Sol Survivors

by Ken Benton

  “That’s absolutely correct.”

  “But,” Sammy continued, “you also used the term ‘standard of morality.’ This implies the word has a universally accepted definition.”

  “Morality?” Mick asked.

  “Yes.”

  “I think most people know what it means, yes.”

  “Aha!” Sammy said. “You expect everyone to have the same definition!”

  “Definition of the term is not the same as application. Everyone knows what the word personality means, too. But everyone does not have the same personality. You’re just trying to be argumentative.”

  “But there are universally accepted standards of morality, don’t you think? For things like theft and murder?”

  “No, not necessarily.” Mick paused. “Say, for example, a hardened criminal who murders liquor store clerks during robberies to eliminate the witness, but if you ask him if he would murder his mother in order to steal her necklace he looks at you and says, ‘what kind of monster do you think I am?’”

  Sammy chuckled. “You think you have a point there, but I say your hypothetical hardened criminal knows what he is doing is fundamentally wrong, both in the stealing and in the murdering. And there’s no way anyone, even you, perhaps even your hypothetical hardened criminal, would honestly support a social policy of tolerance for people whose personal standard of morality allows murder for theft purposes.”

  “Only for reasons of social functioning,” Mick said. “Whether everyone has a conscience about such things is debatable. We’re venturing off into another topic here. What does any of this have to do with Jill?”

  “It has to do with her because I believe that you, along with everyone who has normal brain functionality, acknowledge the general foolhardiness of picking up hitchhikers in the current national crisis. You’re the one who was telling me about the rioting yesterday and how we should get out of the city. But as soon as a pretty blonde girl shows up outside your window needing a ride, you go all soft and lovesick on me, and then blame it on me saying I was the one being too soft. When I call you on it, instead of fessing up you give me a bunch of morality crap about helping an obvious stranded motorist, inferring that if I didn’t let her in I have a lower standard of morals. It seems to me that your standard is prone to change on a whim. You may be more of a moderate than you like to think you are.”

  “Well … she was someone who needed help which we were in an obvious position to provide.”

  “So is this guy,” Sammy said more than a little aggravated, pointing to a man in a dark helmet standing on the shoulder of the interstate ahead, next to a motorcycle with his thumb out. “I guess we better stop and help him, too, since we are in an obvious position to.” He changed lanes and slowed.

  “Um,” Mick began to say. “You’re not really going to…”

  “Why not? If we are to maintain our standard of morality.” Sammy stopped the truck on the shoulder a few yards before the hitchhiker.

  “Sammy, rescuing a sick pregnant woman is quite a different thing than picking up Darth Vader.”

  * * *

  To Roller’s delight and amusement, a white double-cab mini-truck with two young men inside pulled over to him from the fast lane. He pushed open his helmet shield to approach them.

  The passenger, a straight-laced type, rolled his window down. But it was the driver, a cooler-looking dude with curly black hair, who spoke.

  “Tire blow-out?”

  “Yeah,” Roller said glancing at the bike. “Damn near lost control of it, too. Thanks for stopping.”

  The driver motioned to the truck bed. “We could lift it in and drop you at a service station or something.”

  “Nah.” Roller shook his head. “Engine blew, too. I hate to leave her, but she’s dead.”

  “Oh. Sorry. Well, you want to jump in the back and we’ll take you to the next town? Don’t think they are writing tickets for small stuff today.”

  “The back?” Roller looked at the bed and then the stuffed back seat. “I, uh, would rather get out of the sun. If you really want to help, maybe I could squish myself in the back seat? I’d appreciate it, man.”

  “Yeah, all right.”

  “Thanks.” Roller took his helmet off and reached for the door handle. It was locked.

  That’s when the passenger jumped out of the front seat.

  “Tell you what,” the passenger said. “I’m smaller. I’ll squish there. You can sit up here.”

  Roller hesitated, but agreed. In a few seconds they were on the road.

  “I’m Sammy and that’s Mick,” the driver said. “Sorry about your bike.”

  “Roland,” Roller replied. “Yeah, it’s a shame.”

  Some clothes pushed over the driver’s seat as a result of Mick’s back seat rustling and ended up on Sammy’s neck.

  “Hey, take it easy back there,” Sammy said.

  Roller turned in time to see Mick retrieving a weapon from the bottom of a pile.

  He turned forward again. “Sawed-off shotgun, huh? If you’re planning on robbing me, you’re going to be disappointed when you see how much money I have.”

  “Oh,” Mick’s voice replied, forcing a laugh. “I’m just moving stuff around. That’s not even mine.”

  “It’s actually my boss’s” Sammy said. “We’re good guys.”

  “It’s cool,” Roller said. “I’m used to it. Thanks for the lift, anyway.”

  “What do you mean? Used to what?”

  “Oh, you know. People like you guys thinking I’m an axe murderer because of the way I look. Just don’t poke me in the back through the seat with that thing, please.”

  “Hey, man.” Sammy shook his head. “It ain’t like that. He’s only moving crap around back there trying to get comfortable. I’m a car salesman. I deal with all kinds of people every day and never judge anyone by appearances. Besides, you don’t even look that bad.” Nervous chuckle.

  “Car salesman, huh? Both of you?”

  “No, just me. Mick there has some kind of meaningless desk job.” Roller noticed Sammy eyeing the rear view mirror with a mischievous grin.

  “I guess you guys are all right,” Roller said. “Where you headed?”

  “To my boss’s second home near Knoxville. You?”

  Roller felt for his cigarette pack. “I was following some friends. They were headed that way, too. I don’t even have the directions.”

  “So you don’t know where you were going?”

  Roller forced a laugh. “I guess not. Some chance we’ll catch them. I haven’t been stranded long, and they don’t drive very fast. I stopped in Roanoke to find cigarettes. You guys smoke?”

  “No,” both replied in unison.

  Roller decided to leave his smokes in his pocket.

  “So your friends are up ahead on this highway?” Sammy asked. “Southbound Interstate 81?”

  “Yes. They’re up here somewhere.”

  “Well,” Sammy said—and with that he sped up.

  “You gonna try to catch them for me?” Roller asked.

  “I’ll give it a shot, if they drive slow as you say. I don’t mind doing about eighty, or a bit more. Like I said, I don’t think they’re giving tickets for small stuff today.”

  “Solid, man. Thanks.”

  * * *

  The presence of the new hitchhiker started to bother Sammy. Something about his mannerisms triggered an uneasy suspicion after a while. During conversation he was okay. It’s when the talk stopped that he did too much nosing around for Sammy’s taste, checking out every little detail in the truck and turning to see Mick often, as if to stay apprised of his position.

  The talk had stopped for an uncomfortably long time now.

  What in creation had Sammy gotten them into? He suddenly hoped Mick was actually keeping the shotgun at the ready. Was Sammy really supposed to keep speeding in an effort to catch some cryptic car that might be ahead somewhere? At what point would giving up and driving the speed limit be reasonable
?

  The next thing Roland did caused Sammy to involuntarily let off the gas. He had the crudeness and audacity to open the glove box and poke around inside.

  “This the car dealer you work at?” Roland asked looking at a brochure.

  “Yeah. That’s it.”

  Roland’s voice abruptly changed.

  “Holy fucking shit.”

  “What is it?” Sammy responded. He eased off the gas even more, and moved into the slow lane.

  “This is your boss here in the picture with you, right?”

  “Um … yeah, I think.”

  “McConnell Motors. Hot damn!”

  “What about it?” Sammy asked.

  “Oh. I bought a car from him once. In DC, right?”

  “Yes,” Sammy said trying to hide the relief in his voice.

  The relief didn’t last. Roland went back to the glove box and rifled through it as if he were on a mission. He then checked all around the car seat, the door compartment, and finally opened the center console.

  “Something I can help you find, man?” Sammy asked.

  The look Roland returned him for a nanosecond was frightening. In that brief moment Sammy understood Roland was not a person to be messed with. The situation had just gotten delicate and tricky.

  Roland then took the folded note with Joel’s directions from Sammy’s cup holder and opened it.

  Sammy hesitated to respond, mostly out of a state of alarm. Roland only stared at the note. Finally, Sammy worked up the nerve to put his hand out.

  “Don’t lose that, please. I need it.”

  Roland held it another twenty seconds before surrendering it with a devilish smirk.

  That’s when Sammy noticed an unnatural bulge in the front of Roland’s pants. He looked away quickly to see the speedometer was now reading 60.

  “I guess I’ve slowed down, sorry.”

  “That’s all right,” Roland said first turning at Mick, then pointing to the side of the road. “In fact, pull over, will you? I need to take a piss.”

  Mick spoke. “There’s a truck stop at the next exit, in less than a mile.”

  “No!” Roland retorted. “Stop right here.”

  Sammy frowned at him.

  Roland gave him a fake smile. “It’s kind of an emergency, man.”

  Sammy slowed. Roland turned steel eyes to focus on Mick in the back seat, his left hand slipping under his shirt towards the bulge in his pants.

  Sammy hit the gas.

  “Hey!” Roland shouted.

  “Sorry,” Sammy said. “There’s an army Humvee coming up on my tail fast.”

  Roland’s left hand reappeared as he checked the outside mirror. “So just let them go by, dude.”

  “No,” Sammy said. “I need to pee, too. You can hold it for a half a mile.”

  Roland didn’t reply and Sammy refused to look back at him. Whatever happened now happened, but Sammy made sure he stayed in front of the Humvee until he reached Radford Travel Center. It was the longest half-mile he ever drove.

  Once there, Sammy didn’t go where two soldiers directing traffic told him to. Instead, he headed for the commercial truck pumps, ignoring the ensuing shouts outside, making a beeline to a spot where several additional soldiers who looked to be in charge stood. Two of them unshouldered rifles and held them at the ready in reaction to Sammy’s chaotic arrival.

  Sammy rolled his window down.

  “Can’t you follow directions?” the one of them who was unarmed said, taking an unlit cigar out of his mouth. “You can’t pull up here, and there’s no gas pumping. Go around the back if you are stopping.”

  “We aren’t stopping,” Sammy said. “We’re just dropping off a hitchhiker.” He turned to face Roland now, to encounter a fearsome glare.

  Sammy made an obvious motion of staring at Roland’s groin, keeping his own expression of stone.

  “Trouble here?” The soldier with the cigar asked. He leaned forward into the window.

  “Not as long as this hitchhiker gets out,” Sammy answered. “This is as far as we take him.”

  Roland glanced out the windshield, opened the door, grabbed his helmet from the floor, and mumbled something that included the words soon and assholes before leaving the vehicle, slightly slamming the door to punctuate his exit.

  One minute later, Mick again occupied the passenger seat as the two of them continued southwest on Interstate 81.

  “I made a seriously bad decision back there,” Sammy confessed. He expected Mick to agree and chide him. Instead, he offered a measure of encouragement.

  “At least you corrected it with a seriously good decision. I figured we’d ditch him when he was peeing in the bushes.”

  Sammy shook his head. “I spotted an object bulging in his pants. If I pulled over where he said, I don’t think he was going to the bushes. Most likely, I would have ended up in them—and you, too, if you were lucky.”

  “What do you mean lucky?”

  “I mean to still be alive,” Sammy said. “If that guy wanted to carjack us, the logical course of action would be to first shoot the one with the shotgun in the back seat, then order the driver out of the car.”

  “I wasn’t holding the shotgun. He kept checking on me. So he could have just pointed his gun at me and told us both to get out. But, like you said, that would be the lucky result. Thank God the army vehicle appeared when it did. You really came through under pressure there, man. Way to think on your feet.”

  “Thanks. Though I was kind of hoping you would be quick with the shotgun as a backup plan.”

  “Sorry to disappoint. I wasn’t privy to all the information you were.”

  “Would that have made a difference?”

  “Not sure. His eyes were everywhere. It would have been difficult.”

  “You ever even fire a gun before?” Sammy asked.

  “No. You?”

  “No. But I think it may be time to learn.”

  Chapter Fourteen

  Washington, DC

  “Mr. President,” Chief Justice Wallace said, “a case in this court takes weeks, oftentimes months, to decide. You cannot, in all earnestness, expect us to make a snap ruling.”

  The President frowned. “This isn’t a case, so there is no ruling. I am simply asking for advisement before I act.”

  Associate Justice Janet Peterman swiveled in her chair and bit the end of her pen as the unanticipated scene played out in front of her, here in the well-lit room temporarily being used as a court chamber somewhere in the vast underground bunker.

  “No,” one of the liberal justices replied. “You are obviously making an inappropriate attempt at covering your ass.”

  “Covering my ass how?” the President snapped back. “Only a fool undertakes a complicated project without first consulting an expert. Why is this inappropriate?”

  “It is a complete breach of protocol, sir. Our purpose is not to approve decisions or authorize actions, but to review individual cases to interpret and define constitutional law as applicable in those cases, in order to set legal precedents.”

  “And all I am asking for is your interpretation,” the President said. “Is this really so out of line, especially under the current circumstances of a national emergency? You people are the highest legal authority in the country. Heck, I appointed one of you.” He glanced at Janet…

  “And if it were up it me,” the President continued, “I would reappoint every one of you, hard to believe as that may sound to some. So how about returning the favor? I must tell you I read this Article 2, Section 2, Clause 1 statement twenty times this morning. All it says, as far as I can see, is that I am in charge of the armed forces. It does not spell out that I have power to institute a state of complete military control among the civilian population, as the constitution appears to do for Congress in Article 1, Section 8, Clause 15. Congress has never used this power, but a President once has, and his actions were apparently vindicated by this court under the Article 2 clause. I want to know i
f that legal precedent still flies.”

  Chief Justice Wallace responded. “Mr. President, as you correctly pointed out, this court has in the past interpreted the clause you referenced as giving the President the same authority as Congress in regards to declaring martial law.”

  “In the past,” the President said. “A quite distant past. How does this court today interpret the clause? Sure, Lincoln got away with it. The country was a lot smaller then, and he only had half of it under his control when he made the declaration. Hell, it was an outright civil rebellion he had on his hands, and even then Congress nitpicked his declaration to death when ratifying it, resulting in further dissention in Congress itself. You are all well aware of the degree of political sectarianism dividing our country today. Some say we have our own civil war on our hands. I get lambasted for every little thing, no matter which way I decide. So I just want you nine people to tell me today, based on your current understanding and your own personal interpretation, whether you believe the President actually has this authority under the Constitution of the United States of America.”

  “Why don’t you ask Congress, if you don’t have the courage to order it yourself?” another of the liberal justices asked.

  The President replied calmly but pointedly. “I’m trying to save lives. I don’t know if you fully realize what’s happening out there. Our fastest Air Force jets have returned from reconnaissance flights all around the world, and report that the scope of the power grid destruction is nearly global. Looting, robbery, murder, and rioting have erupted in every major city. Backup power supplies will soon be exhausted for medical facilities, resulting in tens of thousands of additional deaths. Food transportation has come to a standstill, so we are effectively facing conditions of famine. Ordinary citizens are finding themselves at the mercy of thugs, swindlers, and gang leaders. Others who are more prepared are being forced into gunfights to protect their families while trying to survive the crisis. Innocent people are dying.”

  The President turned to the Chief Justice. “So I am asking you, Chief Justice Wallace, if no one else than you alone, as a personal favor, to give me your opinion on the matter.”