“So you’ll keep looking for a cure?” Blake wanted to know. “Not yet used to knowing you’re about to die? That’s nothing new for you, either.”
I shook my head, chuckling under my breath. “Never quite loses its novelty. And no, I won’t stop. I’ve never been one to accept conclusions that don’t quite gel with my outlook on life.”
“Good luck with that,” Blake offered—and sounded like he meant it. I eyed him askance but he didn’t add anything, instead concentrating on the road. With not much else to do—since we were driving in the middle of our little convoy, and someone else had taken on the task of pathfinder—I idly flipped through the maps that we had, none of them with the level of detail that we’d need to plan the last leg of our journey. I knew Nate had a bunch of better maps, and the first thing we’d do once we got to the Texas border was to hunt for more—but none of that gave me anything to do right now.
Which turned out to be a good thing, as staring out of the side window in frustration made me notice the light plume of dust far on the horizon. Grabbing my binoculars, I tried to get a better look at it, but it could be anything—a large group of grazing animals on the move, a zombie streak, or another caravan of cars. From what I could tell, it was heading in the same direction as we were, likely on rougher ground or with a lot more individuals. Experience made me rule out the animal option as Nate and I on our own had, at the most, seen three larger herds of cattle or deer in two years, and outside of hunting range. That left vehicles or zombies, and I wasn’t sure which I preferred.
Reaching for the car’s radio, I turned it to the general team frequency. “Miller, do you copy?” Nate was in the first car, either driving or annoying the fuck out of whoever was behind the wheel. Since it wasn’t me, I couldn’t care less, but suspected it would be Hamilton. “Did you see the cloud of dust to our one? Could be shamblers, or another caravan heading for the road we are on, or the larger one to the north that we’re trying to avoid right now.” Going ten to fifteen miles to the south of one of the established trade routes had sounded like a bright idea this morning as the entire corridor had, so far, been looted, leaving few obstacles on the roads or enterprising scavengers about. I’d seen firsthand how thorough the residents of the camp had been about scouring the landscape for anything useable, including dishes.
“I see it,” came Nate’s reply a few moments later, with enough of a lag to make me guess he’d had to check up on the plume first. My momentary triumph was a stale, short-lived one.
“Do we change course?” I asked when no further instructions came.
“I say we check it out first,” Nate responded after an equally long pause as before. “If it’s a streak, we’ll see it long before they can come after us. If it’s cars, we decide on what to do once we can identify their payload.”
I made a face, about to ask what came of the stealthy approach he’d preached this very morning, but instead put the mic back into its cradle and switched the radio to receive only. The following silence in the car seemed deafening to me, but was likely just three pairs of eyes trying to catch sight of said plume. Since Blake was driving and the others didn’t have a good vantage point in the back, that sounded reasonable.
Blake cleared his throat to make me focus on him. “You know, if you’re that opposed to following commands, you’re maybe in the wrong car,” he noted, rather self-satisfied.
“I probably am,” I agreed, making him chuckle but otherwise keep his tongue. I was surprised that none of them made an attempt to learn more about my animosity with a certain man I was less and less happy to see still alive, karmic backlash and all that notwithstanding. Maybe when I’d crooned about wishing Hamilton a long, long life to enjoy his daily nightmares I should have specified that happening far, far away, maybe on another continent. So much for being careful for what you wish for.
Eventually, conversation resumed in the back row, with Blake and me not-so-stealthily listening in as he kept driving. The plume continued to grow yet its spread remained somewhat contained, which limited it to a smaller zombie streak, if it was one at all. Nate and I had once seen one that dragged a haze that spanned the entire horizon behind it, churning dust up after a long, dry summer going into an equally warm and dry fall. That this had only been less than a year ago felt weird now, as if the raid on our tree house had somehow slowed down the time passing since then. For Nate, that must have been awfully true. For me? With my mind only now clearing up and the shakes still present, it was hard to gauge anything that went beyond my current withdrawal symptoms.
We took another break an hour after I’d first noticed the dust rising, driving the cars off the road and into the trees to make stumbling into us a little less likely. That left recharging with the portable solar panels impossible, but getting up to stretch our legs seemed more of a priority. I’d mulled over the possibility of switching cars, but one look at Hamilton sliding from behind the wheel was enough to decide that I did, indeed, appreciate the present company more. The one and only time I’d met Blake before, he’d been rather hostile toward me, but babysitting the pariah that everyone blamed for losing half of their scientists might do that to the most even-tempered man—and those weren’t adjectives I’d assign to the marine sergeant. I was surprised that he was putting in an effort to let bygones be bygones. Or maybe I’d just hung out with too many assholes so that common, professional courtesy seemed downright friendly to me. Then again, Richards had never acted any differently, either. Looking back, Hamilton and Taggard had been the exception. Just my luck that I was collecting assholes like them.
With none of us expecting serious trouble until we couldn’t avoid the urban areas any longer, everyone was happy to stuff their faces while rations weren’t something we had to weigh the amount of ammo we’d be bringing against. From what I could tell, nobody found it strange that I wasn’t riding with Nate—or Burns and Sonia—and the somewhat strict demarcation line between the different groups seemed to have gotten more blurred in just half a day of travel. I wondered if I should go hunt for yet another ride but the disapproving look I got from Scott when he saw me eyeing their Humvees made me decide that Blake was as friendly as it would get, unless I wanted to oust Gallager—or delegate him to the jump seat once more. The idea was tempting for a moment, until I realized that Cole and Hill would probably call me out on my ruminations on my own mortality within the first five miles, and my ego wasn’t quite up for that yet. While the scavengers had turned out more friendly and pleasant toward me than I’d expected from what I’d been told before—and had seen firsthand before they realized Harris and I were friends—I wasn’t keen on riding with them right now. Too tempting was the idea to try to stave off the withdrawal symptoms with a refresher hit of whatever they had brought along for the ride. Just because they appeared borderline sober today didn’t mean the same would be true for me. If not for our mission and the overbearing energy expenditure I expected to come with it, I might have considered not eating a thing for a few days and subsisting purely on water to completely flush my metabolism, but we were far beyond that possibility. And, I hated to admit, the idea of putting unnecessary strain on my body that might just turn into a slippery slope right to insta-conversion gave me the creeps. Just standing in the sweltering midday heat, even in the shade of the trees, made me want to reduce the stress on my system.
Yeah, going into zombie-infested downtown Dallas really sounded like a bright idea!
We ended up back in the cars before I got a chance to chat with Nate, but since I had nothing to share and he seemed busy talking to Hamilton and Scott, that was fine with me. We switched up our driving order once more, with both of Scott’s Humvees taking point and the army Humvee bringing up the rear. Conversation was either light or non-existent, which I didn’t mind since the last few days had been, quite frankly, overwhelming on so many levels. I used to rib Nate about being able to spend days on end without talking; now that we were back in what counted for civilization, I realized
I’d lost some of my constant need to exchange pleasantries. Looking back, Martinez had been leading most conversations that we’d had on the road. And damn, our reunion had been too short by years.
In the forest, we’d lost sight of the plume of dust, but as soon as we were out of the trees a few miles farther west, it was easy to find once more, closer now although we’d taken some quality time off the road. It was still moving, if at a weird pace. That was, until I checked the maps and, yup, as I’d expected, there was a larger road intersection in that direction. A caravan switching directions would leave a somewhat stationary cloud for a while. I was about to get on the radio and share my observation when I pictured Hamilton’s reaction—to me reporting the fact that everyone else had likely come up with already. Latent anger was ready to flare but I did my best to keep a lid on it, and instead turned to Blake.
“Does Dispatch still keep track of convoys that have signed in? And before you ask, I don’t know what Richards did when he picked me up and brought me to California, and our convoy back was, if not trying to fly under the radar, not advertising our position. I’ve been off the grid since last we saw each other.”
His smile let me know that he’d been ready to tease me about my lack of knowledge—and really, I should have known the answer—but instead obliged my quest for knowledge. “The scavengers no longer sign in unless they are doing something highly official, which never happens. But some of the traders, particularly the larger convoys with extra guards, hope that the more visible they are, the safer. Why?”
“Just wondering,” I mused, and picked up the radio after all. “Cole, how good are your hacking skills with the radio network?”
Chatter on the general frequency died, and it took the sour former Delta operator only a heartbeat to do what he did best—underline how little clue about anything I had.
“It may surprise you, but one doesn’t have anything to do with the other,” he let me know, not without mirth. I’d never get how being incapable of something could be a triumph for anyone.
“So you can’t, I don’t know, hack into the official Dispatch frequency network and splice us in so we can see if that plume over there is a sanctioned convoy and likely happy not to get too close to us?”
Muttering answered me, yet before Cole could get in my face again, a different voice responded—Richards. “I don’t think he can. But the contraband transponder unit that we have in our vehicle can.”
Part of me was annoyed, and not only because of the rebuke I’d gotten, but because on some level, I still identified more with the traders we were about to stalk than any other faction. Those had been my people, back when assholes had forced me to take sides. Hell, before there had been sides, even, considering Nate had set out in the first spring from the bunker to do just that—help get a little of the civilization that we’d all lost back to those who couldn’t do it themselves. Look where that had gotten us.
Silence followed, until my impatience made me ask, “So, are you going to use it or not?”
Richards took his sweet time responding. “Are you just curious, or is there more to this?”
I hated justifying myself—particularly with everyone who was listening in—but this wasn’t just on a whim. “We’re trying to stay under the radar, at least until we are close to our destination? I think they just took a turn onto the road we’re following, and considering how much closer we have gotten in the past minutes, I’d say we will show up in their rearview mirrors in less than twenty minutes. They must have seen our own dust plume, so switching roads will likely just make them question why we are avoiding them.”
I’d hoped to keep the radio frequencies free of Captain Asshole, but he took it upon himself to cut in now. “And how is any of that of any consequence to us, Lewis? Except that you’re bored and need to start shit, apparently.”
I did my best to ignore Hamilton’s interjection, but the way my jaws hurt from grinding my teeth, I was doing a shit job. That it was a valid question didn’t help. At least nobody was speaking up in his favor, but I felt the silent agreement of the group close in on me.
Great—more paranoia. Just what I’d needed.
“Well, we are heading in a more or less straight line from our well-established, last known point of residence to our new destination. The people we are hunting will know where we might be headed if we are on their trail. Do we absolutely need to confirm that?”
I knew I was on to something when Nate responded. “If it’s a convoy—and it looks like it, from the proposed direction change you mentioned—they have already seen us and likely reported us in. Where does that leave us?”
“Misdirection!” I maybe shouldn’t have sounded so gleeful, but the idea that had just come up in my mind was too good not to be enthusiastic about it. Just then, the terrain after the next bend in the road fell away, opening up into a plain—and, true enough, I didn’t need the binoculars to see the caravan of vehicles crawling toward the horizon. Or those were the most orderly-walking shamblers I’d ever seen. Roughly halfway to the last car I saw the intersection they must have taken. I stalled for a moment to take it all in and do a quick calculation how soon we would reach them. Half an hour sounded reasonable—unless we floored it. “Okay, I know this will sound crazy, but I have an idea that might work without much planning or chance of shit going sideways.”
Hamilton couldn’t pass that one up. “No planning? That does sound like you.”
I couldn’t help but bare my teeth at the windshield in a silent grimace, fighting hard to keep my cool—or at least a semblance of it.
“No worries. This one won’t backfire in your face and require someone else to lay down their lives so you can get away,” I bit out, instantly hating that I’d let him bait me like this. Before it could get any worse, I forced out the words I should have uttered in the first place. “We don’t want to look like we’re heavily armed, well-equipped, and on a clandestine mission, right? So we need to look like we have a reason to be on the road but not hunting down assholes. We can’t do anything about the cars or our equipment, but we can absolutely do something about the optics.”
I took a deep breath, which was too long, I realized, when the radio spewed out static—but at least it was Nate who asked, impatiently, “How?”
“We pretend that we’re scavengers,” I explained. No reaction followed, making me deflate for a second. “Which is easy, and a good plan,” I went on. Still nothing. Blake beside me was grinning, but most likely because of me rather than the plan. “Oh, come on! All we need to do is let Eden and Amos take point—the paint on their car will be a clear indicator of what’s going on. Add some reckless driving and a little bit of swerving, and we’re all set. Maybe roll down a window and flip them off as we pass by.” Still nothing. “Wanna know why it will work? Because they will apply the same snap judgment you just showed, and not question it after coming to the wrong—right—conclusion. Easy peasy.”
It was a good plan, with barely a hitch possible and no flaw to be found. Nate, of course, had to disagree. “You do realize that half of our cars are military vehicles?”
“And?”
I could picture the annoyed look on Nate’s face when I forced him to explain.
“That’s a lot of armor plates for a scavenger group,” he pointed out.
“And you know that from where exactly?” I asked succinctly. “Last time I checked, you had about the same exposure to their vehicles as I did. Maybe even less. I came into the camp in one of their cars. You didn’t.” Maybe not the best reminder, but I was getting near the end of my rope.
Nate didn’t fare much better, although I doubted most of the others caught the hard edge in his voice. “And exactly how many Humvees have you seen them driving? Or stashed at the camp?”
That… was a good point. It occurred to me then that I had somehow missed the opportunities to ask both Hamilton and Cindy what had happened to the vehicles they had been driving getting close to the camp. Damnit! Yet far w
as it from me to accept defeat so easily. “You absolutely sure that none of the scavengers—all several thousand of them that are out there—have gotten their hands on any Humvees? I’m pretty sure nobody will ‘fess up if I ask now, but all of the military factions must have, at one time or another, lost some of their transportation, or had a base raided. They managed to blow up the docks in New Angeles. Don’t tell me they can’t get their grubby little hands on a couple of Humvees.”
More silence—until a wry, female voice offered, “Why don’t you ask the scum directly how well they are doing in the transportation department?”
Eden’s tone made me grin. “From what I’ve seen, quite well, but, sure. How are you doing?”
“Better than the traders,” she drawled—which I could tell was the true point of contention. Looking back, her reaction toward me and the bunch of traders who had been along when we’d hitched a ride on the boat to New Angeles took on a somewhat new tint. It had been easy for me to discard them as the savages they so loved to style themselves as, but I could understand how losing all the privileges with the settlements—that the traders retained—must have rankled. “I’m not dishing intel about our troop strength, but we have, in fact, acquired a handful of Humvees over the past two years, and they are still operational. We have, more than once, also used them as decoy vehicles, so them not looking visibly different actually works for your narrative. Which is a good idea, Amos would have me tell you. I agree. Those assholes are very quick to discard us, and they will buy it if you sell it right.”
Part of me was a little disconcerted about so much agreement coming my way; I wasn’t used to that. Considering the scavengers seemed to be on board with anything as long as it was fun or violent—or, preferably, both—might have helped.
Nobody spoke up, so I did. “The plan’s easy. You take point. My car goes last. The Humvees go in the middle. We sell it. They just drive. Sounds good?”
Retribution: Green Fields #11 Page 11
