by Merry Jones
Hank knelt beside her, spoke gently. ‘I promise. We’re okay.’ He kissed her forehead, held up a round yellow thing. ‘Need this?’
Wait – Hank? She looked from him to the lemon, back to him. The war flickered, faded away. Oh God. No. She didn’t need the lemon. She stood, brushed herself off, and turned away so he wouldn’t see her flushed red face. She’d almost slipped into a flashback. Damn. She was not going to let that happen, wouldn’t allow it. Wouldn’t get swallowed by the past just because some gas company was blowing up rocks nearby. But they should warn people about what they were doing, shouldn’t they? After all, the area was packed with hunters and campers. Never mind. It was probably fine. Hank seemed to think it was. But Harper remained on edge, ready to bolt. Nothing here seemed fine.
She called out Phil’s name again. Got no response.
A breeze rustled the leaves. The sun was getting low. She estimated another hour of sunlight. Felt unsteady. Needed to focus.
‘Do you really think Stan did something to Phil?’ she asked. ‘Because what about that local militia group – the Hunt Club?’
‘What about it?’
‘Well, they hate the pipeline, right? And fracking, too. So maybe they assassinated the guy from the pipeline. And maybe Phil was there and saw the shooting so they had to take him prisoner. In fact, maybe that explosion was the militia training for combat—’
‘Harper, hold on.’ Hank stopped walking. ‘You’re spiraling. You can speculate all day and just go in circles. If that explosion was anything unusual, the fire department, the park service, and every volunteer this side of Pennsylvania will be racing to deal with it.’
He was right.
‘And as to Phil? I’m trying to believe he just wandered off. But right now, I’m concerned about you and your flashbacks. Be honest. Finding that body this morning, and searching for Phil, is it stirring up more than you can handle? Tell me. We can stop—’
‘No. No, I want to help. It’s just … something feels wrong.’
Hank started walking again. ‘Yep, it does,’ he said. He started to say something else, but before he could, a scream shook the forest, soul-searing and female.
The sector chief finally got home, poured himself a mug of lukewarm coffee and went to his landline. Hiram answered on the first ring.
‘Where’ve you been?’ Hiram was breathing fast. ‘Do you have any idea what the fuck is going on? I’ve been trying to reach you—’
‘Been busy.’ He gulped some coffee.
‘Well, so have I. You got to be more accessible. Everything’s gone crazy. Do you know who set it off?’
‘Set what off?’
‘Your mama’s knickers. What do you think? That bomb or whatever it was that just exploded.’
The chief swallowed too fast, almost choked. ‘What?’
‘Where the hell were you, in Kansas? You must have heard it. Somewhere out by the old hunting lodge. Not ten minutes ago.’
Come to think of it, he had heard it. Heavy, like thunder. But he’d been concentrating on other problems, hadn’t paid attention. Damn.
‘I haven’t been out there yet, but I sent a couple guys out right away. Meantime, I’ve called around. Nobody admits to it, but what with everything else that’s going on, I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s some of our own people raising hell.’
‘No, can’t be.’ The chief lowered himself into a kitchen chair. ‘We agreed nobody would go off on their own.’
‘I wouldn’t be too sure. People are pissed off. What with that shooting, the state cops are going to be here, blaming us. And the press. There’ll be fucking TV cameras and lights, and the gas company, the pipeline company – they’re all going to be here. Plus the woods are already crawling with weekenders. Josh is hopping mad.’
‘Tell Josh to sit on it. He needs to stop parading around—’
‘It’s not just Josh. Mavis and her people swear they won’t put up with more outsiders – she’s insisting that this is it, the invasion, and she’s telling everyone to gather up arms—’
‘Shit,’ the chief said again. He rubbed his eyes. ‘Not again. Mavis and her pigtail vigilantes—’
‘I know. But she’s just saying what the others are thinking.’
‘I’ll talk to her. You think she set off a bomb out there?’
‘Mavis? No. She’d have said.’ For a moment, Hiram didn’t go on. The chief heard him breathing. Hiram had a way of hesitating, as if he had to be a damned politician. Practicing tact.
‘What? Tell me,’ the chief growled. He leaned on his kitchen table, messed with the salt shaker. Knocked it over. Spilled some salt. Damn. Wasn’t that bad luck? Weren’t you supposed to toss salt over your shoulder when you spilled it? But which shoulder? The chief had no idea. It was bullshit anyway. What was the deal with Hiram? What was he hiding? ‘Did you call a meeting like I told you?’
‘I did.’ Hiram’s voice was edgy. Tentative. ‘But what I’m trying to tell you is that some of our people are fed up. They’re going off on their own—’
‘Setting off explosions.’ The chief tossed salt over his left shoulder, then his right. ‘What else?’
‘Lots of things. They’re launching a full-out campaign to clear the area.’
‘Who are you talking about, Hiram? What kind of campaign?’ The chief simmered, felt his face heat up.
‘You already know some of it.’
‘Our deal is we all work together—’
‘But you haven’t been around – no one could reach you. Meantime, people are running out of patience. They don’t want to wait for committees and discussions. They want the area cleared—’
‘I don’t give a flying fuck what they want.’ The chief’s voice was soft, but his fist slammed onto the table. ‘Christ, Hiram. We all want the same thing. But we’re powerless unless we coordinate and work together. We have to think before we go off half-cocked …’ He stopped himself, took a breath. Scolding Hiram wouldn’t help. Besides, as a leader, he needed to remain calm and controlled.
‘I agree. But you’re sector chief. You need to step up and remind them. Because they won’t listen to me.’
Right. He needed to do that. But how could he if they were all splintering off, conducting their own little mini-wars?
‘Tell me. Besides the explosion, who’s done what?’ He stood and went to the kitchen window, watching the trees, their red and golden leaves.
‘You already know about Josh’s campaign—’
‘Idiocy—’
‘Listen. He was out this morning, doing his thing. And he found a guy.’
‘What do you mean “he found a guy”?’
‘I mean he took him.’
What? Oh God. The chief sat again. ‘He took a guy?’ So it was Josh? Josh had shot that guy from the gas company? Damn. The chief closed his eyes, reminded himself that he couldn’t get angry. Emotions got in the way of leadership. He had to remain calm and rational. Had to think.
‘Okay,’ he said. ‘So what’s done is done. They won’t be able to trace it to Josh if we all stick together and insist we know nothing. But for sure, Josh is going to have to answer for bringing the gas company people, the state cops and probably CNN and the fucking New York Times—’
‘What the fuck are you talking about? Nobody even knows about it.’
‘Everybody knows, Hiram. For sure everybody at the pipeline and the gas company – the dead guy worked for them. He was a pipeline walker.’
‘But what does he have to do with what I’m saying?’
The chief closed his mouth. Dread snaked up from his belly. ‘You’re not talking about Al Rogers, the pipeline walker who got shot?’
‘Did I say anything about a guy who got shot? I said Josh took someone.’
Oh. Took? As in kidnapped? The chief rubbed his eyes again. Fatigue washed over him. ‘Why?’
‘How should I know? Does Josh need a reason? Maybe the guy saw him prancing in his costume. Anyhow, he’s got him at the com
pound.’
Of course he did. So they would all be considered accomplices. The chief pursed his lips. ‘So that’s it?’
Hiram let out a breath. ‘Not exactly. There’s one more thing.’
When he got off the phone, the chief took out a bottle of Old Grand-dad, poured a quantity into what was left of his coffee, and sat at the kitchen table, drinking, trying to lower his blood pressure. The whiskey burned his chest, reminded him of the war. Iraq. He’d led soldiers there, too, making order out of confusion. Keeping his people alive. He’d do the same here.
Number one. Something had exploded out by the old hunting lodge. One of the locals might have set something off. Then again, there were old septic tanks out there. Maybe methane gas had built up and blown. But even if none of his people had done it, others would come in droves to investigate an explosion so close to the pipeline. The pipeline people, of course. And government and environmental groups looking for weaknesses or damage or pollution. Swarms of them. Damn. It needed to be addressed.
Number two. Mavis. She had her contingent ready for all-out war. He had to settle her down. Would have to invest some private time and personal attention. He’d get on it.
Number three. The dead gas company worker. Hiram had found out nothing about who’d shot him. So the shooter might not be one of the Hunt Club members, might just be an accident. In which case, the investigation would pass quickly. All he needed was to make everyone wait it out.
But Number Four was a problem. Fucking Josh. He was out of control. For months, he’d flitted around the park, scaring people, and that was trouble enough. But now, he’d taken a living person. Kidnapped someone. And that would bring cops, the FBI, who knew who else. And that wasn’t all.
Because the final thing Hiram had told him on the phone was that Josh had found another dead body. Not the gas company guy – another one. Josh had claimed he’d stumbled over it while he’d been out testing his new legs and scaring campers, before he’d even taken his prisoner. Hiram hadn’t seen the body; all Hiram had seen was a driver’s license, belonging to Philip Russo.
The chief poured more Grand-dad and drank. He had the urge to find Josh and smash in his skull. Had the damned moron killed Philip Russo? And the gas guy, too? He’d known for years that Josh was psycho. As a teenager, he’d been caught not just hunting small animals, but torturing them. Peeling their skin off, tearing them apart while they were still alive. Saying that he was studying their anatomy. Christ. Even then, he’d been twisted. Probably he had no clue what havoc he was causing – what outside attention he was drawing. And kidnapping? Did he have any sense at all? He’d ruin all of them.
The chief’s blood pressure was soaring. He had to slow it down. He’d be no good to anyone if he had a heart attack or stroke. He had to steady his breath. Stay calm, controlled. Clear-headed. That’s how leaders kept people alive in wartime. And this was just another kind of war. Besides, it wasn’t definite that Josh had killed anybody. Hiram hadn’t said he had; in fact, Hiram had implied that some outsider had probably shot Russo by accident. But wouldn’t that be an odd coincidence – a novice hunter who didn’t know what the fuck he was doing, shooting both Rogers and Russo by mistake? In the same morning?
Either way, that damn Josh had gone too far. Renegade needed to be brought down.
The chief wanted a cigarette. Hadn’t smoked in a year. He got up, began searching cabinets, drawers. He must have left a pack somewhere. Damn. Maybe in the bedroom? He stomped through the cabin, tearing things apart until finally he realized that it wasn’t a cigarette that he wanted. It was relief. He just wanted a fucking break. How was he supposed to rein in these people when each one of them thought they alone knew what was best and didn’t give a crap in hell what their actions meant to anyone else? Who’d blown up the old hunting lodge – and why? Had Josh shot those two guys? And if so, did he plan to keep on shooting?
The chief went back to the kitchen, poured yet another drink.
Damn, the locals were rising up. Three hours until the meeting. And who knew what might happen before then? It was time to take charge. Finishing his drink, he reached for the phone, punched in a number.
‘Mavis? Stay put. I’m coming over.’
Before she could talk, he hung up.
Shit. Literally. Pete had it in his eyes. Mucky stinking cold black soup, all over him. Under him. Around him. He blinked, trying to see. Raised a slimy wet hand to smear the stuff off his face. His hands came away blood-streaked. Where was he? What the hell had happened?
Cautiously, he lifted his head up off the ground and looked around. Everything was splattered with the stinking stuff – bushes, weeds, fallen leaves. And Bob.
Bob was there, lying still as a log. Where the fuck were they?
‘Bob?’ Pete started to say, but stopped. When he opened his mouth to talk, crud seeped in, starting him gagging.
When he finished puking, he was on his knees. He looked over at Bob. Bob hadn’t moved. Christ.
‘Bob?’ he managed. His voice sounded dim and far away.
Bob didn’t answer. The silence was long and thick. Why didn’t Bob answer? Oh God. Was he dead? Pete strained to remember what had happened. Where they were. Why couldn’t he remember? He crawled to Bob, his hands slipping in slime, and he saw something hanging out of his vest pocket, a drenched paper. He pulled it out, unfolded it, his map of the pipeline. He blinked at it, finding jagged shards of memory. The pipeline. They’d come to blow it up. He remembered finding the place where it passed through the old campground. He remembered putting the device together. And waiting for the moment to set it off. Had they done it? Blown the thing up, destroying the pipeline? Making history? He couldn’t remember.
‘What?’ Bob’s voice was dim, like an echo, but it sounded mad. He was flat on his back, covered with muck. Blood trickled out of his ear, his nose. He didn’t move. Just lay there, moldering.
Maybe they were both dead. This could be hell, the smell, the crap all over. The ringing howl in his ears. The cracking pain in his head. The bomb – they must have done it. Actually blown up the pipeline. The explosion must have sent them flying, knocked them out. He looked down at the map. A red drop landed on it. Splat. Pete stared at the drop, then up at the sky, trying to see where it had come from.
‘Fuck.’ Bob still didn’t move. ‘What happened?’
Pete touched his forehead. His cruddy hand came away with red smears. Blood. He looked at Bob. ‘I’m bleeding.’
Bob didn’t say anything.
‘Bob? You okay?’ His voice sounded muffled, as if filtered through a feather pillow.
‘I’m fuckin’ ducky.’
Pete could hardly hear him. Why? Damn – had the explosion blown his ear drums? Made him deaf?
‘Chrissakes, Pete.’ Bob pushed himself up on an elbow. ‘Would you stop doing that thing with your eyes?’
Really? He was half deaf, covered with crud and bleeding, and Bob was on him about blinking too fast? ‘I’m bleeding.’ He put his head down for Bob to see. ‘Take a look. Is it bad?’
‘Can’t tell.’ Bob let out a groan as he sat up. He held his head in both hands and paused before trying to stand. ‘Shit. We gotta get out of here.’
Pete didn’t move.
‘Come on. Get your ass up.’ Bob bent one leg, put weight on it. Steadied himself.
‘What happened? Did we get the pipeline?’
‘You think this is what they pump through the pipeline?’
‘Fuck. Then what did we blow up?’
‘You want to discuss it? Now? Here?’ He pushed himself up onto his feet. Wiped wet clods off his sleeves, plopping them onto the ground. ‘Pete? What’s wrong with you? Get the hell up. They’ll be coming from all over the park to find out what blew. We gotta go.’
Pete looked around, tried to stand. Slipped in some muck and, falling, reached for Bob, grabbed his arm. Pulled him down with him. They both landed hard, with a splat. Bob sat in a puddle of crud, glaring and silent
.
‘Sorry,’ Pete muttered. He fumbled around, got on all fours, trying to balance enough to stand.
Bob got up and held out a hand, pulled Pete to his feet.
They stood for a second, winded from the effort. ‘Let’s go.’ Bob turned and headed for the woods, grabbing their backpacks on the way. They’d been shielded by a tree, were still pretty clean.
‘Where we going?’ Pete trudged after him.
‘Out of sight,’ Bob said. ‘Then someplace to get this stinking shit off.’
They moved through the woods, orienting themselves. They were looking at the map, figuring out where they were, deciding which way to go to get to the creek when the woods rang out with a sharp, high-pitched scream.
The Bog Man lumbered along on his new legs, tall as a grizzly. He walked stiff-legged, working his prosthetic extensions, swinging his huge feet. He was a marvel of engineering, coordinated and balanced. And fearsome. The hides around his head altered sounds, muffling those of the woods, enhancing those under the bearskin. His amplified breath sounded primitive and hungry; his heartbeat pounded out danger. He was a beast, towering over the other creatures. The only one of his kind. Alone.
In fact, he was beginning to realize how truly alone he was. The Hunt Club was just a herd of sheep, cowering together, passive and weak. They didn’t understand how dire their situation was. And they sure didn’t see the significance of his work. Most of them thought he was just a jokester who liked playing pranks. Hiram snubbed him like he was nobody, just a mechanic from the auto repair shop. And the chief was even worse, acting like he was some kind of a pervert ever since that trouble, even though that was what? Like fifteen years ago? Fact was the chief was threatened by him, trying to hold him back. But guess what? He didn’t give a damn what the chief or any of them thought. He was on his way, just getting started. He chuckled, thinking of the guy who’d spotted him that morning, the way he’d stood frozen, gaping. And then, the way he’d taken off like his ass was on fire.
The Bog Man pushed his way into the trees, feeling mellow. Must be how a coyote felt after he’d eaten a doe belly. Lifting his legs, crushing plants, he realized that his senses were keener. Not just his ears, but his eyes and nose were sharper. And without being conscious of it, he’d been following a scent. Something animal. Primal. It tugged at him, leading him through the woods as surely as if it had taken him by the hand. Not that it was the only smell pulling at him. No, there were scents all around him, opening like a hooker’s legs. Odd how he’d never paid much attention before. But the bearskins had a strong odor. And the trees, the soil, the drying leaves. And something warm – maybe deer? He inhaled, sniffing. Trying to separate and identify each strain in a symphony of scents. Only one, though, compelled him forward. And gradually, as he walked, he identified it: the smell of the dead guy.
