Devil's Haircut

by Sam Sisavath

  Nothing like the prospect of immediate death to keep your mind off hypothermia!

  “Yeah,” Keo said.

  “What should we do?”

  “Well, they’ve already seen us. And they just destroyed that boat. They could do the same to us, but instead they’re…waving us over?”

  “Are you sure about that?” she asked, every word stuttering from the cold.

  “I don’t think we have any choice. It’s either them or, you know.”

  “Since you put it that way…”

  “Hold on,” Keo said, and began swimming toward the shoreline.

  This time he didn’t have to take them both under the surface, so they made better progress. Also, Claire’s kicking did more good up here.

  “Keo,” Claire said after a few seconds of swimming.

  “Yeah?”

  “You’re a hell of a good swimmer, you know that?”

  He grinned. “Thanks, kid. If I let you go, can you swim on your own?”

  “Keo, I don’t think I can move my arms right now. I can barely feel my legs.”

  “In that case, just relax.”

  “Now that I can do,” Claire said, though she didn’t stop kicking.

  Good enough.

  He glanced over his shoulder a couple of times even after the flashlight had turned off. He knew where he was going and could see the trees getting brighter as the night continued to fade and morning began to creep into its place, little by little.

  In front of him, on the other side of Lake Mansfield, the fighting hadn’t stopped for a second, the pop-pop-pop coming across the length of the lake like endless ropes of firecrackers. It was harder now to see the burning buildings or pinpoint where the battle was most intense. Gunfire seemed to come from every end of Buck’s former command center. There were the occasional explosions, but most of it was small arms and machine guns.

  Have at it, boys. Have at it to your heart’s content.

  And there, the island with the warehouse, looking small. It wasn’t anywhere close to their position, and though it was likely within shooting distance of the people who had destroyed the Bucky twenty-footer, no one had fired at it and vice versa. He could barely make out the guard towers, never mind the men in them.

  What are you hiding in that warehouse, Buck? What secrets don’t you want us to know?

  “Keo,” Claire said, her voice bringing him back to the freezing lake water.

  “Yeah?”

  She was looking behind her, back toward the trees, and Keo followed her gaze.

  In the growing morning dusk, there were men back there, watching them approach. They wore black fatigues and some had black camo on their faces.

  “They look like the same ones attacking Fenton,” Claire said.

  “That’s good to know.”

  “Is it?”

  “‘The enemy of my enemy is my friend.’”

  “You hope.”

  Yeah, that too, Keo thought as he turned around so he could more easily drag Claire and swim at the same time.

  On the plus side, no one was shooting at them yet.

  That, he concluded, was good enough, for now.

  Twenty-Five

  They were pulled out of Lake Mansfield by a half-dozen men wearing black clothing—not quite fatigues or BDUs, but close enough—and dark face paint. Neither Keo nor Claire had any weapons to give up, so it made for an uneventful “capture.” The men didn’t say anything and led them away from the shoreline and into the woods before they even had the chance to dry out.

  Keo took a second or two to glance back at the compound across the lake as they were taken away. Unlike the calm water that separated him from Buck’s base, there was nothing tranquil about what was taking place on the other side. The fighting raged on under the ever-expanding cloak of morning sunlight, though it wasn’t quite as helter skelter as it had been during the night. He sensed a stalemate on the horizon.

  Claire was shivering from the long swim, and one of their captors was nice enough to take off his thick winter jacket and give it to her. The teenager smiled and thanked him, and got back a shy smile from behind a face covered in black and green camo.

  The others weren’t quite as nice, but they weren’t assholes, either. Instead, they marched Keo and Claire through the trees that, like the rest of the wooded area, were coming to life. Animals and men alike were coming out of their slumber and moving around. Keo glimpsed figures around them, armed men and a few women, going back and forth from the shoreline.

  There were two men in front of Keo and Claire and two more behind them, including the shy kid who had given Claire his jacket. Keo’s instincts were to try to get some information, but like the teenager next to him, he was suddenly very cold from their arduous trek across Lake Mansfield to do very much except control his shivering and keep his teeth from chattering too loudly. Unfortunately, he wasn’t nearly as attractive (or female) as Claire, and no one offered their winter gear to him. There was some benefit to trying not to freeze to death, though; he could barely feel the aches and pains from all his bruises and wounds. Claire hobbled noticeably next to him, and when their captors noticed, they slowed down their pace.

  The long walk—about two hundred meters or so from the shoreline—gave him and Claire the opportunity to dry out. He was still dripping lake water, though not nearly as heavily as before, by the time they reached the makeshift command post. There were two to three dozen tents spread out inside a clearing, with guards on the perimeter and patrols around the area. Men on horseback moved back and forth, but Keo couldn’t see any vehicles. Which made sense if the compound’s attackers had been sneaking into position all night last night before launching their surprise strike. A car engine would definitely give away their approach.

  Even all the way back here, Keo could still hear the pop-pop-pop of gunfire coming all the way from Fenton. Things were clearly slowing down to a series of sporadic back and forth, though, and nothing like the full-on attack he’d been hearing all night.

  Their captors led them through the CP and into a tent near the middle that looked identical to all the others except for the guards standing outside. There were three men already inside, standing around a cheap plastic portable table with a map of the area spread out between them. They looked up when Keo and Claire were brought in.

  “This them?” one of the men asked. Keo had never seen the speaker before; he was older than the other two in the tent with him by about twenty years. He was in his fifties, wearing similar black clothing to the others, except his didn’t have a single dot of dirt on them.

  Someone hasn’t gotten his hands dirty yet.

  Keo zeroed in on one of the men standing next to the leader. Thirties, dark hair, with equally dark eyes that widened almost comically at the sight of Keo.

  “Fancy meeting you here,” Keo said.

  The man smirked back at him. “What the hell are you doing all the way out here?”

  Keo took a moment to squeeze some leftover water from his shirt. “I thought it was a perfect morning for a swim. What does it look like?”

  “You know him?” the older man asked.

  “His name’s Keo,” Nolan said. Keo recognized him instantly from Cordine City—or what was left of the place after Merrick had gotten through with it. Nolan was dressed the same as the others, with a rifle slung over his shoulder, but his “uniform” looked a little more worn than the older man’s.

  There were no signs of Cassandra, the woman who had been at Nolan’s side back in Cordine City. Instead, the third man in the tent was a redhead with a goatee and not very much on top. He was in his thirties and he kept silent; even so, Keo recognized the signs.

  Now that’s a dangerous man. Might want to keep a close eye on him…

  “I know that name, don’t I?” the older man was saying as he eyeballed Keo.

  “Probably,” Nolan said. “Ol’ Keo’s been around, from what I hear.”

  “Here, there, everywhere in-between,�
�� Keo said. He glanced back at the two armed men who had led them into the tent. “We good, Nolan?”

  “Yeah, we’re good,” Nolan said. He nodded at the guards, who exited. “Keo, this is Copenhagen.”

  “Copenhagen?” Claire said.

  “That’s right,” the older man said. He walked the short distance over and shook Claire’s, then Keo’s hand. “Let me guess: All that commotion last night—that was you two?”

  “Guilty as charged,” Keo said, and thought, Copenhagen. I guess he’s not dead after all. “What are you guys doing here?”

  “What does it look like?” Nolan said. “We’re taking Fenton.”

  Not today, you’re not, Keo thought, but he didn’t think that was going to help his cause, so he said instead, “So what is this? Some kind of alliance?”

  “That’s exactly what this is,” Nolan said. “We didn’t feel like waiting for Black Tide to make their move. Buck needed to be stopped. Now.”

  “So you guys joined forces?”

  “Not just us. There are people from about ten towns here. Most of them already know what these Mercerian assholes are capable of. They’ve seen the damage up close. We’re going to put a stop to them now, whether Black Tide approves or not.”

  “They don’t know you’re here.”

  Nolan shook his head. “We don’t need their permission. Or hers.”

  He didn’t say who her was, and Keo guessed he didn’t really have to. Everyone knew.

  “We’re going to take Fenton, then put Buck on trial for his crimes,” Copenhagen said. “He has a lot to answer for.”

  Like taking Fenton away from you? Keo thought, but again, he didn’t think that kind of straightforward talk was going to help his cause.

  He said, “Have you talked to Black Tide lately?”

  “Not for a while,” Nolan said. “Why?”

  “I need to make contact with them,” Keo said, even as he thought, If they’re still out there. God, please let them still be out there…

  He got a change of clothes and fresh venison from one of the campfires, and one of Copenhagen’s medics took a look before redressing his wounds. He pocketed some painkillers before leaving the camp with a long-range radio, anxious to reach Darby Bay. The city was close enough to his current position that they should have answered, but they didn’t. He tried Black Tide Island itself, but it too failed to respond.

  Keo spent the next thirty minutes trying anyway, repeating his calls and switching back and forth. When that still didn’t work, he attempted every Black Tide emergency channel he knew, hoping that maybe there was someone—anyone—out there who would answer. He needed information. He needed to know what was happening in Darby Bay. He needed to know something.

  But he got nothing, and the frustration grew. He spent more time chewing and filling his belly with warm soup than he did getting any closer to reaching Lara or anyone from Black Tide. He couldn’t stop and didn’t. When sitting around using the radio got to be too much, he got up and moved around. He was now wearing a gun belt with a pistol in a holster, which was like a pass to roam in and around the CP.

  Claire found him pacing in the woods a few meters from the main campsite. She had changed into warm clothes, and like him, got her wound dressed. She stood by listening to him fruitlessly trying to make contact with someone over the radio. Every now and then she would glance over in the direction of Fenton as cracks of gunfire continued throughout the morning.

  When Keo finally put the receiver back into the radio’s cradle, Claire asked, “I don’t understand. Where is everybody? Even if Darby Bay…” She stopped short before continuing. “Someone should be out there. Someone should have answered.”

  Keo shook his head. She wasn’t saying anything he hadn’t thought to himself a hundred times in the last hour. Someone should have answered one of the channels. It was impossible for Buck and Merrick to have taken out every single arm of Black Tide in one night. Lara’s people were heavily spread out over multiple states, for God’s sake.

  So where the hell was everyone?

  “This doesn’t make any sense,” Claire was saying. “The island should be safe, no matter what’s happening in Darby Bay or anywhere else. And if the island’s safe, then Jane should be answering your calls.”

  The kid wasn’t wrong. Jane was in charge of Black Tide’s radios. The woman practically lived in the communications room on the island, and the fact that she hadn’t answered any of Keo’s attempts spoke volumes.

  Keo kicked the radio in frustration and watched it slam into a tree and shatter.

  “We need to go,” he said. “We need to be halfway to Darby Bay by now.”

  “You want a horse?” Nolan asked.

  “Two, actually,” Keo said. “One for me, and one for Claire. Unless you have a car sitting around that you’re not using?”

  Nolan shook his head. “We used horses and boots to get here. It was the only way to make sure Fenton didn’t hear us coming.”

  “Did you get him?” Claire asked. “Buck?”

  “We don’t know. And we won’t know until we take the compound.”

  “Which isn’t going to be today,” Copenhagen said.

  They were back inside the main tent, with Nolan and Copenhagen. The third man with the red goatee wasn’t there this time. They could still hear small arms crackling in the distant sky, but they were far and few now. According to Copenhagen, his men had taken the perimeter around the base but hadn’t been able to make any further headway inside. The Buckies were too dug in and had too much firepower, and Copenhagen had elected to hold off on another full-frontal assault now that they no longer had surprise on their side.

  “They’re not going anywhere, and neither are we,” Copenhagen said. “It might take a day or a week, but they’re not getting out of that place. That army is dead; it just doesn’t know it yet.”

  “What about the city?” Claire asked. “The civilians?”

  “They’re hanging back. I know most of those people; they were never that enthusiastic about Buck’s arrival, and from the intel I’ve been gathering before last night, that hasn’t changed. So they won’t get in the way.”

  “If anything, they’re helping our forces with food, water, and shelter,” Nolan said. “I have to admit, I didn’t see that coming.”

  “He’s not in there, you know,” Keo said.

  “Who?” Nolan asked.

  “Buck.”

  Nolan and Copenhagen exchanged a look, before Copenhagen said, “And you know this how?”

  “He left last night. That large caravan you saw taking off that still hasn’t come back? That was him. He was on his way to Darby Bay. He’s there right now, and I doubt very much he cares what you do with Fenton. He was always just using the city as an FOB for something bigger.”

  “Black Tide,” Nolan said.

  Keo nodded. “Yeah. This was never about Cordine City or Fenton or any of the other towns he massacred. This was always about Black Tide.”

  “Shit.”

  “So I need horses. The fastest ones you have, and supplies to get me to Darby Bay.”

  “And what is it you’ll do when you get there?” Copenhagen asked. “If you’re right, and Buck is already there with an army?”

  Kill everyone if they’ve harmed her, Keo thought, but he said, “I’ll figure it out on the way over. So? Can you spare those horses or not?”

  “Yeah,” Nolan said. “I’ll tell them to bring you two.”

  “Thanks,” Keo said, and turned to go with Claire. He stopped at the tent flap and looked back at Copenhagen. “What was in the warehouse?”

  “The warehouse?” Copenhagen said.

  “The one on the island.”

  Copenhagen shook his head. “I don’t know. The last time I was in Fenton, that building was under construction. I don’t know what’s inside or what Buck’s been using it for. Whatever it is, it couldn’t have been that important.”

  “What makes you say that?” Claire ask
ed.

  “Because if Buck did take off last night, he left whatever was inside the warehouse behind.”

  “Unless he took it with him,” Keo said.

  A horse was a horse, but not when its name was Horse. Keo recognized it instantly, along with the large man sitting in its saddle as they trotted through the camp toward him.

  Keo grinned and waved them down. “Jesus. You’re still alive.”

  “Why wouldn’t I be?” the big man, Wally, said as he jumped down. “Oh, you weren’t talking to me, were you?”

  Keo ignored him and walked over to the big thoroughbred. The animal lifted his head and let out a loud whinny.

  “I guess he remembers you, too,” Wally said.

  “Of course he does,” Keo said. “We’ve been through a lot together.”

  “You two know each other?” Claire asked.

  “We met in Cordine City,” Wally said. “Wait. You’re talking about me and Keo here, right?”

  Claire smiled. “Who did you think I was talking about?”

  “The horse.”

  “The horse?”

  “Yeah. His horse.”

  “That’s your horse?” Claire said to Keo. “When did you get a horse?”

  “Long story,” Keo said. Then to Wally, “Thanks for taking good care of him, Wally, but I need him again.”

  “Hey, he was always just a loaner anyway,” Wally said. “Where you running off to?”

  “Darby Bay.”

  “What’s in Darby Bay?”

  “I’ll find out when I get there,” Keo said. “Can you get Claire another horse? Something that can keep up with Horse here?”

  “Wait. You named your horse, Horse?” Claire asked.

  “You say that like it’s an odd thing to do.”

  “Well, it is.”

  “Everyone thinks it’s odd except you, Keo,” Wally said. He nodded at Claire. “Follow me, kid,” and led her away.

  The teenager followed the big Cordine City man, but not before glancing over her shoulder at Keo as if to say, You really named your horse, Horse?

  Keo smiled back at her before turning his full attention to Horse. The animal had already lost interest in their reunion and was grazing on a heavy patch of green on the ground.