by Schow, Ryan
When she got closer, they saw her, half of them looking her way. There was no other way to go but through them. She came to a full stop, discretely tucked the sides of her shirt in so she had quick access to both her pistol and her knife, and then she resumed her pedaling.
When she was near, the thirty or forty people looked more like fifty or sixty people. They were preoccupied with a pile of bodies off to the side of the road. She wondered if the Chicoms she’d seen earlier had killed these people as they drove through.
Her heart was heavy at the thought of such senseless violence, and it still pumped hard with fear. She wasn’t just afraid of these people, of what they might want from her, but of the notion that if she hadn’t flashed the shooter, maybe he would he have shot her, too. And for what? For not being Chinese?
A few of the people parted to make room for her, but there was a man who stood in her way, his hand up—a clear gesture for her to halt.
She slowed the bike to a stop, her hand resting over her revolver. He looked her up and down, frowning at what he saw. She felt every pulsing thud of her heart beating against her breast.
“What are you doing?” he asked.
“I’m going to see a friend,” she said, slightly winded, a little short of breath due to nerves. “He lives in Five Falls.”
A woman started toward her trailer, eyes on her gear.
“Don’t,” Felicity said, her senses heightened, along with her fear. “There’s no food. Just a sleeping mat, a bloody sleeping bag and a torn tent.”
She became acutely aware of her surroundings, and how everyone was closing in on her.
“We need food,” the woman explained, sad but desperate.
There was dirt under her nails, her clothes were in tatters, and she looked like she hadn’t bathed in weeks. Then again, with all the blood on Felicity’s clothes, they appeared to be in better shape than her.
“We all need food,” Felicity said. “But there’s only enough for me to make it to where I’m going, if I’m lucky.”
Several people saw her weapons, but they were taking in the gruesome sight of her bloodstained pants, her shirt and her damaged gear.
“Who did you kill?” the man asked.
“More like what did I kill,” she said. “A wild boar attacked me last night. I killed it, and then I gut it and ate what I could of it.”
“You’re lucky,” another man said, his eyes also on her trailer. “Lots of us are living off the scraps of others.”
He took a small step toward her, discounting her because of her youth, but not knowing she’d spent a few days with a man named Clay who taught her the most valuable lessons of survival: don’t hesitate to get a little dirty.
This was war. Surviving sometimes meant killing.
In one smooth advance, she tore the weapon from her holster, held it at her side with her finger resting against the trigger guard.
The group stilled beneath a collective pause.
“Obviously I can’t get all of you,” she said, overtly hostile, “but if one more of you steps toward my stuff, I’m starting with them, then moving to you.” She said this as she turned on the man in front of her. “After you, I’m taking out the women and children. Do you hear me?”
The man standing before her held up his hands in mock surrender and said, “No one wants to hurt you, we’re all just survivors, like you.”
“And curious about my things,” Felicity added. “I get it. But I am losing daylight here while my parents are back in Roseburg in a detention camp, along with most of the city. So if you don’t mind, move out of the way or I’m going to move you myself.”
She used the gun as a pointer, aiming it at the man and flicking it sideways. As if he had failed to make his point, and was unwilling to elaborate, he moved to the side, his hands still raised, palms facing her.
“Good luck. And if they come after you,” he said as she slowly rode by, clearly referring to the Chicoms, “kill them all.”
“That’s the plan,” she responded, standing up and pumping her legs again.
She managed to make it most of the way through Medford without any trouble. That didn’t mean her concerns with the Chicoms had lessened. They hadn’t. She couldn’t stop wondering where they were headed, or if they would be returning anytime soon.
As much as the voice inside her head said to stay off the interstate, she wondered if taking side streets would only put her in more danger.
People were desperate months ago. How many of them were dead now? The good people, she told herself. The weak people.
In her mind, she did the math.
If those who survived were the strongest, if this truly was survival of the fittest, wouldn’t it also be survival of the most ferocious?
At what point did the people turn on their pets for food, or their neighbors, or even their loved ones?
The body and the mind fought to survive until the point when they snapped.
Early on, the suicides were off the charts. People used to the good life who had not prepared for this couldn’t take the stress. It was easier to take a bullet, stick your head in a noose, slice open a wrist and quickly bleed out. Those who remained among the living were a mix of smart people, prepared people, bad people and downright insane people.
Which one was she? Had she become all of them?
No, she was a good person, for sure. But the good died off early, didn’t they? Could she be a bad person? Would God forgive her? Would He know what was in her heart? He had to. He was God. But if she kept on living, could she forgive herself? She was prepared to kill people back there. The woman first. The man, without question. Was that the behavior of a young woman trying to earn her way into heaven?
Is there even a heaven anymore?
Her mind returned to the question of getting off the interstate. She was afraid. Her father, of course, told her all she needed to know about fear. Fear was weakness, and weakness was death. Beyond fear, however, was wisdom. With enough wisdom, fear tended to fall to the wayside.
If she got off the interstate, she was afraid she’d come to a pack of survivors inside the city who thought killing a girl like her meant sex and a meal…both needs satisfied from the same body. If they robbed her, these mythical deviants, would they steal her clothes, rob her of her dignity, take her virginity from her? Would they throw her on a spit, cook her and eat her? Of course they would.
Rather, the possibility rang true in her frightened mind.
Thinking of her virginity, she thought of Shawn. Her now dead boyfriend. Thinking of him was like driving a stake into her heart. The Chicoms killed him because he stood up for a family that wasn’t his. She never had her chance at first love because the Chicoms held the community in a state of fear, and Shawn served more as protection than he did potential husband material. Whenever he tried to touch her, or be with her, she always said the fear was crippling, that she didn’t feel like doing it, that she wanted her first time to mean something. Most of the girls in town said the same things. Not to their men, but to each other. They said they didn’t want to fall in love because you just never knew when the Chicoms were going to kill that someone and leave you emotionally destitute.
Too many people were experiencing such bereavements with their own families. Felicity’s friend, Anastasia, lost her fiancée and ended up going into an emotional coma she never recovered from. The Chicoms killed her, too. She was alive, but completely dead inside. Felicity had been dating Shawn long enough for them to consider sex, but in the end, the mood never presented itself for them to take their relationship forward. And then one day he was gone. Just another body, another statistic, soon to be forgotten in the wake of more deaths.
Now that she was on her own—with no protection from a father, a boyfriend or a dog—would one of these soulless survivors try to take that which she was unwilling to give? This was a nagging concern, one that failed to fall silent. That left her wondering, if the meek truly did inherit the earth, were they subject
to the wrath of the untamed, the vile, the wicked? She had no answers. Only a hypothesis. And this is why she stayed on the interstate, faithful to her original course.
While she rode the interstate, sitting in the back of her mind was the thought that—if push came to shove—she’d rather be shot than robbed, tortured or raped, because that’s the kind of thing some alpha males do. It was what someone who would hurt her would do. With no law to stop them, how would she survive an encounter?
Her father taught her that most people were killed for being in the wrong place at the wrong time with the wrong people. This whole world was the wrong place at the wrong time with the wrong people. Besides, there was no more direct route to Five Falls than on I5.
It lead right through town, according to maps.
Ahead, she saw random vagabonds wandering around the freeway, some walking on the sides, but none of them bothered her. Still, when she rode by them, she had her gun in hand, ready to make sure she was not a victim out of irresponsibility or unnecessary civility.
When she reached a high point on the interstate and could see nothing but a long city sprawl, she saw several buildings lying in ruin, a whole section of the city bombed out. But then she saw the Chicoms in the Fred Meyer parking lot. Fred Meyer was a gigantic grocery store where outdoor generators were humming heavy. Did they have food in there, or just power? The building was so large, and in such close proximity to I5, it made sense that they would congregate there.
In the back of her mind, she dreamed of waltzing into the store, pumping every last round into those rat bastards until the cylinder clicked dry and she was taken out of her misery with a hail of retaliatory gunfire.
After that, they could do whatever they wanted with her bloody corpse.
But she kept on pedaling, not doing any of that because she was focused on the greater tasks: save her parents from the internment camps, kill as many Chicoms as she could liberating them, don’t get raped or eaten along the way.
Chapter Thirteen
Quan knew the time to leave Five Falls had been coming soon. He knew he needed to get to Yale, that it was getting close. This was where the last fight for control of the West Coast would take place. This was how they’d get to Zheng and his henchmen, and quite possibly President Hu.
Now, with the traitor exposed and dealt with, with his contact’s message to get to Yale riding every single thought, Quan was anxious to leave.
Longwei threw him a curveball, though.
“You can take half the crew, but I’m not coming with you. We can’t leave until Ryker, Skylar, Logan and Noah get back.”
“The town’s defenses are good,” Quan argued softly.
“Not against a real threat.”
Quan was forced to relent. Longwei was right. And none of the men he wanted to take were his team. He was a loner. But the team was Longwei’s, and inevitably, they would take orders from him and him only.
“How many?” Quan asked, uncomfortable.
“You can have half of the crew,” Longwei said. “But I choose and they get final say on whether or not they want to go with you.”
“That’s fine,” Quan conceded. “Don’t forget about Harper, though. Or Clay, or Boone. Those guys are plenty capable, and they’re locals”
“Boone’s a ghost, man, you know that.”
“I just need to get to Washington, assess Yale, see if there’s a way to tear down this regime from the inside out.”
“Don’t let hate be the poison in your blood that blinds you,” Longwei said.
“I remind myself of that daily,” Quan replied.
“And don’t rush in for the first opportunity. If you find Hu, or Da Xiao Zheng—even if you have that perfect opportunity to gut it all—think of the bigger picture. One man can be replaced, but if these people are going to make this their new paradise, then we need to think long term. A year, two years, five years.”
“That’s too long,” Quan said, his words intensified by the anxiety burning inside him.
“I trust your instincts, my friend.”
Longwei gathered up the crew, talked to them aside from Quan, asked for volunteers. Most of them raised their hands. Like Longwei, though, there were a few who had fallen in love with Five Falls, with the idea of peace as opposed to a prolonged war.
In the end, he chose a little less than half of his crew and brought them to Quan.
“These six soldiers want to accompany you to Yale,” he told Quan. “They were given the chance to volunteer, as I indicated earlier, so you will not need to worry about mixed loyalties.”
“Is the second bug out location solid?” Quan asked. “Just in case I return and don’t immediately find you.”
“Roderick drilled down on the proposed site yesterday,” one of Longwei’s men said. “He hit the water table at about twenty feet. They’re getting a pipe down there now, along with pea gravel and the hand pump. From what Roderick says, the well should be fine, which means we’ll be building out the proposed site upon confirmation. They’re going to prime the well tomorrow, then test for pump volume and water quality.”
“That’s great,” Quan said, his understanding of wells rudimentary at best.
The second site was near a hillside where workers were digging into the earth to both build and conceal small homes from the ground and air. There was also a nearby clearing for a community garden if they had to think long term and out of town. Farther back, there were places to set up campsites for privacy, or eventually build a number of small homes, or even several very large ones, if need be. Overall, the area was tucked far enough away that it could also be made in a ground fight. They just needed people to move there and start working the land. And that’s where Longwei and the rest of his people would volunteer.
After Longwei told him this, Quan realized the man did not want to go to Yale. Quan would have to make peace with that notion, or perhaps test it later on down the road if they were right and truly needed.
“By the time you get back,” Longwei told Quan, “this second site should be rock solid.”
“If I return, it’s to get you back into the war, not to drop stakes and call this place home,” Quan replied, slightly agitated by his enthusiasm for something that was only supposed to be temporary. “Not that I don’t value what you’re doing. Just don’t forget that before long term survival, there is the fight to secure it.”
“We all understand that,” Longwei said, clear on Quan’s meaning.
“We need to talk about the elephant in the room,” Quan finally said. “I’m leaving, but we’re leaving you exposed to a possible Chicom attack.”
“We’ll manage it fine,” Longwei said. “We’ve got Otto making the last of his dynamite. Connor is working on the last rounds in his ammo supply, and Noah has stationed his lookouts to the farthest point of the Uniden’s range on both the northern and southern borders.”
They’d recently blasted the northern end of the highway, cutting a deep trench ten feet wide and eight feet deep. Whatever vehicles were headed down from the north would end up just as wrecked as the Chicom vehicles that met their match at the south end.
“You need to have teams ready to go at any minute,” Quan said. “Don’t be lazy. And don’t count Noah out because of his age. He’s at his best when he’s not drinking, and since he’s run out of booze, he’s been on point tactically, even though he’s become more unmanageable than ever.”
“He’s a belligerent asshole,” someone said.
They all laughed.
“And yet he made sure the perimeters were covered,” another of Longwei’s soldiers said.
“We tease because we like him,” Longwei clarified. In a deeply American accent, he said, “It’s the same thing we’d say to his face, and he’d call us pus nutted bags of commie crap, or something like that, if he were here.”
Everyone started laughing at the impression, but then the mood returned to its somber start. The team was breaking up. And it was happening so fast th
at both Quan and Longwei didn’t know what to make of it. Then again, rule number one was don’t get attached.
“Speaking of the old goat, it’s when we’re nice to Noah that he gets pissed off,” Quan said, more a warning than a revelation. “So be vigilant, but don’t be nice.”
“When are we going?” one of Quan’s team asked.
Quan said, “We’re leaving in the morning, at first light. Maybe sooner if I start getting too antsy.”
Chapter Fourteen
Ryker, Skylar, Logan and Noah got nearly forty miles up the road, to Weed, California, when Ryker let his foot off the gas and said, “Skylar, hand me the binoculars.”
“If you want to look at Mt. Shasta,” she said, “we can always pull over. I have to take care of some lady business anyway.”
“It’s not that,” he said, taking the binos. “Grab the wheel.”
She took the wheel.
“Good God,” he said as he looked through the field glasses, as if the sight of whatever he was seeing alarmed him.
He then angled the glasses up to two black dots in the sky and found a helicopter coming in from one direction and a small plane from another.
“Can someone tell me if there’s a small airfield near Weed?” Ryker asked.
He handed Skylar the binos and pulled over to the side of the road. In back, Logan was studying the paper map.
Noah said, “What’s up there?”
Ryker answered as best as he could. “SAA, I think. And not just a few grunts. Looks like a hardened military installation, even though it’s not.”
“How the hell are they surviving in all of this destruction?” Skylar asked. “This state has been nothing but obliterated since we arrived.
“Maybe this is fresh meat making their way up through the wastelands,” Noah said, thinking out loud.
“But why?” Skylar asked.
“Because they aren’t admitting defeat,” Logan replied. “Weed has a small airport. It’s nothing really. Just a footnote as far as airfields go.”