by Tom Abrahams
Rickshaw held the child at arm’s length with a grip altogether unfriendly. There was nothing paternal in this man and very little that was human.
“Sir,” said the guard at the van, “I can take the child. There’s no need—”
Rickshaw spun around to face the burly man, the child still at arm’s length. His little body swung with the momentum of Rickshaw’s turn. His cry, which was like a lamb bleating, was more of a wail now. The child’s legs were drawn tight to its body.
Dallas’s face was drawn with fear. Lou’s was pinched with anger.
“Krespan,” Rickshaw snapped, “I don’t need you to get a conscience here. Do your job. Don’t suggest how I do mine.”
Krespan’s face knotted with confusion; then it shifted into realization. His eyes darted wildly, not focusing on anything. Marcus thought the soldier was searching his soul.
“In fact,” said Rickshaw, “your job is to kill that woman and her child.”
Rickshaw was looking at Andrea. Andrea looked at Rickshaw, then at Lou, then at the guard. Marcus was certain she’d take off running. She didn’t. Instead, the brave woman was frozen in place. She wasn’t shivering anymore.
“Sir,” said Krespan, “I don’t think I can do that. We don’t kill children. That’s not what—”
Rickshaw spun around. “Are you disobeying an order?”
“No, sir,” said the soldier. “But—”
“Fine,” said Rickshaw. “I’ll do it.”
Rickshaw marched to the truck. He set Lou’s wailing baby on the front seat. The boys in the truck were crying. Dallas looked pained. Marcus searched his mind for some way out of this. He didn’t see one.
And then he did. This was it. After a lifetime of conquering demons, one in a leather duster was going to be his undoing. This would be his end.
Marcus charged forward. Unarmed, he raced as fast as his stiff joints would carry him. If he could draw attention and fire his way, that might give the others a chance to defend themselves. The world slowed as he jumped into action.
Three bounding steps into his charge, the guard at the van swung his weapon toward him. Then he jerked, his body twisted, and he disappeared behind the door, falling to the ground.
Rickshaw had shot him. Then he spun to Marcus, leveling his revolver directly at him.
Marcus was sunk. He’d take a direct hit. There was no avoiding it. He charged forward nonetheless. He was committed.
Beyond the barrel of the revolver, Marcus noted the grin on Rickshaw’s face. He heard the children’s cries, tasted the sweat dripping on his face, felt the sting of it in his eyes.
Two more steps and the muzzle flashed. An instant later a familiar, air-sucking heat pierced his side. Marcus twisted, his body absorbing the force of the bullet, but he kept running. Only two or three more steps and he’d tackle him. One more shot, though, and he’d never make it.
That shot never came.
As Marcus reached him, ready to take a final hit before diving onto his killer, a blur of swift movement shot from the left edge of his vision. Then the soldier was on the ground, flat on his back.
Lou was atop him, her hands at his chest. And then they were above it, clasped. The glint of blood-soaked steel beneath her hands reflected the sunlight for a brief moment before she plunged the blade again into Rickshaw’s chest.
Marcus reached them as the man dropped his revolver. Marcus dove for it, then spun around and yelled for Dallas to take cover.
Dallas dove into the truck’s front seat at the instant the barricade guards on the other side opened fire. Bullets zipped past Marcus. They dinged into the van’s open passenger door, shattering the windshield.
Andrea was on the ground, covering her child. She was trying to find a safe place.
Marcus ran to her and put his body between her and the incoming fire. “Get in the van!” he yelled at her.
When she didn’t move, he repeated his order. She acquiesced and started crawling awkwardly, the baby in one arm.
Marcus returned fire. Three more shots. Then the revolver was empty. He was trapped.
“Get back here!” yelled Lou. “Now!”
The staccato of semiautomatic rifle fire followed her command. She was standing behind the driver’s side of the van. She had Rickshaw’s rifle and was emptying it at the barricade.
Hunched over, Marcus ran toward the driver’s side. Andrea was there. So was the guard named Krespan. He was holding the baby in his lap. Andrea had his rifle.
Marcus gave them both a confused glare and ducked beside them. “What is this?”
“He’s good,” said Andrea. “He’s hurt, but he’s going to help us.”
Krespan’s voice was weak. His chest heaved. Blood soaked through his uniform at the spot where his shoulder met his neck. That arm hung at his side. “There’s more in the back,” he said. “More guns.”
Krespan was pale. The color had drained from his face. He was sweating and his lips were blue. He was losing a lot of blood.
“You’re bleeding,” said Andrea. Her eyes were wide and focused on the wound in Marcus’s side.
“I’m fine,” he said. “We’ll deal with it later.”
Marcus climbed into the van and maneuvered his way into the cargo hold. Behind him the cacophony of the gunfight was louder. Andrea was returning fire.
They had to end this and get away. The longer it went on, the more Pop Guard reinforcements would show up. Then they’d never have a chance.
Marcus found a rifle and checked the mag. It was good to go. He climbed over Lou’s baby and out the passenger’s side. Lou was in front of him, still picking her targets. There were at least three dead soldiers at the other end of the street fight.
Marcus stepped around the door, rifle pulled tight to his shoulder, and tilted his head to take aim. He counted another six men.
“Get behind the wheel,” he said to Lou. “Get Andrea and the guard.”
“What about you?” she asked. “And Dallas? The boys are in the truck.”
“Get in the van and back away,” he said. “We’ll follow in a minute. Head southeast. Do it now.”
Marcus picked off the first of the six targets as he advanced. Another round drilled into his side, almost exactly where the first it him. An explosion of pain sparked through his body. He hitched and gritted his teeth to fend off the swell of agonizing heat. He took out another guard. And another.
Now he was at the open door to the truck. He was almost there.
Behind him, doors slammed. Tires squealed. An engine revved.
Good, he thought. Lou listened for once.
Marcus used the driver’s side door for cover and took out a fourth and fifth guard. He couldn’t find the sixth, but he was there. Short bursts of semiautomatic fire cracked. Bullets dinged off the truck’s exterior.
“Dallas!” Marcus yelled. “Get behind the wheel!”
It wasn’t a yell, really. It was a hoarse attempt at yelling. Marcus didn’t recognize the sound that came from him. It was soaked with pain, with the inability to breathe normally.
Sweat drained from his scalp and down the back of his neck. Although the throb of the wounds at his side almost doubled him over, he held his position. He scanned the barricade for the sixth soldier, who was hidden beyond his line of sight.
The barricade was getting bigger. Another pair of Pop Guard patrol vehicles joined the party. Four men from each spilled onto the streets, their weapons raised.
“Dallas,” Marcus said; then he stopped. Sally’s body was on the ground beside the truck. Only the door separated him from the conductor’s graying corpse.
Dallas was already behind the wheel. He was trying to crank the engine. It didn’t start. “Get in, Marcus.”
“Get it started first,” Marcus said.
“I’m trying. It won’t turn over. It says there’s no key.”
“No key?” Marcus wasn’t sure if Dallas could even hear him over the percussive blasts from the newly engaged Pop
Guard.
No key. No key. Where had the key—
Marcus squatted at the door. He dropped onto his knees and then lay prone on the ground. Bullets ricocheted off the asphalt near him. They pounded into Sally’s body, shaking her otherwise unmoving body with every strike.
Marcus reached under the bottom of the open door and felt blindly for her body. He touched fabric. Was it her shirt? Her pants? The flesh underneath was thick and muscular, but there was fat there too. It had to be her leg.
“It won’t start,” Dallas said. “What do I do?”
“Hang on,” Marcus said.
A bullet drilled into Sally’s body next to Marcus’s hand. He flinched but quickly resumed his search. His hand was on her thigh. He groped until he found her pocket. There was a bulge.
Marcus dipped his fingers into the pocket, between the pieces of cotton. When she’d pulled on her pants, she’d likely never imagined they’d be the clothes in which she would die.
He didn’t know her story. He couldn’t know that she’d survived nearly as much loss as he had since the Scourge devoured so much of the world.
Sally had escaped the Scourge on a boat. Her parents had taken her and strangers off the coast to outlast the plague. It almost worked. But even after she’d found land again, her life was adrift. Not until the railroad gave her purpose was she truly anchored. It was that same anchor that dragged her off the tracks.
Marcus would never know any of that. He would never understand her sacrifice, her wounds, her insecurities, her depression, her desire to live a life in sunshine as opposed to one in shadows.
He did know she’d given up the life in the pursuit of saving his, Lou’s, Dallas’s, Andrea’s, and the children’s. That was all he needed to know to love who she was. He thanked her silently as he pulled the keys from her pocket.
Marcus got back up and gave the keys to Dallas. The truck started and Dallas shifted into gear.
“Start moving,” said Marcus. “I’ll get in.”
Marcus moved around the front of the truck, staying low, as it lurched forward. Dallas pulled the driver’s door shut. Marcus stayed behind the passenger’s door, walking backward with the truck as he returned fire. His aim found three more guards and dropped them before he edged around the door, kicked the rear passenger’s door shut, and dove into the front passenger’s seat. He reached back behind Dallas and across the crying boys to yank the rear driver’s side door shut. The stretch sent a lightning bolt of pain from his wounds that radiated to his fingers and toes.
The truck bounced, then bounced again. It had hit something.
“Oops,” said Dallas. “I ran over the guy in the ugly coat. My bad.”
“Did you aim for him?” asked Marcus, his eyes on the kids.
“Maybe,” said Dallas. “Just had to finish what Lou started.”
The pain was getting worse. His fingers were going numb. Marcus groaned but forced a clenched smile to ease the fear on the boys’ faces.
“It’s okay,” he said to David and Javier. “We’re going to be okay.”
“I did my best to keep them calm,” said Dallas. “I really tried. But I—”
“It’s okay, Dallas,” said Marcus. “You did a good job.”
Each word was more difficult to utter than the one before it.
“Quiero mi madre, por favor,” said Javi. “¿Donde esta mi madre?”
“He wants his mother,” said David.
Marcus gritted his teeth through the pain and hissed through his teeth. Then he smiled. “Where’d you learn Spanish?”
“Norma.”
Marcus nodded. Of course Norma taught him Spanish. She was a good woman.
“Both your moms are okay,” said Marcus. His body jerked to one side as Dallas turned left. “We’re going to them now.”
The boys nodded their understanding. David took Javier’s hand and gripped it tight.
Marcus tried to see through the truck’s rear window. It was still blocked by the cargo they’d hauled with them. Holding his side, he shrank back into the passenger’s seat and exhaled.
His vision was wobbly. He was losing blood. It wasn’t as bad as that guard Krespan, he didn’t think, but it wasn’t good either.
“You’re hit,” said Dallas. “You got hit.”
“Keep your eyes on the road,” Marcus grunted.
“You okay?”
Marcus nodded, but he wasn’t sure. He was light-headed now, his breathing labored. Shock? Or something worse? He couldn’t feel his feet.
“I don’t see the van,” said Dallas.
“Head south and east,” said Marcus. “Go back toward the park. You’ll find it.”
“What if the boat’s not there? What do we do then?”
“Don’t worry,” Marcus replied. “Focus on the task at hand.” He gave a long explanation as to why the boat would be there, told Dallas he was proud of him. He told him he loved him.
All Dallas said was, “What?”
Marcus started to repeat himself. The edges of his vision were dark now, his breathing shallow. He was sweating but cold.
“Marcus,” said Dallas, “you’re mumbling. I can’t understand you. What are you…”
Marcus didn’t hear the rest of it. The numbness spread from his fingers and toes to his arms and legs. The motion of the truck, bouncing and rocking, was like a lullaby urging him to sleep. He was tired. His body hurt, where he could feel it, and it was cold, so cold. Maybe a little sleep would help. A short rest between here and the boat.
Dallas was shouting at him now, his words urgent. They were spiked with fear.
The world went dark. And Marcus was at peace. This was what it felt like to be at peace. At long last, no pain, no sadness, only peace.
CHAPTER 30
APRIL 24, 2054, 4:00 PM
SCOURGE +21 YEARS, 7 MONTHS
BUXTON, NORTH CAROLINA
Norma stood in the sand. It covered her feet. The grains shifted and rubbed against the spaces between her toes. The cold water surged against her ankles in a rhythm brought about by the moon and tides.
She shivered. Ripples of chill and goose bumps moved up her legs, to her torso, the back of her neck, and tingled her fingers. But she didn’t feel the cold. Not really. Her heart was warm. In the surf, puttering beyond the break, was a boat. It was bigger than she expected. The vessel was longer than the one that brought her here and wider than the boat that had delivered Gladys hours earlier. On its side and at its aft, its name was painted in fading red letters that looked brown. It reminded her of the way dried blood changed its color after time, how the elements deadened the vibrancy and life of the initial hue.
STELLA.
That was the boat’s name. It was Latin. Translated into English it meant “star.” The boat rose and sank on the waves before they rolled beyond the break and crashed into the shore.
“Took them long enough,” said Rudy. “I thought they’d be here last night or this morning at the latest.”
“They had to stay offshore longer than expected,” said Gladys. She stood between the couple.
The sea breeze fluttered across Norma’s face. She inhaled the scent of seaweed and salt. It was so different from the dirt of west and central Texas, the constant dust and heat.
Overhead, clouds rolled inland, pushed by the breeze. They were white and wispy, absent the potential of rain.
As the Stella bobbed in the surf, a line off its bow alternating a slack and taught position like a rubber band stretched between fingers, a raft pitched and yawed its way back toward the beach.
Aboard the raft, the kind once often used with an outboard engine, were at least four people. The spray of the surf and the dance of light off the water made it difficult to distinguish the shapes.
Rudy pointed to the raft. “I think that’s her. See the ball cap on her head?”
Norma covered her mouth with both hands. She pushed onto her tiptoes and leaned from side to side, trying to catch a glimpse for confirmation.
>
It came a minute later when the raft was close enough for her to make out the features on the faces of those aboard. She didn’t recognize two of them.
Norma waded out into the surf as the raft slowed, riding the waves. Its starboard side was parallel to the shore.
“Norma!” Rudy called after her.
She waved him off and trudged through the ankle-deep water. It splashed against her thighs. She kicked her feet out, running awkwardly, as the water rose to her waist. It took her breath away when it dipped past her navel.
“Lou!” She waved. “Oh, Lou, you made it!”
Her eyes were so locked onto Lou’s, Norma didn’t notice the infant in her arms until she reached the side of the raft. The craft bounced against her hip and she reached up toward Lou. Then she pulled back, seeing the newborn. Her hands found her mouth again. She gasped and nearly lost her balance when the raft pushed against her a second time.
“Let’s get close to the beach,” said a man at the aft, oars in both hands. “I don’t want to risk the babies falling into the water.”
Babies? Norma backed away, confused. Had Lou had twins?
Then she saw the stranger, the other woman with an infant in her arms, and Norma’s heart surged. They’d made it with two infants, not one. It was all the more miraculous.
Norma looked down at David, who was closest to her. His tiny features were bright. He smiled at Norma and she reached out to take his hand, holding his tiny fingers in hers. They weren’t as tiny as she remembered.
Had he grown in the few days since she’d last seen him? Was he getting bigger?
Norma waded back to the beach, standing in ankle-deep water again. Rudy joined her, and together they helped the travelers from the raft. The group walked up the beach to waiting blankets and towels, to bottled water and pieces of warm bread.
The raft headed back to the boat, the oarsman churning against the surf.
Norma had so many questions. So many. None of them came to mind.
They sat on the blankets. Lou offered the child, bundled in a large T-shirt, to Norma. “Hold him. He’s been waiting to meet you.”
