Will to Survive (27 page)

“There are five of them!” one of the men yelled out.

“Five of who?” my mother demanded.

“Children,” came the swift reply. “They're at the gatehouse by the bridge … It's the same as the others … Their parents have been murdered.”

 

26

By the time the children had been brought up to our house, most of the crying had stopped, replaced by silent, shocked expressions. The five children were from three families: two sisters, ages five and seven; a brother and sister, who we guessed were a little older; and a teenager named Thomas.

Thomas explained exactly what had happened in dull, blunt terms, sounding almost as if he were bored or tired of telling the story. Of course he was just in shock. The way he described things was almost as if he had been watching a movie and hadn't been there.

He and his parents had been down by the river, on the far side but basically in sight of our guard station on the other side. A man who later identified himself as Brett swept in with five other men and overpowered them. His parents tried to reason, talk, explain, and finally beg, but nothing worked. Brett had shot them right in front of him.

Thomas gave the details so painstakingly that most of the people who heard turned away. Howie had started to tear up, and my mother worked hard to keep calm.

I didn't look away. I listened and forced myself to picture it all in my mind. All of the evil. I had to.

The guards reported that they'd heard the gunshots. There were two shots, and then two more, and then a final two—all in less than twenty minutes. It had been less than another thirty minutes before the children showed up, stumbling across the bridge over the river. Thomas had been carrying two of them—the little sisters—and the other two clung to his sides. He said he didn't know any of them or their parents. They were bound together only by the tragedy that they'd all experienced. Somehow those families had managed to survive all the dangers of the past few months, managed to survive against the odds. They couldn't prepare for such an act of unprovoked evil.

The children had been driven forward by Brett at gunpoint, the littlest girl with a letter tied around her neck.

The letter was simple and short.

In case you thought I wasn't serious. See you soon.

There was no need for a signature.

Thomas stood up and moved toward me from the far end of the room, his eyes locked on mine. I felt a sense of uneasiness but didn't look away.

“You're Adam,” he said, his voice hardly a whisper.

I nodded.

“Can we talk?” Before I could answer he said, “But not here.”

I got up. Every eye was now on us. Even two of the other children were looking in our direction.

I had to say something.

“Thomas and I are going for a walk.”

I could tell from the expressions of my mother and Maureen that they were surprised and concerned. My mother looked like she was going to say something but instead just nodded and mumbled something about being safe.

“They'll be all right,” Herb said in my defense. He motioned for us to leave.

“We won't go far,” I said as a final reassurance.

Thomas and I left the house behind, and I felt myself wilt as the pressure was relieved. I had a big question: How had he known I was Adam? Nobody had mentioned my name. I had just sat off to the side of the room and listened.

“He said I was supposed to give this to you,” Thomas said. He dug into his pocket and pulled out a crumpled note.

I took it and went to read it, but he stopped me.

“He said it was just for you … a secret … that he'd do something to me if I didn't get it to you or if anybody found out.”

“He can't get you here,” I said.

“You have to promise!” he pleaded. “He said if I didn't deliver it that he'd … he'd…”

He burst into tears and I put my arm around him. “I promise I won't let anyone else know about it.” I stuffed it into my pocket. I'd read it later, in private, where my reactions would be my own.

“What happens now?” Thomas sniffed. “What happens to me … to us … to the others?”

“We'll take care of you. You'll stay here.”

“Really? Why now and not then?” he asked.

“I don't understand.”

“We tried to get in once. My parents said it would be safer inside. The guards on the walls said we couldn't, that they'd shoot at us if we didn't leave.”

“They wouldn't have done that,” I assured him. “They were just trying to get you to leave, that's all.”

It had been one of the hardest things for our guards, to send off innocent people, to tell them to leave, that they couldn't help them. And then I thought it through another step. “Did you think our guards were going to shoot you when you were walking toward our gate right now?”

He nodded, and his eyes started to fill with tears again. I could only imagine how terrifying that walk would have been—away from a group of people who had just killed his parents, under a threat he'd be shot if he didn't, and toward another group he thought was going to kill him.

“We're not like that,” I said. “He is.”

“He told me he killed my parents because of you.”

“It wasn't because of m-me,” I stammered.

“I know,” he said. “He did it because he wanted to, because he enjoyed it.” He paused. “I saw it—he
wanted
to kill them.”

“You don't have to talk about any of this, not to me.”

“I can't stop thinking about it! I can't stop seeing it.”

I wanted to tell him it would go away, but that would have been nothing more than a bad lie.

“What grade are you in … Or, I mean, what grade would you be in now?” I asked.

“Ninth.”

“My brother and sister are in fifth grade. You're going to become like a big brother to them because you're going to be staying at our house, with us.”

Thomas just looked at me with dull eyes.

“And I'm going to make you a promise. You're never going to have to worry about Brett getting near you again. I'm going to … take care of it.”

“You're going to kill him?”

I looked at Thomas and nodded.

“Yes.”

 

27

It was almost four o'clock in the morning. I couldn't sleep, so I slipped out of the house and started walking the perimeter fence. In my pocket was the note from Brett that Thomas had passed on to me. I couldn't believe how a single piece of paper could weigh so much, could feel so heavy. I hadn't shared it with anybody—not the content, not the fact that I'd been given it.

Of course there wasn't one person in the neighborhood who hadn't heard about what had happened. Five more orphans, six more dead parents. Brett's name and deeds were on the tongues and minds of everybody. He couldn't have been more present if he was living among us.

All along my walk I'd nodded to or had a brief conversation with guards stationed at the wall. I'd had to answer the same questions in one form or another at least a dozen times. If my hope was to get away from the situation and clear my mind, this was the worst plan possible.

Up ahead I saw Howie with three other guards. He started toward me.

“I didn't expect to run into you out here,” Howie said.

“I couldn't sleep, so I thought I'd go for a moonlight stroll. You?”

“Sleep is never easy for me, so I thought I'd inspect the troops,” he explained. “I think they needed it. There's a lot of tension on the line. It's ramping up every night.”

“We won't have to wait much longer.”

“At least the break gave us more time to plan, prepare, and get in some reinforcements,” Howie said.

“We basically had this plan in place in two days,” I said. “The waiting is always the hardest part.”

“Maybe that's why he gave us five days, to make it harder,” Howie suggested.

“I never thought of that,” I said. “I'll ask Herb what he thinks.”

“If you hurry, you can catch him. He was here just a couple of minutes before you.”

“I guess he couldn't sleep either,” I said.

“I don't think he ever sleeps, but that's not it. He's going around talking to every person on the wall. He's giving them confidence, trying to reduce the tension, eliminate the doubt.” Howie pointed. “He went that way.”

I started off and Howie stopped me.

“How's the kid Thomas doing?”

“He was asleep when I left. He's bunking with Danny.”

“I heard that your family is taking him in and that it was your idea,” Howie said.

“I just thought of it first, that's all.” I knew I should have checked with my parents before I'd made that offer to Thomas, but he did need a place to stay and people to take care of him. Besides, having him close was good for me.

“Either way, it was nice of you. Caring.”

Caring wasn't the only reason, but I couldn't tell Howie that. Having Thomas nearby gave me a chance to see this living reminder, to hear the stories, to think about what Brett had done and what he would continue doing.

“I better get going if I want to catch up to the old man.”

I went away quickly. I passed by the first two towers on the North Wall, exchanging a couple of words with the guards and confirming Herb had just spoken to them. I moved right along the base of the wall. It was solid cement, and double my height. It was the most secure fencing we had, and I felt protected in its shadow.

If I could have seen over it I would have been able to see the smooth, empty lanes of the highway and the forming community to the north. Of all of our new neighbors, that community had been the slowest to come together. Fields were being cultivated with winter wheat and some hardy greens, and security was being organized, but the people there hadn't been able to fashion a complete wall and Howie had reported that their attempts at perimeter guards were the least developed. Because of that he'd put his best guards on this segment of our walls. If we hadn't been so occupied with the pending exchange with Brett we could have invested more time in helping them. I'd feel better, more secure, once they were a more solid force.

To the left, the west, was one of the small buffer communities and the highway. If danger was to come, it would be from the city, in the east; that highway heading west would be our escape route.

To the right, the east, were the gate and the guardhouse over toward the Credit River. That's where we'd be passing in two days. We'd probably be walking into a trap that Brett had waiting for us. I could only hope that he didn't know that a trap was being set for him as well.

I heard laughter coming from the next guard tower and suspected Herb was there. As I approached there was more laughter and I recognized Herb's voice. He saw me and waved, offering a smile.

“So it looks like everybody is out tonight!” Herb said.

“Maybe you two could stay here and we could go home and get some sleep,” one of the guards joked. I knew her—Joanie—the way I knew everybody else. She was a decent person, took her job seriously, and was somebody who could be counted on. She had two children and a dog and a husband who was also a guard on the wall. They usually were on two different shifts so that one of them would always be home to watch the kids. I wondered if either or both were assigned to any of the away teams and how the children would cope if something happened to their mother or father. Hopefully one of them would survive—hopefully both would survive.

What a terrible thing to have to think about. Terrible because it was true. No matter what happened, somebody was going to lose somebody they cared for. I just had to hope it wasn't my parents or me or Herb or Todd and his family or the Petersons. But was that like wishing that somebody else was going to die?

Herb shook hands with everybody and we started walking again.

“So what brings you out tonight?” Herb asked.

“Couldn't sleep. And you?”

“Too much work to do. My father used to say there'll be plenty of time to sleep when you're dead.” Herb laughed a little. “I guess he's been sleeping well for the last forty years. Hard to believe it's been that long and the time has passed that fast. I know you might find this difficult to believe, but at one point I used to be your age.”

“That
is
almost impossible to believe,” I said. “Actually, there is something I wanted to talk to you about. I was wondering about Brett setting the drop-off five days after he sent the message. Why would he give us that much time?”

“Perhaps he wanted to make sure we had time to meet his demands,” Herb suggested.

“He knows how we operate, so he knows it wouldn't take us more than a day or two to decide and prepare. There has to be another reason.”

“It might be taking him that long to set his trap.”

“Then why didn't he get it all set before he sent the message? He set the agenda and the time. He showed us today that he has no problem finding more people to kill to send a message.”

“Or messages,” Herb said.

Messages? Did he know about the note Thomas had given me?

“It could be more psychological than anything else,” Herb continued. “Waiting is hard. It allows uncertainty and fear to spread, causes people to divide and decisions to be second-guessed. All that gives him control.”

I thought about the promise I'd made to Thomas about not telling anybody about the message, but if nothing else I'd learned that many promises couldn't be kept.

“How did you know there was more than one message today?” I asked.

“I couldn't think of another reason why that boy—”

“Thomas,” I interrupted. “His name is Thomas.”

“Yes, Thomas. I couldn't think of another reason why he would need to talk to you privately. What was the message?”