by Lou Cadle
Kelly said, “Get over here, hands on the front door. Spread ‘em. Sierra, check him for weapons.”
Sierra didn’t know how to do that, but she’d seen it in movies. Feel for metallic lumps, she supposed. She didn’t want to touch him, but she patted him on the chest, back, and sides.
“Check his ankles.”
Sierra remembered that Arch carried a pistol there. She patted around his ankles and calves, but there was nothing. “I think he’s unarmed,” she said.
“Keep your eye on the other men in that room. I’ll double check this one.”
One of them said, “I need help. I’m bleeding.”
Kelly yelled back, “Tough it out.” To the man, she said, “Sit down there and answer some questions.”
“I can’t,” he said, then said in a whisper, “Not here.” He turned his head toward the others in the meeting room.
“Sierra, you okay watching all those guys? I’m going to march him over to the jail and stop and check Dev.”
“Yeah.” It seemed all but two in here were dead.
Kelly left, calling out to their men outside before she left the front door.
“You could help me,” yelled the one who had said he was bleeding.
“I could,” Sierra said sweetly. She stayed right where she was. These were the kind of men who has assaulted Emily, who had sent twenty of their kind up to her neighborhood to kill them, using children as shields. They could all bleed out their useless lives onto the floor, as far as she cared. She’d be happy to be on the firing squad, if execution was their fate. Giving them first aid would be a waste of time—unless she could get one of them to talk. Might be useful to keep one alive to get information from him, but they already had two alive over in the jail.
She stepped over the broken glass and into the room, weaving among the bodies, kicking at them to see if anyone was playing possum. She moved to the open front windows, not right up in case someone out there saw a movement and shot at her, but close enough they might hear her. “It’s Sierra!” she yelled. “We’re clear in here. You can come in.”
She went back to her search of bodies. When she was done, she wove back through, picking up weapons, piling them on the central table.
“Sierra?” Jackson’s voice, from the front hall.
“In here. We have two still alive but injured.”
The invader said, “Those guns are empty. Can you help me now? My leg is bad, man.”
“Where is your spare ammo stored?” Sierra asked.
A light came on and the world flashed white, blinding her.
“Jesus!” she yelled, yanking the goggles off. “Warn a person.”
Through her undamaged eyelid she saw the light go back off. “Sorry,” said someone. “I found a lantern.”
Now Sierra had lost where the whining enemy was. “Shit. Turn that back on if you want, but keep it dim and stay low in case someone bad comes up from outside and sees us in here.” She turned around until she saw—for the first time—the men in the room. Saw their faces. Saw the blood.
Carnage: the word came to her from a lesson in junior English class on word origins. The word came from an old word for flesh, as did “char” and “carnelian,” a stone the color of bloody meat. Bullet wounds opened up the body, ripped away the skin that usually hid the truth, that we were all made of meat. Plenty of raw meat on display in this room.
“We lost one?” Sierra asked, bending down to pick up another rifle. She’d just stopped herself in time from saying “only lost one.”
“Yeah. Noah Reed. He was an insurance adjustor. Married, no kids.”
Sierra couldn’t stop the thought that it was a better person to have die than some. His wife probably wouldn’t think so. Then she realized she wasn’t any better than Noah, whose last name she’d already forgotten. She had no job skills that made her valuable in the post-oil world—just raising hens and shooting people.
“What now?” another man asked her.
“Wait for Kelly. She’s leading us.”
“Can we go home? We’re done here.”
“No,” she said. “You agreed to that. You’ll only put yourself at risk anyway, but you need to wait until Kelly gives you the okay. And there may be more for us to do.”
She wondered what Kelly would decide to do next. Hunt down the roving patrols with just her and Kelly? Or go back out as a team, all ten of them armed, and clear the southernmost tip of the town? It wouldn’t be smart to take the men up toward the other armed group, their friends coming in from the north. But she’d better give them something to do, or she’d have a hard time holding them here. “I tell you what you can do,” she said. “Three of you get up to the top of the building, open the windows, and listen hard. See if you can hear any gunfire away to the north. Northeast, northwest, whichever. If you do, estimate how far away it is.”
“Which three?” Jackson asked.
“You, and I guess anyone who hunts. Wouldn’t you be better at guessing the distance of gunfire if you had that experience?”
After a brief debate, three of them went up. Jackson said, “We’ll clear the building too while we’re up there.”
Sierra nodded her thanks. Maybe he understood she was trying to keep the men engaged in a task. To a pair without weapons she said, “Okay, you can all shoot, right? We have rifles here, but I assume they were out of ammunition by the end. I need two of you to check all their firearms and see if any are loaded. If you find a loaded one, keep it.”
That left three men without something to do. She asked for their names and tried to commit them to memory. “Sorry if I forget your names later on.”
“Don’t sweat it,” one of them said—Will, was it? “So what do we do?”
She was inclined to shoot the injured men and get rid of that problem. But that’d have to be someone else’s decision, not hers alone. “Two of you, give these two guys first aid, and then tie them up real well. See if you can convince them to tell us where their armory or spare ammo is. You—Roy, is it? Find a closet we can put them in that locks, or that has a door that opens out so you can move furniture in front of it to block them in. Maybe you can find keys in a desk drawer. I need to use the restroom. Be right back.”
One of the guys checking guns said, “I wouldn’t mind a functioning one myself.”
“There’s a small one right here off this back hallway. When I’m done, the rest of you can use it.”
Sierra used the toilet, got a trickle of water from the faucet, and washed her hands and forearms, which were splattered with Dev’s dried blood, or someone else’s. There were no paper towels, though there was liquid soap in a bottle, so she had to scrub at the dried blood with her fingernails. After a few minutes, she was cleaner, but when she returned to the lit room she saw it would take a scrub brush to get all the blood off. It was ground in around her nails and cuticles.
“How are the injured ones?” she asked. She noticed for the first time how much better fed the dead men looked than the prisoners, whose clothes hung loose.
“I don’t think that one will make it, but this guy will.” Will pointed at the one who had been begging her for help before. He’d gone silent around all the men.
One of her men had a new rifle and held it up. “Three rounds, but that’s better than none.”
Must have been on one of the men who was shot earlier in the battle.
“I found a full magazine,” said Will. “Still checking if the rounds work for any of these other rifles. The magazine itself doesn’t.”
“We lost track of three of the enemy, I think. They ran out and climbed the fence. That mag must belong with one of their rifles.”
Roy returned and said, “I found a closet that locks. A healthy man could kick down the door, but probably not injured men. Here’s the keys.”
“That’ll do. We’ll move them now.”
The four of them carried the men to the closet Roy had found and shut them inside, the conscious one complaining, but clea
rly not really believing it would work on them.
On the walk back to the office, Roy said, “How old are you?”
“Me?” Sierra said. “Eighteen.”
He shook his head.
“What?”
“Just thinking. These guys thought women weren’t as dangerous so didn’t jail any. You seem plenty dangerous to me.”
“I am,” she said. “I guess they were thinking about if they had to subdue them without guns, women are generally smaller and easier to push around. If they’re mothers with kids, a threat might keep them in control.”
The third guy who had helped with first aid said, “Might work on me too. I’d do anything to protect my son.”
“Hey, wait a sec,” Sierra said as they entered the meeting room again. She had just now remembered the pictures she had on her phone. She shrugged off her backpack and dug through until she found it. “I have some photos of children to show you. We think they’re all from Payson, but they’re up at our place right now, safe and out of tonight’s fighting.”
They all huddled around her. She handed over her phone to one and said, “You guys look.” She wanted to check the street, but she’d do that from the front door with the night vision goggles.
As she left the meeting room, she heard one of them say, “That’s my neighbor’s kid, I’m sure of it. Essie. Sweet girl.”
Good. It gave her hope they’d find homes for those kids, if not with their parents, with a neighbor or relative.
She opened the main door, looked out bare-eyed, and then slipped on the goggles again as she let the door shut behind her. She was still suffering from some after-images of the bright flash of lantern light, and the area bathed in interior light behind her was too bright to look at, but the jail and the street in the other direction were visible. And empty. She could see her rifle, still glowing dimly from being fired before, hottest where the gasses vented.
Jackson’s voice startled her. “Anything?” He came up to stand beside her and let the door close behind him.
“Not a sign of any of them. We might grill the guys who can still talk, see if there’s a meeting place, an emergency plan, or whatever.”
“There’s the barracks. The apartment building.”
“Which direction is it?”
“West of here. To your right, ten or twelve blocks.”
“Did you hear any gunfire?”
“None.”
“Should we go through the streets, do you think?”
“We’re low on ammo. We don’t know how many of the enemy there are, or what their arms are. There are ammo caches somewhere. Have to be.”
“Even with limited ammunition,” she said, “I’d rather do something than nothing. And if we do nothing, I think one of these guys—our allies—is likely to bolt for home.”
“Wait for the boss woman to organize.”
“I’m going to go check on her. Try to keep the men busy and their minds off their homes. And get me my phone back, would you?” She was walking backward while she said all this to him.
“Your phone?”
“I loaned it to them to look at pictures of the kids we have. Payson kids, we think.”
“Be back quick,” he said, as she turned and jogged across the street.
She pounded on the jailhouse door, then remembered the signal knock. “Sorry!” she called, and then she knocked three, then two.
A moment later, the door popped open. Mr. Lambert was behind it, a baton in hand.
“Just me,” she said. “Sorry again for forgetting the knock. Where’s Kelly?”
“Back in the cells, checking on everyone.”
“How’s Dev?”
“He’s right where he was. She sewed him up. He’s a stoic fellow. Didn’t make a peep.”
“No, he wouldn’t.”
“Everything okay out there?”
“Good as we could have hoped for. We lost one man. Noah someone.”
His face fell. “A good man.”
“I’m sorry. But everyone else seems okay, and we killed several of theirs. A few ran. A couple are hurt and one seems unlikely to survive.”
“What next?”
“We need to ask Kelly to decide that. Either go for where they live, go south where there’d be no fighting to root out the rest of them, or wait here. Whatever she decides.”
“Where are the others? The other people that are supposed to be here? You said they were coming in from the north?”
“No idea. If she doesn’t have a text from her husband telling her, there’s no way of knowing until they show up.” She was trying to make it back to Dev, but every time Lambert asked her something, she stopped to answer him.
“Text? There’s no cell service, is there?”
“We’ll explain later,” she said, and slipped through the door.
Dev was sitting on the floor, his rifle beside him, staring at his hand. It was wrapped much more neatly, with pure white gauze, and no blood was soaking through the bandage.
“Hey, how you feeling?” she said, squatting down in front of him.
“My head hurts.”
“It must, if you’re admitting it.”
“I’m a little scared. It’s bad.”
That worried her. “Did you tell your mom about it?”
“Yeah. She said it’s probably from the thing. The explosion.” He waved his hand around, searching for the right word.
“Grenade,” she suggested.
“That’s it. It’s hard to think. To talk.”
“Then you’re out of it for the night. But you did great, Dev.”
“Only got one. Up on the fire escape.”
“You did? Good for you.”
“You going out again?” he said, squinting at her as if she were a bright light he couldn’t bear to look at.
“Whatever your mom says, but I hope so.”
“Be careful.”
“We’re almost done. Done for good, I hope. Maybe a few clean-up skirmishes after tonight, or an occasional band coming through the woods, but I think this is our last big battle.”
“Ever?”
“For a while.”
“Thought you liked fighting.”
“I do, in a way. Thanks to you and your dad, and even Kelly and my dad, I got to be good at it. It’s nice to be good at something useful, you know? Not just school, like algebra or essays. But at something real. And this is as real as it gets.”
“You’ll be careful?” He looked at her with wet eyes.
“Always. You aren’t crying, are you?”
“Not crying. Just my head. It makes my eyes water.” He swiped at his eyes.
It must feel really bad if it was bringing tears to his eyes. “How’s the hand?”
“Throbs a little.”
“Did she give you anything?”
“She says no aspirin. I can have a pain pill if I want later.”
“No reason to be in pain.”
“There aren’t a—” he said, and then looked frustrated. “A bunch that will last forever.”
“Infinite amount? Unlimited supply?” she tried.
He pointed at her. “That’s it.”
“Maybe you should close your eyes and rest. Your mom knows best.”
“I need to stay awake. What if the jail is attacked, and I’m the only one armed in here?”
“The door is solid.”
“More worried about you.” He reached for her with his good hand.
She took it in hers and gave it a squeeze. “I’ll be okay.”
“I love you,” he said.
She had feared this moment was coming, but he’d blindsided her by saying this now, with no lead-up to it. She knew he didn’t mean like a sister, like a cousin, like a pal, which is how she loved him. This was the worst possible time to have a discussion about this. And while she had rejected guys before, she never before had cared so much about not hurting someone’s feelings while she did. “I’ll be careful,” is the best she could manage.
She dropped his hand and stood.
He looked up at her, confused-looking. Maybe he hadn’t meant to say that. Maybe he was wondering if he’d said it aloud. Maybe if she was lucky, tomorrow he’d think it was a dream and she wouldn’t have to explain to him that she wasn’t feeling anything but chaste affection for him.
The silence lasted, growing more awkward, until she had to break it. “How many rounds do you have left?”
“Forty or so.”
“Better than most of us.”
The door to the jail cells opened, and Kelly walked through, alone. Sierra had half-expected a group of released men from the town to be trailing her. “What’s next?” she said.
Kelly said, “How are you, Devlin?”
“I’m okay.”
“Want that pill yet?”
“No, I’m good.”
Kelly looked at Sierra, looking doubtful about what Dev had said.
Sierra said, “He wants to be able to defend the jail while we go do the next thing. So what’s the next thing?”
“I was talking to our other prisoner in there, getting more information out of him.”
“Was he talking?”
“Yeah. I think being surrounded by angry men has him realizing we’re the best chance he has of surviving the night.”
“What’s he say?”
“There is extra ammo stored in a couple places. A concrete park building that’s locked, and their leader has the only key. The water treatment plant, which is just outside of town. And behind the jail.”
“In the jail? We looked.”
Kelly shook her head. “In a building behind it, a duplex. I guess it was for visiting lawmen or something, if they came with a prisoner transfer, a free place to spend a night.”
“Do we have a key to it?”
“Nope. He swears there isn’t much in the way of ammunition, even if you add it all up between the three caches.”
“If true, that’s good. It would also mean they don’t have much on them. The way I figure it—”
Kelly held up a finger and glanced at Dev. Then she jerked her head toward the front room. Sierra went first and heard her say, “Hold the fort, son,” to Dev.
They stood by the front door with Lambert and talked in low voices. “Okay, so first thing, we get the ammo,” Kelly said. “Then next, what do you see as our choices?”
