by Tom Abrahams
He remembered how much of a mess he’d been. War? No problem. A complicated sales deal with high financial stakes? No biggie. Negotiating with a huge energy company for the rights to use the natural gas on his own land? Piece of cake. But watching a baby being born? It made him weak in the knees.
“I think it’s happening,” said Andrea. “I need your help.”
Marcus nodded blankly.
“My pants,” she said. “Can you…?”
Her eyes widened and she cried out. Her head was back, her chin toward the sky. Sweat glistened on her neck. Her chest heaved.
Marcus moved along her side and tugged at her pants. He slid them down, trying to avert his eyes while doing the job. Then he had her exposed and ready to birth the child.
Andrea lifted her knees and grabbed them with her hands. In the distance, Lou cried out. The two women were like wolves howling at each other, speaking some tribal language only they understood.
Marcus understood what was happening. He was delivering a baby. In the woods. At night. And he had the easy part. Swallowing against the lump in his throat, he moved into position.
“Okay,” he said. “I’m here. You’re okay. You’re doing great. Just push.”
He didn’t know what else to tell her to do. There was nothing else he could do except catch the kid as it came out. His stomach lurched and bile crept up toward the lump.
“Push,” he said. It was hard to see anything. He thought he could see the head. Maybe. Maybe not. “Push.”
Andrea grunted at him and spat an angry retort. “I am pushing.”
“You’re doing a great job,” said Javier. Then he spoke Spanish to her. She replied through short puffs of air. The muscles in her neck tensed, drawing taut. A blood vessel strained against her skin.
Several agonizing minutes later, the baby was in Marcus’s hands. But it was blue. Even in the dim light, he could see it. It didn’t appear to be breathing, at least not that he could tell.
The look on his face must have given away his concern.
“What’s wrong?” Andrea asked anxiously. “Is something wrong? Is the baby okay?”
Marcus pulled on the child and its heels slipped free. He flipped the child over, revealing its pinched face. Marcus ignored Andrea’s urgent questions and studied the baby, looking for the problem. What was keeping the child from—then he saw it.
He quickly slid his fingers between the child’s neck and the fleshy rope still attached to the mother and turned the child at the same time, maneuvering both in his hands. The umbilical cord came free, untangling from the child. Marcus lifted the baby and slapped a palm against its back. He slapped again, ignoring Andrea’s pleas, tuning out Javier’s shrieks.
On the third smack the child coughed and opened its mouth. A soft wail swelled from the baby’s chest. A deep breath and another cry, louder than the one before, warbled and filled the space around them.
Marcus sighed. “It’s okay. It’s okay. The baby’s okay.”
He handed Andrea her child. Javier beamed. Andrea was exhausted, but held the naked child tight against her chest. She shushed the crying newborn, her hands rubbing its pink, slimy back. A swirl of dark hair was matted and shiny.
“It’s a girl,” said Andrea, through tears. “A baby sister, Javi. Una hermanita.”
Marcus fell back onto his backside, relieving the pressure on his lower back and the fronts of his calves. He wanted to vomit. The whole adventure had him light-headed. He avoided looking straight ahead. Andrea, oblivious and immodest, was still undressed from the waist down.
He reached toward her, leaning on an elbow, and folded one corner of the blanket over the lower half of her body.
She thanked him. “You’re my hero,” she said, a tired laugh accompanying her admission. “Really. I couldn’t have done it without you and Javier.”
Javier’s grin broadened, if that was possible. His face was as close to the baby as he could get. He was making clucking sounds and cooing. It was adorable and reminded Marcus of and older Sawyer with Penny. Sawyer, Lola’s son, had been the perfect big brother to his adopted sister.
Marcus sat back again and braced himself with locked elbows, digging his palms into piles of leaves. “I have a feeling you’d have managed without us. You’re the hero here. I just played catcher.”
Andrea shook her head. Then her face brightened. “I have an idea,” she said. “I’d like to name her after you.”
“Me?” he said. “She’s a girl.”
“You’re Marcus?”
“Yes.”
“What’s your last name?”
He hesitated, then answered, “Battle.”
She giggled. “That’s a silly last name. I can’t name my baby after that.”
“I don’t blame you.”
“What’s your favorite woman’s name?” she asked. “A woman important to you?”
Marcus looked past Andrea to the Stoudemire family. Dallas was holding their newborn. A boy, born a minute or two before Andrea’s girl. Lou ran her hand along Dallas’s head, fingering his bangs from his face. David, like Javier, hovered next to the child.
The growing crescendo of groans and wails and cries had given way to sighs and exhausted laughter. Marcus wiped his eyes with the back of his hand. “Louise.”
“Louise?”
“Yeah,” said Marcus. “If you want to name your girl after a woman important to me, name her Louise.”
Andrea appeared to consider the name, mull it over, and test it in her mind. Then she nodded and smiled. “Louisa. Yes, it’s perfect.”
“You okay here for a minute?”
“Yes,” she said. “I have Javi. I’m good.”
Marcus stood and limped toward the Stoudemires. His knees and ankles loosened more with each step. He was nearly to Lou when Andrea called out, panic in her voice. It was almost a shriek that made the hairs on his neck stand on end. His skin tensed with goose bumps.
“Battle?”
He swung around, his hand reaching for the pistol at his waist. As he pivoted, he leveled the gun at his hip. It was a move he’d perfected during his time as the sheriff in Baird so many years ago.
Standing in the dark next to the horses was a tall, broad-shouldered shadow of a man. His presence was palpable.
The adrenaline surged and Marcus took two deliberate steps. He kept the gun pointed at him. His finger was on the trigger, ready to apply pressure.
“Whoa!” The man lifted his hands above his head, his fingers spread. “Hold on, partner. No need for that.”
His voice was resonant, with a pleasant gravel to it. It reassured even as his presence alarmed.
Marcus kept his finger ready to fire. “Who are you?”
“I heard the commotion. Coulda woke up a bear on Christmas. I mean to tell you, if y’all were trying to be surreptitious and all, you get a big fat fail.”
Marcus moved closer, keeping his gun leveled, and repeated his question. “Who. Are. You?”
“I’m guessing y’all came from Gun Barrel City?” the stranger asked, sounding like he knew the answer. “And you’re headed east. That a fair assumption?”
Marcus didn’t say anything. None of them did. Andrea’s baby, Louisa, was crying. It was a soft, agitated whimper.
“I’m fixin’ to head that way myself,” said the stranger. “Maybe catch a ride on the railroad?”
The tall man stepped forward now, finding the light. His face was round. It matched his broad bulbous nose and small wide-set eyes. He was bald with a white, bushy mustache that hid his mouth. A deep line creased the middle of his protruding chin.
None of that was as distinguishing as his height. He must have stood six feet five or taller. His girth matched it. He wasn’t fat, but wasn’t trim either. Everything about him was big, including his meaty hands, which he still held up at his shoulders.
“How did you find us?” asked Marcus.
He jerked a thumb over his shoulder, pointing north. His mustache shifted
on his face as he spoke. “I was at the parking lot. Got there early and waited. Then it got late. Y’all weren’t there. Air’s real still tonight. Sound carries. I heard the unmistakable sounds of a woman in labor.”
He chuckled. His eyes flitted past Marcus and then back to him. “I say it’s unmistakable,” he said, “but truth be told, it could just as well be cats fighting in a paper bag. No disrespect intended.”
Marcus lowered his weapon but kept it in his hand and glanced back at the others. They were paying rapt attention. Dallas was now standing a couple of feet behind him, a rifle leveled.
“It’s okay,” Marcus told Dallas. “You can put it down. This is our conductor.”
Marcus shifted the gun from his right hand to his left and stepped forward, offering his hand. “I’m Marc—”
“No names,” the tall stranger cut in, taking Marcus’s hand with a tight grip. “That’s part of the deal. Keeps things copacetic. I think they call it plausible deniability. Any of us fall into the wrong crowd, nobody knows anything.”
“Fair enough,” said Marcus.
“I mean”—he released his grip and ran his thumb and index finger along the edges of his mustache—“I already know your name. That pretty little lady over there called it out when she saw me. Sorry about that. I shoulda been less surreptitious.”
That was the second time the new conductor used the word surreptitious. Marcus wondered if he’d looked it up in a dictionary and was using it as many times as he could to reinforce its meaning.
“No problem,” said Marcus. “I’m sure you can forget it.”
The man smiled. His mustache stretched up and out, revealing his lower lip. His white eyebrows arched high on his head. “Forget what?”
Dallas joined Marcus at his side. He’d lowered the rifle, but held it in both hands with the barrel aimed at the ground.
“What now?” Dallas asked. “Both women just gave birth.”
“That doesn’t change anything,” said the conductor. “We’ve got to get a move on. It ain’t ideal, but that’s the truth of it. I can’t get the van any closer than it is. So we’re gonna have to walk to it.”
“How far?” asked Dallas.
The conductor shrugged. He ran a hand across the top of his head and then rubbed the back of his neck. “Maybe a quarter mile. Not far. Like I said at the top, I could hear the women rattlin’ on.”
“All right,” said Marcus. “Give us a minute. We’ll get everybody together. We’ll make it happen.”
“Yeah, you will,” said the conductor, all hints of humor gone. “You got no choice in the matter. With them babies, we’d best get a move on. Otherwise you might as well hand them over to the Pop Guard with a bow and bottle.”
CHAPTER 8
APRIL 20, 2054, 10:00 PM
SCOURGE +21 YEARS, 7 MONTHS
ATLANTA, GEORGIA
The chime from the computer woke Rickshaw from his uneasy sleep. He was leaning back in his chair, his feet propped up on his desk, ankles crossed.
“Captain Greg Rickshaw,” said the digital voice, “I have a message from your team at The Greenbrier Resort. Would you like me to play it?”
Rickshaw cleared his throat and sat up in his chair. He knuckled the sleep from his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose. Sometimes he couldn’t stand the formality of the central computer and its directives.
“Yes,” he said, his voice thick with phlegm, “play the message.”
“Of course, Captain Greg Rickshaw, I—”
“For the love of all that is good and holy,” he snapped, “would you please refer to me as Rickshaw? Save it in your protocol.”
“Saving your request, Rickshaw,” said the unfazed androgynous voice.
Rickshaw tried putting a face to the voice and couldn’t do it. The images flipped between a feminine-looking man and a masculine-looking woman.
“May I proceed with the message?” asked the computer.
“Proceed,” Rickshaw said dismissively, his voice sounding closer to normal.
“The message was transmitted from the team, via a series of radio connections, to governmental headquarters here in Atlanta,” said the computer. “Given the series of relays, the estimated transmission lag is approximately nine minutes. The message is verbatim.”
Rickshaw spun in his chair and opened a cube-shaped refrigerator under the desk. He plucked a bottle of black-market spirits from the icebox and set it on the desk. With a twist of the cap, the bottle opened, and Rickshaw drew it to his lips. He took two healthy swigs, relishing the burn in his cheeks, on his tongue, down his throat.
His head buzzed from the bite of it. He touched his fingers to his numb lips and thumbed away excess drink.
“We arrived at The Greenbrier on schedule,” said the computer, reading aloud the message transmitted from the mountains of West Virginia to the Appalachian Plateau in northwest Georgia. “A survey found evidence of residency on the grounds and in the main building. We made contact with seven people: four men and three women. Our teams discovered no children on the grounds or in the aboveground portions of the main building. The women did not have subdural evidence of motherhood. Nor did our scanners detect any devices implanted in the men.”
Rickshaw took another pull from the bottle and spun the cap tight onto its top. The second mouthful tasted warmer than the first, his mouth having cooled from the initial guzzle. Condensation clouded the bottle, and drips of perspiration rolled down its side, pooling on the desk.
The computer droned descriptions of the men and women, their living conditions, the lack of children. The men and women denied any knowledge of underground railroad activity.
“We had one of the men lead us to the entrance to the bunker complex,” relayed the computer. “We entered the complex and performed a thorough sweep of the rooms, tunnels, and storage facilities. We found evidence that untold numbers of people, including children, lived in the underground facility.”
Rickshaw sat up. The recording now had his full attention. “Computer,” he said, “stop. Replay last fifteen seconds.”
“Okay, Rickshaw,” said the computer. “…entered the complex and performed a thorough sweep of the rooms, tunnels, and storage facilities. We found evidence that untold numbers of people, including children, lived in the underground facility.”
Untold numbers.
“Mother—” Rickshaw eyed the bottle, but his head was already swimming.
“Yes,” said the computer, “it’s reasonable to draw the conclusion that the untold numbers of people included both mothers and fathers given the presence of children. Shall I proceed with the remainder of the message?”
“Yes,” Rickshaw said through gritted teeth. It sounded more like a growl than a command.
“There is evidence the men, women, and children were here for an extended period of time,” said the computer. “It could be as much as several months. They are gone, though. Our subsequent interrogations of the remaining men and women procured intelligence that puts their departure somewhere between two and three weeks ago.”
Rickshaw balled his fingers, the knuckles popping as he did. He raised his arm to pound the heel of his fist onto the glass desk but stopped himself. Nothing good could come from the short-lived relief of a violent outburst. Instead he flexed his fingers in and out and used his hands to push himself to his feet.
They’d come so close to finding the Harbor. Rickshaw had to look at the bright side. They’d identified the existence of the fabled sanctuary and rooted it out. The families were on the run. They were looking for a new harbor. If he’d successfully found the Harbor once, he could find it again. The tension in his hands, in his neck, eased. He exhaled audibly.
He would finish this. He would find the new harbor. He would annihilate it. Then he would tear up the virtual tracks of the railroad spike by spike.
“Is there any more to the message?” he asked the computer. “You stopped talking.”
“That is the end of the messag
e, Rickshaw,” said the computer. “However, there is an addendum.”
“An addendum?”
“Yes. It’s sent as a separate message. Would you—”
“Play it.”
“We have one surviving man from among the men and women who lived aboveground in The Greenbrier. The others would not cooperate. We believe this man may have information as to where the others have traveled. We are bringing him back to headquarters and delivering him to you.”
Rickshaw grinned. He wasn’t sure if it was the message or the alcohol. It didn’t matter. This was ultimately good news. They were getting closer to finding the Harbor and to undoing the railroad.
CHAPTER 9
APRIL 21, 2054, 3:15 AM
SCOURGE +21 YEARS, 7 MONTHS
BAIRD, TEXAS
Norma keyed the radio. It was a long shot. She hadn’t slept, couldn’t sleep, and wasn’t about to risk keeping Rudy awake. Once the sun came up, they’d have their work cut out for them.
“Hello, this is NGBTX1,” she said, identifying herself with the nonregulation call sign. “CQ, CQ, CQ. Is the frequency busy? Anyone there?”
She’d created the call sign using her initials, the first letter of her hometown, the postal abbreviation for Texas, and the number one. It was easy to remember.
“NGBTX1 calling,” she repeated. “Is this frequency busy? Anyone?”
“GA NGBTX1,” the respondent said. “I hear you. This is GFAGA5. I hear you. Very strong signal, perfectly clear copy, five plus nine.”
She was there. Gladys was awake and near her radio. Their communication wasn’t planned. This was luck. Or maybe it was something bigger than that, like destiny or kismet.
“Good to hear you, GFAGA5,” said Norma. “I’ve got an update.”
Norma had never learned the correct way to communicate on the radio. Hers was a hybrid, nonofficial lingo. It was as close to real amateur operator language as Creole was to French, but it did the trick.
