Finally, Malin walked over to Raymond and shook him by the shoulders until he lurched up out of sleep, his snore becoming a startled cry.
“Get up, buddy,” Malin said, as he walked over to Elna. “The welcome committee has started to gather.”
“What…what are you talking about?” Raymond said. “Who is that?”
“Look east, Skipper, and you’ll see them.”
Malin gently patted Elna on the arm until her eyelids fluttered. She stirred from sleep almost silently, taking a single deep breath as she sat up.
“Who are these people?” Raymond asked, leaning against the mast to steady himself. “How long have they been standing on the beach?”
“No idea to either question,” Malin said. “I don’t know what they’re all worked up about, but I don’t care to find out. What do you say?”
Raymond continued to study the crowd, but Malin had seen enough. He hopped over the cockpit and positioned himself beside the small windlass, ready to raise anchor as soon as their skipper gave the order.
“If they’re trying to get our attention, they clearly want something,” Elna said in a sleepy voice. She yawned and added, “That can’t be good.”
“Agreed,” Raymond said. “Let’s move the boat a little farther away. Malin, raise the anchor.”
As Malin pulled the anchor in, Raymond released the jib sheet, and Elna unlashed the tiller. Immediately, the sloop began to turn, and the people on the beach became even more frantic. A few of the locals were now running back and forth. Malin could still hear their voices, a faint cacophony echoing out over the water.
“It’s like a zombie horde,” he said. “They really, really want to get to us. The town doesn’t seem like it’s in trouble. What could be going on over there?”
Indeed, other than the crowd on the shore, the sleepy little town looked peaceful. Nothing was burning. Malin didn’t see any armed men or gangs roaming about. There were no strange walls or barbed wire, no tent camps or indications of public executions.
“A lot of terrible things happen behind closed doors,” Elna said. “My guess is they want the boat. Possibly to escape.”
“Well, they can’t have it,” Raymond said, shaking a fist in their direction.
They sailed out of the little cove and moved around a few large rocks out of sight of the shore before anchoring again. Despite the cloudless sky and the bright morning sun, the cold would not release its grip. Malin took a seat next to Elna as Raymond went below and retrieved a small log book. He had maps and a list of towns and landmarks along the coast tucked inside, and he pulled them out. After a few quiet minutes, he made some notes in the log book, then tucked the papers away.
“Well, my friends, if I am correct, we’ve come about forty miles down the coast,” he said, glumly. “Sadly, that puts us well behind schedule.”
“Only forty miles?” Malin replied. “How is that possible? We sailed for almost a full day. We should have gone twice that far, shouldn’t we?”
“Sadly, I believe we are not very good at sailing,” Raymond said. “We have not taken advantage of the wind as much as we should have. Perhaps we overcorrected, turned into the wind too many times—not sure. I accept blame for this, amigos. I did not do a good job sailing when I was with Daniel, and I am not doing a good job now. I estimate we’ll need at least one, possibly two, extra days at this rate.”
“Don’t beat yourself up over it,” Malin said, though he couldn’t even begin to imagine the physical toll this trip would take. He was already tired and shaky. He’d been a surfer for years, and he was in good shape, but something about the long, relentless hours of sailing had brought on a deeper exhaustion than he’d ever known. His former friend Garret had once talked about something called boaters’ fatigue. Maybe this was it.
If I’m feeling this wiped out, the others must be feeling it as well, he thought. Or else I’m just the biggest wimp on the crew. Is that possible?
“It’s not just about how fast we can sail,” Elna said. “Even if we pick up speed, we don’t have enough drinking water on board. Plain and simple. We didn’t bring enough to last two extra days, but now that we’ve dumped half of it into the sea, we really don’t have enough.”
“I don’t suppose you could rig a way to desalinate water on board the ship?” Malin asked.
“No, I’m afraid not,” she replied. “If I could cobble together the right gear, we’d still need a fire to heat the water, and then, even if it worked, the amount of water it produced would be negligible. On the island, I built a big firepit near the parking lot, so I can boil a few gallons at a time. There’s no safe way to do that on ship, even if I had the means to do it. The contraption alone would probably sink us.”
After this, they sat quietly for a minute. Malin idly gazed up the nearby outcropping of rock. He could tell Elna was considering options, but Raymond seemed at a loss.
“Forty miles,” Malin groaned. “You know we would’ve made faster progress if we’d ridden Garret’s double-bicycle, right?”
“We can’t go by land,” Raymond said. “Crazy people are everywhere. In Petaluma, my son and I saw bodies on the street, stabbed and burned corpses dumped like trash from gangs fighting for control of the city.”
Finally, Elna patted her knee and said, “Okay, here’s the situation. We have to make faster progress somehow, and we have to find a source of fresh water. I believe that means going ashore. Maybe we could find an old gas station or someone willing to trade. I don’t know.”
Raymond shook his head and then collapsed forward, putting his face in his hands. “But we can survive without water, yes? A couple of days, if necessary.”
“Maybe,” Elna said, “but it’s not a risk we should take, unless we absolutely have to.”
“Is there another option?” Raymond asked, speaking into his hands.
“No, I don’t think so,” she said, “We’ll anchor the boat somewhere out of the way so we can come back to it later. Then we continue to the clinic on land. We can find bicycles or working vehicles of some kind. As long as we avoid gangs and lunatics, we’ll make good time.”
The second option hung heavy in the air. Land travel was dangerous, but Malin almost preferred those risks to sailing nonstop for days on end. He could see that poor Raymond was anguishing over the choice.
“Do you need some time to think it over?” Elna said.
“Maybe, but I don’t want to sit here,” Raymond replied. He took the cap off his head and furiously scratched at his scalp with both hands. “If I’m right about where we are, we will find a marina a few miles to the south. We can dock there and resupply, assuming the place isn’t overrun by dangerous people.”
“We have to resupply in either case,” Elna said. “Let’s go.”
“Yes, let’s go,” Raymond muttered, standing up on shaky legs.
They got underway again, but Malin was so fatigued that he had to concentrate on every movement. At one point, while stepping onto the deck, he reached for the grabrail and missed. He tried to take a corrective step, but his foot slipped. Suddenly, he found himself tipping toward the sea, flailing his arms in vain. Raymond reached over and grabbed the collar of his raincoat.
“Careful,” he simply said, dragging Malin back toward the cabin. “No time for swimming.”
They fought a brutal headwind most of the day, reaching the marina in the afternoon. It was a small facility: a couple of docks protruding from a narrow strip of beach. The place was mostly abandoned, with only a few boats docked here and there, as if most people had taken to the sea. Malin imagined a great mass of people fleeing the coast, trying to cross the Pacific to find a nation with electricity—a silly notion, of course.
Beyond the docks, there was a quaint little building that Malin assumed was a clubhouse. He didn’t see any people. A good sign. He much preferred empty buildings to roving bands of weirdos. As they navigated the boat into an open spot, they wound up slamming the starboard side of the boat against
the buoys.
“Careful with the hull,” Raymond said. “We don’t want to crack open like an egg. We will be the yolk.”
They lowered the sails and dropped anchor. Malin couldn’t restrain himself. As soon as the anchor was down, he leapt over the gunwale and landed on the dock. Though it was floating on buoys, the stability of the wooden planks beneath his feet was such a good feeling that he almost cried. Elna joined him, holding her hands out to either side and sighing in relief.
“Isn’t it a nice feeling?” she said.
“I forgot what it feels like not to wobble constantly,” he said, tying off the dock lines.
“Okay, what do we do now?” Raymond said, joining them on the dock.
Elna was studying the distant building. Malin noted a few more buildings beyond the clubhouse parking lot and wondered if they were close to another small, coastal town.
“I think we wait here for a little bit,” Elna said, finally, “to make sure locals don’t suddenly accost us. I don’t see anyone at the moment, but they could be hiding indoors. Besides, we need to eat. Let’s get some food, and if nobody comes creeping out of the shadows by the time we’re done, then a couple of us go and look for fresh water, while the other keeps an eye on the boat. After that…” She held her hands up. “We have a difficult decision to make.”
11
They huddled together on the dock, sharing some food from the cabinet among them. Malin avoided the veggie omelet MRE this time and went for dried meat and some fresh berries instead. He had no idea what kind of animal he was eating. They’d trapped a variety of small game on the island, and none of it tasted particularly good. This was some chewy, gamey piece of meat, but combined with the berries, it was palatable. It certainly filled his belly and lacked the sweaty-foot smell of the veggie omelet.
“There are some vehicles that survived the EMP,” Raymond noted, digging into a bowl of berry salad. “We could find one, if we’re lucky.”
“Yes, if we’re willing to think outside the box,” Malin replied. “We might not find a nice, roomy sedan to cruise down the coast in, but there are other kinds of vehicles than cars and trucks. We saw a few functioning dirt bikes in a militia camp. Somehow, they weren’t fried.”
Raymond nodded. “I’m just thinking…if we find a working vehicle…we could travel a lot faster, even with all the obstacles on the roads. Danny is waiting. I hate to leave the boat, but we’re going too slow.”
Malin caught a movement out of the corner of his eye behind the distant clubhouse. It took a moment to spot the figure that had stepped around the corner. The man stood there silently. He was dressed in black clothing and held some long object in his hand, possibly a stick or staff or even a long gun. After a moment, a second man joined him, then a third, all dressed darkly.
“Um, guys, we’re not alone,” Malin said, gesturing at them.
Elna turned, and Raymond leaned to one side to get a good look at them. There were five men now, all just standing there.
“They don’t look friendly to me,” Raymond said. “Are those rifles?”
Elna glanced at Malin, eyes wide. “Get back in the boat,” she said. “Cast off. Right now. Come on.”
She hopped up and climbed onto the deck. As Malin shoved the last of the dried meat in his mouth, he saw one of the distant men gesture at the others. They started to approach, moving slowly, deliberately.
“Yeah, here they come,” he said, untying the dock lines and following Raymond onto the boat. “Let’s get out of here.”
Without waiting for his skipper’s instructions, Malin began to raise the sails, and Elna pulled in the anchor. Wind caught the sails as Elna turned the rudder, and the sloop began slowly—too slowly—backing away from the dock. The men didn’t move in lock-step like soldiers, but they did move together. A local gang? Maybe just some protective townsfolk? Malin didn’t know, but in their black clothing, they were clearly trying to intimidate.
The men reached the end of the dock, turning and marching directly toward the boat. As they got closer, Malin realized just how big and ugly the leader was. He had a flat, pockmarked face, dark and hateful eyes, his upper lip curled back in a sneer. The stick he was holding turned out to be an ancient shotgun. The barrels were pointed at the ground, but Malin moved behind the mast to give himself some modicum of cover.
And the Betty Lynn continued its too-slow retreat from the dock, pushed by a weak wind.
“After all those hours of blasting us in the face with a relentless headwind, this is all you’re going to give us?” Malin muttered, glancing at the cloudless sky.
They had only cleared about ten yards when the lead man said something over his shoulder to the others, and they all adopted a similar pose: shoulders squared off, guns held at an angle, heads tipped down, feet apart.
“I haven’t seen such friendly faces since Rod Smith met us on the causeway,” Malin said to Elna.
“Maybe they just want to scare us off,” Raymond said.
“It’s working,” Malin replied.
Indeed, the men just watched as the Betty Lynn slowly left the marina and drifted back out into the open sea. Once free, Elna turned the rudder and pointed them south again, and just before they sailed out of sight, Malin saw the group of men walking back toward the clubhouse.
“Well, we know when we’re not wanted,” he said.
“You dreamed of becoming a pirate,” Elna said. “I think those guys just assumed you are a pirate. Good job. Your reputation precedes you.”
“To be fair,” he said, “our plan was to raid the town for water. Isn’t that textbook piracy?”
“I believe I mentioned bartering,” she reminded him. “Like civilized people. We still have to go on shore at some point. We’re going to need water, one way or another.”
“So we look for friendlier mainlanders, then,” Malin said. “Maybe we can hold up a sign that says, ‘Not pirates. Just thirsty.’”
“We’ll have to take what we need,” Raymond said. “Sorry, señora, but your friend was right about becoming pirates. We’ll have to dock fast, very fast, rush ashore, grab what we need, and retreat. I don’t see another way to do it.”
To this, Elna merely nodded.
They were still fighting a headwind, so Raymond and Malin returned to the damnable zigzagging. Malin had grown to hate it with a passion. However, as they came around a small grassy finger of land, he saw a big mansion on a hill with a switchback path winding down toward the water and a private dock thrust out into the surf. There didn’t seem to be anyone in or around the house, but then again, you couldn’t really tell from the boat.
He pointed it out to Raymond. “Is it worth the risk?”
“Safer than the last place, maybe,” Raymond replied. “Let’s try it, my friend.”
“Like you said before, Mr. Cabello, we’ll stop fast, rush ashore, and try to find water,” Elna said, turning the rudder and aiming them toward the small dock. “If we’re lucky, the house will be abandoned.”
“Okay, then,” Raymond said, pulling himself toward the jib sheet. “We’re going to come in fast. Brace yourselves.”
They turned broadside to the wind, approaching the dock at a shallow angle, but Malin was a bit disconcerted by their speed. He started to lower the mainsail, but Raymond signaled at him to wait, counting off ten seconds. Then he nodded, and Malin quickly lowered the sail. However, they were moving fast, and the dock was closing in. Elna tried to compensate at the last second by steering them away, but this just caused the stern of the boat to swing around and hit the buoys hard.
Raymond was on the deck at the bow of the ship, still holding the jib sheet, when they made impact. As Malin went to his knees, Raymond was thrown overboard. He hit the gunwale and flipped over it. In the process, his sleeve caught on something, and Malin heard the plastic rip. Then Raymond fell onto the dock, landing on his right shoulder with a cry.
“You okay, buddy?” he asked, as he quickly tossed the docking lines over a
nd scrambled down to tie them off. “That looked like a hard fall.”
Raymond rolled onto his back and sat up, immediately crying out again and grabbing his shoulder. The sleeve had torn all the way up to his elbow. Blood ran down his forearm and dripped off the back of his hand onto the dock. The sight of blood on the man’s arm set off a deep ache in Malin’s own right arm. Malin still had an ugly scar on his right arm thanks to his fight with Dominic, and the pain was fresh in his memory.
“He’s hurt,” Malin shouted to Elna as he rushed to Raymond’s side.
Malin tried to get a look at the man’s injured arm, but as soon as he touched him, Raymond cried out again and twisted away. By the way his right shoulder slumped, it was clear he’d dislocated it.
“It’s out of the socket,” Malin said.
“Don’t touch it,” Raymond said.
“I can put it back in place for you,” Malin said.
“No, no, just give me a minute. Wait. Wait.”
Elna came up behind them then. “Could you find something to bandage his arm?” Malin asked her. “I don’t know how bad it is, but he’s bleeding all over the place.”
“No, no, I’ll be fine,” Raymond said, writhing from side to side. When Malin reached for him again, he turned away, but this made him cry out even louder. Elna climbed back on board and went into the cabin.
Malin finally squatted in front of Raymond. “Listen, Skipper, I’ve dealt with dislocated shoulders before. It happened to me when I took a bad fall while surfing once. A wave slammed into me in shallow water, and I went all the way down. I know how to fix it. I can pop it back in place. Just hold still. Trust your first mate, okay?”
Grimacing in pain, Raymond squeezed his eyes shut. “Okay, fine, do it. Please, hurry.”
“I’ll do it quick, but you’ll need to sit still.”
Malin didn’t give him time to resist. Lunging forward, he grabbed Raymond’s wrist, pulled his arm forward, and then gave it a little jerk. Raymond shrieked, the sound echoing far and wide, ringing out over the ocean and bouncing off the distant hills.
Island Refuge EMP Box Set | Books 1-3 Page 33
