Jake Morrison's Arc

Chapter 21 of 54

Jake followed the laughing man's tracks off the empty cove. Marcus came with him, wrench in hand. The prints crossed the sand and cut into the treeline. Sofia stayed near the cabins with the map. Marisol worked the radio in the boat shed. "He didn't run for the water," Marcus said. "He ran inland." Jake nodded. A breach in the wall let creatures in. A man inside was worse. He could open a door on purpose. They moved through the pines toward the cluster of cabins. Solar panels caught the low sun on the peaked roofs. Boats knocked against the pilings below. Jake checked each porch. Doors he had shut last night still stood shut. Then he saw one hanging open, the frame splintered near the latch. "Here," he said. Inside, the laughing man crouched by the far window. He had pried a board loose from the shore fence and dragged it up. He held it against the glass, working the nails free. He grinned when he saw Jake. "They're coming anyway," he said. "Better to let them in fast." Sweat shone on his face. His arm had a fresh bite, red at the edges. Jake understood. The man was turning, and he wanted the wall down. "Drop it," Jake said. The man laughed and swung the board. Jake ducked and caught it on his shoulder. Marcus stepped in and drove the wrench into the man's ribs. He folded. Jake wrenched the board free and pinned him to the floor. The bite meant one thing. Jake had seen it too many times. He looked at Marcus. Marcus looked back and gave one short nod. Jake did what the shore needed. They checked the whole cabin. The window held. The fence board had not opened anything. The man had breached the wall, but he had breached nothing else. Jake dragged the fence plank back to the shed himself. Sofia counted it back onto her lumber pile. "One board," she said. "We can nail it home before dark." By afternoon the shore had teeth. Marcus and the strangers hammered fence into the six landing points. Sofia matched each board to her list. Two survivors dropped lines off the good dock and pulled up fish. Marisol had the radio working. Sofia knelt in a cleared patch behind the cabins and pressed seeds into the dirt. The island looked less like a hiding place and more like a home. Marisol found Jake at dusk. His eyes were raw. His hands had stopped shaking hours ago and now just hung. "You've been up two days," she said. "Frank and Marcus will find anyone else. Sleep." She led him into a cabin and the low bed. Jake lay down still in his boots. Marisol pulled them off and lay beside him. She rubbed slow circles on his back. "The wall holds," she said. "We hold." Jake let his eyes close. For the first time in weeks, nothing was clawing at the door.