No Light Beyond

by L. Douglas Hogan

  Mason was distracted by the presence of his daughter just a few yards away, who was waving at her daddy. Mason waved back and gave her a half grin. He knew his situation was dire, so he tried to swallow as much pride as he could, hoping that he could bend the will of his captor.

  “What do I have to do?” Mason asked, now in a humbled state.

  “I’ve brought your daughter to visit with you, but you’re going to have to promise me that you won’t make any threats of any kind or disrupt the mind of that little girl. Your affinity for aggression could have an adverse effect on her.”

  “I have no intentions of threatening you or anyone else in her presence. The things I have in store for you are the things of nightmares, nothing I would expose Lydia to.”

  The Colonel motioned the guards at the door to let Lydia in. She came running to the cell where Mason was waiting for her.

  “Daddy, I’ve missed you so much.”

  “I’ve missed you too, sweetheart. Are you okay?”

  “I’m fine. They have lots of kids here for me to play with. How’s Tammy? I saw the bad men hurt her.”

  “I don’t know, baby. Did the bad men hurt you?”

  “They grabbed me hard and kept me tied up. They brought me to Mr. Sanders.”

  “Mr. Sanders, huh?” Mason asked, smirking at his captor. When Mason’s muse with Colonel Sanders was over, he looked back at Lydia. “Do you know where they took my friend?”

  “That’s enough,” the Colonel barked, signaling the guard to take her away.

  “I love you, Lyddie,” Mason said, using his pet name for her as she was being escorted away.

  “I love you too, Daddy.”

  The door closed behind Lydia, and the Colonel looked at Mason and said, “I just wanted you to see her one last time.”

  “One last time? What are you doing with her?”

  “I’m a businessman, Mason. I have to look out for the greater good of the community. You would do anything for your daughter. Well, I will do anything for mine.”

  Mason safely assumed that the Colonel’s people had found his pack when he saw him pull his journal out of the back of his waistline. “I spent some time going through your journal. I wish you would have taken me up on my offer. I’m going to have to come up with a new one now.”

  “What do you mean? What are you talking about?”

  “I’ve negotiated with the Ebony Pistols and a few Scroungers to keep them away from Haven for a while. It cost me a few resources and a couple of very tough decisions.”

  Mason looked into the Colonel’s eyes in anticipation of some very bad news.

  “After reading how you killed a few Scroungers in this here book, I was visited by some individuals who seemed very interested in you. When I refused to oblige their request to turn you over to them, they accepted a counteroffer.”

  Mason’s eyes were welling up with tears. If not for the glass and steel partition, Mason’s hands would be wrapped around the Colonel’s throat, choking the very life from his body.

  “As for your friend Shemika, she is to be handed over to the Ebony Pistols at first light. Like I said, Mason, I wish you would have taken me up on my offer.”

  “Lydia?” Mason barely uttered, his throat draining with tears.

  “The Scroungers are waiting outside for her at the gate. She may even be gone as we speak.”

  Mason sat down on the bed.

  The Colonel opened the chuckhole of the cell door and dropped Mason’s journal and pencil into his cell. “Feel free to document your loss,” he said, resecuring the small latch before walking away.

  Mason seemed void of all expression and thought. His mind was numb as he surrendered to his overwhelming sense of helplessness.

  Entry Four

  The next morning

  Mason rolled over and saw his journal lying on the floor of his cell. Not too far from it, his pencil lay there, a nice sharp object sure to cause some sorry person pain. Mason began flipping through the pages. As he did, he began seeing where the Colonel had made notations in the margins and circling key places, events, and people. There was little doubt that these markings represented the information he’d worked with to cut deals with the Scroungers and the Ebony Pistols.

  ...

  “Dear Lydia, I was so happy to see your perfect face yesterday. I’m sorry it was under the conditions mandated by Mr. Sanders, though. I would never have allowed you to see me in a room like that.

  “They put me in here because I was trying so hard to rescue Shemika; I guess they thought I was a threat. They took her and you away from me and then refused to give you back when I refused to commit myself to them. I will do whatever I must to hold you in my arms again, but he never told me he had you here until I refused. By then, it was too late.

  “Even now, in this cell, I am plotting a way to get to you. If you’re reading this, then I did what I had to do and you are sleeping well because I’m watching over you.”

  ...

  Mason had few viable options if he wanted to escape this place. Even if he were to be successful at getting out of his cell, which would be a huge task in itself, he would have to navigate through the building, which would be another mammoth task, especially since he was completely unaware of the building’s layout.

  Mason reasoned that if Lydia were truly gone by now, then there’d really be no reason to enter the main facility where the Colonel resided. He assumed the Colonel might return to his cell for another visit, and the last time he did, he had keys that he used to open the chuckhole. That, he pondered, could be his avenue. If the two guards stayed back, Mason could use the Colonel as leverage to get them to open his cell door. It was too risky acquiring the keys and doing it himself, not knowing if he could even reach the keyhole from the position of the chuckhole. He also figured that if he called for the guards to get the Colonel, it would sound too obvious and raise suspicions, so he decided to wait them out and to let the Colonel come to him naturally, sidestepping any possible red flags that might incur.

  Hours later

  The far door opened and Mason smirked briefly. He could feel his heart rate rising, so he took a couple of deep breaths to calm himself and relaxed the anticipation that could have otherwise been seen on his face.

  The second door opened and Mason heard the sounds of footsteps growing closer to his door. He looked up at his visitor. It was the Colonel again, and as it worked out, he had food in his hand.

  “I can’t imagine how hungry you are, Mason. I hope you forgive the amount of time it took me to acquire the necessary resources to feed you something tangible.”

  “You should have plenty of resources now that you’ve traded my daughter off to man-eaters.”

  “They assured me they weren’t going to use her for food, Mason.”

  “What did you figure they would use a nine-year-old girl for, Colonel?” Mason asked as he stood up and walked to the door to meet his captor.

  “They didn’t say, but when they found out she belonged to you, they bartered a deal I couldn’t refuse. Of course, I had to ensure they wouldn’t harm her before I agreed.”

  “And what about Shemika? Did you make sure she wouldn’t get hurt in the deal?”

  “I’m afraid the Ebony Pistols were far more persuasive than the Scroungers. They promised us a year of no conflict in exchange for the woman they said you took from them after killing two of their men. I let it slip that you killed the one you took hostage. I was going to keep that to myself, but I have a loose tongue.”

  “I’ve noticed.”

  The Colonel stooped to open the hatch. When he did, Mason waited for the perfect moment to strike. The Colonel set the food tray down on the flat surface of the opened chuckhole, and Mason reached out, grabbing the Colonel by the arm. The grab shocked the Colonel, who instead of yelling for help, only tried to pull away. Mason used both of his hands to grab the Colonel’s arm and then placed both of his feet on the door and used it as counter-leverage, pulling his a
rm through the chuckhole opening. The Colonel’s body slammed into the door with every ounce of strength Mason could muster, disorienting the Colonel. The Colonel’s body made a loud slamming sound, which alerted the guard at the closest door.

  “Hey,” the guard yelled. He unlocked the door and ran to Mason’s cell, where Mason had already maneuvered the Colonel into a choke hold with the tip of his pencil pressed firmly against his neck.

  “Open the door and back away. Be quiet about it,” Mason commanded.

  “Do as he says,” the Colonel managed to force out in a raspy voice.

  Normally, high-ranking employees of prison-type environments lose their authority once they’ve become a hostage. They lose the ability to negotiate because they have become the prisoner and lose their rationality. The Colonel was never trained in hostage negotiations, so he was all about giving Mason whatever he wanted to save himself.

  The guard opened the cell door and backed away a few feet down the hall. Mason could still see him, so he barked another command, “Farther.”

  The guard backed up a little more.

  Mason was forced to let go of the Colonel so he could slide the cell door open. When he did, the Colonel fell to the floor and the guard ran to his aid, choosing not to shoot him because the Colonel was on the other side of Mason’s position.

  Mason’s face absorbed the first counterattack. The guard had advanced quickly and caught Mason on the left side of his face. Mason counterattacked with a hammer fist to the soft spot between the man’s left shoulder and his neck. It might not have hurt so much had Mason not buried four inches of the pencil into it. The man let out a yell, alerting the other guard.

  Mason took advantage of the distraction and grabbed at the guard’s rifle, but it was attached to the man’s body by the sling. He gave it a really hard and sudden tug that jolted the man forward, throwing him off balance. At the same time, the Colonel was composing himself and making a move to assist him. Mason didn’t want to fire the rifle unless he absolutely had to, preferring instead to keep things quiet in the facility.

  The Colonel punched Mason, so Mason grabbed the pencil from the guard’s shoulder and drove it into the Colonel’s chest, right between the pectoral muscle and the deltoid. He screamed in pain and sat down on the floor.

  The guard jumped on top of Mason, who managed to hold his weight for a moment before tripping over the Colonel and falling to the floor. The second guard was now at the second door and making his way to the aid of his colleague and leader.

  Mason was lying on his back with his legs draping over the Colonel. The first guard was choking Mason, and he was beginning to feel like he was losing the fight when he felt the rifle in his hand and made the decision to maneuver his way to the trigger. The first guard knew what Mason was doing, and they each began to struggle for the rifle. A shot rang out, surprising the second guard, who was now just feet from the ground fight. He stopped his advance to see who had been shot.

  All three of the combatants were lying still, and then the Colonel looked up at the second guard and said, “Get me out of here.” He was firmly stuck under both Mason and the first guard.

  When the second guard went to assist, a second shot rang out from the rifle. The second guard fell. Mason pushed the first guard off his body and stood up. He reached down to grab the bloody pencil that was now lying on the floor and stuck it into the neck of the second guard, who was still squirming about on the floor, then took his ammunition and magazines before he was even dead.

  Next, Mason waited to see if any more guards might be responding to the sounds of the gunshots. After a few moments, it became clear that nobody had heard the commotion. Mason grabbed the keys from each of the guards and, finally, the curator himself.

  “I bet this morning didn’t turn out the way you were expecting it,” Mason said, looking down at the Colonel, who was experiencing a rare moment of speechlessness. “What’s the matter, Colonel? Contemplating your future? Don’t worry. I need you, for now. I know a man of your stature has something I can use to drive out of here.”

  “I have a motor pool, but you’ll never get a vehicle without getting caught.”

  “That’s where you come in, Colonel. You’re going to acquire a vehicle for me or die trying to escape. I’ll let you decide.”

  Moments later

  The Colonel was standing at the gate of the motor pool, looking up at the tower guard, only there was no guard, none that he could see, anyway.

  “Hello up there,” the Colonel shouted up.

  The tower guard was reading an old magazine that he had read a hundred times over. His feet were propped up on the sink, and he was doing a poor job of monitoring the area he was assigned to. When he heard the Colonel’s voice, he quickly jumped up from his casual position and opened the door and stepped out on the catwalk.

  “Is that you, Colonel?”

  “Open the gate!” the Colonel said. His tone was off, but the guard figured he was probably mad that he wasn’t paying attention.

  “Yes, sir,” the guard said as he headed back into the tower and out the other side, where he hollered down to the rover, “Hey, the Colonel’s out back. Open the gate.”

  The grounds rover cranked the gate open and let the Colonel in.

  Yards away

  Mason was lying on the ground concealed beneath some trash and debris and pointing his newly acquired rifle at the Colonel as he moved in to the motor pool. Volcanic dust was gently blowing across the surface of the ground, and Mason was already covered in a light coating of ash that helped hide his position. The rifle was equipped with a scope for long-distance shooting, but the rifle itself didn’t have a rear sight adapted for shots farther out than three hundred yards. The scope made the difference.

  The gate was left open while the Colonel made his way through the motor pool. The tower guard was on the catwalk, watching the Colonel, who suddenly took off running. Neither the tower guard nor the rover knew why the Colonel had taken off in a sprint, but Mason was closely monitoring the situation as it escalated. He shot the tower guard in the back, and the noise caught the attention of the ground rover, who ran to the gate crank and attempted to close the gate. A shout rang out from the near distance and the rover felt the bullet impact his knee. He stopped cranking and dropped to the ground.

  Mason ran up to him and said, “Fetch me a getaway vehicle or you’ll eat lead.”

  The man looked at Mason, who was pointing his rifle at his face. The man took a set of keys off his belt and said, “Take ’em, mister. Don’t kill me; I have a son.”

  “Which key goes to which vehicle?” Mason asked as he looked out over the property for the Colonel to return with backup. “Hurry up, pal,” Mason pressed.

  “This key goes to that bike right there,” he said.

  “Isn’t there anything with four wheels?”

  “No, sir. That’s what they give the rovers to get around on. That’s all I got.”

  Mason knocked the man out with his rifle and ran for the motorcycle the rover had pointed him towards and zipped off through the gate on a 1941 Harley Davidson Wartime Knucklehead, leaving Haven behind.

  Entry Five

  “Dear Lydia, I spent the night shivering in the corner of some abandoned store. I managed to break out of that prison place where Mr. Sanders was holding me against my will. I’m afraid he’s done something terrible, and I don’t like thinking about what it might be. I had to leave all my survival gear behind. I couldn’t risk going after it.

  “It’s pitch black outside these days once the sun has gone down. I haven’t seen the moon in two years; some say it’s not there anymore. I like to think that you’re in a better place and maybe you can see it.

  “The sun’s a little easier to see. All you have to do is find the brightest spot in the sky and somewhere, behind all that smoke, is the sun, shining down on our home, trying to heat things up. I knew a guy at the Reservation that told me it would take at least five years for the sky to clea
r up. That means we’re looking at a worldwide famine.

  “In just a couple of minutes, I’m going to have to scrounge up some food. I’m hungry and I have a feeling this town has been picked clean.

  “I’m going to have to head back to that place where I killed those three Scroungers with Shemika. Mr. Sanders told me he gave you to them, so I’m hoping they have clues on their bodies that can lead me back to you. If not, maybe there’s a smaller group in the area that I can get information from. Those three had to be a part of a small group connected to a larger network.

  “All Scroungers in a particular area usually work for someone who coordinates their efforts to benefit the greater collective. Somewhere, in the middle, is a brain that controls the whole operation. I hear he’s like Oz. Nobody gets to see him except his inner circle. That assures his survival and the continuity of society as they know it. Each society of Scroungers competes fiercely with one another over the control of their areas.

  “I’m going to try to find you, although I’m thinking my trek to where you’re being kept is going to require some help. They took Shemika from me and gave her to somebody else. I need her, but going after her displaces precious time that I need to find you. I’ll need to buy every precious second. I’ll write more later. I have to go. I love you.”

  ...

  Mason tucked his journal away in the waistband in the small of his back, then headed to the bus stop where he and Shemika had shot the Scroungers.