Gray Skies

by Justin Bell

  “Nuh uh,” answered Brad, moving himself into a seated position as well.

  “Think they grabbed him?”

  “I hope so. Otherwise he’s…down there.” Brad looked towards the water. There was still a vague outward ripple where the car had sunk though the thick murkiness of the water concealed any sign of the red Subaru from outward view.

  “That was messed up,” Max said. He moved towards a tree, one of many that ridged the edge of Peoria Lake, and used it as leverage to clamor to his feet. “Think there’s a road over here somewhere?” he asked, glancing at the lake and deciding he wasn’t up for swimming back across.

  “Only one way to find out,” Brad replied.

  They worked their way through the thick trees, weaving between trunks, heading towards what looked to be a road on the other side. Max was still catching his breath, walking with a stuttering limp and in his head, his mind wandered towards his parents. He wondered where they were. Had they escaped? Were they safe somewhere?

  Was he now an orphan? Would he have to navigate the dangers of this new world all on his own?

  Max liked to put up a hard front; he liked to be the tough guy who could handle anything. He didn’t need his mom and dad—he was learning how to fire a gun, he was smart, Greer had taught him a bunch of stuff.

  Only, he did need his mom and dad. He knew that. As much as he resisted it, he had known it before, and he especially felt it as he walked along—as he prepared to face a world without them. The same world that Brad had been facing already for ten days. Two kids, no parents.

  As he pushed through the trees, they came to Route 26, a street that had been busy at one time but stood empty as it ran north past a residential neighborhood where they walked. The houses were all dark, the power long since gone out, and every once in a while, he’d see someone walking through a backyard, or a curtain moving in a window as people peeked out. There were people in the city, but Max was pretty sure they were people he didn’t need, or want to, know. The world remained silent even as they meandered through an actual town with actual civilization, the sun rising towards the clouds, too early in the morning for most folks to be waking.

  Especially if their coffee machines weren’t working.

  “I could live here,” Brad said quietly as they walked the streets, looking at the small, middle class homes that surrounded them. “It’s not Denver, but I could do it.”

  “What are you saying?” Max asked, turning towards his friend.

  Brad shrugged. “I dunno. Just, if we had to, you know. If we’re the only ones left? I could do it if necessary.”

  “We’re not living here.”

  “Where exactly are we going?”

  “Lakeview Mall.”

  “Just the two of us?”

  “Brandon’s friend said there were people there. That’s where I bet mom and dad went. Probably Winnie and the others, too.”

  “Or they ran into our friends in the van.”

  “Don’t say that,” Max barked, turning towards his friend.

  Brad held out two hands. “Easy, man, easy. Just saying is all. We should be prepared for anything.”

  Max shook his head as they kept walking.

  “How far away is this mall, anyway?” Brad asked.

  Max shrugged. “I don’t know, I figure we’ll walk north ’til we get there. Or see signs telling us where to go. Customs guy said it was ‘north of Peoria,’ so we’re heading north.”

  “Solid plan.”

  “You got a better one?” Max stopped walking and turned towards his friend, obviously not appreciating the sarcasm.

  Brad opened his mouth to speak, then shut it again. “Hey, Max. I’m sorry, man, okay? I know.”

  Max lowered his head and drew a deep, long breath. “It’s all good, Brad. Sorry, I was being a jerk. We gotta stick together on this, right?”

  “Absolutely.” He extended his hand and Max tapped him a high five, then they turned to continue walking down the road through the meandering neighborhood.

  “So who do you think lives here?” Max asked.

  Brad looked around. “Middle-class white people.”

  Max chuckled.

  Brad laughed, too. “Am I wrong? Tell me I’m wrong.”

  “No way, man, this is totally a white people neighborhood.”

  “You think any of them have a swing set? It’s been forever since I’ve swung on a swing set.”

  “How old are you, Brad?”

  “Dude, I’m only eleven. I’m still a kid! Just because we’re in a nuclear holocaust doesn’t mean the monkey bars are any less rockin’.”

  Max shook his head. “Man, I can’t believe I ever hung out with you.”

  Brad slapped him in the back of the head and the two laughed. They were chuckling as they walked and didn’t even hear the approaching car until it rounded a corner.

  Max’s head shot around and he glared at the sedan. It was coming down the road, down route 29, bearing right down on them, less than three houses away.

  “Brad! Run!” Max charged forward, grabbing Brad’s arm and spinning him so he could follow, darting down the narrow street, lungs burning after only a few moments. Max’s hip jerked and spasmed as he ran, shifting him into a clumsy shamble, but he kept going. Brad caught up to him and passed him, angling to his left and darting towards a row of similar looking modular homes.

  “Come on, man!” Brad shouted. “This way!”

  Max followed him, hearing the car rev behind them, feeling it bearing down, waiting for it to run them down, but they spun left over a once well-manicured lawn, ducked around the house, ran through the backyard, and slid down behind a row of squat bushes along the sloped edge of the yard leading back down to the lake. They both knelt there, breath rasping and hearts pounding, huddled among the trees and leaves, hoping the car would pass on by.

  For a while they heard nothing but their own breathing. The early dawn morning was quiet and even the engine of the car had faded into nothing.

  “Did we lose them?” Max asked.

  “Maybe?” Brad replied.

  They stayed crouched low and tight to the ground, buried behind the bushes, letting their breath come in slow motions, trying to will themselves to be silent.

  To their right, the trees rustled. Narrow trunks tipped and bent, someone leaning over and peering through them. Max fumbled in his belt and removed the revolver that had miraculously stayed in place even through their adventure in the water. Sliding it from its holster he held it in both hands, his arms trembling from cold. While they’d been moving it hadn’t been so bad, but as they crouched still, unmoving, the raw dampness of the lake water had soaked deep into him and he couldn’t stop himself from shivering.

  “Max,” whispered Brad. “You okay?”

  Max nodded, his teeth chattering and his arms and hands shaking, the revolver hopping up and down. The bushes behind them rustled and he could feel the presence of someone looming over them, hovering there, ready to come down and snatch them up, drag them away to who only knew where…

  “Gotcha!” Arms swung down from the bushes, latching around Max’s armpits, and yanked him back. In his surprise, the boy’s fingers sprang apart, dropping his weapon as he was pulled through the bushes, spun around, and brought face to face with Clancy Greer. He didn’t recognize Greer at first and immediately fought to get free and dash away to retrieve his weapon.

  “Come on, boy!” Greer hissed loudly. “Whatcha running for? It’s me!”

  “Clancy?” Brad asked, standing up from behind the bush. Max’s eyes widened in recognition and he stood still, staring in amazement. Behind Greer, Angel came walking and Winnie brought up the rear, limping on a blood-soaked leg. Their old stolen sedan sat on the road, parked with the engine off.

  “Winnie!” Max shouted, breaking free from Greer and darting back across the lawn. He wrapped his arms tight around his sister, who hugged him back, her cheeks flushing as she tried to look as uncomfortable as possible.
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  “Jeez, Maxie, what’s got into you?”

  “We thought maybe you were all dead or something.”

  “I have no idea how we survived that wreck, but somehow we did,” Winnie replied. She pointed to her pant leg, soaked with a dark, rusty stain. “My leg’s seen better days, but it could have been a lot worse.”

  “Have you seen mom and dad?”

  Winne’s face fell as she shook her head. “No. We haven’t. I was hoping you had.”

  Max closed his eyes and took a deep breath. “Brandon was with us, but a van drove us off the side of the road and some dudes grabbed him. They left us in the car to drown.”

  “Dag, that’s cold, man,” Angel said.

  “So what’s our plan?” Brad asked. “Where were you guys headed?”

  “A few of the Cavendish boys tried to take us out, but we managed to get the drop on them and swiped their car,” Greer said. “We cruised by the RV to check it out, found nobody there, then jumped on 29 to go north towards the Lakeview Mall. We couldn’t believe it when we saw you guys walking up the side of the road, clothes all drenched.”

  “Yeah it’s been a wild few hours,” Brad replied.

  “So what do you guys think?” Winnie asked. “Keep going? Get to the mall and see what’s what?”

  Max and Brad both nodded.

  “That might be where mom and dad were headed,” Max said.

  “What about our boy Liu?” Angel asked. “We leavin’ him out to pasture?”

  Brad shook his head. “We can’t do that.”

  “We’ll hit the mall first,” Winnie said. “See what’s there and talk about what to do next. First things first, we need to find a place we can call home, or as close to it as possible.”

  They all started walking back to the sedan.

  “I wonder if there’s a mattress store in there?” Brad said. “I could use a good night’s sleep.”

  Chapter 8

  It was full blown morning as the beat-up sedan rounded the corner, coming up on the tall, rectangular sign proclaiming their arrival at Lakeview Shopping Mall. Angel eyed the entrance on the right and the mostly empty parking lot as they approached.

  “I don’t like this,” he said as the car cruised towards the turning lane.

  “Keep moving,” Greer whispered. As they approached, a black van was entering the parking lot and making its way around the back of one of the empty big box stores on the opposite side. From the back seat, Brad peered out the window.

  “Was that the van?” he whispered to Max.

  Max was looking right over his shoulder. “I don’t know. It was dark, and the headlights were shining pretty bright.”

  “What are you boys saying?” Greer asked, looking back from the front passenger’s seat.

  “The car that ran us off the road,” replied Max. “We think it was a van.”

  “A van like that?” he asked, jerking his head towards the vehicle curling around the far end of the shopping mall.

  “We couldn’t really tell,” Brad replied.

  “Let’s play it safe,” Greer said to Angel, and Angel kept on driving past the main entrance. Up ahead, the access road curled around to the right, preparing to surround the mall like an oval racetrack, but a road jutted off to the left as well, leading out to some surrounding restaurants and freestanding stores. The roads were empty as they seemed to be everywhere, and Angel couldn’t see anyone in any of the buildings. He took the left-hand turn away from the mall, swung into a coffee shop parking lot and killed the engine, making sure the building was between them and the van.

  “Let’s play spy,” Greer said, slipping out of the passenger’s seat.

  “I’m coming, too,” said Winnie.

  Brad started opening his door, too.

  “No, no, no,” hissed Greer. “We can’t be sending the whole army out there to check this out. Winnie and I, we can handle this. You boys sit here and chill out.”

  Brad and Max nodded as Winnie stepped out of her back door and went around to lift the trunk. As Greer walked past the back of the car, he stopped and rapped on the rear window with his knuckles, and Brad looked around until he noticed the strange-looking—to his young eyes—manual crank device. His eyes widened as he figured out how to crank the window down on the ancient vehicle with no automatic windows.

  “I mean it, Max,” Greer said, pointing at him. “Stay here. Please. There will be plenty of chances to be a hero, but now’s not one of them. Got it?”

  Max chewed his lip for a moment, then nodded. “Got it. I’ll stay here.”

  “Good man.”

  Winnie rustled in the trunk and a few moments later, softly closed the lid, then walked past the driver’s side with a weapon in one hand and binoculars strung in a loose strap around her neck. Max smiled when he saw her, and for a brief moment, he saw a lot of his mother in her. She walked with a rigid, confident posture, even with her limp, and her long, straight hair was pulled back into a clutched ponytail. He saw some definition in her arms, with her t-shirt sleeves rolled up to her shoulders, and the way she held the weapon looked practiced and comfortable.

  “Dang,” he said quietly, “my sister suddenly became Sarah Connor.”

  Brad looked over at him. “Who’s Sarah Connor?”

  Max looked back, his eyes wide. “You did not just ask me that.”

  “How am I supposed to know who Sarah Connor is?”

  “I shoulda let you drown,” Max replied, shaking his head. Brad punched him in the shoulder.

  Winnie and Greer stayed low as they passed from behind the coffee shop to behind a small muffler shop, then halted as they came to the corner, seeing no other immediate cover. The mall access road passed right in front of the muffler shop, with the parking lot on the other side, and from their angle, they could see the second empty box store to the back left of the structure. As they watched, the black van came around that side and started navigating through the lot. Winnie saw several other cars back there, at least a dozen of them, and all of various makes and models. As the van angled towards the loading dock, she ducked and charged across the road, half-running, half-limping low to the ground until she got to a squat, waist high cement barricade that blocked the access road from the parking lot.

  Greer shook his head. Were all the Fraser kids as impulsive as her? He figured they got it from their mother.

  Winnie made her way left, then lumbered across another opening in the concrete barricade, favoring her injured leg, but still moving quickly, and made it to another barricade on the other side of the small road leading into the parking lot, staying low and out of site. She continued her painful, low-crouching walk, peering up over the barricade every once in a while to see what was up with the van. As she made it to an empty fast food restaurant, she swerved around the corner and pressed her back to the brick wall, leaning out to glance at the large box store, getting a good view from where she was standing. The van had stopped at a loading dock at the store, a corrugated metal garage door easing open.

  Ducking low again, she pressed the binoculars to her eyes and looked out over the wide expanse of the parking lot, increasing the magnification within the binoculars as she focused on the dock where the van had pulled up. One of the side doors was wrenched open in her view, and someone stepped into the van. Suddenly, a shadowed figure was half pushed, half tossed from the van, a man Winnie recognized as Brandon Liu. Liu tumbled to the concrete dock, bracing his fall with his hands, but almost immediately crumpled there and lay still, having to be scooped up and dragged by two others who had appeared at the door.

  They did have him. Max and Brad were right.

  Then, as Winnie watched, two men went back into the van…and pulled out her mother. Rhonda’s head hung low as they escorted her from the black vehicle, and her walk was a sluggish shuffle, one foot in front of the other as she strolled across the concrete. Just from the look in the binoculars she looked devastated, winded, and utterly defeated.

  What had they done
to her?

  Her father stepped from the van next, taking some strides towards Rhonda, but two more men stepped between them and grabbed him by the arms, dragging him a different direction, back towards the opened door. In a serious of orchestrated movements, Liu, Rhonda, and Phil all ended up inside the shopping mall, and the metal door ratcheted shut behind them, closing them off from Winnie’s view.

  They were there. All three of them.

  And now it was up to her to rescue them.

  Winnie ducked low and broke away, this time limping straight backwards from behind the restaurant, then angling up a second side road which crossed behind the various strip mall stores and free-standing buildings. She made it back to Greer within two minutes in spite of an aching pain stabbing at her calf. There was a hot fist of raw nerves in her lower leg, but her muscles worked and she could feel herself pushing through it.

  “What did you see?” he asked.

  “They have them.”

  “Who?”

  “All of them. Mom. Dad. Brandon.”

  “Go figure.”

  “We need to get them out.”

  “Easy there, Rambo,” Greer said. “Let’s get this info back to the others first, then see if we can figure out what to do with it, okay? There could be hundreds of those rednecks in that shopping mall, and unless we want every single one of us dead, we need to think long and hard about what we want to do.”

  “I’m not going to leave them in there.”

  “Not asking you to, hotshot. We’ll figure it out, okay?”

  Winnie nodded. She and Greer left from behind their cover and crouch walked back across the street and towards where the sedan was parked.

  “What did you see?” asked Max. He could almost tell by the look on Winnie’s face she was bursting with news.

  “They have mom and dad!” she shouted. “And Brandon.”

  “And they’re okay?”

  Winnie flattened her hand and shook it back and forth in a ‘kind of’ gesture. “Mom looked to be in pretty rough shape. Not physically, but mentally. Brandon wasn’t walking on his own, but dad looked mostly okay.”