The wind hit Arthur Hail like a fist the moment he opened the barn door. 80 years old, 5'8", nothing barbone and gristle under his worn flannel jacket. He had no business being out in this. The blizzard had turned his farm into a white hell. The kind of storm that killed cattle and shut down highways.
The kind that made grown men prey. "Come on, old man," he muttered to himself, squinninging against the needles of ice tearing at his face. "Just get to the first one. " The first body was 10 yard away. Might as well have been 10 mi. Arthur's boots sank into snow up to his knees with every step.
His lungs burned. The cold was already working its way through his coat, through his skin, reaching for his bones. The man in the snow wore black leather covered in patches and chains. "Hell's angels," Arthur realized. The motorcycle club everyone in three counties feared.
The ones decent people crossed the street to avoid. Arthur grabbed the man under the arms and pulled. Nothing. The biker was easily 220, maybe more, all muscle and dead weight. Arthur tried again, his back screaming in protest, his heart hammering against his ribs like it wanted out.
"Move! Damn you! " Arthur gasped. "Move! " The body shifted an inch, then another. Arthur's vision started to blur at the edges, black spots dancing in the white. His hands had gone numb inside his gloves, but he kept pulling, kept dragging one impossible inch at a time.
When he finally got the first biker into the barn, he had maybe 5 minutes before his body gave out completely. That's what his brain told him anyway. The smart thing, the sane thing would be to close the door, get warm, and call for help in the morning. He counted 18 more bodies in the snow. Sarah, Arthur whispered, his voice cracking.
His wife had been dead 3 years now, but he still talked to her sometimes. I know what you'd say. I know. She'd say the same thing she always said. Arthur Hail, you do what's right, even when it's hard, especially when it's hard.
He went back out. The second biker was a woman whose face blue white ice forming in her short dark hair. Arthur got her halfway to the barn before his legs gave out completely. He fell hard, his knee cracking against frozen ground, pain shooting up his spine. For a moment, he just lay there, the woman's unconscious body pressed against him, both of them sinking into the snow.
"Get up," he told himself. "Get up, you stubborn old fool. " His body didn't want to listen. His muscles had turned to ice. His heart was doing something irregular, something that scared him. But somewhere in the howling wind, he heard Sarah's voice.
Not real, just memory, but strong enough. I didn't marry a quitter, Arthur Hail. He got up. Biker number three was so heavy. Arthur could only move him a few feet at a time, stopping every yard to catch his breath to let the black spots clear from his vision.
Biker number four had a knife on his belt that Arthur had to be careful not to cut himself on. Number five was bleeding from somewhere. Arthur couldn't see, leaving a red trail in the white snow. Halfway through number six, Arthur's heart did something that made him stop and press his hand against his chest, gasping. The rhythm was all wrong.
Too fast, then too slow, then a skip that felt like falling. "Not yet," he said through gritted teeth. "Not until they're all inside. " "You hear me? Not yet. " The storm wasn't letting up. If anything, it was getting worse.
The wind screamed across the open fields, carrying snow so thick Arthur couldn't see the farmhouse anymore. Couldn't see anything but white and the next dark shape waiting for him. Number seven. Number eight. Number nine.
His hands weren't working right anymore. He couldn't feel his fingers. Couldn't tell if he was gripping or not. He just hooked his arms under theirs and pulled, stumbling backward, falling, getting up, pulling again. Number 10 was just a kid, maybe 25, with a baby face under all the leather and chains.
That one hurt something in Arthur's chest worse than his misfiring heart. The kid's lips were gray. Arthur couldn't tell if he was breathing. "Don't you die on me, son. " Arthur said, dragging faster now, his body pulling from some reserve he didn't know he had. Don't you dare.
He got the kid inside and checked for a pulse. There faint but there. Arthur covered him with a horse blanket and went back out. The cold had stopped bothering him. That was bad.
That meant hypothermia was setting in his body, shutting down its outer defenses to protect the core. Arthur knew this intellectually, but he couldn't seem to care. There were still nine more people dying in his driveway. Number 11 fought him unconscious but thrashing some animal part of the brain still struggling against death. Arthur took an elbow to the jaw that split his lip tasted blood mixing with snow.
He held on anyway. Easy, he said, though the man couldn't hear him. Easy now. I got you. Number 12 was the biggest yet 6' something and built like a bear.
Arthur looked at you and looked at the barn that seemed a mile away now and almost laughed. Almost cried. Maybe both. Sarah, I don't think I can do this one. But he was already bending down and already getting his arms under the massive shoulders.
He pulled nothing. He pulled harder. The body moved half an inch. It took Arthur 20 minutes to move that one biker 30 yard. 20 minutes of pulling and resting, pulling and resting his heart, doing things that would have sent a doctor running for the defibrillator.
20 minutes of talking to himself to Sarah, to God if he was listening. When he finally got the big man inside, Arthur collapsed against the barn wall and just breathed for a while. His whole body was shaking. His clothes were soaked with sweat under his coat, which was worse than the cold. His heart was beating so hard he could hear it in his ears, a drum that might stop any second.
Seven more. Seven more bodies in the snow. "You can quit now," he told himself. "You got 12. That's more than anyone would expect.
You can quit. " But then he'd have to live with himself. He'd have to imagine their faces when spring came and the snow melted and someone found seven frozen bodies in his driveway. He'd have to know he'd given up. He went back out. Number 13 was clutching a photograph in frozen fingers.
Arthur saw it as he pulled the man toward the barn. A woman and two kids smiling. He held on tighter, pulled harder. Number 14 had a gray beard and looked about Arthur's age. Old man biker still riding at 80.
Arthur felt a strange kinship as he dragged him through the snow. 15. 16. Each one harder than the last. Each one taking more out of him than he had to give.
Arthur's vision was tunneling now. Everything going dark around the edges. His left arm had gone numb. That was probably bad. Number 17 was another woman.
Tiny thing couldn't have weighed more than 100 lb, but Arthur could barely move her. His strength was completely gone. He was running on something else now, something beyond muscle and bone. Pure stubborn will. He fell three times getting her to the barn.
The third time he wasn't sure he'd get back up. Wasn't sure his heart would start again if he let himself stop. Arthur Hail, you finish what you start. Sarah's voice clear as day. He got up.
18 was already dead. Arthur knew it the moment he touched the cold skin, the absolute stillness. But he dragged the body inside anyway, laid it respectfully against the wall, closed the frozen eyes. "I'm sorry," he whispered. "I'm so sorry. " "One more.
Just one more. " Number 19 was the worst because Arthur's body had completely given up by then. His legs weren't really working anymore. He couldn't stand up straight. He had to crawl part of the way, dragging the unconscious biker beside him through the snow. The barn was right there.
20 ft, 15, 10. Arthur's heart stopped. Just stopped like someone flipped a switch. He felt it happened. Felt the sudden nothing in his chest.
The absence of that familiar rhythm he'd lived with for 80 years. He was lying in the snow next to the last biker, his face pressed against the ice, and his heart wasn't beating. Time did something strange. Stretched out. He could see Sarah standing in the barn doorway, young again.
The way she looked when they got married. She was shaking her head, smiling that smile that always meant he was being ridiculous. Not yet, Arthur. You're not done yet. His heart lurched.
Once, twice, started beating again, angry and irregular, but beating. He pulled the last biker inside. When Arthur finally closed the barn door behind him, shutting out the howling storm, he had 19 leatherclad strangers laid out on his barn floor. 18 breathing, one knot. And Arthur himself was pretty sure he was dying.
His hands were useless, frozen claws. He couldn't get them to work. Couldn't unbutton his coat or grab the blankets he needed. He stood there shaking, staring at all these people he'd saved, wondering if they'd wake up to find him frozen solid beside them. "Come on, old man," he muttered.