Echoes of a Dying World (Book 3): A Dream of Tomorrow

by Esquibel, Don M.

  “Smart thinking,” Richard says. “They could also keep a line of communication to the parties on the ground.”

  “I know this isn’t what you signed up for,” I say, turning now to Lynn. “But if you could help, I’d appreciate it.”

  Lynn laughs dryly. “What exactly did you think I agreed to?” he asks. “Shit like you were planning rarely goes down nice and neat. I knew that before I agreed to help you. My answer hasn’t changed. I’ll help, and I can vouch for a few more.”

  “Thank you,” I say, hoping my voice conveys my gratitude. “We’re going to need all the help we can get.”

  With Lynn on board as overwatch, I feel my confidence in the plan grow. It’s a risky ruse, but one that could pay off huge for us. If just one of our teams can get eyes on Barr, if they can shadow him until he leads them to where he’s hiding, it will change everything. For once, we’re the ones with the numbers and firepower on our side. If we can corner him, they won’t stand a chance. But I’m getting ahead of myself. First, we have to find him.

  The room empties soon after, everyone, I think, feeling the same bout of confidence I feel. Tired as they are, nervous as they are, they know there’s at least a chance this all could end as early as tomorrow. It may be a small hope, but it is hope all the same. We break the news that night, informing the others that we will be sending out a small party to recover the fictional supplies we had stashed. They swallow the lie easily enough, unsurprised we would stash some away in case our plan to overtake the DoubleTree didn’ work. Still, there is some pushback to the idea. While they know that acquiring supplies is an ever-present need, they fear the dangers of getting them while Barr is still out there. This fear is most prominent in the families of those who will be going. And while we assure them it is for the best, and that we will take every precaution to stay safe, I can’t help the twist my gut makes at the lie.

  It will be worth it. It has to be.

  Naturally, my family knows there are no such supplies but have the sense not to say as much while we address the others. But that doesn’t mean they don’t have questions.

  “It’s a cover for what we’re really doing,” I tell my mother and father in answer to their unasked question. “We don’t know who the mole is, don’t know how to flush him out. So instead of trying to figure it out, we’ve decided to get at the heart of the problem.”

  “You’re going after Barr,” my mother says, guessing correctly. “You’re feeding the mole false information to try and bait Barr into the open.”

  “Yes,” I admit.

  My father lets out a long breath. “That’s a hell of a plan, son,’ he says. “If Barr decides to bite, he has enough people behind him to take out whoever you send.”

  “I know,” I say. “But I don’t see that we have a choice. We can’t just sit here and wait for another body to fall. You saw how panicked people were the first time. If it keeps happening, how long until they turn on us? We’ll be playing right into Barr’s hands if we let it get to that point.”

  “There’s some truth to that,” my father admits after a long pause. “Let’s just hope it works.”

  The rest of the family is informed in short order. After everything we’ve been through, they deserve to know the truth. I can sense their concern over the party we will be sending, but like my parents, they understand the necessity of it. I hate seeing them like this. It seems like anything we do, something happens that is the cause of stress and worry.

  It all stems back to Barr. Get him, and we can start anew.

  “Thank you for volunteering for this,” I say, coming up on Frank. We stand alone, peering out the window of a fourth-floor balcony. “Going out there like this paints a huge target on your back.”

  “I’ve had a target on my back for a while now,” Frank says. “But that’s not going to stop me from doing what’s necessary.”

  He speaks with bitterness in his voice. Anger.

  “Are you alright?” I ask hesitantly.

  He doesn’t immediately answer, continuing to stare out the window, face blank, eyes distant. I half expect he won’t reply at all when he finally speaks.

  “This is where he kept them,” he says, the pain in his voice flooding me with a cold realization. “My girls. For months this was their cage. Since we took the place I’ve avoided this room, avoided this floor altogether. But I needed to see it...I needed to remember what that son of a bitch is capable of.”

  He grows quiet, and so do I. Nothing I say will matter much right now. Better that I wait for him to gather his thoughts. As the silence grows, I find myself thinking not of Barr, but of the man standing beside me. Nobody is the same as they were before this began. I'm certainly not. And as dark and twisted as this road has been, it doesn't compare to the things Frank was subjected to. With his girls as leverage, Barr and his brother coerced Frank in the worst way possible. They took the smiling man of my memories and transformed him into El Matador. A transformation that still lingers inside of him. I see it flash in his eyes when others dredge up his past. I see it in his stoic face when harsh glares and biting insults are hurled his way. The things he’s done, the blood he spilled, it was only ever done to protect those he loves. But that fact has never seemed to matter to the Animals we freed. The hypocrites. It’s as if they forget they did the same.

  “We have to get him, Morgan,” he says. “That’s the only way this ends.”

  The anger I heard earlier has dissipated. He just sounds tired, the longing in his voice, unmistakable. Hearing it, I feel my own anger rise. It’s not just for what Frank’s been through, but what we all have. Barr has done nothing but cast a shadow of misery and hurt. It’s time we returned the favor.

  “We will, my friend,” I say. “One way or another, we will.”

  Chapter 16: (Lauren)

  The road is slick beneath my feet, the top layer of snow melting and refreezing, creating a sheet of ice we walk on. I slip more than once. Worth it though to feel the warmth of the sun on my face. To breathe in clean air tinged with the changing of the season. Spring is on its way, and we all could use a fresh start. There’s only one obstacle standing in the way of that.

  Barr’s face flashes across my mind, bringing with it a wave of hate so pure it’s almost blinding. I’ve only ever felt this kind of hatred toward one other person in my life: Steve, the man who once made my life a living hell. I think of the last time I saw him, dead on the floor, a bullet through his head courtesy of Morgan. I remember the relief I felt when I realized it was over, that he could never hurt Grace or me again. It’s the reason I agreed to join Felix’s party. After everything Barr has done, all the lives he’s ruined, he deserves the worst kind of death. But more than that, the people back at the DoubleTree deserve that same relief. And I want to have a hand in bringing that about.

  We pass the train tracks and I look back, the entrance to the DoubleTree just visible from this angle. Besides, if Morgan couldn’t be here, I need to be. It feels odd, being out here without him. Anytime I’ve been out on this sort of mission, It’s been with him leading it. And though I love those I travel with, though I trust them with my life, I feel his absence now as we reach the intersection of Main Ave.

  “Promise me you’ll be careful,” he said before I left.

  “You know I will,” I said, hoping my voice sounded more assured than it did in my head.

  “Good,” he said. “I still can’t do this without you.”

  I forced a smile. “You’ll never have to.”

  It came out as a promise, one we both know I cannot guarantee. But I sounded sure, and despite himself, Morgan’s mouth curled into a small smile. I hold onto that image now as Frank turns to speak.

  “You know the areas you’re covering,” he says. “Be careful and keep your heads on a swivel. If Barr’s out here looking for us, our only chance is spotting him first.” He pauses, his gaze landing on Felix a moment before speaking again. “Good luck.”

  We split up. Frank and
his team veer right, where they will continue on towards Bodo. Lylette and Owen’s teams veer left, the two teams responsible for the area north of 17th street. As for us, we continue straight for two blocks before turning left onto 3rd Ave. Two double lanes stretch the entire length of the avenue, separated by islands of grass and trees, their snow-covered limbs crisscrossing above us. Only one lane has been cleared of the four, the remaining three congested with wrecks and stalled cars. We use these as our lane of travel, the hunks of metal as good of cover as we could have hoped for.

  My eyes scan back and forth constantly. Down the street. The front yards we pass. The depths of the dark windows staring back at us. I search for anything that might give a hint of Barr’s scouts. If he took the bait, one thing is certain, he’ll have them out here. He’ll want eyes on us before mobilizing the rest of his men. And if he's gone to ground, we have to search the places that would accommodate such a large force.

  We approach our first target: a stone church at the corner. I feel my pulse rise as we draw near, that familiar shot of adrenaline coursing through me. We may be after Barr, but there are other threats we might encounter. My time searching the town for Frank has taught me that. Felix signals for us to get into position and raises three fingers. Two. One. he enters the door and turns right. Leon immediately follows and turns left. Emily and I go next, our guns sweeping the area directly in front of us.

  Pews and pillars become our cover as we scan for threats, ears strained for tell-tale signs that we are not alone. We pause long enough for my pulse to settle down a bit before Felix signals for us to continue. We move slowly from our cover, searching the pews and alcoves till we reach the stage of the church. The back rooms are searched as well. Nothing. The statues and figures painted upon the walls and windows our only company.

  “On to the next,” Felix says.

  It’s only a block to our next target which so happens to be another church. Like the first, we breach and clear the place, finding nothing to report. The same is true on the next two targets, both churches as well.

  “So did they just decide to build every church in town on top of each other?” I ask after clearing our fifth church in a three-block span.

  Leon laughs. “Pretty much,” he says. “I avoided 3rd completely on Sundays. Middle lanes full of cars, doors flying open on all sides, pedestrians cutting out in front of you without a second thought. Just ask Em’.”

  I turn to her expectantly and she just shakes her head. “I was driving down 3rd with my dad when some idiot flung his door wide open as I was passing by. Ripped the door clean off and smashed the front of my car all to hell. I thought my dad was going to yell at me, but he was only angry at the dumb ass in the other car. I’ve avoided this place on Sundays ever since. And you can stop laughing,” she warns Leon. “Or would you like to relive some of your roadway mishaps?”

  Their banter dies off as we exit the church as if the outside world is a place where such normality is forbidden. Not for the first time, I realize how different this must be for them. Because though we travel down the same road, both literal and figurative, that is not how it’s always been. I’ve only known this town in its current state. I don’t know the locations they speak of so often, their stories giving me only a small glance of their lives before. As much as I love them, as much as my future is invested in this town, the truth is, it’s still a foreign place to me.

  Maybe that’s a good thing. I may not know the streets and back alleys and the quickest routes between places, but I also don’t have to remember how different life here used to be. I don’t have the constant reminder they do every time they step outside. I see how hard it is on them. It’s in their painful expressions as we continue to look. It’s bad through my eyes. I can only imagine how much worse it must be through theirs. I’ll always resent my upbringing, but the one thing it did was instill a deep understanding of just how brutal the world could be. It showed me that people like Barr existed long before the EMP.

  We leave the church and head across the street to a small rec center nestled at the base of a hill. Skirting along the edge of some tennis courts, we approach the building itself. At the front entrance, we find the glass doors shattered, the broken shards buried beneath a foot of snow. There are no footprints, but that doesn’t mean much. It’s a good-sized building, plenty of potential entrances.

  We check the gym first, our flashlights on as we sweep the place. Our shoes hit the hardwood floors, echoing in the cavernous place. I feel a chill creep at the base of my neck, the overwhelming sensation of being watched overcoming me. But we reach the limit of the gym, searching every likely place a person would hide and find nothing. Must be imagining it. We leave the gym and continue our search of the rest of the building.

  Our flashlights are turned off as we continue down the hall. We make our way slowly, eyes squinting in the low light. Doors are spread out at intervals along the hallway. Dozens of them. I share a look with Felix and I know he means to check them all. Some are unlocked. Others ajar. Few are locked. In the end, it doesn’t matter. They all get searched and we find nothing.

  “Where to next, boss?” Leon asks.

  Felix considers this. “We’re to stay south of 17th Street,” he says. “I say we sweep Main. There are another dozen places we can check out before we have to head back. If we’re lucky we might even—” I cut him off with a raised hand, body tense as that ominous feeling of being watched returns. My head swivels around, and this time I see more than just darkness within the gym.

  I move past them in a hurry, gun drawn as I re-enter the gym. I hear the others come in beside me, our flashlights, crisscrossing through the dark until one lands on a fleeing figure. He tries to dodge the light but mine isn’t the only one trained on him now. We hen him in until he’s backed into a corner with no way to go but past us. A hood cover’s his face as his head swivels between us, desperate for an escape from his predicament. Seeing none, a sob escapes his throat, the sound resigned. Defeated. It’s the sound of one who has given up.

  A wave of pity and guilt floods me as I recognize it, spreading through my body as the man sinks to his knees and curls up into a ball. I no longer feel the adrenaline I did only moments ago. Watching this man come undone, it seems obvious that whoever he is, he is no threat to us. He’s no Animal. The thought is not unanimously agreed upon, however.

  “Quit crying, and lower your hood,” Felix says. “Don’t try anything stupid, or I swear I’ll put a bullet between your eyes faster than you can blink.”

  A hard edge cuts through his voice, his words coming out clipped and harsh. It’s a tone I’ve never heard from him, making me second guess my guilt. Then the man lowers his hood, and in his eyes, I see nothing but wild fear. He’s terrified, his hands shaking as he splays them before us and squints against the beams assaulting him. I lower my gun and my flashlight.

  “Why were you spying on us?” Felix asks, still in that harsh voice.

  The man trips over his words as he explains. “W-wasn’t spying,” he says. “Just hiding. Wanted to make sure you were g-gone.” He doesn’t look like he’s going to add more, but then he poses his own question, the words leaving him like a terrified whisper: “Are you Animals?”

  This gets our attention, making each of us stiffen in response. “No, we’re not,” I say, softening my voice in contrast to Felix’s. Though still scared, the man seems to breathe a little easier. “You’ve met the Animals before?”

  Through the fear, I see something else ripple across his face. It’s gone too quick for me to place it. “Yes,” he says. “I have.”

  I look at the others, wondering what this man’s story is. More importantly, I wonder if he might be able to help us.

  “You’re not one of them?” Leon asks, blunt as ever.

  The man’s eyes flick to Leon, and this time I have no problem seeing what overcomes him. It’s hate. Pure and undiluted. “No,” he says as if disgusted by the very idea. “I’m no Animal.”
/>   “But you know them,” Felix says pointedly.

  “I survived them,” he barks, voice cracking. “Sometimes I wish I hadn’t.”

  “What do you mean?” Emily asks.

  “I mean what I said,” he answers. He looks around warily. Whatever angry spark he had a moment before now gone. He looks as defeated as when we first cornered him. “What do you want?”

  “To kill the man who leads the Animas Animals,” I say before the others can answer. “We are searching for them so we can end them for good.”

  The man looks up at me as if I mock him. When he sees I’m serious, his expression turns from jaded to incredulous.

  “You’re wasting your time,” he says. “There is no stopping them.”

  “That’s not true,” I say.

  “It is true,” he argues. “You’re just too foolish to see the truth.”

  “Then why have we taken the DoubleTree away from them?” I ask.

  The man’s eyes narrow in disbelief. “You lie,” he says. “There are too many of them. There’s no way you killed them all.”

  “We didn’t,” Felix says. “We liberated those who were blackmailed because of the greed of one man. Now they are with us, and the man who controlled them is in hiding until we can root him out.”

  The man looks from Felix to the rest of us in disbelief.

  “Liberated, you say?” He shakes his head. “You don’t liberate monsters, you kill them. If not, there will come a day when you wished you had.”

  “They might have done monstrous things, but that doesn’t make them monsters,” Felix says. “What choice did they have but to comply when the alternative was watching their loved ones be killed?”

  “There’s always a choice,” the man says. “That they saved their loved ones at the expense of others doesn’t excuse them.”

  “No, it doesn’t,” I say. “But we can’t build a worthwhile future if all we focus on is the past. That means putting differences aside. Mending what can be mended. If not for ourselves, then for those we’ve left behind and those who’ll come after. We owe it to them to make what we do mean something.”