Fall of Venus Read online

  Fall of Venus

  Daelynn Quinn

  Copyright © 2013 Erin Meredith

  All Rights Reserved

  “One’s greatest fear, when confronted,

  Invokes one’s greatest strength.”

  ~Anonymous

  Prologue

  Dear Drake,

  I’m engaged! Last night was purely magical. Glenn and I lay out in the freshly mown grass at Macville Park, watching the glittering fireworks rain down on us while he proposed. I’m so in love and I can’t wait to spend the rest of my life with him. I haven’t told mom and dad yet. You know how they will react. I’ve only been out of high school for two years and they are going to think I’m not ready. But Glenn and I have been together for five years now and I just know he is the one.

  Mom and Dad are both sick right now, came down with some sort of cold. Or maybe it’s allergies. They have been doing a lot of gardening outside since coming up from the bunker after this past summer. I’ll tell them when they are feeling better.

  Evie misses you dearly, as we all do. We still haven’t told her yet—waiting for the right time. How do you tell a little girl with no mother that her father died? She’s going to make a beautiful flower girl at our wedding.

  Wish you were here,

  Pollen

  Chapter 1

  My arms and legs twitch with a tingling, itchy sensation and my cheek hurts when I stretch my mouth to yawn. A sharp, stinging pain radiates from the right side of my forehead, over my nose and down my left cheek. Spooky much have scratched me while I was sleeping last night. He does that sometimes. Damn cat wants me to pat him all night and all I want to do is sleep. I know he doesn’t mean to hurt me when he paws at my face. In fact, it’s probably my fault for getting lazy about clipping his claws. Come to think about it, my whole body aches. And the air feels different. Breezy. And it smells putrid. Why am I so itchy? I am not in my bed, am I?

  I open my eyes, slowly, as the blinding daylight pierces them like a thousand needles, which radiate back into my occipital lobe. I have to blink a few times before I can keep them open in a squint. Surrounding me are towering pine and oak trees, which seem to disappear into the dusty sky. Why have I fallen asleep on the ground? And where am I?

  I massage my throbbing head and briefly wince in pain as my thumb grazes my left temple. I’m starting to think I had a little too much fun partying last night when I notice something peculiar. The absence of sound. Have I gone deaf? No. I can hear the leaves and pine needles shifting under me as I move. I am in a forest. I should hear birds chirping, squirrels scampering, something. But there’s only stark silence. There are no sounds to be heard other than a slight breeze rustling the dried leaves in the trees.

  My muscles are so stiff I can barely get to my feet. I feel like I’ve been bedridden for a week. It takes a moment for me to steady myself because I am still reeling with vertigo. My head is spinning and I stumble over to an adjacent pine to lean on its craggy bark for support. My forehead rests on my arm as I lean into the tree, trying to regain my composure. This position usually helps me when I stand up too fast, one of the drawbacks of having low blood pressure.

  Gazing down, I can’t help but notice my long chestnut hair, stringy and caked with sweat and god knows what else; and my clothes—filthy and tattered. The yellow heart-shaped patch on my khaki capris has started to tear off and hangs loose, exposing a small patch of skin on my thigh. It reminds me of my niece, Evie.

  Evie’s mother died in childbirth and when my brother, Drake, was deployed to war last summer, she came to live with my parents and me. Evie and I had an interesting relationship. In some ways, she was like a daughter to me because she was so young. In other ways, she was like the little sister I never had. We used to take turns braiding each other’s hair. She would play dress-up and I’d paint her face with makeup, then she’d strut down an imaginary runway. She’s such a girlie-girl. One day she was rooting around in my stuff and I found her cutting fabric from Lex’s blanket. I had gotten pregnant my senior year of high school and gave birth to Lex the following summer. He died shortly after. That was two years ago.

  When I saw Evie had cut Lex’s blanket to make a miniature blanket for her dollhouse, I flipped out. I don’t think I’d ever been so angry in my life. I began to throw things around the room. Evie got scared and ran out, fleeing into the woods behind our house. I didn’t mean to scare her; it was just a very sensitive, painful part of my life that I didn’t want anyone interfering with—even a harmless three-year-old.

  When I realized what I had done I chased her outside and beyond the old rickety fence in our backyard, which led to the woods. She was pretty fast for a three-year-old. After I caught up with her I realized I had a pretty big gash in my leg. Must’ve happened when I climbed the fence. Evie was frightened of the blood and concerned for me. Being so young and naïve, she thought any sight of blood meant certain death.

  Eventually I was able to convince her that my leg would be okay, but I would have to patch up my pants, because we couldn’t afford to buy new clothes. Evie was so distraught by the whole incident and my injury she cut her miniature dollhouse blanket, made from Lex’s blanket, into a heart shape and I carefully hand-sewed it to my capris. They’ve been my favorite pants ever since.

  As I continue to regain consciousness, I gradually begin experiencing different feelings: confusion, aching, hunger, distress, panic. And I’m quickly becoming aware of my thirst. My mouth is a desert and there is no water within sight. I need to get moving if I am to find my way home. Hopefully I’ll find water on the way. Now, which way to go?

  I glance up from the tree and immediately spot the source of that foul odor. A doe lays lifelessly just a few steps away from me, decaying in its own juices. It must have died a few weeks, maybe even a month, ago. I look back down, feeling sickness in my stomach, but it’s unavoidable. There’s a pile of silver and black striped bird feathers just a few inches from my shoe. A breeze ruffles the feathers to reveal a faded yellow beak and some delicate bones. I vomit right there by the tree. But nothing comes out. I continue to dry heave a few more times before the reflex subsides. I’ve got to get away from here.

  Judging by the angle of the sun in the sky, it is mid-morning. I’m assuming that I am in the woods behind my house, so I choose to go south. That should put me within two or three miles of home at the most. I’ve spent a lot of time hiking in the woods by myself. It’s my own personal sanctuary where I go to be alone and away from the stresses in my life. I must have come out here last night and fallen asleep. Maybe Glenn and I got into a fight, or I had an argument with my parents. Those are the only explanations I can come up with.

  Dead animals are everywhere. A squirrel here. A raccoon there. Birds scattered sporadically among the bases of trees. The stench of death surrounds me, but it’s not so bad now that I’m further away from that deer. Or maybe my nose is just growing accustomed to it. After a while I don’t even notice the smell any more.

  Each step I take sends a jolt of pain throughout my aching muscles. My eyes search for a walking stick to lean on and ease my walk home, but there are nothing but flimsy twigs on the ground. If only I could remember what happened yesterday to make me feel like I fell from a ten-story building.

  I have no idea how much time has passed, but it feels like I have been walking for an hour already. I sit down with my back against a tree, and use my sleeve to pat away the dampness on my face. My energy level has plummeted, and judging by the empty gurgling in my stomach it’s been more than a day since I’ve eaten. Not only do I need water, but I also need food. Maybe a dead animal? No. Even if I weren’t a vegetarian, I wouldn’t eat a rotting corpse. I make my rest as short as possible, standing back up after a couple of
minutes. I should be home within an hour.

  But that hour passes; as does another. Where am I? How do I get home? How did I get here? Panic is erecting a fortress inside me, threatening to take over as I realize I’m not where I thought I was.

  The most important task right now is to find water. I cannot allow myself to surrender to my anxiety. If I hope to get out of here alive, I must suppress my fear. I stop and stand as still as possible, hoping to hear running water. I hear my heart drumming. I hear the hissing of my breath as I exhale. Nothing more. But I do see an object of interest out of the corner of my eye--a recently fallen tree limb, about five feet tall and three inches in diameter. I strip the side shoots off and hold it up. It’s a little gnarly toward the top, but it will work well as a hiking stick.

  It’s time for a change of direction. I turn west and soon I am in a forcing my legs to climb daunting hills. I make it to the top, but my weakness gives in as my knees buckle. I stumble halfway down the hill and fail to regain my balance. The rest of the hill goes by in a blur as I roll down the remainder, slamming into protruding roots and broken twigs on the way. I lie there for a moment, staring at the skeleton of a dead squirrel, letting the pain of my new bruises and aching muscles take hold of me.

  I wish I were home, buried under my covers and sleeping in late on a lazy morning. I close my eyes, hoping that when I open them I will be in my own bed; hoping that this is some sort of nightmare. But if it is a nightmare, it is one I’ll never awaken from.

  Shaking it off, I rise to my feet again. I don’t think I can muster the energy to climb up the next hill, so I resign to walking along the valley.

  As much as I love the forest, I’m growing tired of my surroundings. I love trees, I really do. And I’m not too fond of people, so the solitude is usually welcome as well. But at some point I need human contact. Or even animal contact. I’m not too picky.

  Frustrated, I call out, “Help!” and listen to my echo sing back to me. Of course, there is no response. I don’t bother repeating myself. Surely nobody would hear me in the middle of the forest anyway. Oh well. It was worth a shot.

  But I do hear something. I have to stop breathing for a moment to be sure I really hear it--a delectable trickling so faint I almost believe I am imagining it. But the silence out here makes that impossible. Out of nowhere I manifest enough energy to run at a full sprint in the direction of the blessed sound.

  As the trickling grows louder, my feet gallop to the beat of a fast-paced tribal drum. It’s funny how the pain in my body seems to diminish while I’m so intensely focused on the water. I round a cluster of small trees and there it is. It is nothing more than a small stream, water percolating over some smooth stones, but more than enough to quench my thirst. I collapse on the ground and cup the water in my hands, slurping it up noisily. For a moment, the forest does not exist. The world does not exist. It is a moment of pure ecstasy.

  When my thirst is satisfied, I heave heavily to try to catch my breath. Then I catch a glimpse of myself in the water. A single deep red line stretches across my face. There’s no way that was caused by a cat scratch. I lightly trace the line with my finger, stroking the knobby scab that has formed, and try to remember how this scar came to be. But nothing comes to mind. I splash water on my face to clean the residual blood that had dripped down and dried to a crust. Then I notice something else unusual. There is a dark spot on my left temple that will not wash off. At first I mistake it for a bruise since it hurts when I press on it. But I notice some distinct lines. It appears to be a tattoo of some sort. I inspect it closer, but it is too difficult to make out in the rippling water. Moments like this I wish I carried a compact mirror.

  I must have had a crazy night last night. I construct a story in my mind to explain what could have happened. My boyfriend, Glenn, and I went out into town--most likely, since we do that often. We had way too much to drink--plausible, although I am not of age yet, so I either had a fake ID or we drank at someone’s house. Then, in a drunken stupor I got a tattoo. Not likely, but if I drank enough to black out and end up in the woods, then I suppose anything’s possible. As for the injury to my face, well, I can’t come up with an explanation for that.

  I sit back to rest and almost jump out of my pants when I spot a boot right next to me. With a foot in it. Connected to a leg. Which is connected to a body sitting against a tree. It is a large, overweight man, wearing a flannel shirt, black vest and Stetson. And he appears to be staring at me.

  “Oh god, you scared me!” I exclaim, “I’m sorry I didn’t see you there.” He does not react. In fact there is no movement from him whatsoever.

  “Sir? Are you okay?” I wave my hand in front of him to see if he reacts. Then a gruesome realization hits me. His chest is not moving. His eyes are glazed over. I reach for his wrist and it’s cold. There is no pulse.

  He must have died recently. I wouldn’t say he smells pleasant, but he has not begun decomposing yet. He has a brown leather pouch attached to his belt, which I remove. Obviously he won’t need it anymore. Inside I find a half-full canteen of water, a folding knife, some sort of makeshift first aid kit in a small mint tin, dried fruit and jerky, and a lighter. The fruit is the first thing I demolish. I scarf that down within thirty seconds. The jerky I’ll hold on to. Being a vegetarian, it is not too appetizing, but when hunger calls again, I may have no choice. I dump out the contents of the canteen and rinse it out in the stream, then refill it.

  Preparing to move on, I attach the belt and pouch to my waist, poking a new whole in the belt to ensure a tight fit, and decide to go ahead and take the hat too. I’m not sure if I’ll need it, but it will be easy to carry. As I lift the hat off the man’s head I am shocked to see a tattoo on his temple. It looks like a dragonfly, or an infinity fly. They look nearly identical, except that the infinity fly has a slightly longer thorax and when viewed from above, their eyes form an infinity symbol. I cast a glance back into the stream and realize it’s the same as the tattoo on my temple. Whoa. Something’s really not right here. Now I’m getting a little freaked out.

  In the distance I hear a rustling of leaves. It’s the first I’ve heard since I woke up to near silence. Finally, hope of rescue has come. Jumping to my feet, I yell out, “Help me! Over here!” The sound of rustling leaves picks up and I can vaguely hear voices of several men.

  I bend over to pick up the hat and behold a sight that strikes horror in my heart: a bloody hole in the back of the hat. I pull the man’s head forward and I see the source of blood: a gunshot wound to the head. In a moment of panic I am paralyzed.

  I try to put this situation in perspective. I am standing next to a murdered man and a small group of men are running in my direction. I think calling out may have been and really, really bad idea. The men are drawing closer. They will be atop the hill any moment. I have to make a decision now: stay or run.

  Chapter 2

  “Hey Earl, come quick! It’s another one!” Like a deer in headlights, I look up, wide-eyed, to see a tall, scraggly man in dirty clothes aiming a rifle right at me. Pow! I was lucky the bullet hit the tree right next to me.

  As if the exploding pop turned on a switch, I turn and bolt out of there, still holding tight to the hat. I used to go for runs all the time before I had Lex. I even placed second at the intramural track meet my junior year of high school. But after I got pregnant I stopped, and never really took it up again. My muscles have weakened in the past few years as a result, but I’m still faster than the average person.

  It takes a few seconds for my legs to get into the rhythm of the sprint. My legs move nimbly now, dodging deceased forest creatures, hopping over gnarly tree roots, avoiding prickly bushes. I can hear the voices shouting behind me along with gunshots, but I still can’t make out how many there are. And I am in no position to turn around to see.

  I am still running along the stream because, despite my burst of energy, I don’t feel confident enough or strong enough to climb a hill while being chased by armed men
out to kill me. The stream begins to widen, and before I know it I am stumbling upon a lake. I look to the right, then left. To the left there is a little cove, where the land rises a bit over the shore. It’s a great hiding place, but rather obvious. I don’t have much time left. Then I remember I’m holding the hat. Quickly, I run to the right and toss the hat into the lake then I run back through the stream and toward the cove. As soon as I squat down I hear the men’s’ voices approaching. I cover my mouth with my trembling hand to muffle the sound of my heavy breathing. I’m shaking with trepidation and it takes every ounce of tenacity I can muster not to move. I’m not as well hidden as I thought I would be, but it doesn’t seem to matter. At the edge of the woods are three scruffy-looking mountain men: the tall man that sent the first shot at me, a short, stout man wearing a baseball cap, and a large, burly man with dark, thick sideburns.

  “Where’d she go, Ned?” says the stout man wearing a ball cap.

  “Dunno,” replies the tall man. I assume he is Ned.

  “You idiots!” shouts the big guy, with a deep wolf-like voice. “Look!” He points to the hat floating atop the water. I think my last minute ruse has fooled them.

  “She’s in the water!”

  I crouch there in that cove, among rancid, slimy fish carcasses, holding my breath for nearly an hour before the mountain men decide leave, heading back the way they came. My heart thumps so powerfully it’s almost deafening. I thought for sure they would hear it. But they shot at the water a few times, and they waited around, probably thinking I was hiding under the water and that I would need to come up for air. Finally, they figure out I’m not in the water and berate each other for letting me get away.

  “You just lost us another one, you idiot!” says sideburns man to Ned. “Now how we gonna meet that quota?”