by Schow, Ryan
“What’s that doing to the cities?” Connor asked.
“If the South American Army wages war on the Chicoms in the occupied states, which is what we’re thinking will happen, we’ll have a hot war in our own backyard. Before that happens, if we can put together enough of a militia, the Resistance might be able to thin the Chicom’s respective herds.”
“How would you do that?” Orbey asked.
“We’ll use the chaos of the invasion to activate our insurgents. From a distance, we might be able to take out the Generals of both armies.”
“That’s an optimistic plan,” Connor said, not terribly enthused.
“It’s unrealistic thinking we can win the war and take our country back,” she said. “But every dead occupier is one step closer to restoring our sovereignty and our freedom.”
“You’re going to need your strength,” Orbey said.
Harper, lost in the midst of all of this data, and the horror that came with knowing what was next, almost didn’t hear her. “I’m sorry, Orbey,” she said. “What was that?”
“I said you should try to eat. You’re going to need your strength.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
She ate slowly while she crafted out a response to be delivered over encrypted email to the different Resistance factions. The infiltration teams were in place, but it was now time to shift from subversion to staging for a preemptive assault.
The Resistance knew that when the time was right, when the dogs began fighting for scraps—i.e., what was left of the former United States—they would activate the interior assault teams. These were teams run by people like Yoav, Kim, Paul and the others. On a single night, they would go weapons hot, taking out the Chicom hierarchy and establishing a new command. So far, they weren’t in place yet.
They were close, though.
After finishing her directives, she powered down the laptop and slid it into a lead-lined pouch. She did the same for her cell phone. Looking at her half eaten food, she couldn’t finish it. They were about to go from clandestine to full assault. How would she handle that? Was she even equipped to do so anymore?
“We may have been weakened,” she muttered to herself, “but don’t count us out of the game.”
Looking out the window, it was easy to pretend the filthy streets of San Francisco and the occupying forces never existed. California was a nightmare compared to the dream of Five Falls, Oregon. All around her there were pretty trees and clean, fresh air. Long gone were the TVs that made you yell at them, the Chicoms and their monstrous ways, the day-in and day-out monotony of working both for and against the enemy at the same time. If not for her position in the Resistance, she might have convinced herself of this. But the pending war demanded her attention. Because if they got that wrong, then before long, Five Falls would be a war zone, too.
Before she went back out to help Stephani finish digging up the body, she pulled the laptop out and emailed Tristan at the emergency address he’d last provided. She sent him her new encryption key. She then sent him a message.
HARPER: I need a Megan’s Law rundown around my place, plus anyone with a violent past or present. I think I’ve got a pedo and two violent felons nearby. Oh, and I need to know about any retired military or former police in the area.
Five Falls wasn’t a large town, but it did have its fair share of residents. At least three thousand people, maybe even a thousand more, if everyone came out of the woodwork. In addition to good people who could rise to the occasion, there were bound to be problems as well. Guys like Ned at the Five Falls Feed & Seed. Or worse. If she could weed out the trouble ahead of time, she could pick off the violent offenders first, then monitor those who presented a subsequent threat later. She wasn’t a hundred percent on how she felt about this approach, but it was definitely something she’d been thinking about. The reality of it, however, felt far worse than the strategy. In order to clean out the town, she’d have to play judge, jury and executioner. And if she did that, would she really be that much different from the Chicoms?
They weren’t at that point yet, so she stowed the laptop once more, and hurried back down the property where Stephani was digging.
“My freaking back,” she said, clearly happy to see her. “It’s like my dad’s standing on it.”
“Let me jump in there for a bit,” Harper said.
“At least the soil’s still soft from when we buried him,” she said, taking Harper’s hand and crawling out of the grave.
An hour later, after they switched again, the blade of the shovel hit meat. “Got him,” Stephani announced.
She started moving all the dirt off the body. Harper dropped into the pit with a bucket and a hand scoop ready to help. For the next hour, they created space around the body, then tucked some small kindling underneath it hoping for hotter, longer burn. They need to ash this clown, meaning they needed to leave no bone behind. No bones, no teeth, no nothing.
They each knew what the Sheriff had in mind. Bring out a dog, sniff out the corpse, use any trace evidence as cause for their arrest.
When the body was ready, they climbed out of the pit, dusted themselves off, then grabbed the accelerant. There was five gallons of it.
“Don’t use it all at once,” Stephani said to Harper. “Just get it wet.”
Harper doused the body. Stephani lit a match and tossed it down in the hole. They both stood back as a fiery explosion whooshed up in front of them, the dry heat palpable.
“Whoa!” Stephani said.
Harper laughed, but only out of nervousness. She’d never burned a body before. If they got it wrong, their tasks would double, as would their risk of capture and incarceration. But if they got it right, then perhaps they could wash their hands of the Sheriff.
“We should have brought marshmallows,” Stephani said, deadpan.
Harper looked at her, blinking fast. “You want to cook food in the heat of a corpse?”
“I’m sure it would be fine.”
“Yeah, I’m sure it would, too. Hey Harper, how do you like your marshmallows? Oh, hey, Stephani, with a little burnt meat on them. Uh, no thanks.”
“If we roasted hot dogs,” she asked, “would you ever know the difference?”
“Wait, are you serious?” Harper asked.
The flames were still tall, the body engulfed in fire. This was a hot burn so far, one that had promise.
“Are you hungry?” she said, as if this was an answer. “Because I’m always hungry.”
“I am, but I ignore it.”
“You’ve lost weight,” Stephani said, looking her over.
“Your eyes are playing tricks on you,” Harper replied.
“No, serious. You’re going to start shedding fat real quick, beginning with this dig.”
“I was kind of hoping to keep it,” she said, truthfully. “You know, insulation against the cold.”
“You’ll be fine.”
Looking at her funny, she said, “I’m going to be sleeping in a barn.”
“You don’t have to do that just yet,” Stephani offered.
“Yes, I do. And the sooner the better,” she said. “How much longer until this guy turns to embers?”
“We’ll see. One of the workers up at the barn likes you, by the way,” she said. “He’s a total douchebag, but I thought you should know.”
“Why is he a douchebag?”
“Because I was practically throwing myself at him and he keeps asking about you. I was like, ‘So are you into girls who are fit and into honey games?’ and he says, ‘I guess, but does Harper like honey?’”
“He really said that?” Harper said.
“Yep.”
Harper started laughing, this time not out of nervousness, but out of delight. She was happy to have someone actually like her the way she was, but then again, she realized she didn’t know the guy Stephani was talking about.
“You’re not even going to ask who I’m talking about?” Stephani asked.
“No,”
Harper said, still smiling. “It’s just nice to feel wanted.”
“I didn’t say he wanted you,” she teased. “I just said he wants to know if you’re into honey play.”
“Is that a real thing?”
“Um…any food thing is a real thing. If a guy eats whip cream off your tits or honey, what’s the difference?”
“It takes longer to lick up the honey?” Harper asked.
“Oh, God. I didn’t think of that. Great,” she said, glaring at Harper, “Now I’m horny all over again.”
“What’s that like?” Harper joked.
Sitting there on a dirty mound of grass, unconcerned with staying clean, Stephani broke into laughter. Harper joined her. Stephani laid down beside her and looked into the clear blue sky, splayed out like she was making dirt angels.
“I’m so glad you’re here,” Stephani said.
“I am, too,” Harper replied, lying down beside her. “Speaking of hot guys, I think this one smells like its chilling out.”
The stink of the burning corpse was diminishing by the minute. They both sat up, looked into the pit and found the remains smoldering below.
“Shake a little more gas on him. He can’t just be a crispy critter. We need him be one with the earth.”
Harper did as she was told, the sprinkles of accelerant bursting into flame.
For the next hour they tended to the body, keeping the burn alive until it looked like the heat would eat through the bones sufficiently.
“I’m going to have nightmares about this,” Harper said.
“About this guy?”
“No, about hot dogs,” she said jokingly. “Of course, him. But speaking of hot guys, who was it that asked about me?”
“The foreman. The hot foreman. Vlad. And for the record,” Stephani said, “if you let him stick it to you, I want details.”
Chuckling, Harper said, “I doubt that will happen.”
“You need to promise me!” she teased. “If Vlad becomes Vlad the Impaler, I want details of the impaling.”
Holding up her hands, she said, “Alright, alright, if our apocalypse suddenly becomes a steamy, bodice ripping, virgin breaking romance, I’ll give up the details.”
“You’re a virgin?” she asked.
Suddenly her laughter stopped. Did she just say that? Crap. She did.
Oh, God…why did I say that?!
“It’s an expression,” Harper tried to say.
Stephani started laughing, like hard, and then she got up and said, “I’ll be right back.”
The woman headed up the hill toward the barn, causing Harper to jump to her feet. “Stephani, you’d better not do anything! What are you doing?”
“You can’t die a virgin!” she called out over her shoulder.
She suddenly stood completely still. If Stephani was going to set her up with Vlad, the guy she thought was cute but wouldn’t hardly give her the time of day, she’d be okay with it. She’d be scared out of her mind and uncertain, but she could deal.
When Stephani disappeared over the hill, Harper went back to the burning body, sprinkling a little more gas on the corpse, and warming her hands in the wash of heat.
“What a shit show,” she muttered to herself.
Then she caught herself smiling.
Chapter Thirty-Five
Harper logged onto the internet, accessed the dark web, then grabbed a backdoor program Tristan left for her. She also downloaded another file named incaseidie.txt which presumably allowed her to do what he needed done in the event he went off line permanently. There was a companion file named opennow.txt which was a single word document that said, “If I die and someone tries to put a whole banana on my casket, shoot them. And talk to Logan about the EMP. Imminent detonation.”
Instead of laughing at the absurdity of this guy, she saw the letters “EMP” sitting next to “Imminent detonation” and tried not to freak out. She looked away, had a moment.
She knew this time would come.
She knew it.
Whatever Logan knew, he’d contact her in the next day or so, or she’d reach out to him. She was tempted to do that now, but she didn’t know if he’d been compromised or not. She could not reveal her location by acting impulsively.
Instead, she opened the file Tristan sent her. It was the results of the most recent sex offender registry, the violent felons record and the retired vets and retired police files.
He’d compiled this list for her in short order.
It was no wonder.
The list of names was very small, for it only encompassed a twenty-five mile radius with Five Falls at the center. Like Orbey said, if they wanted to get ahead of things, they needed to know the good, the bad and the ugly. Realizing she’d only met one of these guys in person, she clicked on a link next to Ned’s name.
Ned Brown.
She followed the link provided and this gave her a police report and his criminal record. She saw the conviction: aggravated sexual assault of a minor.
Her skin crawled as a dozen unwanted visions sprung to mind. She tried to flush each and every one of them out of her head, but she couldn’t. She’d seen the man. She’d seen him and talked to him. Thinking back to the way he’d studied her, a pit formed in her stomach. Despite her revulsion, she forced herself to dig into the police report.
Ned Brown was a violent felon who raped his colleague’s youngest daughter, a thirteen year old. She swallowed hard, tried to keep her stomach down. But no matter her resolve, the details of the case were just too much. She looked away, fought to gather her composure. Taking a deep, stabilizing breath, she returned to the report. After she finished reading it, she wiped her watery eyes, closed the file and thought about putting a bullet into his brain by day’s end.
All this happened a long time ago, she told herself.
He’d been released last year.
This caused her to think about rehabilitation. Could someone like Ned change? Perhaps they could control themselves, but could they quell their impulses? She didn’t think so. With the right circumstances and the proper stimulus, Harper was pretty sure he’d reoffend.
Stephani walked into the kitchen and said, “Where’d you go?”
“Obviously I’m right here.”
Grinning, she said, “I was thinking you’d get your nerve back up and join me at the barn.”
“Those guys need to work,” she said, turning back around to the computer.
“I was coming on to Vlad again,” she said.
“Oh yeah?”
“Yeah.”
“And?” she said. Her eyes were on the computer screen, but her focus was on what Stephani was about to say next.
“I’m telling you, the guy’s got a thing for you.”
Her lips curved into a smile. She quickly hid it, then she turned around and said, “How would you feel about maybe doing a preemptive strike?”
“On who?” Stephani asked.
“The town’s riff raff.”
“You want to just go and kill them?” she asks.
She nodded her head.
“Is this who you are?” she asked, her earlier mood shot. “Is this what the Resistance is?”
This was a fair question, one she didn’t answer.
“Well?” Stephani pressed. Still, Harper stared at her, waiting. When Stephani saw she was getting no answers, she asked, “Are you the leader of the Resistance?”
“There is no leader.”
“Are you like some sort of captain or something? Because…I mean, why are we harboring you then?”
“Things are about to happen, Stephani. We need to prepare.”
“What do you mean?”
“When everything goes south, and it will, not only will we be dealing with the Chicoms, the South American forces are going to roll into California looking to wipe out the Chicoms and claim the coastal states for themselves. If everything happens the way I’m afraid it will, we’re going to be smack dab in the middle of it all.”
&n
bsp; “So I hear,” she said, solemn for the first time since she and Harper had met.
“The last thing we need is someone like Ned Brown turning on us, or the girls in this town, when he gets the chance. Because guys like that, they don’t need a reason, they only need an opportunity.”
“Ned Brown?” she asked. “The creeper from Five Falls Feed & Seed?”
“Yeah, that’s the one.”
Nodding her head, seeing the wisdom, she said, “I get it. And I agree with you. Even though the thought of murdering someone outright sickens me.”
“It’s a horrifying feeling deep in my gut,” she admitted, touching her stomach. “But with guys like this—and I’m afraid to say this—I’m pretty sure their brains are broken.”
“You saying they’re not redeemable?”
“That’s right.”
“Then we need to do it,” she said.
“I know.”
“When?” Stephani asked.
“When the EMP hits, or if the Chicoms get overrun and the war spreads to our little corner of the world.”
“Can I switch subjects?” Stephani asked.
“Sure.”
“Do you think she’s dead?” she asked. “Skylar?”
She didn’t think she could feel any worse than reading about Ned, but then Stephani asked her this and proved her wrong. Should she lie to her new friend? She couldn’t. In that moment, she knew that would be the wrong thing to do.
“Maybe,” she said. “Yes, I think. I don’t really know.”
Stephani’s eyes began to water. She sat down in the chair and Cooper came trotting into the kitchen. Cooper moseyed up to Stephani, sensing something was wrong. He whined in the back of his throat, then laid his head on her thigh. She petted him with wet eyes.
“What are we going to do, Harper?” she finally asked. “I mean, what can we do?”
“Can you fight?” she asked.
“I can shoot.”
“Could you pull the trigger on Ned Brown?” she asked. “No questions, no conversation just walk up to him and put a bullet in his head. Can you do that?”
