by Mark Tufo
“I didn’t say we were gonna go toe to toe, but I owe it to you to at least try and get your old lady back.”
“Old lady? Shit, I’d love for her to hear you say that.” I was going to turn his offer down. He was a wild card but something in me decided against it. At the very minimum he’d be able to get me through the city faster. He whistled and some thirty or so of his gang came out from where they had been. I was thankful they hadn’t just killed me—the odds had been more skewed then I had initially realized.
“Flats, bring Strings to Hernandez and get his arm slung. Why didn’t you just kill him? He would have killed you if he could have.”
“I’ve killed enough men, kind of sick of it.”
He looked at me then nodded. I guess I answered the question correctly or at least to his liking.
“How many of you are there?” I asked as we made our way through the area.
“Enough.”
“Enough” was a vague answer. Enough to defend his turf, defend against the Genos, or attempt an overthrow of the government? That last part made no sense since there wasn’t much left to take down. A well-armed Girl Scout troop might be able to do that.
“How long have you been here?” I tried another question. For some reason I felt the need to talk, maybe it was a nerves thing. I wasn’t too big on having this many men following me and not know their intentions. Although if he’d wanted my gun why the charade? He could have taken me out a dozen or so times. This time I didn’t even get a one-word response.
“Why are you helping me?” I had waited a bit before trying again.
“You sure do ask a lot of questions.”
“That’s not really an answer.”
“I know that.”
And then we were once again traveling in silence, well, at least verbal silence. Our footfalls echoed off of the remnants of buildings. The devastation was awful. I can’t even begin to imagine the loss of life that must have happened here in one fell swoop. I’d finally decided that I was not going to calm my nerves with idle chitchat, at least not with him. I could probably pull off a full conversation with myself but I didn’t want them to think I was any more unstable than maybe they already thought.
“Hold up,” BT said as he put his forearm against my chest. I’d seen smaller tree trunks.
“Sure thing.” I winced as I tried to get air back into my lungs after he’d knocked it out.
There was a series of whistles and hand gestures.
“All clear,” BT said after a moment. “Check point.” He explained before I could ask.
We had gone maybe another mile. I was looking around for any signs of life.
“No more questions?” he asked.
“Well I’d love to, but you don’t seem like much of a conversationalist.”
“You asked why I was helping you.”
“I did.”
We must have walked a quarter of a mile before he spoke again. Maybe to figure out the answer himself. “We don’t have much here.”
That was an understatement, I kept my mouth shut. Whatever the reason they stayed here, he found value in it.
“This is where I grew up, right over there in fact.” He pointed to what I guess was a house lined street at one time. Now it looked like something you would expect to see after a tornado has ripped through a mobile home park. There were stacks of crumbled two by fours intermingled with pieces of furniture and hunks of drywall everywhere. Occasionally a personal item like a picture frame or a stuffed animal could be seen but really for the most part it looked like mountains of trash.
“I was away while it all happened. I had gone to take my police entry exam, if you can believe that.”
“You’re shitting me?”
“What’s the matter, you don’t think I could be a cop?”
“No, I don’t think they’d been able to find a uniform big enough.”
“I’d had enough of this gang bullshit and I’d somehow managed to keep a clean enough record. I’ve done some stuff, petty larceny, stole a car or two. Never got caught. I guess I had the luck of the Irish.”
“Irish? Sure, why not. And was the car a Volkswagen Bug? Because that would have been kind of funny trying to see you fit in one of those.”
“You’re making me regret my decision.”
“Sorry, my wife tells me I don’t have much of a filter from brain to mouth. Part of it is being raised in Boston, the other might be lack of proper medication.”
“Anyway, I never killed anyone, at least up until the Allees came. By then it was out of necessity. Kill or be killed.”
“I can relate to that.”
“I figured you might. That’s why I’m thinking we could be kindred spirits or something.”
Personally, I was thinking he was nuts. Those of us who are precariously holding on to our sanity can spot this in others. He was tough to read but I was thinking his killings weighed as heavily on him as mine did.
“Is everything they say about you true?” He had turned to look into my eyes as he asked this.
“Not sure if that’s a fair question. I don’t know who you were listening to and what they said. For all I know someone might have told you I shit gold coins.”
“Well, if that was the case it really would have been a shame if Strings had killed you. I’m talking about what happened aboard that ship.” He pointed but did not look, as if to do so would summon its wrath.
“I’m not proud of it.”
“I didn’t say you were. You did what you had to do. From what I can tell, you held on to at least a little of your sanity, enough to snow a woman into marrying your ass, anyway.”
“And having a kid.”
“And a kid. Impressive.”
“I know—I’m already saving up to put his therapist’s kids through college.”
“All I’m saying, man, is that me and a lot of the guys behind me are thankful for what you did.”
“I honestly didn’t get that feeling.”
“We’re a gang. There’s not much room for social graces or the expressing of one’s true feelings.”
We were coming up on the outskirts of the city and the debris field was slowly diminishing. This was not a fact I registered until I finally looked around and realized the ground was scraped nearly clean, leaving only the remnants of foundations or pavement as the case may be. “What happened here?” All I could think was that it was part of some rebuilding effort.
“You’ll see.”
He wasn’t kidding. It took another quarter mile and then there it was—Los Angeles’s own version of the Great Wall. Mountains of trash were piled twenty to twenty-five feet tall as far as the eye could see. “What the...? How?”
“We got a hold of a few bulldozers and other construction equipment and have crews working around the clock.”
“To what purpose, keeping people in or out?”
“Not people.”
“We know about the Allee city and if they attacked, this is the most likely avenue of approach.”
“That’s not going to stop them,” I told him as we approached closer. “Slow them down a bit, maybe.”
BT looked undeterred. “Oh, I think you and the Allees are going to be a bit surprised. Follow me.” He began to traverse the hill.
“Whoa, I’m not sure if my tetanus shot is up to date.”
“It’s mostly stable.”
“Wonderful.” I walked in his footsteps figuring if he hadn’t caused an avalanche I should be all right. “Is that cement?” I was looking down at my feet and noticed the material between cracks in beams and twisted metal.
“We put as much cement on each layer that we can.”
“Where are you getting these kinds of resources? Nothing against you, big man, but this seems pretty industrious. Wouldn’t just heading to a safer place be a much easier proposition?”
“This is my home, I am not leaving it again,” he said defiantly. “You might want these.” He handed me a pair of black sunglasses a
s we began to crest the top.
He had donned his and then stopped, motioning me to move ahead of him. Well, here it is, I thought. He’s going to push me over the edge and out of his life. I was a fraction of a second too late putting on the glasses as sun glare nearly melted my eyeballs. I clamped my eyes shut and put them on, which I now realized were welding glasses. Only the most intense light could make it through and still it looked like noon when I dared to open my eyes. The beginning of a headache from where I’d singed my cortex was flaring in the middle of my head.
“I...I can’t make out what I’m looking at.” The side of the hill facing away from the city was ablaze in white fire. As much as I was drawn to the shiny shit I couldn’t take the intensity anymore, even with the glasses on. I turned and walked back towards BT, pulling the shades off and rubbing my eyes furiously. I was thrilled I could still see, albeit everything was a little washed out with giant blue spots floating before my eyes.
“It’s glass and mirror fragments from the skyscrapers mostly,” he said proudly.
“To what purpose?” I was pinching my nose again. “If it’s to blind the enemy then fucking congratulations, although I would have loved a heads up.”
“I gave you the glasses, it’s not my fault you didn’t put them on immediately.”
“Fine. What if they attack at night?”
“The glare, although it is effective, is not the primary reason for the glass and mirrors.”
“I’m listening, sort of.” My head was throbbing. Whatever fire had been unleashed in my skull seemed to be catching and laying waste as it moved rapidly through the folds of my mind. I was sort of hoping it would incinerate some of my shittier memories. Lord knows I had enough of those.
“The glass absorbs a fair amount of the alien rifle fire.”
So lost in my minor misery, I didn’t process what he’d said immediately. “Wait...what?”
“The glass...”
“I heard you.”
“Then why did you ask again?”
“I just really enjoy your voice. It’s sort of soothing, like Barry White or something.”
“You realize I could just pick you up and toss you over the edge, right?”
“How? How do you know this?” There was more going on than he was letting me know. “And how effective is it?”
“I don’t have percentages if that’s what you’re talking about. But that blue shit just kind of dissipates when it hits that much of the material. There’s some blow back but not much.”
“This is unreal…I’m sort of speechless.”
“From everything I know about you I’ll take that as a compliment.”
“Funny.” My head was finally beginning to feel relatively normal. “So, now what?”
“We wait.”
“My wife is out there.”
“Listen, I said I’d help, but leaving our only means of defense was never an option. If she’s alive and she comes this way we’ll get her. Sorry, man,” he added when he saw my reaction. “If your old lady is anything like you she’ll be fine.”
“Shit, she’s twice the man I am.”
BT laughed. “Then I’m looking forward to meeting her.”
I don’t know what message BT had spread but more and more men and women came to man the wall. It was easy to see at one time these were multiple gangs. Some wore blue, some red, while others had leather vests with their name or colors. Others were tattooed on their faces with their particular gang sign. But each person had on a black bandana armband to signify his or her allegiance to BT and to whatever his higher purpose was.
“Here, put this on.” He handed me an armband.
“I follow my own orders. I’m sick of taking shit from others.”
“I understand. Just consider it a piece of armor—when the bullets start flying you don’t want to be misconstrued as an enemy.”
“I’ll take my chances. Last I checked I wasn’t anywhere near eight feet tall, green and scaly.”
“Suit yourself.” He stuffed it back in his pocket.
There was a silence between us, but not an uneasy one. It felt good being around this giant of a man, like maybe I was supposed to be. I don’t believe in that alternate reality bullshit or past lives or any of it to be honest. Which in and of itself is kind of strange that this is where I decided to draw the line. I mean, I’d seen Debbie’s spirit when she died and aliens were attacking us. Plus, I was fairly certain Beth was the anti-Christ so there’s that. But the alternate reality stuff? That’s all bullshit. Although I don’t know why I felt like I already knew BT somehow.
“What does BT stand for?”
BT looked over at me. “That’s the question you have for me?”
“Right now, yeah. I think on very basic terms. Next will probably be, ‘Do you have any food?’ ”
“Let me know when you get to the self-actualization level.”
“Are you talking about Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs?”
“I wouldn’t think you were educated enough to know that.”
“Don’t let the fact that my knuckles drag on the ground fool you. So I know self-actualization is the highest level—I get that. And esteem is the second highest; I have a fair amount of that, maybe more than the average soul. But I’m also racked with self-doubt and paralyzed by past actions so that is a tenuous level for me. At the bottom is physiology, right? Besides not being able to get enough sleep, whether due to my boy waking up or being in battle, the next thing I do is stuff my face whenever possible, which is not always easy. Then comes safety, something I haven’t felt since early in my freshmen year at college when the only thing I was really worried about was contracting some new and rare STD. Then at the mid-range is the social aspect. Look at me man…do you really think I’m going to get past that roadblock any time soon?”
“You’re a funny bastard. BT stands for Big Tiny.”
“Of course it does. Is that your birth name?”
“I didn’t realize you were going to show your social ineptitude this quickly.”
“We are who we are.” I smiled proudly. “See, that’s esteem.”
“Only my mother knows my real name and I’m not going to tell the likes of you.”
“Eugene?”
“What?”
“You look like a Eugene. No? How about Maurice? Am I getting close?”
“Listen, I realize you talk a lot when you get nervous, but how about you try for some quiet solitude, otherwise…”
“Yeah, you’re going to toss me off this glistening mountain of trash. Speaking of which...”
“Shit.” BT pinched his nose. I think I was giving him a headache.
“How did you come to realize the glass absorbed the rifle energy?”
“If I tell you, will you shut-up?”
“There’s no guarantee.”
“We have a few of their rifles. While we were practicing with them we noticed that the damage done when they hit glass was far less than other material like wood or metal. So we experimented, putting in more and more glass until finally it was like hitting it with BBs.”
“How thick?”
“About a foot and a half.”
“That’s genius.”
“See! Look at you already working and improving on your social skills.”
“Why this mound and how? Nothing against you and your umm...associates but this is a serious undertaking and for what reason? The Genos were seven hundred miles away and peaceful for the most part.”
“And now?”
“I mean I see your point and I’m thankful someone took the lead on this project. It’s just surviving right now is a full-time job.”
BT was reluctant to answer any further. If a big man can be described as squirming then that’s what I think he was doing. There was more here, but like his true name he wasn’t going to tell me. I was hoping I had the opportunity to wear him down.
Someone brought some food around. I guess that’s what you could call it. The pouch
of sand-food they handed me made military MREs look like fine dining. I had a plastic spoon and was on my third bite of chalk when BT looked over.
“You do realize you’re supposed to put water in there, right?”
“Jerk,” I mumbled, dust shooting from my mouth as I spoke. I added some water and retried. “Not bad.”
“I should have just let you eat the whole pack like that. It’s the quietest you’ve been in hours.”
I was about to say something witty I’m sure, when my glance caught the horizon. All water in my mouth dried. It was like trying to swallow pebbles. I pointed.
“Whoa,” was BT’s response, and it was as good as any. I’m sure had I been able to talk I would have had said something laced with a liberal amount of profanity. BT stood. “Tell everyone to man their posts.”
The Genos were still miles off and I’d swear if I’d been able to still my heart I could have felt the ground shaking from their running. Maybe if this had been a cheesy sci-fi novel their accumulated mass and footfalls would cause a rift in the tectonic plates and a giant earthquake would swallow them up. I could live with cheesy right now.
BT got back down beside me.
“Why, man?”
“Why what?” He looked a little perturbed.
“Why are you doing this for me?”
“You really do hold yourself in high regard, don’t you?”
I shrugged.
“Contrary to popular belief, it isn’t all about you, man. We didn’t build this wall or come here for you. This is about defending our turf.”
“This is a gang thing? You know if you just melt back into your homes they’ll pass right on by, right? This isn’t their objective.”
“They took my home. And I’m not about to let those ugly bastards just waltz down my city streets like they own the place!” He was hot now.
“Look around, man, there’s not much of a city left.”
“And who’s to blame for that?” Others had stopped what they were doing to see what was happening on my tiny little piece of real estate. “Listen, man, if this is too much for you and you don’t want to fight, you’re more than welcome to leave.” He was breathing heavy, his fists curling and uncurling.
“I think you’ve forgotten why I’m here.”