by Payne, T. L.
As Maddie and Lugnut walked back to their horses, she heard Harmony telling the story of how she had met Maddie’s group.
“Should we leave without them?” Maddie asked. “She is only at the part where the dog attacked me. If Rosland lets her finish the story, it’ll be morning by the time they are ready to leave.”
“Let’s wait. I’m sure that Zach remembers how to work a grid, but he may get distracted by all that talking. We should stay within hearing range of them.”
“Oh, gawd,” Maddie said, resting her head against Spirit’s neck.
“She is a talker, isn’t she?” Ron said, leaning in and rubbing Spirit’s nose.
The dirt bike deputy came to Rosland’s rescue. He was ready to take a group out and had selected Maddie’s. As he handed her a roll of pink tape, Maddie’s heart sped up. She felt stupid having such a reaction, considering their task. Maddie stuck the tape into the pocket of her jeans, made sure the laces of her boots were tight, and adjusted the straps on her pack. Her rifle hung across her chest on its two-point sling.
As he gathered the group for instruction, Maddie tried hard not to stare at the man.
“My name is deputy Jacob Rawlings. I am going to be taking you out to your grid, and we will perform a search of the area.”
Maddie stared at Jacob’s boots while he gave the rest of his speech. She was relieved when he paired with Ron on the opposite end of their search line.
They hadn’t walked twenty feet into the woods surrounding the Henson farm before Harmony had fallen on her face. Maddie had never seen four men move so fast to help someone. Zach, being nearer, had reached her first and was helping her up while Jacob gathered up her backpack from the ground. Maddie sat on a nearby rock as Ron cleaned the wounds to Harmony’s hands and face.
While the other’s fawned over Harmony, Lugnut dropped his pack and took a seat on a boulder across from Maddie. He removed a monocular and began to scan the area. The orange sun peeked through the tops of the trees. Maddie was glad they were searching east of the farm. She hated walking into the sun when it was low on the horizon. She’d left her sunglasses in California.
She pushed a stab of grief away at the thought of her grandmother. Then another for her mom an instant later. She thought of one-eyed Jack for the first time since the world went to hell and wondered what her mother would do with him when she headed home.
“We’re in the wrong grid,” Lugnut said, startling her out of her thoughts.
“Do you see something?”
“It is what I don’t see.”
“What do you expect to see that you aren’t?” Maddie asked.
“Signs of a struggle or more than one person walking. Ron, come take a look,” Lugnut called out.
Maddie retrieved her monocular from her pack as Lugnut handed Ron his. Lugnut was right. She saw nothing. But unlike Ron and Lugnut, she had no idea what she was even looking for.
“Yeah, she didn’t come this way,” Ron agreed.
“Hey, deputy,” Lugnut called out.
Jacob turned to face them. Maddie looked away. Her face flushed. She decided to find something she did not like about the man and focus solely on that.
Yep, that should do the trick.
Chapter 6
Kingman Compound
Kingman, Arizona
Event + 12 days
As Beth pushed her way through the crowd of women standing outside the door to the dining facility storage room, she could see that a woman lay on a mat in the middle of the room. Angel was positioned between the woman’s legs telling her to push.
“No!” Beth yelled. “Don’t push.”
Beth shoved a very pregnant girl out of the way and dropped to her knees beside Angel.
“Get me some gloves,” Beth called over her shoulder at the bystanders.
Angel stood and allowed Beth to examine the woman.
“Hi. What’s your name?” Beth asked.
“Sophia Aguilar-Gonzales,” the woman said between panting.
“Hi, Sophia. I am Beth, and I’m a nurse. I am going to help you deliver your baby. So, what I need you to do right now is to continue to breathe through the contractions, but do not push.”
From the amount of blood that Beth was seeing, she knew that Sophia and her baby were in trouble, but she needed to examine her to see if she could determine why and how to save them. After instructing Angel to bring her some towels, Beth did her best to deliver the baby safely. It quickly became apparent that Sophia may require a cesarean section, something Beth was not qualified to do.
“Angel, I need you to go see if the doctor can come here or if we can get some men to come to move Sophia to the medical facility,” Beth whispered.
She tried to keep Sophia calm and breathing through her contractions, but time was not on her side. In the next few moments, Beth delivered Sophia’s baby boy.
But by the time Angel and the men returned, Sophia was gone.
Emotionally overwhelmed, Beth swaddled the baby in the towels Angel had brought and somehow found her way to the medical trailer with the baby. As she turned the knob to go in, she realized she was covered in blood. She needed to get cleaned up and tell Maria about her sister and nephew. Beth pulled open the door.
Rebecca was up to her elbows in trauma cases. Two men lay side by side on gurneys—both with obvious gunshot wounds. Beth stared hard at their faces, relieved that neither man was Roger. Rebecca looked up from her task.
“Sophia?” She asked.
Beth shook her head.
“How’s the infant?”
“He needs oxygen. His Apgar was low,” Beth informed her.
“In there,” Rebecca nodded to a cabinet to her right. “Third drawer. There may be a mask small enough. Heat the rice sock and lay it next to him to get his temperature up.”
Beth stuck the sock filled with rice into the countertop oven and set it to one hundred degrees before pulling the tiny manual oxygen respirator from the drawer. She took the child to the room she had recovered in the day before and lay him on the bed. After placing the warmed rice-filled sock next to the infant, Beth manually provided him with oxygen until his skin was nice and pink and his pulse rate and respiration were normal.
When Beth returned to the surgical area to reheat the sock, she noticed Angel standing near the door. Angel straightened and approached Beth.
“How is he?” Angel asked through her tears.
“He is doing much better. Do you want to come see him?”
Angel nodded, tears breaking free from their glistening paths and falling to the floor.
She followed Beth to see the baby. Angel gently lowered herself onto the bed and sat next to him. As she stroked his hair, Beth said, “You can hold him if you’d like.”
Beth watched Angel cradled her friend’s newborn son in her arms. More tears fell to his blanket. She rocked him gently and whispered in his ear.
“Angel, would you mind staying with him while I go tell Maria?” Beth asked.
“No, I don’t mind, but I went to the gate to tell her myself and she was gone.”
“Did someone relieve her?”
“Yes, Stanley was there. He said the colonel sent her and a security guy out to find Roger.”
Beth was quiet for a moment. She tried to decide what she meant. She could not imagine what may have happened to Roger.
“Did the others all come back in yet?” Beth asked, handing Angel the warmed sock.
“Most of them have, I’m told. Stanley said that one team is staying out to patrol and provide protection as they search for Roger—and to make sure the cartel doesn’t get that close again.”
“Do they have any idea which way he went? Did he hook up with one of the other teams?”
“I don’t know any of that. You could ask Stanley, I guess,” Angel said, placing the warm sock next to the infant.
“Do you know if there is any formula for the baby?” Beth asked.
“Yes. It is in the dining hall st
oreroom,” Angel said, bursting into tears.
“I’m so sorry, Angel. I am going to go over there and have someone bring you a bottle for the baby. Would you mind feeding him while I see what I can find out about my friend?” Beth asked her, hand already on the doorknob.
“I don’t mind. I’ll take him. Sophia was going to make me one of his godmothers. I’ll look after him until Maria gets back.”
“Thank you,” Beth said as she pulled the door closed behind her. As she entered the surgical area, Beth saw Rebecca’s son curled up, asleep in a corner. She glanced back to Rebecca, and they both looked down at the boy.
“You want me to carry him and have Angel watch out for him while he naps?” Beth asked.
Rebecca nodded and returned her attention to stitching the wounded man’s arm.
After Beth laid Ethan on the bed and exited the room, she grabbed Jack and headed back to the dining facility. Without going in, she instructed a woman standing outside to have formula brought over for the baby.
Beth slung the straps to Jack’s carrier over her neck and walked to the south gate. As she approached, she called out.
“Stanley, you up there? It’s Beth Howard. I’m looking for Maria.”
“You Roger’s girl?” a man called back.
“Yeah.” It was easier to say yes than explain they were just friends.
“Maria left with Robertson to track Roger down. The colonel sent a team to provide security as they search. Don’t you worry, Maria could find bigfoot if you asked her too.” Stanley said, poking his head out of the guard tower.
“Thanks, Stanley. I’m going to take a shower and get cleaned up. After that, I’m going to see if I can help the doctor. If Maria or Roger come back through this way, will you tell them where to find me?”
“Sure thing.”
After showering and feeding Jack, Beth returned to the medical trailer. The sun had set. She used a flashlight from her pack to find her way.
She checked in on Angel and examined the baby. His color was still pink, and he appeared to be doing okay. Beth left Jack in his carrier and set him in the corner of the room before going out to help Rebecca with her last patient.
“We are going through blood supplies and antibiotics twice as fast as we had planned. We will be rationing them before long,” Rebecca said as she pulled the last stitch through the man’s leg wound and tied the knot.
“If you had a way to type and cross it, you could replace the blood, but antibiotics are irreplaceable. I’m afraid we will be back to twentieth-century medicine before long where a small cut could be deadly.”
“That is what I’m afraid of too.”
Beth sat with the patients as Rebecca took her son home and got some rest. Rebecca’s nurse came and relieved Beth around midnight. After checking in on the baby one last time, Beth retrieved Jack and they made their way to the women’s quarters.
She could hear quiet sniffles of grieving friends as she slid off her shoes and crawled into bed. Jack curled up next to her, and Beth closed her eyes. No matter how hard she tried, she could not stop her mind from playing out all sorts of dire scenarios of the fate of Roger and her children. Even though she now knew that her kids were with Ryan and on their way home to Missouri, she knew that Ryan, even with Lugnut and Rank joining him, still might encounter dangerous situations on the road.
While exhaustion took over, Beth forced her mind to think about better days. She thought of the day she would pull into the cabin’s driveway, and of her children running out to greet her. She was as determined as ever to make it home. Beth said a silent prayer for Roger, her children, and Maria’s newborn nephew before drifting off to sleep.
Chapter 7
Kingman Compound
Kingman, Arizona
Event + 13 days
As if she was on autopilot, Beth removed the bandages of the man Maria had brought in the day before. She was struck by what a gifted surgeon Rebecca was, to be able to do such an amazing job under the current conditions.
Beth had figured out that Rebecca likely had extensive field medicine experience. She’d said that she had to remove bullets from Roger before. Beth knew that he’d been wounded in both Iraq and Afghanistan. But even the best surgeons have limits when blood and proper surgical supplies aren’t available. Antibiotics and pain medication would eventually run out. She was sure that Rebecca’s job was only going to get more difficult.
While Beth cleaned the man’s wound, Rebecca was examining Maria’s newborn nephew. He hadn’t been eating well through the night.
“How’s he doing?” Beth asked.
“He’s jaundiced this morning and his respiration could be better. He also has a low-grade fever.”
Beth looked up. Rebecca’s expression was grime.
“You think some sunbathing will perk him up?” Beth asked, ripping a piece of medical tape with her teeth.
“I am going to have Angel take him outside for a few minutes every day and set a crib by the window, but I am also going to start a round of antibiotics as well.”
Beth pressed too hard on her patient’s leg, and he winced. Beth didn’t acknowledge his pain.
“Has anyone heard anything about Maria or the search for Roger?” Beth asked.
“The colonel sent a second team out early this morning to make contact with Maria and her team. They haven’t been responding to their radios,” Rebecca said.
“That doesn’t sound good,” Beth said, pulling a sheet over the injured man’s legs.
“It could be nothing. There are spots up in the mountains where the radios don’t work. It may be hard for them to get a signal.”
Beth pulled surgical gloves off her hands and tossed them into a wastebasket in the corner. She looked around, realizing that this was the first time she had slowed down enough to notice the layout of the surgical suite and examination room. It was sixteen feet by twenty feet and held two beds. Both were full at the moment. Beth was told there was a third person in the room Roger had vacated. The floor-to-ceiling white cabinets were well stocked with medical supplies. Solar panels attached to the roof of the trailer ran a small refrigerator that kept the dwindling blood and insulin products cool. A red toolbox on wheels, serving as a supply chest, rested in one corner. On top of it sat a box of surgical gloves and bins filled with gauze pads and syringes.
Beth turned to Rebecca who was wrapping the infant in several blankets. She pulled a tiny knit hat down over his little head and cradled him in her arms.
“Is there anywhere out there for Roger to find water?”
Rebecca hesitated.
“If you know where to look.”
While Beth tended to the second man, Rebecca took the baby outside.
Beth stared at the door long after she had closed it. She imagined Roger lying in the desert, his lips parched and bleeding from his shoulder wound. She shook her head.
Why would he run off like that?
“I wouldn’t worry too much about Roger,” Beth’s patient said, startling her out of her thoughts.
“You know him?” Beth asked as she returned her attention to the man’s injured arm.
“Yeah. He came out and drilled with us when he could. He was training me on various weapons. He knows his stuff. He knows how to survive. He has been all over this area.”
“That is good to know. Thank you for sharing that information. I do feel better knowing Roger knows the area.”
The man tried to sit up, but the pain of his injured arm and leg proved too much.
“Do you want something for the pain?” Beth asked as she finished applying a clean dressing to his arm.
“I took some ibuprofen about an hour ago. I asked the doc to save the good stuff for those who may need it more than me later. We are having a hard time finding strong pain meds these days. What we have here may be the last we ever see.”
“You’re probably right about that. You’re competing with the drug addicts in your search for whatever narcotics are left out
there. I’m sure all the pharmacies have been looted by now.”
Beth wiped sweat from the man’s brow and offered him a sip of water. He was young, likely only Maddie’s age—the same age Greg and Roger had been when they’d enlisted in the Marines. The age of those tasked to protect their communities had dropped the day the EMP struck and would drop still lower as more people died of starvation, sickness, and violence.
Beth heard hurried footsteps on the hard-packed dirt outside the medical trailer. The door flew open. Angela and Rebecca raced into the room. Rebecca was holding the baby in one arm and giving the child CPR with the other. Beth’s heart dropped. She pulled the roll-around supply chest from its corner and swept the contents off of its top. Rebecca laid the infant down while continuing to provide chest compressions. Beth searched through the cabinets along the wall and came back with a small respirator. His tiny body was blue and lifeless. It reminded her why she’d hadn’t worked in pediatrics. It was always harder to lose children.
After continuing CPR for a full thirty minutes, Rebecca finally called the time of death. There would be no death certificate to file with the state and no obituary in the local newspaper. His grave would likely never have an engraved granite marker. After less than two weeks following the collapse of society, those things had become relics of a bygone era.
The loss of this child was more pronounced to Beth as she remembered a news report about the EMP commission prediction that ninety percent of the population would die from starvation, disease, and violence. Every single child was important for the sustainability of the nation—maybe even the world.
Rebecca, Angel, and Beth did not speak as Rebecca wrapped the baby in a blanket and placed him in the crib by the window in one of the patient rooms down the hall.
An injured woman had been brought in sometime in the night. She lay in the other bed in the room. The woman was asleep and had not stirred during the resuscitation effort of the baby.
