The Barriers

by Katie French

  Deciding I’m still too far away for the men to see, I creep over the ridge and down a ways, keeping to the tall weeds. I zigzag down about halfway until I can hear goats bleating and the chickens clucking. And then I hear men’s voices.

  I fumble in my pockets for the knife. Still there.

  Crouching low, I watch. A few men throw something from a bucket to the cluster of chickens in the pen closest to me. Several mill around the gated area that surrounds the windmill. The six-foot fence has a gate with a huge lock. The men stand outside, holding large, empty buckets. Must be watering time.

  As I watch, the group backs up and creates a path for three large men and a small boy. Even from here, I can see how they turn to the biggest man as he nears. He’s huge with a bald head and wide shoulders. He must be in charge. Even from here, he looks terrifying.

  The big man reaches the gate, fiddles with it, and swings it wide open. The men spill in with their buckets.

  My throat clenches. It’s so dry.

  We need water, but we need Clay more. But if I don’t get water, how can I keep moving? Putting my hand down, I splay my fingers in the dirt and take deep breaths, closing my eyes. I might faint here under the morning sun. Take it easy.

  When I open my eyes, I see a dark stain on the ground beside me. I crawl over and touch the dirt. Bringing it to my nose, I smell it. Blood. And beside it, boot prints, scuffed in the dirt like there was a fight.

  Turning my eyes from the crowd at the windmill, I see a man by himself near one of the shanties’ steps. I watch for a long time, but he doesn’t move. Squinting harder, I can see his hands tied behind his back. He looks dead, but dead men don’t need their hands tied up.

  “Clay,” I whisper. “Please let him be okay.”

  I run up the ridge back to the auto shop where I barrel into Betsy as I slam through the door. She stumbles back, clutching herself, pale faced and worried. “What is it?” she shrieks. “Did you find him?”

  I shake my head, sucking in big lungfuls of air. “He’s… I think he’s been taken.”

  She grabs my arm. “Taken by who?”

  “The guys. The people at the windmill. At least, I think I saw him tied up. It was hard to tell.”

  Dropping my arm, she begins pacing and muttering. One hand twists strands of wig hair around her fingers and the other rubs her mouth, making her chapped lips raw and red. If I let her, she’ll wind herself into a tizzy.

  “Betsy, stop. That isn’t helping. We gotta go get him.”

  She flicks her eyes up to me, her hand pausing on her lips. “How?”

  I glance back toward the windmill. I can’t see it, but I can picture it—the tall structure, the whirring blades, and the clump of houses around it.

  “I don’t think there were very many men down there.”

  Betsy sticks out her tongue like a kid. “Not many men? How many men does it take? We’re doomed.” She flops down on the bedding and drops her head into her hands. Her shoulders shake with fresh sobs.

  I watch her for a while. She’s right; it does seem impossible. I’m a kid, and she’s a girl. A messed-up girl. What chance do we got against grown men?

  “Where’s Clay’s gun?” I ask, letting my eyes skip over the store’s empty shelves and trash piles around the dirty tile floor.

  Her shoulders go up and down heavily. “He hid it and then forgot where.”

  I pace, trailing my boot through the piles of trash. We could try to find the gun. Or we could sneak down there in the night and try to bust Clay out. Either way, it’ll take too long. Clay might not have a lot of time. And we got no water, so if we don’t figure something out quick, we’ll be dead long before we can rescue Clay.

  “I’ll just have to go down there,” I say more to myself, but Betsy snaps her head up.

  “Nuh-uh. You are not leaving me behind again, Ethan Meemick. It’s awful here alone.” Her lower lip trembles.

  I shake my head, still rolling the plan over. “Don’t worry,” I say, eyeing her. She won’t like this plan at all.

  “You won’t be left alone.”

  ***

  Betsy tugs at the rope around her wrists and glares at me. “This is the worst idea I’ve ever heard.”

  Ignore her whining, I scan the village below. The men look like ants. A few hurry from one thing to the next, but most seem to be in their huts, staying out of the sun. A few lean in the windmill’s long shadow, talking. Three stand guard outside the gate.

  “Ethan. Ethan!” Betsy whines until I turn back.

  “What?”

  “I don’t want to do this.” Her face is pink and dotted with sweat. In this heat, she looks like a piglet in a wig. If I said it out loud, she might cry, but she locked me in a rat-filled hole, so I don’t feel bad.

  I turn away and continue to watch the men. She tugs on the rope in my hand. It runs to her bound wrists like a leash. “Ethan,” she whines.

  “Look, Betsy, don’t be a baby. You agreed. We use you as bait and get into the village. We look around for Clay. We bust him out, and then he helps us all get out. Easy.”

  Only, it doesn’t feel easy. It feels like the hardest thing in the world. But it’s the only plan I have that doesn’t end with us starving to death inside the auto parts store.

  She whines quietly, leaning back in the dirt.

  “Look, we’re just gonna walk in there. Me with you as my prize. They’ll give us water.”

  She won’t even look at me.

  I know this is more risky for her than me, but I’ve got my knife, and besides, when we get Clay, he’ll know what to do. He always has before.

  I stand up and tug on the rope. At first, she won’t come, but when I tug again, she labors to her feet. Sweat stains her dirty dress and wilts her wig. At least she looks like someone I’ve captured in the wild.

  I look at the men’s outlines below. I’m not afraid. I’m not afraid.

  “Let’s go.” I give the rope a tug, and we walk down the incline.

  The hill is steep and we skid down the dusty ridge, making our approach known far and wide. I wanted to be ninja stealthy, but by the time we get halfway down, a crowd has gathered at the base of the hill. A few have drawn knives, but they don’t look ready to beat us into a pulp. Instead, they look confused. I try to think about what we look like, a kid and a teenage girl, skidding down the hill. Probably pretty nuts. Maybe it’s better they think we’re nuts.

  When we hit the bottom, the men back away, ringing us in a wide semicircle. My eyes dart around the crowd of about fifteen. All men between the ages of twenty and fifty. Most are shirtless and tan bone deep. They’re thin and stringy, but not starved.

  A boy runs up, the crowd parting for him. Before I know it, he’s yelling. His angry little face is heavy with black eyebrows and eyelashes. His cheekbones and chin are sharp, making him look like a cartoon character. He has on a holey T-shirt with a picture of a rubber duck on it and dirty tan shorts. Even though he’s my height, I get the feeling he’s older than he seems.

  “What d’you think you’re doing here?” His finger darts between Betsy and me as if he could zap us just by pointing.

  I raise a hand in defense, the other holding onto the rope lashed around Betsy’s hands. “Came to trade. We need water and food. This one”—I nod toward Betsy—“might be of use.”

  Betsy begins to tremble, but I don’t look. I have to pretend I don’t care, that she’s nothing. I think how she trapped me in the pit and the rats at my feet.

  The mean little boy looks Betsy over and points his scarecrow finger back at me. “We don’t want her. What’re we going to do with a girl? We don’t like girls.” He says “girl” like it’s a bad word.

  I look at his angry face, all scrunched up with rage, and then at the other men. Some stare at Betsy with dropped jaws. Some look angry, but not as angry as the mean little boy. I wish he’d shut up.

  I hold up the leash. “But she’s worth money.”

  The mean little boy bats
my rope away. “Not to us.” There’s a small grumbling from the men, but the boy flashes a dangerous look around, and they all shut up. “I’m Hank,” he says, pointing a thumb at his chest, “and I say what goes around here. We don’t want no girl, so you can hightail it right over that hill where you came from.”

  In confusion, I stare around. I thought they’d want to sell her. Women were worth a lifetime’s wages from what I was told.

  The crowd pulls back again, and a giant man, flanked by two smaller men with ancient guns, lumbers up. The man in the center has a bald, bullet-shaped head sloping down to broad shoulders and muscled arms. Around his throat, a nasty ring of scars decorates his skin, like someone tried to hang him. One eye turns in toward the other, making me unsure where he’s staring. I shrink down the closer he gets, melting. The mean little boy goes to stand beside him, looking up like a dog at his master.

  That explains why Hank thinks he’s in charge. He’s this big guy’s pet.

  I expect the big man to speak, but he just stares for a long time. Beside me, Betsy is a trembling mess. She’ll probably start bawling any second.

  The man leans down and whispers in Hank’s ear.

  Hank takes a breath and speaks. “Mike the Knife says to tell you he doesn’t know you or the female. He doesn’t like all these strangers coming in on his lands. You need to get the hell out of here. You have five seconds to go before his men start shootin’.” He smiles, showing small, yellow teeth.

  My heart is thumping. I hold out an empty hand. “There’s no water. We’ll die.”

  Mike’s face stays stony, but some of the men shift uncomfortably, like they don’t want to send a boy out to die.

  Then Betsy starts wailing.

  I fold my hands together and look up with big eyes. “Please don’t send us away.”

  Hank sneers, but Mike the Knife cocks his head. He grabs the mean little boy’s collar, draws him in, and begins whispering in his ear.

  This time, Hank doesn’t smile. “Mike the Knife says if you complete an initiation task, you and the girl can stay. If you fail, you go.” His voice is flat, emotionless. He’d gladly send me to die.

  I stare right at him. “I ain’t afraid. Give me the task.”

  Some of the men in the crowd chuckle. Some shake their heads. Mike the Knife lifts one corner of his mouth in a ghost of a smile.

  I smile, too, as Mike turns and walks away.

  “Don’t look so pleased, idiot,” Hank says to me. “The last three people who’ve done what you’re about to do are dead.”

  CHAPTER TEN

  Riley

  I sit locked in the masked bender’s solar car, keeping an eye on her every move as she and her men deal with the crashed Jeep. They haven’t bound my hands, but they collected any guns that survived the Jeep’s flip. Once again, we’re unarmed and outnumbered, but I’m not afraid. We’ve been through this before.

  Everyone’s alive, thank God. Bran made it through without a scratch on him. Apparently, being lashed to the roll bar saved him. Auntie has a bloody cut on her chest and some lacerations on her right forearm. Doc’s gun smashed into his skull, and it bled like a faucet for a while. A masked man bandaged the wound and helped him into another solar car. From where I sit, I can see him looking dazed as he stares out the car’s tinted window.

  My ears ring and I keep getting dizzy, but when my right ankle sent shards of pain up my leg as I walked to the car, I kept my face blank as stone. Showing weakness to our enemies is something Clay warned me against. Something from his gunslinger rule book. God, I wish he were here. My hand searches under my shirt, finding his ring and photo.

  Another setback. Another barrier between us. I can barely stand it.

  The men wedge Bran, with his hands still bound, into the small backseat of a car next to mine. He looks wary back there, his eyes marking everything with a look of intense observation. Does he know these people? Is he worried they know him?

  Once Auntie, Doc, and Bran are collected, the men tear our Jeep apart. I watch in horror as they pull out supplies and rip tubes from the engine.

  “Stop!” I yell through the solar car’s closed window. When I bang on the glass, they turn, eye me, and keep ransacking the Jeep.

  As I watch them destroy our ride, I realize they must’ve ambushed us for spare parts. They might not intend to kill us like I originally thought. If they’d wanted us dead, we would’ve been vulture food long ago. And the crash was my fault. But that doesn’t mean I trust them. Just because they haven’t cuffed us or beat us up doesn’t mean they’re our allies.

  My head pounds as I watch the bender sift through the supplies I so carefully packed. Nearly every part of me aches, and my chest where the seatbelt snapped taut feels crushed. I may have broken ribs. It’s then I remember the child I might be carrying. Is what I just went through enough to kill a baby? I could ask Auntie, but then I’d have to tell her what I’ve done. If she knows I was careless enough to get pregnant, she’ll kill me. How would I feel if it’s dead? Relieved, mostly.

  The car door opens, and the bender leader slides in the solar car’s driver’s seat. She presses the latch at the side of the mask and pulls it away, shaking out her chin-length hair. Turning her intense brown eyes to me, she holds out one gloved hand. “Corra.”

  I look at her hand and then her face. When she sees I won’t shake, she pulls her hand back, using it to smooth back the hair dangling in front of her eyes. “It’s fine,” she says. “We trashed your Jeep. I get it.”

  “That and the Taser you have aimed at me right now.” I nod to the other hand in her lap, the one holding the futuristic weapon that happens to be aimed at my midsection.

  She chuckles. Her teeth are straight and incredibly white. “Do you blame me?”

  I shrug. “What now?”

  Her eyes lift to the horizon. “Normally, we’d release you and send you on your way. But you’re all too banged up. So…” She blows out a breath. “We’re gonna do something we don’t normally do. How’s about a hot meal and a soft bed?” Her full red lips twitch in a broad smile.

  I narrow my eyes. “What if I say no? We have somewhere to be.”

  She purses her lips. Is she flirting with me? I can’t tell. “What’s your name?”

  I pause for a long time and finally decide there’s no reason to lie. “Riley.”

  “Riley, if we leave you out here, you’re buzzard food in two days. There’s no water for miles. No town. Plus, people around here don’t take kindly to benders.” With her free hand, she taps her chest.

  She thinks I’m like her. Doc and me are her people, and she wants to help us. I nod solemnly, falling into the act. “I hear they’re rounding us up for factory work. Pure slavery is what it is.”

  She frowns. “Someone put an end to whoever was enslaving benders, but it’s still dangerous. There’s a turf war going on between Kirtland and White Sands. A lot of people have been caught in the crossfire.”

  I try to look surprised. “We don’t wanna get hurt, but we lost people. We need to find ’em.”

  She winks at me, flirting again. “Don’t worry. We have ways of finding people.”

  When she puts on her helmet, she turns back into the insect-like creature. She pushes two glowing buttons on the vehicle’s console. “Buckle up.”

  I manage to get the buckle snapped before she peels out, leaving a trail of dust.

  When I look back, the two other vehicles carrying Doc, Bran, and Auntie follow us single file. Nervously, I clutch the seat and keep my eyes open. I check out the solar car’s interior. The molded plastic runs in sleek lines that make everything seem aerodynamic and futuristic. Even the stitched leather seat beneath me looks like new. Small, circular vents blow cool air toward us, wicking sweat from my face and neck. The steering wheel isn’t round, but more bowtie shaped with places for Corra’s gloved hands to grip. A readout screen shows the outside temperature, the car’s tire pressure, solar battery levels, terrain—everything. Every v
ehicle I’ve ever driven had its screens smashed to pieces long ago. How in the world did a bender get her hands on a car like this? Things like this don’t get made anymore. Very little gets made anymore, except recycled junk and Breeder babies.

  “What’re you and your crew doing out here in the middle of the desert?” I ask, trying to sound causal.

  “Research, mostly.”

  I probe harder. “You guys scientists?”

  She nods. “You could say that.”

  “Have you always lived here?” I run a finger along the leather seat’s stitching, trying to appear disinterested.

  She looks at me again and then back to the road. It’s an extremely well cared for piece of pavement. They must maintain it. “Look. I can’t tell you a lot. But you’ll see enough for yourself when you get to the compound.”

  My ears perk up. “The compound?”

  She doesn’t answer.

  The road we’re on dips down, sandy walls rising up on either side. This path was dug down into the earth, and it soon becomes clear why. Up ahead, nestled into the hillside, is a large, semicircular cement opening sealed off by huge concrete doors. An underground compound. You’d never find an entrance like this unless you knew it was here, and it’s completely defensible from nearly everything except a nuclear warhead.

  What the hell is going on?

  “I can’t believe it,” I say

  She chuckles from inside her helmet. “We don’t mess around here.”

  A beep sounds from the car’s dash. Corra reaches to the car’s ceiling and presses a glowing blue button.

  “Go for Washington,” she says.

  “Dr. Washington, you have visitors in your car. Is everything okay?” a voice from the speaker says.

  She’s Dr. Washington? A big name for a little bender.

  “We have some guests. Have a team meet me at the entrance.”

  I whip my head toward her. “A team?”

  Batting my question away like it’s nothing, she talks into the ceiling speaker again. “Moore, has Beetle returned?”

  There’s a pause. “No. No sign.”