by Logan Jacobs
“The only real question that’s left, then,” Sorcha noted as she stretched the kinks out of her back, “is what to do once Freya’s free.”
“I’ll take her somewhere safe,” Darwin declared.
“But where?” Sorcha pressed.
“I’ve heard of places,” Darwin said vaguely.
Sorcha studied him in the firelight for a moment, then gave me a quizzical glance.
“You know, you two could come with us,” I replied. “You wouldn’t have to go all the way to the island if you don’t want to, but it would probably increase the odds for all of us to survive if we traveled together, at least for a while.”
“Is that what you offered Freya?” Darwin asked.
“No,” I admitted. “Actually, we told her she shouldn’t come with us because it would be too dangerous.”
“But she can’t stay here,” Sorcha added. “Nor can you. And if the mages believe you have guns, well, they’ll be hunting you as well, so either way, Freya will be facing that danger.”
“Ah,” Darwin snickered. “But doesn’t it make more sense for us to split up? If we do that, then they’ll have two groups to hunt instead of one, and that may increase the odds of success for one of us, since they’ll have to split their resources.”
“They have a lot of resources,” I pointed out as I thought about all the mages I had faced since I discovered my magic.
“That they do,” Darwin agreed.
“Hex and I can do this,” Sorcha added. “But having someone with your skills and experience on the journey would make it easier.”
“And I would guess you’ve taught Freya a few things about survival as well,” I suggested.
Darwin stared into the flames for a minute, then regarded the two of us with an inscrutable look.
“Do you have a next step?” the old man sighed. “I mean, besides just heading west.”
“I was looking through the atlas Evan gave us,” Sorcha replied before I could say anything. “We can follow some of the old highways to Gateway.”
“Saint Louis?” Darwin asked in surprise. “Why there?”
“It’s the halfway point, roughly, between the two coasts,” the Irishwoman explained. “It’s the major transit point for people traveling between the coasts who don’t have access to a really powerful portal mage. We should be able to find someone who can move us closer to the west coast from there, and it won’t attract any attention from the Magesterium because it happens all the time.”
“And you think you can just walk there?” the ex-trooper asked in disbelief. “Do you know what lies between here and there?”
Sorcha and I glanced at each other again.
“Well, everyone knows the stories,” Sorcha hedged. “It’s mostly a lawless area, filled with brigands and criminals. There are mutant reservations as well, but Hex and I already made it through one wasteland.”
I nodded, though our escape from Short Hills had been a close thing, and had probably cost Vance his life.
“Oh, lord, but you know nothing,” Darwin chuckled. “So, along with these brigands and criminals, what else do you think you’ll face?”
“Ummm,” Sorcha murmured as she looked at me.
“I’ve lived rough since I was a kid,” I assured him. “I can survive off the land.”
“While mutants and outlaws are chasing you?” Darwin pressed. “And I know trail hands always travel in groups. You have to if you want to bring the cattle in alive. So now it’s just the two of you, and you’ll be outnumbered everywhere you go. And don’t even get me started on what winter in the mountains is like. You’ll be lucky if you don’t freeze your asses off the first night.”
“Then what would you suggest?” Sorcha asked innocently.
Darwin wasn’t fooled though, and for a moment I thought he wouldn’t answer.
“Go west,” he responded, “but head north more for the Great Lakes. Well, Great Lake, now. At the western tip of Pennsylvania, near Erie, there’s a ferry that will take you to the real Motown, Detroit. From there, you have a couple of options. Stay on the water, and take the Mississippi south to Gateway, that’s your first option.”
“And what’s the second?” I asked when Darwin didn’t add anything else.
“Well, it is Motown,” Darwin mused. “Do you know what industry put Detroit on the map?”
Sorcha and I shook our heads and waited for Darwin to continue.
“Detroit was the automobile capital of the world for decades,” Darwin explained. “Time was when almost every car in the world was American and came from Detroit.”
“But no one makes cars any more,” I pointed out.
“I know that,” Darwin huffed. “But I’m sure you’ve seen those conversions. The ones that are powered with some sort of magic.”
“I’ve heard of them,” I Sorsha said.
“And do you think there are just a bunch of mages out there that know how to do this?” Darwin pressed
“No,” she said.
“No, indeed,” Darwin snorted. “Look, I’ll admit, the first time I saw one of those, I thought about getting my hands on one, but back then there were still a lot of problems with the things. They were unreliable so you couldn’t take them very far, and after a few months, they just stopped working.”
“But there are better ones today,” Sorcha added as she suddenly sat up.
“There are,” Darwin stated. “And the best ones, as near as I can tell, come from Detroit.”
“But then we’d just be back to crossing the land instead of riding a boat down the river,” I pointed out.
“But we’d be in a car, or actually, something more like a Jeep maybe,” Darwin mused. “In either case, something that could carry people and supplies and outrun anything on two or four feet.”
“We’d have to come up with a lot of money,” I replied.
“Oh, I’m sure we could do that,” Sorcha insisted. “Just look what you did at that inn.”
“That was a few hands of poker against players with okay skill,” I sighed. “We won’t get that lucky every place we stop.”
Sorcha and I fell silent, and I stared into the flames as I tried to imagine how we could come up with ways to pay for a car. Darwin watched us both, then picked up a poker and jabbed at some of the logs.
“Well, that’s what I would do,” he declared.
“So if we head toward the Great Lake and take the boat to Detroit, will you and Freya at least travel that far with us?” Sorcha asked.
Darwin prodded the fire again, then set the poker down. He looked around the cave, then finally turned toward Sorcha.
“If it were just me, I could pack up the guns and disappear without a second thought,” he said quietly. “And, hell, if they got too close, well, I could make sure I took out plenty of them before I went down. But I have to think about Freya. That girl deserves a shot at a normal life.”
“She does,” I agreed.
“It could be that there’s a good place for her near one of these mutant zones, or maybe in the town that Sorcha mentioned,” Darwin added. “Wherever it is, I have to help her find it, and that will be easier to do if we have some help.”
“So that’s a yes,” Sorcha said gleefully.
“Only until we reach Detroit,” Darwin quickly added. “After that, well, we’ll see.”
And just like that, our party of two had become a band of four. That’s if we could rescue Freya and make it out of town.
But hey, we’d already survived the wilds of Brook Island and the wastelands of Jersey. What could be easier?
Chapter 15
None of us got much sleep that night, and Darwin had breakfast ready before the sun had made it over the horizon. I only knew that because I’d given up on sleep after a few restless hours in the sleeping bag and ventured back to the crack to take a peek outside.
The skies had cleared overnight, and only a few stray clouds scudded by. There was a thin layer of frost on the ground and a cold shar
pness to the air that lingered as the blue-blackness of the night sky gave way to the first gray fingers of morning.
“Darwin said the hash will be ready soon,” Sorcha announced as she slipped up behind me.
“Do I want to know what he used?” I asked.
“I didn’t pay much attention,” Sorcha admitted. “But it smells alright. Maybe a bit heavy on the onions.”
We returned to the camp where Darwin was filling three metal bowls with his concoction. It did smell of onions, as well as wild garlic, fried potatoes, and beans. It was the same trail fare I’d eaten for years, and I wolfed it down without even tasting it. With the addition of Darwin’s thick, sludgy coffee, I could have been anywhere along the eastern cattle trails.
We rarely left the tunnel during the day, and when we did, we only ventured out by a few feet. We kept watch over the airport from a ledge along the hillside, but if the Police Department had spotted the tracks of the ATV, they hadn’t followed them. Except for a few crows, everything remained quiet.
“I’m surprised I haven’t seen any police around the airport,” I noted when Darwin joined me.
“They know I won’t leave the area without Freya,” Darwin remarked. “They’re just waiting for me to make my next move.”
“You still feel good about our plan?” I asked.
“As long as Sorcha can do her part, we’ll be fine,” Darwin replied. “We can be well away from here before those bastards from the Magesterium show up.”
“I wish we’d bought those two horses the other day,” I sighed. “It would have made this easier.”
“The mounts in the police barn will be just as good,” Darwin assured me. “And it will keep them off our tails for a bit longer.”
“What if they don’t like the ATV?” I asked.
“They’ll get used to it.” He shrugged.
Most of our discussions the rest of the day ran along the same lines. We rehashed the plans over and over again without making any real changes. I handed the Glock I had created to Sorcha, since she had handled it before, then created the Colt revolver for myself and another Mossberg pump-action shotgun for Darwin at his request. I still had the Winchester rifle, as well, and Darwin had his small arsenal on hand, and for the first time, I wondered if we had too many guns. But then I remembered the frustration of not having any guns while the mages attacked and decided I would rather have too many weapons than too few.
At sunset, the sky turned a brilliant orange and the scent of burning wood drifted on the wind. We crept back to the airport, and after a quick check for snooping deputies, we darted into the giant barn and retrieved the ATV.
“We should have enough fuel in the tank to get us to the rendezvous point,” Darwin stated as he checked one of the gauges, “but I’ll add some more once we arrive. Wouldn’t do to run out of gas in the middle of the chase.”
I let Sorcha have the seat to herself and sat down on our load of supplies. I grabbed a hold of the nearest bar as Darwin started the engine, and then we were on our way once again. We bounced across the concrete and back toward the old dirt road, and I was already regretting my decision to ride in the back. I’d already smacked my head against the frame once and nearly toppled over the side twice by the time Darwin had steered us onto the road, and this wasn’t even the roughest part of the journey.
“Hang on,” Darwin yelled as we swerved around a pothole.
“I could walk,” I called back as I slid perilously close to the edge again.
But no one responded and the ATV moved onward. Eventually, we left the road and Darwin steered it across a field of brambles and down a muddy slope. After that, we splashed across a small creek and then powered up a rocky hillside. It was probably a fun ride, if you had the luxury of being in a seat, but bouncing around on the boxes and bags while holding on for dear life was not endearing the ATV to me.
I was the first one to stumble from the machine when it finally came to a halt, and it took me a few moments to find my footing again. I ran my fingers through my hair and wiped off what mud I could, then finally looked around.
Darwin had chosen a spot that was a short run from the Police Department, but still far enough away that no one would hear the motor over the sound of the bell. As Darwin had told us, tonight was the night Medrick offered his services at the old church, and the bell was rung to let the citizens know when Medrick was ready. Medrick, according to Darwin, was a stickler for promptness, and that meant the bell tolled at the same time on the same night of the week, week after week, year after year.
The lights had started to come on, and I could hear the sounds of horses hooves on the roads, the buzz of human conversation, and over it all, the bell that rang from the rock church at the opposite end of the street from the Police Department. I could see a large crowd already moving toward the bell, and that included many of those who had stood outside the Police Department.
“Here,” Darwin said as he handed me my Winchester. “Keep it out of sight until you need it.”
The glow around the weapon was more obvious in the evening gloom, and it reminded me of a story my father used to tell of a hero who carried a glowing sword. I wondered for a moment what my father would think of me and my magic, then I tucked the rifle beneath my long coat.
“Sort of strange that they glow,” Darwin commented as he studied the Mossberg pump action I’d made for him. “But at least I can tell the difference between the two.”
“Are we ready?” Sorcha asked as she joined us.
“Nearly,” Darwin replied as he pulled a tin can from the back of the ATV. “Let me just top her off first.”
Darwin moved to the side of the ATV and unscrewed a cap. In the darkness, there was little to see under the cap other than a black hole, but Darwin tipped the can and I could hear a heavy liquid slosh from the can into the ATV.
“Is that the oil you mentioned?” Sorcha asked.
“Yep,” Darwin agreed. “As long as we can find some, we can keep this little beauty running. The good news is that people still like to fry their food, so that shouldn’t be a problem unless we hit a long stretch without a town.”
“If we stick to the old roads, we should be okay,” I mused. “Most of the towns I’ve ever seen are near the pre-magic roads, even if no one uses them anymore.”
“Doesn’t surprise me,” Darwin mused as he screwed the cap back on the ATV, sealed the can, and then placed it back under the tarp.
“It looks like quite a crowd at the meeting,” Sorcha murmured as she watched people enter the church.
“Then let’s get these explosives set while everyone’s in with Medrick,” Darwin declared as he set the twin shotguns aside and pulled out one of his mystery boxes from the back of the ATV.
“I’ll take one of the shotguns for now,” I offered as I picked up the glowing twin gun.
Darwin nodded, then marched off with the box in one hand and the original pump-action shotgun in the other. He picked his way through the shrubs, then dropped onto a deer trail. Minutes later, we were on the other side of the town, within sight of the horse dealer. A lamp was still on near the corral, and a pair of men stood outside the lawyer’s office engaged in a long conversation, but otherwise, this section of town looked to be empty.
“Stay here,” Darwin whispered as he slipped through the shadows.
I saw him for a moment near a crumbling wall, and then he dropped out of sight. I waited for him to pop back up again, but somehow he managed to circle back to us without either of us seeing him.
“Next spot,” the ex-trooper whispered as he suddenly appeared behind us.
“Oh!” Sorcha exclaimed in surprise.
The two men outside the lawyer’s office stopped talking for a moment and turned toward the sound. It felt like an hour dragged by, but it was only a few moments before one of the men shrugged and the two men started to walk away, still in conversation.
“Don’t surprise me like that,” the Irishwoman hissed.
�
�Come on,” Darwin urged as he set off again.
We went through the same exercise four more times as we circled the town. Our luck held, though, and the men outside the lawyer’s office were the only ones who came close to spotting us. When Darwin had placed the last of his explosives, we snuck away to a spot just off Main Street where we could watch the Police Department.
“Ready for the fireworks?” Darwin asked with a gleeful tone.
“Do you really think they’ll work after fifty years?” Sorcha asked.
“I’ve taken good care of this C-Four after I lifted it from Picatinny,” Darwin replied. “Some of the elastics have degraded, but the explosive is still good.”
“Isn’t there supposed to be a wire or something?” I asked.
“I’m not that old fashioned,” Darwin grunted. “Remote detonation, courtesy of the mages actually. I’ve been able to figure out how to turn some of their crystals into receivers of sorts.”
“Let’s see it, then,” I replied.
Darwin nodded, then with the flair of a showman, held up a rectangular metal box for our approval. There was a button in the center of it, and a small metal wire sticking out of one of the short ends. A small mage crystal had been glued to the end of the wire, though it wasn’t glowing at the moment. Darwin pressed the button, and a heartbeat later, the crystal winked on with a blue glow.
“Did it--?” Sorcha started to ask.
The rest of her question was cut off as the ground beneath our feet seemed to rumble, and then a deafening roar erased all other sounds. Clouds of dust and dirt plumed up into the sky, blocking out the moon and stars for a moment before it all fell back to earth.
I could hear screams by then, and people tumbled out from the buildings along Main Street to try to figure out what was going on. The front door to the Police Station opened, and three men spilled out. One had to be the Chief of Police, given all the gold braids on his shoulders, but the other two looked like regular deputies. They also didn’t look terrified the way the townspeople did, and the Chief slowly scanned the streets even as dirt and debris started to fall on the town.
“And now, for part two,” Darwin murmured as he produced a second metal box.