Runner Boy | Book 2 | Rider Kid

by Mackey, Jay

  I bet the people have no idea that President Pounds is going to announce his war today. Or at least, set the foundation for the war. We’ll see about that.

  I had no trouble getting here this morning. Other than listening to Jerry and Steph yell at me, that is. They were a bit unhappy that I didn’t show up until about midnight. At one point Steph actually said that he’d have to do my job. When I said that would be fine, I didn’t want to do it anyway, I thought he was going to hit me. But eventually everyone calmed down.

  Walking across the Roebling Suspension Bridge was fine. Jerry walked with me, and Steph was a few yards behind, to make sure I didn’t back out, probably. But the border people looked at my driver’s license and passed me through, no sweat.

  The plan was all good so far. I walked right into the hotel—not really being used as a hotel since there is no water or power or anything—into a stairwell, up a few flights, down a hall that connects the hotel with the condo building, up a bunch more stairs, and into the condo, which was unlocked. There, set up on a balcony that faces the stadium, was my rifle, or Len’s rifle, really. That’s one part of the plan that I don’t know the details about. Jerry and Steph took the rifle when we were still at Jerry’s yesterday morning, and some guy was supposed to take it across the river into the GSA at Louisville, then get it to Covington and the condo somehow. I was told only that some guy who either lived in the condo building or worked here was going to get the rifle up to the condo and set it up.

  And bingo. Here it is. I’ve checked it out. The setup is good. The rifle has a built-in tripod, and they’ve set up some couch cushions for me to lie on while I sight in. I move some stuff around, and get a good, solid base set so I’m ready to go.

  With time to kill, I look around the condo. Nobody lives here now, of course. But it’s clean, although a bit dusty. I take my flashlight and tour the place, just to see how someone lives who’s rich enough to afford a place like this. It’s pretty nice, but not as big as I might think for a place that costs probably several millions of dollars, back when the old dollars were a thing. There are three big bedrooms, each with big walk-in closets. There are still clothes hanging in the closets in the master. They mostly look like dressy clothes, though, and most of it is women’s. I don’t see anything as cool as what I’m wearing—my colonel shirt and jeans. My go-to wardrobe, perfect for any occasion, even one as important as this.

  The master bedroom has two gigantic closets, each bigger than my bedroom at my old house. In one there’s a stack of luggage, made with white and tan leather, that they just left here. I guess they didn’t need to use them to carry their stuff when they left after the pulse. I wonder where the rich people went. It’s not like they could just take their private jets and fly off to France or somewhere. Jets couldn’t fly after the pulse. Unless they were military and were built to survive an EMP, that is. So where are the rich people today? Are they still rich, or did all their money disappear when the electronic records were wiped out? Did they end up in shelters, or sharecropping farms like so many people did?

  When the crowd starts to enter the stadium, I begin watching carefully, standing a step or two back from the doorway to the balcony. It’s not as if anyone could see me up here—there’s no one home in the other condos, and I’m not visible from the ground, except maybe from the stadium. I guess someone in a tall building somewhere with binoculars could see me, but that’s not a real risk. No, I’m standing just because I’m not ready to get down into shooting position yet.

  It’s another hour or so before anyone shows up on the stage, so I’m doing a lot of walking around and trying to think pleasant thoughts.

  Who’s going to be the happiest man in America, or at least in the Republic of North America? Rob, of course.

  Who’s going to be the proudest girlfriend in the RNA? Rachel, naturally. It may be a stretch to call her a girlfriend, but I’m trying to think pleasant thoughts.

  Who’s going to be the most shocked parent? Mom!

  Who’s going to be the most pissed-off parent? Dad.

  Wait, that’s not a happy thought, is it?

  Who’s going to be the most jealous brother? Clark. He’ll wish it was him who did this. Guaranteed.

  Time to get serious.

  I get down into shooting position, and look through the telescopic sight. It’s truly amazing. I can see the expressions on the faces of the assholes that are taking their places up on the stage. I don’t know any, until— Wait, that’s Governor General Wayne. Of course he’d be here. I wonder if Colonel Williams will be on stage. I’m sure he’s here somewhere. This has to be big for anyone in the military.

  We lucked out on the weather. It’s been rainy the last few days, but today it’s mostly sunny and warm. A perfect October day. Perfect for an assassination. Ha ha. I’m a funny guy.

  My hands are just a little sweaty, so I get up and go get a towel from one of the bathrooms and wipe my hands. Fuck. Guess I’m a little nervous. Can’t imagine why.

  Back in position. More assholes on the stage. Lots of people in the stadium. I can’t see most of them, because they’re facing the stage and many are blocked from my view by the stadium walls and the big scoreboard.

  The men on stage are wearing suits and ties. There are a few women on the stage too, and they’re also dressed up. I guess they all think this is a big deal. Must be twenty or thirty of them. I wonder how many know this is all to kick off a war. I’ll bet some will be surprised. No, they won’t, because the announcement won’t be made. They’ll definitely be surprised, but for a different reason.

  There’s President Pounds now, walking onto the stage. Waving to the crowd. I can’t hear what’s going on. Are they cheering or booing him?

  He’s got that smug smile, like he’s sucking a lemon. He knows something that you don’t, and he wants to make sure you know it.

  Oh, crap. There’s President Bowers, too. What’s he doing there? Does this mean he’s going to be joining Pounds in the war? Fuck. This is messed up. The two of them on the same stage? Smiling?

  They’re all sitting down. Some other asshole is talking to the crowd. He’s got a microphone, so they’ve got their generators going. I still can’t hear though. I get a bit of crowd noise. Cheering?

  My cue to shoot is when Pounds gets to the microphone. After he’s done waving, before he finishes his first sentence. Since I can’t hear him, I’ll just watch his lips. When he’s talking, he’s . . .

  Shit. This is so fucked. Who is that guy talking? He’s taking a long time.

  The rifle is big. Bigger than normal? No. It’s the same. Len’s. I’ve shot many rounds with it. Big fucking rounds. This thing is amazing. I check to make sure I’ve got one round in the chamber. Doesn’t matter about the magazine; I’m only shooting one round. One fucking round.

  Do I want to do this?

  What choice do I have?

  There’s no good alternative.

  The asshole is turning to point to Pounds. Now to Bowers. They’re both standing. Waving. Smiling. Fuckers. They’re both coming forward. Both going to talk? Pounds leans in toward the microphone.

  Pounds is a fucking Nazi.

  Do it for me.

  Do it for all of us.

  I’ve got a clear view. No wind. Sights set by me. Good to go. Take a deep breath.

  Don’t do it, Brady!

  I aim. Aim again. Breathe. Squeeze.

  BLAM!

  Well, that’s weird.

  I pull back from the sights. There are people scrambling all over the stage. I can’t tell what they’re doing. Sound of the rifle scared everybody. Getting everyone out of there, I’m sure. Looks like a mess. I don’t have time to wait around.

  Plan is to leave the rifle. But I don’t. I quickly take it apart. Not all the way, just enough to stow it away. I hadn’t planned this, but it seems right. Takes me an extra minute. Maybe two. Okay. Done.

  Out the door. To the stairs. Got my flashlight. Down I go. Two steps at a tim
e. Maybe three. Careful. Many flights to go. Relax. Just go down. Breathe.

  Back into the connecting hallway. Into the other stairwell. Down.

  Parking garage under the hotel. The door is here. An SUV will be waiting for me.

  Open the door. There’s the SUV. What the f—

  44

  Pulse Anniversary 10:59 p.m.

  The captain sits again, but doesn’t start the recorder this time. I speak first. “You keep telling me I’m not innocent, but I don’t even know what I’m accused of. If it’s starting World War Three, then I’m innocent. If it’s being stupid, or getting fucked over, or being naïve, then, yeah. Guilty as charged.” I’m not sure why I blurted all that out. Maybe because I’m feeling clueless, and I’m pretty sure that’s because I stumbled into something that I had no business being involved in, and now it’s too late.

  “Not so fast on the world war thing. Because that’s almost exactly what you’ve done.” The captain’s look is not so harsh now that we’re actually talking. He looks, I don’t know, hopeful. I wish I felt as hopeful.

  “What do you mean?” I say.

  “Well, maybe it’s not WW3, but it’s likely to be Civil War 2, which could easily blow up into WW3 if things go a certain way.”

  “What the fuck. That’s exactly what I was trying to stop. Civil War.” He looks at me now as if I’d said something in Greek. So I continue, knowing that I’m confessing to something and I shouldn’t. “I was trying to stop the war against the USA. What’s left of it, anyway; the Northeast.”

  “What? Why did you think there was going to be a war against the USA?”

  “That’s what Pounds and Bowers were doing, right? They were announcing their alliance against the USA.” I can tell that I’m wrong by the captain’s expression.

  “I don’t know if you’ve been fucked over or not, but when you said you were naïve, you weren’t kidding. Who the hell told you that?”

  Now I’m not sure who to trust. Is the captain leveling with me? “Some friends. Fellow resistance fighters.”

  “The rally today was to announce the opening of the border between the Republic of North America and the Great States of America, and cooperation in rebuilding infrastructure. It’s in Cincinnati because we’re sharing in power generation and water treatment operations on both sides of the Ohio River.”

  “But you said there’s going to be a civil war.”

  “Now there is. See, lots of people here in the GSA are against the open borders, mostly the Russians and those they’ve managed to get to support their view of things. And you’ve given them a perfect out, a justification for attacking the RNA.”

  “What do you mean? How did I do that?”

  “You shot President Bowers, you dumb fuck.”

  45

  Pulse Anniversary 11:12 p.m.

  I’m sitting there, stunned. I’m sure my mouth is hanging open. “Wait,” I say after a long pause in our conversation. “Bowers?”

  There’s a knock on the door. The captain yells, “Yeah?” and it opens. Another cop sticks his head in. “They’re on the way. Fast!”

  The captain jumps up. “You got the hood?” he asks the other cop.

  “Yeah.” The cop comes into the room, holding a black bag. He comes over to me, tells me to stand, and puts the bag over my head. It blocks all light, except for a sliver coming up from below. I’m not claustrophobic, but I panic a bit, feeling like I can’t keep my balance. One of them grabs my right arm and jerks, and I nearly fall. “Come on,” he says, pulling me around the table.

  I stumble after them, out the door and then to the right. I’m sure I’m going to fall. I hold out my left hand to feel for the wall, but I’m pulled along quickly, feeling like I’m going to fall any second. We take a left turn, then they pull me through a door. It sounds like a swinging door, so I’m guessing bathroom. That’s how it smells, too. The cops have turned their flashlights off, too. I can tell because there’s no sliver of light at the bottom of my hood.

  The cop holding my arm jerks it and says, “Shh,” even though I’m not saying anything. I hold my breath. I hear what sounds like a group of people walking by. They’re talking, but I can’t tell what’s said. One laugh, hee hee hee. It makes the hair on the back of my neck tingle. Not sure why. After a minute or two we’re moving again. Back through the swinging door, left and then left again. There’s that sliver of light again, so the flashlights must be back on. Stumble forward. Try not to fall.

  Through another door. Down some stairs. I’m falling for real now, but both arms are being held, keeping me upright. Barely. I don’t speak, but I can’t help letting out little grunts and gasps as I’m pulled and pushed around.

  At the bottom of the stairs we stop. My arms are jerked behind me, and I can feel handcuffs being snapped on. They hurt. They’re too tight. But I don’t say anything. We go through a door that takes us outside. Or at least it feels like outside. Down a short flight of steps. There are noises out here. The air is different. Cooler.

  There’s a voice, from a way off. I can’t hear what it said.

  The captain’s voice. “Just transferring a prisoner,” he calls out. I guess that’s good enough. We keep moving.

  They shove me into a car. It’s hard to sit up with the handcuffs and the hood. I tip over. Somebody jerks me so I’m more upright. The door closes. Both cops get in the front. We’re moving.

  I have no idea what’s going on, but I feel somehow that this is good. I could be going off to my execution, but it doesn’t feel like that.

  46

  Pulse Anniversary 11:27 p.m.

  Soon after we get moving, the captain asks the other cop, “What happened? They going to use the confession?”

  “Nah, don’t think so. They asked me for his identification and told me to bring him up. I went downstairs, gave it a few minutes, and then told them he wasn’t in the cell. There was a lot of screaming in Russian, then they started a search. That’s when I came to warn you.”

  “Gotcha.”

  “Where we takin’ him?”

  “Campbell County Detention.”

  I’m not sure I understood all that, but I know Campbell County is right next door to Kenton County, where I was caught. I’m not sure where Campbell County Detention is, but it shouldn’t take us long to get there.

  We drive for ten or fifteen minutes in the surging, slowing, surging way that cars now drive, especially at night, since there are no stoplights. We come to a stop and I’m pulled out of the car, still hooded and handcuffed.

  The one cop says, “This place is labyrinth now. I hope you’ve got extra batteries for your flashlight.”

  The captain says, “Yeah, they never run their generator.”

  “Not much reason since they let all the prisoners out.”

  That’s one more effect of the pulse. Regular people couldn’t find food or water, and nobody was going to work to feed prisoners. So all, or at least most, of the people held in jails were released. It’s just one more reason so many people died—the bad guys were running loose.

  “Do they know we’re coming?” asks the cop.

  “No. But I know most of the guys over here. I’ll just tell them the kid is wanted on a Campbell County charge. They’ll let us in. Wait here while I go check in.”

  I stand, leaning on the car, with the cop holding me by my left arm, like I’m a risk to suddenly start running. With a hood and handcuffs, I don’t think I’d get very far.

  The captain comes back in a couple minutes and says, “We’re good.” They lead me inside through at least four more doors, three of which have to be unlocked, based by the sound. Finally, they take the handcuffs off, and then the hood. I’m in a cell, this one with bars. It’s so dark I can’t see far, but there are empty cells on both sides of me and across from me.

  “Relax for a few, get some sleep,” says the captain. “Big day tomorrow.” He and the other cop leave, locking the cell door, naturally. They take their flashlights, the onl
y source of light, so it’s blacker than black when they’re gone.

  I feel around, find a hard ledge, probably meant to have a mattress or cushion or something, and sit with my back against a cold wall. It’s uncomfortable as hell. I try to lie down, but it’s hard and cold, so I sit again. I find that I’m not alone. There’s someone moaning off in the distance. I can’t see him. I yell, “Hello. Anybody there?” but no one answers. Just this moaning, which continues for as long as I’m awake.

  A key rattling in the door wakens me, and then a flashlight in my eyes blinds me. I’m lying on my side on the hard ledge, and I’ve fallen asleep. I sit up, slowly because I’m stiff as fuck and I hurt all over, but mainly it’s my head that aches.

  The captain comes into my cell. “Good morning,” he says, way too cheerfully for what I perceive to be my situation. Nothing good about it. At least he points the flashlight at the floor, not my face, so I can see. Not that there’s much to see. There’s another ledge on the opposite wall of the small cell, and he sits on it.

  There must be a window somewhere, because there’s just enough gray light to see the empty cell across from me. So it must be morning, after all. Not good, but morning. I don’t hear the moaning at the moment.

  “You’re dead, and my career, hell, my life, is pretty well shot too,” says the captain, “So, maybe we should figure out the truth while we still have a chance.”

  “What do you mean, I’m dead?” I ask. Seems like a logical thing to ask.

  “Have I finally got your attention?” says the captain. “After all this time? Are you going to listen to me now?”

  I nod. I’m not sure about any of this, and I’m still pretty sure I’m going to be fried for what I’ve done, but for now, I’ll play along.

  “Okay,” he says, and stands up. He starts pacing back and forth in front of me in the small cell. “Listen carefully. I don’t want to repeat this. And if you don’t start answering my questions truthfully, then I’ll just turn you over to Bowers’ people. Although I suspect that the people that are here are no more Bowers’ people than you are, or I am, for that matter. Got that?”