by Logan Keys
It scared the hell out of Luckman, because it meant he and Jean would be alone out by the cacti, hoping they could see well enough in the dark to hit their mark. Hoping the enemy could not see them.
Jean and Luckman found their spot and set out a blanket to sit on.
“Careful,” Jean said. “Check for rattlers down there.”
“Rattlers!” Luckman shouted.
“Shh,” she said, but with a laugh.
“You think it’s funny?” But Luckman was grinning.
“Matter of fact, I do.”
They both sat in the tight space, now comfortably sharing such close quarters. If Luckman turned to his left and she to her right, they shared the same air. With the adrenaline making his senses heightened, he felt her every move, every tension.
“Can you see anything?” she asked.
They both pushed closer because the temperature had dropped. It was freezing outside, even in their warmest clothing.
“Not really,” he said, but he wasn’t looking out at the desert. He was looking down at Jean. Her hair was out of her jacket hood, and it was tickling her face in the breeze. She was cute as a button all buttoned up.
“Lucky, I…” She was staring up at him, too.
“I know,” he said. “I know.”
They didn’t need to discuss it. Things were what they were.
“I’ll be leaving soon,” he blurted.
“I know,” she replied.
Still, they stared at one another hard enough that his eyes burned from lack of blinking.
“What was that?” Jean said, and she grabbed her rifle. “Did you hear that?” she whispered.
Luckman held his gun. “I did.”
They searched the desert, squinting through to try to see.
“There,” Jean said. “It’s a horse.”
“Just one?” Luckman asked, trying to spot it.
Then there was another horse and another, and soon a whole group was trotting through the darkness on the trail for the house.
Luckman’s hands shook. He was certain he couldn’t hit anything without seeing them more clearly than shadows.
“Should we…” Jean was as confused about what to do as he was.
She turned to Luckman, desperate as he was to do something.
In that moment, it was as if sanity and insanity was at war within him. He grabbed her by her jacket and kissed her on the mouth hard.
Jean murmured and kissed him back just as fully as he did her.
They broke apart mutually and turned and aimed their weapons.
Luckman cleared his throat and called. “Halt. Who goes there!”
Chapter 10
New York City, New York
Cameron had worked the entire night through and when he was finished, he finally turned to Bob and Michelle with tears in his eyes and sat back with defeat. “I can’t do it. Sure, I might have started to change some trajectory, maybe some orbits, but nothing that would finish this. Nothing that would…I tried. I’m not sure it will even help at all, what I’ve done. It’s all for nothing.”
Michelle wanted to say it would all be all right. That it wasn’t his fault. But she couldn’t. It was his fault. Reese’s too.
“I’m sorry,” Cameron said. “I’m sorry that you stayed behind. That you risked everything for this. It won’t do any good. I know it won’t. I’ve done everything I can think of. I’ve racked my brain and looked at all sides. But I knew it---I always did. There’s nothing that we can do. It’s unstoppable.”
Michelle gritted her teeth. She hadn’t come this far to watch the goal fall apart now. She hadn’t risked everything to watch Cameron feel sorry for himself.
She faced him, thinking to say something encouraging, but all of the manners and carefulness left her in that moment. Instead, what came out was, “Try again.”
“I…” Cameron’s gaze snapped to hers, and she knew she must have looked as frustrated as she felt because he swallowed. “I did. I can’t…”
“Don’t say can’t. Or won’t. Or any of those things. Just say okay, Michelle, Bob, world! I will try again!” Michelle was screaming at the scientist.
“Be quiet, they can hear you,” Reese snapped pointing at the door.
“Let them! They know we’re in here!” Michelle was coming more unhinged by the second. She stomped over to the door and kicked it. “What are you waiting for!”
She spun back around and stormed over to stand near Cameron’s seat at the desk. She shoved him to face the computer not caring if she was acting crazy. “Try again.”
“There’s no point,” he stammered.
Michelle pulled her gun and pointed it at Cameron. Bob’s eyes widened but he didn’t tell her to stop. He watched her as if he was interested to see how this played out
Cameron put his hands up, and Reese squeaked in surprise then scurried away from Michelle. “I don’t care if you have to push random buttons until that computer explodes. Try again. Make it look like you are. For me. For humanity.”
Cameron nodded. “Okay. Okay. Fine.”
He started typing and when he moved to lean away, Michelle lifted the gun again making sure he saw her aim was true. “I’m trying,” he said quietly.
After another half hour of that, Michelle’s arm was tired, she was exhausted, and Cameron was wiping at his eyes, begging her to let him quit. “Okay, it’s done,” he said. “I don’t think it will do anything, but I tried everything I know of to try.”
“You don’t think it will work?” she asked, and he shook his head.
Michelle walked over and glanced at the screen. She lifted the laptop and she turned it over before beating it on the desk as hard as she could. Keys and plastic flew in all directions.
“What are you doing!” Cameron shouted.
She spoke as she continued to beat the computer lifeless. “Its not…like…I can do…any worse…than you!”
She tossed the pile of junk at his feet in disgust.
Michelle was so angry that she was shaking. Bob came to her side and pulled the gun from her hands. “It’s okay,” he said, “it’s okay.”
Realizing she’d put faith in this mission. Realizing that she’d actually believed they could save the world, Bob more than anyone knew that Michelle had pictured a good outcome. Something. Instead, it was just all going to end. Nothing would get better. The crawling ice would arrive soon, if it hadn’t already.
**
Michelle had finally gotten ahold of herself and it was time to figure out the elephant in the room: Now what?
Reese and Cameron seemed afraid to speak. Like Michelle would go on a rampage. She felt like she could. She felt as if she could burn Cybercorp to the ground with ease. Just light it up and watch it all blaze.
“This place,” Michelle said with venom. “It should be wiped off the map. It should be nothing but rubble…with you two inside of it.”
Cameron turned pink in the cheeks and looked away. Reese glared at Michelle but said nothing.
With her anger dissipated Michelle’s teeth chattered hard, and she pulled her jacket closed.
Bob sighed and rubbed his arms. “The temperature must be dropping again. We need to get out of here.”
“Can’t he turn on the heat?” Michelle demanded. She was looking for a reason to scream at them both until her voice was hoarse. They couldn’t fix a world they’d broken. Countless lives were gone because of those two.
“Not without turning on everything else,” Cameron said.
“So. Why not?”
Bob sniffed. “You don’t mean that.”
“I do.”
Cameron lifted finger. “Why not?” Michelle and Bob stared at him as he continued, “What if we let them in?”
Bob crossed his arms. “What do you mean?”
“I have an idea.”
Michelle snorted. “Now, he has the idea. Where were you an hour ago?”
Cameron ignored her. “No really. We send the elevator down and when
they take it to our floor, we go out the back to the parking garage.”
Reese nodded. “Basically, Michelle’s plan before but instead of luring them up the stairs, they’re in the elevator. We will see what floor they are on before we can run.”
“It’s not the worst plan I’ve heard today,” Bob said with a pointed look at Michelle.
“Mine worked.” She crossed her arms.
“This could, too,” Cameron said with a hopeful expression.
As if she could forgive him. As if anyone should. He’d built the thing that put them into an ice age once more.
“Okay. Let’s do it.”
They all went to the elevator and stood, waiting to decide. “What do we do now?” Michelle asked.
Cameron motioned at the elevator. “Just close the doors. If they push the buttons below, or above us, it will move and we know they’re going to be in it a few seconds later.”
Michelle stepped inside and released the emergency button. “Here goes nothing,” she said as she stepped out and the doors slid shut.
They all waited in silence until the light above them showed someone had pressed for the elevator. “Let’s go!” Bob called, and they raced for the stairs.
They got into the stairwell and didn’t worry about being quiet this time. They just ran as fast as they could downward. Michelle slipped a few times, but Bob lifted her up and they went down and down and down until they were on the bottom floor.
“Wait!” Michelle cried, wondering why no one was following them yet.
But Reese didn’t listen, she threw open the door. Cameron and she raced through it first into the parking garage.
Bob and Michelle were still in the stairwell, not far behind.
The door stayed open, stuck wide. Before she could step through, gunfire froze her in her tracks.
Seagerman and Al were waiting for them in the parking lot. They’d tricked them by pushing the elevator buttons but obviously had not planned to use it to get to their floor. They’d come to the garage and waited.
Cameron clutched his chest and fell back. Blood blossomed across his jacket.
Without thinking, in self-preservation, Michelle slammed the door closed, and grabbed hold of the handle.
“Wait!” Let me in!” Reese shrieked from the other side, and then another gun went off.
Michelle cringed, but held the door. Reese was now silent.
Bob helped Michelle lock the door. “He has the keys, though,” she said, and Bob said, “And Reese still has hers and the offices are all locked.”
“Did they kill her? Do you think she’s dead?” Michelle swallowed the guilt that she felt. Reese had been asking for this day since the first, but Michelle closing the door had doomed the woman.
“It’s just a matter of time,” Seagerman called. “You have to let us in eventually.”
“You’ll freeze out there first,” Michelle shouted back.
It was true. The stairwell was so cold that she was shivering, but the parking garage must have been much worse in the early dawn.
“You’ll freeze in there too,” Al said through the door.
“You first,” Bob spat.
“So, it’s a standoff to see who freezes before the other,” Seagerman said with a laugh.
“It’s far colder outside,” Michelle said to Bob. “They’re bluffing. I hear them already stomping their feet.”
“Reese,”Michelle finally called, the guilt becoming too much to bear, but she didn’t answer. “Reese, are you okay? Cameron?”
“Are they dead?” Bob asked the two men, knowing they could hear them.
“Why not open the door to find out?”
Both sides went silent after that. Michelle counted the minutes, though it felt like hours. There was nothing but her imagined horrors on the other side of the door.
“They’d expect us to go back the way we came,” Michelle whispered, teeth chattering.
“But you want to go this way.”
She nodded. “I do.”
“They’ve probably taken Cameron’s keys. The car’s no good.”
Michelle shook her head. “No. Keyless push to start and the remotes were still on the console in the middle when he parked it. I don’t think he took them with him.”
“So, a mad dash for the car?” Bob asked.
“I think so.”
He sighed. “Okay. Let’s do it.”
“We wait five more minutes and go,” Michelle said. Decided.
They counted them down, each more dire than the last. Michelle couldn’t feel her nose, her fingers or her toes by the time they’d reached five minutes. She wasn’t sure she’d be able to move fast.
But when they threw open the door, no one was there except for Cameron and Reese. Reese was bleeding, and still, but breathing. “Reese,” Michelle whispered. “She’s still alive.
“Cameron?” Michelle asked, and Bob shook his head while crouched down by the stiff scientist.
Michelle felt bad that that last thing she’d really said to him was a threat. She’d pointed a gun at his head.
“Help me with her.”
Reese was quiet, frozen through nearly, and they carried her as quickly as they could to Cameron’s car.
“Where are they?” Michelle demanded in a whisper. “I keep waiting for them to jump out of every shadow.”
They put Reese in back and Michelle hopped into the driver side. Bob got in and Michelle found the remote right where they’d been before. “See.”
The car started, and they drove out of the parking garage. The tires seemed to be extra loud as they crunched over the snow on the empty streets.
**
The drive back to the bowling alley was laborious. They nearly got stuck several times. “If we don’t leave now...”
“I know,” Bob said in frustration.
The window for them to leave New York was closing by the hour. They would not be able to drive soon. Already, even a block north, it was completely blocked off by ice. They had to get out of the state and soon.
Reese didn’t stir in back. It was possible she wouldn’t make it. Michelle hadn’t been able to check her injuries.
“We stop just once, only to check on Reese and grab the last of the supplies. Then we head south,” Michelle said.
She reached for Bob and he grabbed her hand.
“South,” he said.
They pulled up to the bowling alley and Bob pointed at a car parked right out front. “It’s them.”
Al and Seagerman had been waiting for them. They’d planned all along to simply meet them here, probably guessing the rest had left and that they were alone.
“Where are they?” she asked
Bob frowned, squinting at the car. “Inside.”
“We should just go.” Michelle put the car in drive.
“No,” Bob said pulling out his gun “This ends. Now.
Chapter 11
Just Outside Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
Colton bit down on his hand and when he was far enough away from the crashed Jeep, he pulled over and ran around the front of the truck. “Hang on, Man. Just hang on.”
He threw open the passenger door and leaned over his brother to check the wound.
Together, Rufus and Colton put cloth and pressed on the hole in his side, but it was refusing to staunch. The red was pooling and running out onto the seat and out of the SUV like a river.
“Ah man, is it bad?” Bart asked, and Rufus and Colton shared a grave look.
No matter how they tried, it just kept on bleeding like a faucet.
Bart was groaning in pain for a while, and then he was quiet. He seemed to accept his fate as the color leached out of his face. His lips were blue and Colton’s heart jacked into overdrive at the proof that he’d lost far too much blood already.
“Don’t you give up on me,” Colton said. “Don’t you dare.”
Bart smiled. “I’m not, but my body is.”
He reached for Colton and pulled him into a
hug. Turning his mouth to his brother’s ear, he said, “Listen to me. You go and find that girl and then you go to Texas. You don’t stop at anymore major cities. You don’t help anyone out that might weight you down. I know you, Colton, and you’ll spread yourself too thin in this crazy place. Promise me.”
Colton leaned back and the anguish of losing Bart nearly buckled his knees.
“I do. I will. But,” Colton kept back a loud sob just barely. “I need you with me, Bro. I need you here.”
“I know.” Bart coughed. “I wish it were different.” He sighed, leaning his head back, eyes closed.
“Hey. Hey. Wake up.” Colton pushed his forehead to Bart’s. “I can’t do this without you.”
Bart laughed a soft sound. “You can. You’re going to. For me, you won’t give up now anyway.” Bart frowned. “I’m sorry”
“Don’t be sorry. No reason to be sorry.”
Bart wheezed. “No. I mean. I’m gonna die owing you twenty bucks.” He weakly touched his pocket. “I’m all out of cash. Do you take credit cards?”
“What do you…” Colton choked on a laugh that was half hiccup. “It was a dummy? Jake? He wasn’t a dead guy after all.”
“Yeah,” Bart grinned.
“You lied to me to get ten dollars?” Colton let the tears run down his face. “You always were cheap. Jerk.”
Bart shook his head. “I may be a jerk, but you should have seen your face when you thought you’d ridden all that way with a dead guy,” he said with a half-smile. “One more thing. They might come looking for you, and you need to move on. Don’t be sentimental and try to bury me. Put me on the side of the road. And don’t ride around with me like Weekend and Bernie’s. I always hated that movie. Plus, I don’t want to end up like Jake in your front seat.”
Colton cursed under his breath. Only his brother could make him want to laugh while he was dying.
Bart weakly grabbed Colton’s wrist. “Take that off. Do it.”
Colton nodded and moved the fabric. It wasn’t helping anyway, and he understood that Bart just wanted it over. If he was going he didn’t want to drag it out.
He glanced behind them to see if they were in fact being followed, and in that split second, when he turned back to his brother, Bart was already gone.
