He sighed, "You know, you're pretty fussy, for a woman in distress."

"Oh, so now it's because I'm a woman. I couldn't possibly know if bears are nocturnal or not, because I'm a girl. Is that it? I couldn't possibly have a good plan, because I'm a woman."

He gritted his teeth, "I don't like having my words turned against me like that."

"Oh, I'm sorry, sir. Was I being disrespectful to your male superiority? Well, forgive me, sir. I forgot my place. I won't say another word. I'll just sit here and look pretty."

She slumped to the ground and turned to look away from him. She did look pretty.

Chewy walked over and put her head in Erica's lap. The dog whimpered, then snorted in Jerry's direction.

"You ... now ... listen ... garhgh!" He dropped the shotgun to his side and drew a .45 automatic from the holster on his hip.

"You just ... you two ..." He raked the slide to chamber a round and placed it back in the holster.

"You two wait here." He grabbed the pistol grip on the shotgun and crept into the forest toward his motor coach and, hopefully, a bit of his dignity; if he could get it back.

Chewy whimpered and looked up at Erica with big brown eyes.

"We girls have to stick together, Chewy. I knew I could count on you."

Every ruffle of a leaf registered as a threat. Acorns dropping from trees were met with a threatening wave of the shotgun barrel.

His senses were acting on overdrive and the closer he got to the motor coach, the more threats he perceived from the surrounding woods.

There was a sudden deafening roar. Wet with rage, the warning echoed throughout the woods. He spun, shotgun at the ready, looking for the creature.

There was nothing. He froze for what seemed like minutes before creeping forward to the motor coach.

Approaching from the rear, his eyes swept the surrounding forest, looking for smart bears, dumb bears, and boogie men in general.

The coach was quiet and still with the exception of the occasional sway from the bears' movements.

It couldn't be just one. One bear, no matter how smart, couldn't roll and steer the coach to a clearing in the woods. There had to be two or more.

If they were in the cabin, it would be a problem. What scared him even more was the possibility that they weren't in the cabin. If he had them cornered he stood a chance, but in the open he would be no match for the superior strength and speed of the hulking beasts.

Another roar overtook the clearing in the woods. It seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere. His imagination placed the giant creatures behind trees, lurking, awaiting a momentary lack of attention before rending him as they had the license plate.

Apart from almost over killing a squirrel with the shotgun, he reached the rear of the Silver Lining.

It rocked back and forth on its suspension. The rocking was subtle, but it was enough that he figured it would go unnoticed if he climbed the ladder to the roof and peered in through the skylight. He had to know how many were inside.

He reached the top and slid on his stomach to the rear skylight, which looked into the modified storage s.p.a.ce behind the cabin. There were no bears in there. The cargo looked untouched.

Inching forward, the pistol grip of the shotgun never leaving his hand, he made his way to the second skylight and peeked in.

Two ma.s.sive pelts of brown fur rushed about in the cabin trying to pull open doors and cabinets in a search for food.

The locks he had installed throughout the motor coach were holding their own against the mighty creatures.

A third bear sat on the couch, buckled over, and rocked back and forth. It seemed to be moaning and grasping, its hand between its legs. Chewy's attacker was in obvious pain.

The bears made noises as if they were communicating. It was unintelligible like a m.u.f.fled growl, but they seemed to understand one another as they moved about the cabin, occasionally comforting the wounded ursine.

Smiles were hard to come by after the world blew up, yet a grin crossed his face. They were distracted. He had a chance.

He began to move away from the skylight when he heard a scream come from inside. Glancing back in, he saw something that disturbed him. The bear on the couch was grasping and shaking his own head.

The other bear screamed at him.

Surrounding him again was the tremendous roar. This time it was the same he had heard when the mutant animal tackled Chewy into the woods-blood curdling and vicious.

He rolled over, expecting to see the monstrous creature towering above him.

There was nothing there.

He peered into the branches and discovered the source of the roar. There were several of them perched high in the limbs of the trees. Loudspeakers.

"I can't f.u.c.king breathe in this anymore."

The nomad turned his attention back to the bears inside.

The one sitting down had removed its head and placed the bear mask aside. He was young, only a child.

One of the bears roared at him.

"I'm not putting it back on. Find something for my hand. That d.a.m.ned dog almost tore my finger off. And it's probably infected."

One of the bears went back to working on a drawer.

The other yelled back at him. His true voice m.u.f.fled by the bear mask.

"They're not going to follow me. The dog may have bit me, but they were scared. You should have seen that dude. The only reason he didn't pee himself is because he was too scared."

There came a m.u.f.fled argument.

"Yes. Yes, you can."

Another m.u.f.fled argument came from the bear.

"You can too be too scared to not pee yourself. Now, quit being a jerk and help me."

The bear gave him the finger and went back to searching the coach for food.

Jerry had seen enough. Without a sound, he slid over the edge of the motor coach and lowered himself to the ground. He stepped into the cabin and announced his presence by c.o.c.king the shotgun.

"For Super Smart Bears, you're really stupid."

THIRTEEN.

Squinting through one good eye, the major scanned the deserted street. The retail center had not been directly affected by the apocalypse. Looting accounted for the missing windows in the storefronts.

Sporting goods stores and food centers were hit after the electronics stores had been picked clean.

Looters had taken everything. In the seven years since the bombs, no store escaped the scavengers. People looted jewelry stores hoping there would be value in shiny metal objects. And there had been, for a short while, before hunger overtook greed.

Furniture stores were cleared out for firewood. Auto parts stores were picked clean for fuels and parts to run generators.

Pharmacies were often places of conflict as looters were more discriminating. People searching for life saving medicine became more aggressive fighting over a prescription than they did a media player.

The only stores that had been ignored by the rampant looting were the Blockbusters. No one ever went to Blockbuster.

If there had been anything useful left on the shelves of the strip mall, his scavenging team would have already found it. Trained to be efficient and thorough, it was rare that they missed a useful item.

There was one item, however, that he could not ask his crew to collect.

Personal property was not permitted on the truck. That was the code he enforced on his crew, and drilled into them at every opportunity. Everything was for the good of the whole. The truck would carry nothing that didn't benefit the crew or the nation they served.

It was for this reason that the major often gathered his gear, placed his lieutenant in charge, and strolled off into the wasteland alone.

Had his charge ever been foolish enough to question his orders, he would explain that it was to determine, firsthand, that the scavenging team performed to expectations. He would tell the soldier this after striking him with whatever blunt object was within reach.

The truth was more personal.

He shifted the weight of the rifle across his back. High-caliber and scoped, it was a tool designed for bringing down large game. While the major feared no man, mutations populated most of the wasteland. They had spread in a very short time; it was necessary to be prepared for an encounter.

The major touched the patch that rest across his temple; his first encounter with the creatures had taken his eye. Now it served as a reminder to him and his crew that, despite the unrelenting power of their army, and their truck, s.h.i.t still happened.

The rifle was not meant for people. Should any man, or overly muscular or hairy woman that resembled a man, happen to interrupt him on his excursion, they would feel the wrath of his knife. Worn at his left side and drawn by his right hand, the weapon was his own design. The draw had been inspired by the samurai. The blade's shape was taken from the Khukuri, the legendary weapon of the feared Ghurka warriors. It curved like a boomerang and yielded fatal striking force. He designed the pommel as a lead skull. Struck upon a temple, the skull would render death, disorientation, or severe headaches.

Unsheathing the wicked blade would usually deter any small group of unfortunate opportunists that hoped to ambush him. If it didn't, the sight of the knife's first victim would cause the rest to scatter.

Large strides carried him past a former hobby store. His team would have scouted there to find casting tools and resin mixtures. The clothing stores would be searched for leather belts and durable clothes that could be cut and fashioned into uniforms.

A glance through the shattered gla.s.s of the sporting goods store window was enough to tell that it was all but empty. Hunting and camping departments would have been cleaned out first. Those arriving too late to grab a rifle or camp axe would have taken the baseball bats.

The golf section was void of bags. Clubs, now tarnished from exposure, littered the floor in the hundreds providing little in the line of defense or survival use. If the apocalypse proved anything, it was that golf skills were useless skills.

Football and hockey pads would have been secured by the more ambitious who planned to use them in crimes against their fellow man. Those with less sense, but the same intentions, grabbed Under Armour clothing, not knowing that there were very few armor qualities to it.

Next door, even dumber people looted the mobile store. Those people would spend the better part of a day screaming "h.e.l.lo" into a dead device and wondering out loud why no one was responding before finally giving up and blaming AT&T, as was the trend when the world blew up.

He continued on to the grocery store. It was a mess. Nothing lined the shelves, but, in their haste, the looters had knocked countless boxes and cans to the ground.

His crew would have sifted through the mess, retrieving anything that could be useful. The more days that pa.s.sed between the apocalypse and the present meant the fewer useful items could come from a grocery store.

At this point, the scavenger teams only enter looking for non-grocery fair. Even food items with a long shelf life had expired years ago. His prize, however, had not.

Shattering gla.s.s echoed throughout the store as he kicked the last bit of the window from the frame. He stepped into the lobby and looked around. Even the gla.s.s panels in the two ice machines were shattered; looters had no time for doors.

A "wet floor" sign was sitting in front of it. He would never know if it was placed there before everything went to h.e.l.l, or afterwards in an attempt at humor. Either way, he didn't care.

The remnants of stock crushed, crunched, and squished under his feet as he moved across the front of the store reading the signs that still hung over the aisles. A couple of them were missing, some hung from only one chain, and one had been re-lettered to read Jack and s.h.i.t.

At the end of one row was a coffee bean dispenser. The plastic dispenser was, like everything in the store, empty and shattered, but it was a good clue to what the surrounding aisles had held.

Neither side had a sign. He glanced down the right aisle and guessed that his prize wasn't there. He stepped to the left.

The creature had been quiet. Since losing his eye, the major's hearing had become a more reliable sense. The ma.s.sive beast had not made a sound as it sniffed the air in the grocery store, hunting for something itself.

The major stepped back out of view. The bear had not spotted him; the creature was too absorbed in its own quest. The gray-haired, one-eyed man drew the rifle from his back and slowly pulled back the bolt.

There was no indication from the beast that it had heard.

The major pulled the rifle to his shoulder and stepped into the aisle. Placing the reticule over the bear's chest, he prepared to fire.

The ma.s.sive bear sat. It no longer searched the floor and shelves. Its paws held what it had been looking for.

The major spotted the familiar plastic bear in the real bear's paws. The honey container was unopened and unspoiled. He pictured the small plastic bear sitting on his old kitchen table next to her morning tea. The combination of the honey and the Tetley tea would fill the kitchen. The morning tea had always made her happy.

The bear looked up at the man with the gun and c.o.c.ked its head-its eyes moved from the man to the weapon. It sat still, holding the honey in its grasp.

The honey, the same honey she had used every morning. Anger flashed in the major's eye and he lowered the rifle. "I've come for the honey."

The bear snorted. Its large brown eyes focused on the grizzled man. For a brief moment it stopped pawing at the honey. Then it turned its back to the major and resumed the struggle to remove the plastic cap that held the precious honey in place.

If not for the missing windows at the front of the store, the report from the rifle would have caused a perforated eardrum or permanent hearing loss. Neither the major nor the bear flinched.

The creature turned and examined the major.

Smoke rose from the rifle barrel and drifted up towards the hole he had just shot in the roof.

"I'm talking to you, bear!"

The bear swiped at the litter on the floor and sent the trash twirling in the air. A plastic container slid down the aisle at tremendous speed and slammed to a stop at the major's feet. The major stared down; Mrs. b.u.t.terworth stared back.

He picked up the syrup bottle and hurled the old lady at the beast. "I didn't say syrup!"

The bear roared and stood, but it did not charge. Its ma.s.sive frame towered above the empty shelves that formed the aisles.

"I want that honey!"