The Road North

by Phillip D Granath

  Now it was Little Bird’s turn to interrupt, “I would never betray my people!” she shouted.

  “I believe you, and as far as I can tell, so far, your lies have only been those of omission. Now the Elder Council and I spoke at length before your arrival, and unfortunately, it is as we had feared. Perhaps it is age, or perhaps you have just lived away from your own people for too long, but either way, we are in agreement that your time among the whites is over. You will remain here in the Nation and against my better judgment will even be allowed to take up your duties on the Council of Elders once again. But first, you must tell me everything that you know, say one word less, and you may find your time amongst your own people has drawn to a close as well.”

  Little Bird was dumbfounded and stared up at the Chief with her eyes open wide. Two-Steps had played her to perfection, she was now forced to choose, either be branded a traitor for lying or simply appear incompetent by admitting her delay and her omissions in reporting. His spies, whomever they were, had given Two-Steps just enough to seal her fate and now she had to assume that they knew everything. The old woman turned to look back at the rest of the Elder Council and found a mix of shame and regret in their eyes. Little Bird suddenly felt very tired, as if the weight of all of her years had finally caught up to her, she turned and sat down heavily in the nearest pew. She thought of Kyle then and Anna, and the baby growing inside of her and then she told the Chief everything that she knew.

  My Tower’s Keeper

  Kyle guided the buggy down the 101 dodging the burned out wrecks and other bits of debris that littered the roadway. While the constant swerving around the obstacles forced the scavenger to slow down, he had to admit that the highway was much easier to navigate than he had expected, in fact, it was easier than most of their surface streets back home.

  “It’s not as bad as I thought it would be,” he said.

  “It makes sense if you think about it,” Miles replied.

  The old man had just finished tying a bandage around Kyle’s head and was now working on replacing the one around his own injured hand.

  “The event happened in the middle of the night, and no one in their right mind is going to pull over on the side of the highway to stare up at the sky. That’s why all of the side streets and exits are packed full of cars.”

  “No buildings out here to loot or burn down either,” Coal added.

  Kyle nodded in agreement and then turned to look out over northern Phoenix. He watched as a series of quick flashes were exchanged from the top of a parking garage a few blocks off of the highway to a hilltop somewhere in Peoria, and he shook his head.

  “They’re still talking.”

  “Of course they are, they’re planning their next ambush,” Coal replied.

  “There’s another one,” Miles said pointing to a white tower perhaps a half mile to their North.

  Kyle just nodded, while they could outrun the slavers it was becoming clear that as long as they remained within the city the masters could call in men from every direction to head them off. For years Kyle had often wondered why they had so few outsiders come into their little town. While the Indian Nation claimed all of the lands, including the state route to the East, they should have expected travelers from the West, especially with Phoenix so relatively close. But now Kyle understood, the slavers had turned Phoenix into a black hole of misery. Anyone that ventured to close would find themselves pulled in, surrounded and either killed for food or enslaved. This was the Master’s game, and buggy or no, Kyle and his friends were still playing right into it.

  “Where will they hit us?”

  “Well by now they got to know we are just trying to get north,” Coal pointed out.

  “The 17 interchange is about a mile and a half ahead of us, it’s a big intersection and if the last one was any indication…” Miles said shaking his head.

  “It’s going to be a hell of a scrap!” Coal added.

  Though the bounty-hunter smiled as he said the words even Kyle could tell that the tone was forced, none of them were looking forward to running another gauntlet like they had in the canal. The scavenger shook his head, and then up ahead saw an exit sign and the green outline of a plane. Kyle glanced back to his North and suddenly realized that the white tower that Miles had pointed out before was an airport control tower.

  “Miles Quick, which direction does that airport run?”

  “What?”

  “The runway, which direction does it go?”

  “Ahhh…kinda north east,” Miles offered lamely.

  “Close enough, hold on!”

  Without any further warning, Kyle turned the speeding buggy down the next exit. The trio managed to slide around several wrecks before finding the burned out husk of convertible blocking the rest of the exit. The scavenger slowed, but instead of stopping, he eased the rover’s two passenger side wheels up on to the wreck and slowly began to climb over. The rusty metal groaned and buckled beneath them as the buggy’s passenger side pitched up nearly a 60-degree angle.

  “Steady, steady now,” Miles cautioned.

  With one last satisfying crunch what remained of the rusted convertible failed beneath them as the rover rolled over the wreckage and back down on to the concrete. The hard plastic wheels chirped loudly as the buggy accelerated away from the exit and the trio found themselves maneuvering down a street in an industrial part of the city, surrounded on all sides by warehouses and holding yards filled with dead machinery.

  “Coal, I know you would hate to have to hand back any of those bullets to the council, so what do you say we put them to use?”

  The half-breed laughed in reply, “You know me too well Tonto! But shooting while we are moving ain’t no easy feat.”

  “Are you saying you can’t do it?”

  “Now for as long as you’ve known me, have I ever said that about anything?”

  The bounty-hunter reached down and untied the bits of rope securing his hunting rifle to the underside of the rover’s roll bars and held the rifle lovingly.

  “What do you need me to do?” Kyle asked.

  “You just keep this thing steady, but Miles, I’m going to need you to move,” Coal said with a grin.

  A few minutes later a sign welcomed the trio to the Deer Valley Airport, and just beyond it, a long runway came into view. Kyle spotted a section of down fencing, and without missing a beat, he turned the wheel sharply to the left and guided the buggy across a narrow ditch, through the open section of fencing and onto an aircraft taxiway.

  “Are you doing alright Miles?” Kyle shouted over his shoulder.

  The old man had taken up Coal’s place and now lay spread out on the back of the buggy holding on for dear life.

  “Don’t you worry about me!” Miles growled back.

  “You’re a real trooper old man,” Coal said with a grin.

  The bounty-hunter was now seated in the passenger seat but facing backward as the half-breed’s hunting rifle rested on the buggy’s roll bar. Coal leaned forward pressing the butt of the stock into his shoulder checking the feel when the rover was jarred by a sudden bump.

  “Damn it Kyle, what do you want? Speed our accuracy, because you can’t have both!”

  “You just worry about the shooting, and I’ll handle the driving,” Kyle shouted in reply.

  The buggy cleared a long line of small aircraft and then turned out on to the main runway. Kyle punched the accelerator to the floor, and the vehicle launched forward with a chirp of the tires. Up ahead the right the tower was coming up quickly, and already Coal could make out several figures on the roof.

  “This is it Coal, the smoothest and fastest piece of road you could ask for!” Kyle shouted.

  The bounty-hunter laughed, “A couple dead slavers coming up!”

  “Don’t aim for the men!”

  “What?” Coal demanded.

  “You’ll never get them all and men is one thing they have plenty of.”

  “Well, what in the fuck am
I aiming for then?”

  “Whatever it is they are signaling with!”

  “What, that could be a fucking pocket mirror for all you know!”

  “No he’s right, it would have to be something large enough to be seen over a good distant!” Miles added from the back.

  “And that would look like?” Coal demanded.

  “It would be shiny?” Miles offered.

  “Very fuckin helpful Miles!”

  “No time now Coal!”

  The bounty-hunter looked up just as the speeding buggy passed the control tower on their left, he swore again and dropped down behind his rifle. Turning the barrel upward Coal racked a round into the chamber and aiming down the open sights quickly located three men on the tower’s roof. At that moment it all came together for Coal, he took half a breath sighted in on the first man and then nearly fired on instinct. But instead, the bounty-hunter bit his lip and forced himself to take a moment to do as Kyle asked and look for the source of the flashes.

  A shirtless man stood against the railing holding a pair of binoculars and undoubtedly staring back at him. Coal gritted his teeth eager to put a bullet in the man, but then he noticed a length of chain dangling from the man’s wrist and secured to the railing. A second man knelt just to his right and seemed to keep turning as if speaking to someone behind him, from here Coal could see the second man was chained as well, shackled around his feet. It hit Coal just then as hard as any bullet, the lookouts were all slaves.

  “Do you see it?” Kyle demanded.

  Coal released the breath he had been holding and looking down the sights again, he could now just make out a third man, nearly hidden behind the second. He was kneeling over something and facing away from the runway and back towards the center of town.

  “Maybe, I think so,” Coal replied.

  “Well then shoot, we are running out of road!”

  Coal glanced up, and sure enough, the end of the runway was quickly approaching, and as the distance increased with each passing second, the shot became increasingly difficult.

  “I… I don’t have a clean shot. I mean …I’m going to have to shoot a few of the… lookouts,” Coal said.

  “Then fucking shoot them then if you have to!”

  Coal looked back down the sights again and aimed squarely at the back of the third man, but even as he lined up the shot, the second slave kept turning into the line of fire. Coal held his breath willing the second man to move out of the way, but the unaware slave seemed to be rooted in place. Then just to their left, the slave at the railing lowered his binoculars and even over the distance Coal met his eyes. The man’s gaze seemed to carry a weight, and he gave Coal the slightest of nods, he was the only one of the three that knew what was about to happen, but his face held an expression of peace and not fear.

  “Shoot Coal! Fucking Shoot!” Kyle screamed behind him.

  The half-breed said half a prayer to a god he didn’t believe in and then the rifle bucked against his shoulder. A split second later the bullet tore through the chest of the second slave and into the back of the third. The second slave went down in a spray of blood as the impact of the bullet pushed the kneeling slave forward. The man tumbled over the edge sending his body and the glass parabolic dish he had been holding smashing to the ground a moment later. Coal shifted to the left, worked the action on the rifle again before he lost his nerve, and shot the slave with the binoculars through the head. The lookout dropped without a sound, the chain that bound him to the railing in life now awkwardly holding his arm upward in death.

  “Did you get it?” Kyle screamed, followed quickly by, “Oh fuck.”

  Ahead of them, the runway ended abruptly as a length of rusted fencing came into view. Kyle jerked the wheel to the right and was forced to slow down as he angled for another break in the fence. The scavenger risked a quick glance at Coal before he asked again.

  “Did you?”

  Coal turned to face forward again cradling his rifle in his arms.

  “Isn’t that why you keep me around Tonto? Because I can do the things that you can’t?”

  Kyle gave his friend an odd look and was about to reply when Coal cut him off.

  “Just drive Kyle, just drive.”

  The trio left the airport behind them and sticking to the surface streets in the industrial area they continued moving north. While they could still see a flurry of flashes being exchanged in the distance, they saw none of them to their north, and since they weren’t attacked again, they took that as a good indication that they had finally shaken the Master’s chosen. At the edge of a town called Norterra, they pulled onto highway 17 headed north and as the land steadily rose in front of them, they left the nightmare that was Phoenix behind them.

  Anna sat on her stool and watched as her small group of new nurses moved about the clinic quietly helping patients. While she had to admit that getting off of her swollen feet felt amazing she couldn’t help but, for the moment at least, feel completely useless. The most aggravating part was that today, of all days, she could have really used the distraction. She hadn’t slept very well last night, her sleep was plagued by strange dreams, and when she was awake, she found herself thinking about Kyle. They had spent the better part of the last six months living like strangers and barely speaking, but now that he was gone all she wanted was to hear his voice. Anna took a quick breath and suddenly realized her eyes were welling with tears.

  “Fucking hormones,” she muttered.

  “Are you Anna, the pregnant doctor?”

  Anna turned to find a Black Jacket standing a few feet away and looking at her expectantly. She quickly wiped the tears from her eyes and then pointedly looked down at her swollen midsection.

  “What gave it away?”

  The man blinked twice as if unsure what to say, and he held up a plastic milk crate in front of him. It was filled with an odd assortment of bottles, all of which appeared to be filled with water.

  “I’m supposed to give this to you,” he explained.

  “I thought Juan was going to be delivering my water himself?”

  “Sorry lady, I got no idea. The little mute boy writes some shit on a bit of paper, Jasper reads it, and then he tells us what to do. That’s all I got,” the Black Jacket said raising his hands.

  Anna nodded and accepting the crate of water sat it on the counter behind her. The Black Jacket turned to leave, but before he took two steps, Anna called out to him.

  “Well, I’m going back with you.”

  “Come on Doc, you don’t want to walk across town in the middle of the day. It’s hot as balls out there…I mean…it’s hot, and you’re all pregnant and shi… stuff,” he objected.

  A nurse passing by overheard the conversation and to Anna’s complete irritation, the woman decided that her opinion was sorely needed.

  “Oh honey, you can’t go out there, not in your condition!”

  Anna turned, ready to tell the mousey woman more about her condition than she probably ever wanted to know, but then a chorus of voices from around the room added their own objections. It seemed that while 48 hours ago Anna had been well enough to run the clinic alone, both day and night, she was now considered an invalid.

  “It’s just too hot right now to be out walking,” the nurse continued.

  “He walked here!” Anna said pointing to the Black Jacket.

  The gang member nodded, “It’s true, I did.”

  “He’s not pregnant or the only doctor in town!” the nurse pointed out.

  “Also true,” said the Black Jacket.

  Anna clenched both of her fists in front of her in frustration, “Fuck it! Fine then, I’m not walking, but I’m still going! I’m going to take the ambulance.”

  With that Anna turned and began to storm towards the clinic doors.

  “What happens if someone rings a bell for help?” the nurse called.

  “Like you said, I’m the only doctor in town, who else would you rather be responding.”

  An
na pushed passed the Black Jacket and out through the clinic after a few seconds the Black Jacket called after her.

  “Hey wait, can I get a ride?”

  By midday, the streets around town were nearly abandoned as everyone took shelter from the heat in whatever shade they could find. Anna sat on the wagon’s buckboard and guided the horses down Main Street towards the water tower. The Black Jacket, insistent upon providing her an escort, sat behind her in the shade of the wagon’s canvas top.

  “Now I know you got like a…well…a little person and stuff inside of you and shit, and that’s got to suck, but you should try wearing one of these black leather jackets out in this fucking heat!” he said.

  Anna just shook her head in reply as she pulled the wagon to a stop in front of the faded blue water tower. Several Black Jackets, including Jasper, stepped out of the shade of the wall to take the horses and to help her down from the wagon.

  “Hey there Doc, I just sent a man your way to deliver you some water,” Jasper said.

  “Yes I got it, thank you. Is Juan here?”

  “Of course, he’s at the pump, where else would he be?” Jasper replied.

  Anna nodded in agreement and walked into the compound, behind her, her Black Jacket escort climbed down from the wagon and immediately caught Jasper’s attention.

  “Well, I sure hope you had a nice ride in the shade because you’re back on foot patrol now princess!”

  The Doctor found Juan just were she would have expected to find Miles, pining over his pump while the rest of the grease monkeys took shelter in the shade of the compound’s walls. The hulking machine was silent, and its furnace door had been left open wide, presumably to cool. Juan was perched on a step ladder, he held a brush and wooden bucket and was applying a thick coat of grease to the pumps upper arms.

  “Juan!”

  Perched on the top of the ladder, the boy suddenly froze as if he had been caught red-handed in the midst of some type of mischief. Anna smiled at first, but her face quickly turned grim as she realized that was exactly what a boy Juan’s age should be doing. Instead, the boy found himself in charge of maintaining the town’s literal lifeline and for all of their sakes and not for the first time she wondered if they weren’t, perhaps, asking too much of him.