Emergency Transmission

by Sean McLachlan

  What was it? Anguish? Regret? She wasn’t sure. But it was obvious this man was hurting.

  He walked with a swagger up to the table, an old army duffel bag slung over his shoulder, one of Reginald’s guards trailing behind. He stopped in front of the table, legs wide apart, studying each person in turn before his eyes settled on Reginald.

  “My name’s Aaron Hart. I’m a scavenger.”

  The Doctor’s gaze roved over him, taking in the full camouflage outfit, the healthy body, and the empty holster. “Are you now?”

  He thumped the duffel bag down on the table. “I’ve got a few things to trade.”

  “All right, let’s see what you got.”

  Aaron turned to the guards at the gate behind him. “First off, there’s the stuff I had to leave over there. Hey you! What did I leave with you?”

  One of the guards looked at the table next to the gate. “An AK-47 in decent repair. Four clips plus a box of ammo. I’d guess about 300 rounds of ammo. Then there’s a 9mm automatic pistol with a full eleven-round clip, a spare nine-round clip, both full, and 30 extra rounds.”

  “Actually it’s 400 rounds for the AK, but whatever,” Aaron said. He turned to the duffel bag and started pulling things out. “There’s also this pair of military binoculars, and seven Blue Cans, and this spare poncho, and some bread, and half a kilo of cornmeal. And take a look at this, a functioning digital camera from the Old Times. I’ll show you how to use it in a minute. And, fuck it—” He pulled off his belt and yanked the buckle in two to reveal a short blade. As he dropped in onto the table with a clang, Clyde snatched it away. Then David pulled his boots off and dropped them on the table. “Here, you can have my boots too.”

  The Doctor studied him, his face a mask. “What do you want in trade?”

  Aaron met his eye. “Five minutes of your time, and after the five minutes are done, I get to walk out of here.”

  Yu-jin tensed. She had a feeling this was a bad trade.

  The Doctor paused a moment.

  “I think I know where you’re from,” he said in a soft voice before his features hardened and he flicked the boots off the table. “You have yourself a deal. But don’t be a drama queen, keep the fucking boots.”

  The scavenger bent down and put on his boots. The guards kept their guns trained on him, watching his every move.

  To Yu-jin’s surprise, when he stood up again he was trembling and his eyes welled with tears. He blinked them away.

  “David Nimitz isn’t what he claims to be,” he said, his voice shaking.

  “Well that’s not a big surprise,” The Doctor said. “So what the hell is he?”

  Aaron looked at the guards. “Let me pick up that camera and I’ll show you.”

  The Doctor gestured towards it. “Be my guest.”

  Aaron picked it up and touched a button. A back panel lit up. He turned it to face them.

  Yu-jin’s breath caught. The photo showed David covered in blood with a machete in one hand and the decapitated head of a man held high in the other.

  But that wasn’t the worst of it. The worst was David’s face. He had a transcendent look of exaltation, like all his prayers had been answered. Like he had seen the face of God.

  She glanced at Reginald. Clyde had moved in close beside him. Both stared at the picture with the same expression of profound shock.

  “Is that who I think it is?” Reginald asked. His voice came out hushed, unbelieving.

  Aaron nodded. “David killed the Pure One a few weeks ago. He’s the new leader of the Righteous Horde.”

  The guards raised their M-16s. The Doctor’s hand shot up.

  “Easy!”

  “This could be a trick,” Clyde said.

  “Why would I lie about something like this?” Aaron said. He scrolled through the photos, showing images of the decapitated corpse dressed in white robes, and of David on another day, cleaned up, speaking to a throng of emaciated people.

  “Holy crap,” Clyde whispered.

  “So who are you?” The Doctor asked. “And where’s the Horde? My scouts haven’t reported any large groups to the south.”

  “I’m his second-in-command. The Righteous Horde is skirting the coast, heading back here. We’re moving slow because we have to gather food on the way. I sailed on ahead to find David.”

  Yu-jin kept staring at the pictures, trying to reconcile the blood-soaked images with the man who preached in the marketplace, trying to match the man who had cut off someone’s head with the one who laid hands on tweakers and healed them.

  “He doesn’t seem like the same person,” she said.

  Aaron shook his head and wiped his eyes. “He isn’t. He’s gone mad. Thinks God talks to him.”

  “No, I meant he’s a good person now. God saved him,” Yu-jin said.

  Reginald snorted. Yu-jin shot him an angry look.

  Aaron gestured at the camera. “Don’t let him fool you like he’s fooled himself. That’s the real David Nimitz. He’s no holy man. He’s got as much blood on his hands as anybody. He just thinks he’s found a way out of it.”

  Reginald studied the man from the Righteous Horde, eyes narrowing.

  “You didn’t come here just to rat out your friend. What do you want?”

  Aaron looked him in the eye. “We have a deal, right?”

  “Yeah, but I’m waiting for the other shoe to drop. What’s your angle? You get to be in charge with him dead?”

  Aaron nodded. For a moment no one said anything. Then Yu-jin spoke up.

  “But with him gone you’re already in charge. What else are you after?”

  “Nothing,” Aaron said, and Yu-jin was sure it was a lie. He turned to Reginald. “Can I go now, or is your word not any good?”

  “It’s good. But I don’t think I’ve seen the last of you, have I?”

  Aaron paused for a second. “I don’t know. Not sure I care anymore.”

  He turned and was gone.

  As soon as he was out of the gate, Clyde and Reginald went into a huddle. Yu-jin stood.

  “I need to talk to Randy about something,” she said.

  They didn’t even hear her. She headed for the gate, following the man from the Righteous Horde.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

  David felt truly afraid for the first time since he had come to this wonderful place. The Lord had told him what he had to do, and he trembled at the thought of doing it.

  When he told them about the concrete, they would learn who he was. There was no getting away from it. Sailing south in the freighter, they would see the Righteous Horde marching up the coast, and they would send scouts ashore who would see their tracks leading all the way back to the bunker. It wouldn’t take a genius to figure out he was from the Righteous Horde, and that Doctor looked like the smartest man David had ever met.

  And when they learned, they would kill him.

  David walked alone out in the farmers’ fields beyond the Burbs. It had taken some time to get the crowds to stop following him. They had gathered as soon as he emerged from his tent. He had told them he wasn’t going to give a sermon at that moment. They had followed anyway. At the edge of the Burbs he had turned, thanked them, and told them he wanted to pray alone. That had gotten rid of some of them, but the more persistent, especially the tweakers, followed. He had stopped after a kilometer and prayed with them. Then he told them to return home.

  Now he was alone.

  And how alone he felt. He walked along the edge of a fallow field, the slate gray sky pressing down on him, and thought about what he would do about the instructions the Lord had given him.

  For a long time, David hadn’t feared death. He had lived with it—the stink of it, the filth of it—for so long that it had become as familiar to him as the sun and wind. But now he shook like a child at the thought of it. It was easy to figure out why.

  Now he had something to lose.

  He had a comfortable tent in a place that was far safer than anything he had ever known, and gr
owing safer by the day. He had people who loved him. He had the smiling, eager faces of the crowd that gathered twice a day to hear him speak.

  And there were all the little things, like the decent food and a bar with electricity and music and beer. He’d gone into $87,953 just the other night. People were amazed to see a “preacher,” as they called him, standing up at the bar and ordering a drink.

  “Why not?” He had answered. “Didn’t Jesus turn water into wine? He wants us to enjoy life!”

  People had cheered. Everyone talked and joked and for a little while he got to be a regular person.

  That fun evening mingling with the good people of this place had probably gotten him more converts than any two sermons.

  David had even begun to look ahead. He could build a house, and a church, and maybe—he sometimes dared to dream—even start a family. He could leave all that old dirt behind.

  None of that would happen if he told them about the concrete.

  Aaron had been right about that. They would never forgive. They’d kill him the minute after they got their hands on the concrete, if they could control themselves that long.

  He knew having killed The Pure One wouldn’t save him. He was part of the throng that had slaughtered so many of their relatives and friends. He had burned the land all around this place. They would never forgive that.

  All his new life would be lost. All his teachings would be lost too.

  He’d come so far in such a short time. The tweakers had been pariahs here just as they were everywhere else, and now people tried to help them. Farmers and market vendors gave them scraps of food, and an old woman from New City had given each of them a blanket. They’d cast aside their filthy rags and now wore whatever they could scrounge or beg. They still looked tattered, the poorest of the poor, but they were clean. Their backs had started to unbend and their minds had started to clear.

  The hatred against the Chinese had begun to heal too, although more slowly. The Reverend Wallace had been responsible for a lot of that, after the Lord had turned his heart.

  What would happen to all that when they learned he had once been their enemy?

  Why was God doing this to him? Why was He building him up only to knock him down yet again?

  “Another test,” David muttered. “It has to be another test.”

  He didn’t understand God’s plan. The manpower needed to cap the well was huge. They’d need hundreds of people to mix and pour the concrete, hundreds of people who would die from the fumes coming out of the ocean floor.

  The Doctor had tried to keep that part secret, not wanting to panic everyone, but too many of his assistants had been involved in trying to solve that problem and word had gotten out. That had a somber effect on the people. Not only did they not have anything to cap the well (or so they thought) but they didn’t have any way to do it even if they had the materials.

  While the people worried, they also got to work. A farmer suggested that they use soil, scraping off the top layer of every fallow field.

  “It’s loose earth and easy to move,” he had said to a crowd at the market. “It’s contaminated anyway so it would be good for us to get rid of it. We’d have a hell of a time breaking the new earth beneath for next year’s planting, but it would be worth it.”

  He had taken the plan to the mayor. The technicians had gotten together with those on the ship and studied the idea. Their answer had come down the next day—the soil would be too permeable and the fumes would work their way out.

  Other people came up with other solutions, such as pouring sea water down the shaft. That, apparently, would just make matters worse. The toxins would bubble up, creating a corrosive mixture of salt and chemicals that would quickly erode the concrete platform and leak out to make the biggest toxic slick they had ever seen.

  Still people tried to come up with ideas. The effort to solve this problem was actually helping to bring the settlement together. It warmed his heart. As divided as these people were, they could come together when faced with a threat.

  Just as they had come together to defeat the Righteous Horde.

  Just as they would unite against him when they saw what he really was.

  David staggered at the thought. Maybe this was God’s plan. Maybe he had to be a sacrifice.

  Yes! God had decreed his punishment. He would be torn apart by people he loved, people he wanted to join, just so he could solve part of a problem.

  Not even the whole problem. His contribution wouldn’t even be remembered. They’d remember the smart man or woman who figured out how to pour the concrete without losing half the population of New City. That person would be the hero. He would be forgotten five minutes after they killed him.

  David groaned with despair. He had left the fields, not paying much attention to where he was headed, and he found himself in a garden. Withered vines clung to trellises, and empty furrows sat out the winter, waiting to be planted with the next harvest, if the next harvest ever came.

  David paused, looking at the ground laced with toxins and the withered vines that may, or may not, bloom again in the spring. He’d never know if they would, because he wouldn’t be around to see it.

  But there was no way out of it. All he had done had led to this point. He had even promised his followers a solution to the leaking well. God had forced the words past his lips, and now he had to fulfill that promise.

  And die. And be hated. And be forgotten.

  David fell to his knees, turned his eyes heavenward, and prayed.

  “Lord, I am your humble servant. I am sorry I ever doubted you. Even when I heard the ship over the radio I still had a trace of doubt. I don’t doubt anymore. You are working through me to help these good people. I’m not expecting anything for myself, I don’t deserve salvation. I just want to know how all this is supposed to work. Why are you doing things this way? The concrete is only half a miracle. What’s the other half? Can’t I know? Is it part of my punishment not to know?”

  The gray sky had no answer. David grew impatient.

  “Why do you never speak to us like you did with the people in the Bible? No words from the sky, no burning bushes, just silence. We have to stumble around trying it figure out if what we’re seeing is a sign or just coincidence.”

  David stood, frowning at the featureless clouds.

  “Don’t I deserve at least that? You’re asking me to die for this half-miracle. Why? What will it solve? If someone else solves the other half of the problem, couldn’t I at least see that before I go? Can’t I at least know why I have to die?”

  “Hey! What are you doing here?”

  David turned. A white farmer stood a few paces behind him, gripping a shotgun.

  “I … I was praying.”

  “More likely looking for something to steal.”

  “I was praying. Didn’t you hear me?”

  “All I heard was you babbling to yourself something about dying. You sound like some drunk scavenger to me. Beat it.”

  “I’m sorry if I scared you, but—”

  “Get off my land, nigger.”

  David felt the old rage rise up. He tamped it down.

  “I’m going.”

  David turned his back on the shotgun and walked out into the empty fields.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

  It was pretty busy for a morning shift. It usually was after a toxic rain. Last evening’s storm had kept a lot of people away, and the lingering stink gave them a good excuse to skip work until the winds blew it away. His place was like a second home to them, a place with electricity and music and friendly faces, far better than the shacks and tents and old shipping containers that really were their homes.

  Most were getting breakfast, preferring to eat inside than at one of the market stalls that served up decent food at cheaper trade. His cook was busy while he and Tammy worked the front end. Clayton was on guard, looking a bit drowsy. His bouncers had been pulling some serious overtime lately.

  Things were beginning
to calm down, though.

  Half the conversation on any given night was about David, all of it positive. People had changed from debating whether or not the Chinese were a threat to talking about how much a threat suspicion and prejudice could be. He hadn’t heard conversation like that for years.

  The guy was a miracle.

  They also talked about how God was going to give them enough concrete to cap the well. The brother had overstepped himself there. No point getting people’s hopes up if he couldn’t deliver.

  It all looked pretty calm this morning. No drunks yet, and nobody nursing a bad hangover that put them in a foul mood. It looked like everything would be fine for a while.

  Until the stranger walked in.

  Roy had scoped him the night before—a big burly brother wearing all camo. Roy had never seen him before. The guy looked like a killer, one of the wild ones living out in the wasteland. He was used to them. You had to keep an eye on them, of course, but they didn’t scare him.

  This guy did.

  He hadn’t caused trouble last night, just come in with eyes bugging out and a jaw down to his knees as he gaped at the electric lights and looked all over for the source of the music he was hearing.

  The guy hadn’t given his name, only fumbled through a trade for some beer and a sandwich, and when Roy had told him it was movie night, had asked what a movie was.

  The movie blew him away. He’d stayed for a while longer, nursing a beer and studying the building and everyone and everything in it like he was sizing up a market trade. Then he had left.

  Roy was not happy to see him again.

  The guy walked through the door and barely glanced around. His brow was knitted with worry, and his hung head low. Roy put on his winning smile.

  “Hey, brother, good to see you back!”

  The man came up to the bar and held out a small rectangle of plastic.

  “You know what this is?” he asked.

  “Sure, that’s a memory chip.”

  “It’s from a camera I traded,” the stranger said. “I have some … friends who told me that the images get preserved in the camera as well as this little thing. I don’t know how.”