“I think I saw a fourth,” whispered John, finally speaking, his deep male voice seeming to rumble across the cold air.
Shit. If John had seen one, too…
“I think you’re right, John,” said Georgia. “I think I saw another one too. A fourth.”
“This is just what we need,” muttered Cynthia.
“Mom,” said Sadie. “What do we do?” Her voice sounded scared, becoming something of a high-pitched whimper.
The distant gunfire continued, bursts of it roaring across the cold night. Max’s fight hadn’t gone as easily as theirs had.
Although maybe theirs wasn’t over yet.
“Max needs help. I can’t make it quickly enough…”
“I’ll go,” said John, interrupting her. He was already standing up.
Georgia didn’t know what to do. Should she send just John alone? She couldn’t send Sadie into a situation like that. But if she sent Cynthia with him, it would just be herself and Sadie left behind, left to face the shadow that had disappeared, slinking away into the night to save his own skin, possibly more dangerous than all the others.
Normally, it wouldn’t have been a problem. But Georgia had to remember she was injured. She wasn’t completely herself. Not physically. And maybe not mentally either. She knew she’d become more cautious, maybe more timid. The injury had gotten to her. Everything had gotten to her. There simply wasn’t a way to be through what they’d been through and not come out affected.
And it wasn’t like it ever ended.
It was one life or death situation after another. There was no way it couldn’t affect a person. The trick was to not let it crush you, let it pummel you relentlessly into the dirt and mud.
Georgia needed Cynthia there.
She looked at John. “Go,” she said.
“I’m going too,” said Cynthia, standing up.
“You’re staying here,” said Georgia.
“But…”
“We need you,” said Georgia.
She could have given her a strict order. She could have dared her to disobey. But the truth worked better.
John looked at Cynthia, and then darted off through the trees, heading towards his brother.
21
Marshal
Marshal was no fool.
He hadn’t gotten as far as he had in life by not understanding risk and reward.
He’d learned early on to only get into fights that he knew he could win. It’d served him well in life, particularly in prison.
He’d seen countless guys get carried out dead from the prison. They were guys who didn’t understand what Marshal understood. They were guys who, often enough, had known they hadn’t stood a chance. But they’d gone in anyway. They’d gone for the fight, heading right for the opponent’s throat, even when it didn’t do them any good. They were guys who’d been out to prove themselves, to make a name for themselves.
No one reminded Marshal more of those guys than Anton.
Anton was too easy to read. He was desperate for power, desperate to prop his image up.
But he didn’t know shit.
And that wasn’t even the start of his problems.
The whole trip, Marshal had let Anton take the reins. He’d let Anton think that he would simply go along with everything. He’d told Anton that Anton was the boss, and that he wouldn’t dare interfere with his own plans.
And that was true.
To a certain extent.
The other guys from the compound didn’t seem sure about Anton. But they certainly weren’t ready to follow Marshal instead. They weren’t ready for a mutiny, so Marshal didn’t try. That was a fight he knew he wouldn’t have won. And what would have been the point, anyway?
Marshal had told his men he’d take up the rear. He’d told them to get into position, and as they were walking, he’d simply slipped off. They hadn’t noticed him. Not until it was too late.
Marshal had hidden between the trees, deep in the shadows, and watched the three men under his command get shot. Marshal hadn’t lifted a finger to defend them. He’d saved himself. That’s what was important.
But that wasn’t all he was after.
Seeing the three men die like that had given Marshal a certain satisfaction. He felt it in his chest, a feeling of happiness that seemed to swell through him. A smile, a true smile, formed slowly on his face.
Marshal didn’t have those feelings often. In fact, he hadn’t felt anything at all until he’d discovered his ability to inflict pain. It’d been when he’d been young, playing with the family dog. Out of what had started as sheer curiosity, Marshal had stomped on the dog’s paw with his sneaker. The dog had squealed in pain, and given Marshal a look that he’d never forget.
He never forgot that feeling either, that happiness that, before his discovery, had been so foreign to him.
Early on, he’d learned to fake smiles, fake happiness. Even laughter and sadness. He knew exactly how to mimic the facial expressions and emotions of others. But inside, he felt nothing. Nothing at all. He’d known, even as a child, that they would have sent him somewhere, that his life would ever be the same if he admitted to anyone that he was at all different.
Marshal had faked his way through school. He’d fooled his parents and the teachers. He’d fooled most of his peers. But the people he couldn’t fool were his friends. Once people got close enough to him, they tended to realize that something was wrong, that something was off. They sensed somehow that Marshal was different. He didn’t give the same responses other kids did. No matter how good he was at faking emotions, there were some responses and things that he just couldn’t fake.
So the other students had respected him, but also tended to keep their distance. He wasn’t a loner, but had leaned in that direction.
At some point along the way through his schooling, Marshal had decided he’d get to the bottom of himself. He’d wanted to figure out what made his own mind tick. He wanted to understand why he was different. Eventually, this interest had let to psychology textbooks, found on a dusty shelf of some teacher’s shelf, probably left over from her college days.
Late at night with the textbooks, Marshal had made the discovery. The term “psychopath,” had, at first, seemed like it fit him the best. But then he found “sociopath.” The difference, according to the textbook, was slight. Psychopaths, though, tended to have lower intelligence scores than sociopaths. Sociopaths appeared, on the outside, completely normal. But inside, they were different. Their brains and minds were different, and they fit superficially into society very well.
Marshal knew he wasn’t dumb. In fact, he’d been given an IQ test in school, and scored in the 99th percentile. The teachers had arranged a meeting with his parents, and told them he belonged in the gifted program. His parents, not believing that their son Marshal was exceptional in any way, refused. They said they wanted him to have a normal experience, just like any other kid.
Marshal had resented them for that. He’d written about it in his journal, the one he’d kept since he was a kid. He put everything in that journal, every thought he could remember. He wrote about his struggles trying to fake emotions, about the way he felt nothing, and about the way hurting animals made him feel something, that fleeing happiness that was, otherwise, impossible to capture.
His parents had found the journal on his seventeenth birthday. They’d been beyond furious. His mother had cried, and his father had called him a freak of nature, telling him that he didn’t want to see him ever again. They’d kicked him out of the house with nothing more than the clothes on his back.
That was when Marshal’s path had strongly diverged from his peers. He’d stopped going to school. He’d spent weeks on the street, wandering through South Philadelphia, sleeping under bridges and above heating grates.
Life on the street had provided plenty of opportunities for him to pursue his enthusiasm for inflicting pain. On the street, there’d been no parents, no teachers. No one was monitoring what happened
. Police presence had been minimal on the back streets where Marshal spent his time. The world of the homeless had been, for the most part, un-policed.
Marshal had started slow, torturing stray animals he’d found. He remembered his first experience vividly, luring a stray cat to his side with soft words and the promise of a can of tunafish Marshal had stolen from a corner store. Then Marshal’s strong hands had tightened themselves around the cat’s neck. The feeling never left him, and he went on, looking for the next high. He’d moved on to people. Not killing them. But hurting them.
Killing animals and injuring people had been enough nourishment for his twisted mind. For a while.
Eventually, he’d become the go-to man for various gangs. When they’d wanted to bring about particularly harsh “justice,” they’d bring out Marshal, knowing that no one knew the dance of death and pain like he did.
That’s what had landed Marshal in jail.
The EMP had been, he’d thought, a new beginning. Not just a get-out-of-jail free card. But something more. Much more. Marshal had seen the EMP as a return to man’s natural chaotic state. It was life on the streets all over again. Only more so. More intense.
No police, no military. No government. No nothing. It all meant, to Marshal, that he could pursue his passion for pain in ways he’d never previously imagined. He’d roamed the streets, wild, inflicting pain whenever he wanted to. He’d killed often, and he’d been happy.
But he’d also been smart about it. He’d never risked his own safety in pursuit of his passion. In that way, he was reserved.
He’d also recognize, soon enough, that the world wouldn’t remain ungoverned. To his dismay, the militia started to take over almost immediately. In the weeks following the EMP, the militia had grown more powerful, stricter, and more regimented.
The only thing to do was to join. Marshal had worked his way up. His intelligence was his primary asset, not to mention the reputation he’d gained in prison as someone you didn’t want to mess with if you wanted to stay alive.
Marshal was a realist. He knew he couldn’t exist the way he wanted to outside the militia. He also knew that the militia was too strictly controlled to let him run wild the way he wanted to.
So he’d resolved to play the game again. To the militia, he’d present himself as a rule-following man dedicated to the growth and power of the militia. Meanwhile, privately, he’d do everything he could to cause chaos and pain. He’d use his rising reputation within the militia to seek out opportunities in which he could pursue his passion.
And he’d keep no journal. There’d be no way to discover his true intentions, the interior of his dark mind. He’d learned that lesson the hard way. He’d learned it for good.
Marshal had enjoyed seeing his companions get gunned down on the dirt bikes. It’d been something, but not quite enough. Marshal had been finding that the more pain he could inflict or witness, the more he craved it. It was like a drug, and he felt like he’d merely just whet his appetite.
There was gunfire in the distance. Presumably Anton was fighting for his life. Or the other way around.
Marshal didn’t particularly care which way the fight turned out. He didn’t care which side won, so long as he could move in afterwards like a specter and kill those who remained.
Whatever happened, Marshal would be there at the end. He’d hide in the shadows until the gunfire ceased. Then, when the survivors, whoever they were, thought everything was fine, and that they were safe, Marshal would move in and enjoy himself.
Marshal had never cared about the radios. Or about forming an alliance with the compound. It had all just been a ruse. He’d have his fun here, and then slowly make his way back to the suburbs of Philadelphia, where he’d deliver a completely false but completely believable report about the state of things in the western part of the state. Despite what he’d told Anton, he knew damn well how to get back. His ignorance had, like everything else, just been an act.
Marshal scanned the trees from his hiding place. Clouds were drifting in front of the moon, blocking its light.
Soon it would be time.
For now, he’d wait.
22
Max
Max had gotten beyond the bursts of gunfire. He didn’t know how he’d survived, but he didn’t stop to ponder his good luck. Not even for a moment.
He’d gotten to safety. The night was darker now. Clouds covered the moon. Max was lost in the dark shadows where the trees were dense. All he had to do now was sneak around from the side, attack the enemies from a direction they weren’t expecting.
But he had to move fast.
The gunfire continued. Max heard the clear sound of a hunting rifle discharging. Hopefully James had stayed in place, but it sounded like he was firing back when he could. Max knew that meant that James was taking a huge risk, sticking himself into visibility in order to fire back.
He had guts, that kid. Max hoped it didn’t get him killed.
It would help Max. It would serve as a distraction.
Max just didn’t know how long James could keep it up.
Two rifle sounds now. Definitely hunting rifles. Mandy had joined in.
Max was already on the move, and he picked up his pace. His boots crunched through the snow.
Blood trickled down from his forehead all the way to his mouth. He tasted it, and spit it into the snow. He’d knocked his forehead pretty hard. But it wasn’t enough to deter him. Not a lot was.
The fall had hurt his ribs. He doubted he’d broken one.
Max clutched his Glock in his right hand. As he moved, his cold hand fumbled inside his jacket for a spare magazine.
He was expecting to feel the magazine against his hand. But instead, there was nothing.
At first, he thought his hand had just gone numb with cold. Or from injury, when he’d fallen on it. After all, there were some small cuts on hands that he’d ignored. It was possible that he’d sliced through some nerves and not realize it.
But, no, Max switched hands, handing the Glock over to himself, and there was still nothing. He opened up his jacket, unzipping it completely.
Max found the problem. There was no longer a bottom to the jacket’s internal pocket. Instead there was just frayed fabric. Maybe it had torn during his fall. Or maybe it’d happened earlier. Whenever it had happened, the spare magazines had fallen right out of his jacket.
Max looked back in the direction he’d come.
No sign of the spare magazines.
If Max couldn’t see them from where he was, the magazines were either where he’d fallen, right in range of the enemy, or somewhere else entirely. It would take too long to find them. And be too dangerous.
Max had to continue.
Max remove the magazine from his Glock and checked it. Four rounds left.
Well, thought Max, that’d have to be enough.
Ignoring the pain in his legs, his forehead, and his ribs, Max ran forward as fast he could into the night.
He didn’t bother trying to be quiet. Not yet. Max ran through the woods in a large semi-circle. He calculated the path roughly in his head, visualizing the scene from a bird’s eye view. He had to manage risk and time. He had to get there fast. But if they spotted him in the process, the whole plan would be ruined.
If he was spotted, he’d be shot. But it wasn’t his life he was worried about. It was Mandy and James’s. Not to mention Georgia, his brother, and the others. Max didn’t know what was happening over there on the other side. But he knew that if he didn’t do what he had to do, the likelihood of the others surviving was slimmer.
Max pushed back his jacket sleeve to see his watch. The luminescent hands were just barely visible in the clouded moonlight. Russian watches had never been known for their lume.
It’d been ten minutes so far. Max was almost there. He could see the figures up ahead. He heard the gunfire still. But he hadn’t heard the hunting rifle. At least, he didn’t think so. It was hard to distinguish, after all, individu
al firearms through the cacophony of sound that ripped sporadically through the night.
He hoped Mandy and James were still alive. He hoped they weren’t lying behind their trees, bleeding out into the snow.
But whether or not they were didn’t change what he was going to do next.
Max was approaching from behind. He slowed his pace. He eased his boots onto the snow, trying to eliminate the crunching noise they made.
Max’s finger was on the trigger.
Three figures were in front of him. They were completely focused on Mandy and James. They didn’t turn around once. They didn’t even glance from side to side.
They were sloppy. That was their business. It was Max’s job to take advantage of whatever opportunity they left him.
Max took a deep breath. There was so much at stake. He couldn’t let his emotions run away from him. He needed to keep a calm, cool head and do what he needed to do. He needed to act swiftly.
By approaching the enemy from behind, Max knew he’d be putting himself directly in the path of Mandy and James’s rifles. It was a risk that he needed to take. Hopefully Mandy and James, despite the desperate situation, wouldn’t shoot too hastily. Hopefully they wouldn’t shoot Max.
But if they did, then Max was willing to live with that.
He knew he was up against impossible odds. If he came out of this alive, he’d be surprised.
Three men, even if they were facing the wrong direction, were too much for him to tackle on his own. Especially when all he had was his Glock with four bullets, a knife, and his own cunning. He had a busted leg, and his ribs and head hurt. The enemy was heavily armed. All they had to do was spin around and pump Max full of bullets.
But Max had to try.
His body was rebelling against the thought of death. No matter how determined someone was, or how brave, there was a desperate drive inside them, telling them that they had to live, that they had to do whatever it took to stay alive.
Fighting Rough Page 11
