by Mark Kelly
The sound of laughter and glass smashing on the pavement filled the air. With the door open, they could hear everything the men in the parking lot were saying. Lucia and Kateri crouched by the window and watched as Otetiani confidently approached the gang of bikers with the dolly in front of him.
A good foot taller than everyone else, Petit Henri saw him coming first. “Salut, Michael,” the biker leader shouted, his French-accented voice booming across the parking lot. “I hope for your sake you brought more than one drum.”
“Don’t worry, Henri. The rest is coming,” Otetiani shouted back.
Petit Henri’s men pressed together, blocking Otetiani’s passage. Lucia knew it was a test. She had seen the Calle 18 gang members in New York do the same. Otetiani would have to push his way through. Too much force and he’d be beaten, too little and he’d be a coward, not worthy of their respect.
She watched Otetiani, still holding the dolly, use his elbows to firmly brush back the men who ventured too close. A few seconds later, he reached Petit Henri.
“Good to see you, Henri. How are you?”
“Not bad, but I’ll be a fuck of a lot better when you deliver what you owe me—fifteen hundred gallons of high-test.”
“Eleven hundred gallons,” Otetiani corrected. “That was our agreement. Twenty drums per month. I’m sorry for the delay, but there was a mix-up on our side.”
Petit Henri grunted with seeming indifference. “Our bikes don’t run on apologies, Michael—Premium unleaded only. They gulp it down like the men drink liquor.”
He took a drag on his cigarette, then butted it out on the drum full of gasoline. His face turned serious. “I will say it one more time to be clear…Une mille cinq cent gallons…Fifteen hundred gallons this month. You should be thankful I don’t ask for more. I’m not happy I had to come here and collect what I am owed.”
“I understand, Henri, but it would have been delivered to you—just like it always is.”
Otetiani looked past the big biker to the empty market stalls. “We had an agreement. You were to keep your men away from here, and we would deliver the fuel to you in Montreal every month. No offense, but when your men show up, it isn’t exactly good for business.”
“I don’t care about your business, Michael,” Petit Henri said, the tone in his voice turning dangerous. “Whatever agreement we had, you broke when you didn’t deliver on time. You are a smart man. You can see there are many of us here today. Don’t push your luck. Bring me fifteen hundred gallons and we will leave.”
Otetiani stroked his chin, taking his time to reply. After a few seconds, he nodded grimly. “Fifteen hundred gallons—this month only.”
Petit Henri grinned and shook Otetiani’s hand. “A wise decision, Michael. But I warn you now, next time you are late it will be double.”
“There won’t be a next time.”
“We’ll see about that. The snow is coming. How will you deliver during the winter?”
“We’ll find a way.”
“Perhaps you could use a reindeer and sleigh,” Petit Henri said with a laugh. “But enough talk, we have a long road ahead of us. It is time to load the fuel and get moving.”
He slapped the side of the truck with the palm of his hand and shouted at the driver, “Allez, let’s go. The fuel is inside the building, like always.”
Otetiani looked over his shoulder in the direction of the maintenance shed and quickly brought the radio to his mouth. The sound of his voice came out of the radio clipped to Kateri’s belt.
“This is Michael to Outpost Four. The deal is fifteen hundred gallons. They’ll get it directly from the maintenance shed. I repeat, fifteen hundred gallons—directly from the maintenance shed.”
“Pssst…” Baker whispered to Lucia and Kateri. “That’s our hint to get the hell out of dodge. Come on.”
He crouched and waddled across the floor to the back door. When he opened it, one of Otetiani’s men was standing there with a radio in his hand.
“You need to get a move on,” the man said. “Go wait in the boat while we bring the rest of the drums up.”
As the biker’s white truck turned to back up, Lucia stole one final glance out the door and caught a glimpse of long blonde hair in the truck’s passenger side window. Her heart skipped a beat. It was the girl from the truck stop.
“What is she doing with them?”
Baker spun around. “Who?”
“Her—in the front of the truck.”
He crawled to the window and looked out. “I see her, but there are too many of them. Lucia, you can’t go out there.”
She ignored him and took a step towards the open door as Kateri grabbed her arm. “What are you doing? My brother told us to stay in here.”
Lucia turned and stared at Kateri. “She is your age. If that were you—kidnapped by men like that, men who would do awful things to you—you would wish with all your heart for someone to help you. Would you not?”
The fierce look on Kateri’s face wavered. Her grip loosen and she released Lucia’s arm. “But like he said, you can’t go out there.”
“I must.”
“I know I can’t stop you once you’ve made up your mind,” Baker said, a resigned expression on his face, “but I hope you know what you’re doing. It will be awfully lonely riding to Kansas without you.”
“You won’t be alone,” she blurted. “Besides, without me, you would get lost and never make it.”
She spun on her heels and marched out of the shed. She would have to pass right by Petit Henri and his men to reach the truck. She reached down and touched her gun, feeling comfort in the knowledge that Petit Henri would pay a high price if he tried anything.
A dozen steps later, she reached the fringes of the gang of bikers. She pushed through the mass of men, ignoring the grabbing hands and lewd comments.
The sounds of their hooting and hollering reached Petit Henri and Otetiani at the same time she did. The two men turned in unison and stared at her. Otetiani’s face was tight with anger. Petit Henri’s eyes, wary at first, turned cunning. He looked like a hunter trying to decide how best to take down his prey. His hand was on the butt of his gun, but he didn’t draw it.
“I thought I told you to stay out of the way,” Otetiani said.
Petit Henri looked at him with surprise. “She is with you?”
Otetiani nodded. His eyes burned with anger as he spoke to Lucia. “What are you doing here?”
“There is someone I need to check on,” Lucia replied. She stole a quick glance at the white truck, which had stopped while the driver waited for the bikers to finish moving their motorcycles out of the way.
“Where’s your friend?” Petit Henri growled at Lucia. “You know who I mean, the bastard that took my guns and stole my spark-plug cables.” He squinted and stared in the direction of the shed. “He is in there with a gun pointed at us, isn’t he?”
Lucia shrugged, enjoying the uncertainty in Petit Henri’s voice. “Baker is around,” she said without turning to look. “He’s watching us…watching you. You are a big target—hard to miss.”
The veins in Petit Henri’s tree-trunk-like neck bulged as he grit his teeth. Lucia took a step back, ensuring she was out of his reach.
Petit Henri ran his eyes over the shoreline. He studied the dam and then took one final look in the direction of the shed. His right hand remained on his gun, tapping the grip with his finger. It was a message to her. Your friend might get me, but I’ll get you first.
“Do you know what they did?” he said to Otetiani. “Her and her friend.”
“I heard they did you a favor.”
Petit Henri sputtered with indignation. “A favor?…Sacré bleu, you’ve got to be kidding me. They started a fucking war. Why do you think I am here with so many men? We are going east to warn the Cyclones to stay in their territory.”
Lucia fixed him with an icy stare. “You told us at the truck stop we took care of a problem that you would have had to take care of
yourself. What happened?”
“You happened,” Petit Henri replied, pointing his finger at her. “You and your friend. How was I to know the new leader of the Cyclones would be even crazier than the previous one. He says because the meeting was in territory we had just given to the cyclones it was my responsibility to stop you.”
Petit Henri gave Otetiani an incredulous look. “Can you believe that? Somehow, I am responsible for what happened in their territory.”
“How long was it their territory?” Otetiani asked.
“Ten minutes…perhaps twenty.”
“He might have a point.”
“That is nonsense. The only point he has is the one on top of his head, and even if he had a point, it is not like anyone could have stopped a crazy bitch like her.”
Lucia flinched at the insult. The last person to have called her that was one of the punks who attacked Saanvi at the school outside of Washington, and she’d killed him. But coming from a man like Petit Henri, she took the insult as a badge of honor.
“Henri, you know war won’t be good for your business—or mine,” Otetiani said.
“War isn’t good for anything,” Petit Henri muttered. “Good men die. Bad men live. But unless les Chevalier de Montréal make amends to the Cyclones, it will happen.”
“Amends, how?”
Petit Henri had a glint in his eye as he answered Otetiani’s question. “There is only one way to avoid it,” he said, his voice as hard as steel. “By handing her and her friend over to the Cyclones.” He snatched his gun from his holster and pointed it at Lucia.
“Je suis désolé…I’m sorry to do this. You’re tough. I like you, but business is business.”
Lucia knew Baker hadn’t seen or heard Petit Henri make his move. If he had, he would have shot the big man immediately.
“I don’t care that you like me,” she said, slowly reaching for her gun and hoping Petit Henri would make a mistake and expose his weapon to Baker.
Petit Henri shook his head. He crouched down and waved his gun at her as he guessed what she was doing.
“Don’t, you will die before your soldier friend shoots me.”
Frustrated, Lucia dropped her hands to her side.
“Is there some other way we can make this right?” Otetiani asked Petit Henri. “You know if you hand her over, they will kill her.”
Petit Henri’s brow furrowed. “What is this we, Michael? What is she to you?”
“Part of a group that helped my family a few months ago.”
“A friend?”
“No, just someone I owe a debt to.”
“It seems we have a dilemma then.” Petit Henri looked at Lucia and grinned. “Or perhaps a Mexican standoff.”
“I am not Mexican,” Lucia replied tapping her chest with her fingers. “Yo soy salvadoreña. I am from El Salvador.”
Petit Henri grunted. “Whatever, same difference. Let me think on this.”
Taking care to keep his gun on her, he lit a cigarette. A bluish-white cloud of smoke drifted through the air. It was nothing like the sweet smell of the tobacco she had burned in the longhouse. His cigarette smoke reminded her of the tenement house in New York City and the filthy mattress where she had lain on her back.
“Put it out.”
Petit Henri threw back his head and laughed. “C’est Incroyable…You are something else. If you were a man, I would say you had balls of steel. Are you not afraid to die?”
“We all die, but I would rather not die from your cigarette smoke.”
He took one last drag and butted his cigarette out. “What is this debt worth to you?” he asked Otetiani while looking at Lucia.
“Five thousand gallons,” Otetiani offered. “It’s the best I can do. That’s almost six months of supply.”
“No,” Petit Henri said without hesitation. The big biker ran his fingers through his thick black beard. “Twenty thousands gallons of gasoline in two tanker trucks. And it must be delivered to Montreal before the winter. And I get to keep her, but the soldier can go free.”
“No one gets to keep me,” Lucia snarled. “I am not a pet.”
Petit Henri grinned. “I had a dog once. She was a mutt, and I loved her very much, but every time I left the house, she would shit on the kitchen floor. I think you would be like that dog, but you wouldn’t wait for me to leave, you would keep shitting on the floor.”
He turned back to Otetiani. “Trente mille…thirty thousand gallons. You can deliver the third truck in the spring and you can keep her.”
“No one gets to—”
“Shut up!” Otetiani yelled, his eyes bulging with anger as he glared at her.
Seething, Lucia became even angrier when Petit Henri smirked and said, “Bad dog, now you’ve pissed off your owner. Thirty thousand gallons, Michael—final offer.”
Otetiani swallowed hard. After a few long painful seconds, he thrust his hand out. “Thirty thousand gallons, but it will take me a few weeks to find the trucks and move the fuel across the river. Do we have a deal?”
“We have a deal,” Petit Henri replied, shaking Otetiani’s hand.
“Lucia!”
They all turned and stared as a girl ran across the parking lot towards them. Lucia reached for her gun but stopped midway, confused by the smile on the girl’s face. She doesn’t look scared at all.
“I thought I’d never see you again,” Abbie said, out of breath as she skidded to a stop beside Petit Henri. “How come you’re here?”
“I should ask you the same thing?” Lucia replied, bewildered by the sight of the girl standing beside the giant biker. “Did he hurt you?”
“Hurt me? No, of course not. He’s helping me get back to Montreal.”
“I don’t understand,” Lucia said, realizing she had made a grave mistake. She listened as Abbie breathlessly explained what had happened at the truck-stop.
“After that, I couldn’t stay there—not anymore, so I asked Henri if he would take me to Montreal.”
“You asked him to help you?”
“Begged is more like it,” Abbie said with a half-smile.
Lucia stared suspiciously at Petit Henri. He looked back at her with a bemused expression.
“Would someone like to tell me what the hell is going on?” Otetiani said. He stood with his arms folded across his chest looking at Lucia and Petit Henri.
Lucia forced herself to breathe as her stomach did somersaults. She had made a mistake—a colossal mistake. “I thought she was in trouble. I had to check.”
Otetiani pointed at Abbie as he spoke to Lucia. “She’s the reason you didn’t stay in the shed and do what I asked you to do?”
“I told you, I thought she was in trouble. I am sorry.”
“You’re sorry? What am I supposed to do with that?” Otetiani yelled. “Do you know what you’ve done? Do you have any idea what that fuel means to my community?”
“Michael, would you like to make a new deal?” Petit Henri offered. “She and her friend are nothing to me, but you and I, we go back many years. Perhaps, we can reach an outcome that is better for you. It is your choice, but make your decision quickly. I either leave here with the two of them and avoid a war that will cost us both, or I leave here with your fuel, and we all hope for the best.”
Otetiani clenched his jaw and spoke through his teeth. His voice vibrated with barely suppressed anger as he looked at Lucia. “You saved my sister’s life once, and now I’ve saved yours—twice. My debt is paid in full. The boat will take you back to the other side of the river. Get on your motorcycles and leave.”
Lucia’s throat closed up. There was nothing she could say that would make things right. If she had only taken just a few more minutes before rushing out of the shed, maybe things would have been different.
Ignoring Petit Henri who appeared to be enjoying her humiliation, she spoke to Abbie. “I am glad you are safe, but be careful. I have known men like him. He is not worthy of your trust.” Then with a hollowness that wouldn’t go aw
ay, she turned to Otetiani.
“Lo siento mucho…I am so sorry. I did not mean to cause you and your people so much trouble.”
When the cold expression on Otetiani’s face didn’t change, she turned and walked across the parking lot to the maintenance shed. Baker and Kateri were both on their feet. They had heard enough of the conversation to know she had done something very stupid—and very costly.
“We should get going,” Baker replied. “We have a long way to travel.”
“Will I see you again?” Kateri asked.
Afraid she would cry, Lucia looked away and shook her head.
“No.”
21
It Will Never Be Enough
Using his feet to propel the rolling chair along the smooth linoleum floor, Tony Simmons moved from one end of the long lab table to the other, stopping every few feet to check the digital probes that measured the oxygen levels, temperature and acidity of the contents of the eight large glass flasks lined up in a row.
He noted the readings in a black log book and tossed the book back into the drawer he had taken it from.
The readings were good. Less than 1% oxygen with a consistent temperature of 36.8 degrees celsius and a ph of 6.2. Decent considering he was sitting in a make-shift lab in the middle of the Canadian wilderness.
He leaned back in his chair, ignoring the creaking squeak from the springs, and allowed himself a small smile as he closed his eyes and thought about the last couple of weeks.
Thanks to the equipment Abrams had helped him scavenge from the university in Ottawa, they finally had a well-equipped microbiology lab and a functioning bioreactor.
Every second day, they seeded the system with bacteria taken from Saanvi’s colon, then they pumped feedstock and nutrients through the flasks configured to simulate the anaerobic conditions of the human digestive tract.
Thirty-six hours later, a tiny amount of brownish yellow, mostly liquid broth emerged—fake poop, as Emma so aptly called it. With its diverse mixture of bacteria, peptides, enzymes and antitoxins, Simmons hoped they would find the key to conferring immunity in that liquid. But only time would tell, and they still hadn’t produced a sufficient quantity for a human trial.
