by Hunt, James
“I think it’s a good idea,” Zi said.
James looked for any further objections, but found none. “Good. Now, we need to figure out housing. We can’t keep everyone in the bunker again for much longer. It’s too small, and the summer is only going to get hotter. We need shelter.”
Luis hooked his thumbs in his beltloops by his hips and cocked his right hip to the side. “Harry’s junkyard had some campers in it last time I visited. Some of those might help.”
“Good,” James said. “You and Zi can go. Take the semi and the trailer and bring them back in it. They should fit so long as they’re not too big. Pack a go-bag with at least two days rations. And make sure you’re armed. Rifles and handguns for each of you.”
James and Zi departed, heading toward their horses that were munching on the grass around the outskirts of the bunker.
“How’s Mary?” Nolan asked.
“She’s fine.” James looked to the old doctor. “And you?”
Nolan smiled. “Good.” He drew in a breath and sighed. “For now at least.”
“You sure?”
Nolan touched his forehead. “Just have a headache is all.” He lowered his hand and squinted, looking up at the sky. “Probably the heat.” He looked at James and smirked. “And the cancer.”
“Why don’t you go to the bunker and lie down,” James said. “Mary needs the company anyway.”
Nolan nodded. “Yeah, that’s a good idea.”
James watched as Nolan walked away and wondered how much more time the old man really had. Nolan was a realist, and that tended to make him slightly more pessimistic, but James didn’t think Nolan had downplayed the severity of his condition.
But the old doctor wasn’t the only one suffering from a disease, and James knew it was time to go and check on his son.
Shovels worked their way through the dirt, the trench they were digging from the bunker to the river wide and deep enough to keep the pipeline buried. While most of the townspeople provided the manual labor, Jake acted as the supervisor, a role which he fell into easily enough.
Because Jake was the only one in the group that understood the process of laying irrigation, he was charged with overseeing the more technical matters of the process. It wasn’t hard, but Jake would have been lying if he hadn’t made it out to be a bigger deal than it actually was.
But not one to slouch, Jake also helped with the digging when he wasn’t connecting the pieces of PVC pipe that the water would flow through. He was forced to take several breaks, more than the others, and he grew worried about his condition.
“Good work, everyone,” Jake said, again feeling that spat of dizziness taking over, but he was able to fight through it this time. “I want everyone to take a quick water break.” The group headed for the trough that had been set up in the shade of the tree to keep the water cool.
Jake pressed his hand against his chest and over his heart. He knew what the dizziness meant, along with the small pains pulsating from his head and his arms.
“Jake!”
He turned at the sound of his father’s voice and saw him ride toward him, alone. He dismounted and kept hold of the horse’s reins as he glanced over to the group of townspeople that had huddled by the water trough, drinking greedily in the shade.
“How’s it going?” James asked.
“Good,” Jake answered. “Just taking a break now.”
James looked from the group and to his son. “How are you holding up?”
Jake hoped that he didn’t look bad, and that his symptoms hadn’t become noticeable, because he knew he’d be confined to the bunker the moment he showed any signs of weakness.
“I’m fine,” Jake answered.
James studied the boy, examining him with a careful eye. After a pause that seemed to stretch for eternity, his father finally nodded. “All right. What do you have planned next for them?”
“I was going to show them the filtration process, and then—”
“Hey!” One of the townspeople stepped away from the water and shade, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand and squinting as he barged his way into the conversation. “How much longer are we going to be out here?”
Jake noticed that the question was directed toward his father and not him.
“We work sun up to sun down,” James answered.
The man, who Jake remembered his name was Benny, kept his hands planted on his hips and didn’t back down. “And is that what you’re doing?” He gestured to the horse. “Working?”
Jake stood between both men like a spectator at a bullfight. He could tell that his father was getting angry, he’d seen that look on his face before.
But there was no outburst, no threats. His father simply stared the man down until Benny finally stepped backward.
“If you have any problems with the way I run my land, or if at any point in time I discover that you have caused problems for the operations here, you will find yourself on your own.” James kept his tone even-keeled and calm, which Jake found even more frightening. “And you’ve already seen what happens when you’re out on your own.”
Again, James held his gaze until Benny finally walked away. When he was gone, James dismounted the horse and placed a hand on Jake’s shoulder. His father’s hand was heavy, the arm attached to it thick with muscle, and the palm itself easily engulfing the entirety of his shoulder.
“I’m going to see Banks,” James said. “I’m taking the piece of the bomb we found, and I’m going to try and convince them to help us if those people come back.” He paused, and Jake sensed that there was more his father wanted to say, but he didn’t.
“Dad?” Jake asked, trying to prod. “What’s wrong?”
James stared at Jake, and he watched his father’s expression soften, and just when he thought that his father was going to leave, he spoke again. “You’re going to get worse.” He tapped Jake’s chest, right over his heart. “Do not hide it from us, okay? If it gets bad while I’m gone, Nolan can perform the procedure.”
“Okay,” Jake said, unable to stand the silence. “How long will you be gone?”
“Hopefully not long,” James answered. He then patted his son on the shoulder and stood, moving back to the horse quickly. “Just keep working with the group, and make sure that everyone stays hydrated and eats.” He reached for the animal’s reins. “Don’t push them too hard.”
One quick flick of the wrist and his father and his horse were off, galloping toward the road, back to the remnants of the barn and the house. It still amazed Jake how his father and his horse seemed to always be one entity. It was like his father controlled the beast by telepathy, as if he could let go of the reins and the animal would know exactly where to go and what to do.
James had told Jake that it was the ultimate form of trust and one of the cornerstones of their family’s success. It was why they had survived the buyouts from the bigger ranches. It was what people had come to call the Bowers Standard.
Jake had spent his entire life trying to live up to that standard, and he did so with the disadvantage of his illness. There were times when he wished that he would have never been born instead of having to live with the pain and embarrassment that the illness provided.
It was something he never quit understood, but something he never questioned. It was an instinct, and every time he got close to quitting, that instinct would push him a little bit further, just far enough to get him past the hard stuff, to regroup. Jake could never be sure, but he hoped that he and his father shared that trait, because he’d never seen his dad fail. He always came through. And that’s what Jake would do.
38
The first half mile from the ranch was bumpy, the big semi-rig jerking forward along the road as Luis struggled to get a handle on it.
“Good thing I put on my seatbelt,” Zi said.
Luis blushed. “It’s just been a while.” Fueled by embarrassment, he forced himself to drive smoother, and by the time the first mile ticked past on the od
ometer, he succeeded.
“God,” Zi said, rolling down her window. “We finally get a car that works and the A/C is busted.” She tilted her head out the window, her tightly-curled hair flung wildly in the breeze as she shut her eyes.
Luis snuck a few glances her way while she had her attention focused on cooling herself, and he noticed the way the sun reflected off her skin, making it glisten. He cleared his throat and adjusted his hands on the steering wheel as he weaved around a sedan that had broken down on the road. “So, what did you do in San Antonio?”
“I was a waitress,” Zi answered.
“Where at?”
“At a café in the lobby of a Marriot downtown.”
“How long have you been working there?”
“Are we playing twenty questions?”
Luis raised his hands passively. “Just trying to pass the time.”
It was quiet for a long time, and then Zi finally leaned over. “I’m just working there while I’m going to school.” She raised an eyebrow. “Was going to school, I guess.”
“What were you studying?” Luis asked.
“Nursing.” Zi smiled as she answered, but it faded. “Not that it matters anymore.”
“You don’t know that,” Luis answered.
Zi scoffed. “You really think that things are going to go back to normal after all of this? Have you not seen what’s been happening over the past few days?”
“People will start to get a hold on things,” Luis answered, shrugging off the doubt. “That’s what we’re doing, aren’t we?”
Zi laughed. “I don’t know if I’d call driving a semi-truck to a junkyard to pick up some old rusted campers my normal.” She looked at him. “Probably just another Saturday for you, huh?”
“I’m just saying that people fight their way through,” Luis said. “People have gone through bad batches before, and we’ve always made it out the other side. Sometimes it takes a while, but we usually figure it out and turn it around. We’re creatures of comfort and habit, and once those are disrupted, we tend to give those that caused the disruption a lot of trouble.”
Zi jutted her jaw forward and nodded as she stared out the window. “It’s just that everything is so different now. The world has gone off the rails and we’re stuck trying to piece everything back together again. It’s bullshit. It makes me want to take that piece of bomb and nuke the people that did this to us. Wipe them off the map.”
Luis was quiet for a moment and then nodded. “They’ll get theirs. If history has taught me anything, it’s that the bad guys eventually lose. Call it a balance of the universe, call it God, call it whatever you want. But so long as there’s life, then anything that threatens to take that life won’t last. Because once life is gone, what’s left?”
The words lingered in the cabin, nothing but the hum of the diesel engine between them, but it was Zi who finally broke the silence.
“Hopefully us,” Zi said.
The road remained clear for most of the trip. There wasn’t much traffic to begin with out in these parts, but Luis was thankful not to have to avoid too many obstacles on the road.
The brakes squealed as they pulled into the junkyard parking lot. It was a large piece of property that sat alone in the middle of nowhere, the whole thing surrounded by a tall fence with barbed wire spiraled around the top.
“Big wall for such a bunch of junk,” Zi said.
Luis parked, shut off the engine, and the big semi lurched forward. He shrugged. “One man’s trash is another man’s treasure.”
“You think anyone is home?” Zi asked.
“No. Harry’s in Houston. Been there since May.” Luis opened the door and landed hard on the soles of his boots. He left his pack in the cab, but made sure to bring his pistol and rifle as Zi joined him at the front of the truck. “So, I know how to get in, but we’ll need to be careful because if we’ve decided to come and pick the meat off the rest of this carcass, then chances are there might be others with the same idea. And anyone in that junkyard just heard both of us pull up due to our ten-ton pickup behind us.” He tucked the rifle’s stock into his shoulder, holding the weapon comfortably in his hand.
Zi nodded. “I’ll follow your lead.”
Luis moved toward gates, muttering under his breath. “We’ll see how long that lasts.”
The main gate was chained shut, but Luis knew where the spare key was hidden inside the small building, which was always unlocked. Old Harry Finster relied solely on the security system sticker in the window, which he did not own. But he’d always told Luis that there wasn’t anything of value to steal inside the building. He kept his cash at the bank.
Inside, the place had already been ransacked. Not that it was very organized to begin with, but Luis had visited the place enough times to know that it had been looted.
But the key was still in its secret place, hidden amongst hundreds of others in a jar that had been shattered. It was Harry’s cruel joke to any burglars, giving them the key to what they wanted in plain sight, but them having no clue of which key it really was. But Luis knew what to look for, and he located the correct key quickly.
Key in hand, Luis headed toward the front gate, unlocked the heavy chain, and then slid it open, exposing both of them to the piles of junk that stretched for miles.
Luis looked to Zi. “Shall we?”
The junkyard was an intricate series of pathways that Harry Finster had left between the massive piles of scrap that he’d accumulated over the past forty years.
“Last time I was here, I saw the campers in the back-right corner,” Luis said, keeping his eyes peeled for any movement.
“How many did you see?” Zi asked, staying alert like Luis. It was impressive how quickly she had taken to the life of fighting.
“At least a dozen,” Luis answered, the paths growing narrower the deeper they moved into the junkyard. “We should be able to move most of them with one of the ATVs that Harry left lying around. We can chain them up and—”
The gunshot ricocheted the bullet off an old radiator with a twang as Zi and Luis ducked behind one of the coves in the trash piles for cover.
Luis kept one hand back to keep Zi still, using himself as a human shield. “Did you see where it came from?”
“I can’t see anything if you don’t move.” Zi shoved his arm off of her and quickly jettisoned across the path to another pile of trash that provided cover, her quick motion triggering another gunshot.
When she was settled, Luis glared at her, and she wrinkled her eyebrows together as she moved carefully toward the front to get a better look.
When another bullet was fired from somewhere in the junk piles, Zi jumped backward and held up two fingers, signaling that she saw at least two shooters, and then pointed up, letting him know that they were high up.
Luis braced himself for what came next, knowing that he’d have to move fast. He held up his own hand, extending all five fingers, and then counted down from five. Four. Three. Two. One.
Luis spun from the edge of cover and planted a knee on the ground so he could steady the rifle in his hands. Through the scope, he quickly located the first shooter, but he didn’t line up the shot properly and the bullet missed wide left.
While Luis was realigning his next shot, Zi provided cover fire, but her assault pushed both shooters back into hiding, not giving Luis a chance to adjust his aim.
Luis peeled his eye off the scope and moved forward quickly, waving for Zi to follow. He kept both eyes on the pair of shooters ahead and waited for them to show themselves. When the tops of their heads appeared above the piles of trash, Luis returned fire, his assault unrelenting as both he and Zi charged forward.
The trash pile where the two shooters were located had a fork in the road. When they reached the pile, Luis turned right and signaled for Zi to go left.
Bullets chased them along the path, but eventually the same pile of junk that gave the shooters the high ground provided cover for Luis and Zi, and that g
ave Luis time to charge up the trash pile.
It was dangerous climbing, every piece of junk precariously stacked against one another. One wrong move could spell disaster and send Luis tumbling down.
Muscles burning by the time he reached the top, Luis worked his way back to where the shooters were positioned, but he found nothing but trash.
“Drop the rifle.”
Luis froze, and then, keeping the weapon in his hand, he slowly turned around.
One of the shooters had gotten hold of Zi and had positioned themselves in front of her, using her like a human shield with a pistol to her head.
“I said drop it!” The voice barked the demand once more, but Luis knew the moment the gun left his hands, they’d be finished.
Luis didn’t move. He found Zi’s eyes, which were unafraid of the circumstances, and when she glanced just past his left shoulder, Luis knew what was coming.
Luis ducked, spinning around in the same motion as he swung the rifle around, the barrel cracking against the shin of the second shooter who had stealthily snuck up on him. But when Luis aimed the weapon at his attacker, Luis was surprised to see a kid.
A boy that couldn’t have been much older than Jake, his face dirtied and sunburnt, his hair disheveled and a mess, wearing clothes that swallowed him up. He thrust his hands up to protect himself, but Luis also saw that the boy had no weapon.
“Get away from him!” The man puffed his chest and placed the pistol beneath Zi’s chin. “I’ll do it! I swear I will!”
Before Luis could act, Zi jerked away from her captor, separating her head and the pistol, and elbowed the man in the ribs, buckling him forward and then twisted the man’s wrist, causing him to drop the pistol, which she quickly picked up and aimed at him.
Wincing and now on his knees and weaponless, the man slowly raised his hands in defense. “Please. I’m sorry.”
“A little late for that now,” Zi said.
Luis picked up the kid from the ground and then pushed him toward his father, the pair hugging in a tight embrace. “What are you doing here?”
