by James Hunt
The contact of the bullets vibrated through the cockpit, and Kate white-knuckled the throttle. As the speedometer ticked upward, the engine’s roar drowned out the rest of the gunshots.
Kate pulled back on the stick. “C’mon, baby. C’mon!” The cockpit rattled, and the plane jumped with lift and then landed hard on its wheels. The end of the field was closing in, and Kate pushed the throttle down further, pulling back on the stick with all her might. “Gaaahhh!”
The Skyranger’s nose lifted, and the wheels separated from the field. The top of the trees disappeared as Kate continued her strained pull on the stick, and the wheels scuffed the tip of a conifer just before clearing.
Kate’s muscles relaxed, and she laughed in triumph. “YES!” She leveled the plane out a bit so the engine wouldn’t stall and then turned to her son, who still lay unconscious in the seat. “Luke? Can you hear me?” She patted his cheeks, and when he groaned in response, she smiled. “Good boy.” She pulled a first aid kid out of from behind her seat, her gloved fingers fumbling it open awkwardly, and then applied gauze over the wound. “Just hang on, Luke.”
The plane tilted to the left, and Kate was forced to grab hold of the stick. She couldn’t keep one hand on the stick and the other on her son. She found tape and strapped the gauze over the wound and prayed it would hold for the trip.
Luke groaned again, and Kate retook the stick. She looked back at Luke, sunlight reflecting on his bloody chest, and a tear broke free from her eye. She looked down at the fuel gauge, which hovered well below half a tank. She was short on time and fuel.
9
Mark and Rodney stomped through the forest, leaving a trail of churned up snow on their hastened trip toward the hospital. The cold burned Mark’s lungs, and his muscles twitched and spasmed in protest, but he pushed through it. He glanced over at Rodney, who held the other rope attached to the sled that Holly rested on.
Ice formed in little bits along his eyebrows and the scruff of his face. His breathing was labored, but his pace was steady. He kept his eyes forward, the snow around his shins piling to the sides with every step.
Glen and Laura had fallen behind. It was mainly Glen, but Laura stayed with him to make sure he didn’t collapse in the snow with a heart attack. Mark couldn’t see them anymore through the trees.
“There it is,” Rodney said with breathless relief.
Mark turned quickly and saw the large grey building. “Thank god.” He turned back to Holly, whose wheezes and rasps had worsened.
The pair pulled Holly toward the ER doors, where two ambulances were parked with their back doors swung open. Mark glanced around, surprised at how vacant the outside looked. Compared to what he’d seen in New York, this was a ghost town.
The inside of the ER was dark, but there was a woman stationed at the desk, bundled up in a jacket and rubbing her hands together, looking down at something on the desk.
“Hey!” Mark said, still dragging the rope and the sled inside with Rodney’s help. “My daughter’s sick!”
The woman didn’t move. She just kept huddled at her desk, shivering, staring down.
“Hello!” Mark grew more agitated, and then he dropped the rope and went over to the desk. “Hey, I said—”
The woman looked up and hissed, flashing yellowed teeth.
“Christ!” Mark jumped backward, and the woman looked back down at whatever she’d been staring at before.
A woman wearing blue scrubs stepped through two swinging double doors, holding a candle.
“Can I help you?” The woman wore earmuffs and gloves but no jacket. And before Mark answered, she saw the woman at the station and beelined toward her. “Cara! How did you get out?” The woman hissed again, but the nurse ignored it and grabbed the woman by the arm. “Let’s get you back to your room.” She turned to Mark. “I’m sorry—”
“My daughter’s needs help,” Mark said. “She’s—”
“Mark!”
The alarm in Rodney’s voice caused both Mark and the nurse to spin around at the summons.
“She’s not breathing!”
“Oh my god,” the nurse said.
Mark sprinted over, sliding on his knees as Rodney untied the straps holding Holly down. “Holly!” Mark lifted his daughter in his arms, her lips blue as the nurse rushed to his side.
“Follow me. We’ll get her to a room.”
Mark sprinted after the nurse, bursting through the double doors and into the darkened hallway. The candle in the nurse’s hand provided the only light, and its glow didn’t cast farther than the nurse herself. “Hang on, sweetheart.”
“In here.” The nurse opened the door and gestured to a table in the middle of the room. “Put her there.”
The table was on wheels, and it jerked away from Mark as he set Holly down. The nurse was already at his side, putting over Holly’s face a plastic mask that was attached to a small ball that the nurse squeezed to pump air into her lungs.
“What happened?” the nurse asked, pumping air and checking Holly’s pulse.
Mark stammered, trying to put his thoughts together in an orderly fashion but failing. “She had a cold, and we’ve been giving her medicine, but it’s not—”
“What do we have?” a doctor appeared, his white jacket trailing him and then wrapping around his legs when he came to a stop at Holly’s side.
“She’s not breathing,” Mark answered. “She’d been wheezing a lot and coughing.”
The doctor leaned down and pressed his ear to Holly’s chest then straightened up. “Her lungs are full of liquid. She’s choking herself to death. Stacy, take the mask off.” The doctor whirled around, producing a massive needle and syringe. He positioned the needle at Holly’s chest, and Mark reached out his hand to stop him from inserting the monstrous thing into his daughter’s body.
“What the hell are you doing?” Mark asked.
“We need to get the liquid from her lungs,” the doctor answered.
“She’s still awake,” Mark replied. “Shouldn’t she get some anesthesia or—”
“We don’t have anything for her.” The doctor’s voice was calmer than the expression on his face. “You either let me do this, or she dies on this table.”
Mark examined Holly’s pale complexion and her blue lips and then removed his arm.
“Get her shirt off, and sterilize the area,” the doctor said.
The nurse complied, and the doctor inserted the needle through Holly’s chest. It disappeared, deeper and deeper until Mark thought the damned thing was going to come out the other side.
The doctor slowly pulled back the pump, and greenish-yellow liquid filled the glass. Once it was full, he removed the tube. “Give her another pump with the mask.”
The nurse complied, and Holly’s chest expanded with the mask’s compression. The doctor moved the nurse’s hand away and leaned his ear down to Holly’s nose. He lingered for a few seconds and then grabbed the mask himself, giving another pump. “C’mon, sweetheart.” He removed the mask again and lowered his ear to her nose, listening for breath. He shook his head and repositioned the tube. “I’ll have to get more of the liquid out.”
“How much?” Mark asked.
“All of it.” Holly’s body spasmed. “Keep her still. If she thrashes too much, I might damage her lungs.”
Mark dropped her daughter’s hand and used his strength to keep her still as the bottle filled with more of the greenish liquid. Halfway through, Holly opened her eyes and started to cry. “Shh, it’s okay, baby. Everything’s fine.”
“Keep her still!” the doctor shouted.
But when Mark tried to end his daughter’s thrashing, she suddenly lay still. The doctor snatched Holly’s wrist as quick as a snakebite. After a moment, he dropped her arm and removed the needle, tossing it with the bottle of liquid it collected on a table. He shooed the nurse and Mark away. He placed his hands over Holly’s sternum and pressed down hard, a loud crunch echoing through the room like ice breaking.
&n
bsp; “What are you doing?” Mark lunged, but Rodney held him back, pulling him from the room. He struggled against Rodney’s hold, fighting to be at his daughter’s side. “Holly!” He thrashed. “Let me go!”
“You need to let the doctor do his job, Mark.” Rodney’s voice trembled due to the concentrated effort to keep Mark in place. “You can’t do anything in there for her.”
“She’s my daughter!”
“She knows that!” Rodney spit back. “But you can’t save her, Mark.” The fight started to slip out of Mark after that comment. Rodney’s voice softened. “You did what you could do.”
Slowly, Rodney let him go, and Mark slid to the floor, sobbing. He shook his head. And while Rodney attempted to offer words, they fell on deaf ears. It was a father’s job to be prepared, to protect his family against the world. But the world dealt a hand that Mark couldn’t beat. If Holly died, so did he.
Dennis stood naked by the window, looking out onto the street from the second story of the house he’d commandeered as his. It cost well into the seven figures, maybe even eight considering the location in the mountains and all of the amenities.
Of course, most of those amenities no longer worked. He would have killed to get that Jacuzzi going. But it would sit outside beneath the awning, unused, at least until he could get the power going. He puffed a cigarette, taking a slow, deep drag.
He’d raided the local convenience store last night and picked up a few luxuries before the rest of the inmates got wise and started hoarding. He hadn’t had a decent drink or a smoke since he’d been on the inside. And here he had both. He smiled. It was good to be king.
He’d been awake since before dawn but only recently moved himself from beneath the sheets. It was warm there and cold by the window. But he needed to wake up. He needed to think. The frigid air and the cigarette were better than a double espresso.
A scream echoed outside, loud enough to penetrate the walls of the house next door and the walls of his place. He frowned, knowing the raping was going to have to be dealt with soon, but then chuckled. He was already thinking like a fucking politician.
He flicked the cigarette on the carpet and then stomped it out with his bare heel, smearing a black stain into the beige floor. He looked back at the bed. The woman was still asleep, with both hands cuffed to the headboard. The restraints were more for necessity than pleasure, at least for her.
The drugs he slipped her last night would wear off soon. It wasn’t until after he had his way with her and she lay naked and passed out on the sheets that he thought maybe he’d given her too much. But she was still breathing, and he made sure that she slept on her stomach so she wouldn’t vomit and then choke on her own puke.
He turned back to the window and looked down to the wedding ring that belonged to the woman’s husband he’d killed. There was some blood on it, but instead of scrubbing it off, he let it be. He liked it bloody.
Dennis got dressed, and before he left, he paused at the door, leaning back inside the room. “Bye, baby. Time to make the donuts.”
Downstairs, spread out over the kitchen table was a map. He’d found it when he raided the convenience store. It was of the surrounding area, and the longer Dennis stared at that map, the more that bug started to burrow. He snatched the map off the table and walked outside.
The temperature had dropped, made even worse by a stiff wind. Dennis glanced up at the clouds, which already looked dark. It looked like the makings of a bad blizzard.
“Hey, Dennis.” Mulls took a swig from a nearly empty bottle of Jack Daniels, his voice gruff and scratchy like the stubble on his face. “Have a good night?” He chuckled and took another drink.
“Hell, we all had a good night!” Jimmy appeared, then punched Mulls playfully, his voice high pitched and quick like an excited teenager. But the playfulness made Mulls spill his drink, and the big man landed a hard hook into Jimmy’s stomach that buckled him at the waist.
“You need to stop fucking around so much, Jimmy,” Mulls said, wiping his mouth. “Shit’s not funny.”
But Jimmy straightened out quickly and bounced excitedly on his toes. “Aw, it’s a little funny.” He coughed, rubbed his stomach, and then gave another playful shadow box routine to a still unamused Mulls, who was too slow to stop him.
“Knock it off,” Dennis said, and Jimmy dropped the act. “We’ve got work to do. Round all the guys up, and tell them to come to the hall.”
“What do you want me to tell them?” John asked, cocking one eyebrow up.
“Tell them I said so.” Dennis turned and left Jimmy and Mulls to their task. This was the first test. He hoped that after a night of fucking and drinking they’d be in a good mood. If even most of the guys showed up, then he was in good shape. If it was anything less than half, then he would hit the road and move on. The inmates he knew hoarded together like locusts. So long as the majority agreed, the rest went along for the ride. But he wasn’t about to be the outsider looking in.
It took less than twenty minutes before the hall was filled with sleepy, drunk, and hungover prisoners from Renniger Penitentiary. And every single prick that had stayed in this town was up like morning wood. Reporting to him.
“I don’t know about you fuckers,” Dennis said, raising his voice to a loud boom. “But my dick is rubbed raw!”
Laughter echoed the response, and a few of the guys raised beers they’d brought with them in a salute.
Dennis paced the platform at the front hall. “We’ve been locked away for a long time, boys. We’ve sat behind bars while the rest of the world ate, drank, and fucked! Well, now it’s our turn.” Another round of cheers erupted, and Dennis felt the first swells of power flood through him. They were listening to him, they believed him, and now it was time to find out if they would follow him. “We have a good thing going here, fellas.” He stopped walking, finding the center of the hall’s platform. “But if we don’t take measures, it won’t last.”
The cheer died down, some of the men grunting in confusion.
“If we don’t stake our claim, then someone else will! The more time goes on, and people start figuring out whatever the hell happened, the more others will start to gather their strength. And when that happens, it’ll be harder for us to get what we want.” He hopped off the stage and into the group of inmates. “But if we strike now, while everyone is still disoriented, we can make sure we have enough to last us the rest of our lives.” He found each of their eyes, and noticed the twinkle of lust as he ticked off everything that they could have. “Booze. Drugs. Food. Women. Houses. Gold. Whatever the fuck we want.” He whirled toward Mulls. “You want a waterfront beach property? It’s yours.”
Laughter echoed in the hall, and Mulls clapped his hands together greedily. “Nothing like a little sand and surf!”
Dennis turned and pointed toward Jimmy. “You want a Lamborghini? It’s sitting out on the highway.”
Jimmy grabbed hold of an imaginary wheel, and turned it sharply left and right, spitting over his shirt because of the engine noises he made in coordination with his erratic driving.
The group of inmates turned to follow Dennis as he cut through the crowd, and he waited until there was a small uproar of cheers behind him before he turned with a smile on his face, unfurling the map that he’d been holding. “There are five other towns within ten square miles, just like this one. Outside of those towns is nothing but trees and mountains for forty miles. We control this hub, and we have ourselves a nice little setup.” He rolled the map back up. “Now, some of these towns will have authorities in them. Others won’t. But if we strike now... if we hit them when they’re still fumbling around and trying to figure out what happened... then the easier it’ll be to push them out.”
“So what do we do?” The question was shouted by a man in the back.
“I want to send out scouting parties,” Dennis answered. “I want to know everything that’s around us, and then I want us to take it. And we need to figure out how to get some heat g
oing in this place.”
“I did some electrician trade schooling in the pen.” A man stepped forward, shirtless despite the cold. Tattoos crawled over his stomach and chest and up both sides of his neck. “I might be able to take a look around, see what’s going on.”
“Good. I like that,” Dennis said. “Anyone else with trade schooling?”
A few more hands shot up in the air, and Dennis couldn’t help but smile at the irony. All of those rehabilitation programs that taxpayers had funded were finally coming full circle to further screw over those same taxpayers.
Dennis turned to Mulls. “Let’s get a list going of everyone’s skills. And make the rounds for everyone that’s still alive. See what we can squeeze from them.”
It took less than an hour to get everyone organized, and by the time it was over, Dennis received a roaring round of applause. The scouts were sent out in groups of two, and Dennis smiled as he watched them leave.
To celebrate, he walked down to the liquor store and grabbed a fresh bottle of Jack Daniels and a two-liter liter of Coke then returned to his house. He stopped in the driveway and looked up at the two-story cabin that reached toward the sky. In all his life, Dennis never lived in something so huge. He’d grown up in a trailer park in northern New Jersey.
It was a shit childhood, and it was a shit way to grow up. Dennis twisted the cap off the Jack Daniels bottle and took a swig then wiped his mouth as he stifled a cough with the back of his hand. The liquor instantly warmed his innards and spread to his hands and feet. He walked into the house, leaving the thoughts of the trailer park out on the driveway. He wasn’t going back to that life. No way in hell. He was a king now. He was the one giving orders. And he wasn’t going to let anyone take it away from him. No fucking way.
10
Kate balanced between keeping both hands on the stick and then reaching over to check Luke’s pulse as he lay unconscious. She trembled each time she pressed her fingers onto the cold skin of his neck. The idea of her son dying right next to her on the plane was more than she wanted to think about. But each time she checked, she exhaled in relief at the bump of his pulse.
