EMP Crash (Book 5): Hostile Grounds

by Kip Nelson

  The girl looked at Grace then looked away, and tapped her fingers against the table. She ran her hand through her dirty hair and exhaled, then rolled her bottom lip underneath her teeth.

  “I'm not going to talk, you know. You're not going to be able to find us, and even if you can, we're too powerful for you. I'm just going to wait here until they come for me and you're not going to be able to do anything to stop it,” she said, turning away from Grace when she had finished speaking. Grace looked at her implacably and then rose from the table and left. She had been in there for a total of ten minutes and had left without asking a question.

  “How'd it go in there?” Saul asked.

  “I've only just begun,” Grace replied.

  She knew that it would take a lot to get anything out of that girl. So, she remembered a few stories Mack had told about how he had interrogated people, and tried implementing the lessons she had learned. It was difficult, however, because her natural instinct was to force the issue and demand answers, but Mack assured her that tactics like that didn't work and a little more subtlety was required. Grace's problem was she wasn't sure how much time she had to interrogate the prisoner. She had hope Luis and Will would return soon, but she couldn't be sure of that either. It was as though she was in a race and had no idea how quickly her opponents were moving.

  To gather her thoughts, Grace clasped her hands behind her back and strolled out to the middle of the settlement, glad that the place had been formed around the central park. In some ways, she missed the forest and the peace it had offered. Being back in the city and around all these people reminded her how despicable humans could be to one another. While she was out she bumped into Freddie and Hank, who were walking together. She greeted them with a smile and asked how things were.

  “People seem to be holding up well, and we let them know that if they want to talk to us about anything they are welcome to seek us out,” Freddie said. Hank then gave him a knowing look. Freddie paused, and Grace wondered what was on his mind.

  “Freddie has something else to say to you,” Hank prompted. Freddie glared at him, while Grace looked at him expectantly.

  “Well, we were talking and Hank thinks it would be a good idea if I told people I was a counselor. I don't want to sound arrogant, but I think I could help people here, and I was wondering if I could use my apartment as an office, and if people need to come to me to talk about anything they can.”

  “I think that's a wonderful idea!” Grace said.

  “And that goes for you as well. You've been dealing with a lot recently,” Freddie added.

  “I'll keep that in mind but, no, I think that's great,” Grace said with a smile. “While I have you here, actually, I was wondering if I could get your help with something? I'm trying to get information from this girl we captured. Do you have any tips or advice on how to get people to open up?”

  “There's not really a magic trick to it. I suppose you just have to be patient and don't let yourself get caught up in anything she says. Like, don't take the bait if she tries insulting you. Then again, I've never interrogated anyone, I've only counseled them. So, my experience may be different,” he said.

  Then he threw a deferring glance to Hank, but the preacher didn't have anything else to add, and said that what Freddie had offered was good advice. Grace thanked them and left it for a while. She walked around the settlement and spoke with a few people before returning to the makeshift jail, where Saul still was standing guard.

  “How are you coping with this, Saul?”

  “You know something? I'm actually liking the sound of the quiet life. I think we've all had enough excitement and I'm going to keep my head down for a while. I like it here. People don't ask too many questions, and they don't look at me funny. I think I could be happy here.” Grace smiled and patted him on the shoulder.

  She was glad he felt that way and, in truth, she felt similarly, although they would have to make sure the settlement survived any incoming attacks. But the more she thought about the future the more she could see herself staying in one place. It was certainly different than spending every day on the move, aiming for something. Here was a real challenge, where they could build something, and yet she knew that, eventually, Mack would leave. She already had pledged her loyalty to him and didn't know if she could watch him go out into the world alone. Still, she decided that was a decision she could make another time and, for now, she had a prisoner to interrogate. She entered the room again, once again sitting at the table and resuming the same posture.

  “Back again?” the girl asked smugly. Grace smiled at her silently, meeting her stare.

  Again, the girl came to the table and sat down, but this time she did not say anything. Neither did Grace. The girl fidgeted and adjusted her posture multiple times while Grace stayed still. After about ten minutes, Grace rose from her seat and left once again. Saul expressed surprise that she was leaving so soon after having gone in, but Grace told him she was trying out something she had learned from Mack. She continued doing this throughout the day, entering the room, sitting in silence for about ten minutes, and then leaving again. The girl didn't seem to know what to do as she had been expecting Grace to get angry with her or demand answers.

  When Mack had told the story, he said how he had been tasked with getting secrets from someone, but that person had insisted Mack would not get anything from them. So, over the course of several days Mack entered and didn't say anything. Grace hoped that because the girl was young and not trained in the art of keeping secrets the technique would work in a shorter period of time. It seemed to have done so because, at one point, just as she was about to leave, the girl finally broke and begged Grace to tell her what she wanted.

  “I want to talk to you,” Grace said, flashing that same neutral smile, and leaving again.

  This time she knew that the next time she entered that room the girl would talk, and she was proud of herself for being able to pull it off. Indeed, when she entered the room again after taking another walk around the settlement she sat at the table in the same manner. This time the girl immediately came over. Grace looked at her expectantly.

  “I'm ready to talk,” she said.

  “I'm ready to listen,” Grace replied, and folded her hands together as she leaned forward and waited to hear what the girl had to say.

  FREDDIE HAD BEEN WALKING around the settlement telling everyone where he was located in case they needed to talk. It had been a big thing for him to return to counseling in an official capacity. Ever since the EMP had hit and the world had been plunged into such chaos, Freddie had been trying to help people where he could, but it wasn't the same as having his own office. Yet, returning to his career brought with it some anxieties as he was unsure if he could be the same counselor he used to be. He had been through so much and, in the old world, most of his clients had come to him with regular troubles, not troubles that plagued people in this one. He hoped he would be able to offer people some solace.

  He looked at Hank with envy because Hank had an easy way with people, and being a calm presence was something that came naturally to him. In Freddie's opinion, it was easier to advise someone to pray than tell them that they had to work on their problems, not that Freddie was going to bring up that point with Hank. But now that he was arranging his apartment he was feeling excited, and hoped that at least one person would come and talk to him because they felt at a loss. He was not as strong or brave as some of the other people he had known, and he put down his survival as much to chance as anything else. He first had taken up counseling because he had suffered from anxieties and low self-esteem when he had been younger, and now that he had to forge a path of his own making, those feelings were returning.

  He dragged a couch into the lounge and set a chair against the wall. It wasn't the same as his old office, but it would have to do. After he was finished he waited for the first patient. It reminded him of when he first had moved into his office and wondered if he really was capable of b
eing a therapist. Over the years, he had (or at least he liked to think he had) helped many people, but these people would be his greatest test, as surely they would be suffering from great depression and trauma after everything they had been through.

  After a while he looked out the window and then walked downstairs to see if there was anybody looking for him. Perhaps they simply forgot where he said he was located, he told himself, but the sad truth was nobody had shown up. He returned to his office, morose, and sighed heavily. He pulled out his notebook and doodled aimlessly while he let his thoughts wander. There had been a time when there had been a long waiting list to get an appointment with him, and he had to face the possibility that there wasn't a need for someone like him anymore.

  It wasn't until about a half hour later when there was a light knock on the door and a young woman came in. She was followed by a man, and suddenly Freddie had a number of patients who wanted to speak with him. He gave them all numbers and told them to wait outside, and if anyone else came to give them a new number, for it was getting tiresome having every session interrupted by someone new and he, of course, wanted to give his patients his undivided attention.

  Before long there was an almost endless line of people wanting to see him, and as soon as one left another one entered. He talked about the apocalypse and the effect it had had on them, but a curious thing happened. After the first few people, he noticed a trend and began making notes. After he had seen most of the people there was a definite sign of something unexpected.

  He had assumed people would have been devastated by the apocalypse and the subsequent trials they had been through, but people actually felt emboldened. When he talked to them, their problems mostly revolved around them either missing loved ones, or trying to figure out their place in their world and the future, problems he was accustomed to talking about before the world had changed. When it came to talking about the event, he found that people generally weren't scared or traumatized by it, even though the lasting scars were all around for people to see. But for the most part, people had made their way to the settlement soon after the city fell, and they had managed to avoid the rioting and violence. When he asked them why they felt no great fear, they all came back with the same answer, even though some of them had to think about it longer than others.

  'Because I survived.'

  They all had survived, and Freddie realized this had spurred on their courage and given them a cloak of bravery with which to ward off the demons that threatened them. It made them feel invulnerable, and once he had figured this out, he introduced a new question. He asked those who came to see him if they were afraid of the threats against the community. They all pondered the answer and said they were afraid for the people around them, and perhaps afraid that they would be made to do something they weren't comfortable with, but if they could survive the apocalypse then they could survive anything, and they were not going to cower in fear.

  Freddie was astounded by this and furiously scribbled down notes, wishing he had a way to catalog these reactions and study them further, although he knew there was no way to do that. Instead, he had to be content in knowing that, despite there being a world-changing event, many of the problems that people faced were still the same, and there was an odd comfort in that. He settled into his chair and, for a while at least, he could pretend that the world was normal.

  CHAPTER NINE

  GRACE SAT across from the prisoner, pleased and proud that she had been able to pull off the technique to get her to open up. It made her feel like Mack, and she was glad his influence had rubbed off on her. Once again, she reflected on how much she had changed since the plane had crashed; it was almost an unrecognizable transformation. However, she tried not to think about that too much because she had to focus on the task at hand.

  Another aspect of leadership had been revealed to her during the last couple of days. She had to learn how to push aside her own personal concerns and remain clear-headed for the task at hand. For example, she was dreadfully concerned with the fact that Mack and Luis had yet to return. Anytime she thought about them, her stomach twisted unnaturally, and all the worst thoughts careened through her head. The new world was not a place in which one wanted to be left alone, and she only just had become used to the fact that they all would be together. To have the two most important people in her life be taken away was cruel, and she wasn't sure how she would be able to carry on. So, she pushed it away and decided not to think about it until there was proof of their deaths, since she could have been worrying over nothing.

  When Grace looked at the girl sitting opposite her, she saw the person she could have become in different circumstances. The girl had a wild look in her eyes, but also a scared and vulnerable look. They were of similar age, and it was clear she simply had fallen in with the wrong crowd. Grace had been fortunate to be with Mack when it all happened. He had shown her how to take care of herself and how to survive. If she had fallen in with people like this girl had, then Grace would have been just as likely to be sitting in that chair. Not that it excused what the girl had done, of course, but Grace did feel a swell of pity for her.

  “What would you like to tell me?” Grace asked.

  The girl stuck out her jaw and blew upwards, sending a few strands of light blonde hair flying back. She used both hands to push away the remaining hair, and left one hand perched atop her head as she raised a knee on which to rest her elbow and turned her eyes towards Grace.

  “You're the one who has been coming in here, day after day. What do you want to know?” she asked.

  “How about we start with your name? I'm Grace,” she said, remembering that Mack always began by sharing his name.

  “Lily,” the girl replied flatly, almost as though her name was something to be ashamed of. Perhaps because it reminded her of her old life, before all of this happened.

  “Well, Lily, we have ourselves a problem here. You and your people repeatedly have come into our settlement and stolen things from us; things that we've worked hard for. We're not going to tolerate it anymore, but first I need information from you. I would like you to tell me about the people in your faction and the tactics they employ. How many of you are there? How can we prepare to defend ourselves against them?”

  At this, Lily threw her head back and let out a morbid laugh, and when she returned her gaze to Grace it was cold and heartless. “You can't prepare yourselves for what's coming. We're like a storm.”

  “There must be some way, if you help us,” Grace said. The grim smile dropped from Lily's face and she sighed heavily. Her knee dropped and she turned fully toward Grace, shoulders rounded, body low, hair falling so it rested against the surface of the table.

  “I can't help you. It's not allowed. We have a code.”

  “Honor among thieves?”

  “Something like that.”

  “Well, break your code. There are lives at stake here. Innocent people-”

  “Nobody is innocent in this world, at least nobody should be. You must do everything you can to survive, and that means forgetting about right and wrong. There is no right and wrong anymore. There's only alive or dead.” Lily's words were grave and Grace had to admit there was some truth to them. But Grace had to fight against that, because that's what Mack had taught her to do.

  “No, there is still room for right and wrong. You just have to be with the right people so they can show you. I was like you. I had no idea what I was doing in this world and thought that I would have to rely on others to stay alive, but I learned. I adapted. I changed myself without sacrificing who I am.”

  “And now you're the leader of this place. At least, that's what I assume, considering you're the only one who's been talking to me.”

  Grace sat back in her chair, noting the impressed tone in Lily's voice. “Yes, I am.”

  “Violence isn't the only way to progress in this world, Lily. I know it might seem like it at times, and I've certainly done things that I'm not proud of, but it's our responsib
ility to be better than our nature, to lift ourselves up and be proud to call ourselves human.” Grace spoke with passion, which she hoped she would impart to Lily, although the prisoner seemed unmoved. She spoke with a quiet voice.

  “Sometimes you go too far down the other path, so far that you can't see the way back.”

  “It's never too late to make a change, Lily.”

  “What happened to the old guy anyway? The one who used to be in charge of this place. Did we get him?”

  Grace tried to hide her irritation at the wording of the question, but wasn't entirely successful. “No, we didn't 'get him'. There just...needed to be a change.”

  “Oh, I see,” Lily said, without meaning anything in particular.

  “We're not here to talk about me or this camp anyway. Tell me about yours.”

  “You wouldn't like what I've got to tell you; that they're vicious savages who won't stop at anything until they've taken what they've wanted; how they don't care about being better or being good, they just want to take what they can get while they're here. They know what this world is, that we're all going to die, and probably sooner than we all think. So, they simply don't care anymore. There aren't any rules that apply to them, they're not scared of anything, they sweep through like a force of nature, and there is nothing, absolutely nothing, you can do about it. You aren't the first group to try resisting and you won't be the last. But there's nothing you can do, so you might as well surrender and try making it out with as many lives as possible.”

  Grace didn't know if she should take that as a warning or a threat. Lily kept referring to the group as 'them', but did she still consider herself part of it? If she could, Grace wanted to bring Lily around, and prove to her there was a better way, but for now, she was still a prisoner, and Grace couldn't afford to trust her too much.