Nobody came to investigate the sound of my engine, and everything about the place told me that it was abandoned. Where I had stopped was well beyond our usual range for scavenging, so it was unlikely that anyone had even been here since everything changed. I tried doors until I found a small bar. I knew I wouldn’t be getting any sleep, but I needed to get off the road until daybreak. I returned to the truck and dropped the tailgate to drag the man out by his feet which made him squirm and plead loudly.
“Shut your mouth,” I snarled at him, “just shut up.”
He understood.
I drew the blade from my right shoulder and the noise made him wriggle again and whimper until he felt the bonds at his feet cut and stopped moving.
“Out,” I said, sheathing the knife again and drawing the Walther, “walk.”
He walked, turning once to open his mouth and try to speak but the twitch of my gun barrel stopped whatever thought he had before it came out. I walked him into the bar and pointed him towards a padded bench.
“Sit down,” I told him, watching him as he did as instructed before whistling for Nemesis to come in from where she was sniffing around outside. I shut the door and could barely see so I took out the little LED torch I carried, wound the handle on it a dozen times then flicked the switch to look for something, anything, to fill the silence. I found a few candles and set them on the dust-covered dark wood of the bar and tried to light them with the matches I’d found in the same place. The matches were dried out and the wood snapped in my fingers, so I tutted and used the disposable lighter from my vest. I slipped the heavy ballistic armour off, sighing as I did, and rested it on the back of a chair before walking behind the bar and opening the doors of the small refrigerators under the counter. I took two small bottles of beer, looking around for the opener before figuring out that they were twist-offs. I used the hem of my vest top to protect my hand and screwed off the lid with a small hiss before the tinkle of the discarded cap rang out on the floor. I took a sip, finding it still drinkable and far smoother and lighter than the home brew lager at Sanctuary. At home.
I opened the other one and took a straw from the glass on the bar, placing it in the neck of the bottle and sliding it towards my prisoner across the table he was sat behind. He leaned forward and took an awkward sip, his eyes still glued to me.
“Gràcies,” he said again, then tried another language as I didn’t understand his words. “Merci?”
“You’re welcome,” I said in sullen English, not wanting to converse with him.
He took another sip and leaned back to breathe out with that satisfied aaah that just seemed natural after the first beer at the end of a hard day.
“What are you called?” he asked in English so accented that it took me a moment to understand him.
“Don’t worry about that,” I growled, trying and failing to intimidate him like Dan would have, “just drink your beer and shut the fuck up.”
He gave an amused shrug to show that he expected no less, even if he didn’t understand my words he understood my tone. That didn’t dissuade him enough though, evidently.
“You are angry that they try to make catch of you?” he asked.
I said nothing, grasping instead at the ‘they’ part of what he said and guessing it was a translation issue. I couldn’t let it go.
“They?” I asked icily. “You mean we.”
“No, is not me,” he said adamantly, “these men, they are no my… amics, no my friend?”
I bit.
“You expect me to believe that those people weren’t your friends when you were the only one with a gun?”
He shrugged, either because he didn’t understand or else that he didn’t care whether I believed him or not.
“Like I said,” I told him, “just drink your beer and shut the fuck up.”
I settled in for a long night with my back to the door and tried not to fall asleep.
Dead Mouse on the Doorstep
I woke with the dawn, which in that part of the world in the middle of summer was early. He was slumped over on the bench, breathing heavily in an almost snore, so I kicked the table in front of him and hid my smile as he sat bolt upright with a snort and dust plastered to one side of his face.
“Urgh,” he moaned, “I must go…”
Yeah, I thought, I do too. How to manage this stumped me for a while before I just decided that I’d have to cover him. I walked him back to the truck and cut his bonds, stepping back and drawing the gun from my leg again. The threat was evident. He rubbed his wrists and stretched his shoulders and arms out.
“Hurry it up,” I warned, seeing him put both hands up and turn away to the derelict vehicle beside the truck to unfasten his fly and give a loud sigh of relief before emptying his bladder. He took a long time and I had to admit that the amount his bladder could hold was impressive. He finished and turned back to me smiling with relief and gratitude. I stepped back and raised the gun slightly.
“Get back in,” I told him.
“I no fight,” he said, his hands up in surrender again, “I no fight you.”
The way he said you as choo was funny, but I kept my face straight.
“Tough tits,” I said, knowing that he would have to read my tone of voice for that translation, “get in.” He sighed in defeat and climbed back in the truck. I used sign language to make him put his hands up against the bars behind the glass of the cab and whistled for Nemesis. She jumped up to skitter her claws on the plastic liner and I muttered for her to watch him. She switched on the growl and set her front paws wide with her head low.
“Is okay,” the man said in fear, “okay…”
I ignored him, a little pleased with the fear my dog sparked in others, and used my last cable tie to bind his wrists to the grate and force him to sit up to face the direction we would be driving in. I didn’t like him watching over my shoulder, but I liked the thought of him unsecured even less, so I guessed I just had to deal with it.
I left him there and went back into the bar to throw a few choice items into a bag I’d found, namely three bottles of decent scotch for Dan and Neil as I was never one to miss an opportunity to scavenge, and used the useless toilets there.
I went back outside and saw him wriggling his wrists until he heard my approach and went still. I climbed back up into the truck bed and gave another pull on the cable tie to cinch it up. Few clicks tighter. He hissed in pain but said nothing, evidently thinking it was fair enough as I’d blatantly caught him trying to see if he could get free.
I started the truck and coaxed it backwards out of the spot to pull the unfamiliar leaver into drive, then headed out as gently as possible for the coast.
The needle registered just inside the red on the fuel gauge, and I had no idea if that meant there was supposed to be a certain amount left which I could correlate into kilometres but seeing as I reckoned I’d done two thirds of the journey before having to stop I had hope yet that I could make it back to Sanctuary without having to resort to walking.
Within an hour I started to recognise the roads and reckoned I knew the way back, but a good few miles short of the trading post the engine spluttered and coughed.
“Shit,” I snarled, earning a sudden alertness from my dog who scuffed my arm with a big paw. “It’s alright, girl,” I said, “we can make a few more miles yet I reck—”
The engine coughed again and cut out, rolling to a creaking stop after fifty paces as the fuel had run dry at the foot of an incline.
“Cancel that,” I said, picking up the two full water bottles I had found at the bar and climbing out to abandon the truck where it had stopped.
I repeated the routine of getting Nem to watch him as I cut his hands free and covered him with the Glock as I was close enough to home to not worry about my shots attracting attention.
I made him climb out and carry the bag as I gestured him to walk ahead of me, the shotgun in my hand.
“We…” he said questioningly, clearly unhappy at t
he thought, “we walks?”
“Yes mate,” I snapped, “we fucking walks. Watch him!”
Nem’s sudden and unwanted attention made him almost start jogging. I walked behind my prisoner come pack mule as the sun beat down on us, the gun held relaxed across my body. Friendly territory or not, my eyes still scanned the surroundings for any threat as Nemesis kept a close eye on the prisoner after I had called her back to heel.
It took close to two hours, meaning a distance of just over six and half miles by my usual pace, until the trading post became visible through the heat haze.
I almost cried with relief when I saw it, and it was all I could do not to run the rest of the way until I realised I was too exhausted and it was much further away than I thought.
“This your houses?” he asked tiredly, squinting his eyes against the bright sunlight.
“No, dickhead,” I said, “it’s not.”
He half turned to look at me, getting the gist but trying to understand my sarcasm.
Good luck with that, matey.
The guard at the trading post saw us coming and wandered into the road when we were far enough away for me to just about make out his face and held his gun low. I knew they wouldn’t be expecting anyone on foot from this direction, and I hoped it would be someone who recognised me.
It was. I knew the man as Roland, a man originally from the farm who had shown an aptitude for guard duty by staying alert and being friendly. He volunteered to live at the trading post with another couple of men, one of them being from Sanctuary.
“Leah? Qu’est qui se passe?” he asked, wanting to know what was going on, his eyes casting suspicious glances between me and the prisoner.
“C’est une longue histoire. Je dois envoyer un message au Sanctuaire,” I responded, telling him that it was a long story and that I needed to get a message to Sanctuary. He beckoned me inside.
“Prisonnier,” I told him, pointing at the man in answer to the question he seemed to want to ask. He looked at the man who smiled at him.
“Hola,” he said, being ignored by Roland who puffed up his chest and set his mouth into a grim mask of disapproval.
I went inside, happy that Roland could watch the man as he would be more exhausted than I was having not eaten for a day and dehydrated along with me clumping him on the head a few times. I pointed at a bottle of water and the old man behind the counter passed one to me with a bowl for Nem. I thanked him and poured out the water for her which she started lapping up greedily before I’d even finished pouring it. He passed me another one and I chugged it straight down before asking him in French to get a pigeon ready and give me a pen and paper. I scribbled the note hastily.
D.
Bring vehicle to trading post ASAFP.
L.
I handed over the message and watched as the old man rolled it tight to slide it into the tube on the struggling pigeon’s leg. It was old-fashioned, but it was effective. The bird could get to Sanctuary faster than I could drive there, so I was satisfied and relieved to sit in the cool interior of the high-ceilinged building and wait. Roland brought my prisoner inside, demonstrating his alpha male status as he pushed him ahead of him. I tossed him another bottle of water and he thanked me again, earning a suspicious glance from Roland as to why I was wasting water on a prisoner, an enemy. I told him, “Article three: prohibition of inhumane treatment,” and saw him frown as he didn’t understand the relevance of the words.
“Il ne peut pas parler s’il est mort,” I explained, seeing that Roland understood that the man couldn’t be questioned if he keeled over from dehydration.
Thirty minutes of strained silence later and an engine note pierced the air, so I climbed to my feet followed by Nem who struggled awake to pad out of the door. The engine revved, being driven hard as I heard the tyre bite into the gravelly dust outside as it skidded to a hurried stop. The sound of a door opening and closing reached me as Dan flew from the small van as soon as it reached a stop and he ran up to me firing questions the whole time as Ash bounded out to circle the area with his nose to the ground until Nem ran to him and the two froze in a locked sniffing contest.
“Relax,” I said, “I’m not hurt but you need to listen first and ask questions after.”
He nodded, his mouth set firm in anger at the risk I had been in.
I told him about getting there, how it was uneventful and how we were stopped at the border or just inside to be accurate. I told him about the setup of the place and what they offered and what problems they had encountered. He listened with obvious impatience and paced distractingly as he fought against himself to not interrupt and let me get the whole story out.
“We left after breakfast and got ambushed in the tunnel,” I said, seeing his nostrils flare with a righteous fury that threatened to boil over as he glanced between me and the man he didn’t know. I suspected he knew the answer to that particular question but didn’t want to act until I had told him the rest.
“The Defender got trashed, front-offside wheel was knackered. Rafi was out from a head injury and I got hit in the head with something.” I waved him away as he tried to fuss at my skull and look for injuries. “Nem took him out but when I tried to get Rafi they started coming out of some kind of access door and laid down fire. I ran for the exit of the tunnel but ran into a cut-off team. They were behind schedule and both went down, I—”
“How?” Dan asked, unable to contain himself.
“Nem dropped a woman with an arm takedown and a bloke tried to take the Glock off my chest. I locked him up and took him down before I put two in his head. She got the same.”
“Then what?” he asked, his pacing gathering enough speed to wear a rut in the floor as he shot vicious glances at my prisoner with enough venom to make him back up to the wall.
“I ran. Straight into the woods before a direction change. Spent most of the day trying to get down the mountain paralleling the road until the first junction where there was another cut-off force.”
“And?” he snapped, misdirecting his anger at me which I ignored.
“And I stalked them. I only saw three with one weapon so when they bunched up to hear a radio call I took them out with the Walther. This one,” I said, gesturing at the terrified prisoner, “missed me with this”—I hefted the shotgun—“and I took him prisoner along with their truck. It’s less than ten miles back up the road. Had to stop for the night about ninety K’s away and almost made it back before the fuel ran out.”
Dan stared at me for a few seconds before turning to regard the prisoner in concerning detail.
“Hola?” he tried weakly before flinching as Dan took two fast steps towards him.
“Hola your fucking self,” he snarled, sparking Ash to step forward and regard the man for the first time. It was not attention that seemed friendly.
Seeing the two dogs side by side I realised just how bloody big Ash was, and if Nem was a killer then Ash was death incarnate.
Dan seemed ready to set Ash on the man or else pull his limbs off by hand and beat him to death with them with all the fury of a father cornering his daughter’s ex-boyfriend after a bad breakup. He controlled himself and instead whipped out his own cable tie from his vest and grabbed the man’s shoulder to spin him around and bind his wrists.
Other than a hiss of pain as his hands seemed to turn purple with the pressure he said nothing, demonstrating that he could read a situation and at least had the sense to try and stay alive.
“Let’s go,” he said. “You’re like an unruly cat…”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” I moaned.
“I let you out, and you bloody well bring me back a half-dead mouse to drop on my doormat. Let’s go.”
The Art of Interrogation
“You talk to the fucker,” Dan snarled at Mitch, who knew better than to take it personally, “I’m too angry.”
Mitch sighed, biting back the quip about it being his day off in light of the seriousness.
“What a
re you doing?” he asked me.
“I’m going to find Rafi’s brother,” I said, seeing both of their eyebrows raise, “I need to tell him what happened. Don’t start without me… and if you want Alita then I need her first.”
There was a pause, both men coming up with questions which they bit back given the resolved look on my face. It was my responsibility to inform his next of kin that I had got him killed or captured, and it was my responsibility to make the promise to his face that I was going back to bring him back his brother, or if the worst had happened then his body for a proper burial on the cliff overlooking Sanctuary.
I rehearsed it my head, trying out different words in different combinations until I settled on something that didn’t sound like I was asking him to feel sorry for me. If he had any sense, the purple welt on my forehead and the scratches on my arms should tell him that I didn’t run away without getting involved at least.
I found Alita on the way, sitting in the shade near her place that she shared with Mitch by the harbour. It had been the dive centre way back when, and Alita had just stayed there out of a sense of familiarity and converted it into a home.
“Can you help me?” I asked her, seeing her eyes roam over my visible injuries.
“Aye,” she said in her curious Spanish/Scottish accent, having learned most of her English from Mitch which was a separate language in itself.
“Do you know Mateo? Rafi’s brother?”
“No, what does he do?” she asked, knowing that the best way to track down one of their number was through their trade.
“He’s on one of the fishing boats, I think,” I told her, replaying all of the information I had gleaned from talking to Rafi.
“Let’s away then,” she said, mixing the highland colloquialism with her accent.
We walked a short distance to the place in the harbour that smelled of fish guts all year around. It was where the trawlers unloaded and was arrayed with flat tables with lips where the fish were gutted, cleaned and sorted. There were stacks of crab and lobster pots beside an old woman who had done the same thing even before the world went sideways. Alita spoke to her in a rapid conversation that sounded like Spanish but used words I didn’t understand. It translated intermittently in my head to French words, but I retreated inside myself to think and try to make sense of the conversation.
After It Happened (Book 7): Andorra [The Leah Chronicles] Page 10
