by James Sperl
“Do you know where they could've gone?” Samantha asked.
“No, we have no idea,” Cesare answered. “We thought she was here.”
Andrew watched the two harried women in the back of the store scurry around frantically as they gathered supplies. He turned back to Samantha. “How far out are you from leaving?”
Samantha shrugged uncertainly. “I don't know. Twenty minutes? Twenty-five maybe?”
Andrew didn't know when Travis would get here, but he knew it was soon. Samantha and the others were cutting it close.
“That's too long. Listen to me. Go outside and recruit help. Get anyone. Doesn't matter who. You need more bodies in here. If no one will do it, abandon the supplies, take the children, and get out of here.”
Samantha's eyes bulged even larger. “You're scaring me,” she said.
“I'm sorry about that. But good. You should be scared. The man that's coming is no joke. You ladies and these kids need to be long gone by the time he gets here. You've got ten more minutes. Tops.”
Samantha's empty gaze sank to the floor. Cesare stepped up to her and took her shoulders comfortingly.
“You can do this, honey. But you need to get moving. Right now.”
Samantha inhaled her fear then nodded furiously. “Okay. Can...can you two stay and help?”
Andrew let his body slump. “I wish we could. But we have to find our friend.”
“Oh. Okay.” Samantha glanced around incoherently. Andrew wondered if she was up to the task ahead of her. “Well, would you at least be able to bring Clarissa her baby? It would be one less body we'd have to move.”
Andrew almost fell over sideways. “Naomi's still here?”
“Yeah. Her crib's right over there.” Samantha pointed at the three-to-six-month section.
Andrew and Cesare darted past her to the crib she indicated. Inside it, Naomi chewed her hands and kicked her feet gleefully. She looked up at the men and made happy gurgling noises.
“She didn't take Naomi, Andrew,” Cesare said.
He wasn't stating a fact. He was acknowledging the implication behind it. Andrew closed his eyes and let the horrible truth seep in. Clarissa hadn't shown up to meet them, and she hadn't even taken Naomi. And now, Dustin was missing, too? He could think of only one explanation, and the conclusion Andrew came to formed a big neon arrow that pointed directly at Donna.
He scooped up Naomi.
“If you see Clarissa...” he started to say to Samantha, but he let his words trail—Clarissa and Dustin would not be back. Instead, he told her, “Just remember what I said. Ten minutes.”
Samantha scrunched her face and gave an angst-ridden nod. “Okay. I...I will.”
“Good luck,” Andrew said. With a nod, he and Cesare rushed for the door and pushed their way outside.
The gun-loaded trucks had migrated into the heart of the Sleep Zone, pulling teeming crowds along with them. The man with the bullhorn shouted unintelligible rally cries, his voice buried by shouts of defiance and rage from the restless crowd.
Andrew held Naomi close to his chest. He could barely think straight. How had so much gone so wrong so suddenly? The confrontation with Donna was likely the catalyst for Clarissa's disappearance, but the timing couldn't have been worse. Were Travis not blazing a trail straight for New Framingham, Andrew would have had time to think, to formulate a plan to get her and Rachel back. But this place would be a war zone within the hour. Time wasn't a luxury he had.
“Andrew!” Cesare shouted. Andrew snapped his head to him. “It's Jon!”
Andrew followed Cesare's finger over to Jon, who rushed across the lot with a mob of guards and armed civilians. It didn't escape his attention that Jon held an assault rifle.
“Jon!” Cesare shouted.
Jon heard his name called but couldn't pinpoint from which direction it came. He slowed to a trot and searched the crowd.
“Jon! Here!” Cesare screamed. He waved his arms as if signaling a rescue plane.
Jon sighted him, lifted his chin in response, and sprinted over. “What the hell're you doing here?” he demanded. “You should be leaving.”
“What are we doing here?” Cesare challenged, his eyes flitting to the rifle. “What the hell are you—”
“We're looking for Clarissa,” Andrew said. “Have you seen her?”
Jon's face crashed. “She's not with you?”
“No,” Cesare said. “She never showed.”
Jon trailed to the baby in Andrew's arms. “Fuck!” he said, tearing himself away to walk a tight circle. “Donna?”
“Has to be.”
“That bitch.”
“Well, at least we found you,” Cesare said. “Come on. Evan and my grandmother are waiting for us. Let's get out of here, so we can figure out what to do about Clarissa and Rachel.”
Cesare started to walk away but froze when neither Jon nor Andrew budged.
“You're not coming, are you?” Andrew said to Jon, his tone matter-of-fact.
“What?” Cesare coughed. “Of course he's coming. What're we talking about here? Let's go.”
Jon regarded the people who scattered around him, people who either fled or ran to take up defensive positions. He returned to Andrew and Cesare, though Andrew already knew what he was going to say.
“I can't leave. Not now.”
The muscles in Cesare's face went slack. “What the fuck do you mean you 'can't leave?' This isn't funny, Jon. We've got to get out of here.”
“Do you see me smiling?” Jon replied. “This is no joke. I'm staying.”
Cesare was beside himself. He looked at Andrew pleadingly, as if Andrew could somehow provide clarity to what Jon was telling them.
“Look, I know this is coming out of left field,” Jon began, “but once I got in here and saw the fear and determination on everyone's faces to take this prick out, I knew I had to be a part of it.”
Cesare stepped forward aggressively. “Rachel and Clarissa are missing. My grandmother and your son—your son—are waiting for us right now. And you're telling us you've suddenly chosen this moment to become a...a patriot?”
Jon charged Cesare so the two were face-to-face. “I've always been a patriot if that's the word you want to use. If I see a fucked-up situation and there's something I can do about it, then I will. I always have.” He glanced at Andrew then stepped back. “I owe this fucking Travis guy. I owe him. He took from me. He took part of my and Evan's life from us. I can't just walk away from this. I can't just leave and hope somebody stops Travis. I need to be here to make sure it happens. I want to see his lifeless body and spit on it for what he did to us. I hope you can understand that.”
Andrew remembered the Railleys. He understood all too well. “What do we tell Evan?” he said, rocking a fussy Naomi.
Jon exhaled what seemed like every last molecule of oxygen from his body.
“You tell him that I'll see him soon. That his dad loves him more than he'll ever know and that I stayed behind to make things right.”
Andrew nodded. “Okay, I will, though I doubt he'll share your reasoning.”
“Jon!” a Kevlar-vested man shouted from across the parking lot. He ran with a gang of other armed men. “We're taking position along the southern perimeter. Let's go!”
“Roger that!” Jon called after them. He returned to Andrew and Cesare. “I've got to go. But this isn't it. We'll find Clarissa.” He looked at Cesare. “We'll find Rachel. I promise. If, though, things...”
“I've already instructed Evan and Elenora to meet us back in Ashland if something should happen,” Andrew said. “Seemed as good a place as any.”
“Ashland,” Jon affirmed with a nod. “Okay.” He searched Andrew's and Cesare's eyes. “Take care of my boy for me until then, will you? I'll see everyone real soon.”
“For Evan's sake, I hope you're right,” Andrew said.
Jon delivered a final silent goodbye then joined up with the stream of people who charged south toward the community's most
vulnerable border.
Andrew watched him leave. Then he wondered what to do next.
CHAPTER 66
The sun was almost dead. Soon it would begin.
Inferno climbed into the machine-gun turret of the Humvee in which he rode. He gazed at the purpling sky and the deep blue night that chased it then settled on the line of vehicles that stretched into infinity behind him. They were like an in-motion used car lot as realized by the hallucinogenic minds of the mentally deranged. Cars, trucks, vans, flatbeds, and tractor trailers—all had been modified to reflect the unique personalities of the used and disposable people who drove them.
It was a gift, the Humvee. Brought to Inferno by a scraggly group of strung-out meth freaks who claimed they had “found it” abandoned on the side of the road. They hoped to trade it for a score. Well, did Inferno have something for them. Not only had he acquired a military-grade vehicle out of the deal, but he had also attained something far more valuable: allegiance. For his current undertaking, he would need all he could get.
Moist, late-summer air rushed past him, as the Humvee streamed down the highway. The air was ripe with the smell of rotting vegetation and dense humidity. The odor temporarily transported Inferno to another time, back to when he was a teenaged Travis, and his days were full of forest explorations and creek adventures. Back to when possibility crackled like live electric wire, the future a red carpet that rolled out in front of him and led to wherever he wished. Back before circumstance robbed his childhood and placed one parent in jail and the other in the ground.
But those were different days.
Mourning the loss of opportunity and innocence did no good. Things and people became what they became, and no amount of wishing undid a person's life path. Fate was a crutch leaned upon by the faithful and the weak—choice was one's only true compass. And Inferno had made his fair share of those to terrific results.
He bent down into the cab of the Humvee and plucked a transmitter from the vehicle's complicated-looking radio. Mr. Stitch, who sat behind the wheel, and who had served in the Army for an undisclosed amount of time, called it SINCGARS. Whatever. All Inferno required was that it shared the same frequency with the CB radios in the vehicles that followed. Mr. Stitch assured him that it did.
Inferno rose to his full height in the turret and faced backward. Headlamp light from the nearest trailing vehicles illuminated him in a dim glow of halogen.
“Our time is almost upon us,” he said into the transmitter. “All of your dedication, all of your commitment, will be brought to bear. Never forget how you arrived here. Never forget that you are the excluded ones, the ones who were cast out before and the ones who've been cast out since. But now the playing field is level. There is no more entitlement, no upper-crust reward for the rich and the undeserving. There is only taking what you want. Taking what you have been deprived of. There are no obstacles or false justices preventing you, no lies of equality to stymie you. There is only what you desire.”
Inferno breathed in a mixture of diesel exhaust and something floral. “We have suffered at the gates of oppression long enough. Now it's time for those who have never truly known displacement and suffering to experience the insecurity of a hardscrabble life. To know judgment, to know how it feels to be set aside and forced to wander, never knowing if they will make it to the next day. For this has been our reality.”
A smattering of distant car horns blurted down the line, punctuating the brief pause.
“But now we are one, unified in our conquest. New Framingham will be but the first of many. We will continue our assault against privilege until it is we who are staring down at them from atop our high castle. And it will be done. Stand by your convictions, and never forget what relegated you in life. For today, we take the first steps in establishing our foothold in this world. Today, we are the ones in control.”
A chorus of car horns bleated in cacophonous harmony. Inferno raised his arms in triumph, further encouraging the assault of discordant noise. He bowed into the cab of the Humvee and handed Ludi the transmitter. She smoldered with awe and self-satisfaction as if Inferno had expressed her personal sentiments for going to war in clear, unvarnished speech. He nodded at her, a slight tip of the head that said we are together on this. Her pinched, prideful smile left him with little doubt that he had her—as well as everyone else—hook, line, and sinker.
But it was all bullshit.
His sanctimonious speech was nothing more than fodder to motivate a rudderless mob of willing sheep. Wasn't it the job of all shepherds to guide their flock? To steer them in the right direction when they became lost? Inferno didn't give two shits about world domination. But he did have a conquest, and for reasons he had yet to grasp fully, he also had an obedient entourage that numbered into the thousands.
Inferno was no fool. Even though he attributed his followers' devotion to his cult-like status as a revolutionary chemist, it didn't hurt his reputation that he had literally walked through fire and survived. These things mattered in the cosmos of the devoted. So why not play them up? Dress the part in post-apocalyptic attire: wear all black, of course; sport a fear-inducing mask; speak of injustice; suffuse speech with cadences and vocabulary so he came off sounding like a cross between The Matrix's Morpheus and The Humungus and Immortan Joe from the Mad Max franchise. In the 21st century, people were hardwired to respond to pop-cultural references, even on a subliminal level. Brand recognition and celebrity envy were embedded in the DNA of the millennial slave. Was it Inferno's fault if he capitalized on it?
His ascent could have happened to anyone. Well, maybe not anyone, but certainly to someone who provided a similar diversion from the horrors plaguing the world. Some found solace in God to get through. Others embraced the chaos as if it were the very thing that had been missing from their lives. Some drank. Some fucked. Some did scores of mind-altering drugs. Were it not for this latter group, and Inferno's innate skill in crafting ceiling-shattering product for them, he might very well be making the journey to New Framingham alone.
Because he would still be going. With or without an army. He had to. Clarissa was there.
Passing her name around in his mind prompted him to retrieve a photograph from his pocket. He used to carry it in his wallet, but he had no use for wallets anymore. Instead, he had inserted the picture into the pocket of a baseball card protector and trimmed away the empty slots to keep just the one.
He didn't know how many times he had looked at the photo since he saw Clarissa at the bar that night a few months back. He had always kept it with him, tucked safely into a jacket or jeans pocket, but he hadn't felt compelled to view it before the way he did now. Something about seeing her reawakened a long-dormant emotion. She looked so beautiful. So self-possessed. So happy.
Just like she did in the picture.
Inferno held it close to his face and studied it, just as he had a thousand times before. She stood with friends, arms interlocked, and smiled a wide, toothy grin that threatened to split her face. He took it at a high school football game, he remembered. Considering the girls' cheerful reaction, he assumed their team had won, but with the way Clarissa was back then, she didn't need a reason to find joy. She was joy.
He had scratched out the faces of the other girls in the picture long ago. The white splotches that stood in for their heads made the image that much better. Now he didn't have to endure seeing Clarissa's dull friends, with their bland features and sub-par beauty, juxtaposed against her. It was an insult for them even to be in the picture with her. But beggars couldn't be choosers, as they said.
Back before Inferno was even a smoldering thought, Travis coveted her. He had waited the entire evening to snap a covert shot of her, but she was never away from her friends long enough to give him the opportunity. They were joined at the hip, she and them. So he'd had to utilize stealth. He recalled the game finished in some grand fashion—a field goal for the win?—and when pandemonium ensued, he seized the moment. The school paper was
there. Jonathon, Travis thought the kid's name was, was one of its photographers. He had approached Clarissa and her whooping friends for a shot, for which they happily agreed.
The picture featured in Monday's edition, and it bore a striking resemblance to the one Inferno held save one glaring difference: the girls in Jonathon's picture actually knew they were being photographed. When Jonathon had propositioned them for a pose, Travis happened to be there, finger poised over the shutter button. As Jonathon's camera viewfinder met his eye, Travis was ready with the secondary shot.
It was easy to do in those days. He was largely invisible to most people, particularly girls. But something happened in his early teens after his body and mind staged an intervention against puberty. His physique began to change, aided in its transition via a healthier diet and a previously unknown routine called “exercise.” Soon, the pudgy, quiet boy was no longer pudgy or quiet. And people noticed.
It amazed him how such a transformation bolstered confidence, and with that confidence came recognition and respect. That Travis owed much of his newfound reputation to his at-the-time fledgling narcotics network was not lost on him. He was savvy enough to recognize what people wanted, and his popularity benefitted from acting as the conduit to get it to them—people always remembered where the outlet was when they needed juice.
But an inflated ego and a deluge of self-importance had ruined it all. He could admit that now. He had become so blinded by his feelings of self-worth, so skewed toward entitlement, he had forgotten that some things simply could not be taken.
He wished he would have learned that lesson before Clarissa.
He couldn't do anything about it now. What was done could not be undone. Clarissa would never accept an apology from him, no matter how genuine or heartfelt. Which left him with no choice.
He supposed a fragment of compassion from his old soul remained; that it felt Clarissa should be allowed to be free of him and live out her days as she pleased. But it was outmatched by what remained, which was a heart as black as the darkest night. The unbending belief that nothing in this world mattered had become Inferno's mantra. Goodwill? Charity? Mercy? Benevolence?—these were angels' dreams drifted down from clouds of cotton candy. The only thing real was what a person held in his hands, what he possessed.