And to that very day, five years later, Dave still hated the term: remains. It just left a very sour taste in his mouth.
He’d been limited by circumstances in what he could do for Tony. But if this was a small piece of his friend, he’d at least do the proper thing for part of him.
If it wasn’t him… if it wasn’t part of Tony, then it once belonged to someone else who went against the Dalton clan in some form or fashion.
And that fact: that he was Dalton’s enemy, automatically made him Dave’s ally. Whoever’s finger it was, Dave would give it its proper due.
He had no shovel. But then again, he didn’t have to dig a full-sized grave.
A shoebox-sized hole would do.
And the cutting blade of the bolt cutters would do quite nicely in the soft mud.
It just didn’t seem proper not to wrap the finger in… something.
But Dave was limited in what he had. So a sock would have to do.
He spoke to the finger as he prepared it, as though he were talking to Tony.
“I’m sorry I don’t have something cleaner, or more appropriate. But I figure this is better than laying you directly into the dirt. And maybe it’ll take a few days for the worms to chew through the sock before they start eating you. I know, you’re way beyond caring. But right is right.”
He placed the finger in the bottom of the sock, then twisted it a couple of times and wrapped it back over itself once again.
Then he placed it gently into the bottom of his hole and raked the mud back over it.
Lastly, he stood over the tiny grave, bowed his head, and said a brief prayer:
Lord, please take and keep this token and the soul of the man it once belonged to. Whoever he was, whatever he did in this life, he was a man created in your image and therefore deserving of your mercy.
Please take him into your care, forgive him for his sins, and give him a place in Your kingdom.
In your holy name,
Amen.
He was stopped anyway, and the engine on the Polaris was off. This seemed as appropriate a time as any to refill his belly and satisfy his thirst.
It seemed an odd time and place to eat a meal, but it was as good a place as any. And the new world had become essentially a great big graveyard. Bodies, regardless of the way they became such, were now left in the open all over the place.
As he ate a can of Dinty Moore beef stew, Dave tried to remember the last time he went a full twenty four hour day without seeing at least one dead human, propped up in an abandoned car with his head torn apart by a self-inflicted wound. Or lying beside the road where a bandit left him to rot.
It had been so long he couldn’t remember.
Months, maybe.
He decided for the thousandth time he didn’t like the new world.
Not much at all.
Chapter 44
After Dave traveled several miles he turned his attention to the ribbon of highway he’d been following half a mile away.
He watched it looking for a particular landmark.
He’d hidden his weapons at an office park, a strip mall next to the highway. Beneath a mountain of garbage directly adjacent to several overloaded dumpsters.
He couldn’t remember the mile marker on the highway directly in front of the place. And he didn’t really need it. As long as he remembered a red cement mixer, directly in front of a Chevy Silverado towing a bass boat, directly in front of a Mayflower moving van, he could find his weapons again. His Explorer would be parked in the right lane of the highway about a quarter mile beyond the series of vehicles.
By his calculations, he was getting close. No more than a mile and a half to two miles away now.
He’d have to be careful not to pass it by.
There was no reason to believe he’d been spotted. He’d heard no gunshots that would have forced him to go to ground or speed out of there. He was well aware there were nomads walking back and forth along the highway, crawling in and out of the trucks looking for food.
But really, how often did they take the time and trouble to peer out onto the horizon? And even if they did, he’d appear no bigger than an insect atop his four-wheeler.
Those who did see him would write him off for the most part, assuming he was a hunter out for game. They might be surprised he was atop a working vehicle. Or more likely, wouldn’t even notice he was. From that distance it might be hard to make out what was beneath him, and they might just assume he was on horseback.
Another hour and several more cut fences and he finally saw the series of vehicles on the highway he was looking for.
His timing couldn’t have been more perfect. The sun would be setting within the hour. Another and it would be dark enough for him to drive the Polaris a bit closer to the highway, and then to abandon it in heavy brush.
He’d make note of where he left it by memorizing the mile marker. And if his memory faltered, as it sometimes did in recent months, he’d simply look once again for his vehicles and their relation to the ATV.
He had some time to kill, which he normally hated. But in this case he was exhausted. Taxed not only by the events of the previous day, but by the fitful and restless night he’d had in the sleeper cab following.
If he’d had a flat place to lie he’d have napped.
And he did- have a flat place, that is. The ground in this particular part of New Mexico was flat as a pancake.
But it was still soaked from the rain.
Having spent the previous evening and all night long in wet clothing, he was sick of it. His clothes had now dried and he much preferred for them to stay that way.
He did the next best thing. He lifted up the armrests between the two seats and moved to the passenger seat, then leaned over on his side and put his head in the driver’s seat.
Atop his backpack.
The pack was great for carrying rations, but it really sucked as a pillow.
Still, it was better than nothing.
The two side by side seats would never pass for a bed. But at least he was more or less prone, and still, and reasonably certain no one would walk up on him.
Under the circumstances it was the best he could do.
He wasn’t fooling himself. He knew he’d never doze off in his current position. It was just too darned uncomfortable.
And he was way too tense.
But as long as he could close his eyes and rest them, it wasn’t a bad way to kill an hour.
He was surprised when he woke up thirty five minutes later and realized he had indeed dozed off.
He was obviously more tired than he thought.
He sat up and immediately regretted it.
Lying in such a position for so long made him stiff. In his back, his neck, his legs.
But at least the pain jarred him awake.
The sun was going down and he was treated to an absolutely beautiful sunset. It reminded him that the desert has its own kind of beauty that many people never experience.
He wondered how many more sunsets he’d have to endure alone before he finally got his family back together again.
Dave was a simple man. He never longed for much in life. A few dollars in the bank. The love of a good woman. The security of knowing he could have and raise children in a safe environment in the greatest country in the world.
He never bargained for this… any of it. If his family had been in San Antonio when the lights went out, he’d never have had reason to leave.
Unfortunately, Dave wasn’t allowed to pick the circumstances surrounding the blackout. The timing was atrocious, coming at the exact time Sarah and the girls were on a plane heading to a place a thousand miles away.
Going after them was never in question. Neither was going after Beth.
As many times as he’d wished this was all a very bad dream it wasn’t. He’d dealt with it thus far as best he could, and he’d continue to do so. No matter how long it took, no matter how many people he had to kill to get there.
He’d get there. That wasn’t in question either.
As the skies grew darker he cranked the wheeler back up and turned north toward the highway, inching forward at a mile an hour or so. He’d chosen his target before he napped, a stand of mesquite brush just adjacent to the bass boat.
A crack of thunder in the distance surprised him. He thought the rain was finished with him.
But the prevailing winds were chasing the thunder and would probably blow the front clear of him.
The skies overhead were cloudy but not so much so. The moon was in crescent and mostly obscured.
The night would be dark, but that wouldn’t be a problem. For the first place he’d head after he hid the wheeler would be to his Explorer.
The night vision goggles he’d stashed beneath his passenger seat would make the rest of what he had to do so much easier.
Chapter 45
Dave checked his watch as he stood before the mountain of garbage, waiting for two voices in the darkness to pass him by.
It was twenty one hundred, give or take a bit.
He’d never be sure, since he occasionally let his watch wind down and had to reset it based upon the position of the sun.
Twenty minutes slow or fast didn’t matter much.
He had a good ballpark number and figured that was good enough.
The voices passed and he moved aside several garbage bags until he found what he’d come there for. A canvas military deployment bag full of various rifles and handguns, ammunition, his crossbow and bolts, and several hand grenades given to him by Karen’s neighbors outside Kansas City.
He strapped on his sidearm, and for the first time in days didn’t feel totally vulnerable. There was something oddly soothing about knowing one had the ability to defend oneself against aggressors.
He silently vowed he’d never let anyone talk him into being unarmed again.
The bag was heavy. Close to a hundred pounds.
He wouldn’t attack until the following night. It would take him awhile to get close to the Dalton’s compound, and the night would be half gone by then.
He didn’t want to go to battle limited by time. Nor did he want the sun to rise halfway through his campaign. For darkness was one of his most loyal friends.
No, his plan was to move forward on this night. To get into position half a mile from his target. Then to hide his weapons again and to get some rest.
He’d formed a plan. It was methodical and well-thought out. But it depended on his being well rested and alert.
There was also the element of surprise to consider. Had he had weapons the previous night on the Daltons’ porch he’d have had the advantage. But he couldn’t attack with just his bare hands.
He lost the element of surprise when he stole the Polaris and left the compound. In essence, he alerted Dalton that someone had been on their turf.
Someone who was bold enough to steal from them right from under their drug-impaired noses.
Surely, even in their drugged up stupor, they could see that such a person was a danger to them.
Dave expected, once they’d determined Tony had been moved and his Polaris was missing, that they’d be on high alert.
The sentries would have been beefed up. With their best people, not just some miscreants occupying space and killing time.
There would be snipers hidden in the trees. The porch would be fortified with sandbags. Vehicles would be rolled into the yard to act as barricades, their tires flattened.
Dave expected diversions.
Some of the gang would take up positions in adjacent houses, in order to pin down any aggressors with crossfire. And to provide ready reinforcements for the headquarters if the need called.
He also expected a recall, of all the gang members, from wherever they might be on the gang’s extensive turf.
He expected Crazy Town to be on the same war footing he was.
Because that’s what he’d have done if his name was Dalton.
He was already tired when he finished lugging the heavy bag to the Explorer and opened up the hatch. When he hefted it up, it seemed like it had doubled in weight. It was going to be a long night.
He’d intentionally wait until past midnight to head out. By then the nomads would all be bedded down for the night, for nobody liked to travel in the hours of darkness.
Dave didn’t mind, because he had the goggles to light his way. It was an eerie greenish-gray glow which made everything look rather surreal. But it beat the hell out of stumbling around in the darkness trying to feel your way around.
He tried to relax, as he sat in the seat of the Explorer. But he was way too tense. He knew the next couple of days were going to be sheer hell.
But he also knew he had a mission to perform. And he wouldn’t be able to live with himself if he didn’t get it done.
Chapter 47
At one minute past midnight Tony turned the key on the auxiliary ignition he’d installed on the dashboard.
Nothing.
He started to curse his bad luck, then cursed his stupidity instead.
He’d removed the negative battery cable and placed it in his weapons bag on the night he’d parked the damn thing, just to keep somebody from trying to hotwire it.
Back out of the vehicle and back to the back, where he retrieved the cable and reinstalled it.
As he crawled back in the drivers seat he grumbled, “Well, this is already turning into a goat rope.”
Indeed, it wasn’t starting well.
He was already beat, and at ten miles an hour would need another hour and a half to get past the Dalton’s Raiders’ exit ramp. It would take another hour to hide his weapons again. And probably another to find a sleeper cab which wasn’t occupied.
There were two bright spots as he saw them.
First of all, once he was situated he could sleep the remainder of the night away and late into the next afternoon. He’d go into his campaign well rested.
Second, the heavy thunderstorms from the previous day had brought with them a cold front. For the first time in a long time he could count on sleeping soundly.
Those two things, he reasoned, would go a long way toward evening his odds.
Sure, they may outnumber him twenty or thirty or forty to one.
But as stupid as they’d already shown themselves to be, he expected them to continue their drug use, continue their partying.
He fully expected them to be at least partially impaired.
Dead would be better. Comatose would be good. But he’d settle for impaired.
He drove off hoping nothing else went wrong.
Shortly before oh two hundred Dave parked his Explorer about fifty yards in front of a tractor trailer rig, as was his habit from the beginning.
He hoped the sleeper cab was available. If it was already occupied, he’d have to search for another, but there were several in the area. He was confident he’d find a place to sleep. Worst case scenario, he’d pop up the one man tent he always carried in the Explorer’s cargo bay.
The first thing to do, though, was to hide his weapons.
Dave was a big believer in not fixing things that weren’t broken. Along that same vein of thinking, he would stick with something which had worked in the past until such time it failed him.
Just south of the Explorer, on the eastbound access road of Interstate 40, was a huge apartment complex.
Dave’s experience was that, in the days immediately following the blackout, most residents stayed in their homes. They were afraid because bad men were roaming the streets, taking what they needed at the end of a gun.
At that time, most residents naively believed that the blackout was temporary. That at any time, the power company would restore the power, and they’d figure out why in hell all the vehicles stopped running at the same time.
Most households had at least a few days supply of water and food.
Granted the food wasn’t the best.
The lucky ones had canned goods and boxes of
cereal and maybe some pasta to sustain their families for several days.
The less fortunate might have to settle for packages of old Jell-O and turkey gravy from the top shelves of their cupboards, long forgotten and covered in dust.
The really unfortunate ones had to start eating their dog’s or cat’s food after a day or two.
The taps stopped running almost immediately when the water plant’s pumps shut down. They’d had generator backups, of course. But the generators were fried at the same time as the electrical grid.
Once again, the good planners and the lucky had bottled water. The poor planners and the unlucky had no such thing.
And the stupid among them used their bottled water to wash up so they smelled pretty.
They’d never been up against something like this before. So it wasn’t really their fault.
Actually, it was. That was really, really dumb.
What was even sadder was the number of people who never knew they could drink the water from their hot water heaters in a pinch.
And from their toilet tanks when they really got thirsty.
That was water which was already in place when the water plant’s pumps stopped pumping.
All over Albuquerque, people tried to put on a brave face and remain patient for the first days, confident that everything would be okay.
It was during those days they tried their best to carry on a semblance of routine life.
They continued to dutifully carry the household garbage to the dumpsters.
Until the dumpsters started to overflow because there were no garbage trucks running with which to empty them.
Once the dumpsters were full, bags of garbage started piling up in front of them.
Huge mountains of garbage were soon formed.
The piles served their purpose. They got the garbage out of the homes.
The residents who created them, though, never realized they’d serve a second, equally important purpose.
On Desert Sands: Alone: Book 6 Page 13