by K. M. Fawkes
Neal nodded. “I guess you could say that I do,” he said, sounding almost embarrassed. “See, I worked for the government, back when it existed. I was there all the way to the last days.”
Now that was a surprise. At the same time, though, Brad felt like he should have known. Neal’s efficiency, his tendency to follow orders without questioning them…it all screamed government worker. If Lee had been here, he would have walked away rather than continue a conversation with the man. Brad stayed right where he was, waiting for more information.
“Doing what?” Jack asked, clearly just as shocked as Brad.
“Nothing important, really,” Neal admitted. “I mostly did what I do now. Fetch and carry for the bigwigs.” He gave a small laugh and then his face grew serious again. “But when people started dying off, I sort of got on the fast track. Ended up working with the FBI.”
“No way,” Vance said with a laugh.
Brad could see the other man’s disbelief. Neal was a pretty small guy. He might have been an obvious choice for government work, but he was certainly no one’s first choice for FBI.
“There was a lot of panic,” Neal went on. “No one in the department or any other branch of the government knew what to do. The possibility of an EMP was mooted pretty early on—I mean, when you have a piece of rogue technology infecting millions, it was bound to be brought up—but the idea kept getting shot down because people thought it would do more harm than good.”
He paused and pushed his hand through his hair. “Then, things got even more complicated. The military was splitting, along with the government. They were dividing into two factions that wanted very different things.”
“Why haven’t you said any of this before?” Charlie asked.
Neal shrugged. “What would be the point? I can’t do anything about how any of it happened. And I don’t know much,” he went on. “I just know that the side that didn’t want the EMP eventually died off. And now, here we are. With nothing.”
The bitterness in the man’s voice made it clear what side Neal had been on.
In the tense silence that followed that statement, Brad’s thoughts turned to Sammy and Martha again. Wherever they were, even if they weren’t starving, they had to be freezing cold and miserable.
His mind was made up. He was going to talk to the Major tomorrow. And he’d be heard, come hell or high water. It was time to end the farce. Either the man was going to help him or he wasn’t and Brad needed to know what to plan for.
Chapter 15
By the next morning, a warm front had come through, bringing a heavy rain with it. The plus side was that it had washed most of the snow away. The downside was that there would inevitably be ice once the temperature dropped again.
Deciding to enjoy the nearly forty-degree weather while he could, Brad took a leisurely walk over to the cow pen. The injured cow was doing better; the redness and swelling was completely gone. He rubbed her nose one more time and then headed for the breakfast hall. He’d need all the fortification he could get if he was going to face the soldiers again today.
Finding the hall to be oddly quiet, Brad wondered if everyone was out enjoying the semi-warm weather and ignoring breakfast. To his surprise, when he pulled the door open, everyone in the facility was there, they were all just dead quiet. It seemed like the entire room was holding its breath. Brad stopped just inside the door.
Major Walker walked to the center of the room and Brad’s muscles tensed. What the hell was going on here? The Major held up his hands and smiled.
The silence deepened, somehow. It became almost reverent, but Brad could feel the undercurrent. He’d felt it before. It was fear. Fear that the residents of the facility were trying fairly successfully to hide. Brad might not have recognized it if he hadn’t seen the Family in action.
“I have an announcement for you all,” the Major said, his voice loud and extremely cheerful. “Today is Thanksgiving! What do you people say to a little celebration? I say it’s been too damn long!”
Cheers erupted in the room. The residents clapped and families hugged one another.
Brad stood by the door, wondering just why the hell the holiday mattered. Then, he sighed as Sammy’s birthday party flashed through his mind. It mattered. It mattered to these people. And, his intuition whispered, it was a benevolent distraction. With the food stores he had piled up, it wouldn’t hurt Walker one bit to have a dinner party and it would help make him look really good.
Walker raised his hands again and the noise died immediately. “We’ll have our celebration tonight,” he went on. “The list of assigned duties is posted by the door. Please finish your meal and get started as quickly as possible so that we can all have a good holiday!”
Brad stepped forward, determined to take his chance while he could, but a few families hurried up and began thanking the Major. He shook a few hands, smiling and chatting amicably. Brad continued to edge forward, trying to work his way to the front of the group. Major Walker turned suddenly and met Brad’s eyes. Then, he turned away and walked out the door.
“Damn it,” Brad muttered under his breath. “What the hell, Walker?”
Luckily, the other residents were milling around and talking so excitedly that they hadn’t heard him talking to himself. Another plus side occurred to Brad at that thought: it would be the perfect time to talk without being heard. If Major Walker wouldn’t help him find Anna, he’d get people on his own. Jack had promised some help and he’d become pretty good friends with Vance. Surely they could work out some time when they were all free.
He walked over and checked the list, hoping that he’d be paired up with Vance. He ran his finger down until he reached his name. He was on the hunting crew again, which didn’t surprise him. The added instructions to look for a turkey didn’t surprise him either. What else was he supposed to look for on Thanksgiving? A water buffalo? Skimming down the list, he was annoyed to see that Vance had been assigned on-site duties. He’d have to try and talk to him at dinner.
After he’d eaten his bowl of oatmeal—which was hard to gag down without any brown sugar or flavor whatsoever—Brad joined the group heading out to hunt. He would be the only civilian on this particular trip, it seemed. Brad didn’t know whether that meant that the Major had decided that he needed closer supervision or if he’d simply picked the men most likely to bring back some game. The other soldiers were good shots; he’d been out with each of them before. All he could do was keep his guard up, which was exactly what he planned to do.
He got into the back of the truck and settled in.
“If you’ll get me a kit, I’ll clean the guns while you drive,” he offered, and one of the soldiers handed him the kit.
The guy didn’t offer any thanks, but Brad decided to let it go. Even if he was holding a gun, it probably wasn’t the best time for a lecture on manners. The three soldiers all crowded into the front seat, leaving Brad in the back by himself, which suited him perfectly.
He listened idly to the soldiers’ conversation. From what he could tell, they were making bets about extra rations for the person who got managed to get a turkey. Brad assumed that the offer didn’t extend to him.
Once they came to a stop just outside a densely-wooded area, Brad took his rifle, handed the newly cleaned guns back to the other men, and headed off. He’d known from his calendar that today was Thanksgiving, of course. He just hadn’t given a shit.
Holidays had never been a big deal in Brad’s home. Lee hadn’t seen the point of them. Other than the birthday present he always got for Brad, he preferred to spend his money on prepping for the end of the world. At Christmas, Brad might get a cheap toy or a new jacket.
His mother might have wanted to do more, but she didn’t have the funds and she wasn’t one to sit around and mope about what she couldn’t do. Brad usually got given a quilt at Christmas and his mom usually managed to scrape together enough money for a big dinner at Easter, his birthday, and Thanksgiving.
Of course,
big was a relative term. They’d usually just had a turkey breast instead of a whole turkey since it was just the two of them, and his mother shopped the sales for weeks leading up to the holiday, piecing the dinner together over time.
He wondered absently if there was any canned cranberry sauce in that pantry. Thanksgiving—whether it was now a pointless celebration or not—wouldn’t be the same without canned cranberry sauce. One of the women he’d briefly dated right before his mother had gotten sick had brought homemade cranberry sauce as her contribution to Thanksgiving dinner one year. Brad hadn’t been able to eat it, even though he’d tried really hard, and the relationship had fizzled out not long after. It probably wasn’t entirely the fault of the cranberry sauce, but it was much easier to let the blame rest there.
As he walked deeper into the woods, Brad couldn’t help but wonder what Anna would have prepared for their Thanksgiving dinner. There was no way that she would have let the holiday pass her by. She probably would have started planning sometime around the end of October.
She for damn sure would have had him out looking for a turkey well before the day of the holiday, too. She’d always been the type that wanted to mark occasions. He thought back to what she’d said about her birthday party, the words flashing through his mind with painful accuracy. He missed her voice so much.
“We hid under the table. They never even noticed we were gone.”
In the moment, he’d been so happy that Anna was opening up to him that he hadn’t really realized how weird that statement was. Why were she and her sister, who were supposed to be the guests of honor, being ignored that way? Why wouldn’t they have been the center of attention?
Brad’s birthdays might have been a little meager by modern standards, but he’d been the most important person in the house during them, no matter what. Maybe that was why Anna had spent so much on Sammy’s birthdays. She hadn’t ever wanted him to feel as forgotten as she had.
Lost in painful thoughts, Brad had walked a lot further off of the trail than he’d meant to. He stopped to get his bearings and get himself back closer to the trail. Then, he heard something off to his left. He held his breath and listened for another moment and then he eased forward, being as careful as he could not to make any noise. He knew that sound.
When he carefully leaned out from behind a tree, he had to bite his lip to keep from exclaiming in excitement. It was a huge, beautiful, wild goddam turkey. It looked like it had walked right out of the pages of a hunting magazine.
Silently, Brad raised the gun to his shoulder and squeezed the trigger. A perfect shot.
He walked over to the fallen animal and picked it up.
“Sorry buddy,” he said. “But you’re about to make a whole lot of people really happy.”
Like he’d expected, as he was carrying the bird back, the soldiers were making their way to him. They stopped and stared. Brad took a second to relish the moment. Usually, the soldiers he encountered looked at him with either disdain or annoyance.
“God, it has to weigh twenty pounds,” one of them said.
“I’d say about twenty-five,” Brad corrected, handing his gun over. He was never allowed to keep it for long. “It should be no problem to feed everyone with it.”
“Damn straight,” Mason said with a grin that didn’t even try to conceal his excitement. “Good job, man.”
Brad considered the soldier’s praise a Thanksgiving miracle. “No problem,” he said, taking his prize into the back of the truck with him and bundling up in a blanket for the long ride back.
Chapter 16
Brad had been granted the rest of the day off as thanks for his hunting prowess, further confirming his theory that days off were rewarded for things that benefited the soldiers more so than the citizens. At a loose end, he went next door to Jack and Charlie’s place. Jack was out, in the vehicle store, and Charlie was working on lesson plans, so Brad offered to take Remington out for some exercise.
Out in the yard, he tossed one of the tennis balls he’d found in the closet of his apartment and Remy was after it like a shot, diving for it and grabbing it before it had a chance to bounce. He came running back at Brad with the ball in his mouth, grinning from ear to floppy ear.
They played until he heard the dinner bell ring. Remy looked toward the sound, his tail wagging; the only thing the dog loved more than fetch was food. Brad scratched him between the ears and snagged the ball while he was distracted. Charlie came out of her apartment a moment later, her coat hanging open.
“It’s so nice out here,” she said with a smile. “It’s great not to have to put on so many layers just to be able to go outside!” She patted Remy’s head and looked up at Brad. “Did you boys have a good time?” she asked, her voice light and teasing.
“We sure did,” Brad confirmed. “I don’t think he ever gets tired, though.”
“I don’t think he does either,” Charlie said with a laugh. “But thanks for trying to wear him out, at least.”
“No problem. Want to walk down to dinner with me? Jack will probably already be there.”
“Sounds lovely,” she said, looping her arm through his after she threaded a bit of rope through Remy’s collar. “Let’s go get some of that turkey!”
Remington’s ears perked up. Turkey was apparently one of the words in his vocabulary. Brad smiled and they headed for the dining hall.
Knives and forks clanked against plates as people milled around, talking and laughing while they waited in line. Brad and Charlie had run into Jack at the door and they’d already received their plates, having been some of the first people to be served. Brad’s mouth watered just looking at the canned cranberry sauce on his plate, but he held back from diving in. They had all been told that Major Walker had planned a few remarks. Brad hoped that he made them before the food got cold.
When all of the residents were finally in their seats, Major Walker stood up. The room fell into that deep silence again. Brad looked at the man, waiting to see what he would say.
“Isn’t it amazing that we’ve gotten this far?” the Major asked with a smile.
The crowd all either nodded or called out some type of affirmative.
“I never thought that I’d celebrate another Thanksgiving again,” he went on.
Brad forced himself not to roll his eyes. Sloppy sentiment. That’s all this was. He understood the crowd psychology too well for it to work on him, but everyone else seemed to be hanging onto the Major’s every word.
“It’s thanks to you and all of your hard work that we are where we are today,” Walker said. “We never would have been able to eat as well if it wasn’t for our hunting crew.”
Lie number one, Brad counted to himself. With those stores of food, they didn’t need to hunt at all through the winter.
“We wouldn’t survive if it wasn’t for the soldiers who put their lives on the line every single day to keep us safe,” Walker continued.
Lie number two, Brad thought even as the dining hall erupted into cheers.
It seemed downright un-American not to cheer when someone complimented a member of the military, but Brad held back. Walker’s praise didn’t make a damn bit of sense. What were the soldiers protecting them from on a daily basis, anyway?
No one had attacked them. There were no real threats that he’d seen, other than the one random coyote attack. And the soldiers hadn’t even acted fast enough to deal with that. He and Ben had handled the whole thing perfectly well and it would have been over even faster if they’d been allowed the same firearm use that the soldiers had.
There had obviously been some kind of danger in Bangor, but nothing had happened here in the whole time Brad had been there. It had obviously been that way for a long time; the people here seemed to think that the bad times were all behind them.
“All of you, by performing your duties diligently and not questioning them, have helped keep this facility safe for us all.”
Brad tilted his head, replaying that phrasing in his
mind. “Performing your duties and not questioning them.” Caleb had been right, then. “Nobody asks questions.”
“I just want to thank you for the things you’ve made possible,” Walker went on, lifting a glass. “I wish I had something better to toast you with,” he said with a self-deprecating smile. “But I’m afraid water is all we have.”
Lie number three, Brad counted as he held up his water glass to join in a toast that he didn’t believe a word of.
“To survival!” Walker said.
“To survival!” the group chorused back.
Brad didn’t bother to join in. Instead, he kept his eyes steady on the Major as he took a sip of his water.
“I won’t keep you from your food any longer,” the Major said. “Happy Thanksgiving!”
The noise level in the dining hall rose as everyone began to chat while they ate. Brad took a bite of his portion of turkey. It wasn’t great, but it was good. The cranberry sauce, however, tasted like cranberry sauce always had and always would. Apocalypse or not.
He hadn’t realized that he was frowning in the direction of the Major, who was sitting at a table in the corner with the soldiers. His back was to them.
“Hey,” Charlie said, poking him. “You okay?”
“Yeah, sure. Why?”
“I don’t know. You look awfully serious,” Charlie said with a smile. “What’s going on?”
“I haven’t been able to get in to see the Major,” he said after a pause. There was no point pussyfooting around it. There would never be a good time, since they might not all work together again soon and since Neal lived right next door to Brad. Right now, the Major’s right-hand man was at the table with him. This was Brad’s best shot.
“And I’m tired of waiting,” he continued bluntly. “I’m wondered if any of you would be interested in going out on a search mission with me on a day we all have time.”
