by Kirby Howell
She reared, and I felt myself sliding off her back. I grabbed the saddle horn and hung on, feeling a seam in the skirt of my dress pop. Snicket came down again, and the shock of her front hooves hitting the dusty earth rattled my teeth.
I stroked Snicket’s neck with a shaking hand and kept the reins pulled back tight. I heard whooping laughter and saw a few people at the lake’s edge. They must be setting up the fireworks and couldn’t resist testing one. I kicked Snicket into a gallop again.
I reached the Rec Hall a few moments later and jumped off Snicket before she could skid to a full stop. I stumbled to my knees, shocking the people still leisurely enjoying the party. They tried to help me up, but I brushed past them and ran inside. Shad saw me first, and his carefree face dissolved into concern as he took in my windblown hair and scuffed knees.
“Autumn, are you okay?” he asked, catching Ben’s attention and waving him over.
“Something’s happened in Vegas!” I blurted out. I filled them in quickly on the little information I had. “I couldn’t lift him on Snicket to bring him back here, so I left him there on the bridge. Someone should go back for him, and we need to get to Vegas fast!”
Ben reacted first and made a beeline for the sound system. I watched him fumble with a few buttons, and all of sudden, the music stopped. Everyone stared at him.
“Quiet down. Quiet!” I heard him yell. “We have a situation. Where’s the mayor?”
A murmur shot through the crowd, and Mayor Westland appeared in the doorway from the veranda. “What’s this?” he asked. “What’s going on, Mr. Harmond?”
Ben jumped down from the stage and rushed through the crowd to him.
“What were you doing down at the bypass bridge?” Shad whispered to me.
I ignored the question as Mayor Westland called, “Where are our medical people? I need someone at the bypass bridge, immediately.” The crowd began to buzz around us.
“We’ll go!” shouted Kathy, a middle-aged nurse I recognized from my time healing at the medical clinic when I first arrived. She was standing next to another med center staff member, JR. JR had been a dental hygienist's assistant before The Plague, but the Hoover medical staff wasn’t picky about what kind of training he’d received.
“It’s a young boy,” the mayor said. “Sounds like he rode here from Las Vegas on a motorcycle and needs treatment for exhaustion.”
Kathy and JR left the Rec Hall immediately, heads together in discussion. I looked around for Grey, surprised he wasn’t the first to offer his assistance, but he was nowhere to be seen. I looked around the room again. Lydia was absent as well.
The volume in the room rose, people’s voices on the edge of panic.
“Quiet!” called Mayor Westland. “We believe this boy is a messenger from Vegas. He said there was a sandstorm and an accident.”
Murmurs rippled through the crowd, and it took several moments for him to get everyone’s attention again. “I know some of you are worried about the children on the field trip, but please don’t panic. We don’t know if they’re even involved. A group will fly to Vegas tonight, to offer help. Randy!” the mayor yelled. “Do we have a plane ready?”
All eyes turned to Randy Blanchard, who leaned leisurely against the back wall of the Rec Hall and looked like he’d fit in better at a Jimmy Buffett concert.
“Daniel took the Cessna to Vegas. Gotta finish overhauling the Beachcraft before she’s good to go,” Randy said, his voice vacant and unhurried.
“How long will that take?” the mayor asked.
Randy scrunched up his face, thinking. “Few days? I don’t know.”
“Thank you, as ever, for your unparalleled service, Mr. Blanchard.”
Randy shrugged and turned to leave, mumbling about going to get started.
“All right. That means horses. I’ll need volunteers,” boomed the mayor’s voice.
“I’ll go!” I called. The mayor nodded and counted the few other hands going up around me. Shad and Ben both volunteered as well. I looked for Grey again but didn’t see him. I wondered if he was with Lydia and if that was why he hadn’t met me at the Winged Figures. I ignored the swell of irritation at the thought and focused on what the mayor was saying.
“Those going will meet by the medical facilities in half an hour ready to –”
A howl of wind drowned out the rest of the mayor’s sentence, and a million tiny pebbles peppered the outside of the Rec Hall. This was probably the remnants of the sandstorm that hit Las Vegas. I groaned. Riding through a storm would only slow us down.
Tess shut the doors against the blowing dust outside, but Shad tore past her. The door banged against the wall, and Tess stared after him, her brow wrinkled. Before the door could shut again, both Ben and I were following him.
“Be careful, you guys!” Tess called after us, her hand up to block the sand from her eyes. I waved back to her, then concentrated on finding Snicket in the blowing sand.
“I’ll see you at the clinic,” I called to Ben and Shad as I leaped onto Snicket. I snapped the reins against her side, making her jump into a canter, and the skirt of the dress I borrowed from Connie split the rest of the way. I rounded the Rec Hall to Main Street and into the full force of the gritty wind.
The small voice in the back of my mind urged me to find Grey so he could help. But my pride was bruised, and I silenced the voice.
Back at home, I pulled on a pair of jeans and a t-shirt. I grabbed my sneakers and a hooded sweatshirt and threw some clothes into a backpack, along with a few other necessities.
I couldn’t stop my mind from asking the questions that hurt the most. What if something had happened to Rissi... or Connie? I looked up at the light spilling into my room from the hall. I could easily see Connie standing in the doorway, her blonde hair tucked into a short ponytail, talking to me about school and her students, and complimenting the garden I built in the backyard. I imagined Rissi eating oatmeal pancakes in the kitchen. I imagined I heard her voice drifting down the hall with the warm scent of breakfast. Then I imagined living here alone.
I saw my phone lying on my bed and remembered Sarah. She was waiting for me, depending on me to come back for her. My stomach twisted. What was I supposed to do? I couldn’t forget about Sarah, but Connie and Rissi could be in immediate danger. I would be back to Hoover in a couple days, along with everyone else. I could go find Sarah then. It was the very best I could promise myself for now.
Ten minutes later, Snicket and I were huddled on the leeward side of the medical center, partially sheltered from the stinging sand while we waited for everyone else to arrive. There was a wagon near the front door with rubber tires and a tarp-covered frame high enough for an adult to stand under. Its tires would be useful, because I was sure we would be off-roading most of the way. Even here, the highways were still clogged with cars.
Suddenly, the door to the clinic banged open, and a figure dashed through the wind to the wagon, deposited a box and ran back inside. I made sure Snicket’s reins were tied and followed.
Kathy, Lydia and a few others were inside, pulling supplies from shelves and packing them into boxes. Matt, the boy from Vegas, was asleep in a hospital bed in the next room.
Mayor Westland arrived on my second trip to the wagon and hurried inside. I shoved the box into the wagon and ran back inside, but froze when I heard the mayor’s voice from behind a closed door.
“How did he get past three towers without someone seeing him? Tell me how three different manned guard towers missed seeing or hearing a motorcycle roar past them?”
“The South Tower and the Central Tower must have been in the middle of guard changes when the boy passed.” I recognized Josh Hamilton’s voice, the head of the Welcoming Committee. I slowly knelt to grasp another box so I could hear as much as I could.
“The guards were probably in the stairwells, exchanging logs,” he continued. “Charlie was out at the West Tower.”
“And is Charlie deaf?” The mayor sounded imp
atient.
There was a pause, and then Josh said, “He was asleep.”
“Asleep!” Mayor Westland exploded. “The whole point of the Hoover Guard is to protect us! How can they do that if they’re asleep out there? I want to speak –”
Josh cut him off. “You can’t, I’ve sent him home to get a full night’s sleep for the first time in a week. No one likes being all the way out at the West Tower alone, so he’s been pulling double shifts. The silence out there doesn’t bother him like it does other guards. The other towers overlook busier parts of Hoover, but the West Tower is on the edge of Boulder City.”
I didn’t blame the guards. I’d been through what was left of Boulder City once, and I understood why they didn’t want to be out there. Though the gas riots ended the previous year, the torched buildings still smoldered, slowly burning through the remaining fuel and shrouding the wrecked city in hazy smoke that muffled all noise.
A door opened behind me, and I grabbed the nearest box and stood up. It was Lydia. She had changed from the dress she wore to the dance into jeans and a crisp black shirt. I felt the usual pang of self-loathing as she swept toward me, her face flawless and expressionless and her hair perfectly smooth. Either she paused to clean up after every trip outside into the windstorm, or dirt was repelled from her by some supernatural force.
She picked up a box. “Looks like you need help,” she said, as if I wasn’t moving fast enough. “Grey was supposed to be back to do this himself, but I guess we can take care of it.”
“Where is he?”
“He was here with me until Kathy and JR brought the boy from Vegas in. Grey got him settled and packed most of these boxes, then he went home.”
So he’d been with Lydia instead of coming to meet me. Grey and Lydia had been friends longer than most humans because of the immortality their E-Vitamin granted them. Since Grey met me, he’d stopped suppressing his emotions. A small part of me wondered if someone else would fill the void now that I was gone from his life. I remembered Grey accusing Lydia of “cracking” and showing her emotions, too. I recalled a time earlier this year when I believed Grey and Lydia were a couple.
I suddenly felt uncomfortably warm, and the box in my sweaty hands grew heavy. Lydia backed into the door to open it against the wind, and I reluctantly followed.
The wagon was almost full when several horses and riders materialized out of the darkness. Ben and Shad came first, followed by JR. JR’s horse was hitched to a small two-wheeled cart that rattled with its large load of shovels, picks and plastic barrels. His usually cheerful face was grim as he climbed down from his horse and went inside.
My shoulders sagged when I saw who followed behind them. It was Sam. Her heart-shaped face peeked out from under the darkness of her sweatshirt hood, and her small fingers clutched the saddle horn nervously, exposing her inexperience on a horse.
I grabbed Ben’s arm as he dismounted from his horse. “What’s she doing here?”
“You’re talking to the wrong person,” Ben said, as he began to reorganize the contents of his backpack.
“Seriously, that’s your answer? Two months ago, she and a bunch of her Greeter friends were chasing me down outside The Water Tower and now you don’t care if she’s here, living with us like she can be trusted?”
“Samantha was granted immunity for the intel she had,” Josh said, appearing behind me.
I turned to glare at him. “Intel? Karl and The Reconstruction Front are bad news. That’s all the ‘intel’ you need to know.”
“If only it were that simple,” he said, straight faced. “I need you to trust that I do my job well, Miss Winters, and let this go. Besides, there are more pressing concerns just now, wouldn’t you agree?”
I glared at him and was forced to nod my head.
“Good. Now let’s get ready to go.” He turned, surveyed the wagon and retreated to his horse, which had a pack tied to its saddle.
“Come on,” Ben said. “It’s a thirty-mile ride to the Egyptian, and every minute may count.”
Hoofbeats sounded, and I turned toward the noise. Grey’s horse, Gideon, burst from the darkness, mammoth and menacing, his coat as shiny black as a panther’s. He skidded to a stop beside us, spraying our legs with loose dirt, and Grey dropped to the ground.
“Sorry about that,” Grey said, as Ben sighed and began dusting off his bag. “I was afraid I might have missed you guys. Can we talk for a second?” Grey asked, glancing at me.
I tried not to notice Ben watching us as we walked out of earshot of the others.
“Unless you’re offering to project me to Vegas to find Rissi and Connie, I don’t want to talk to you,” I said, before he could say anything.
Grey sighed heavily. “I know you’re mad. I’m sorry. And believe me, I considered projecting myself there immediately when I heard.”
“But you didn’t.”
“No, I wouldn’t be able to explain how I got there so fast.”
I didn’t want to appear weak, but I was burning to demand an explanation of why he stood me up. I glanced up at him. “Why didn’t you come?”
“I would never stand you up unless it was for a very good reason. You should know that. Lydia had something to tell me, and it couldn’t wait.”
“What I had to say was important, too,” I argued, trying to keep my voice level. “I found out my best friend, Sarah, is alive. She was taken by The Front, and once we find out Connie and Rissi are okay, I need you to take me to LA.”
He stared at me for several seconds and then said, “How do you know this?”
“My cell phone was inside the jewelry box you brought me this morning. After I charged it, there was a text message from her.”
I waited for some kind of reaction from him at this amazing news, but his face remained pensive. “Sarah was the one who went to UCLA Med Center to look for her mom, right?”
I nodded. “And I quit hearing from her the same day. I thought she’d gotten sick, too, but she didn’t! She’s still alive! And she’s in LA! I need you to help me get to her.”
Grey didn’t respond.
“Please, help me. She’s my best friend.” I felt my anger rising. Why wasn’t he saying anything?
He looked down at me. “Autumn... aside from myself and Lydia, no one left UCLA Medical Center alive. I know, because I was there.”
I stared up at him. Of course. I remembered him saying he helped at a hospital in the days following the outbreak of The Crimson Fever. So he was at the same hospital as Sarah and her parents. Maybe she left before Grey was forced to give up and leave the hospital?
I shook my head. “She made it out. I got a text message from her.”
“Do you know when she sent the message?”
“It’s dated right after we arrived in Hoover. She mentioned hearing our radio broadcast.”
“And you said she’s been taken by The Front?”
“Yes, which is exactly why we need to rescue her.” I was starting to feel impatient.
“But you don’t know her exact location?”
I shook my head, frustrated he wasn’t reacting the way I’d hoped. “No, but we can start at the warehouse store The Front was using and go from there.”
“Los Angeles is a massive city, more than four hundred square miles, and if she sent the text two months ago, she could be anywhere now.”
“We have to start somewhere.”
“Maybe I can go alone – ”
“No!” I interrupted. “You’re not going without me –”
“And I’m not taking you down there into another dangerous situation!” Grey snapped, anger flashing across his face. I stepped back, suddenly uneasy.
“Forget it,” I said curtly. “I shouldn’t have asked.” I turned and began to walk away, but Grey grabbed my arm and pulled me back. I stumbled and crashed against him. My breath caught in my throat like water as he looked down at me with cool, blue eyes.
His grip softened, and he said, “You can’t ignore m
e for months and then expect me to –”
“I don’t expect anything from you anymore,” I hissed. I yanked my arm from his grasp and walked away, relieved to have my back to him and space between us.
My face burned, and my mind was in a million pieces. As soon as I began concentrating on one worry, another pulled my focus away. It was an unwinnable tug of war. Connie and Rissi, Sarah, Las Vegas, Los Angeles.
If I’d been asked nine and a half weeks ago, I would have sworn on my life Grey would do anything for me, and I could blindly trust him for anything. That wasn’t the case now.
I rejoined Ben but didn’t say anything. I stood with my arms crossed over my chest. I felt Ben looking down at me, but I hoped my body language told him not to ask me any questions. I was in no mood to make up a story about what Grey and I were arguing about.
“Westland for Kyle,” I heard a voice say behind us. It was Mayor Westland, pacing around our group with a walkie-talkie.
“Go for Kyle,” the walkie crackled in response.
“Have you gotten Vegas on the emergency channel yet?”
“No response yet from Vegas on any channel, Mayor,” Kyle responded.
I turned to Ben, who stared into the darkness toward Las Vegas. We had already lost so much. My stomach clenched, and I thought I might be sick. I pressed a fist to my mouth and forced myself to take a deep breath. Rissi was fine. Connie was fine. We weren’t going to lose any more. Those days were over.
“All right everyone! Let’s move out!” Shad yelled from atop Thunder.
I climbed up on Snicket and joined the tide of horses heading into the wind and the darkness. Away from the light and shelter of the med center, our group suddenly felt very small.
CHAPTER FIVE
Our group pressed west on what was left of Highway 93, toward the pass leading to Las Vegas. Sand covered the road in loose drifts so deep the horses’ hooves sank into them. The metal highway signs were bent low by the strong wind, and above us, billboards that once screamed ads for the casinos were now stripped of their promises of penny slots and large jackpots. The raw boards underneath were exposed, like showgirls without their makeup. Some signs had been blown over completely and lay half-buried under mounds of sand, like sleeping animals.