Paradigm (2 page)

“Thanks for the help.”

“I didn’t think you’d need it.”

She looked at him, then strode back to her bike and pulled a gunbelt out of a saddlebag. Sam watched her strap it on.

“You took that off on purpose, didn’t you?”

The girl shrugged. “Maybe. Sometimes it’s more interesting when they think you’re unarmed.”

“So this kind of thing happens to you a lot?”

“It’s what I do.”

“Sam,” he said, smiling.

“What?”

“My name. Sam Cooper.”

“Why should I care what your name is?”

“I think we might meet again.”

“I doubt it.” She got onto the bike and started it up.

“But if we did, what would I call you?”

The girl let the bike roll forward to where Sam was leaning against the wall. She stared at him and Sam noticed a swirling tattoo on her left temple.

“Alma,” she said. “Alma Kaahu of the Makahua. But we won’t meet again.”

She revved the bike and shot away, leaving nothing but a cloud of dust. Sam walked back to the car.

“Who was that?” asked Nathan, a bag of groceries in one hand.

“No one. A Hakadun.”

“A Hakadun? You’re joking! I thought they were all dead.”

“So did I, but apparently not.”

“Did she have the tattoo?”

“Yep.”

“Cool.”

“Her name is Alma.”

“You got her name?”

“Sure.”

“Oh, man…not again.”

Chapter 2

“D
o you realize
how much that gas cost?”

They were sitting in the flickering light of a small campfire beneath a ragged ironwood tree surrounded by dense bushes of stunted manzanita. It was some way off the road, but Sam didn’t believe in taking chances, so the GTO was parked close to the largest clump of manzanita and covered in a dark green tarp.

He sighed and tried to ignore Nathan. He didn’t like thinking about money or barter, preferring to meander through life with more of a “something-will-turn-up” approach.

Nathan, on the other hand, thought about little else.

“I said—”

“I heard you.”

He was lying on his back, staring at the night sky and gnawing on the last bit of the rabbit (or whatever it was—something with pretty big ears, anyway) that they’d had for dinner. The air was cool after the heat of the day and he really, really didn’t want to talk about the car.

Nathan wasn’t about to be put off so easily. He was squinting at his account book and adding up columns of figures. Sam hated that book.

“If I convert the stuff we traded to actual cash money, then...”

“I don’t want to know.”

“But—”

He rolled over and glared at Nathan.

“I don’t want to know because there’s nothing we can do about it. It costs what it costs. It’s not like we can go somewhere else.”

“Yes, I get that, but—”

“Look,” Sam rolled back and threw the rabbit bone into the fire, “There’s supposed to be one of those big warehouse stores off the I-99 about a hundred miles west. We’ll swing by there tomorrow and see if we can get you some more stock.”

“A warehouse store?” If Nathan was trying to keep the contempt out of his voice, he failed utterly. “Sam, those places were picked clean years ago.”

“You never know. Maybe they forgot about this one.”

Nathan exhaled slowly, like a parent whose child has just failed math for the third time.

“There’s no future in this, Sam, not any more. Most of the good stuff is long gone, and even when you can get it people don’t want it no more.”

“Whoa,” Sam rolled over again and stared at Nathan. “Is this a moment of clarity?”

“No one uses it. No one has time to make fancy sandwiches and blended fruit drinks, or whatever the heck that glass thing is supposed to do.”

“That’s why I said you should concentrate on the pocket generators. Everyone wants those.”

Nathan sighed. “I’d still need to get the parts.”

Sam stared at him. He’d never seen him like this, Nathan was always so relentlessly upbeat. For Sam, things were about the doom and gloom more often than not, but for Nathan there was always a brighter tomorrow.

“We could go and look, though. At the warehouse, I mean. You never know.”

Nathan shrugged.

“Maybe.” He closed his accounts book and looked at Sam. “Or maybe we could get some light bulbs.”

“Light bulbs?”

“Yeah.”

“And where do you propose we find some?”

“In a city.”

“Right.”

“No, really, think it through, Sam. That’s what people keep asking for. Everywhere we go, they want light bulbs. So why don’t we get some for them? I mean, we could go to a city, buy some there, bring them back out here and make a killing.”

“Or get killed, which is much more likely.”

“Why should we get killed? We’ll just go there, buy some light bulbs and leave.”

Sam looked at him and shook his head.

“You see,” he said, “This is exactly why people should read books. Whenever a character says a thing is straightforward and they’ll just go in and out and be done with it, something always happens.”

“Yeah, but—”

“Something bad.”

“But we’re not going to
stay
or anything. Just buy some stuff and leave. I don’t get your problem. I mean, what could possibly go wrong?”

A wide grin spread across Sam’s face.

“Perfect.”

He pulled the dog-eared book out of his pocket and rolled over to try and get some light.

“So you won’t go?”

“Nope.”

“Great. Can I sleep in the car?”

“No.”

“Ah, c’mon. It’s going to be freezing tonight. I’ve only got this lousy blanket and you’ve got that big coat .”

Sam considered offering him the coat, but thought better of it. Nathan looked so miserable—it would have been like kicking a puppy. And it wasn’t like he could sleep in there himself. It had been months since he’d been able fold himself up small enough to sleep in the back seat without losing all feeling in at least one of his legs.

“Okay,” he said, finally. “But take your boots off before you get in.”

Nathan nodded and walked over to the car. He yanked his boots off, pulled the tarp up and scrambled into the back seat.

Sam couldn’t help feeling a pang of jealousy as the door thunked shut. He had loved sleeping in the car. The clunk of the door and the way the curve of the back seat embraced his body, had made him feel safe and secure and allowed him to forget about the outside world and all the people in it. It was almost like being at home.

Almost.

He stared up at the night sky. It didn’t look yellow now, just dark. The sky at night had always been dark, of course, but he had read that there used to be stars. There were probably still stars, far away, across light years of space, blinking at the shrouded Earth. But their meager light was no match for the lowering clouds that clung to the once-blue planet like an old man’s cataract. There was still the moon, though, a blurry yellow glow in the sky. It seemed quite big tonight. Perhaps it was a harvest moon.

Sam had read about those, too.

A cold breeze skittered across the valley floor, probing for flesh and chilling to the bone. He pulled his coat closer and built up the fire. He kept it small, though—no sense in attracting attention. He watched the flames for a while and tried reading his book, but the firelight just made the letters dance on the page. He put it back in his pocket and pulled out his old pocket watch. It wasn’t some family heirloom or anything, just something he’d won in a card game, but he really loved it. He loved its simplicity and complexity and he loved taking off the back and watching the little gears swinging backwards and forwards as they counted down the seconds. He’d even bought himself a proper vest so he could wear it like the people he’d seen in old photographs. Ten o’clock. He laid the watch down carefully, coiling the chain and fob around it, and watched the firelight reflected in the brass.

Cities.

His parents had always avoided them. He’d seen some from a distance, but only ever been to one—Chicago. He’d been nine then, and they’d been living in a small settlement about ten miles away for nearly six months. It was one of the longest times they’d stayed in one place. He’d even made a few friends and begun to think that this time they might really settle down for good. But then his mother was injured while clearing brush. It wasn’t anything much, just a small cut, but it became infected and within a few days she was dangerously ill. Someone in the settlement had heard of a doctor in Chicago City who had a cache of antibiotics. Most antibiotics had stopped working years ago, but his dad was desperate, so they headed out on foot for the city. The memory of that walk and their arrival in the walled metropolis was etched into Sam’s brain like an old movie playing on a continuous loop. The gleaming skyscrapers, the gates, the hostile glances from the well-dressed inhabitants…and the headache.

It had been his first. Sharp, shooting pains that made him stumble and vomit, tears streaming down his face. His father had picked him up and carried him, running, through the streets, anxious to get the drugs and get out. But the story wasn’t true. The doctor had no antibiotics. He wasn’t even a doctor, just a well-meaning man who tended the sick and comforted the dying.

They had left the great metropolis and headed home, their hearts heavy with dread. The headache had faded the further they got from the city, but the pain of knowing what was coming was even more searing.

It wasn’t until after they buried his mother that Sam’s dad had spoken to him about the headache in the city. He grilled Sam on every aspect of it. Where exactly it had hurt. What it felt like. When it started. When it stopped.

Then he’d shone a light into his son’s eyes and asked another question: “Did you hear any voices?”

Sam remembered staring at him, a knot in his stomach. Why would he ask that? He hadn’t heard anything, hadn’t even mentioned it. Why would his dad think that he might? His father must have seen the panic in his eyes, because he mussed his hair and grinned.

“Just joshing with ya, son.”

Sam wasn’t sure then and was less sure now, but one thing was certain—there was no way he was going to any city ever again. He watched the flames for a few minutes longer, before rolling onto his side and closing his eyes.

It was still dark when he opened them. Someone…some
thing
was moving. No. More than one. There was the unmistakable slow rustle of people treading carefully… closing in. He picked up his watch, stood up slowly and eased himself over to the ironwood tree. This had happened before—the Wilds were full of predatory scavengers—but he’d always been in the car, so all he had to do was scramble into the front seat and take off.

Only this time the car was on the other side of the clearing. Could Nathan have heard?

It didn’t matter. He didn’t have the keys. Sam peered into the darkness. How close were they? Maybe he could make it to the car after all.

“Don’t even think about it.”

He nearly jumped out of his skin. The voice was female and right behind him. He turned his head slightly and recognized the glint of the same dark, dangerous eyes he’d first seen that afternoon.

“There are four of them,” she whispered. “They’ve been following you since you left town.”

“And you?”

“I followed them.”

“Is that supposed to be reassuring?”

“It’s your lucky day.”

“Not feeling much like it right now.”

Alma raised a finger to her mouth, nodded to her left, pointed back into the darkness and made a kind of grabbing gesture before pointing into the clearing. Sam stared at her blankly. He knew she was telling him to do something, but had no idea what. She rolled her eyes and leaned in. He could feel the warmth of her breath as she hissed into his ear.

“I’m going to get behind them. See if you can do something about that fire.”

Sam nodded as she disappeared into the darkness, leaving him to wonder which gesture was supposed to have meant “put out the fire.”

He hesitated for a moment, straining to hear—trying to get some idea of where anybody was. But there wasn’t a sound. It was as if everyone had just disappeared and the rolling plain was as it had been at the dawn of time.

Well, except for the car.

And the fire.

And then…a faint noise.

Someone was whispering.

“Ov…y...th…ar…”

He froze. Were those words? He strained to hear, closing his eyes to concentrate, but was immediately jarred back by a sharp dig in the ribs.

“Are you going to stand there all night or are you going to help me save your worthless hide?”