by Justin Bell
His dark eyes narrowed and darted right, then left, dim but alert, searching and scanning the surrounding yard. He jammed the rugged butt of the weapon into his shoulder, the fingers of his other hand coiling around the ribbed pump of the weapon, the rounded, metal barrel raising even with the ground, moving back and forth.
Cloth shifted over his muscular frame, the dull gunmetal gray jumpsuit covering neck to ankle, except for his thick sleeves which were pulled up to shoulder length. The cloth bunched up there, just above his bicep, revealing the tanned skin covered by a web of intricately manicured tattoos. Both arms had the tats, and the embedded ink shrouded every inch of flesh that would have been otherwise visible. Thick boot soles thumped in the grass, wet with early morning dew, and his finger twitched on the trigger of the semi-automatic shotgun.
He was looking for trouble, and part of him was hoping he’d find it. Glancing back over his shoulder at the brick building behind him, the man let the barrel of the weapon drop as he surveyed their new home. Staying at the school hadn’t been his first choice, but it was safe, had plenty of food, and there was even a bomb shelter underneath, giving them everything they needed for the coming storm. Maybe it would all work out okay.
A scrape of wood caught his attention, and he snapped around, the weapon once again jerking to eye level. He stepped forward, getting closer to the metal gate which separated them from the outside world. The sun was still in the process of rising, casting strange shadows throughout the yard and out into the trees, and he approached the gate, glaring out into the broad and thick overgrowth of vegetation flanking the dirt road leading to the school.
He squinted, trying to glare into the shadows, but he didn’t see any motion—no strange shadows and no shapes of anything that didn’t belong. Letting go of the shotgun pump, he reached back and touched the metal of the pistol in the back of his belt, but he kept his attention focused on the trees outside the gate. Two brick columns flanked the main arched gate itself, reaching up seven feet into the air. Six-foot walls extended from those two columns and ran the perimeter of the entire campus, making him feel somewhat uncomfortable in his security.
A thin crackle broke the silence, and he freed his hand once again, reaching down to his hip and snagging a walkie-talkie from a belt clip.
“Yeah, this is Franky,” he said quietly.
“Anything?” the scrambled voice asked on the other end.
“Nah. Everything looks clear,” he reported back. “I coulda sworn I heard something, but place is empty out here.”
“They said they searched the area.”
Franky took one last look around the nearby yard, turned back, and looked at the large tree sprouting up from the center of the freshly mown green grass.
“I’m coming back in,” he said into the radio and returned it to his belt.
“A’ight,” the voice said on the other end.
Franky took cautious, calculated steps back around the tree, rounded the other end, and made his way back towards the brick structure, step by step, his shotgun traversing the area ahead of him with each one. A few moments later, he slipped in the door and slammed it behind him, a sliding latch sound signaling the finality of his return.
Max let out a long breath. He hadn’t realized he’d been holding it for the entire time that the man walked the grounds beneath them, but he had, ensuring that he stayed as still and silent as possible. Brad made the same sound next to him, both boys clinging low to the angled wooden branches of the large tree. For one horrible moment they thought the guy with the shotgun had looked right up at them, but somehow he must have missed them laying there, willing themselves to be invisible.
“Is he gone?” whispered Brad, inching forward on the branch and looking down.
“I think so,” Max replied. He crawled further out onto the branch, slowly and quietly, the branches rustling as if caressed by a warm breeze. “You stay up here for a minute,” Max said, glancing back towards Brad.
“What are you doing?” the younger boy asked.
“Just trust me.”
“No offense, Max, but you don’t have the best track record.”
Max scoffed and moved closer to the edge of the tree branch. He clutched the round shape of the wood and kicked his legs around, doubling around the branch and dropping from the tree, landing on the grass in a low crouch. He froze there for a moment, looking at the brick building ahead. He recognized it as being the main mess hall for the entire campus, and looking in through the window, even from this distance, he saw what they’d already seen earlier. Tables and chairs had been all cleared out and used to barricade walls and windows and through the slats of grid-covered glass, he could see man-shaped shadows moving around in the room.
“We’re clear!” he whispered up to Brad, and moments later his friend dropped from the branch himself, hitting the ground next to him.
“You seem to have some expertise in this area,” Brad said as they walked low from the tree, off towards the north end of campus, clinging to the perimeter wall as they went.
“Well, you know…when you make a habit of swiping junk from the mess, you find all sorts of interesting ways to navigate the campus.”
“I still can’t believe you did all of that.”
“Hey you gave me plenty of help. Don’t play innocent here, Bradley,” Max said, though his tone was more genial than threatening.
“Yeah, yeah, but you took it to a whole new level.”
“Is it too late for me to keep blaming the older kids?” Max asked.
“Well, it certainly seems to have given you a valuable skill set during the end of the world.” Brad’s attempt at comedy fell somewhat flat, especially since his parents were several hundred miles east and completely cut off from them.
He’d been happy that the Frasers had saved his dad’s answering machine message for him to listen to, though actually listening to it had been more difficult than he thought it might be. Hearing his dad’s breaking voice mixed with his mother’s sobbing had brought tears to his eyes, though as he looked at Winnie and Max, he’d gritted his teeth and drove them back, trying to shut down any indication of emotion.
Up ahead, they could see the elaborate maintenance shed structure, a tall and broad wooden construct with backwards sloped roof and four large garage doors, all closed. Max held up his hand, signaling Brad to slow up, and the two stopped, drifting further right. The concrete wall still progressed, tucked along the wooded edge of the forest with trees hanging over the top of it, and they remained along the edge, concealed in the shadows of the tree overhang. Brad immediately thought back to his first day at the sprawling campus.
He’d lived among the tall concrete and glass structures of Denver for his whole life, never seeing anything beyond the thickly grouped urban goliaths. They were intimidating, but he felt comfortable there. He felt like they were huge giants surrounding him and protecting him.
When his parents dropped him off at Vernon Academy, the goliaths were no longer concrete and steel but were instead wood and leaves. They were thin, scraggly fingers, not the familiar solid rectangular giants. He had this strange feeling—the opposite of claustrophobia where everything was too wide open, too blank, too vulnerable. He’d looked up the feeling online one day and came across agoraphobia—a fear of open spaces. It seemed to fit, though he never bothered calling it by its proper name.
That first day, he’d retreated towards the maintenance shed, which had been the tallest building on the campus. Still nothing compared to the skyscrapers and structures that he called home, but it was a step in the right direction.
Max had found him there near tears but hadn’t harassed him, hadn’t given him a hard time or teased him, just asked what was wrong and if he wanted to tag along. Brad did, and Max had helped him feel like he still had some measure of protection, even in this strange new place.
“Down!” Max hissed and Brad saw the reason why. Two men in gray jumpsuits were walking across the line, each of them
cradling what appeared to be semi-automatic weapons, their heads swiveling back and forth as if on greased hinges. They were talking to each other though they were too far away for either boy to hear precisely what they were saying.
Max’s heart slammed. These two men were larger than the older boys he’d dealt with at the academy, but he couldn’t help but think of them. Those seniors and juniors who had arbitrarily decided to make Max’s life miserable during his first few years at Vernon. Max had wanted to belong, but at the same time had wanted to do the right thing, and in some twisted miscalculation, he had ended up doing neither. He’d stolen from the school and gotten caught, raising the ire of administration, and yet no matter what he did to impress the older boys, they never seemed impressed and only cast it aside, giving him more difficult things to try to do. He was caught in this vicious circle of petty theft until it had gotten too big to control.
These men in the gray jumpsuits reminded him of those older boys. Reminded him of them so much that he almost froze in place, intimidated, not wanting to continue. Not because the men held weapons, but because he was afraid of disappointing his parents if they got caught.
Drawing in a breath, Max took a step forward, and his foot landed on a discarded branch with a sharp, sudden crack.
He froze, his arms outstretched and eyes wide, holding in place like an all-too-realistic statue dressed in black.
“Hold up!” one of the men shouted, this time loud enough for them both to hear.
“You heard that, too?” the second man asked.
“Yeah. Sounded like it came from the wall over here.”
“Man, it was probably a deer or critter or something. We’re in the middle of the boonies out here, anyway.”
"I know, I know…you’re a city boy, Levry. The woods make you nervous?”
“Darn straight they make me nervous. All sorts of stuff you can’t see in there.”
“Hey at least the critters don’t conceal carry.”
“Funny guy, Coops. Funny, funny guy.”
The two men walked across the grass over towards the wall, weapons raised. One of them carried an M4 Carbine semi-automatic, a second hand clutched around a tactical fore grip with a rounded scope bolted to the top. The second man had an AR-15 clamped in the fingers of his two hands, an extended magazine and laser sight equipped along the ridged body of the weapon. Both weapons were courtesy of the guards from the buses and both men were itching to try them out on something. Twin beams of light cut through the pre-dawn darkness, scanning towards the tree-shaded wall, roaming back and forth along the concrete, searching for whatever made the noise.
“What do you see, Levry?” Coops asked, branching off left.
“Jack and squat,” replied Levry, his own laser sight pinging on an empty section of wall.
“You sure you heard something?”
“I thought you heard it, too?”
“I don’t know what I heard.”
“You’re killin’ me, man.”
The two men broke away and headed back away from the maintenance shed, walking towards the central brick building, their forms growing dimmer in the low, pink light.
Above the wall, the overhanging leaves rustled, narrow branches scraping along the concrete. A single shape dropped from the thickly clutched sprigs, Max falling from the top of the wall where he'd been hanging on the other side. Brad followed, swinging his legs over and stumbling down to the grass.
“Yeah that was a little too close,” he said.
“I've had closer,” Max replied. “This one time, Mr. Rupert almost saw me leaving the cafe with a bagful of chips and candy. I swear he was like a foot away from me when I was under the table.”
“Oh yeah? Did Mr. Rupert carry a dang machine gun?”
Max scowled at him. “C’mon, man. You’ve never been on the business end of one of his ‘what are you doing with your life’ talks. I think I’d rather get shot.”
“I don’t think that’s very funny, Max. Not these days.” Brad stopped walking and looked at him. He couldn’t help but see the wide expanse of green grass out behind him spotted with several narrow trees. The trees were short and skinny, however, and did nothing to quench his feeling of being wholly exposed.
“Sorry, Brad, I know. I’ve got a crap sense of humor. Let’s go check out the garage, then you can give me a hard time, okay?”
Brad nodded, falling in behind Max as they remained low to the ground, crouch-walking towards the huge four-door garage.
“What guns were those?” Brad asked as they went.
Max chuckled. “So just because I got in the habit of swiping stuff, that makes me some kind of weapons expert?”
“Well, according to Mr. Rupert, you were halfway into your life of crime.”
“I wonder if he’s still alive.”
Brad didn’t reply and their voices were silent for a few moments as they continued their trek towards the garage. He’d wondered if a lot of people were still alive. He spent almost all day wondering if his parents were still alive. Sure, they sounded fine on the answering machine, but it had been a long time since then. Coming up next to the large, red-painted structure, Max reached down to test one of the doors. It didn’t budge.
“Doors are locked,” he reported.
“Hoist me up,” Brad whispered, walking over towards Max, who cupped his hands and let Brad put his foot in them. Max lifted his arms, picking up Brad who supported himself with two hands on the door itself, glancing through one of the square windows.
“What do you see?” Max asked, his voice strained.
“I see them,” Brad replied. “Four ATVs in there. All sorts of lockers. I see a few five-gallon gas tanks, too.” His voice was a low whisper even though nobody else seemed to be around.
“All right, good. You can get down now before my shoulders give out.”
Brad nodded and jumped down off his cupped hands, hitting the grass and heading for the wall. Max jumped to his feet and ran after him, hoping that nobody else from inside was watching the outside, especially now as the sun began breaking the crest of the new day.
***
“Where are they?” Rhonda asked, starting to step out from around the Chevy.
“Careful, Rhonda,” Phil whispered. “That guy was just out there with a shotgun. We can’t be seen.”
Rhonda snapped her head back around and glared at her husband. “That’s our son out there, Phillip. What do you think will happen if he gets caught in there with the guys in gray jumpsuits?”
“Easy, Rhonda. I’m worried, too, believe me.”
“Maybe not quite worried enough.”
“Hey, you two. Take it easy,” said Clancy Greer, still dressed in his familiar tan and brown uniform from the Brisbee, Colorado Sheriff’s office. He’d removed his brass badge but still wore the belt and holster with Glock 17 pistol. “We’re all on the same side here.”
Rhonda nodded and looked away, back towards the yard.
“Thanks,” Winnie spoke quietly, coming up behind Greer. “They get squabbly sometimes.” She flashed a smile, the first indication of any sort of happiness he’d seen since he’d met her. Not that there had been much opportunity for friendly banter, with the whole packing-all-of-their-belongings-and-attempting-to-escape-a-nuclear-winter thing.
“They’re trying, kid,” Greer said. “This is kind of uncharted territory, right?”
Winnie nodded her agreement.
“Look!” hissed Rhonda and Phil came up behind her, glancing out from underneath the low hanging tree branches. Max and Brad were hoofing it across the grass, running low and pinned to the wall, moving swiftly and smartly.
As they watched, Brad reached the brick column and bent down, helping hoist Brad up onto the top. Brad swung slightly over, then leaned down to help his friend up, then both of them tumbled down the other side of the gate, landing in a heap on the grass. Brad charged to his feet, reaching back and helping Max stand, then they both ran across the short length of grass,
skidding down to the ground around the front of the truck, crawling to shelter behind it.
Rhonda moved forward and hugged Max long and hard, then broke away and embraced Brad as well, ruffling his dark, curly hair.
Greer approached, ducking down into a crouch to look at them eye to eye.
“Nice work, boys,” he said. “Certainly looks like you’ve done that sort of thing before.”
Max’s cheeks flushed and Brad glanced away, not wanting to meet the ex-sheriff’s eyes.
“They’ve got four ATVs, just like we said,” Max said, shooting Brad a look, and he returned a thumbs up.
“Maintenance garage,” Brad continued, “north side of campus, about two hundred yards down the wall.” He pointed in the direction they’d just come from.
“Good work, boys,” Greer replied. “What can you tell us about the guys inside? Was there just that one?”
“Nope,” Max shook his head. “We saw two others. Both with machine guns.”
Greer made a strange expression and stood back up, his palms pressing his knees. “Same gray jumpsuits?”
Brad and Max both nodded.
“I was afraid of that,” Greer said.
“Afraid of what?” Rhonda asked.
Greer turned towards her, Phil, and Winnie. “Remember that bus crash we saw?”
“The one on fire?” Winnie asked, her voice thin and brittle, as if the memory alone might crack her fragile foundation.
Greer nodded. “I don’t think it was a school bus. I think it was a prisoner transport.”
Phil’s eyes widened. “There’s that SuperMax prison down in Florence,” he said quietly. “I’ve seen buses transporting between there and the state penitentiary before.”
“Right. If they were doing prisoner transport and ran into some trouble on the road…”
“They could have stolen the guards’ weapons and set up shop here,” finished Max.
