Crisis Event: Jagged White Line (8 page)

Since Sadie was outside Blakely didn’t need to hold back. He fired on motion, at the first target that appeared—an old man with a revolver who’d stepped in from a bedroom door to the left. Blakely snapped a shot off before the old man could react, and the man jumped back quicker than Blakely would have thought he could, considering he now had a bullet in his right shoulder and blood rapidly soaking his white shirt.

“God will destroy you!” the old man roared from somewhere behind the wall, and then he fired his revolver.

Blakely saw a hole appear in the wall and heard the bullet come through and smash harmlessly into the corner of the walls near the front door.

Even through the crackle of burning drapes and rugs, and the flaming couch next to the overturned coffee table, Blakely could hear and feel the old man’s footsteps pounding over the hardwood floors. Blakely went to the door set into the wall in front of  him. The door was to the far right of the front room, and led into a hallway, Blakely guessed. He thought the house’s floor plan would probably let you run a circular lap through it if you wanted, and that the stairway would be at the center of the house, on the other side of the door or not far from it.

He shoved the door open and stepped through and took satisfaction in being right about the hallway beyond the door. It may have been a big old farmhouse, but it had been built like every other old farmhouse he’d ever been inside.

To his left was a door Blakely guessed led down to a cellar. Next to it was another door, this one to a bathroom. Straight ahead the hallway made an L. He could go  through to a  guest bedroom or an office or a parlor, Blakely guessed, or turn left and head to the kitchen and a dining room.

He turned left, and his foot came down on a warped board that creaked. The old man stepped into the doorway.

“I rebuke thee in the name of the Lord!” he shrieked, then ran toward Blakely, squeezing off three quick shots, one of which whizzed by Blakely’s ear. When the old man got halfway down the hall he ducked through an arched opening and into darkness. Blakely guessed the arch led to the dining room.

Blakely charged after the old man and turned the corner in time to see the silhouette of the old man staggering around a dining room table, having to put a hand on the dining room table to keep from toppling over. At the center of the table, a dimly burning lantern flickered, casting twisted shadows on the walls. Beyond the rear storm door hung open. Next to it, Sadie’s rifle leaned against the wall.

Next to the rifle barrel, a hand was reaching into the house from outside, going for the gun.

“My God,” the old man shrieked as he staggered toward the door. “How have I offended thee?”

Blakely stopped, took aim, and fired.

Chapter 9

Sadie was relieved to find her backpack sitting where she'd taken it off, next to her dirty clothes, which were in a pile beside the old man's coveralls. She was also relieved that Noah and his young wife had left the heavy wooden door open and the glass storm door unlocked.

She snatched up her pack up and put it on. Then she gathered her clothes and respirator and got ready to run. The sound of gunshots stopped her and she looked through the storm door.

In the dim lamplight, she could see the outline of a rifle barrel leaning against the wall. She wasn’t certain it was hers, but the sight at the muzzle looked familiar. On impulse she reached out and pushed the latch and pulled the storm door open.

As her hand snaked through the gap between the door and the doorframe, Noah staggered into the dining room. His eyes rolled left and right, like a frightened horse. Dark blood poured down his checkered shirt from a hole beneath his collarbone.

Noah staggered around the dining table toward Sadie. A second later Blakely appeared behind him, his respirator over his face but his demeanor and stance telling her exactly who he was.

The shock of seeing Blakely alive stopped her. Her hand remained poised to grab her rifle as she tried to process the feelings of relief and surprise.

The old man said something, and then Blakely’s pistol roared and the old man’s head became misshapen and odd in the instant before the slug tore through the other side of his skull. Chunks of brain and bone hurled toward Sadie, and a slower red mist followed, splattering the dining room table and spraying a fan of blood against the glass storm door.

The sight of Noah’s head exploding sent Sadie into action. She grabbed her rifle and pulled it to her. She’d already stepped back from the door and was getting ready to run when Madelyn pounded down the stairwell, screaming. She had the pistol in her hand again, and she fired as she ran at Sadie.

The storm door glass exploded, sending glass shards jittering across the porch. Tiny slivers of glass sprayed against Sadie’s bare skin, stinging her.

Without thought or planning, Blakely shoved his hand between the balusters and caught Madelyn’s foot. She tripped and fell forward, sprawling onto the hardwood floor. The pistol slid across the hardwood and smacked into the storm door frame.

Blakely stepped forward and pointed his pistol at the back of her head.

Sadie shouted “Don’t!”

Madelyn tried to crawl forward. Her arm stretched for the pistol.

Sadie reached through the shattered glass and picked it up.

“Not loaded, huh?” Sadie said.

“Why’d you do it?” Madelyn wailed. “I was nice to you. You could’ve been happy here. And safe.”

“If being raped everyday is your idea of safe, no thanks.”

“Much as I’d like to hear this conversation,” Blakely said as he reached through the storm door to take the pistol from Sadie, “We got a fire going at the front of the house and two or more unfriendlies on the way. Not to mention a girl to track down.”

Sadie looked up at Blakely. The surprise and relief she’d felt when she saw him alive gave way to aggravation. He was staring at her, his eyes bouncing up and down from her breasts to her crotch then back again. Finally he noticed her watching him and managed to look at her eyes.

“Sorry,” he mumbled, and dropped his gaze to Madelyn, who had pulled herself up to her knees.

Sadie turned and shrugged off her pack and pulled her clothes on. Then she walked out into the dusty back yard. When Blakely came outside a few seconds later she said, “I want my ammo back.”

He thought about it for a few seconds before nodding.

“Fair enough,” he said, and pulled off his backpack. He dug into a side pocket and pulled out a single rifle round. Then he dug a pistol round out of another side pocket. He held them out to her and watched her closely as she stepped up close enough to take them.

She’d cleaned up nicely from the bath, despite the roll she’d taken in the dust. Her face was still mostly clear of ash. She was pretty.

“Two bullets?” Sadie said. “Thanks a freaking buttload.”

“Only if you promise to see this through and not run away until we get that Geiger counter,” Blakely said as she took the bullets.

Sadie laughed.

“What good is my word at the end of the world?”

“You’re honest,” Blakely said. “I can tell. It might be the death of you, but you’ll stay honest.”

Madelyn came outside and stood on the porch.

“Watch her, will you,” Blakely said, and Sadie nodded. Then he took off, disappearing around the corner of the house.

Madelyn wrapped her arms around her chest.

“What do I do now?” she asked. “What’s going to happen to me?”

“I don’t know,” Sadie said. “Salvage whatever you can here and move on. Go to Shanksborough. They’ll take you in. It’s only six or seven miles. At least you won’t get raped there..”

By the time Blakely returned the fire had spread upstairs and the old house was beginning to crackle and creak and groan. Windows were shattering.

“Come on,” Blakely said as Sadie finished putting on her boots. He had a walkie talkie in his hand. “They’ll be here soon and I don’t want to have to kill them.”

Blakely tossed the walkie-talkie to Madelyn, who caught it and stared at it as the orange light of the burning house flickered over her face.

“You tell ‘em Samuel’s tied up out in the field four hundred meters north, and they better get him fast. He’s shot.”

“He’s shot?” Madelyn wailed, stepping off the porch.

“Not bad,” Blakely said, “But you better get him help. And you better not come after me or I’ll kill every last one of you.”

Madelyn wasn’t listening. She ran into the burning house and when she came out half a minute later she had a flashlight in one hand and the walkie talkie in the other. She didn’t pause or look at Blakely or Sadie. Instead she ran off into the darkness, following the beam of her flashlight, and calling for someone named “Sarah” over the walkie-talkie.

“Let’s go,” Blakely said, and handed her a pair of night vision goggles. “We got about an hour till morning. We need to catch this girl today.”

Sadie nodded and followed him away from the burning house, out into the darkness.

Chapter 10

    “We ought to scout it before we go in,” Sadie said as she looked through the binoculars. “Find out more.”

    They were on the second floor of a wrecked two-story house, examining what remained of Steubenville. The homes in the suburbs were abandoned. They had mostly collapsed or burned or been covered over in such a heavy layer of dust and ash they were no longer safe. Sadie didn’t want to think about where the people who’d lived in them had gone. She guessed things hadn’t been much different here than they had in Boston, when government collapsed and cops walked away and everyone realized they were on their own.

Out in the distance, on the road leading into downtown Steubenville, there were now a pair overturned tractor trailers set up to block anyone from passing. Painted in white letters across the tops of the trailers were the words: “No Black Feasters.”

The blockage was at a fork where a small road split off to the north and the main road continued east to the river. Chain link fence panels stretched away from the trailers, reinforced by a wall of cars that had been flipped on their sides and placed bumper to bumper so that they formed a slowly curving arc. In both directions the wall stretched away toward the curving river, which formed a “C” that surrounded two thirds of the city. Guards paced the fence at four hundred meter intervals.

    Sadie followed the fence with her binoculars, studying the chain link panels and the upended cars behind them. She liked the way the people in this town had incorporated abandoned houses in the neighborhoods surrounding the downtown area into their wall. It gave guards a place to sleep between shifts.

    Then she saw the heads.

    Hundreds of them, hanging on strands of rope or wire affixed to the top of the fence. They were hanging at all heights along the chain link, forming a kind of asymmetrical sculpture of butchery.

    “What the hell?” she said.

    The heads were from men, and all of them black, their faces preserved and dried, their mouths and eyes all open as if some taxidermist had tried to make them appear as terrifying as possible.

    “Psy-ops,” Blakely said. “Very effective.”

After her initial shock, Sadie continued scanning and saw something she hadn’t expected to see again: working video cameras. The cameras had been mounted on poles, as had makeshift wind turbines fashioned out of galvanized metal and aluminum—whatever parts the people could scrounge for the purpose. They’d built a full-on surveillance system powered by renewable energy—and coal. The black smoke staining the gray sky down by the river told her where most of their electricity was coming from.

    “What’s a little pollution among friends,” Sadie said.

    “Just using what they got,” Blakely said.

Sadie frowned. The people here had been thorough. She couldn’t see anyone besides guards inside, but there were a lot of them, moving in pairs up and down the streets.

“Damn smart,” Blakely said. “Using the river to protect their backs and flanks.”

“You sound like you admire them,” Sadie said.

“How long you think this fence would hold up a force like mine?” Blakely asked.

“A few minutes,” Sadie said.

“Maybe less,” he said. “But it’d be enough. They’ve probably got a counterattack plan with snipers and good ol’ boy sharpshooters ready. Guarantee you they’ve got IEDs and booby traps. It’s what I’d do.”

“So you’d hang heads outside the fence to scare people.”

“Hell yeah,” Blakely said. “There ain’t no World Court anymore. Besides that, we don’t even know that they killed all those guys.”