“I think we should go another mile up to be safe, then exit,” Mrs. Rodriquez sang. “What say you, Princess A?”
Oscar grinned showing teeth he’d yet to grow into. “That’s you.”
“I know.” Audra winked at him and scanned the horizon. Unlike from some people, the title was practically an endearment when the older lady said it. Besides, the smoke did seem thinner.
“Exit?” Faye flapped her scrawny arms. “Why exit? We have all the fuel we need in the last bus. We can stop right here on the freeway. No need to get off.”
Audra ignored her. Advice was so easy to give when no one asked for it. Especially when everyone already knew it.
“What should I tell her?”
She slapped on the turn signal and made her way to the right hand lane. “Tell her we’re going to fill up.”
The buses followed her lead and swerved.
She shifted in her seat. Maybe she could empty her bladder and stretch a bit. Hopefully it wouldn’t take too long to refill from the barrels on her mother’s bus—the one carrying the last of their food and many of their belongings.
Plus a few corpses.
The corpses. She sucked on her bottom lip. What should she do with them? Leaving them on the side of the road seemed so callous, especially when rats prowled for a meal. But carrying them further was out of the question—they could be contagious. The scent of fecal matter drifted by. Her gut threatened to exit her mouth. And there was the matter of the slops pot. The five-gallon bucket they used as a potty needed to be emptied.
“Miz R, we’re pulling over,” Oscar shouted into the walkie.
The rest of her passengers scuttled to their seats. Three of them raised their hands.
She shook her head. Once a teacher… “Yes, Haley?”
An eight-year-old in a red jumper stood up, crossed legs and wedged a hand against her private parts. “Can we get out, Miss Silvestre? I have to pee.”
“Yes.” Ignoring the shoulder, she guided the bus up the ramp. They needed facilities, hopefully the kind with running water. “Grab your buddy and stay close to the parent assigned to watch you.” If they are still alive. “I don’t want anyone getting lost, you hear?”
Groans interspersed the ‘yes, Missus S’.
“Pit stop sounds delightful, Princess A,” Mrs. Rodriquez twittered through the walkie. “Mr. Know-It-All says we could try for the Burgers in a Basket. He says they were opened for a few days and will have laid in a supply of cooking oil we can use to conserve our biodiesel supply.”
Cooking oil for biodiesel? That didn’t sound right. Audra braked at the top of the ramp. But then what did she know? She taught English not science. “Okay, I’ll keep an eye out.”
Cars jammed the intersection. Flies swarmed some—a sign that their occupants slowly rotted inside. The stench of death clung to the pervading smoke drifts. She glanced right then left. Two gas stations stood across the freeway. Would one of them have batteries to power their radio? Surely, there had to be news somewhere.
“I see one, Missus S.” Isaac jumped on the floor. “I see one.”
She followed the direction of his pointing. On the south side, along with a string of stores, sat a gas station and a Burgers in the Basket. Wood boarded up the windows of the gas station and only the eight remained of the eighteen-ninety-five price tag for a gallon of regular gas on the milky sign. Gang tags stained the stucco walls in bloody hues. At the restaurant, faded posters proclaimed the arrival of toys for the new movie Hatshepsut.
Grand reopening signs hung from the eaves of the grocery store and fluttered in the breeze. Empty carts scattered across the rutted parking lot. Here and there, tall weeds sprouted above closely cropped greenery. A narrow strip of asphalt had been cleared through the metal bottleneck, funneling them to the restaurant. The skin on her neck prickled. Please don’t let this be a trap. Please. Please.
Cranking the wheel hard, she eased onto the gas pedal. The front fender scraped black paint off the side of a BMW. Metal screeched as she pushed the car back against the median. Maybe she hadn’t quite gotten the hang of driving a bus. Hopefully, no one was around to hear.
As soon as the bus straightened out, she pulled the steering wheel in the other direction. An ache spread from her clenched jaw and tightened her scalp. Who was the idiot that designed such a tight turn? She jerked backward when the bus jumped the curb. Her hand shot out and her fingers curled into Oscar’s jacket, keeping him on his feet.
“Whoa!” His dirty nails dug into her arm.
“Why don’t you put the walkie back and sit down?” She rolled through the empty gas station bays.
With a shrug, he tucked it back into the jeans pocket on the dash then smoothed the fabric flat and fiddled with the tape. By the time he’d finished, the bus had coasted into the fast food joint’s parking lot.
Kids. She shook her head and shifted the bus into park. A check in the rearview mirror showed that Mr. Johnson hadn’t stirred in his seat.
Faye grabbed Oscar by the scruff of his neck and shoved him toward his seat, catching Audra’s eye. “He passed around four this morning.”
Fear banded her lungs. He’d been recovering yesterday. Well, the day before yesterday. Still, she couldn’t remember the Redaction killing so fast or folks seeming to recover then getting worse. She shook off the thoughts. She’d think about it later, when they were safe with the soldiers. “Do you want to check for strangers?”
Shaking her head, Faye glanced outside. “I’ll watch over the children.”
Great. Audra ran her fingers through the keys in the ignition. She had to go outside. With shaking fingers, she undid her seatbelt. The metal buckle clunked against the floor but she barely heard it over the pounding in her ears. Slowly, she turned in the seat. Her legs tingled from the change in position. “Get me the flashlight.”
“Why? It’s not dark outside.”
Really? Was the woman so dense or was she desperate to get behind the wheel? God, what if she took off, leaving Audra behind? She flexed her fingers. Faye wouldn’t take off without the supplies or fuel. “For protection from unfriendly strangers.”
Children lined up behind Faye—each doing a unique potty dance.
Faye spun around but didn’t make an effort to move. “Can someone pass the flashlight forward?”
Like a green baton, they passed it overhead until it reached the front of the bus.
Faye was smirking when she turned again. “Here you go.”
Audra’s palm closed around the warm metal. “Thanks. If it’s safe, I’ll radio for the children and you can empty the slops pot.”
Faye gasped.
If Audra had to risk her life, she shouldn’t have to lug the poop as well. Squaring her shoulders, she tugged on the metal handle and the doors folded back. Warm air rushed in. Under the ever present smoke, she detected the faint odor of calamari thrown on a hot charcoal grill. Her stomach clenched.
Somewhere close by, people had burned.
Please don’t let them have been alive at the time. She finished the prayer as her boots scraped asphalt. The last buses in the caravan pulled up until they bracketed the fast food restaurant. A man in a gas mask and camouflage exited the bus behind her. Eddie swung his shotgun left then right then rushed her.
Exiting bus seven-niner, a man in a dirty business suit waved his pistol in the air then jogged to the area behind the bus. Principal Dunn sure did like acting like a desperado, then again, after twenty-nine years, maybe he hoped he could shoot some of the more difficult parents as payback. She hoped it didn’t get him killed. A moment later, a trim woman in torn jeans and an oversized AC/DC teeshirt jumped off the bus. Tina, her former teaching assistant, gave her a thumbs-up, swung her Louisville slugger for a moment before setting it on her shoulder.
Eddie puffed like Darth Vader as he slid to a stop next to her. A snakehead tattoo throbbed over his carotid artery. “We got twenty-two dead, Princess.”
She winced. Only he mad
e princess sound like an insult. But she was above such things. She was a Silvestre.
“Seventeen for us.” Audra set her hand against her bandanna as the wind tried to sneak under the fabric. Her ears pricked and her heart tripped over a beat. Did she hear voices?
Tina sprinted from Principal Dunn’s side to join them. A sheriff’s deputy in faded khakis replaced her and tamed the pistol waving.
“We have ten dead on our bus. Principal Dunn thinks we can put them in the gas station.” She jerked her chin at the boarded up building. Her blue surgical mask slipped and her almond-shaped brown eyes widened as she shoved it back in place.
A hot wind bent the weeds and shook the busses. In the distance, something exploded.
Audra flinched and faced the noise. Black smoke belched from a neighborhood across a vacant lot. Evil red fireflies danced in the cloud. The sparks landed on the shingle roofs.
Frown lines appeared on Tina’s forehead. “I wonder what caused the explosion.”
“People.” Eddie wheezed. “If we stay here too long, they’ll find us. We need to complete our business before they attack.”
Chapter Two
“Why?” The man on his right wailed.
Trent Powers’ fingers tightened, crinkling the pages of the Bible. Five minutes. Couldn’t he have just five fucking minutes without some sniveling, sick bastard demanding his time? This was that damn Marine’s fault for mistaking him for a man of God just because he carried a Bible.
And what had it gotten him?
A ride with the unwashed masses of the world, dismissed by the powers that be, relegated to human cargo in a military convoy.
He should have corrected the ugly Lieutenant Sally Rogers when he first arrived at the camp. Should have but didn’t. That Marine had fucked up his plans by recognizing him, withholding food unless he kept up the pretense. Slutty Sally had encouraged it, seducing him with the promise of power. And now he was stuck.
Without power.
Surrounded by whiners who hadn’t the decency to die.
How could they not see he deserved better than this. Relaxing his hand, he dragged it down the page and watched the words exposed by his index finger. Would the idiot believe he was reading? Would he leave Trent in peace?
It had worked once.
He swayed with the motion of the truck, bumping shoulders with his neighbors, driving a sharp elbow into soft flesh. The storm compressed the air, adding humidity to the body odor, sickness and the noxious gases expelled by the corpses stuffing the back of the truck. Canvas slapped his shoulders and neck in time with the wind and the hard wooden bench drove splinters into his ass.
He needed out of here, needed to be restored to his rightful place. But how? The inner circle seemed comprised of only two people—a United States Marine Corps General and the bitch who stood for the Surgeon General. Both of them had consigned him back here with the losers of the world. The words on the thin paper blurred. Not that it mattered—the Book was boring and contained horrible English. He’d stopped attempting to read it hours after he’d acquired it.
If it wasn’t for the money tucked in the pages, he’d have let it burn. He ran his index finger down the paper. A ridge of hardness bumped against the pad. Was it another fifty dollar bill? Or… His palms itched. Or maybe another hundred? He’d already found three of them. He followed the soft edge to the middle of the page. Five would be nice. Ten hundreds would be better. He licked his lips. Maybe he could pretend to pray over the dead and take a quick peak.
He could use a little alone time.
“Reverend?” The man on his right barked and tugged on Trent’s sleeve.
His finger left the corner of the hidden money. Shit! The assholes wouldn’t leave him be. Flattening his palm against the open pages, he glanced into the narrow aisle running the length of the truck bed.
Hanging from the metal ribs, flashlights swung in an epileptic rhythm to the lumbering personnel carrier. Rain tapped tentatively on the canvas, raising liver spots on the drab green and brown covering. Near the open back of the truck, a trio of men and two women wearing dark stained scrubs and crooked surgical masks hovered over a man. Blue stained his lips and his lungs rattled with each wheeze and gasp. One woman picked up his wrist, settled her finger against the pale skin inside his cuff.
Why did they bother? Nothing they did helped. He was a dead man; he was just too selfish to die.
Others, equally sick, leaned against each other haphazardly and clung precariously to the benches. Near the cab, a handful of dead lay in fetal positions, stealing valuable space from the living.
The corpses should have been thrown out the back. They could be contagious. They could get him sick. Trent pressed against the truck wall and adjusted his face mask. Maybe that’s why the powers that be had sent him here. He snapped the book closed, the small breeze stirred his hair and he smoothed it flat. If that was their plan, they would have to come up with a better one.
He refused to die.
“Hey!” The man on his right drilled his index finger into Trent’s bicep. “I’m talking to you.”
He sighed. Whining was not talking.
The medical team glanced in his direction. One man took a step toward him.
He raised a hand. Great, that’s all he needed—another sick, mewling bastard wanting to hear God’s word, wanting him to sit next to him and hold his hand until the asshole passed on. He had better things to do with his time. He needed to find a way into the inner circle.
The male medic gave him a slight nod then turned back to his team.
Since they were going to leave him alone, Trent could work on the more immediate problem. He turned to his bench mate.
Fleshy bags hung under the man’s bloodshot eyes. Skin dripped from his narrow cheekbones as if the fat had melted rapidly from under it. His long nose pointed to his thin lips and yellow, crooked teeth.
“Did you need something?” He’d be damned if he said ‘my son’ or other such bullshit. It should be enough that he stooped to talking to the scum of humanity. Soon, he’d be sitting all comfy in the air conditioned Humvee, stretching his legs out as much as he wanted. He just needed a moment to plan his rise.
His neighbor scratched the black stubble on his receding chin. Red rimmed his tan eyes and tears blotted the ash-coated mask on his face. “Why, Father?”
Father? What the hell! He looked young for thirty-six. Far better than this middle-aged asshole. His mouth opened just as his brain made the connection. Damn, he must be tired to not have caught on quicker. “I’m not Catholic.”
Therefore not a priest or father. Unless that bitch Sally had assigned him a denomination. He pinched the hasps on his mask until the metal dug into the bridge of his nose.
The loser nodded and his jowls swung to and fro. “Why, Father? Why is God doing this?”
Trent squeezed his eyes closed a minute. Telling the loser that he deserved it was out of the question. That slut Sally had taken him to task when he’d mentioned it yesterday. Not even fucking her twice had dispelled his anger. He smoothed his hair, skimmed the shell of ash. If the preacher he’d stolen the sermon from wasn’t already dead, he would kill him.
Some man of the cloth, he turned out to be. He’d made Trent believe that people wanted to hear they deserved this living Hell, that they had to atone for their sins, that only he, the gatekeeper to God, could provide salvation.
He’d been tricked.
The man on his left hacked into the crook of his arm before collapsing against the side wall. “It’s Judgement Day. That’s why. We’re dying because we’ve sinned.”
Trent’s ears perked up and warmth flooded his limbs. The lying preacher that had run the homeless shelter had spoken of Judgement Day. Twisting at the waist, he inspected the man on his left. Perhaps, he had not selected his audience correctly.
“Tell me I’m wrong, Reverend.” A black teeshirt strained against the beer gut hanging over his belt like an old woman’s tit. Sour sweat
leaked from his overlarge pores and invaded Trent’s space cushion. “Dirk Benedict.”
The only difference between Dirk Benedict and the bums he’d had the misfortune to meet was that this man seemed to be better fed. But that didn’t rule out his usefulness. Trent hugged the Bible close. Maybe some good would come out of this after all. Brute force often came in handy and fools with low brows tended to have rudimentary intelligence—perfect for manipulation. “Why would I do that, Dirk?”
The loser on his right stiffened. One claw-like hand wrapped around Trent’s bicep and jerked him around. “Are you saying my wife deserved to die?”
Trent turned on his seat and faced the aisle. All five members of the medical team faced him. Damn the asshole! Concern etched lines in four faces, but the fifth sharpened with interest. The hair on the back of his neck stood on end as the woman leaned closer.
He sifted through his memories. Shit! She’d been watching him. No doubt, the bitch in charge had ordered it. He sat up a little straighter. So Mavis Spanner had noticed his worth. Had he blown it when he’d tried the preacher’s message on the medics. They certainly hadn’t been receptive. Not that he’d expected any different. The fools treated women as equals, took orders from a woman.
He’d have to be careful. Clearing his throat, he dismissed the medics. If Mavis Spanner had recognized his worth, she might see him as a threat. He couldn’t have that. Not yet anyway. Not until he had an action plan.
“No, he’s not saying that your wife deserved it.” Half-moon shapes burned into his skin from the grip but he didn’t pull away. He couldn’t have the spy moving closer, not when he’d just found a patsy in Dirk. Leaning the Bible against his belly, he raised his hands up like he’d seen the preacher do. “I’m saying we’ve lost our way and this is the Almighty’s method of getting our attention.”
“My wife didn’t deserve to die,” the loser blubbered.
Of course, she did! He’d sat next to her and listened to her whine and sob until she had the decency to die. Feeling the spy’s eyes, Trent patted the man’s hand. “No one is saying that.”
Redaction: The Meltdown Part II Page 2