"As I told you in the woods, we have to stick together as our kind is in a great depression." Rico turned the doorknob and open the door. "I'm not whatever you think I can be. Keep your bat ready."
Liam nodded in agreement and together, they entered the apartment. The whole lounge was clean. Rico put the couch against the door while Liam searched the fridge. After doing another round of investigation around the house, Rico sat on the couch while Liam went to the bathroom and tidied up himself, washing the foul odor off his skin.
Through a broken windowpane, he saw the sky growing gray, thick thunderheads blanketing across it. Liam sighed as he thought of his father, friends, school, and work. He missed school activities — the Arts interschool meet — the aroma of coffee at the café, and whatnots — the former course of life in general. He soughed at the thought and finished cleansing up.
He got out of the bathroom and settled down by Rico. They sat on the couch in pure speechlessness. Liam rested his head on the backrest and sighed in depth.
He then turned to Rico. "What will happen now, sir?"
Rico shrugged. "Earth herself has turned cold, literally and metaphorically, so I don't really know."
"What were you doing at the school on that day, by the way?"
Rico scratched his scalp. "Just, um, getting something for my . . . son."
"Oh, were we classmates somehow?"
"He was a fourteenth grader."
"Oh, where's he now?"
Rico bowed down. "He just . . . um, died two days ago."
"Oh, I'm sorry, sir." Liam straightened up in his seat. "Because of . . . this? I mean—"
"Yes."
"I'm giving you my sincerest condolences, sir."
Liam did not know that Rico was bereaved. The man seemed to have enough physical vigor that it hid his emotional and psychological burdens. Liam heaved a heavy sigh at the thought of finding Lesley breathless the time he arrived at the city.
"I've been moving on more easily than I expected I would." Rico smiled. "My son will always be a godsend in my life."
"I'm sure he feels so loved wherever he is right now," Liam added. "You feel fine, sir?"
"I do and please drop the formality. You can call me by my name, I don't mind. Anyway, what's your name?"
"Oh, um, you can call me Liam."
"Have you eaten yet?"
Liam shrugged. "I don't feel like eating. What's in your backpack?"
Rico tapped his bag twice. "Canned foods. I was at a small market when the pale people attacked our backyard."
"I saw that this apartment building has a rooftop. Can we somehow get up there?"
"Not when they're around."
"So we can?" Liam crossed his arms as a gust of wind hit him. "We could use them to get out of this area."
Rico tilted his head a little bit. "So you're really going to the city, huh?"
"My father is in there so."
"Do you know where he's exactly at?"
"No, but he works in real estate, worked rather."
"There are only two places that headquarter real estate business in Tres Lados though."
"Yeah, I just need a map." Liam squatted with a knee on the floor. "I feel like I can avoid those greymen."
"You truly have got the guts, kid, haven't you?" Rico stood up and walked towards the window. "Well, um, I can't really let you go alone knowing that the streets are plagued with our mother-naked bloodthirsty cousins. I'll come along."
"You sure, sir?"
"I am, I don't have anything left in our neighborhood anyway."
"Um, okay?"
"You want to check out the rooftops, right?" Rico took the beanie off his head and pulled back his hair. "Then let's have a quick inspection."
Liam nodded, then followed Rico up the steps. Rico unfastened the latches of a metal trapdoor, the hinges rasping as he swung the door open. Icy winds met them as they stepped onto the rooftop which was filled with pots of overgrown, sapless bonsai on the corners. Liam pulled the zipper of his jacket up to the top stops. He and Rico stayed hunkered down behind the thick railings.
They looked over the surrounding streets, alleys, and feeders across the vicinity. There were scattered impaled bodies almost everywhere and smoking vehicles were piled across the lanes. Liam's hair on the nape and arms rose in an overwhelming manner when he glanced at a man hung by the neck to the top balcony of the next building. He stepped back and sighed in horror.
Rico moved near him. "What?"
"Nothing, I just--" Liam knelt. "Do you know an easier route to the city?"
"No, all I know is we have to go through an exurb."
"Exurb?"
"Don't mind it, it's just another settlement." Rico stood up and exhaled a cloud of breath. "It's freezing out here. We'll move building to building when it dusks."
"What? We don't have any flashlights on us," Liam said.
"I've got some."
"Right."
They stayed on the rooftop for a few more minutes until they decided to eat, so they went down to the apartment and warmed canned goods and water in the kitchen. They ate in silence while talking about individual experiences they had gone through from the freezing temperature to the current worldwide carnage. After filling their stomachs with enough stock, they cleaned themselves and got ready to take off. They vaulted into the balcony as the already flimsy moonlight died out.
Rico handed Liam a flashlight. "How are you feeling?"
"I'm sort of nauseous," Liam replied while fastening his backpack's waist belt.
"You really want to do this?"
"I can go solo though."
"I won't let you though." Rico set his feet on the ladder and climbed down a few rungs. "Keep your steps light."
Liam jounced his head in agreement. They climbed down the rungs and alighted on the ground in successful silence. They crossed several streets filled with rotting flesh until they stopped by a bakery. Liam could feel his flesh numbing as time passed. He drank a mouthful of the tepid water they had boiled earlier.
They later moved ahead, pacing rather fast and hiding in the shadows of buildings at the same time. The smell the scattered corpses and body parts gave off was fetid enough that the two needed to cover their noses and mouths with a few layers of cloths. The silence of the surroundings was earsplitting Liam could not hear anything but his heavy respiration and their footsteps. The air whistled as the rain clouds did their casual fast flight across the night sky. The two halted in front of a flower shop.
"The place is clean," Rico announced as he descended the stairs. "Let's get some rest here."
"I can still go on." Liam looked around. "The night is still young, I guess."
"You'll drain yourself, Liam."
"Fine, where?"
"Upstairs, obviously."
"There's no grayman there?" Liam queried.
"Would I be here if there was?" Rico grabbed his forearm. "Come on before your so-called greymen pop out of nowhere."
They went upstairs, then connected the upholstered chairs to form a bed-like structure. They lay down the chairs next to each other and, from time to time, clapped out mosquitoes feasting on their unclad skin. Liam crossed his arms and let a long, chilly breath out. His breathing quivered along with his hands. He was in pure deep freeze and the thick clothes on him had gotten arctic as well. He opened his eyelids when the felt Rico moving.
Rico removed his jacket and shirt. "Take your clothes off."
"Wait, why?" Liam sat up straight.
"You need warmth. Come on, I'm freezing here too."
"Fine." Liam put off his jacket and layers of sleeved shirt. "What now?"
Rico lay motionless on his side. "Come on here."
"What the— What's that?"
"We need to generate heat more than we lose."
Liam sighed before resting his head on Rico's upper arm. "Man, this is weird."
"Tell me about it." Rico put his arms around the boy's shoulders.
Liam soughed, then gave in, nestling the other guy. He closed his eyes as he felt his body grow warmer. He could hear Rico's fleeting heartbeats and, in a split second, thought about Lesley. He wondered how cold and hungry his father might have been wherever he was. He just wished he was safe and promised that they would be soon reunited. He recalled the things they would face tomorrow until he dozed off.