by Tom Abrahams
At an intersection two blocks up, a man on fire ran into the street. He collapsed to his knees, howling, and rolled on the ground in a vain attempt to put out the skin-searing flames. A trio following him put him out of his misery with a barrage of gunfire.
Ana didn’t know who was who. Was the Cartel winning? Were the Dwellers taking control of the city?
It didn’t matter. Both were her enemies.
One of the men in the intersection pointed at Ana, and the other two looked her way. She couldn’t see their faces from such a distance. Even the dim lights that gave the street a yellow glow from their perch atop curbside poles didn’t reveal who they were.
Ana stopped the horse and tried to get it to turn around. The men were shouting. Two of them were running toward her.
Ana tugged on the reins. She jerked the horse’s head to the left. It resisted. Penny lifted her head and yanked the diaper from her face. She sucked in a deep breath and started crying.
The men were getting closer. The horse stepped back and snorted, shaking its head. Ana tried yanking the reins to the right. She slammed her heels inward. Nothing.
Penny’s cry grew louder as if she’d spun a dial and turned up the volume. Ana reared back and tugged again.
One of the men shouted, “Who are you? Hey! Stop!”
They kept coming. They were less than a block from her.
“She has a baby!” one of them yelled.
“Don’t shoot her,” another said. It was too late.
One of the other two fired a pair of shots. Neither of them hit Ana, Penny, or the horse, but it spooked all three of them.
The horse reared back onto its hind legs. Ana grabbed at the saddle’s horn as she slid backward. Penny’s weight drew Ana to one side and they barely stayed aboard the animal.
It returned to all four hooves and began a gallop straight toward the three men. They gave the horse a wide berth.
She raced past them without any of the three firing another shot while Ana struggled to stay squarely in the saddle. Penny’s cries reverberated with the bounce as they put more space between themselves and the trio, riding deeper into the chaos.
The horse slowed to turn left, picking up speed as it raced out of the turn. Ana clung to the horse, fighting the inertia as the animal sprinted along the street. They galloped past the grotesque vignettes playing out on corners and spilling out of doorways onto the streets, the violence an indiscriminate blur.
Ana tugged on the reins to slow the horse, to try to gain some sort of control over its speed and direction. It kept chugging forward, huffing through flared nostrils, until it grew tired and slowed to a walk without any coaxing from Ana.
Penny was still crying, her wails interrupted by deep, ragged breaths. Ana pulled her closer to her chest, her hand wrapped around the backpack, and whispered into her daughter’s ear.
“It’s okay, baby,” she cooed. “Shhhh. Shhhhh. It’s okay. We’re okay.”
Penny flung her hand at Ana’s face and a finger caught her mother in the eye. Ana reflexively pulled back and pressed her hand to the sting.
Blinking away the welling tears, Ana noticed a white building with a bright red awning to her right. Above the awning was a building-length panel that bore the name of the shop: DUCATI AMS DALLAS.
It was a motorcycle retailer. Ana rubbed her eye and smiled. She looked over both shoulders. She seemed to have distanced herself from the battle being waged downtown.
She guided the horse to a wooden utility pole at the right edge of the darkened showroom and carefully hopped off the horse, tying its reins to the pole. Ana took a canteen and a bowl from one side of the saddlebag. She poured water into the bowl and put it on the ground in front of the horse.
She took a swig of the water herself before stuffing it back into the saddlebag. Ana had the .357 tucked in her waistband. The assault rifle was strapped inside a makeshift scabbard underneath the saddle. She looked at it and considered bringing it, but didn’t. She had six shots with the .357. It was either enough or it wasn’t.
Penny was whimpering, though her cries had subsided. Ana cranked the flashlight and aimed it at the glass windows that covered most of the one-story façade. The tint on the window reflected the LED beam. She couldn’t see anything inside the windows. She’d have to find a way in and hope there was a faster, less irritable form of transportation awaiting her.
CHAPTER 29
OCTOBER 26, 2037, 4:35 AM
SCOURGE +5 YEARS
FM 1541, 12 MILES WEST OF PALO DURO CANYON, TEXAS
The rifle shots struck the front window of the Humvee. Two of them found Porky’s chest. He looked at Roof, his eyes large and drawn together with confusion, his mouth agape. His hands dropped from the wheel and his right foot dropped heavier onto the gas pedal as he slumped in his seat.
Roof ducked at the sound of glass shattering and grabbed his SCAR 17 from the floorboard. He was stuck between the hard dash and his seat as the Humvee lurched and accelerated forward.
The gunfire shifted from twelve o’clock to the vehicle’s nine o’clock until Roof was slammed violently against the dash. He looked up in time to see Porky’s body flip awkwardly and launch through the windshield. The grunt’s feet caught on the steering wheel and kept his body attached to the vehicle.
Roof looked behind him, trying to unwedge himself from the floor, and saw Skinner standing in the bed, returning fire. Dalton had his back to Skinner’s and was unloading his weapon in the opposite direction.
Roof struggled free and, staying low, pushed on the passenger’s side door, but it met with resistance. It wouldn’t fully open. Still, Roof squeezed himself through the narrow gap between the door and the Humvee’s frame and pulled his SCAR 17 behind him.
The Humvee was smashed against a cluster of tall red cedar trees between the farm-to-market road and two lanes of asphalt that ran parallel to the highway before taking a sharp dogleg to the right toward the canyon. One of the low-hanging branches was lodged between the door and another tree. Roof snaked himself across the branch, scratching his face.
The rapid fire of the attackers was deafening. They were close and they were heavily armed. There was no space along the passenger side of the vehicle.
Roof ducked his head, losing his hat, and crawled toward the back of the Humvee before scooting underneath the bed, dragging the rifle with him in the mud. He positioned himself between the driver’s side tires, held the rifle tight at his chest, and rolled out into the fray.
On his stomach and perpendicular to the Humvee, he propped himself onto his elbows and searched for a source of incoming fire. Straight ahead of him he caught a muzzle flash ten feet off the ground. It was coming from atop a building or shed. Roof leveled the rifle, angling it upward, and fired. A single pulse of the .308 projectiles ended the threat.
A collection of flashes lit what Roof could now tell was a group of buildings on the other side of the farm-to-market road. He guessed there were five more targets, but he couldn’t place their exact locations. The light from one obscured the burst from another. He couldn’t afford to waste what was left of the twenty rounds he had left in the rifle. A volley of shots missed him a few feet to his left.
Roof glanced over his left shoulder. Skinner and Dalton were holding their positions in the Humvee’s bed, both of them using its sidewall as the front edge of a bunker. They’d dropped from their exposed standing position and had taken cover.
From the corner of his eye, he spotted the location of a single flash. It was roughly ground level. Roof couldn’t tell if the target was fully or partially exposed.
He waited for another flash from the same spot, his finger resting on the SCAR 17’s two-stage trigger. He applied enough pressure to take up the slack and narrowed his focus.
The target’s muzzle lit perfectly within the frame of Roof’s sights. He finished the pull and the .308 exploded from the rifle at faster than twenty-six hundred feet per second. Roof unleashed a second round and waited.
He couldn’t see if he’d hit the target, but in the next thirty seconds he didn’t see another flash. The dissonance of the gun battle was lessening in volume. Clearly they were killing the Dwellers one at a time.
Another torrent of bullets came close to Roof but missed. He checked over his shoulder again. Dalton was hunkered down in the Humvee’s bed. He looked like Kilroy with the top of his head and his eyes poking over the edge of the side rail.
Skinner wasn’t there. Roof scanned his surroundings and checked over his other shoulder but didn’t see him.
Then, as he tried to refocus on the remaining threat, he saw a figure running toward the buildings from his left.
Roof scrambled to his feet, gripped the rifle in a two-handed “ready” position, and bolted toward Skinner. The bursts of gunfire zipped past Roof as he ran circuitously, trying to make targeting him more difficult.
Skinner stopped his advance behind a shed at the edge of the highway. He positioned his back against the rotting corrugated metal frame and waved Roof toward him.
Roof put his head down and came as close to a sprint as he could muster with his bad leg and motored his way to the shed. He parked himself on Skinner’s right.
He looked back to the Humvee and saw intermittent sparks of light from Dalton’s position. The kid wasn’t giving up. He was probably wasting a lot of precious ammunition, but he had the right spirit.
Roof nudged Skinner. “There are maybe three left,” he said. “Hard to tell.”
Skinner crouched low and peeked around the corner toward the larger buildings. Without looking back at Roof, he held up two fingers. He then pointed up with his index finger before pointing down.
Roof understood there were two Dwellers left. One was up high, atop a building maybe. The other was on the ground.
He squatted next to Skinner. “I’ll take the one up high. You get the one on the ground.”
Skinner turned around. The tip of his tongue protruded from between his lips. He nodded and stood up. Roof was about to make a suggestion when the captain darted from the safety of the shed and disappeared from the general’s view.
Roof edged closer to the corner and peered around it. He scanned the various elevations of the rooftops and saw nothing. He lowered his chin and swept the property at eye level. A series of flashes and a quick spate of gunfire caught his attention. Skinner had engaged his man.
The general lifted his eyes at the sight of some shadowed movement at the near end of the closest building. He narrowed his eyes, squinting into the gray night, and saw his man.
The Dweller was repositioning himself to take aim at Dalton. Roof lowered himself onto one knee, pulled the rifle tight to his shoulder, and took aim.
Three quick shots later and the Dweller was tumbling off the pitched roof, bouncing awkwardly. He hit the ground with a muddy splat.
Roof kept the rifle at his shoulder and moved forward cautiously, sweeping left and right, surveying the buildings for surviving threats. He stepped toward the spot where he’d seen the gunfight erupt between Skinner and the ground-level Dweller.
When he got closer, he saw two men on the ground in close proximity to one another. Neither was moving.
Roof spun at the sound of mud-sucked footsteps. “Sir.” Grat Dalton was jogging toward him. “We’ve got help. A group of men on horseback is only a few hundred yards back.”
The general looked past Dalton and saw a lone boss on horseback perched behind the Humvee. “Good,” he said. “Go see if they have extra rides for us.”
“Three?” asked Dalton. “I think Porky’s dead.”
Roof glanced over at the bodies and stepped toward them. “I don’t know yet,” Roof said. “Go ahead and ask for three, though.”
Dalton glanced at the bodies, licked his lips, nodded, and jogged back to the boss.
Roof stood over the first body. It belonged to a Dweller. Death had frozen his eyes open. His corpse was bloodied and bullet-riddled. Roof kicked the Dweller’s legs out of habit, receiving no response.
He took a dozen steps to the other body. It was Skinner. He was on his stomach. His head was turned to the side, blood leaking from his mouth.
Roof knelt down and placed his hand on Skinner’s back. He felt the faint rise and fall of his lungs. Skinner was alive.
Roof laid down his rifle and rolled Skinner onto his back, revealing the twin wounds in his gut. Skinner’s eyes were open. His hot, fetid breath came in heavy waves from his open, bleeding mouth.
“You killed him,” said Roof. “You got the Dweller. You hit him four or five times. That’s more than he got you.” Roof tried smiling.
Skinner blinked. He reached for the bleeding holes at his midsection and found them, pulling his hand back to his face. He looked at his bloodied fingers, and then his eyes locked onto Roof’s.
“It ain’t good,” Roof said.
Skinner turned his head to the side and spat. A spray of blood flew from his mouth. He closed his eyes and coughed. His eyes squeezed tight from what Roof imagined was ridiculous pain.
“He gonna die?” Dalton was back. There was a boss and a couple of grunts standing behind him. He motioned at Skinner lying flat on his back in the mud. “The captain? He gonna die?”
Still squatting beside the dying man, Roof looked at Dalton and nodded. He shifted his weight and placed his hand on Skinner’s chest. “What can I do? I owe you for your loyalty.”
Tears welled in Cyrus Skinner’s eyes, spilling down his muddy cheeks. He looked up toward the sky and back at Roof. He dug his fingers into the mud and then waved for Dalton Grat to come closer before his hand plopped back to the ground.
Dalton slowly approached. He stood beside Skinner until the captain motioned for him to come closer. Dalton obliged and knelt down in the mud.
Skinner raised his left hand and, using his index finger, drew a letter on Dalton’s stained white shirt. He dipped his finger in the mud and painted another letter. And another. And another.
When he was finished, Skinner pointed at the shirt. Dalton stood and tugged at the bottom of the shirt, stretching it to make the mud letters more legible.
KILL ME
Roof read the instructions and then grabbed Skinner by the jaw. He turned his face toward him so as to look him in the eyes. “You want me to kill you?”
Skinner coughed again and nodded. His complexion was gray. His breathing was irregular and shallow. He sounded as if he was panting.
Roof licked the front of his teeth and nodded. He looked over at Dalton and the others. “You all can go back to the rest of them. You have two horses?”
Dalton nodded. “Yeah.”
“Then go,” said Roof. “I’ll be there in a minute.”
The men retreated back to the posse. Roof could make out the rough shapes of the gathered men and horses waiting for him at the Humvee. He took a deep breath and exhaled.
Roof started to reach for his SCAR 17, then tried counting in his head how many 308s he’d used, but couldn’t arrive at an answer, so he scooted to Skinner’s side and lowered his head closer to the captain.
“This will only take a minute,” he said. He placed both hands over Skinner’s face, covered the captain’s nose and mouth, and pressed down. Skinner’s eyes bulged wide with surprise and fear.
“Shhhhh,” said Roof. “Shhhh. Don’t fight it.”
Skinner struggled against the pressure, grasping at Roof’s wrists. Roof responded by leaning on Skinner’s chest with his elbows. He pushed his weight into the dying man, expelling his stored air and his will.
Cyrus Skinner’s grip weakened until his hands slipped to the ground. His kicking feet slowed, twitched, and then stopped. The look of fear melted into one of resignation and acceptance. Like that, one of the most feared men in the western Cartel territory was dead.
Roof ran his fingers across Skinner’s open eyes, sliding the lids shut. “I always figured it’d be the cigarettes that killed you,” he said and used Skinner’s body to pu
sh himself to his feet.
He turned back to the men gathered at the Humvee. “Men,” he called with his hands cupped around his mouth, “come get the weapons from these Dwellers.”
A group of grunts led by Dalton marched forward. While the others spread out in search of long guns, Grat Dalton stopped at Skinner’s body. “I didn’t hear a gunshot,” he said. “How’d you do it?”
Roof wiped his hands on his thighs and reached over to grab his rifle. “I didn’t want to waste the ammunition,” he said. “We need every bullet we’ve got.” He shot Dalton a look and stared at the grunt expressionlessly for a moment before walking past him toward the Humvee. “Sometimes you need to be careful what you wish for.”
CHAPTER 30
OCTOBER 26, 2037, 5:01 AM
SCOURGE +5 YEARS
PALO DURO CANYON, TEXAS
“It’s time to go,” Battle was saying before he stuck his head into Lola’s tent. “Paagal wants us at the narrow entry point.”
Lola was sitting cross-legged on the ground, eating a slice of cucumber. Sawyer was trying to squeeze his feet into his shoes.
Battle pointed at the boy but looked at Lola. “Where’s he going?”
“With us.”
Battle shook his head and stepped fully inside the tent. “Yeah,” he said. “I don’t think that’s—”
“He’s going,” said Lola.
“We’re going to be at the entry to the canyon,” Battle said. “He’s a kid. It’s going to be way too dangerous.”
Sawyer stood and wiggled his foot into the shoe. “I can handle it,” he said.
“He can handle it,” said Lola, pushing herself to her feet. “He’s grown up surrounded by danger. Besides, I’m not leaving him here.”
Battle shrugged. “I was just—”
“You were trying to tell me what to do with my son,” she said. “I’m not letting him leave my side. I lost him once. That’s not happening again.”