Natural Disaster (Book 2): Quake

by Lou Cadle

  Gale settled on the arm of the chair and put an arm around him. “I’m sorry. I want to keep everyone safe. Your being here needs to be a secret. We need to work to keep it that way.”

  “So someone else commits a crime, and I’m in prison.” He glanced at Marilyn. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean — “

  She waved it away. “I know what you mean, and no, it’s not fair.”

  He looked over at Gale. “We should both leave.”

  “I…” Gale looked torn. “I have a job to finish. I don’t feel that I can just abandon it.”

  “When will it be finished? A week? A month? Three years?”

  “I don’t know.” He looked miserable. “I need to at least solve the food and water problems, get some steady supply lines set up so that people don’t starve to death over the winter here.”

  “Even the people who would happily tar and feather you for being gay?”

  “Even them,” he said.

  Gale left soon after, nothing really decided between them, except that he promised Bash to sleep at the EOC where plenty of people would be around to defend him if there were another attack. It wasn’t until the next morning and his call into FEMA that he made a decision about their immediate future.

  “We’ll both leave in two days,” he said to Bash after the call. “We’ll walk out. The Corps has gotten a channel clear in the river, and there’ll be food, and heaters, and more tents barged in. Propane, personal water filters, and some equipment the water treatment facility needs to get water flowing down the mains again. Once the barge is unloaded, and distribution of the food set up, I promise you, we can walk out of here.”

  “How far?”

  George turned from his radio and said, “They have roads cleared to about twenty miles from here now. It’s not an awful walk. Two days at most should get you there.”

  Two days. Two days to freedom and safety, to hot showers and plenty of food. “Yes,” said Bash. “I want to. And you’ll come too. You promise?”

  Gale nodded. “I promise. I’ve done my best for the city. Now I need to do my best for us.”

  Chapter 18: Gale

  What Gale hadn’t told Bash is that Flint had assigned a team of two officers with assault weapons to protect the EOC, day and night.

  “Hell, I should have done it sooner,” he said, “as the EOC is so important to the town. Fire station too — we’ll keep a pair of men there, as well.”

  Gale didn’t like it, while he admitted the need for it. He hated to see the town turn into an armed camp, with martial law. But as people got more unruly, more dangerous, there really was no other choice. Flint personally had taken him back to the house to gather clothes for himself, Bash, and the girls’ things, waiting outside, in uniform, his hand never far from his gun.

  Gale also hadn’t told Bash about his conversation with the girls, when he went to pick them up after school the day of the attack on Bash and had taken them to their new home, to the sister of one of his staff who had a pull-out couch available in an intact house. He handed over half his remaining food supplies to the family, so it wouldn’t be more of a burden than it was.

  McKenna had tried every trick — and she knew a few — of wheedling, whining, and threatening, to get him to take her to Bash. Haruka just looked at him with sad eyes, which was worse. He had driven up to their new place and helped them unload their clothes from his car.

  “We’ll come say goodbye before we leave.”

  “You’re leaving?” said McKenna. “Then take us with you!”

  “It’s not safe,” he tried to explain. “You need to stay away from us.”

  “Goddammit,” she said, throwing her bag down on the sidewalk.

  “I’m sorry. It’s for the best.”

  “I’ll find him.”

  “No, McKenna. Please. Don’t even look. Don’t ask around. You’ll be putting his life at risk.”

  “Then just tell me. I wouldn’t tell those people.”

  “I know you wouldn’t. But it’s a small town, really small now, and news has a way of getting around fast.”

  “You don’t trust me.”

  “I trust you. I do. It’s them I don’t trust.” He gestured vaguely down the street at the people he knew were out there, hating him and Bash, blaming them for matters beyond their control. “Let’s get you inside and settled.” No purpose was being served by continuing to argue with the girl, and he had to get back to work. If he was leaving in a day and a half, there was a lot of delegating to do first.

  That night, at the EOC, in the wee hours, Gale was woken from a troubled sleep by, of all unexpected people, Dan.

  “Gale.”

  He came fully awake. “What it is? Is it Bash?”

  “I’m sorry. Your house is on fire. Arson.”

  “Shit.” He kicked off his blanket and got up. “What can I do?”

  “There’s nothing anyone can do. You know we don’t have water.”

  “Take me there.”

  “Yeah, I will. But you do what my guys tell you. Don’t go running in trying to save stuff.”

  “I know, I know.”

  Dan drove him in an official city car through the dark streets to his house, the home that he’d selected so carefully for its safety. Not very safe now, was it?

  He could see the light of the fire from two blocks away, shooting fingers of light into the black sky.

  As they pulled up a few doors down, he could see the flames licking up the sides. Half of the house was burned through, a smoldering ruin. He thought of everything lost, photos and memories of their marriage. Clothes and books and important papers. A life burning down to ruin.

  Behind the smoke, the crescent moon shone orange. Gale couldn’t watch any more. He turned away and walked back to the chief’s car, leaning both arms on the side and feeling dark despair.

  Dan came up. “You’ve done so much for these people. For the city.” His voice shook with anger.

  Gale looked up. “Never seen you pissed off before.”

  “You have. But I’m beyond pissed now.”

  “Are any other houses at risk?”

  “Almost no wind. We got some luck there. And you have a big lot.”

  “Yeah, it’s a double. Was a double.” He sighed, feeling all the weariness from the last half-month of effort settling on his shoulders. “How am I going to tell Bash?”

  “He doesn’t deserve this, either.”

  “I have to be the one to tell him.” He glanced once more at the fire, burning lower now, then away. “Should I wake him up? Or let him sleep?”

  “I don’t know, man. I don’t know what I’d do in your shoes.”

  He looked at his watch. Just after three. “I guess I’ll wake him up around six. I don’t want him to hear from anyone else but me.”

  Dan drove him back to the EOC. Gale checked in with the staff awake this early — or this late — and then drove around town for an hour, wasting gas, he knew, but right now, he didn’t care. He looked at the intact houses, at the fallen ones, at the distant humps of tents at the tent cities, and he wondered which of these people hated him and Bash so much that they’d burn down their house. He found himself parking in front of a fundamentalist church and staring at it, trying to see through the white walls to whatever was in there that stirred such hate.

  He thought of everything it took to build a house — plans, people felling timber somewhere, the timber being shipped, pipe being manufactured, wire extruded, the hundreds and hundreds of people who worked together to make the things that others built into a house, the care of furnishing and decorating it, thousands of hours of labor. And one idiot turns it into ash in the space of a couple hours.

  At quarter to six, he pulled up to George and Marilyn’s house on the darkened street. He made his way to the front door, and he knocked. When no one answered, he went to the windows and began knocking on those, saying, “It’s me, Gale.” He went back to the front door to wait, and a few minutes later, Marilyn pushed
the door open.

  She was in a flowered robe, barefoot. “Is something wrong?”

  “Not anything big, no. Not big to anyone but me. It’s personal. I need to see Bash.”

  She led him to the spare bedroom, where amongst all the boxes of equipment, Bash was sitting up in bed, wearing a sweatshirt.

  “Give us a minute,” Gale said to Marilyn, and she murmured about coffee and left them alone.

  He sat on the edge of the bed and took Bash’s hand. “Our house is gone.”

  “Oh my gosh. Did it collapse?”

  “No.” In two short sentences, he told him about the arson.

  “Did they get the fire put out?”

  “There’s no water, Bash.”

  “Right. Stupid me.”

  “You’re not stupid.”

  “We have to get out of this place.”

  “We will. Tomorrow, noon at the latest, we’re going to be walking out of town. I promise.”

  “But. But our things! How will we get our things out?”

  “All gone, sweetheart.” Ashes.

  “Gone.” He shook his head, dazed.

  Gale could see it’d take the news a couple minutes to really sink in. He watched Bash and waited.

  “Our wedding pictures?”

  “They’re mostly backed up on line, too.”

  “But…everything?”

  Gale nodded.

  “Oh. At least you weren’t there. Or the girls.”

  Gale pulled his husband into his arms, and they mourned together until gray morning light began to filter in.

  The last day, he thought. Let me get the barge unloaded today, and arrange getting the goods out to those who need them, and it’ll be done.

  Chapter 19: Gale

  At the morning meeting of the Triumvirate, held at the police station for safety’s sake, he handed in an official, handwritten resignation. The other men accepted it, with frowns and shaking heads, but they didn’t try to argue him out of quitting — or leaving. “Who’s best to replace you?”

  “Kay, the city clerk. I talked to her about it last night, and she’s okay with it. Nervous, but willing to step up. She’s been my back up since Angela disappeared.”

  “Yeah, Kay Perkins, I know her,” said Dan.

  “The town will miss you,” said Flint.

  Gale moved them on to other business, and they began talking about curfews and martial law, just how far they should go to control the violent part of the populace, when Kay called him on his handheld radio.

  “The barge has an ETA now,” she said. “Nine-thirty, just upriver of the bridge.” All the men checked their wristwatches.

  “Thanks, Kay,” he said. “Over and out.”

  Flint stood. “We should get over right now and set up for that. I’m putting every man I can spare on crowd control.”

  Dan said, “I’ll get the trucks down there to load the goods.”

  Gale said, “I’ll radio water treatment, so they can come and get their equipment. Start fixing the system first thing.” With that repair done in a few days, he thought the city could survive. People could eat light rations for months, but no one can live without water.

  Despite everything, he still felt guilt at leaving town, felt he was leaving a job only half-finished. But he couldn’t put his and Bash’s lives at risk here any longer. It didn’t matter if it was only half a percent of the population who wished them ill. Only two people were in jail from the riot at the hospital of the couple dozen who had taken part. Maybe only one person had burned down the house. Just one other, with a gun and a will to use it, would be one too many.

  He grabbed a ride in a police cruiser to get down to the unloading point. A dump truck had brought scrap lumber, and Gale watched as workers pounded nails to make a ramp to reach from the shore to the barge. They didn’t know how long it’d have to stretch, yet, so they were erring on the long side.

  Flint was deploying police officers along the landing site. He had traffic barriers set up two blocks down, and armed Guardsmen stood there, only moving the barriers for police, fire, and the water truck. Slowly, the street near the landing zone began to fill with the vehicles and people awaiting the barge.

  Gale checked his watch. 9:10. He recognized Oralee, Flint’s wife, and made his way over to her. “Morning,” he said. “What brings you here?”

  “Food. A group of us will get it divvied out and distributed.”

  “Right, of course. That’s good work you’ve been doing all along.”

  “Good work you’ve been doing, too. I’m sorry to hear you’re leaving us, but I can’t say I blame you.”

  “Thanks.”

  “Without you, this barge might not be arriving today.”

  He shrugged. Maybe, maybe not. Surely someone else would have stepped in had it been he who died alongside Evelyn in City Hall. He was just glad the barge was coming, that he could see this one last result of his efforts before he left.

  A gunshot made him start. He turned to the noise, but Oralee had him by the shirt and was dragging him backwards towards a police car. “Get under cover.”

  It hadn’t been that close. He could see down to the traffic barriers and saw a crowd had gathered beyond them. Hungry, thirsty, angry people, wanting to get to the food delivery first.

  “Ah, crap,” he said. “Why don’t they just wait? They’ll get it in a few hours if they just sit and wait it out.”

  “People aren’t logical,” she said. “They’re emotional.”

  They both half squatted behind the cruiser, watching up the street. No more gunfire came, but Gale could hear the noise from the crowd increasing. They hadn’t panicked and run at the gunfire. Maybe it came from one of them. “You think it was a warning shot?”

  “I think it’s trouble,” she said. “I hope Flint can manage.”

  He could hear her worry for her husband in her voice. He knew what that felt like. “Flint’s a strong guy. He knows what he’s doing.” He checked his watch again, and he kept checking it obsessively every minute or so between watching the situation at the barriers. More and more people gathered, and there was a good deal of shoving. Some tried to climb over the barriers and were shoved back by the Guardsmen. Flint waved some of the police officers forward to the barricades.

  Then he heard a sound to his left, and he saw six to eight men had skirted around the road. They had to have climbed the makeshift levee to get through. “Flint,” he called, standing. He pointed at the oncoming group.

  Flint turned and drew his gun. He called to some other officers, two with riot shields. In formation, they walked toward the interlopers. Flint said, “You all get out of here. Get back behind the barriers.”

  “Fuck you,” one of them yelled. “My kids are hungry.”

  “Everybody will be fed. Let us get it unloaded, and everybody will get the same food, in just a few hours.”

  “Bullshit,” another man called. “I hear the police have been getting twice what everyone else has.”

  Gale thought, well yes, that’s true, and the medical staff too, but surely you can see the reason.

  “I don’t trust you to bring me my fair share,” said the first man. “I’ll just take it with me.”

  “I’m telling you, get back behind those barricades,” said Flint. Then, with a signal, the men beside him, the ones without the riot shields, began to shoot.

  Gale’s heart leap into his throat. It was overkill, way too much reaction to the situation. What the hell was Flint doing? Then he saw the group of angry men, not falling dead, but flinching. He realized they were firing the rubber bullets.

  A few interlopers cut and ran back the way they had come. Two others turned up the street, jogging toward the barricade. But three came right toward the line of cops. One pulled a gun. Crazy man.

  The riot-shield bearers had truncheons out. Flint still had his service revolver in hand. Gale saw something fast flick out, like a snake, and he watched as one of the attackers fell, jerking on the gr
ound. Taser, he realized. Then he heard another gunshot — a real one, and he heard a man squeal. Gale dropped to the pavement and got himself out of the line of fire.

  Oralee still peeked over the car, and this time, he dragged her by her shirt. “He’ll be fine. Just stay down.”

  After a few tense seconds, there was no more gunfire, and, exchanging a glance, he and Oralee both risked looking over the car again. The citizen with the gun was down on the pavement, bleeding. A cop was down but moving, being attended to by a paramedic. Flint was handcuffing another of the men who had come at them, treating him none too gently. A third citizen was on his face, sat on by a solid-looking woman police officer. One of the truncheon wielders was circling the injured people, looking like he wanted to beat the crap out of anyone he could get to. Gale and Oralee stood up, and she moved forward a few steps.

  Gale glanced up river. Still no sign of the barge. Up the street, the crowd was still surging forward, being pushed back, surging again. From this distance it looked like the breathing of some giant creature. “The damned barge better get here soon,” he said to himself.

  “I don’t think that’ll help things,” said a familiar voice, and Gale turned to see Dan standing twenty feet to his right.

  “Hey,” he said. “What should we do to help?”

  “Let Flint handle it,” Dan said, but doubt was clear in his voice.

  Gale understood. The citizens down there looked to have the Guardsmen and cops outnumbered by 10 to 1, or worse. He imagined Flint, of all of them, appreciated that they might not be able to control a crowd that big.

  He looked up river again, and this time, he saw something in the distance. “I think it’s coming,” he said.

  Oralee, fixed on her husband, didn’t hear him, but Dan did, and he too turned to watch. “Yup. That’s gotta be it. But it’s not a barge. Too tall.” He glanced once more at the subdued rioters and then again down the street. “Well, we gotta get to our jobs.” And he turned to organize his own men to help with the unloading.

  Gale hunted for the water company employee who was here to pick up their supplies. That man was at his truck, standing with his hand on the door handle. “You ready?” Gale asked.