Twenty-Six
“Maurice,” Phil whispered as he mounted – slowly, quietly – the steps up onto the porch, where Maurice was now huddled with the others.
Maurice nodded back.
“We can do this one of two ways: you can wear the suit, or I can. Which is it?”
“It’s a little stuffy anyway,” Maurice told him, rising.
[RL: *Laughing* Maurice is a smart cat, he knows that whatever the fuck Phil is planning, he’s more than happy to not be a part of it.]
“Okay. Go inside and get it off, I’ll be in in a minute to put it on.”
Maurice nodded again and went inside the house, closing the screen manually to keep it from slapping the jamb.
Phil crossed back to Bryce. “Do me a favor,” he said.
“What’s up?” Bryce whispered back.
“While I’m inside, get that box of dynamite down for me. I’ll need one stick ready to go, the rest I want you to keep in the box. But I need the box open. Got it?”
“Check.”
Phil crossed back to the porch. “Steve,” he whispered. “You have kids, right?”
“Yeah,” Steve said, nodded. “Two of them. But I don’t know where they are. When I got back…”
Phil waved him off. “That’s not why I asked,” he said. “Do they have like a little wagon or something?”
[RL: While the brush off Phil gives the frightened, grieving father is enjoyable, the missing kids are much more fun in the next episode. Where they play a fun, if limited, roll.]
[TK: The man is on a mission.]
“I have a Red Ryder in the shed.”
“Perfect. Get that for me and bring it around. Have Bryce load the dynamite in it.”
Steve looked at him like he had lost his mind, but said, “Okay.”
“Perfect. Now I just need a few more things.”
“Like?”
“For starters, a football helmet.”
Twenty-Seven
“Here’s how it’ll work,” Bowers told the group.
All of the prisoners had sat back down at the table, listening intently. Erin was, as well. Not sure where it was going.
“I’m offering to let you out of lock down,” Bowers continued, “on one condition: that you self-regulate. The first time some asshole skin head or whatever kills someone, everyone goes back on lock down and the offending individual will take a walk.”
He looked from one set of eyes to the next. “Understood?” he asked.
They all nodded.
“Let me be clear: this is still my prison. I am allowing you new privileges, but with them come new responsibilities. You will be responsible for cleaning up after yourselves. Sanitation. Maintenance. Security. And other duties. Female prisoners will handle laundry and kitchen duties. You will volunteer for work duty when we ask. If you do not, you will be put back in lock down. If this facility does not stay clean, you will be put back in lock down. If the guards in the cat walk observe any unethical activity, you will be put back in lock down. If anything at all happens, in any way at all that doesn’t please me pretty as fucking pudding, you will be back in lock down. Indefinitely.”
He let his gaze wash across them again. Said, “Understood?”
They all nodded again.
“Now, because we will no longer have a significant guard presence, the ability for you to voice grievances or warn us of possible events unbecoming a properly ordered prison will be diminished. Therefore, I am going appoint one of you as my representative.”
[RL: In other words: We won’t be around for you to rat your friends out to, so I’ll have another guy for that. Snitch to him, and he’ll snitch to me. Also, as I mentioned before, race relations are largely coordinated through the guards, since the prisoners can’t always be trusted to do it with limited violence. Now, that responsibility to be left to…]
He nodded to Erin.
“I don’t expect an answer right now, though I think we all know the obvious one. I will give you twenty-four hours, and you’ll be called back tomorrow to give me your answer. Talk with your people. Dismissed.”
Everyone stood. “Not you, Gibbs,” the Warden said.
Erin sat back down. The other inmates filed out, casting him hateful glances as they passed.
Finally, the door closed, and the Warden cleared his throat. “Any questions?” he asked Erin.
“Only the obvious one.”
“Ah,” Bowers said, got up from the table and crossed to a small cabinet. Opened it, took out a bottle of scotch and two glasses. Came back to the table on Erin’s side. Sat on the corner of the table. Set the glasses down, and then picked up one and poured some scotch in. Handed it to Erin. Repeated the process with his and then sat the bottle on the table.
“Why you,” he said.
Erin set his scotch on the table and looked up at the Warden.
“Too early?” Bowers asked.
“Saving it for later,” Erin told him.
“Don’t bother, you can have the bottle.”
Erin picked the glass back up and took a sip. It was good. Well rounded. He liked it. Had another sip.
“I chose you for two reasons,” Bowers explained. “One: because I like you. But more importantly, two: the prisoners don’t. Not only do they dislike you, not only do they fucking hate you, but they’re scared shitless of you.”
[RL: A very convincing sales pitch.]
Erin nodded.
“You used to be a cop, so they hate you, but now you’re a prisoner. But not because you were corrupt, because of an accident. So they can’t really embrace you as a criminal.”
“I’ve never really felt like one.”
“Right. And you’re not white, so you couldn’t just go to the Arian Brotherhood and say ‘Yeah, I shot that black boy on purpose.’ But you’re not black and you shot a black kid, so the only way you’d ever get protection from the black gangs is by being someone’s bitch. Which I think it’s safe to say is out of the question.”
Erin nodded again.
“You’re an outsider. You don’t conform to any of their little rules. So, what are you?”
Erin took a sip of his scotch. Set the glass down. Said, “Your new representative?”
Bowers smiled. “Exactly,” he said.
[RL: This is about the point where the series begins to open to allow Season Two and Three. Though the beginning is probably a ways back, this is where you really begin to see where Erin plays in it. Before this, he was just a badass. Now we can see how the population will be released, allowing for more movement and therefore more interaction. You need interaction for a story to take place, otherwise it would be fifteen hundred people sitting around. Not really all that exciting. But the story is moving exactly as it should. Season Two will explore territory Season One could never have begun to touch even passively, because of the constraints of lock down – even if that’s how we planned it.]
Twenty-Eight
The wagon had a squeaky wheel, or maybe it was the weight, but it was pissing Phil off.
His only hope of making it back to the house in time rested atop the dynamite in the wagon.
He didn’t know if he could make it. He wouldn’t be able to run well in the suit, the fucking thing must weigh fifty pounds, he thought. And he didn’t know how long the fuse was. He tried to think back to the Misty Kitty but couldn’t gauge the time, he had been arguing with Bryce.
A minute? Half that?
He decided it didn’t matter, and purged the issue from his mind.
The most important thing now was to move slowly, and not lose his cool. He took another half step – walking sideways, creepers rolling around him like a tide – the wagon wheel squeaked again.
Even in the frigid air, Phil was sweating. It could have been his nerves, but he doubted it. Between the helmet and the suit, he was practically an oven. He imagined himself standing there pouring off steam.
Took another half step. The wheel squeaked again.
; [RL: I love to imagine him standing there, in his giant bite suit, wearing a replica football helmet – I don’t know, Ravens, let’s say – with steam just rolling off of him. A Red Rider in his right hand. The wheel squeaking as he pulls it. Zombies stumbling all around him. He takes a step forward: Squeak “Mother fucker.”]
How far out should he go? A hundred feet? A hundred yards? He didn’t know. How much fucking dynamite was in that crate, anyway? Could be hundreds of sticks. But dynamite went by pounds. He guessed fifty to sixty. Blast radius? A big one, that was for sure. He held back a giggle. If he survived, this was going to be the greatest thing he had ever done. Possibly the greatest he ever would.
Shit, he thought, possibly the greatest thing ever done ever, by anyone.
[RL: *Dying*]
Took another half step. The wheel squeaking as he pulled it behind him.
He assumed they would already be sneaking people out to the buses. It only made sense. His Big Boom would give them the cover to move the rest of them, but if he was in charge, they would be moving the women and children now. [RL: *Sigh* Right. But see what I mean? He’s a fucking gentleman, despite his lust for zombie violence.] The men would make a run for it, and the guards could pull the trucks out while the creepers were on the ground. But he wasn’t in charge. He was pulling a God damn wagon through the crowd.
Took another half step. The wheel squeaking.
[RL: I can’t help it. I love to bask in the visualization of this chapter. But I’m breaking my promise, talking too much. I’ll shut back up.]
He thought he was far enough now. He would have to be. They just didn’t have any more time. Any second someone was going to make a noise or a cloud was going to cover the sun, and they’d all be fucked. Most of all, him.
Took his last half step and stopped. Took a deep breath and let it out.
Reached down and picked up a single stick of dynamite. The gun store owner must have been a fucking nut job, he reasoned, to have a box of the stuff just lying around.
Took another deep breath.
Reached down and picked up the lighter. Flicked it. Touched it to the fuse. It started sparking. Dropped the stick into the wagon and picked up his only hope of survival.
Pulled the cord.
[TK: Time to run.]
Twenty-Nine
“Where the hell have you been?” Tall Bill Mahone asked as Erin came back into the cell. “And what’s that? Is that scotch? Where’d you find a bottle of scotch?”
Erin held it up. “Warden gave it to me,” he said.
Bill looked at him like he had just landed in a space craft and asked to speak to their leader.
“The Warden gave it to you?”
Erin nodded. “Don’t ask,” he said. Walked past Bill and set the bottle on the counter next to the sink.
Bill asked, “Why?”
“Didn’t I say, ‘Don’t ask’?”
Tall Bill scrunched up his face in thought. Then said, “Fine. Fuck it. But can I have a taste?”
“With dinner,” Erin told him. “Like civilized people.”
The door to the cell clanked shut and Bill took the opportunity to take up his usual position against it, his back to the bars. “So,” he said, “where you been?”
“I said…”
“Don’t ask. Yeah, I got that. I’m asking and you better start telling. Because that dead look you had in your eyes, it’s not dead anymore. I want to know why.”
“Like: do I have something cooking to take you and your one true love out of here?”
[TK: Erin’s escape plans now include rescuing the girls, interesting how quickly plans can change once women get involved.]
“Something like that.”
Erin climbed up into his bunk and lay down. Laced his fingers behind his head and sighed. “Warden had an interesting proposition.”
“Being?”
“He wants to let us out of lock down.” He let that sit a moment, then said, “Those bodies we pulled off the fence yesterday, you pulled off today, they’re fucking zombies. Flesh eating, all of that. I saw them in action today.”
He waited for Bill to respond. He didn’t, so Erin continued, “And now the Warden doesn’t have the man power to keep them out and us in. So he’s decided he’s more worried about keeping them out. So, anyone who wants out is free to leave.”
Erin heard Bill shift against the bars. “Is that so?” Tall Bill asked.
“It is. Except me seeing them in action today? That was when the Warden let someone walk out the gate.”
The statement settled in over the two, pressing the edges of the cell, and hung there. Erin’s mind moving from possible scenario to possible scenario. All ending in being torn limb from limb. Except one.
“So,” Bill broke the silence, “what are we going to do?”
Erin shifted in his bunk. “Well,” he said, “funny thing happened when the Warden made this decision: he decided I would be his personal representative…”
“‘Attaché’ is the proper word.”
“Anyway. Now I’m his go-between for the prisoners. If, and when, they take the deal.”
“When’s that?”
“Twenty-four hours from about an hour ago.”
Thirty
Chris got out of the bus and made his way back up to the house. He had to pass the house they were parked in front of, then go through that yard and the next, to come up to the rear of Steve Morris’ house.
“Where are we?” he asked Brooks.
“At the back door of Morris’ house,” Brooks told him, and laughed. Covered it with a meaty palm to soften the sound.
[RL: Ah, yes, ironic comedy is a personal favorite of mine. If you pay attention, you’ll find a heavy dose of Mel Brooks in our books. I think that’s a natural thing in all of popular culture. You’ll see styles, humor, theatrical themes, and literature kind of move between several different styles, often returning to them over the course of a generation. I think that’s because – in the instance of Mel’s (like we’re on a first name basis, or some shit) style heavily influencing a generation that was very young when he was pumping out hit after hit. Twenty, thirty years later, these people are going back and saying “That’s what made me laugh to tears when I was growing up” and then turning around and injecting it back into the culture. And so, in a very real way, the pioneers craft never really dies, it’s simply recycled to influence yet another generation.]
“Ready for Comedy Central,” Chris said. “Do we have time for another run?”
Brooks shrugged his massive shoulders. “Probably,” he said.
“Okay. How many do we have left?”
“About forty. Only a handful able to carry anything or shoot it. Most of them came with us.”
“Fine. We’ll need Phil’s distraction – whatever the hell it is – to move those trucks full of ammunition….”
Chris doubled over from a searing bolt of pain in his side. His muscles tightened – all of them – and he thought they might break his back. Brooks held him up again, and Chris waited for the pain to subside. He sagged into Brooks’ strong arms as the pain washed away, and then stood up shakily.
“Take one more,” he said. “And then we’re done. I’m going to go out front and wait for this big plan of Phil’s. Then whoever we have left will get run down to the buses and we’ll take off in the trucks. It’s the best we can do.”
“Roger,” Brooks said, and left him.
Thirty-One
“Will they take it?” Alexander Pope asked Warden Bowers.
“Would you?” Bowers shot back, rubbing his belly.
“Of course,” Pope told him.
“They’ll take it. Fucking animals, they’re lucky as hell for me to even offer. Just gave them the choice to make them feel better.”
[RL: Again the idea that the prisoners are less than human. I find it particularly appealing that as the season moves along, they become more human to the reader, and begin to become more human to the guards
. Warden Bowers, way up in his tower, is still disconnected. This will play immensely in Season Two and Three. Here we just see the undercurrents.]
“What about the women?”
Bowers thought a moment. The men had been his main concern – they were good for labor and possibly to hold a rifle, the lower risk ones, anyway – but the women would have to be managed as well. Could they self-regulate? He doubted it.
“That’s another matter completely,” he said. “The men have got set factions. Women? Whatever sounds good or makes them feel all warm inside goes.”
Pope leaned forward in his chair. “Should I speak to some of the female guards? See if we can’t pick out a few prisoners that carry more respect than others?”
“See,” Bowers said, and grimaced, “there’s the difference. The men’s loyalties are split along gang lines. There’s some of that with the ladies, but not so much. And the men’s gang lines are built on being smarter, and more brutal. You got a skinny little fuck like Eddie ‘the Prince’ who couldn’t actually fight for a damn. But he’s got big bastards like Smalls to do the fighting. Not the same with the women.
“Instead you’re looking at the biggest, fattest, angriest fucking dike in the world at the moment running the show. Different world between the two.”
Pope nodded.
“And we don’t have a Gibbs on that end, either.”
Pope nodded again. “A representative,” he said.
Thirty-Two
“Chow time,” Mercedes told the two men. Erin Gibbs came up to the bars and took the tray she handed him.
[RL: Hint, hint.]
Outpost Season One Page 50
