“Hello,” she said, “I am Jenny Martinez.”
But the man was done with her. As though they were just passing on the street, he moved off back the way Jenny had come. He didn’t look back at her, just slowly walked away. Jenny didn’t really know what to do with herself, but she decided to just do what she had planned, and after a short pause, she returned to her trek to the market. That was the strangest encounter she had yet had, in this new existence.
After twenty minutes or so, came over a hill and could see the market. As usual, there were hundreds of people there and it always filled her with joy to see this. People were finding ways to survive, and it was beautiful. She made her way down to the old shopping center parking lot that now served as the area market and began saying hello to people she knew. As she looked around the little booths that people had set up, she could see the diminishing amounts of food. Over a month had passed and food was disappearing. There were men who sold dried meats that seemed to always have something to trade. Jenny assumed that they hunted or had livestock somewhere. Cheese was sold by some folks who she knew had goats, but they were beginning to lose goats to poachers and thieves, so the cheese was growing sparse. Jenny had traded for many jams, jellies and preservatives and stored them for the winter. She was all set, but she couldn’t say the same for many of the people she saw.
“Jenny, darlin’! How are you doing today?” came a rough man’s voice from a few stalls away. It was Carl Petersen, a kind old man who carved wooden staffs and whose wife, Maribel, made quilts. “Maribel is over at our stall, and she has someone who wants a reading!”
Jenny loved this kind, elderly couple. They looked out for others and everyone enjoyed their company. “Thanks, Carl. I will go see her.” The Petersens were one of the first families to start up the market, believing that everyone was better off when they worked together.
Jenny walked over and found where Maribel was set up. Her dark hair belying her age, Maribel Petersen was a beautiful woman. The two of them shared a Hispanic heritage, and in these times, any connection was good.
“Jenny,” the older woman started, “I want you to meet someone.” Maribel led Jenny over to where some people were looking through her goods. An attractive young man stood looking at quilts. “This is Jeffrey Cole.”
The man reached his hand out and Jenny reached out also. Instinctively, she switched her inner sight on as she always did when making a deal. The man was shrouded in pink, silver and dirty gray. These were not good colors, but they told Jenny something. They told her that this young man was being deceptive, guarded and that he wanted something from her. There was more to this meeting than she assumed. She looked around at the other people, and she spotted them. There, scattered among the hundreds of milling market-goers, were this man’s cohorts. They bore the browns that she had seen in the dojo men, but that was not uncommon in today’s environment. It meant they were self-serving and uncertain. It was the black outline that concerned her, that meant power and subjugation.
Just as Jenny had spent time honing her ability to read items, the market had given her time to learn the meanings of the different colors. These men were up to no good. She worked a plan in her head to get away, and spied a path which the men were not watching.
Jenny smiled at the man. “Okay, Maribel says you need your palm read or something?”
Maribel looked at her inquisitively, but Jenny continued, “Let me go behind this sheet over here and center myself so I can see with my inner sight, and then I will be ready.”
Jenny saw the man look at the other men, as she walked back behind the sheet. As she hoped, Maribel came soon after.
“Jenny,” the older woman asked, “What is wrong. You never had to center yourself before.”
Jenny whispered to her friend, “Grab Carl and get out of here. Those are bad men.”
Maribel nodded and said, “I will hold them off, when they try to find you, Carl and I will slip away.”
As Maribel pulled the curtain aside, Jenny could see Jeffrey Cole still standing there. As he turned toward her, his jacket came open a little bit, and she caught a glimpse of the black top underneath, emblazoned with the patch of the Fine Modern Karate Academy from downtown. She didn’t know how, or why, but they found her. Jenny ran, she didn’t look back, she just ran as fast as she could. She never even heard the violence that began shortly thereafter.
CHAPTER FIFTY-EIGHT
Kyle walked forward, flanked by two of max’s dogs. His small waif of a cousin walked cheerily behind them, picking daisies. Most of the team was farther back, staying out of sight while Kyle and his “team” moved forward. They were very close to their destination and just didn’t want anything to go wrong.
Suddenly the two dogs ran off ahead of them. Kyle stopped and turned to look at Max. She was staring off into the distance. Without looking at him, she said, “Don’t go that way. Lots of dead people.” She went back to picking daisies.
Kyle looked at her for a long moment, until she looked up again, “What?” she asked.
“Do we know how they died?” He asked.
Max thought for a moment, and then nodded, “Foul Play.” She kneeled down, “Ooh, a purple one.”
“Max,” Kyle said as calmly as he could, “What do you mean by foul play?”
“You know, foul play, they were murdered.”
Kyle looked in the direction she had mentioned and saw the dogs trotting back. He wished he could see what she could see. “So no live people?”
Without looking up, the little girl said, “No, but there are birds picking at the bodies. It is kind of gross. You can go look if you want, but it isn’t new stuff.”
Kyle knew just what she meant. They had seen many victims of murder in the month past. It was all too common a problem, and the murders seemed fresh lately. He guessed it was hunger and survival causing the fights, but he couldn’t be sure. Uncle Ted thought that was it, but he always believed the best of people, even after all the war he had experienced. His dad had always said it was one of ted’s best features, but it allowed him to miss things. Kyle was pretty sure some of this was just a violent form of domination and power-grabbing. He decided not to look at what Maxine had described.
The thought of his dad brought a new pang of sadness to Kyle’s mind. He was functioning well, but it was hard whenever he thought of his dad. It had dropped from constantly to about once every five minutes. He missed him so much.
He looked back to where his cousin was playing, but she was standing up and looking at him. “My Dad wants us to come back.” She said and turned back to walk to the group.
Ted had taken to using Max’s gifts to communicate with people who were far apart from each other. It was really a great advantage. The dogs ran up to Max and she absent-mindedly pet them with each hand as she walked. Kyle ran to catch up, and walked a pace behind them.
Reaching the group, they found they were the last to arrive and they had gathered, as was their custom now, into a circle.
Ted spoke at a level everyone could hear. “Okay, we are almost at the Hillside. We may encounter people there, so Max, don’t send the dogs in too quickly. As those of you who have been there know, there is a winding road that goes up and a sort of flat place they used for additional parking. Most of the group will wait there while a few of us go ahead to scout the restaurant and grounds. We are going to want to secure that first area if we end up being able to stay, so there is no reason not to start looking for things to make a barricade. Make good use of the time. Any questions?”
Since no one had any questions, they moved out again. As he walked toward the front, Kyle’s mom ran up next to him.
“I think I know what my ability is,” she said with a smile that he hadn’t seen since his dad had died. It was wonderful to see her smile.
“Yeah?”
She nodded, “Jessica and I were walking and we heard a noise,” she saw the concerned look on her son’s voice and put him at ease, “It was a rabbit.
But, I didn’t know that and we ducked down. Nat came running when she lost sight of us, and she didn’t immediately see us. I played with it a little bit, using the form and function thing that Cliff taught us and watch.”
Kyle turned around and his mom was gone. He started to get frantic and looked all over, but turning around once again, there she was. “What the fuck?” he whispered.
“I know right?” she said with a big smile.
“You can be invisible?” he asked holding onto her arm like he was afraid she might slip away.
“I don’t think so. Not really, anyway, I just sort of hide in plain sight. I asked Cliff about it and he said he thought I was bending light, so I think you and I have similar powers, but a little different.”
Kyle laughed a little, “Well, that could come in pretty handy, Mom.” And they both laughed a bit.
It took another half an hour to reach the base of the road up to the restaurant and Kyle was again amazed at his dad’s mind. Not having thought of it this way, Kyle did not perceive it the way his dad had without any hesitation at all. The road up was narrow and steep, with towering cliffs on the west side and a growing drop off on the east side. It had one access point and that was easily guarded against a group of any size at all. The road up was barely two lanes and pretty skinny even for that. There was a landing half way up the road that his Uncle ted had called a platform, really a round-about road with flat space in the middle for parking, which gave way to another steep road that went up to the main parking lot, the restaurant and its garden patio. The garden patio was next to a stream and waterfall that came off one of the high cliffs from some lake high in the Rockies, and then ran off into a stream on the other side which went under another road after cascading down the cliffs in another beautiful waterfall. It was gorgeous, but more importantly, it was defensible, you could see all around, it had a fresh water source, and room to grow some vegetables in the spring. The former restaurant had even gone into the locavore concept of fresh food by plating a large amount of herbs and produce before it eventually closed.
Kyle saw his Uncle say something to Max and saw two of the dogs break off and lay down next to the road at the bottom. The group began to make its way up to the first landing. The storm of those first few days when this all started had taken a toll, there were branches and leaves everywhere and it didn’t look like anyone had been on the road. It was steep though, and walking up it was slower than they had gone on relatively flat ground. After a short time, they rounded a corner and found themselves on the first landing. Ted turned to the group.
“Let’s secure this landing, and if we have time, the bottom of the road up. Kyle, Nat, Erica, and Adam, can you come with me?” He turned without waiting for a response and the others followed without feeling the need to respond. Kyle ran up to where his sister was and they stepped their way toward the top. It was frustrating to see three of Max’s dogs run up ahead, but then he turned and saw his Uncle holding his cousin’s hand. He realized what it was, the dogs would smell anyone long before Kyle or Nat could see them. In the end, it was pointless, not only was no one there, but the place was in shambles. The storm had caved in the roof of the abandoned building and the whole place was just destroyed. The pond was now a lake and the waterfall from the high cliff was a torrent. Nature had retaken this hill.
“Perfect” Ted exclaimed.
Kyle turned to what he thought was a sarcastic statement from his Uncle, but Ted’s face told him something different. Ted was delighted with this. Clearly seeing the confusion on his nephew’s face, Ted explained. “More water is good. The building didn’t serve our purpose anyway, so we will clear away the structure and use whatever we can to build our new home. This is great, did you see the soil over at the vegetable garden?”
Kyle looked at his sister and saw the relief on her face as well. After looking around for a short bit, they all went back down the road to tell the others. What they found surprised the hell out of them.
Across the road was a stone wall, like a castle wall, with a door opening in it, into which some of the people were constructing a barricade. Ted called out, “What have we here?”
Kyle’s aunt Kayla ran up with the same gleeful look he had seen on his mother’s face earlier. “It was me,” was all she said as she and Ted embraced in a huge hug.
“I was thinking that if we could only learn how to build with stone, we would be in a great place, and for some reason my imagination started to go to the castles I saw when we toured Northern England. The ground started to move, and there you have it.” She pointed at the wall and she and Ted laughed. Aunt Kayla was the means to building everything they would need up here, but he had another idea as well.
“Uncle Ted?” Kyle called out, “Has my mom shown you her talent?”
CHAPTER FIFTY-NINE
Jenny’s run back to her cave was not a straight line. She wasn’t quite sure she had lost the group from the market that had been following her. Every time she had taken a break in her flight from that particular danger, she had seen the auras of the men following her, sometimes far off and sometimes much too close for comfort. Because of this, she had gone west instead of north. But now, she was up against the foothills and would need to turn north toward her cave, or south to lead the men away. South would mean she would be outside at night, which was not a safe thought. So, reluctantly, she turned north.
She couldn’t believe what she was running from, what kind of monsters were these men? When she had run from the market, she had not initially gone far; hiding about a block away and watching as the men systematically attacked, and killed, many of the market-goers. She hoped the Petersens were among those she saw running off south, but she couldn’t be sure. She had waited to find out, the first of many mistakes that day, and then when all had calmed down, she had gone back to the market to try to help.
The dead were everywhere, but she never saw Carl or Maribel Petersen. At least she could still have hope they made it out. Many of the corpses were mangled in ways that she didn’t think a human attacker should be able to do. She had sat on the asphalt of that parking lot and cried, until she heard the men return. They saw her before she got away and the chase was on. It had been hours now and was growing dark.
Her legs burned from the exertion of running, and her shoulders burned from the tension. She was unbearably hungry, and completely out of energy. She knew if she were to sit down, she would not be able to get running again, inertia was not her friend right now. So, she kept moving.
Jenny ran north along the road that would lead her to the park in which her cave was made. She could not use her inner sight; she did not have the energy or focus to achieve the mental peace necessary to make it work. But, she thought she might have lost them. Looking around, she saw no one, so she darted across the main road and into the park itself. Looking back through the bushes she took refuge behind, she saw no movement, heard no sounds of humanity. She realized that she had already waited too long, feeling the stiffness settling into her legs. She mustered all the energy she could and began up the path toward the cave she had made into her home. She was so exhausted, and so intent on checking behind her, that she did not see the men in front of her. She walked right into the clearing they were standing in.
She turned to run, but she was so tired, her legs just didn’t move fast enough and one of the men reached out and grabbed her by the hair. Jenny was thrown, by her hair, into the dirt at the group’s feet.
“Someone is looking for you,” said the man who had called himself Jeffrey Cole. “He doesn’t like to be kept waiting.”
Jenny mustered all the strength she could to stand up for herself. She would make them kill her before she would let them rape her. “I don’t like to be kept waiting either, so I am going to kill each and every one of you.”
They began to laugh and Jenny rushed. It didn’t work. Jenny was hit so hard, that her feet flew high into the air and she slammed down on to her back, knocking the air completely out
of her. She rolled over to get up and one of the men kicked her in the side, rolling her back on to her back.
“Relax,” said Cole, “let’s have a rest before we take you back. That old couple who tried to guard you said you lived up here, so tell us where so we can go get your things, you are moving to the compound.”
Jenny had no idea what the compound was, but she knew she didn’t want to go there. “There is no way that Carl or Maribel would tell you where I live.” Jenny spat out defiantly, through the pain she was feeling in her ribs and chest.
“Well,” Cole said, “it is amazing what a man will tell you when he watches his wife being stripped nude and threatened with violation. He spilled the beans dear, then we spilled their blood.”
Jenny collapsed and broke into sobs, “No. No, it can’t be. They were just trying to help.”
“They did help, they helped all they could and we put them out of their misery.” The men’s laughter after this statement enraged Jenny, and she was going to go out fighting. She rolled to her other side and lunged upward to gain her feet. But, when she turned, they weren’t even looking at her. Jenny looked to see where they were looking, and there, at the edge of the clearing in which they were standing, was the homeless man Jenny had passed on her way to the market. He just stood there looking down, his arms lying listlessly at his side. Jenny wanted to shout for him to run, but she was mesmerized by his calm.
One of the men stepped forward. “What the fuck do you want?” As the soldier reached the man, his calm became sudden fury. The guy hit the soldier so quickly, that it was hard to see in the dusk. Before a few seconds had passed, the soldier was lying unconscious (or maybe dead) at the homeless man’s feet and the homeless man was back to the same calm posture. The homeless man pointed to Jenny and waved her over to him.
Jenny stepped forward, but Cole stepped in front of her. “No. Our leader has ordered us to bring her to him, and you won’t stand in the way.” Cole motioned to two more men on one side and one on the other, who all rushed in unison. In seconds, they also lay in the dirt, dead or incapacitated. The remaining five men, who Jenny had seen kill and maim hundreds at the market, took a step back. Then Cole took off his overcoat, revealing the sleeveless gi top, emblazoned with the patch she had seen earlier.
Age of Mystics (Saga of Mystics Book 1) Page 19