Fall Back

by Riley Flynn

  “I bet that was kind of scary, wasn’t it?” she asked the girl.

  “Uh-huh.” Hayley wiped her face with her sleeve and snuffled back more snot.

  “You know, my mom passed away when I was a little bit younger than you.”

  “Yes.”

  “I was lucky, because back in those days, we used to print out copies of photos. That way if your phone or your computer died, you could still look at them.”

  Hayley grinned. “I think I’ve seen those in movies.”

  Jax tousled her hair. “Tell you what, kid. I’ll take your laptop down to Cpl. Brown and see if she can get it running. Then we’ll make sure we recover all your photos, and we’ll put them together with mine and print them out.”

  Her eyes widened. “Can we do that?”

  Val nodded. “I think we can.”

  “That would be awesome.”

  “I’ll get on it as soon as I can,” said Jax. “Meanwhile, you can have my phone. It’s kind of crappy, so you’ll have to borrow somebody’s charger to keep it working, but you’ll be able to look at pictures of your mom whenever you want.”

  She looked at him. “Are you sure? Then you won’t be able to look at them.”

  He felt a stab of shame as he realized he’d barely thought about Rachel since arriving at the mountain, and he certainly hadn’t looked at photos. What kind of a bastard forgets about the woman he loved like that? End of the world or not, she had been his universe for months.

  What kind of bastard abandons that woman’s child?

  “You know what, hon?” he said, biting down hard on his emotions to keep them off his face. “My memory is pretty good. But if I forget, then I might have to come here and look at them with you. Would that be okay?”

  Her smile almost made him fall over. You bastard, he told himself. You absolute bastard.

  “I’d like that,” she said.

  He leaned in close to her and returned her smile. “Me, too.”

  She frowned, and for a moment Jax wondered what he’d done wrong. Then she waved her free hand in front of her nose.

  “Your breath smells bad, Jax,” she said in a stage whisper.

  “That’s booze,” said Val, grinning. “That’s why I don’t drink it.”

  “Pee-yoo!” Hayley giggled.

  Jax feigned a look of shock. “I’m not going to sit here and be insulted,” he huffed. “I will bid you ladies a good evening.”

  “Hit the road, Jax,” said Val.

  “And dontcha come back,” Hayley said. “No more no more no more!”

  “Take a deep breath,” he said.

  “Why?” she asked, but did as she was told. Jax leaned in and touched his forehead to hers.

  “Good night, kiddo,” he whispered. “Sleep tight.”

  She let out her breath. “I will. G’night.”

  Hayley went back to looking at photos as Val escorted Jax to the door.

  “Man, when you commit, you really commit,” she said.

  “I did good?”

  “Yeah. Now you just need to keep it up.”

  He nodded. “I get that now. Thanks, Val. And not just for taking care of her. For… You know. For everything.”

  She grinned and gave his shoulders a squeeze with her powerful arm. “You get any sappier on me and you just might make me consider switching teams.”

  A laugh escaped Jax before he could catch it, which amazed him. Two minutes earlier he wouldn’t have believed he’d ever laugh again.

  “I don’t honestly don’t think I could handle you, Sarge.”

  “Damn right,” she said as she walked back to her bunk. “And it’s Chief now. Don’t forget it, sir.”

  Chapter 15

  Hayley sat on the passenger side of the SUV, staring out the window as the city streets passed by them on the way to the resort HQ. For a moment, Jax thought the girl might have fallen back asleep—it was only 0700, after all—before she finally spoke.

  “Are there people in those houses?” she asked quietly.

  It was another hard moment in a series of them that had followed their talk in her bunk three days earlier. Jax was finding it impossible to shield Hayley from the ugly reality of their new life here in Colorado Springs, and each time he had to explain something to her, his heart cracked a tiny bit more.

  “In some of them, yes,” he said. “Not everyone was able to get to the hospital.”

  “Or the hospice, like Mom.”

  Jax had noticed her having an easier time talking about her mother the past few days, and he was proud of her. He himself still couldn’t discuss Rachel with anyone besides Hayley; not yet.

  “Some people wanted to die at home,” he said. “It made them feel better.”

  She nodded. Jax had no idea if that was true—was pretty sure it was bullshit, in fact—but whatever it took to keep her from having a breakdown was worth it.

  “Do you know how many kids will be at the school?” she asked.

  He leapt at the chance to change the subject. The school had been announced two days earlier; Jax suspected it had been set up to keep the handful of surviving children from the bases out from underfoot. Not to mention off the overloaded minds of their parents, who were tasked with rebuilding society. Jax didn’t know what was happening with civilian children yet.

  “I think there are nine,” he said. “A lot of them have lost their parents, like you. Maybe you can all talk to each other about how it feels.”

  He cringed inwardly. Dr. Booth, child psychologist.

  “Maybe,” she said. “I hope we get to play games. I’m bored.”

  Their hopes of resurrecting her laptop had been dashed, at least temporarily, by the fact that Cpl. Brown had been diagnosed with Eko. Like many of the others from the Springs, she’d been given the earlier version of the vaccine. Jax thought about going to see her at Fort Carson, then thought better of it. What could he possibly say to her? Hang in there? Sorry you’re not feeling well? Everything he thought of sounded like a lame greeting card from coworkers you didn’t particularly like.

  “I’m sure it’ll be fun,” he said. “More fun than hanging around the mountain, anyway.”

  “I kind of like it there. I have a lot of time to read.”

  He turned off of Highway 115 toward the road that led to the resort. “How are those books, anyway?”

  “Good. They’re about these four friends who all share the same pair of pants, and it fits all of them even though none of them are the same size.”

  Jack arched an eyebrow. “How does that work?”

  She shrugged. “I dunno. You sort of have to ignore that part, I guess.”

  A lot like real life these days, he thought.

  ***

  The school turned out to be one of the conference rooms at the hotel. The teacher was a young civilian woman named Amanda who seemed genuinely interested in helping the kids—who ranged in age from seven up to thirteen—deal with their new circumstances. The whole idea of learning would have to take on a whole new meaning in the aftermath of the collapse.

  Jax knelt beside Hayley before leaving her there. She’d met Amanda and nodded at a few of the other kids, and he had places to be.

  “You gonna be okay?” he asked.

  She nodded. “Jax?”

  “Yeah, kiddo?”

  “My grandparents are dead, aren’t they?”

  Her face was impassive, but her words hit him like a truck. He cleared his throat as he struggled to come up with an answer to a question no little girl should ever have to ask.

  “It’s okay if they are,” she said quickly, obviously picking up on his discomfort. “I mean, I hardly even remember them.”

  “Honestly, Hayley, I don’t know. But I won’t lie—chances are very good that they got sick.”

  She nodded. “I kind of thought so. But I’ve got you, so it’s okay.”

  Jax wondered how parents did it—how did they deal with these little humans constantly jabbing little pins into your
heart? And why was he starting to crave the experience, when only a few days ago he ran from it like a cat from a junkyard dog?

  Hayley wrapped her little arms around his neck and squeezed. “Have a good day. You’re going to come pick me up after school?”

  He hugged her back. “Nothing in the world could stop me.”

  She waved at him and walked back into the makeshift school, quickly striking up a conversation with another girl, who seemed thankful for the attention. Jax smiled to himself and headed back into the hallway.

  Up ahead, he could see a throng of people milling around the hotel lobby, looking serious and poring over pieces of paper. Some Cpl. Brown counterparts had managed to jury-rig a handful of computers that hadn’t been connected to the Internet when the cyber weapon hit, so printing was still a thing. Jax wondered if bureaucracy would be the one thing that survived the collapse, like a metaphorical cockroach.

  A flash of strawberry blond hair caught his attention: Lt. Grant. It was the first time he’d seen her since they left William J. Palmer days earlier, which already felt like a month ago. She glanced up as he approached and, recognizing him, saluted.

  “Sir,” she said.

  “Lieutenant. How’s life in the resort?”

  She gave him a half-smile. “Living the dream,” she said sarcastically.

  “Remember you’re talking to a guy who bunks in a closet in a hole under a mountain.”

  “At least you’re not flushing your toilets and washing your hair with bottled water.”

  She had him there. The mountain had its own self-contained everything. The hotel, like the city, was on water rationing and dealing with rolling brownouts. No one seemed to know how long the water supply could last without staff to man the treatment plant. Electricity wasn’t quite as pressing an issue, given the supply of gas and generators, but the city’s coal-fired power plant would soon stop operating for good. And heat would be foremost in everyone’s mind in a couple of months as winter settled into the Rockies.

  It occurred to Jax that a significant amount of the paperwork he’d made fun of a few minutes earlier was probably focused on things like that, and he felt a twinge of shame. Everyone had a job to do these days.

  “I see you got some army fatigues,” he said. “So you drank the Kool Aid?”

  She shrugged, but Jax could read sourness in her face. “I didn’t see a choice, so I figured go along to get along. Checking my ego at the door and all that.”

  “How’s Col. Roth handling it?”

  She glanced around the room before leaning in closer.

  “I haven’t seen him since the president’s broadcast,” she said in a low voice. “I honestly don’t know where he is or what he’s doing.”

  “Holed up somewhere pouting, maybe?” Jax asked. The thought of a senior leader like Nicholas Roth sucking his thumb over who ran what was repellent to him.

  Grant shook her head. “I know it seems like that, but that’s not the way he is. He wouldn’t have gotten his command if he was like that.”

  Jax wondered. He liked to think the military didn’t promote certain types of people, but he also didn’t fool himself into believing it was always like that.

  “Speaking of commanders,” she said. “Looks like we have a new one. Anything you can tell me about Col. Smith?”

  There’s a lot I could tell you, he thought but didn’t say.

  “We think he may be former intelligence,” he said. “As no-nonsense as they come. He gave me a bottle of primo whiskey as a reward for our outing at the high school. Sorry, I didn’t think to save you any.”

  She smiled. “I’m a beer gal. Which means I better get used to drinking it warm, at least until winter gets here. So… We weren’t put on report for taking out civilians?”

  “The opposite, actually.” He shook his head. “Col. Archer—sorry, Gen. Archer—was the same way on this. The president wants us to extend an olive branch, but Archer and Smith say to keep a loaded weapon in the other hand.”

  Grant’s face betrayed a sudden desperation. “I’m a pencil pusher,” she said. “I’ve never been in combat. Never fired my weapon outside of the range. This is all beyond me. I shouldn’t be on your team.”

  Jax put a hand on her arm. “I think that’s exactly why you are on the team. The last thing we need is a bunch of testosterone factories running into situations shooting first and asking questions later. Don’t sell yourself short, Carly. I need you on this.”

  “Really?” The relief in her voice was palpable. “Thank you, sir, I appreciate that.”

  He nodded. “I think we can belay the ‘sirs’ from now on. I don’t think the chain of command is going to snap if we start using each other’s first names.”

  “All right,” she smiled. “Jackson, right?”

  “Call me Jax.”

  They stood in silence for a moment. Jax felt like he’d taken a step forward somehow. He wasn’t exactly sure what it meant, but it felt right.

  “Jax,” she said. “Can I ask you something?”

  “Of course.”

  The look in her eyes was oddly fragile. “The incident at the high school… Was that just the beginning of what’s to come?”

  He wished to God he knew the answer to that one.

  “I honestly don’t know,” he said. “I hope it wasn’t, but we have to think like it was.”

  She nodded. “It’s a whole new world out there.”

  “It is,” he said. “But I think we have to start thinking of it in the president’s terms. For us, here, now, it’s a whole new republic.”

  Chapter 16

  Anna Mathis was supposed to be at soccer practice.

  It was Thursday, and Thursday was her day to bring orange slices to Ryan’s team at the middle school. They were only eight, but they had to play at the middle school field because of scheduling. Anna didn’t do the scheduling; she did the orange slices. Every Thursday.

  She glanced at the watch on her wrist. Unlike her phone, the watch still worked. The time was 3:30 p.m. She felt a pang of panic—She still didn’t have any oranges, and practice was about to start. And she was still almost a mile from the school.

  The Safeways all seemed to be closed, so she was hurrying to the Save-A-Lot that she’d been boycotting ever since the bag boy had made eyes at her last summer. She supposed she could put up with it if it meant she could get her bag of oranges. She wouldn’t have time to slice them; she hoped that would be okay. Sure it would. She could peel them and pull them into segments. That would be okay. That would be fine.

  She noticed the cigarette in her hand as it pulled away from her mouth, and suddenly remembered that she had started smoking again. She shook her head; nine years down the tubes. She’d quit the day she learned she was pregnant with Ryan and hadn’t had a puff since, until—until when? When had she started again?

  She pushed the thought away as she scurried up the street. Didn’t matter when. She was smoking again; that was that.

  Up ahead, she saw the bright red and blue letters of the Save-A-Lot sign. The front door underneath was open: she would get her oranges. Her relief felt as good as a glass of cool water in the afternoon heat.

  She pitched her cigarette onto the ground as she approached the door. It vaguely occurred to her that the parking lot was empty. All that meant was more oranges for her.

  Inside, Anna saw that the lights were out. There had been rolling brownouts forever, it seemed, so it wasn’t a surprise. She walked through the door, ignoring the fact that there was no one manning the tills next to the entrance. No bag boys to ogle her today.

  She steadfastly ignored the smell.

  Produce was off to the right, so she made her way past the aisles of processed foods: snacks and potato chips and bulk peanuts. She didn’t let Ryan touch any of that stuff. Fresh fruits and vegetables were what growing boys needed. Everyone knew that.

  Ignoring the smell got harder as she got closer to the produce section; it got worse with each step, and
with each step she felt panic rise a little higher in her chest. Why did the smell affect her like this? She needed to go to the doctor.

  No doctor! her mind screamed at her. No doctor, never again!

  Anna realized she was hugging herself as she caught sight of the fruit section. This wasn’t right—the bins were empty. The ones that weren’t had a few mouldering pieces slowly liquefying inside them. She saw shapes that had once been round and orange but were now powdery blue and looked like deflated balls.

  “Oranges,” she heard herself whisper.

  “There’s no oranges here, lady.”

  The sound from behind her almost made her jump out of her skin. She spun around to see an elderly man in a mechanic’s coveralls. He was carrying a fabric tote filled with cans.

  “The fruit’s all rotten,” the man said. “Can’tcha see that?”

  “My son’s practice,” she sad hoarsely. “I need—I need orange slices…”

  He frowned at her. “There’s no practices anymore, lady. There’s no anything anymore.”

  As he said the words, Anna finally tuned into the sounds that she had been ignoring since she came in on her quest for oranges. White noise in her ears. People mumbling. Mumble, mumble, mumble.

  “I guess,” she said. “I guess they’ll just have to go without. For today. They’ll be thirsty, though.”

  As she said it, she realized she herself was monstrously thirsty.

  The old man was shaking his head now. “I don’t know what you’re on, lady, but if I was you, I’d grab what I could carry and get the hell outta here. That’s what everybody here is doing.”

  Everybody? Now that she was listening to the voices, she was also registering movement. People pushing shopping carts filled with cans of food, bottles of water and soda. A lot of them looked like they hadn’t showered in days.

  When was the last time I showered?

  Just as the thought struck her, she caught the face of someone in the chrome strapping around the upright produce stand next to her. Who was she looking at? Those sunken eyes, the sallow cheeks. That woman needed a meal, fast. She was wasting away.