by Kathy Miner
Christopher looked grim and picked up the narrative. “Yeah, we didn’t offer them any bacon. Anyway, they said they heard Chicago was a death trap. We’ve seen folks from a little further out traveling up and down the river. Only one from Omaha, but five or six from Sioux City, is that right, Michaela?”
“Six,” she said. “Two just a few days ago.” She looked at Christopher again. “That’s about all I can think of.”
“Me, too. Sorry it’s not more.”
Jack looked at Piper. She nodded and folded up her map, while Jack looked back at Christopher. “What do we owe you?”
Christopher wiggled his eyebrows again. “Whatcha got?”
Now that it came down to it, Jack was surprised at how uncomfortable he was offering marijuana in trade, especially to a couple of kids – he felt like a drug pusher. Never mind they’d brought it for this express purpose.
“Well, we’ve got some fresh vegetables and some eggs. And, ah, we’ve got some dried venison and some navy beans, too. Maybe we could spare one of our fuel filters…”
“Uh, Jack?” Piper was frowning at him. “What are you doing?”
He cut his eyes at Christopher and Michaela. “They’re kids.”
“Yeah? And?” She huffed out a breath and turned to the pair. “We’ve got pot. How much for the four of us to cross and some of that bacon?”
“Medicinal marijuana,” Jack clarified, then rubbed a hand across his forehead, speaking low to Piper. “I just turned into a prissy, fuddy-duddy preacher, didn’t I?”
“Totally.” There was laughter in her voice. “You’re a rock star, remember?” Then, to the kids, “Well? How much?”
Michaela and Christopher exchanged glances. “For grandpa,” Michaela said. She looked at Piper. “It’s good for pain, right? Arthritis?”
“Yes, it is.”
“But will he smoke it?” Christopher looked doubtful. “You know how he is, Mikey.”
“Don’t call me Mikey, and he will smoke it, if I have to hog-tie him and stuff a joint in his mouth.”
Jack could tell that Piper was biting the inside of her cheek to keep from smiling – there was no doubt that Michaela would do just as she threatened. Again, there was laughter in her voice when she spoke. “He doesn’t have to smoke it. You can give it to him in an oil or fat base. Heck, you can even bake it into something and not tell him.”
Piper pulled a blank page from her notebook and glanced at Jack. “Let me write down instructions for them.” She looked at both Michaela and Christopher. “I’ll give you enough for several months of pain relief, but you should see if you can find some locally. I guarantee you someone around here was growing, and if you think about it, you’ll have a good idea where to look.”
Michaela and Christopher looked at each other. “The Stedman brothers,” they said in unison. Michaela turned back to Piper. “We know where to look. Now tell me what to do.”
They bent their heads together over Piper’s notes, and Jack took the opportunity to check in with Ed and Owen. Ed gave him a thumbs-up, but Owen wouldn’t meet his eyes when Jack walked to stand beside him. Jack cut right to it. “What is it?”
“They need to get out of here,” Owen said quietly. “They need to leave. Something terrible is going to happen.” He did look at Jack then, and his eyes were bleak. “I saw it. For the first time, I caught a glimpse ahead of time. I think this whole town is going to burn. They need to leave. Soon.”
Jack didn’t ask if he was sure. He nodded, and returned to Piper and the kids. When they finished, he cleared his throat, and decided the direct approach was best. “Look, I don’t know if you all will believe me, but here goes. We have intuitive skills, you might call them psychic skills, that we didn’t have before. One of my friends is getting a warning. He says your town is going to burn, and you need to leave.”
Michaela and Christopher exchanged a long look. Michaela spoke. “We’ve got them, too. Me, most of all. Did he say when this was going to happen?”
Jack glanced back at Owen. “Not exactly. But soon.”
“Okay.” She straightened, and handed her shotgun to Christopher. “You go get grandpa and the kids and have them start packing up, then warn the others. I’ll finish here.”
Christopher nodded at Jack and Piper. “Good luck on your journey.” Then he took off at a jog, nodding at Ed and Owen on his way past. Piper got out the marijuana, loading a generous amount into a plastic bag and scribbling additional instructions on the paper while Michaela ran, swift and graceful, to a nearby house. She came back with four familiar yellow and red packages, and Jack’s mouth started watering again. She handed them to Piper, then impulsively hugged her.
“I wish you could stay,” Jack heard her say. “If you come back through, will you stay for a while?”
Piper swallowed hard, but smiled. “You bet. Thanks for the bacon, and good luck getting that grandpa of yours high.”
Michaela laughed, and lifted her hand in farewell. They fired up their bikes and rumbled across the bridge. When Jack turned for a look back, Michaela had already disappeared from view. He hoped Owen’s warning was enough. In Onawa, they barely stopped rolling, pausing just long enough to identify themselves to a sentry and drop Christopher and Michaela’s names. A strange urgency seemed to have seized all of them, and once they were past the town, they pushed the bikes faster than usual, hardly slowing as they passed through a series of tiny towns: Turin, Soldier, Ute, Charter Oak.
Denison was a little larger, so they scooted around it on unmarked country roads, eventually weaving their way back to Highway 30. Just east of Arcadia, Ed signaled that Rosemary needed to stop, and they pulled into a picnic area. While Rosemary took care of her business, Piper pulled out her map and they all bent over it. Piper traced the line she had marked, then straightened abruptly, wrapping her arms around her elbows.
“Okay, I’ll just say it. Anyone else got the heebie-jeebies?”
Jack rubbed the back of his neck. “I’ve had them since Owen talked about Decatur burning. I thought it was just being there, but it keeps getting worse, not better.”
Owen didn’t say anything, but the miserable expression on his face spoke for him. Ed looked at Rosemary. “Well, you know I don’t feel a darn thing, but Rosemary is sure keyed up.” He looked around at all of them. “Question is, what do we do about it? Do we change course? Or do we keep on as we’ve been, and just stay ready?”
They were all silent for a while, each thinking their own thoughts. Then Jack made the call. It was something he would always remember – that he’d been the one to make the call, sending them all forward into something they had all seen coming. “Okay, we don’t even know why we’re feeling uneasy. It could be a lot of things, but here’s what I know for sure: If we stop every time we get nervous, we’ll never get there. I say we push through.”
Ed nodded. A moment later, Owen nodded, too, though more reluctantly. Piper looked troubled. She opened her mouth to say something, then closed it and headed for her bike. “Let’s get going, then.”
They didn’t even make it another mile down the road. As they were approaching a sprawling farm property on the south side of the road, they saw, just ahead, a trio of pickup trucks pull across the road, completely blocking it. Six armed men got out of the pickups as they approached and stood, not yet aiming their weapons, but clearly ready to. Piper looked over her shoulder at Jack as they slowed.
“Turn around,” she yelled over the noise of the bikes. “We need to turn around!” Then her eyes locked on something behind him. “Fuck!”
Jack’s head snapped around. A similar trio of trucks now blocked their retreat. He and Piper braked, Ed and Owen pulling in tight behind them. Jack scrutinized the open farmland to the north and south. “We don’t need roads.” He started to swing to the north. “Let’s –”
“Jack, stop.” Owen nodded at the deep drainage ditches on either side of the road; they were spiked with everything from farm tools to hefty sharpened st
icks. “Looks like we’re going to have to talk our way out.”
Jack ran his eyes thoroughly over the ditches, looking for a gap, and once again looked behind them. Then, he looked ahead and smiled grimly. “Good thing one of us is such a smooth talker.”
He looked at each of them in turn, nodding his encouragement. When he met Piper’s gaze, there was something hectic in her eyes. “What?”
“Their bond lines,” she said hoarsely. “They’re all red, every single one of them, and they converge on a point just to the northeast of this group.” She nodded her head towards the pickups to the east, and Jack saw that her whole body was shaking. “They’ve got a Brody back there somewhere, running the show.”
Jack reached to cup her pale cheek in his palm, pitching his voice to wrap comfort and strength around her. “Then you’ll know just how to handle him, won’t you?”
She clung to him for a moment with her eyes. Then her spine drew up straight and tall, and she unslung her rifle. She tucked it against her body, under her arm. Her ferocious smile sizzled along his already humming nerves. His Valkyrie. “If it comes to it, hit the dirt when I say.” She looked around at all of them. “I won’t shoot to kill unless there’s no other way. Please don’t ask me to explain right now. I can still scare the shit out of them, and that may be enough.”
Ed reached to rest his hand on her shoulder. “We’re all in this with you, honey. It’s not just on you. Besides, Jack here is going to hocus-pocus us right on through.”
“That’s right.” Jack revved his bike and started rolling forward. “Let’s get this over with. I want bacon for dinner.”
They rode forward slowly, then stopped about 50 feet from the eastern pickups. Owen angled his bike to watch behind them, while Piper and Ed shifted to the north and south. Jack called out over the noise of the idling bikes.
“If there’s a toll, we can trade for safe passage.”
“Not interested in trading. We take what we need.” One of the men stepped forward, a man who might have been handsome if not for the aggression twisting his features. He wore a battered Oakland Raiders baseball cap pulled low on his forehead, but his eyes glittered with excitement underneath. He was enjoying this, Jack realized. The Raider spoke over his shoulder, “Get the kid up here.”
Another man stepped over to one of the pickups and reached into the bed. He hauled up a little boy maybe 8 or 9 years old, lifting him out and setting him on the ground. When he gave the boy a shake, Jack heard both Rosemary and Piper snarl, low and angry.
“Tell us, and be quick about it.”
Even from this distance, Jack could see the boy’s eyes, and he knew he would never forget them. Wide and round, blue as a Rocky Mountain summer sky and just as endless. The boy gazed at each of them in turn. When his eyes rested on Jack, every hair on Jack’s body stood on end. The sensation was strangely pleasant, in spite of the tension of the situation. Finally, the boy pointed right at him.
“Him,” the boy said in a resonant, musical voice. “He’s the most dangerous. The man in front. Don’t let him talk.” Then, he pointed at Owen. “The big man sees, and has for a long time.” His little arm moved again. “She’s tapped into the grid. She sees, too, but in a different way.” Then he hesitated, and his little face fell into sad lines. He tried to pull away, but the man shook him again.
“Finish! What about the last man?”
The boy shook his head, staring down at the ground, and muttered something. The man laughed, not pleasantly, and looked up at the others. “Nothing, he says.”
The Raider pointed at Ed. “You. Get on out of here. We don’t take Squibs, and we sure as hell don’t take animals we can’t eat.” He gestured back the way they’d come and smiled a completely unconvincing smile. “Go on, you’re free to go. If you leave quietly, no harm will come to you.”
“He’s lying,” Jack said in a low voice, and out of the corner of his eye, he saw Piper nodding her agreement. “I think I’ve got this. Let me try.” He turned back to the man. “Look, you need to –”
As one, all six men snapped their weapons to the ready, pointing them straight at Jack.
“Shut up!” The leader shouted. “Shut your fucking mouth now, and don’t you say another word, or every last one of you will die in the dirt where you stand!”
Jack stopped talking and held his hands up, nodding his acquiescence. Behind him, he heard Owen speak low to Ed. “Listen to me, Ed. You need to get to Onawa. Get back there and wait for us – we’ll come back for you. I saw it, when I saw Decatur burning, in my vision.”
“I’m not leaving you,” Ed said grimly.
Jack looked at Piper. She nodded and looked at Ed, reaching to clutch his hand. “Owen’s right. If they wanted us dead, we’d be dead already. They want something else. You can’t help us if they shoot you. Take Rosemary and go. Go!”
She looked back at the Raider. “We’ll cooperate, but only if you let Ed go safely, like you promised.”
The man smiled an oily smile at her down the barrel of his rifle. “Sure thing, sweetheart.” He gestured with his rifle at Ed. “Go.”
Ed’s face was rigid when he turned his motorcycle around, and Rosemary was crying, a low, sobbing sound. Ed looked at each of them in turn. “I’ll get you help,” he vowed. “No matter what, I’ll find a way. Don’t lose heart.” Then he looked at Piper, and tears started into his eyes. “Especially you, honey. No matter what happens, you’ll be okay. I’ll get help.”
He rode towards the western pickups, picking up speed when they parted to let him through. When he had passed, the Raider let out a shrill whistle. One of the men in the western group lifted his rifle to his shoulder and sighted in on Ed’s retreating figure.
It happened so fast, Jack could hardly process it. Piper’s rifle snapped to her shoulder. She shot once, and the man aiming at Ed yelled and dropped his weapon. Piper pirouetted like a dancer, the move eerily graceful, and sighted in between the Raider’s eyes. “Next one kills you,” she said in a clear, carrying voice. “Call them off, or you’re done.”
They stayed frozen like that for the longest heartbeats of Jack’s life. Behind them, the man Piper had shot at yelled to the leader. “Fuck it, Reggie! Kid called that one wrong – she split my god-damned stock and destroyed the firing mechanism! Either that was damn lucky, or she’s a hell of a shot.”
“Stand down. Let him go.” The Raider had shifted his weapon to Piper, and they stared each other down over steel barrels. Slowly, he smiled. “I am really looking forward to hearing you apologize for this, sweetheart.” He nodded. “Oh, yeah, you will apologize. You will beg for forgiveness before we’re done.”
The lust that darkened his face made violence boil and roll in Jack’s gut. He clenched his hands into fists, and his mind raced for words he could say fast enough, words with enough power to stop the men before they could gun him and his companions down. Before he could come up with anything, Piper made a hissing sound.
“Jack, their Brody is headed this way. The bond-lines are shifting.” Her voice hardened. “When he comes into view, I’m going to take him out. Then I’ll wound as many as I can. We want them to panic. When they do, we ride like hell after Ed. Unless one of you can come up with an alternative plan really, really fast.”
Her plan was suicidal – there was no way he could let her risk it. He tilted his head and spoke as quickly as he could out of the corner of his mouth. “Piper, no, we will get out of this without –”
A rifle cracked the air, and a split second later, a hot buzz stung Jack’s right ear. His head snapped around, and the Raider called out. “That is the last warning you’ll get! Now shut up!” He smirked at Piper. “Some of us can shoot too, sweetheart.”
A commotion behind the pickups sent sudden tension bristling through Piper. Jack felt it as if it were his own body. He turned his head again so he could see her, while a trickle of what must have been blood slid down the right side of his neck.
“He’s here,” she s
aid. Her voice had gone stone cold, and her eyes were dead and flat. “I’m taking the shot. Get ready to…” Her voice trailed away. “What the hell? It can’t be.” Her voice wobbled wildly. “Jack, it’s a kid. It’s just a kid.”
Jack turned his head as much as he dared, and saw her narrowed eyes frantically searching. “This can’t be right,” she muttered. “It can’t be him. It’s not possible.”
Jack looked back at the men. There was, indeed, a kid standing among them now, a beautiful boy, brand new to adolescence. He had a shock of white-blonde hair that was badly in need of a trim, and it stood out around his head like a halo. Only when his eyes met Jack’s did Jack understand how very wrong that image was.
The boy was camouflaged under layer after layer after layer of deception. A glowing angel on the surface, underneath seethed every dark emotion Jack could name: Bitterness, rage, disappointment, jealousy, and at the very base, a bottomless pit of fear.
This child could kill them. He had killed before, and he was developing a taste for it.
They had to get out of here. Jack flicked a hand to signal Piper and sucked in a lungful of air through his nose. He opened his mouth, and the voice that left him sounded like thunder, booming with power.
“Drop your –”
A rifle cracked again, and a sledgehammer blow to Jack’s right temple spun him around and sent him plunging to the ground. His face bounced on the tarmac, but curiously, it didn’t hurt. Nothing hurt. He blinked. Then, he heard Piper scream, a rising crescendo of grief.
“Jack! No!”
She dropped her rifle with a clatter and scrambled towards him on her hands and knees. Her hands were shaking so violently, they looked like birds’ wings fluttering. Jack blinked again, and tried to speak, to comfort her. But he couldn’t move his lips. He was so tired, suddenly, so very sleepy. Piper brought her face close to his just before he shut his eyes, and his last conscious thought was, “Such pretty eyes.”
Then, there was nothing.
