The Last Mile by Tim Waggoner

Dan gripped the steering wheel tighter as his ancient Oldsmobile juddered across cracked and broken asphalt. He knew he should slow down, but considering what he carried in the backseat, he couldn’t afford to. There were far too many hungry things out here who’d kill—or worse—steal his prize.
    C’mon, baby, just hold together for one more run…please…
    It wasn’t a prayer, not exactly. Like everyone else in the World After, Dan knew there was no use in praying. If you wanted any special favors, you had to sacrifice to get them. The brand on his forehead—the scarred flesh swollen and feverish—was ample reminder of that. The heat blazing from his thrall-mark was growing more intolerable by the moment, and he gritted his teeth against the pain of his Master’s summons.
    I’m on my way! Dan had no idea if his Master could hear his thoughts, especially from this distance, but the pain didn’t lessen. He knew it wouldn’t, not until he’d made his delivery. Good thing that his thoughts weren’t heard, he decided. Drawing attention to himself would probably just get him more pain as a goad to travel faster.
    The road he sped along used to be Interstate 75, a major highway running through southwest Ohio, but now most people referred to it simply as the Way. Since the Masters’ arrival, the surface had become warped, the asphalt shot through with fissures. Jagged chunks of road stuck up at odd angles, and large subsidences were all-too-common hazards. Thick stalklike weeds sprouted between the cracks: ugly, distorted things, crimson thorns protruding from rough tree-bark surfaces, barbs dripping poisonous slime. Despite the speed with which he drove, the thorn-stalks managed to sway out of the path of his car, moving aside or bending down so he could drive over them. And those stalks that couldn’t get out of the way of his tires withdrew into the cracks from which they’d sprung, rising once more after he’d passed. While the thorn-stalks were by no means the worst things inhabiting the World After, Dan hated the sinuous, serpentine way they moved, and no matter how many runs he made, he didn’t think he’d ever get used to the damn things.
    Though thorn-stalks grew thick on the highway, the land on either side was completely barren, the ground smooth and sickly gray, as if all life had been leeched from it. But Dan knew there was life out there—at least what passed for life in the World After—lying hidden, waiting for anyone foolish enough to come here in the first place and suicidal enough to leave the meager protection offered by the Way. If Dan were to stop the Olds, park, and step out of his vehicle here, even his thrall-mark might not be enough to save him. That’s why he traveled prepared: a 9mm, a large hunting knife, and a machete lay within easy reach on the passenger seat. He used to have a shotgun, too, but he’d lost it during his last run, and as punishment for his carelessness, his Master hadn’t allowed him to replace it yet. As punishments went in the World After, Dan thought he’d gotten off light.
    The sky was filled with a sour yellow haze, like fog but not quite. Dan had once read about the pollution that choked cities during the beginning of the Industrial Revolution in the late 1800s. He imagined it would have looked something like this sky—a perpetual haze that was always the same, without any variance to mark the difference between day and night. If, indeed, there was any now.
    The outside air was cold, and though Dan drove with the windows up, the Olds’ heater hadn’t worked for years, even before the Masters’ arrival, and the inside of the car was chilly. But that was good: the cold helped keep him awake and alert. He hoped it would stay like this. The temperature in the World After could vary wildly at times, going from freezing to sweltering in the blink of an eye. He much preferred making a run in the cold than in the heat. The thorn-stalks grew more aggressive