We Had Flags (Toxic World Book 3)

by Sean McLachlan

  If you want another family you can have one, a voice whispered in her head. All you have to do is settle into this.

  She focused on the ritual.

  After it was done they moved in the dining room. Hanna and her daughters served tea and snacks before the main meal. Yong-jun sat at the head of the table, Da-bin at his father’s side and next to Yu-jin. She looked with concern at the head of the family. The cane he had started using last year was being leaned on more heavily now, and he seemed short of breath even sitting at the table. His declining health didn’t stop him from smiling warmly at the woman who he hoped would one day become his daughter-in-law.

  Yong-jun questioned her about her winter and her plans. He and Da-bin perked up when she revealed that she had moved to the Burbs permanently.

  “You’ll be much happier here with your own people,” Yong-jun said. “I hope you’ll be coming over regularly.”

  “Are…are you looking for work?” Da-bin asked. It was the first thing he had said since they had sat down.

  Why do you always ask me that?

  “I’ll be working at the kiln this winter with Randy as usual. Come spring I’m not sure what I’ll do.”

  You know I have a boyfriend, you know I work with him and sleep with him. So why do you always ask year after year?

  Yong-jun looked nonplussed. “There will be plenty of work on the farm come spring.”

  Da-bin nodded eagerly.

  Yu-jin tried to maintain her composure.

  It just doesn’t enter your thoughts that I might marry an Anglo, does it?

  Yu-jin shifted in her seat as she had to admit to herself that she wouldn’t be marrying Randy, not because he was an Anglo, but for another reason. A far more important one.

  Hanna chose that moment to bring out the main dish. Perfect timing, as usual. Anytime the conversation took an awkward turn, she’d appear with some fragrant creation of her kitchen that almost tempted Yu-jin to ignore Da-bin’s many shortcomings and enjoy that kind of cooking every day.

  Almost, but not quite.

  As they dove into the meal, Ming apologized for her and her sister’s husbands not being there. “They’d love to see you, and they’ll be sure to make some prayers when they come over. They’re both out rebuilding the shed.”

  Xinxin made a face. “It was that cult. They’re lunatics. We were behind the wall when they came, thankfully. The Doctor let everyone in. The Righteous Horde was sweeping up everybody. They broke into all the farms, of course, but they didn’t find a thing in ours. Since we’re so close in we had time to clear everything out. They broke into the tool shed too and I guess they got angry at not finding any tools in there because they burnt it to the ground. They didn’t even use the wood for a campfire, they just burned it. Imagine!”

  Yu-jin shook her head.

  “You should have seen The Doctor,” Ming added. “He was right up on the wall when the attack came, blasting away with a pistol like some real warrior!”

  A wicked urge came over Yu-jin. She turned to Da-bin.

  “How many cultists did you kill?”

  Da-bin blushed.

  “I helped out too,” he mumbled.

  “He was very helpful loading guns and bringing food and water up to the guards on the wall,” Hanna said. “Would you like some more noodles?”

  Yong-jun gave his son a sharp look, obviously waiting for him to defend himself. When Da-bin said nothing, Yong-jun shook his head and kept eating.

  “I’d love some, thanks,” Yu-jin replied, feeling vindicated. If she’d been there, more than a few cultists would have been lying on the ground with arrows in their bellies.

  And you want me to marry this guy? He wouldn’t last a day out in the wildlands.

  Not that Randy would either.

  Yu-jin dug into a second helping of noodles, one of the many things you couldn’t cook over an open fire in a cave. Now that she lived in the Burbs she’d have to get Hanna to teach her how to make them. The Yaos had kept so many more traditions than her family. Living in a cave and scavenging from old ruins while hiding from bandits, they’d never had time to teach her much. She’d learned to read and write scratching Chinese characters onto the walls with charcoal, and her elders had taught her a bit of history and family stories, but they amounted to so little.

  There followed a chatter of pleasantries that made Yu-jin forget her troubles for the moment. She looked around at the smiling faces and let the happy chatter wash over her. Yu-jin imagined what New Year’s would be like, with everyone together and maybe the newborn already. And in five years or ten a whole group of children spilling their food and making noise and running around in the yard, while she and the other adults sat at the table and enjoyed it all.

  That could be you. All you have to do is say yes.

  Da-bin slurping his soup snapped her back to reality.

  Can’t I just marry the family and not the man?

  “What is all that noise?” Yong-jun asked, frowning at the wall.

  They heard the distant buzz of many voices, as if there was a crowd outside.

  “Maybe they caught a thief,” Hanna said, turning to Yu-jin. “You know there’s been three hangings since you’ve been here last? One was a spy for the Righteous Horde, plus there was a murderer and a dirty old man who—”

  “This isn’t proper conversation for the table,” Yong-jun declared. “Let’s eat.”

  “With respect, sir, I think I should take a look,” Yu-jin said. “It’s best to know.”

  “Father said—” Da-bin started, but Yu-jin was already getting up.

  As Yu-jin stepped out of the room he heard Yong-jun whispering to his son, “…wildlands habits. You’ll have to put your foot down.”

  Yu-jin resisted the urge to laugh. The only thing Da-bin could put his foot down on was an ant, and he’d probably apologize afterwards. She passed through the front hall, once again marveling at the Yaos’ new wealth, and unlatched the door.

  Peeking out, she saw a crowd of people passing by, all headed in the same direction.

  “What’s going on?” she called out.

  A woman called back, “Some fishermen spotted a freighter sailing into Toxic Bay.”

  Yu-jin froze. It took a moment for the significance of the words to sink in, then without even a thought she closed the door behind her and started running.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  “What the hell was that?”

  The Doctor looked south towards Toxic Bay, the direction from which the sound had come. It had sounded like a car horn, but deeper and far louder.

  “Damned if I know,” Marcus shrugged.

  They were standing near the shore looking at the meter for the wind turbines. A dozen stretched in a line to catch the sea breeze at the end of the peninsula upon which New City stood.

  “Probably some pipe or something bursting at the old chemical works,” Philip said. “That happened a couple of years ago, remember?”

  “Hope it doesn’t stink up the place,” Marcus grumbled.

  “If it’s anything important Clyde will warn us. I’m more worried what happens to our power supply if the wind doesn’t keep up,” The Doctor said. Philip had just finished explaining how they couldn’t expect the little wind farm to maintain current generation levels since the wind level always dropped off in late winter as the prevailing weather shifted. There would be shortages come spring, just when they needed power the most for agriculture.

  The Doctor paused and looked towards Toxic Bay again, hidden from view by a curve in the shoreline. That noise hadn’t sounded like an explosion. It sounded kind of familiar.

  He shrugged and studied the wind farm.

  “So how many more can you fit in here?” he asked.

  Philip scratched his head and studied the row of wind turbines through his thick glasses. “We’d have to shift them, bunch them up a bit more. That’ll be a big job.”

  “That’s not what I asked,” The Doctor said, his impatience risin
g. Why couldn’t people answer a simple fucking question?

  “We could probably add three or four more. We have the materials for that.”

  “Do it.”

  “But that won’t solve—”

  “I said do it.”

  Why does everyone have to be told everything twice? How many years of my life have I wasted getting people to do the obvious?

  Running footsteps made the three men turn. Clyde Devon, the Head of the Watch, huffed up to them, his face red and sweat beading his bald pate. He wore camouflage from head to foot, had an M16 strapped to his back, and his belly was pressed into shape by a bulletproof vest he wore under his fatigues.

  “Jesus Christ, Clyde. Why are you wearing Kevlar? You’re going to give yourself a heart attack. And yes, that’s my professional opinion.”

  Clyde stopped and took a moment to catch his breath.

  “Did you…hear…that?” he puffed.

  “The explosion?” Marcus asked. “There isn’t a toxic cloud headed this way, is there?”

  The Doctor rolled his eyes. The wind was blowing south, towards Toxic Bay, not north. Why didn’t anyone pay attention?

  Clyde shook his head. “That wasn’t…an explosion. Didn’t you…recognize the sound?”

  The three men stared at him. Clyde flung his arms out. “North Cape? The port? Come on, Doc, you and Marcus are old enough to remember. I even remember and I was a little kid.”

  “Remember what?” The Doctor asked. He could almost feel the answer rising to his conscious mind. An impossible answer.

  “A ship’s horn!” Clyde shouted.

  “Oh, come on,” Philip scoffed.

  The Doctor and Marcus didn’t scoff. As soon as Clyde had said it they remembered.

  In the last days of North Cape there had still been a few freighters plying the sea. The corporations or countries that had made them were long gone, so the ships had become independent merchant vessels, sailing between the last few surviving ports and trying to keep up a semblance of regional trade. But fuel became ever scarcer, and the ports fell one by one to wars or coups or economic collapse. By the time North Cape had its final, fatal revolution, its port hadn’t had a visitor in five years.

  That was four decades ago.

  “It couldn’t be,” Marcus whispered, his voice expressing the same doubt, the same hope, which The Doctor felt.

  “Some tweaker must have found a working ship’s horn over at the port,” the Doctor said.

  “But the rumors,” Clyde said, his eyes wide. “Haven’t you heard the fishermen’s tales of seeing freighters out on the horizon?”

  The Doctor waved a dismissive hand. “Fishermen are so full of toxins they’re almost as high as tweakers.”

  “I’m going to lead a patrol over there.”

  The Doctor shrugged. “They’re your lungs.”

  “Hell no,” Clyde said, regaining his usual swagger now that he had caught his breath. “Me and my team all have gas masks.”

  “Have fun,” The Doctor said with a grin.

  As Clyde lumbered off, Marcus watched him go, shaking his head. “That man isn’t happy unless he’s panicking.”

  “Don’t tell him about the power supply,” Philip said, “or he really will have a heart attack.”

  “We’ll have to announce it at the next citizens’ meeting,” The Doctor said with a sigh.

  That’s going to be fun. More people bitching at me.

  He turned to Marcus and clapped him on the shoulder.

  “How about we get lunch?”

  Marcus looked surprised. “Rosie’s already prepared something, I’m sure.”

  “Well, you said it was an open invitation.”

  Marcus beamed. He was always bugging him to come over for a meal. The Doctor had been avoiding it for too long. Best to get it over with. Besides, there was so much on the agenda today that he’d have an excuse to leave early.

  Twenty minutes later he was sitting at the old card table in Marcus’ and Rosie’s kitchen. Marcus poured a glass of beer for each of them while Rosie hummed some annoying tune and bustled around the hearth.

  The Doctor put his elbow on the corner of the table and the whole thing wobbled, sloshing out some of the beer from his glass.

  “Whoops,” Marcus said, grabbing a cloth and wiping it up. “I need to fix this thing.”

  “I’ve heard that before,” Rosie said in a singsong voice.

  The Doctor looked around. “Where’s Jessica?”

  “She said she wouldn’t be in today,” Marcus replied.

  “You have to watch that girl. Something’s not right about her.”

  “She’s just happy to be having a real life here and not stuck out in the wildlands with her father.”

  The Doctor grunted. That scavenger was a nutcase. He’d even created his own association of riffraff.

  “Well, I can’t blame her for that,” he said. “I don’t like the guy either.”

  Rosie turned and said, “She’s so glad to be here now where she can stretch her wings and fly. You know she never wants to talk about him?”

  “Do you think he abused her?” The Doctor asked.

  “Oh, no!” Rosie looked horrified. “I didn’t mean it like that. It’s just that some of the scavenger parents are so strict. I suppose they have to be, but it can’t be fun for the children. Jessica is just a clever girl who wants to be able to do all the things girls do.”

  “Speaking of,” Marcus interrupted. “She’s not catting around with that Parker boy again, is she?”

  Rosie turned back to the stove.

  “Jesus, Rosie, I told you her old man would flip out about that!”

  “Don’t blaspheme,” Rosie said without turning around. “Besides, her father isn’t here. Lord knows why he hasn’t come and picked her up now that the Righteous Horde is gone. It’s like he doesn’t care.”

  “Or he sent her here to spy on us,” The Doctor said. “Keep an eye on her.”

  “You’re too suspicious, Reginald,” Rosie said as she brought the pot over.

  The Doctor blinked at hearing his name. Nobody called him that. To the world he was The Doctor, the only professionally trained medical man he knew of, the man who healed the sick for free and kept the last outpost of civilization together by sheer force of will. People like him didn’t have the luxury of names. Especially embarrassing ones.

  “We have a nice rabbit stew and mixed vegetables, plus apple pie for desert. Eat up, Reginald, you’re looking thin.”

  Twice in one day. She’s doing that on purpose.

  “Who’s going to say grace?” Rosie asked as she sat next to her husband. She was looking at Marcus, not The Doctor.

  Marcus bowed his head, “Thank you Lord for providing this bounty and keeping our friends and family safe. Thy will be done.”

  Thank you Lord for allowing people to starve and letting the world turn to shit. Thy will be nonexistent, The Doctor said silently, and yet he kept his head bowed and his mouth shut. For all her faults, Rosie’s rabbit stew was not to be missed. Clinging to primitive superstitions may have destroyed her powers of reasoning, but it sure hadn’t hurt her cooking.

  They ate in the companionable silence of old friends. They’d known each other since they were in their teens, these three gray-haired citizens, and besides a bit of banter and small talk, they simply enjoyed the meal and each other’s company.

  They were just finishing the apple pie when there was a frenzied knock on the door.

  “I’ll get it,” Rosie said, getting up.

  “No, I think that’s for me,” The Doctor said, moving faster. A bad feeling rose in his chest.

  When he opened the door he found Clyde leaning against the door frame, gasping for breath as sweat poured down his red face. A couple of his guards stood behind him, less winded but just as panicked.

  “What?” The Doctor asked.

  Clyde tried to speak but his words came out as a choked gasp. One of the guards answered instead. />
  “It’s real. There’s a freighter in Toxic Bay.”

  Within five minutes The Doctor had assembled a larger group of guards, put on a Kevlar vest, strapped on a 9mm automatic, and headed out the gate. He left Marcus in charge of New City, with strict orders to close the gate if he heard gunshots.

  As they hurried through the Burbs in the direction of the bay they found themselves part of a growing crowd headed the same direction.

  “Is it true?” someone called out.

  “Yes. Go home. We’ll take care of this,” The Doctor replied.

  “A fisherman told us there’s a whole fleet of ships!” someone else said. “Is it an invading navy?”

  “There’s only one ship. Go on home.”

  The Doctor picked up the pace, trying to get ahead of the crowd, but it sped up too. He changed tack and got his guards in a line, shouting at everyone to go home for their own security.

  The crowd proved unstoppable. It flowed around both sides of his line. Cursing, he turned to his guards. “Let’s get there as fast as we can before these idiots screw everything up.”

  By the time they made it to the hills it seemed like half the population of New City and the Burbs was on their heels. The stench slowed some down, but curiosity proved stronger than fear of toxins and most kept going. A guard gave The Doctor his gas mask and he huffed and puffed within its rubber confines as he passed through the final valley as it opened up onto Toxic Bay.

  And there, just like everyone else, he stopped and stared.

  A rusty old freighter sat at anchor in the center of the bay. For a moment he was cast back to his childhood, when as a little boy he’d sit on the docks of North Cape and watch the ships come and go. While there hadn’t been many then, far fewer than the glory days of real civilization his grandparents had told him about, even so they had sailed far and wide, plying the coastline and even going to different continents.

  But there hadn’t been a ship bigger than a fishing boat on the seas for forty years.