Ill-Fated (Ill-Fated Series Book 1)

by S. C. McMurray

  Adam nodded, then walked immediately to a pipe sticking out of the ground. He pulled on a crank that was attached to the pipe and pumped it for a few seconds until water poured from the pipe. Evelyn watched in surprise as Adam put his head under the pipe and drank. He then cupped his hands under the stream and splashed water onto his face.

  When he finished, Evelyn walked over to the pipe. Cupping her palms under the water, she filled her hands then took a drink. The water tasted like old metal.

  When she looked back, she found Adam sitting in the shade reclining against the side of an old deteriorating barn. She walked over and sat against the barn herself. There was awkward silence. Eventually Evelyn broke it.

  “Why were you hunting me?”

  “Why were you running?”

  Evelyn shook her head. “I didn’t run until I was chased.”

  “I’m sure you’re innocent.” He rolled his eyes. “They all are.”

  “I don’t know what they told you but I’m not a criminal or a terrorist. I’m just a girl who wants her family back.” Evelyn stared at him hard.

  He bit his lip as if he wanted to say something.

  “What do you know about me?” she asked.

  “I should be asking you that question.”

  He was referring to the sketch and Evelyn knew it. “I know nothing about you,” she answered.

  He flashed her a skeptical look.

  “You didn’t answer my question. What do you know about me?”

  “I know that your name is Evelyn Renee Smoke. You just turned 17 and you’ve lived in the same apartment complex in Cincinnati your whole life. You attend the Cincinnati Preparatory School for Young Women. You scored the highest on the IQ test but rank in the middle of your class. You walk the same way to school every day. You are the daughter of John and Helen…”

  He stopped abruptly and something like guilt swept over his face. There was a few seconds of sullen silence.

  Evelyn spoke slowly. “What about that suggests that I am a criminal or a terrorist, or that I should be hunted down like an animal?”

  He didn’t respond and after another few seconds of silence, Evelyn climbed to her feet. “Break’s over. Let’s go.”

  Adam didn’t make a complaint. He climbed to his feet and followed her out of the shade.

  They walked and walked and walked until the sun was burning low ahead of them, splashing the sky in red and orange and purple as it succumbed to the night. They hadn’t seen another soul all day and Evelyn was thankful for that. The one good thing about where they had crash landed was that it was far away from population centers. The war had decimated the West Coast and caused a major population shift as people migrated to the East and South to escape the radiation and fallout of the missiles that struck there.

  The Eastern part of the UPA was now full of bustling cities bursting at the seams with people crowded into apartment buildings as tall as sky scrapers. They said no one lived in the west, so it was nicknamed the Dead Zone.

  When Evelyn was younger, she’d pictured a land full of zombies or mutants, like out of a horror movie, but the footage they watched routinely in school displayed something worse. Utter destruction and desolation.

  Evelyn first saw the footage on her second day of school. Fifteen four-year-old girls huddled around a 3D projector, cross legged and wide eyed. With the national anthem playing in the background, they saw a shot of the beautiful Pacific and a crowded beach, Hollywood then something called the Space Needle. Shots of people lost in the shadow of trees as wide as taxis and cars traveling across a long red bridge, a playground full of children. The national anthem ended and the screen went dark. Then there was a bright flash of light followed by a mushroom cloud. After that was fire and smoke, toppled buildings, broken, scorched trees, and ash. People covered in burns. Pain and anguish. Vacant stares. Then men in hazmat suits surveying the debris. The lasting image on Evelyn had been the ashy corpses of a mother and child huddled together for protection and a half-melted doll pulled from the arms of the child.

  Adam stopped walking suddenly and turned around.

  “What is it?” Evelyn asked.

  “I’ve been thinking.” He paused, bit his bottom lip. “I’m not sure how to say this…”

  Evelyn stepped toward him, she could see the conflict in his eyes, like a part of him was trying to stop the other part from opening up to her.

  “What do you want to tell me?” Evelyn spoke softly, in a non-threatening manner, like one would to a child who was in trouble.

  “I’m…I’m sorry for what happened to your mother.”

  Evelyn stared hard at him as her stomach knotted up. She wasn’t sure how to respond. She was both angry and sad and didn’t even know if she should believe him. He looked genuine but it could have been an act, she wasn’t sure.

  But she wasn’t ready to forgive him.

  She wanted to hit him, wanted him to hurt like she hurt. She clenched her fist, but she couldn’t do it. She felt her eyes tearing up.

  Not now.

  Adam went on almost babbling as if the words were coming out like the conflicting argument in his mind, “I never intended for that to happen. It was never a part of the plan. It wasn’t clean, I like to be clean. She was innocent.”

  “I don’t want to hear anymore.”

  Just like that Adam shut up and turned around. Evelyn didn’t know how to feel but she knew one thing. She wouldn’t accept his apology. She wouldn’t forgive him. Not now, not ever.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  At least there was a bright moon. They were still in the middle of nowhere but at least they could see five feet in front of themselves. It was actually quite beautiful. So different than nights in the city, so quiet. It reminded Evelyn of her father. He would have loved to be out in the open like they were.

  She could almost hear him saying, ’I was born for this.’

  But she wasn’t with her father. She was with another man, a dangerous man. She couldn’t relax, couldn’t let her guard down for a second. Though he didn’t say a word, the man in question was growing tired. His pace had slowed and he seemed almost to be shuffling now instead of taking the long steps he had been taking.

  It was a typical late spring night in the central plains, which meant a dramatic drop in the temperature. The weather was sporadic all over the world since the war, but the most consistent change was hotter days followed by cool nights. The dew-covered grass and leaves made their shoes and pants wet all over again. Adam stopped suddenly.

  “I can’t hold it anymore.”

  Evelyn nearly bumped into him. “Hold what?”

  Evelyn could see his face reddening with embarrassment in the moonlight. “I have to take a piss-- I mean I have to urinate.”

  Evelyn almost laughed. “Well go then.”

  “I can’t go with you watching.”

  “Okay, geeze.” Evelyn turned around. She heard a zip.

  “Wait!” she said. “You’re going to go right here?”

  He zipped his pants back up. “Where else? I only have twenty feet, remember.”

  “I thought you would find a tree or something.”

  He opened his arms wide. “We’re in the middle of a field and I’m not a dog.”

  “Fine,” Evelyn said over her shoulder, “just go.”

  She heard a zipping sound followed by the sound of liquid hitting the ground, as if someone was pouring out a bottle of water followed by the zipping sound again.

  “Do you feel better?” Evelyn asked.

  “Yes. Thanks.” There was an awkward pause. “What’s your plan now?” Evelyn waved her arm forward. “Keep moving.”

  Not much of a plan, but it was the only thing keeping her from breaking down right there. She had to feel like she was doing something. She knew that her father, her friends and Rillian were probably being tortured for information at that very moment and moving made her feel like she was doing something.

  Just hold on. She kept repeat
ing the words to herself as if her loved ones could hear them. Just hold on.

  They walked and walked until they came to a small farmhouse resting atop hill, looking as if it was out of some old Midwestern painting. The farm was rundown, in need of a mow with peeling paint and clutter. There was a light on outside casting the barn yard in a pale yellow. Adam was obviously tired and though he didn’t say that he wanted to stop, Evelyn could see the need in his eyes as his gaze lingered on the approaching farm.

  “Let’s stop here,” Evelyn said.

  Adam nodded. “Let’s go to the barn, there should be some straw or something that we can use to keep us warm.”

  Evelyn nodded like she knew exactly what he was talking about. This was the closest to a farm she’d ever been. She followed Adam to the barn. He slid the door open just enough for them to slip inside. He then pulled something from his belt. It was a flashlight. He turned it on but cupped the light with his hands so as to only illuminate a few feet in front of him. Evelyn instinctively grabbed onto the back of his shirt and together they maneuvered through the maze of rusty machinery and empty stalls until they came to a hay loft. Adam climbed up the ladder first and then turned the flash light around so that Evelyn could see the rungs as she followed him up.

  Evelyn felt the padding under her feet and the smell of the hay made her nostrils tighten up. She wasn’t sure how she felt about this idea now. She placed her hands on her hips.

  “What now?” she asked.

  “Find a spot in the hay and sleep.” Adam plodded his way through the hay to a far corner.

  Just like that huh?

  Evelyn searched for a spot that looked comfortable. She settled on a pile of hay against the wall directly opposite of Adam.

  Adam rolled over on his side. “Are you going to watch me all night?”

  “Should I?”

  “No. I’m not too big a man to say that I’m too tired to try and escape.”

  “I thought you Military men never got tired.”

  “We aren’t all like you.”

  “What do you mean like me?”

  Adam rolled over to face her. From the beams of moonlight peeking through the gaps in the walls of the barn, she could see his weary silhouette. “We walked in the hot sun all day and you didn’t break a sweat or even say a word about being hot.”

  Evelyn suddenly felt self-conscious, like he was insinuating that something was wrong with her.

  Adam continued, “even now you aren’t tired.”

  “What do you know about me?” she asked again.

  “I told you what I know.”

  He was hiding something and she knew it. “What about the Moirai Project?” she prodded.

  “Never heard of it.”

  “You’re lying.”

  “I don’t lie.”

  “All you military types lie.”

  He sat up quickly. Evelyn had struck a nerve.

  “We do what’s best for our people, even when the people don’t think its best.”

  “Like hunting down 17-year-old girls like they’re animals.”

  “Threats to our people come in all shapes in sizes.”

  “Am I really that threatening?”

  He didn’t respond to her question, instead he took a breath and said, “People take what we do for granted. There are people out there, dangerous people, who hide behind the veil of peace. They proclaim freedom when all they want is disorder.”

  “Maybe all they want is choice. Maybe they don’t want to be monitored all the time. Maybe they want to make their own laws.”

  “You are talking about Democracy. It didn’t work. It failed to protect the people. And now we’ve forged a system that does work, that doesn’t get caught up in political squabbles and render itself ineffective. You can’t argue with the facts. We’ve never been more prosperous. Crime is at its lowest level in the history of North America and the unemployment level is under one percent.”

  “But are they happy?”

  “They’re safe.”

  “Are you happy?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Did you always want to be G.I. Joe?”

  “I wanted to help my country.”

  “Are you made of plastic or are you flesh and bone?”

  “I’m not a robot, I just believe in what I’m doing.”

  Evelyn’s heart began to pound. “Even when it requires breaking apart a family for no reason?”

  “I already told you that I’m sorry for what happened to your mother. You were the target not her.”

  “Why me?”

  He didn’t answer.

  “You don’t know why. Do you? You were just following orders.” She lowered her voice. “You are a robot.”

  Finally he said, “You were with known members of the SPC, that was reason enough.”

  “The SPC is peaceful.” She fired back.

  “Peaceful? Are you kidding me? The SPC was responsible for the deaths of 32 citizens just a few weeks ago.”

  “That’s what they want us to believe.”

  His voice was full of contempt now. “Believe what you want. I captured the criminals myself. I heard the confessions out of their own mouths. Remorseless.” He paused. “Don’t believe everything they told you. Lest you become the robot.”

  She thought of Lana, Everett, Rillian, Selena and Clive. They all had reasons but she couldn’t see them perpetrating such violence.

  “The people I was with, the people you arrested, are all good people.”

  Adam eased his tone. “Did it ever occur to you that maybe they wanted to use you?”

  She felt a lump in her stomach. She wanted to scream at him that he was wrong, that they just wanted to protect her from them, from the Party. But she bit her lip because with one sentence, he was able to plant a seed of doubt that she couldn’t ignore. Perhaps that seed was already there and he’d just watered it.

  Am I just a tool to them, a weapon?

  She refused to give it more thought.

  Adam went on. “Eve—”

  She stopped him right there. “Don’t call me Eve.”

  “What do I call you then?”

  “Only my friends call me Eve. You call me Evelyn.”

  “Fine,” he responded scornfully, “Good night Evelyn.”

  He was snoring in seconds. Evelyn watched him, first in anger, then in something else, intrigue maybe, until her own eyes grew heavy and she fell asleep.

  “Freeze!”

  Evelyn awoke with a start as did Adam.

  “I’ll shoot ya dead, I swear to the mother Mary.”

  Evelyn’s eyes adjusted to the light. She and Adam were staring down a less than sturdy older Hispanic woman balancing a lantern in one hand and a double barrel shotgun in the other.

  “What you doing in my barn?” she snapped. “Are you looking to fornicate?”

  Evelyn felt herself blush a bit. She wasn’t sure if it was from embarrassment or something else.

  “There’ll be no sinnin’ in my barn.”

  “Singing?” Evelyn asked.

  “No!” the woman yelled. “Sinnin’. Fornicating. Havin’ relations.”

  Evelyn threw her arms open. “No.” She looked at Adam, who was watching the woman’s finger on the trigger with a careful eye. “Never. We…our car broke down and we were looking for a place to spend the night.”

  The woman’s eyes narrowed as she swung the lantern toward Adam. “Who ya runnin’ from? Her daddy? She pregnant?”

  Adam and Evelyn looked at each other and said in awkward unison. “No. No. No.”

  “Why else would a soldier and a young girl be hidin’ out in my barn?” She nudged him with the barrels of her gun. “You AWOL aren’t ya?”

  “Umm. Something like that.”

  The woman stared at the both of them hard as if she was trying to interrogate them with only her eyes. Evelyn glanced at Adam. He looked as if he was about to act. She was sure that he could disarm her with ease.

 
But before he or Evelyn could do anything, the woman lowered her gun. “Ya look hungry. Come on in and I’ll make ya a bite to eat.”

  “You’re not going to shoot us?’ Adam asked.

  “Who am I to get in the way of young love?”

  Evelyn started to say something but Adam gestured for her not to.

  “Now come on in.” The woman said as she began the arduous decent out of the hay loft.

  As the woman hobbled down the ladder, Adam leaned in close to Evelyn and whispered, “I know that you loath me, but we have to go with it. One call and you are toast.”

  Evelyn nodded. She wasn’t fond of the idea but she didn’t see a better option. Once they reached the bottom, to keep with appearances, Adam slipped his hand in hers. Her first instinct was to pull away but after the initial shock of it, his hand in hers, almost felt natural.

  The woman led them into her farm house. It was a quaint two story house that belonged to a different era, one with creaky floorboards and peeling wallpaper that Evelyn had only glimpsed in old movies that her father liked to watch late at night.. Dusty and worn photos populated the aged walls. A tall dark man in a military uniform that Evelyn didn’t recognize, a young couple on their wedding day, the woman, thinner and without the gray streaks in her hair, a tall and handsome young man in a military uniform similar to the one that Adam was wearing. Characters from a different era.

  They followed the woman through a hallway where they passed by a small statue of a woman in flowing robes holding a baby.

  What an odd decoration.

  They went to the kitchen where the woman directed them to sit.

  “Would you like some coffee?” She asked.

  Adam nodded. “Yes, please.”

  She glanced at Evelyn. “And you?”

  Evelyn shook her head. “No, thanks.”

  The woman pressed a button on the coffee maker and it rattled for a moment, then began to produce the dark liquid.

  She turned back to Evelyn and Adam. “So, my name is Rosina. What do I call you?”

  Adam looked across the table to Evelyn who suddenly became speechless.

  Rosina seized on Evelyn’s blank expression. “I’m asking what to call you, not for your real names.”