The Harvest Cycle by David Dunwoody

we gotta go to get around this and back on the road? Shit. Shit shit shit.”
        “What is it?” Hitch asked from the back.
        West came back and rummaged through the arsenal. “Some roadblocks have forced us off the freeway. Cutter’s thinking undreamers or something. I think they’re old and abandoned, we’ll find our way around ‘em soon and get back on track.”
        “Cutter doesn’t.”
        “Of course not.” West loaded a sawed-off twelve-gauge and returned to the front.
        “What do you think?” Asked Amanda.
        Hitch shrugged. “Don’t know enough to really guess, and I’m not taking sides. I hope Mike’s right though. This is the last thing we need.”
        “Aw SHIT!” Cutter yelled, and the van lurched, with a terrible metallic squeal that sent shocks through Hitch’s legs. Everyone fell forward, Lucy losing her grip on the puppy and crying out as she awoke.
        The van stopped. Cutter slammed his fist against the wheel. “I hit one of those rock piles hidden in the grass. Son of a bitch!”
        “All right, all right. Let’s get out and see what the damage is.” West opened the back doors.
        “Is it okay?” Lucy asked. “Should be,” Amanda replied.
        The puppy followed West out the back. Lucy, naturally, did as well and Amanda got up to chase after her.
        “Everyone stay close!” Cutter barked, getting out.
        It was nice and cool outside, a light wind nudging the grass. Hitch found West crawling beneath the van. “Need a torch or something,” he called.
        “Not a good idea if we’re leaking.”
        “Well, how am I supposed to know what’s wrong under here, if anything?” West backed out. “Cutter, did you kill the engine or did it die?”
        “I killed it,” Cutter answered from the other side of the van. “Didn’t want to take any chances.”
        “We might be all right,” said West. “Just a little bump is all.”
        “I’ve never seen the night sky so clear as this,” Ira said, perched in his seat with the door open. “Trillions of stars up there. Anyone know constellations?”
        “Let’s see if I can find the North Star,” Hitch said. “I like mapping the sky too.”
        “Beautiful,” Amanda breathed, suddenly beside him. She held Lucy’s hand and pointed upward. “Have you ever seen the stars like this?”
        “Never,” Lucy said. She smiled and turned in a circle, head leaning as far back as it could go. “It’s so perfect up here.”
        “Yes, it is.”
        It was a perfect moment. One of those when a cynic would be expecting the other shoe to drop, the next thing to go wrong. And it did.
        Ira suddenly doubled over, fell out of the van, something long and thick protruding from his torso. He rolled onto his back and Hitch saw it was a spear.
        “Cutter!”
        The man ran around the front of the van and took cover behind the passenger door. He looked at Ira’s wound, then out into the night. “Fuck! Get back inside, all of you!”
        Hitch hustled Amanda and Lucy back into the car, the puppy once again in the girl’s arms. West was slow to follow. “Let’s grab a couple of guns, Hitch. C’mon!”
        “We can’t see shit out there!”
        “Cutter needs help! C’mon!”
        West snatched a couple of pistols from the weapons shelf and stepped outside, protected by the back door. “Cutter! Me and Hitch are back here!”
        “Get inside!”
        “You can’t go this alone and you know it!”
        West crouched, peered beneath the door and across the dark field. Didn’t see a damn thing. Just those tall, wavering blades of grass, and the occasional rock pile.
        “Is Ira all right?”
        “He’s not gonna make it,” Cutter hissed. Ira cried out at hearing it. “Please! Pull it out! Help me!”
        “Be quiet!” Cutter