365 Days At War

by Nancy Isaak

  My heart broke a little at the sight—then, I aimed my gun at the nearest Crazy and fired.

  * * * *

  We continued on that way—down Dume Drive—our two groups of fighters leapfrogging. One team would cover the other team’s retreat. That first team would race to the next roadblock; they, in turn, would cover the second team’s retreat to the following roadblock…and so on…and so on.

  Our plan was simple, to thin out and slow down the Crazies—keeping them too occupied staying alive to realize that they were being led.

  Unfortunately, however, the Crazies weren’t the only ones who were being thinned out. Each time our teams retreated, there were less and less of us at the next roadblock—more Locals stayed behind, dead or dying on the cracked tarmac behind us.

  More than once, seeing the dead bodies of kids I was supposed to protect, I wondered if I had made a mistake—if what I really should have done was simply load up the whole tribe into boats and evacuate everyone across the strait to Catalina.

  But the time for evacuation had passed.

  The Crazies were here and they were steadily gaining ground on us.

  And—we were rapidly running out of roadblocks.

  * * * *

  “Find Frank! Tell him to light it up the moment the Crazies are all in! Tell him not to wait for us to reach the other end!”

  I had a young Local by the arm—one of the first team. We had just hunkered down behind the second-to-last line of vehicles. In front, the Crazies were racing toward us; behind, the first team was leaping over a ditch across the road, heading for the final barricade.

  “GO!” I yelled at the kid, pushing him away.

  As all around me guys started shooting, I watched as the kid soared over the ditch. He moved fast, actually catching up to some of the first line as they were jumping over a second ditch farther down the road.

  Then, he had moved on—finally disappearing behind the last roadblock.

  Good…he was safe.

  I turned back around, peeking over the vehicle in front of me—my mouth dropping open in horror at what I was seeing.

  The Crazies were a lot closer than I had expected.

  Some of them were carrying enormous police shields, the kind that cops used during riots. Those guys had moved to the front—forming a bullet-proof wedge that was now trotting toward us.

  Our bullets, meanwhile, were pinging off the shields—ineffectual, useless.

  “Their feet!” I yelled. “Shoot at their feet!”

  It should have been a good idea.

  Unfortunately, the Crazies’ feet were too small a target for our mostly inexperienced shooters. The bullets missed completely, although a piece of the tarmac ricocheted upwards and knocked one kid to the ground.

  “We have to retreat!” yelled Erroll, as the wedge of Crazies moved steadily closer. He was two guys down from me, blood streaming down his shoulder from where a bullet had grazed him. “We need the horns now!”

  “Do it!” I yelled back.

  Erroll immediately reached for a small foghorn canister he was carrying; it was hanging from a lanyard around his neck.

  Holding it up, he pressed down on the canister’s lever…AWOOOOO!

  Seconds later, the foghorn’s deep call was answered by two more—one from the middle of our group, one from the far right.

  AWOOOOO!

  AWOOOOO!

  Even before the echoes faded away, my guys and I had abandoned our positions and were racing toward the last roadblock. As we ran, I glanced back—amazed that the foghorns had actually worked.

  The Crazies had stopped advancing; they were milling about on the road, their eyes scanning the area around them—confused about what the horns might have meant.

  For my guys and me, however, the foghorns had meant one thing only—a distraction to get us to safety.

  We leapt over the first ditch—a width of about four feet. It was full of tumbleweeds—creating a small hedge across the road, no more than a foot high. One of our guys—a 13-year old with untied high-tops (dang him!)—tripped on his laces and fell into the ditch. He jumped up immediately, easily catching up with the rest of us.

  When I looked down—I realized that his shoes were soaking wet.

  “Get rid of those shoes!” I yelled, as he ran beside me. “When we get to the other side, throw them into the second ditch!”

  * * * *

  We had almost reached the last roadblock, when the Crazies regrouped and came after us again. If anything, they ran faster now—leaping around and over the vehicles we had just vacated—shooting their rifles and guns, hooting and hollering with glee.

  They knew they had us—it was just a matter of seconds now.

  One of my guards went down on my right—blood spraying from his chest.

  Erroll took his place, grabbing me by the arm even as I slowed to see if the kid was alive—forcing me to keep on running. “He’s dead! Don’t stop!”

  Another kid got hit—this time on the far side of the line. He was alive when he went down—the bullet having hit only his leg. A second later he was dead, as a bullet shot through his right eye.

  Tightening his grip on my arm, Erroll literally dragged me toward the last ditch before the final roadblock—the same ditch that Frank and his fire team had dug the previous year as a firebreak. Like the first ditch, this one was full of tumbleweeds. Erroll and I flew over it; what remained of our guys following.

  We had made the final roadblock.

  Immediately, the kid with the high-tops—huffing and puffing—wrenched off his sodden sneakers and tossed them back over the roadblock and into the ditch on the other side.

  “Sorry,” he grinned at me. “I slipped.”

  “If those things had gone up, they could have killed you! Next time, do up your laces!”

  Even as I said it, I realized who I sounded like—my mother.

  * * * *

  With every ounce of my being, I prayed that the Crazies would turn around and go home—to simply give up and leave.

  But—they didn’t.

  Instead, they rushed straight down the road toward us—their main group leaping easily over the first tumbleweed ditch. There was madness on their faces—a bloodlust that terrified me.

  If those boys reached our final position, I knew they would annihilate us—rip us apart, drink from our blood.

  It would be a slaughter.

  * * * *

  “I can do it, chief.” Florenza was kneeling beside me, holding the extra flare gun in her hand.

  Smiling sadly, I took it from her. “No…it’s my responsibility.”

  Then, I lifted the flare gun high into the air…and fired!

  * * * *

  With dusk upon us, the flare was even brighter than the first one.

  This flare was white, a shining star that lit up the smirking faces of the Crazies racing toward us. The police-shield wedge was leading the way, but there were other teams of Crazies—outrunning the wedge, streaming forward on either side of the road.

  As the flare hit its zenith, we began to fire.

  Both of our fighter teams were at this final roadblock—the first and the second lines—and we shot freely; the time for conserving our ammunition was past.

  Bang, bang, bang, bang, bang!

  Crazies began to fall—one after another—but there were so many of them that it didn’t matter; we would soon be overrun.

  “Almost there…almost,” I murmured, watching them come.

  “They’re getting close, Kaylee,” muttered Florenza.

  It wasn’t the forward edge of the Crazies that I was waiting for, however—it was their rear line, the back of the main group. There were perhaps seventy to eighty Crazies already over the first ditch; another twenty to thirty still streaming their way toward it.

  “Real close, mami!”

  The nearest Crazies jumped the final ditch; they were mere yards away from our roadblock.

  I couldn’t wait any longer. />
  “NOW!” I yelled. “Light it up, Frank!”

  * * * *

  From the sides of the road, I saw two trails of fire, each heading toward one of the tumbleweed ditches. The flames licked and sputtered, following a line of gas and oil Frank’s team had laid down earlier that afternoon.

  The fires traveled lazily—unnoticed by the Crazies—disappearing under the tumbleweeds to feast on the great puddles of fuel that had been hidden underneath.

  With a giant WHOOSH! the ditches suddenly exploded—flames shooting upward—catching the Crazies between the two lines of fire.

  I heard a gasp from beside me—the young kid who had thrown away his sneakers. He was now watching his high-tops burst into flames; soaked with fuel, they had been a death-trap just waiting to happen.

  Meanwhile—from the houses to the left and right—came Kieran and Pauly’s teams! Having made their way secretly back to the Point, they appeared now, closing in from both sides of the road—boxing in the Crazies. Each team had one automatic rifle—long-barreled and heavy—that they set down on the ground, centering it on a tripod; one guy feeding it a line of ammunition, while another guy held down its trigger.

  We only had two of the automatics—had found them hidden in the attic of—ironically—an extremely left-wing, anti-gun movie star.

  Now, my guys used those heavy guns to deliver death.

  Crazies fell under the force of what seemed like never-ending bullets. One-after-another, they went down—blood and brain matter spurting from their tumbling bodies.

  It was absolutely horrifying.

  And—it took less than a minute.

  * * * *

  We didn’t kill all of the Crazies between the ditches.

  There were those who were slower than their tribemates, who hadn’t made it between the rows of fire. And there were others who—terrified—had succeeded at jumping back through the flames in an attempt to outrun their deaths.

  Unfortunately for them, Shawnee and her Raiders had come up on their rear and were even now waiting on the other side of the flames.

  With arrows and with bullets.

  * * * *

  When it was finally all over, Kieran, Pauly, and I walked the battleground. From Heathercliff Road to the still-smoking ditches, we bore witness to all the young lives that had been lost.

  Both Crazies and Locals.

  There were bodies everywhere—most with bullet holes, a few with arrows sticking out of them. I couldn’t help but notice that, even with their tattoos and fierce mohawks, how many of the Crazies seemed so very young; they were boys really—as young as ten or eleven—no facial hair, not even the hint of a moustache.

  My heart ached when I thought of how terrified they must have been.

  “I hate this,” I said, sadly—as I knelt beside one of our guys, a kid from Latigo Canyon who had been part of the Locals since the beginning. He was lying at the side of the road, his body chopped in two—legs and feet a good ten feet away. “This is just stupid…ridiculous! No one should have to die like this.”

  “Even in the old world, this was happening,” said Kieran. “Wars aren’t anything new, Kaylee.”

  “But this is our world now,” I said, my tone cross, almost petulant. “And we have a chance at being different, at doing things right. So, why are we acting like such asses?!”

  Kieran shrugged. “Because we’re human?”

  Pauly shook his head, nudging a dead Crazy with the tip of his boot. “It’s ‘cause we’re guys. We’re just kind of built to do this.”

  “No, that isn’t true,” I insisted. “The Foxes are part of this madness and they’re female. This is something else—something evil.”

  * * * *

  Twenty-eight Locals died that night—almost a third of our guys.

  Even more of the Crazies were killed.

  By the end of the evening, our clean-up crew had collected eighty-five of the enemies’ bodies and lined them up along Dume Drive. I walked slowly down the row of bloody corpses, looking carefully at each face in turn—searching for Brandon or the Foxes.

  Unfortunately, if they had been part of the attacking force, they hadn’t been killed—or perhaps—they had simply turned and ran when the ditches went up in flames.

  Either way—Brandon and the Foxes weren’t there.

  But fifteen other Crazies had either surrendered to us or had been captured.

  Florenza and a team of guys led the prisoners—handcuffed, their heads hanging low—toward the compound and their new home inside of the cage. A few of the Crazies obviously needed medical help and—as they trudged unhappily past—Florenza asked me what she should do with them.

  “You get Jay or Porter to take care of their wounds,” I told her. “But you keep them handcuffed and under guard while it’s being done. And no Crazy is helped until our guys are taken care of—unless they’re about to die. Then, it’s Jay and Porter’s decision who will be helped first.”

  Nodding, Florenza continued on with her prisoners, marching them down the road. Pauly stepped forward from where he had been helping with the bodies, watching her go, pride written all over his face.

  “She did good tonight,” I told him.

  “Chick’s a warrior,” Pauly nodded. “Scares the crap out of me sometimes. Keep thinking she’ll cut my throat in my sleep if I annoy her too much.”

  I started to laugh, then realized that he was being serious.

  “She wouldn’t,” I frowned.

  He walked away, grinning. “Yeah…you keep thinking that, Kaylee.”

  * * * *

  I found Frank and his fire team seated at the edge of the road. They were drinking bottles of water and watching the last of the ditch fires burn themselves out.

  “Thanks, Frank,” I said, sitting down beside him. “But you’ve done enough. You don’t have to be here any longer. Why don’t you go home to Peyton and Lance?”

  He nodded toward the fires. “I’ll see them out first. Make sure they’re not going to flare up when the wind changes again.” Then, he looked toward the line of dead bodies. “You burying them?”

  “It’s the right thing to do.”

  “Even the Crazies?”

  I nodded. “Even them.”

  “You putting them out on the Nature Preserve with Denny and Lance’s brothers?”

  “Just our guys,” I yawned. My adrenaline was starting to wear off; I could feel the fatigue setting in. “Still haven’t figured out where to bury the Crazies.”

  “We plowed that field down at the end of Sea Ranch Way. We could put them there,” suggested Frank. “It’d be easier because we’ve already dug the rows. We’d just have to push the dirt over top, maybe cover them with rocks, so the coyotes don’t get them.”

  “You don’t need that field for your crops?”

  He shrugged. “I can always find another field. These boys need a place to rest.”

  I reached out and hugged him. “You’re a good guy, Frank. I can see why Peyton loves you.”

  He grinned at me, shyly. “You think Peyton loves me?”

  I nudged him with my elbow. “You have Peyton Buckingham wearing a pair of farmer’s overalls...what do you think?”

  * * * *

  The scene inside of the compound was one of controlled chaos.

  Our guys circled the prisoners inside of the cage—yelling at them, shaking their fists in rage—wanting vengeance.

  Half of the Crazies yelled back; the others hid near the rear, quaking in fear, the youngest of them crying openly.

  Porter and Jay, meanwhile, had set up a first aid station just across from the cage, to make it easier to attend to the wounded Crazies. They sewed up cuts and stab wounds, irrigated bullet wounds and, even, set a broken arm.

  What they couldn’t do, however, was operate.

  That simply was beyond their knowledge.

  * * * *

  “We just don’t know what to do,” whispered Jay, upset.

  “Maybe if we kn
ew how to do blood transfusions we could save him,” added Porter. “But with what we know—all we could do was give him something for the pain.”

  I looked over at the Crazy we had just transferred to the Medical Clinic. He had to have been about sixteen, was small for his age, but lean and muscular. There were tattoos all up and down his arms, including a fierce Cobra that curled along the side of his neck.

  At the moment, he was writhing in pain on a cot near the wall—his eyes squeezed shut—hands clutching at the bandages around his mid-section. I couldn’t see it, but Jay had explained that there was a bullet hole under those bandages.

  The kid had been gut-shot and was slowly bleeding to death.

  “How long does he have?” I asked, quietly—making sure that the Crazy couldn’t hear me.

  Jay shrugged her shoulders, trying not to cry. “We don’t know…we just don’t.”

  “If you’ve given him something, how come it looks like he’s still in a lot of pain?”

  “Because we’ve given him the top dosage, what the medical books say is the limit,” explained Porter. “If we give him any more, he’ll die.”

  “So—you can stop his pain by giving him a higher dose?”

  Porter pulled back, shocked at what I was suggesting.

  It was Jay who answered me; she seemed almost relieved that I had understood. “He won’t feel it, Kaylee. He’ll just go to sleep and not wake up.”

  “Well, don’t ask me to do it,” huffed Porter, waving his hands in the air. “I just can’t.”

  “I’ll do it,” Jay said quickly.

  “You don’t have to,” I assured her. “Just let me know what to do…I can take care of it.”

  She shook her head fiercely, placing a firm hand on my arm. “Kaylee, I couldn’t do the things you did today, that you had to do. You know I couldn’t. But this thing—this is a kindness. This…I can do.”