The Rising

by Eli Constant

  Sherry’s death was a waste. “Dammit,” AJ shout-whispered, slamming her hands against the steering wheel once again. She’d saved Sherry from rape and worse just to have her die anyways.

  Albuquerque had to be okay. The station had to be operational. Maybe the Native American patrol had just gotten sidetracked, just late checking back in. Empty hopes again. Wishes in the middle of that nightmare.

  Albuquerque was different than most towns. It was nestled in a mountain, its houses and buildings part of the geography. so that the skyline was almost natural-looking. If the virus was had been out of control here, it would have been bad. There would have been no way to contain it. Thousands of places for the monsters to hide above in the rocks and in the buildings below; it would be the ultimate death trap. And in the same part of town, just minutes from HQ, was Kirkland- the AF base AJ had hopes for, in case the station had been overrun.

  The going was slow and AJ found the slow pace exhausting. But between the freakishly high winds and the cars and trucks scattered on both sides of the highway, she couldn’t go any faster. On two separate occasions, she was forced to use the RV to move a smaller vehicle out of the way. The screech of metal and plastic bending and ripping would have been gut-wrenching, if everyone wasn’t already gut-wrenched by what had happened to Sherry. All AJ could think each time she had to manhandle the RV and push her way through was that the old owners of the motor couch must be rolling over in their graves at the thought of their quarter million-dollar investment being used as a battering ram.

  Finally, towards the top of a pass, the cars began to thin out and AJ could pick up a little speed. It didn’t much matter by then. They were close now, close enough to taste what it felt like to near the end of a too-long journey that has left you longing for the comforts of home.

  Then it was there. The outskirts of the city, the repose of its buildings against the late day still so hot that the heat waves were seeable and nearly touchable despite the fading light. There was still another area of hills to fully see the city, to see the lower half that would be more encased in darkness than the bright tips of the buildings that reached for the sky above. One more barrier before the truth would be seen. An enchanted mirror where only the skin beneath the makeups and the lotions and the lies could show.

  One thing was sure; they’d know fast how bad things were. All they had to do was get that degree closer, crest the next range of hills to reveal the entire city. Lost in her own thoughts, AJ jumped when Juan came to sit in the passenger’s seat. His face was steel, any tears wiped away. “No second thoughts about this?”

  “No. We’ve come this far; we have to keep going now.” AJ wanted to say more. We have to keep going. If we don’t, what the fuck did Sherry die for?

  “Let’s finish it then. What’s the fucking worst that could happen.” Juan didn’t make it a question, because it wasn’t one. No, it was a challenge, almost a challenge to fate and reality and whatever the fuck was controlling the destiny of humanity

  “We should wait for morning. There’s only an hour or so before dark.”

  Juan didn’t respond to AJ immediately. When he finally did reply, he sounded defeated. “Fine. Morning and we finish this.”

  They stayed on high ground, resting atop that last lump of hills and facing the city that could be seen from floor to ceiling now. The night was quiet, too quiet for the longest time, and then the winds picked back up like screaming wraiths in the night. The gusts were so strong that they rocked the camper back and forth like a teeter totter. As had become their habit, they’d cut all the lights as they’d entered full dusk flirting with black night. In the past, they’d talked about things, nothing important, nothing relevant. Just things like old news stories they’d read, their favorite sports teams, the places they’d traveled.

  That night they could find nothing to say. They sat quietly in the dark, as separated as was possible within the confines of the RV. Marty fell asleep first, crying himself to sleep. Neither Juan nor AJ moved to comfort him.

  The last thought AJ had before drifting off to sleep, her legs propped up on the dash, the driver’s seat leaned back as far as it would go, and the M-16 across her thighs, was that life doesn’t turn out how you expect it. It doesn’t follow a plan. You don’t find the one, have those two-point-five kids, balance a career, and be totally happy until the end of your days.

  No, sometimes happiness isn’t that picket fence or that life spent single and traveling the world. Sometimes, you get into a position where happiness is sitting in a comfortable chair, in an RV that had air conditioning, and feeling fairly sure you’ll survive the night without being eaten.

  And she decided, right then and there, that if this apocalypse right itself, if the world re-found some semblance of order, that she wouldn’t spend her life chasing down folks who were just trying to survive or give their family a better life. She’d find a more normal pursuit, something that didn’t leave her feeling inhuman at the end of the night.

  Juan didn’t fall asleep, he kept himself awake by focusing on the guilt that poured through his person. The near-rape of Sherry and his inability to save her then. His deferring to AJ and siding with AJ at almost every turn. His letting Sherry die instead of him.

  He stood by the window that he’d looked out of to see Sherry’s head cradled in the Z kid’s hands. He looked up and stared at the stars. It was amazing how big they were and how close they seemed out here. It was like you could reach out and touch them. High up, Juan saw a satellite racing across the sky, sharing space with those blinking stars. It reflected the now invisible sun’s light back to Earth. Those stars, that satellite, they were oblivious to what was happening down here. Juan had never stopped and just appreciated the stars. What a waste that was.

  Juan was about to leave the window, move to the front of the windshield and check the terrain from that angle, when a muted light shone suddenly down the road in front of the RV. Juan could just see it, flickering almost at the base of the hill. It wasn’t light like from a flashlight, it was something else. Fire maybe. Juan turned away from the window, searching around until he found AJ’s monocular. It was hard for him to find the light again once the monocular was pressed to his eye. He waited patiently, eventually thinking it was a trick of the mind.

  Then, it appeared again, like someone had stoked it back into existence. Stoked, because he realized that it was a camp fire, small and unimposing against the dark landscape. Small, but visible. And visible meant vulnerable. “Who the hell would be stupid enough to have a campfire in the middle of the damn night?”

  Juan moved to AJ and shook her shoulder gently. “AJ, wake up, we’ve got company.”

  AJ stirred immediately. “What did you say?” Her voice only sounded moderately sleep tired.

  “Company, we’ve got company.”

  She was out of her seat in a moment, eyes finding the still-sleeping Marty first. “Are you wanting to go check it out?”

  “They’ve got a bloody fire going. They’re going to get themselves killed whoever the fuck they are.” Juan went back to the window and AJ followed. He handed her the monocular and she made short work of finding the flame in the distance.

  “I’ll go, you stay with Marty,” AJ said in a way that made it clear she didn’t want to be argued with. “This could be a trap and I can sneak up them better than you can. This is my training.” AJ moved from the window, giving Juan the monocular back. She retrieved the M-16 she’d left sitting on the driver’s seat and she pulled her bullet-proof vest over her head, tightening the straps until it was snug.

  “And if it’s a trap? If you don’t come back?”

  “I’ll come back, Juan.”

  Neither of them said what they wanted to say- that she might not. That Sherry didn’t.

  “When I come back, I’ll say ‘is this the slow boat to China’ if everything’s okay.”

  “And if everything isn’t okay,” Juan pushed.

  “If I say anything other th
an that, Juan, be prepared for a fight.” AJ unlocked the RV door and pushed her way through into the night. She soon disappeared against the darkness- her black vest, her black hair swishing in its ponytail, becoming nothing more than more shadow to merge with shadow. The wind had died down, which was a good thing, the dust not kicking up and attacking her eyes.

  The fire was a good hundred yards away from the RV, very close to where the traffic was backed up again on the downhill slope going into the city. It was in the area known as Woodring and all around nestled into the mountain were homes and estates. Z kids would likely be there, with so many places to hide. Whoever these people were, they didn’t have the sense God gave a goat and they were just asking to be a happy meal. AJ shook her head, disbelieving the utter stupidity.

  She knew that not everyone was like her. Not everyone knew how to stay safe, how to stay hidden. How to be smart.

  AJ moved slowly and quietly towards the light. The scene around the flame was taking on definition now and I could see two bodies sitting in folding chairs next to the fire. How stupid could these people be? she thought. Not just a fire, but a cooler and chairs and a vehicle nearby with the back hatch open, bags and goods fully visible. No, it had to be a trap, AJ realized. She paused, thinking, wondering what to do. And then she heard a voice. It was singing something, low and sweet. A lullaby. Why would someone set a trap and then sing a lullaby?

  Slowly, AJ started her approach again. Just outside the ring of light she pushed the safety on the M-16 to semi-auto. She could see one man and a woman now. The woman sat profiled and at her feet was a large basket-like thing. No, too wide and tall for that. She squinted, trying to see the details better. It had a thick handle coming out of the top.

  The woman was still singing, singing and she started to rock the handled basket at her feet. If it held weapons or other things, why would she rock it? AJ brought the M-16 up and stepped into the circle of light.

  “Nobody move a muscle,” AJ said and watched for reactions from the man and woman. The woman jumped, both of her hands going down to the handle of the basket at her feet. The man made like he was going to stand, but AJ spoke again so he’d stay seated. “Put your hands out in front of you where I can see them and stand up. Anything fast and you’re dead.”

  The man hesitated. AJ studied his face in the light of the fire that was fluctuating brighter and then fading and then brighter again. She realized that he was barely a man, maybe early twenties. Maybe only late teens. She turned to the woman, to his companion. She was mid-thirties, maybe older. And AJ suddenly realized what she was bending over to protect.

  The woman, emboldened by AJ’s too-long stare, spoke then. Bold enough to speak or not, her voice still quaked. AJ found that she respected that the woman, scared for herself and for those she cared about, would still find the will to speak. “My name is Bethany Thomas. My husband is the Press Secretary for the White House. This,” she pointed at the young man sitting near her, “is Scott Chambers. His father’s the Secretary of Defense. And this,” her voice cracked with emotion, “is my daughter Mari.”

  AJ began to lower her weapon. Then she raised it again, because what were the chances that they’d run across these people, these folks with a very real connection to the government? “How do I know you aren’t lying about who you are?”

  “How do we know you didn’t steal that border patrol vest off some dead agent and decide to parade around like you have authority,” the woman, Bethany, said as if she’d already fallen prey to someone who’d done exactly that.

  “I am a border patrol agent,” AJ confirmed.

  “And we really are who we say we are.” Bethany murmured something to the child at her feet. “If you really are a Border Patrol agent, then we could use some help.”

  “You’re fifteen hundred plus miles from the district.” AJ had always been good with geography, with maps and finding her way. She’d been to the district more than once, flying out for this and that, once just to finally see the Smithsonian. It crossed her mind, before she spoke again that the world wasn’t just wild and fierce and dangerous, or more so than it had always been, but it was strange. Full of oddities. Cowboys with insta-forts, Indians on horseback, zombies and now DC elite roaming the desert. AJ wondered if they’d have found Aliens had they not driven fast through Roswell. “What the hell brought you out here?”

  At that, Bethany started crying and she finally fully relaxed my grip on the gun, pushing the safety back on. When her mother started crying, Mari began crying also. “Do you mind if I pick up Mari? She’s crying. She cries so much.” Bethany didn’t wait for AJ to respond; she bent down, fiddled with something, and then finally picked up the little girl. She was small, either very young or very petite, with hair so black it shone like a raven’s wing in the fire light. Beautiful.

  The sight of the baby, so fragile and tiny, made AJs heart jump into her throat. She didn’t want to be outside any longer and she didn’t want them to be either. Even if they were actually lying, even if they ended up being people with no important connections, who knew nothing, she’d want to keep them safe.

  “We have government cards, dependent cards, if that will help you believe us,” Bethany said it quietly, whispering it against her daughter’s dark hair and rocking the child gently. “I can tell you still don’t. If Cliff has taught me anything, it’s how to tell when someone doesn’t believe you and how to lie so they do. Politics, he calls it.”

  “I’m going to stand up if that’s okay,” Scott spoke then and he stood. AJ didn’t stop him. She watched though, as he left the fireside and moved to a vehicle she had not seen, so dark was its paint and so small was it. It looked like a reject from the 80s. She walked up, fascinated that the son of the SECDEF and wife of the President’s Press Secretary had come across the country in basically a shoe box. “What the hell kind of car is that?”

  “No idea. I’m not into cars, don’t drive or even have my license. Bethany’s BMW was low on fuel, something knocking badly under the hood.”

  A BMW, that made more sense to AJ. “Well, it got you here, that’s all that matters.”

  Behind them, AJ could hear Bethany whispering to Mari again. And that brought the baby back to reality. It was stupid to stand here in the open by a fire that could call the monsters at any moment, and talk about a car. AJ changed the subject. “Grab what you can. Come back to the RV with me. I can guarantee it’s safer.”

  “Do you have a lot of guns?” Bethany questioned behind AJ. She turned to her. “Cliff doesn’t like guns. He doesn’t want Mari around them.”

  AJ almost laughed, thinking she was joking. “This isn’t some campaign in the district where gun control is going to win you votes. There are zombies, or didn’t you get the memo?”

  Her face looked haunted and I almost felt bad for speaking so bluntly. “Yes, I got the memo,” she murmured, and I could see her arms tighten just a little around her daughter.

  “We’ve been doing fine on our own.” Scott sounded stubborn standing next to the dwarf-sized car. “We’ve got a plan. We’re going to find my dad and Cliff and we don’t need help.”

  “Look at the damn world, kid. Everyone needs help.” AJ lifted her hands, the gun held loosely in one, and dropped them dramatically. “Saying you don’t need help is like saying you can go a day without pissing.”

  He started to argue again but Bethany stopped him. “Scott, I know the car means a lot to you, but we need to find a safer situation. For you, for me…for Mari. If she can keep us safe, keep everyone alive, then we need to go with her.” She said ‘everyone’ like they’d lost someone already on their road to survival.

  “Bethany, we don’t—”

  “And if Cliff and your dad aren’t here? What then? We need someone who knows this place. I’ve never been here before, ever. I don’t know anything about the landscape or where things are. We need help. That’s not a question or a maybe. It’s a certainty.”

  Scott clammed up then and he wa
lked around me to the open hatch of the car. He pulled out two medium-sized pull along suit cases, a duffel bag, and what looked like a diaper bag. “Is that everything?” AJ asked. When Scott nodded, she reached forward and grabbed the duffel, slinging it over her shoulder to rest against her back, and then she also grabbed one of the pull along cases. “Come on. We’re lucky as hell that nothing’s attacked us already.”

  Bethany stood, keeping Mari nestled against her chest instead of placing her back in the car seat. “Scott, can you get Meri’s seat?”

  He nodded at her, sliding the baby bag over his shoulder and grabbing the handle of the second suit case. Moments later, he was beside Bethany and bending over to pick up the car seat. He stayed right with the older woman as AJ moved and they followed. He was dedicated to them, the kind of guy that made a promise and kept it no matter the costs. AJ didn’t know what the exact relationship was, maybe they were just thrown together by circumstance and the fact that their father and husband worked together, or maybe there something more tangible between them. Scott seemed overly concerned with the baby in Bethany’s arms, constantly leaning nearer so he could catch a glimpse of the sleeping child’s face. There was love in that look.

  The group of four moved quietly, cutting through the blackness. All three of the adults held hope with every step that no attacks would come tonight, that their luck would hold.

  AJ knocked on the RV door when she got there and she waited a moment before saying, “Is this the slow boat to China?”

  Juan opened the door a few seconds later and his gaze widened a little when he saw the two people behind AJ. He said nothing though, not until the RV door was closed and locked again.