“Better hope so, moneybags,” Luis fired back.
Lucas yawned. “You boys enjoy yourselves. I’m going to get some shut-eye after I check in with the sentries.” Colt had assigned six of the best fighters, all equipped with night vision goggles and on high alert, to take the first watch, to be relieved in five hours. There had been no evidence of looting, but everyone knew it was a matter of time before scavengers materialized to pick the bones clean. The post-collapse world was an efficient place, and nothing went to waste – one man’s loss was another’s gain, everything zero sum in the barren wasteland.
After checking in with the guards, Lucas strode to where Sierra’s tent stood beside his. He unslung the M4 from his shoulder and slid it through his tent opening, and then twisted to where giggling drifted from Sierra’s.
Moments later, the flap lifted and Sierra’s head appeared, a smile in place. Lucas gave an answering grin. “You girls behaving yourselves?” he asked.
She winked. “I can’t speak for Eve, but I’m looking for trouble.”
Lucas sighed. “Best we get some rest. We’re going to be up with the chickens.”
Sierra gave a small pout, but it was clear she understood. “You eat anything?” she asked.
“I’ll gnaw on some jerky. You?”
“We dug into our provisions. Might as well while they’re still fresh. Could be a long time until we taste fruit and vegetables again, especially where we’re heading.”
“Look at the bright side. At least it’ll be freezing.”
“Always silver linings with you.”
Eve’s head poked out next to Sierra’s, and Lucas tipped the brim of his hat. “Good night, ladies. Sleep well.”
“Already?” Eve complained.
“Stay up as long as you want. I’m hitting it,” Lucas said.
Sierra made a face and Eve mimicked it. “Party pooper.”
“Let’s see what tune you’re singing when you’re up before dawn.”
Sierra gave the little girl a quick hug. “He’s got a point.”
Eve nodded with a wisdom beyond her years. They watched as he disappeared into his tent. The rustle and chirping of night creatures around them seemed suddenly louder for his absence, and the thin tent fabric inadequate to shield them from the menacing shadows. Eve scooted closer to Sierra and blinked her big eyes.
“My ears are still ringing from the shells,” she said.
Sierra nodded resignedly. “I know, sweetie. It’ll get better with time.”
“How long?”
Sierra looked up at the heavens, where a thousand stars pulsed like living things, and then back to the little girl, and said with what hope she could muster, “Not much longer now.”
Chapter 4
Green and blue streaked the sky and a neon orange glow spread from the eastern ridge as Elliot forced himself to his feet with a groan. His bones ached from a night spent on the rocky slope beside the trail to the dam, and his sacroiliac felt like a spike had been driven through his back. He drew several deep breaths to steady himself before making his way to where Michael, Arnold, Ruby, and Terry were munching on dry rations while they huddled around a small fire, the night’s chill lingering in the morning air.
Michael looked up as Elliot approached and rose with the ease of the young, his wounded arm giving him only slight difficulty.
“Morning,” Elliot said.
“Morning,” Michael responded. The rest of the group mumbled greetings as Elliot took in the panoramic view of the valley below. The lake and Abiquiu Dam looked like he could reach out and touch them, but he knew it would be another six to seven hours of treacherous trail before they made it there. “We got a broadcast from Lucas. They’re still loading the horses, but they’ll be on their way shortly.”
“Excellent. We should do the same.”
Arnold nodded. “That’s the plan. I told everyone we’d get moving in fifteen minutes.” He checked his mechanical wristwatch. “That was ten minutes ago.”
Terry held up a canteen. “Welcome to some water, if you like.”
Elliot shook his head. “No, thanks. I’ll just find the gents and compose myself.”
The group was smaller than the one with Lucas, only twenty strong, and all capable fighters except Ruby, who had elected to accompany Terry. They’d grown closer over the week since Terry’s near miss with his beloved plane and were now nearly inseparable, easy in each other’s company in a way only those comfortable in their own skins could be.
The party mounted up and resumed the slog down the mountain. The forest road they followed at first quickly degraded to little more than a goat track along the side of a deep gulley, the original trail long before fallen victim to the effects of snow and rain. A line of animals drawing carts loaded with lab equipment and larger gear followed Arnold and Craig, the engineer who’d worked at the dam and who knew the route better than anyone due to his regular trips. They gingerly picked their way along the most perilous stretches as the sun rose and warmed them, the three thousand feet of grade to the lake making the trip easier than the one they’d made yesterday to cross the northern summit pass.
Terry cried out behind Ruby when his horse misstepped. By the time she twisted around to see, one of his heavy burlap sacks had dropped down the side of the ravine and his horse was regaining its footing. Terry’s face was pale and tight at the near miss – it could just as easily have been him falling a hundred feet onto rocks as sharp as knives.
“Are you okay?” she asked.
“I…I think so. But my bag…”
“What was in it?”
He looked sheepish. “A bunch of spare odds and ends from my hangar. Parts, mostly.”
She studied him as Craig retraced his steps to where they were stopped. “Look at the bright side. No more plane, so you won’t need them.”
He nodded glumly. “I suppose you’re right. Still. A lot of time and work went into sourcing them.”
“How’s your horse?” Craig called to him.
Terry swung down from the saddle and inspected the animal’s leg. He looked up and nodded. “Seems fine. He just got one wrong. Happens to the best of us.”
“You’re lucky you didn’t follow your sack down,” Craig said. “Mount up. Time’s a-wasting.”
“But I need to get my bag…”
Craig glanced down the steep slope and shook his head. “Not unless it’s absolutely life-threatening to leave it. We’re on a schedule, and we’re running badly behind.”
“Just give me a minute.”
“Terry, that’s going to take more than a minute. More like fifteen, at least, by the time you make it down and hoist it back up, and more like thirty if anything goes wrong. We can’t spare it. Sorry.”
Craig spurred his horse forward, the discussion at an end. They resumed their plodding along the edge of the ravine, moving more cautiously after the near miss, the prospect of a disastrous plunge fresh in everyone’s minds.
~ ~ ~
As dawn broke across the alluvial valley, Lucas and Arnold watched the last of the horses loading into the trailers. Sierra sat with Eve nearby, who kept careful watch over Ellie the pig; she’d insisted the animal travel with her instead of with the rest of the livestock, promising to keep an eye on her, and Sierra had reluctantly agreed. It kept her occupied, at any rate. When Duke and Luis returned from the truck at the end of the short column, Luis addressed them.
“That’s it. We can get rolling,” he announced.
Lucas had been reassured at the ex-cartel boss’s willingness to lend a hand, but even more by Duke’s gradually warming to him. The trader was a keen judge of character, and he seemed to think that Luis was if not reformed, at least uninterested in resuming his wicked ways now that he was a man of means. It probably didn’t hurt that he’d also seen how precarious his perch as the head of the Locos had been, the gang’s longevity seriously in question once the Crew recovered and moved back into Pecos in earnest.
“Let’s
start them up. We’ll lead the way,” Lucas said. They’d agreed that he, Colt, Sierra, and Eve would ride in the first Humvee, and Duke, Aaron, and Luis in the second, with the cargo areas packed with gear. All the chosen vehicles had been started the night before to verify their batteries would turn over, and the drivers were awaiting the word from Lucas to roll.
The roar of truck exhausts filled the air as the four horse trailers started their motors, followed closely by the pair of buses carrying the wounded and the rest of the survivors. Lucas twisted the ignition and the Humvee’s engine ground to life. He waved out the window and eased the vehicle in a slow circle, the truck’s oversized tires crunching on the gravel shoulder as the trailers maneuvered to turn around. Five minutes later, the column was traversing the highway back toward the junction that led north as Lucas and Colt watched for threats, the unimaginable luxury of air conditioning drying the sweat on their faces as Sierra and Eve contented themselves in the rear seat.
They reached the deserted hamlet of Pojoaque and pushed past several abandoned cars, and then picked up speed along the ribbon of asphalt that stretched into the distance, the sky a vibrant turquoise streaked with high wisps of white. The trucks crossed the Rio Grande at Española and proceeded through a landscape of bluffs eroded over eons, red clay faces stark against the backdrop of unending beige and muted green scrub. Heat waves rose from the pavement and distorted the two-lane highway, lending it an otherworldly quality under the relentless sun.
Two hours into the trip one of the trailers lost a tire, and they were forced to wait while the men changed it. They’d loaded as many good spares as they could fit and still have room for the animals and equipment, but the first tire they tried, its sidewalls brittle as parchment, popped like a balloon when the truck’s weight settled on it. The second proved sturdier, and the vehicles lurched forward once again, keeping their speed to a minimum in order to conserve fuel and minimize the damage to the rubber from the scorching road.
They reached the dam at midday, where they found Elliot waiting in the shade of a grove of trees fifty yards off the road. When the horses and gear were loaded, they resumed winding along the highway through canyons striated with russet and beige, the temperature now in the triple digits.
“The poor horses,” Sierra said, her hair stirred by the air conditioning. “It must be brutal in those trailers.”
Lucas nodded, eyes on the road. “Probably. But still better than having to walk.”
“I don’t know about that. At least they’d be in the open. I’d get claustrophobic in a carrier.”
“Can’t be helped,” Colt said gruffly.
“How’s the snakebite?” Sierra asked him.
“Almost healed. Although I won’t be offering dancing lessons anytime soon.” He twisted to look at Lucas. “I can spell you whenever you get tired of driving.”
“Appreciate it. I’ll let you know when that happens,” Lucas said.
“We going to keep driving after dark?” Sierra asked.
“Probably not. The scouts were attacked between here and Pagosa Springs. If we find an area we can easily defend, that would be better than trying to fight it out on the road in a location they pick.”
“And if we don’t find one?”
Lucas scowled at the windshield. “Then we’ll circle the wagons and keep the big guns trained on either side of the road. Anyone stupid enough to take us on won’t last long.”
Colt eyed the Humvee behind them in the side mirror, its .50-caliber machine gun pointed at the sky, and nodded. “Let’s hope so. They’ll definitely hear us coming, no matter what.”
“They’d have to be suicidal to try to ambush a motorized column, wouldn’t they?” Sierra asked, her eyes fearful.
Lucas’s lips formed a thin line. “Or desperate. Lot of that going around these days.”
Chapter 5
Houston, Texas
Snake listened intently as Dale, the scout he’d dispatched from Lubbock to Albuquerque following the debacle in Los Alamos, reported in via shortwave radio. It had taken Dale nearly a week to cross the state and arrive in New Mexico, where he’d rendezvoused with the shell-shocked survivors of the battle.
“We’re leaving tomorrow to see if we can pick up the scent, but we’re not hopeful. There’s no way they’re still there.”
“We don’t know that. Don’t jump to conclusions. It’s possible they believe they’re safe now,” Snake said.
Dale didn’t sound convinced, but didn’t argue the point. “I’ll proceed as agreed.”
Their communications had been brief and largely coded. There was no question in Snake’s mind that someone from Shangri-La might be monitoring transmissions, but issuing orders was a risk he had to take.
Dale was a bulldog of a man who was unstoppable once given a task. He’d served several of Snake’s pet causes and had yet to meet with failure, his tenacity one of his favorable traits, coupled with his willingness to do anything required to achieve an objective. Under Snake’s direction, he’d dismembered rivals, incinerated whole families, pursued rebellious subordinates and terminated them, never questioning his orders or the legitimacy of his methods.
When Snake had made the decision to send Dale alone rather than a score of fighters, it had been a risk, given that Snake might be perceived as showing too little interest in evening the score for the defeat of the Crew, not to mention the death of its leader. Snake had entertained debate on it among his circle, but ultimately determined that one competent man would stand as good a chance as a dozen – Magnus’s rout had more than adequately demonstrated that large numbers didn’t necessarily guarantee successful outcomes.
Snake stepped away from the radio with a frown. His enthusiasm for continuing Magnus’s crusade was close to zero; the toll of a thousand men was incredible to him personally and a threat to the Crew’s influence, and also left him shorthanded in Houston and having to pull men from Dallas and other Crew hubs. Word had spread of the defeat, and he was already hearing rumors of isolated outbreaks of revolt in some of the outlying areas, which he’d instructed his lieutenants to put down with extreme prejudice. There could be only one way of dealing with rebellion, and that was with shock and awe.
But there was also the matter of saving face. If he didn’t at least attempt to follow up on Magnus’s mission, which had been largely supported by the Crew rank and file, it would further weaken his claim to the throne in their eyes. So he was stuck devoting resources to a cause he didn’t believe in, although the chances of Dale finding the Shangri-La survivors were exceedingly slim. Only an idiot would remain in the valley now that the Crew knew the location, and nothing about the group that had wiped the floor with Magnus’s best fighters struck Snake as foolish. On the contrary, the Shangri-La defenders had proved more than a match for a far larger force and had shown remarkable innovation in their guerilla tactics, based on the accounts of the Crew survivors.
Snake’s strategy was to go through the motions to placate Magnus’s loyalists while he consolidated power. Even if by some miracle they located the Shangri-La survivors, he had little interest in mobilizing another army if he didn’t have to – his hands were already full dealing with the realities of his regime change.
He’d organized an advisory council and after some turmoil had ten strong hands whose opinions he trusted. All had agreed that it would be foolhardy to go on the attack right now; it would be better to focus on developing the vaccine Lubbock was working on, and contend with the Shangri-La variant if and when it surfaced. Given the level of difficulty his big brains were having developing an effective solution to the virus, Snake doubted that a group on the run in the wilds could do better.
Then again, Magnus had been sure that destroying Shangri-La would be shooting fish in a barrel, and it had been that hubris that had cost him everything.
Snake wouldn’t make the same mistake.
Chapter 6
The next morning, Lucas emerged from his tent to find Elliot and Mic
hael standing with Arnold, their grim expressions just visible in the dim predawn. They’d made it more than halfway to Pagosa Springs with only one pause for another blown tire before stopping for the night, but the fuel gauges were ominously low, and even at crawling speed it was obvious they wouldn’t be able to stretch the diesel all the way.
Lucas nodded to them and fit his hat into place.
“What’s up?” he asked.
“Two more of the wounded didn’t make it,” Elliot replied, his tone dispirited.
“Always a risk.”
“Yes. But it’s one thing to risk, another to lose.” Elliot sighed. “We were just discussing where to bury them.”
Lucas checked his watch. “Have to be by the side of the road. We don’t have a lot of time if we’re going to make it to Pagosa by nightfall.”
Arnold grunted. “I’ll get some shovels.”
“And I’ll rouse the gang so we can get under way when we’re done,” Michael said.
The soil was hard as brick, and the burial took forty-five minutes even with three men working hard. When the remains of the pair were interred, the survivors stood in a ragged semicircle around the freshly turned earth mounds, and Elliot said a heartfelt prayer. The gathering murmured an amen, and then Elliot raised his head and addressed the crowd.
“Even as we head to a new home, a new beginning, the hardships follow us. It was my decision to transport the wounded. I take full responsibility. Believe me when I say that a part of me was just buried as well.”
Sarah, the doctor, laid a hand on his shoulder. “There was nothing you could have done, Elliot. They wouldn’t have lasted the week no matter what you’d done. They were both very badly wounded.”
Elliot nodded, too choked up to speak, and Arnold cleared his throat. “Let’s load up. We need to get some miles under our belt before the heat rises.”
The group dispersed and made its way to the buses. Sierra took Lucas’s hand and gave it a gentle squeeze. “I hope this was the right decision. Seems like death follows us wherever we go.”
The Day After Never (Book 4): Retribution Page 3
