The soldier shook his head. “There’s no sense wasting fuel cells activating one of the engines when the rain will take care of it.”
“Has the rain taken care of it yet?” Zach arched his brows. “It’s already spread to a second building, and that third there is starting to smolder. How many people are going to be out of a home tonight before the rain ‘takes care of it?’”
“Maybe they should have been more careful with their fires, then.”
Zach narrowed his eyes. The soldier looked well rested and well fed, the waterproof camouflage jacket of his fatigues fitting so snugly the zipper strained. Zach was willing to bet that if some of the guards were on the take, this one was one of them. “Would you like to explain to your CO why you didn’t stop the blaze before it reached the only medical clinic serving this side of the Clean Zone?”
That got his attention. So far, the clinic had been exempt from the extortion rackets and other corruption seeping through the city. Even the crooks had the sense to realize it wasn’t in their interest to deprive themselves of what sparse healthcare was available. In return, Chantal kept her head low and refrained from reporting a lot of suspicious injuries, making the clinic neutral ground.
If the clinic burned down, the medical care for hundreds of people would once again fall to the Army, who were trying to transfer as much of that burden as possible to Chantal and Zach and to the other clinic serving the far side of the Clean Zone.
Looking like he’d swallowed something nasty, the guard tipped his head to the side to mutter something to one of his comrades, who took off running.
An hour and two more burning houses later, a fire engine finally appeared, and then another. It might not have been enough if not for the fact that the rains turned heavy again. Nonetheless, there were four households without shelter that night. Chantal offered to let them sleep on the floor of the clinic temporarily. Thus, Zach was present for an impromptu community meeting after curfew had cleared the streets of the gawkers watching the remaining embers smolder.
“This can’t go on,” Mike, Adam’s brother, declared. He’d been sharing the targeted house with Adam and Karla. “Someone has got to step in and do something.”
Chantal frowned. “I agree, but you know how precarious my position is here. If I don’t stay under the radar—”
“We know, Doc,” Karla hastened to reassure her. “We know how important the clinic is. But the gangs are out of control and the guards aren’t doing a fucking thing.”
“Meanwhile, they’re living nice and comfy in the complex in the mountains,” Adam sneered. “How many of those precious fuel cells they refuse to part with are keeping that underground facility lit and powered while we’ve been out here freezing through the winter and unable to get a damn fire engine or ambulance when we need one?”
A woman whose name Zach didn’t know threw up her hands. “No wonder they’re not lifting a finger. Why mess with the status quo when it favors them?”
Mike nodded triumphantly. “Exactly. If they won’t deal with the gangs, we have to.”
One of the other neighbors, Drew, shook his head. “It’s risky. I heard a woman who was trying to organize her block to resist the protection racket in the southwest quadrant turned up with a bullet between her eyes.”
All faces turned to Chantal, who gave them a bleak look. “That’s what I heard from Marie at the west-side clinic, as well.”
Mike jumped to his feet. “They have fucking guns now, too?”
“How can they have guns? None of us has guns! They were all confiscated when we went through quarantine!” Zach didn’t recognize the speaker who posed that question.
“Unless it was a guard who did the shooting,” Karla murmured grimly. “Or provided the guns to the thugs who did.”
“Fuck.” Mike began pacing. His hands flailed in a way that eerily reminded Zach of Nico. “Look, I’ve already lost my husband to the pandemic, I’m not going to lose my brother and sister-in-law to a bunch of thieves who don’t seem to get that we’re all in this together!” He stormed past the curtains to the back and returned with a sheet, which he tore into wide shreds. He wrapped one of them around his face, creating a makeshift mask over his mouth and nose. “If the guards are going to give the gangs weapons, I say we make them give us weapons too.”
Chantal folded her arms over her chest. “You’re insane. This is suicide.”
“Better than sitting around waiting to be picked off by crooks!” Adam, Mike’s brother, rose, as well, and claimed another strip. Once most of his face was covered, all that was left were their nearly identical eyes. “We start luring the guards off their patrols in less populated areas and get the drop on them. Knock ’em out, take their weapons, their rations, their power cells, all the shit they’re holding out on us. And they won’t be able to ID us.”
“And what will the rest of us do when they start a manhunt?” Zach demanded, speaking up for the first time. “You know once you attack one of the guards, they’re going to come down on all of us. They’re going to search our houses and who knows what else. You’ll make it worse for everyone!”
“Well, maybe then they’ll finally locate the protection racket ringleaders!” someone snapped.
Karla scowled. “Worse, how? How does it possibly get any worse than watching my family and neighbors preyed upon by some wannabe crime lord?”
Zach caught Chantal’s fretful eyes over the small cluster of people to see his own dread mirrored in her face. It was true that the current situation was utterly untenable, but if this went badly—and there didn’t seem to be any way that it wouldn’t—they were going to see even more people die. How were they supposed to go up against armed military forces? What would they use, shovels and clubs?
But then he saw Mike, his mask now hanging around his neck, talking animatedly to their neighbors, and he felt his own ambivalence giving way to something he hadn’t felt in too long. Hope. For good or ill, what Mike and Adam were proposing—and what the other area residents were endorsing enthusiastically—would shake the status quo. Finally, they would break out of this powerless limbo and try to actually live rather than just get by.
He had a feeling if Nico were here, that would be his choice, as well. He’d be standing next to Mike, stirring the people up into a lather, urging them to take action. Zach had spent too much of his life standing by, permitting the intolerable, and here he was, doing it again. He couldn’t participate in this guerrilla rebellion for the same reasons Chantal needed to remain neutral, of course. Too many people relied on the clinic for them to put themselves in the crosshairs. But somewhere deep inside, a spark kindled and a tiny flame smoldered. He couldn’t take action, but if there was any way he could support their cause without endangering Chantal or the clinic, he’d do it.
In the predawn hours of the next morning, Zach woke, his mind too restless to return to sleep. Tiptoeing, so as not to disturb what little slumber Chantal was able to snatch, he dressed and slipped down the alley to the clinic to pick up where he’d left off cleaning the day before.
This was where he spent his life. Except for Chantal, he had no friends. He had nothing but his work and his memories of Nico to get him through each day. Oh, he was on a first-name basis with many of their patients and neighbors, but he never socialized, never reached out to them in kinship.
But then, he never had made friends easily. Maybe something about the way his father’s dogma and demands had isolated their family had set him apart, rendered him unable to connect with others. Maybe that had been why his instant attachment to Nico had hit him so hard and left him so devastated.
It was lonely. He was lonely.
“Can’t sleep?”
The soft murmur made Zach jump, set his heart hammering in the examination cubicle he’d been scrubbing. He’d thought everyone in the clinic was asleep.
Mike stood in the part between the curtains, eyeing him with something that was uncomfortably close to understanding.
&nb
sp; “Not for months,” Zach answered, pitching his voice low to avoid disturbing the others.
“Who is she? Or he?”
“Huh?”
Mike smiled softly. “You get a look on your face sometimes like you’re thinking of someone who isn’t here. I recognize it because you look the way I feel when I remember Wade, my husband. So who are you missing?”
“His name’s Nico.” Zach braced both his hands on the examination table.
“Died in the pandemic?”
“No.” Zach drew a deep breath, trying to figure out how to summarize the situation, then sighed and let his shoulders slump. “Not exactly. He could still be alive. It’s difficult to explain.”
“Not necessary. If you’re not ready to let him go, you’re not ready to let him go.” Mike shrugged, an oddly diffident gesture considering the fury and determination he’d exhibited the night before. “It takes time. God knows I know that.”
“I know I should give up hope of ever seeing him again, but I can’t. It doesn’t feel right. Like the Lord is telling me he and I aren’t through yet. Not that it does me much good. It’s not like I can go find him.” Zach huffed a humorless laugh. “Why I still think the Lord is really telling me anything these days, I don’t know.”
“You’ll move on when it’s time.” Mike fiddled with the curtain, running the fabric between his fingers. “I guess it would be harder without confirmation if he’s alive or dead.”
“You’re sure about your husband?”
Mike’s jaw flexed, and he nodded.
“If you don’t mind me asking, how was it that he was infected but you and the rest of your family weren’t?”
For a long moment, it seemed Mike wasn’t going to answer. Then he sighed. “He worked at a naval hospital. I’d been out of town visiting Adam and Karla for a couple months, looking for a job near them because I wasn’t having any luck where we lived.” He filled his lungs with air and released the breath with an almost meditative slowness, giving Zach an idea of how hard he was struggling to keep calm. “When the National Guard cordoned off all the hospitals and refused to let anyone in or out, someone hacked into a communications frequency and Wade used it so we could talk a few times. He knew it was only a matter of time until he was infected. He vidded me one last time when he first started showing symptoms so we could say good-bye.”
Zach swallowed. “God. I’m sorry.”
“Hard to believe it’s been sixteen months now.” Mike shook his head. “I miss him. Which is probably going to make it seem pretty crass when I say what I’ve been meaning to say to you. Look, I’m not over my loss any more than you’re over yours, but I’m pretty damn tired of sleeping alone and I’ve caught you looking at me a couple times. So, you know, if you ever just don’t want to be alone . . .” He shrugged and sighed again, trailing off weakly. “I’d get that. I’d be okay with it just being that.”
It surprised Zach to realize how tempting he found the offer. He’d thought he would reject it out of hand, but he couldn’t. A part of him yearned in Mike’s direction, reaching for what he offered.
What could it hurt? He would never see Nico again, and God help him, these days he almost understood Nico’s need for contact, to touch and be touched. To not be alone in the world anymore.
But he couldn’t.
Even if it didn’t feel like adultery—which it did—Zach didn’t care for the chances that when everything was said and done, he’d end up watching Mike die. Getting involved, however superficially, would be a colossal error.
Smiling gently, Zach stepped around the examination table to kiss Mike softly on the cheek. “Thanks for the offer, but I’m not ready for that, either.”
Mike accepted the refusal with grace and a regretful smile. When he was gone, Zach closed his eyes and tipped his head back, turning his face skyward.
Lord, I don’t know if You hear me anymore. I don’t know if You’ve ever heard me. I’ve never wanted to demand that You prove Your presence to me, but please. Please, Father, I’m too weak to keep going on blind faith that Your will is being done. Show me . . . something. Just some indication that I’m on the right course. Please.
Silence answered him, as it always did. He was no longer sure if the lightness he felt in his chest after he prayed was God’s answer to him or just wishful thinking. Disheartened anew, Zach packed the loneliness and despair deep down in his gut and went about his work.
In response to the guerilla attacks on the guards, the Clean Zone curfew dropped by an hour. Then another. The patrols doubled. Zach watched a pair of fatigue-clad, assault-rifle-armed guards toss the clinic for the second time that spring, searching for stolen weapons stashed by the masked civilians who executed sneak attacks on patrols. There were no weapons to be found. No way would Chantal let them stow them here, but the guards’ failure to locate the hidden cache only seemed to make them more determined to turn every stone.
God help everyone when it was uncovered.
Today’s inspection was even worse than the first time. The soldier in charge was named Traverse, the same guard who had been indifferent when Adam, Mike, and Karla’s house was torched by the gangs. The other one was clearly in a position of being forced to follow orders. He seemed reluctant to be conducting the search and hesitant to do so with the amount of—fully unwarranted, in Zach’s opinion—aggression Traverse was using to throw his weight around. Zach stood back and let them get on with it until the subordinate guard got a good look at him, and his gray eyes widened in surprise.
“Zach, isn’t it?” he asked.
His voice scratched the edge of Zach’s memory, calling up memories of unexpected kindness and patience hidden behind a coppery mask. “Private Morris? Gillett?”
The soldier nodded, venturing a smile, but Traverse snapped at him. “Catch up on your own time, Morris. We’re going to find who coldcocked Havarti, and we’re going to give them some hurt.”
Morris turned to him, a slow, steady pivot that suggested this wasn’t the first time Traverse had tried his patience. “Aren’t we supposed to be protecting the civilians, Traverse?” he asked blandly.
“How safe are they if we’ve got a gang arming up?”
Morris looked like he was going to protest, but Zach laid a hand on his biceps and shook his head. “It’s okay, Gillett. Come hang out sometime when you’re off duty.”
He nodded and followed Traverse, who stormed out of the clinic as if its refusal to yield the stash of weapons were a personal offense.
Zach stepped over to the front windows and peered out, tracking their progress down the block. He went cold when they paused in front of Mike, Adam, and Karla’s burned-out house. “Chantal!”
She came scurrying out of the back room, where they hoarded their precious allotment of medical supplies. After the first pair of soldiers had tossed the clinic looking for weapons, some of their meds had turned up missing, so Chantal had refused to let Traverse and Morris search unsupervised. “What is it?”
“They’re poking around the burned-out houses,” Zach murmured, trying to imbue the words with particular weight. He’d noticed after the last time a patrol had been attacked that Mike’s clothes and hands had been stained by soot the following morning. He’d caught Chantal eyeing those stains as well, drawing the same conclusions.
She grimaced. “Mike and Adam are helping Viola plant her garden while she’s off her feet on bed rest. One of us has to stay here in case someone comes in. Can you stroll down the street and see just how deep they’re poking? If it looks like they’re in danger of finding anything, run and let Mike and Adam know to hide.”
His heart thundering, Zach nodded, pulling on his threadbare jacket. Affecting a casual attitude as he walked down the block, he craned his neck to get a look at where the guards had gone.
Morris’s raised voice gave him something to follow.
“What do you mean, we’re not reporting these to the CO? Goddamn it, Traverse, stop! You’re messing with evidence here.
We can use these to bait a trap, catch who’s been carrying out the attacks. At the very least, we need to get them back to the armory!”
“Why? So the sheep can just steal them back? I know a better place they can go.”
“Get that fucking gun off me!”
Zach moved without thinking, grabbing a charred piece of lumber. The sound of a gunshot and Morris’s agonized scream cloaked his stumbling approach through the scattered debris, and Zach raised the two-by-four over his head, intent on bringing it down on Traverse’s skull with all his strength.
At the last instant, Traverse spun, his gun coming up as Zach’s board came down. Something sizzled along Zach’s ribs before the force of the wood crashing into Traverse’s left shoulder vibrated up his arms, numbed his fingers, and wrenched a yell from the soldier.
Zach couldn’t keep hold of the two-by-four when Traverse batted it from his hands, and then he was staring down Traverse’s gun. His hands came up almost of their own accord, a gesture of harmlessness, surrender, which seemed singularly futile in the face of a man who had just shot his own comrade. Especially when Zach now knew, without a doubt, that Traverse was slipping weapons to the gangs. He was dead. It was just a matter of waiting for Traverse to pull the trigger.
But then Traverse jerked. A shadow rose over his shoulder, coalescing into Mike’s grim face as Traverse’s breath left him in an odd wheeze, followed by a trickle of blood that bubbled at his lips. Mike moved, and Zach registered the unfamiliar yet unmistakable sound of a blade sliding through clothing and flesh as Traverse jerked again. He dropped to the ground so suddenly that his spine must have been severed.
“Get out of here, Zach,” Mike growled. The world seemed to be blurring around the edges, but he managed to look past Mike to see Adam looming over Morris, another knife in his hand.
“No!” He shoved Mike aside, aware of the chill of wet fabric against his side and hip, and launched himself at Adam. He almost ended up with Adam’s knife embedded in his chest for his trouble, but Adam managed to jerk it back at the last instant. “Don’t kill him!”
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