by T A Williams
“You still believe you are special,” Xu said, looking at both camps. “You Americans grew up believing that the world was yours, that you can go wherever or say whatever you want. Do not feel bad, it was how you were taught.” Xu got on top of Bruce, who was still lying on his back in shock. Xu raised the blade up high and then brought it back down forcefully into Bruce’s stomach, causing Bruce to cry out again in pain. “I will re-educate you,” Xu said calmly. “This is not your world now, it is mine.” Xu brought the blade down one more time and then got up and stood over Bruce.
Bruce rolled onto his side and his entire body was shaking as a pool of blood began to form around him. No one said anything, no one tried to help. After a few moments Camp Rambo walked back over to collect their extra bowl of food and Camp Yankee walked toward their building. Alec stood there, uncertain what to do. He took one step forward toward Bruce and saw the large man in Camp Rambo looking at him. They locked eyes and the large man shook his head. Alec noticed two soldiers watching him and he turned and walked away.
He walked to their building but before he walked in he looked back toward Bruce and Xu was still standing over the man. Xu’s gaze was locked on Bruce. His expression was blank but Alec could see his eyes twinkling in the moonlight. Xu was enjoying it. A soldier came up behind Alec and pushed him through the entrance. Alec walked into the large building and walked down a long hallway that reminded him of when they used to go to animal shelters, cages on each side. A soldier opened up one of the gates and pushed him inside the concrete room that was barely long enough for him to lie down in. The gate was closed and locked and then he was alone. Outside their building a man was slowly bleeding to death but inside the building it was perfectly quiet. Alec leaned against the wall and cried.
Ben
They moved in silence.
Reaper was in the lead--he was always in the lead--and the rest of the ragtag group of soldiers followed. Broken pieces of concrete and other rubble covered the ground but the group managed to walk over it while not making a peep. Ben, Ohio and Ty, on the other hand, struggled. With every crunch or slip-up they grimaced and a few times some of the soldiers glanced back and gave them a look, but no one said anything. Reaper stopped at the edge of a street and peered around the corner of a building while the rest of the men stopped and surveyed the land. The nine soldiers were rough and ragged but deadly. The same smooth and precise movements that Ben always admired in Mason were reflected in each of them. They knew what they were doing.
Ben still wasn’t sure about Reaper. His eyes were those of a predator and while the soldiers around him were hard, they all stepped out of his way and followed his every lead without hesitation.
“All right Dex, we close?” Reaper asked without looking back toward them.
One of the soldiers, who wore dark aviator glasses with a clear crack in one of the lenses, pulled out a yellowed map and looked over it. “Nearest fill-up should be two blocks northwest of here.”
Reaper nodded and headed in that direction. As the soldiers began to move Dex was still putting the map back in his bag. Ben stopped next to him.
“What’s the fill-up?”
Dex finished putting the map away and was quiet for a moment, as if he was deciding what route to take. After a long moment he took in a deep breath. “Supply depot. Need to refill our ammo and rations.”
Dex started following the others and Ben fell into step with him. “Supplies? Were they here before the attack?”
“Most were,” Dex scratched his nose and shooed a fly away. “Some were already here for normal refill while on patrol, and others were contingency-based in case something like this happened.”
Ben thought of the supply depots that Mason had told him were scattered throughout the United States. They had even hit a few of them during their travels together. “Are they being refilled?”
“Probably not. The Ricers control the skies and the main roads into and out of the city, so we got to make sure what we have lasts.”
Ricers was the derogatory term that the soldiers called the enemy soldiers.
“And if we run out?” Ben asked.
Dex gave him a quick sideways glance. “Then you better learn how to kill with a slingshot.” Dex took several long steps and left Ben behind.
After a few seconds Ty caught up with him. “And?”
Ben shook his head. “They still don’t seem to trust us.”
Ty frowned. “That’s cool. They can doubt us until shit hits the fan and we man up. Shit, wait till they see you go all Rambo on those fuckers; then they’ll know we’re for real.”
Ben and Ty had gotten into a single firefight against a couple of Chinese soldiers and somehow they had managed to survive. Since that day Ty was convinced that Ben was some kind of super soldier when in reality he had nearly wet himself and had barely managed to survive.
“Just stay sharp. I’m more worried about running into a Chinese patrol than I am proving that I know what I’m doing to these guys.”
“What do you think about her?” Ty asked gesturing toward the lone female in the group.
Her short hair was as red as fire, which is probably why the rest of the soldiers called her Crimson. She had hard features, rarely smiled, and some incident in her past had caused her to lose her right earlobe and left the area around it a dark red. Despite all that, Ty seemed infatuated.
“Don’t,” Ben said, already knowing Ty wouldn’t listen to him.
They all stopped at a street crossing waiting for Reaper to give the all clear and Ty slowly made his way over and pretended by coincidence he happened to stop next to her. He looked over and acted surprised.
“Oh, hey,” he whispered.
Crimson didn’t look at him.
“I’m Ty.”
Crimson continued scanning the street. “You know what happens in those movies?” Her voice was just as hard.
“Movies?” Ty asked, confused.
“The movies where a horny man comes up to a woman, hits on her and then she pulls a knife, points it at his balls and pretends like she is going to cut them off if the man doesn’t leave her alone.”
Ty glanced over to Ben, who quickly looked away.
“You want to know the only difference between those types of women and me?” Crimson asked.
“Uh, sure.”
Crimson stopped scanning the building and looked directly at Ty. “I won’t pretend.”
Reaper gave the all clear and Crimson moved forward, leaving Ty crouched there with his mouth agape. Ben moved up next to him.
“I think I’m in love, B,” Ty said as he watched her move forward.
The rays from the sun hit against the damaged skyscrapers, leaving them shrouded in shadow, while the sound of birds chirping echoed throughout the empty streets. The lower levels of all the buildings were filled with various shops, all looted long ago. Reaper stopped outside the store front of an old H&R tax service.
“Really, here?” Ty whispered next to Ben.
Reaper pointed to two of the men and gestured inside; the rest of the men took up positions outside the store front. Ben crouched down next to a rusted-out taxi. The wheels were long gone and the rims rested against the cracked pavement. Ty crouched down next to him, obviously not sure what he was supposed to do.
Ben pointed toward a nearby alley. “Cover that; I’ll take this side of the street.”
Ty looked around. “B, there are hundreds of windows above us. How the hell we supposed to cover each other here?”
Ty wasn’t wrong. There were twelve of them and thousands of windows. All it would take was a single shooter sitting in one of those windows. “Just worry about that alleyway. I’ll worry about this side of the street.”
“Yo, rooks,” said a soldier with tufts of red hair shooting out from under a backwards hat. “You even know what you’re doing?”
Ben looked to Ohio and the young soldier had his back against a tree growing out of the sidewalk and was scanning the bu
ildings above them frantically.
“You,” the red-haired soldier pointed to Ben, “get your ass over here and cover the second floor behind me.”
Ben trotted over and took up position next to the man. The man watched him the entire way with a blank expression on his face.
“You ever actually used that thing?” he asked.
“Used what?” Ben asked.
“Your gun, rook. You ever actually shoot that thing?”
“Yes, I have used my gun before,” Ben said, scanning the second floor of the nearby building.
“Ever shot at someone? I’m talking a human, not an animal.”
Ben didn’t take his eyes off his sector. “Yes, I have shot at and hit someone before.” He looked away for a second and met the man’s eyes. “And they didn’t get up after.”
The red-haired man smiled and gave him an approving look. “Well, well, sorry Rook. Guess I under-”
The man’s head disappeared in a spray of red liquid and chunks. As Ben felt a spray of wetness hit his face, he heard the loud crack of a single gunshot.
“Sniper!” one of the soldiers yelled.
Ben wiped his forehead and then stared at the blood covering his hand. Someone slammed into him, knocking him to the ground just as the street near him exploded and the sound of another shot rang down the empty street.
Dex laid over him and pulled him up next to an abandoned car. “Shit, he got Red.” Dex looked over at Ben. “Keep your head down unless you want to lose it.”
“Where’s it coming from?” Reaper yelled from inside the building.
“Skyscraper at my 12 o’clock,” yelled one of the soldiers behind them.
Ben came to and looked around for Ty and Ohio but they were hidden along with the rest of the soldiers.
“Ghost, you got eyes on him?” Reaper asked.
“Not yet,” came a voice from behind another vehicle. From Ben’s angle he could see the man’s legs. He was laid out on his stomach facing toward the building.
Ben saw his gun laying on the ground a few feet from him. As he began to reach for it Dex grabbed his arm.
“Don’t.” The man pulled him back. “Wherever that fucker is, he’s waiting for one of us to do something stupid. Your gun couldn’t reach him anyway.”
Ben sat back against the cold car and tried to slow his breathing. The man’s head exploded right in front of him. He felt a drop of liquid fall from his chin. He was too afraid to check to see if it was sweat or part of the man.
The hood of the car Ghost was hiding behind was hit and flipped up.
“Shit,” Ghost said as he rolled away from the car for a second and then threw himself back against it. “I got shit.”
“Dammit, we’re going to have company any second now,” Reaper said from inside the building. Ben saw the man peek out for a brief moment. “All right, if you’re on my side of the street then you head for this building or the alleyway. If you’re on the other side you find safety over there. Use the alleyways and hoof your ass to the rendezvous point. Got it?”
All the soldiers said yes or made a grunting noise.
Dex slapped Ben on the face. “You with me?”
“I’m good,” Ben said.
“All right, when he tells us you run as quickly as you can into that building, understand? If someone gets shot keep running; if you get shot that doesn’t give you an excuse to stop. Understand?”
“Sir,” Ben said as he took a calming breath. He had been through worse, he could handle this.
“All right, on three,” Reaper yelled. “One…Two…Three!”
Ben jumped into a crouch and ran into the open street. The sound of everyone else moving seemed distant. His ears waited to hear the sound of the sniper’s gun. As he ran toward the building, which was only ten yards away but seemed like a mile, he realized that he would feel the bullet before he heard the sniper’s gun fire. He dove inside the safety of the building just as he heard the crack of the sniper’s gun.
Dex was in the building shortly after and slammed against the wall. “Shit, did he get someone?”
Reaper took in a deep breath and shook his head. “No, we’re good.”
“He got Red. Red’s gone,” Dex said.
“I know.” Reaper’s face didn’t change. “His equipment is lost. We grabbed a few bags from the depot, so we’re good to go.”
Dex looked to Ben and then to Reaper. “Red…”
“Yeah?” Reaper asked, shooting him a look. “You want to go out and grab his body? He’s gone. Let’s move out before we all end up like him.”
“Yes, sir,” Dex said as he grabbed one of the duffle bags and headed toward the back of the store.
“Ben, grab that bag and follow him.”
Ben nodded and grabbed a nearby duffle bag. They went out the back of the store and into the alleyway, where Ben saw Ty and Ohio. They both looked shaken up but they were alive. They made their way down the streets away from the sniper’s skyscraper, all in silence. When they finally made their way back to the abandoned building they had been using as their temporary base Ben was exhausted, not physically, but emotionally. All of the soldiers, outside of Reaper, had a strained look on their face. They had lost one of their own.
“You okay?” Ohio asked. He glanced at Ben then looked away again quickly.
That was when he realized that the man’s blood still covered his face. Ben ran off into the back and used one of his old shirts to remove Red’s blood from his face. He walked back out and the room was silent. Several of the soldiers were pacing while others were scanning the streets, making sure they hadn’t been followed. Reaper sat in the corner of the room going through the bags of supplies. Ben sat on the opposite side of the room on an old chair.
Ghost walked over and slumped down on the floor next to him. The hardened man had a large grinning skull tattooed on the right side of his neck. “You all right, rook?”
“Yeah…yes. Thanks for saving my ass out there.”
“Don’t mention it. I know you’re a rook but if you want to keep breathing out here the last thing you can do is stand still when someone starts firing. Make sense?”
Ben felt his face starting to turn red so he looked down at the ground. “Yeah.”
Ghost was quiet for a moment. “Look, none of these guys would admit it, but if they had just witnessed someone’s head getting blown off they would have hesitated too. Don’t beat yourself up, just learn from it.”
“Thanks.”
Ghost got up and went to talk to the others while Ben just sat there not knowing what to say or what to think.
Ally
She listened to the sound of the horse’s hooves as they walked across the muddy ground. It reminded her of when she used to play with suction cups on their old hardwood floor when she was growing up. They had hunkered in an old house all of yesterday to allow a large storm to blow past and now they were following its wet, muddy path. Traveling on the road would have been easier but the roads had become increasingly busy the closer to the west coast they got. Everything from normal cars and trucks to Humvees. So for safety’s sake they stayed off the road, which was why they found themselves slogging through the mud.
Dena led the pack quietly, only stopping to check the map while Adam and Coby rode alongside Ally. Adam tried from time to time to interact with Dena but the woman lived inside her head, barely saying more than a few words at a time. The only person who could bring her out of her shell was Coby but the young boy didn’t want to be around her. For some reason he seemed upset with her, for what Ally didn’t know.
Ally scanned the area as she rode, hoping to see something that would make a good meal. In the distance she could see the tops of dozens of roofs and beyond that another large city. They would avoid it, as it was safer that way, but Ally couldn’t help but think of all the squirrels and rabbits that had probably made their homes in the empty buildings. As she brought her attention back to where they were going she caught track of a set of mud
dy footprints leading off toward the woods. She pulled back, slowing down her horse, and looked closer and was certain they were footprints.
“What is it?” Adam said from beside her. While Dena was obvious about her intentions of smothering her, Adam was much slyer. He tried to keep his distance but as soon as Ally paused or noticed something wrong he was always right there.
“Footprints,” she said, nodding toward the muddy tracks.
“So what?” Coby said from the back of Adam’s horse.
Ally looked closer and noticed something else. She swung off her horse effortlessly and bent down near the closest set of tracks and confirmed what she had suspected.
Blood.
She slowly followed the tracks and noticed more drops of blood ever few feet.
“Is that-” Adam started to ask.
“Yes,” Ally answered.
“It has to be fresh, right?” Adam asked. “I mean, if it had been awhile it would have dried by now.”
He was right. Ally followed the tracks until they got to the edge of the woods. The person was hurt and had taken refuge in the woods. She pulled out her bow as another question popped into her head. Who had hurt the person? If the blood was fresh then whatever happened had occurred recently. She heard Dena ride back toward them and stop.
“They found footprints and blood,” Coby explained to Dena. The woman didn’t respond.
“Should we follow it?” Adam asked.
Ally wasn’t sure if he was talking to her or not but she answered. “They’re hurt.”
Adam didn’t need to hear any more and steered his horse into the woods as Ally got back on her horse. He had a harder time following the tracks in the woods and Ally made her way around him and picked up the tracks. The farther they got the more blood there was. She glanced once over at Dena, who followed them with a look of irritation clearly on her face. Ally understood and wasn’t even sure if they should be following the tracks. It was possible the person who was hurt was actually a bad person and simply got what they deserved, but part of her just wanted to know.
