Scorched

by Theresa Shaver

  I look around the area but all I see is desert and scrub in all directions except for ahead where a bridge is.

  “Where is this place? Why are you all out here?”

  He takes the time to wave and nod at some of the people we are passing but they all continue to look at Glo and me with suspicion.

  “Avi is twelve miles south of us.” We’re on the way back from Laughlin. There’s a trading post there once a month. We go to share news, trade supplies and barter for rations sometimes.

  I look at him in surprise. “The government is still giving out rations here?” I ask with hope. Maybe we can find a place nearby instead of going all the way to the valley.

  He snorts a laugh. “No, there hasn’t been a station around here for years. The closest ration station was in Vegas but the news we got yesterday was that they’ve closed all of them now. Too bad, there used to be a guy with a truck that would bring people down from there to trade.”

  I let out a disappointed breath. “Yeah, they shut ours down too. That’s why we had to get away. The gangs in our town were going on a rampage stealing everyone’s water and rations.”

  He makes that humming noise in the back of his throat before speaking. “It’s the way of the world now. The strong take from the weak. Tell me, why are you out here alone? Where is your mother or grandmother?”

  I bite my lip as an image of Abuela laying in a pool of blood fills my mind. I try to swallow the anguish down but it sticks in my throat. It’s Glo who answers him.

  “Abuela died two days ago. The gangs got her but she saved us so we could escape!”

  He looks sharply at me to confirm her words so I just nod with tears in my eyes. “She did, she prepared us to leave but the gang attacked before we could get away and they...they shot her. Our home is gone now, burned to the ground.”

  He stops and turns me to face him putting one of his hands on my shoulder and one on Glo’s.

  “I’m so sorry for your loss. Bonita was a wonderful woman. You were both blessed to have her in your lives. Where is her daughter, your mother?”

  I shrug my shoulders. “She left us with Abuela when I was eight and Glo was just one. She went north to find my grandfather’s people. It’s just been the three of us ever since.”

  He shakes his head in sadness. “You are orphans now with no family but each other. Where are you going?”

  I look away from him and try to think of a way to ask if we could stay somewhere around here but Glo pipes up and lets all our secrets out.

  “We’re going to see a waterfall with a pool I can swim in! I’ve never been in water before! Do you think there will be fish? I hope there are fish. I’ve never seen fish either.”

  I let out a groan as she tells this total stranger our biggest secret but he just throws back his head and laughs. He sees my distress and holds up a hand.

  “No, no, don’t worry child! I know of the place she speaks of. Like I said, Lucas and I were good friends. I arranged delivery of many of the materials Lucas needed to build his home there as well as the rental of the hover sleds he used to get it all into the valley.”

  My mouth drops open in shock. “You’ve been there? You’ve seen it? It really exists?” I had bet on it being there but a small part of me never really believed until this moment. Just as fast as hope flares in me his frown and words take it away.

  “Well, no actually. I haven’t been there myself. I wasn’t all that interested in hiking through the mountains but he told me all about it and like I said, I helped coordinate all the supplies he hauled in for the house. I know he was heartbroken when Bonita refused to relocate there. I can’t say I blamed her, though. It’s very isolated. It’s a good choice for you now. That isolation is a good thing with all the troubles in the world.”

  I shake my head in disagreement. “What if we travel all the way there and the water is gone like everywhere else? Is that a chance I can afford to take with her life? What about here? Is there a place we could settle here? With your people?”

  His shoulders slump and with sadness in his eyes, he reaches up and cups my cheek.

  “I’m sorry, that isn’t an option. If it was up to me alone I would take you in for the sake of my friendship with your grandparents but it’s not up to me. The band voted to not let any outsiders in. There was just too much bad trouble at the start of the wars. There’s a lot of anger in my people. They wouldn’t allow it. I’m sorry.”

  I nod my head in understanding and turn away. We are on our own.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Boyd has no choice but to swallow down the acid of anger that keeps creeping up his throat. They’ve traveled over two hundred miles and still haven’t caught up with his brother and the girl. Marco and Pete have lost faith in him and he can hear the disrespect in their tones every time they speak to him now. What should have been a triumphant day turned into one headache after another. Already miserable from an uncomfortable night spent out in the desert with only a tarp to protect them from the bugs and constantly blowing sand, they were then forced to sit around waiting for the buggy to charge up. They had finally started up again when not two hours into the journey, a tire blew out. It was then that Marco started making noise about returning to town with Pete agreeing with him.

  Boyd shut them down even though he was ready to quit too. The problem they didn’t see was, what then? They could return to town and live off of what they’d looted from the other residents but what would they do once it all ran out? With the ration stations closing, there would be nothing coming into the town and most of the people would either leave or die. He needed to look to the future and the only future he could see was going north and finding a way over that wall. The only way over the wall was money which led him right back to the girl.

  He looks around at the passing landscape of...nothing. There’s nothing out here for her to run to. She has to be going to one of her grandfather’s claims for gold. She, like everyone else, has no hope of making it down here in the south so she must have a plan to get the funds to go north. There could be no other reason for her to take a kid out in this desert that he could think of. It had to be to get gold and he hadn’t come this far to give up on it now.

  Pete interrupts his thoughts from the back seat. “Boss, we only have enough water for a few more days. If we don’t find them by tonight, we’ll have no choice but to turn back.”

  A growl of frustration escapes Boyd and he barks back, “Then we cut back on how much we drink. We are NOT going back until we find that girl!”

  Marco takes his eyes off the way ahead and sends him a look of disbelief. “You can’t be serious! Listen, I know you want revenge for what she and your brother did but it’s not worth dying over!”

  The contempt in his voice has Boyd’s anger reaching a boiling point. “Stop the buggy!” When Marco ignores him and keeps driving, Boyd pulls the gun from his waistband and holds it to his head.

  “STOP...THE...BUGGY!”

  Marco slams on the brakes causing all of them to lurch forward. Once they come to a stop, Boyd orders them out.

  “Let’s talk about dying out here or back in the town because if we don’t find that girl, that’s what we’re facing!” He shook his head and spit at their feet at the dumb looks on their faces.

  “What do you think’s going to happen once we run out of rations back home? The stations are closed for good so what we got back there is it. Once it’s gone, there’s not going to be anyone around to take more from. We have no choice but to go north and I don’t know about you two but I’m not going to be anyone’s slave! I’m getting over that damn wall to the good life no matter what it takes.” He takes a heaving breath and waves his gun to the east. “She came out here for a reason and the only reason I can come up with is to go to her grandfather’s claims for the gold he used to mine. We NEED that GOLD! So I’m going to keep after her until I catch up, even if it takes every damn drop of water we have to do it!” He waves the gun back to point at them. />
  “You two are either with me or you can walk back. You decide right here, right now!”

  Pete and Marco share a look but both nod in agreement. Marco holds up a hand.

  “We’re with you, Boss! Neither one of us wants to go to the labor camps. You’re right, the gold is the key. We just forgot about it, that’s all!”

  Boyd lets out a long-suffering sigh at being saddled with these two idiots but nods his head and waves them back into the buggy, catching the looks of concerned relief that the two share. He trudges back around the front end to the passenger door when Pete calls out.

  “Hey! What’s that?”

  Boyd looks up at where Pete’s standing in the back seat, staring off into the distance with a hand shading his eyes. He climbs into the buggy and stands on the seat to get a look at what his man has spotted and starts to grin. For the first time on this journey, the landscape has changed. He can’t make out exactly what it is but it looks like there’s movement out there. Even if it’s not the girl and his brother, it might be someone who saw them. He grins at his men.

  “Let’s go. It’s hunting time!”

  Chapter Twenty

  “How are you set for water?” Charlie asks us when Beck has joined us again.

  I think about how much I should tell this guy but then I just give up worrying about it. He seems to know everything anyway.

  “We’ve gone through some of it but I hope we will have enough to get back to the cart if the valley is dry.”

  He nods. “We will exchange your empty jugs for full ones to help with that.”

  I look over towards the river. “Thank you for the offer but can’t we fill them up from the river?”

  He shakes his head in caution. “No, it must be boiled and strained to make it safe to drink. We have plenty of treated water to gift you a few jugs and we’ll be home in the morning where we have a large treatment station set up.”

  Before I can thank him for the generous gift, his son John walks up with a concerned frown.

  “Sorry to interrupt, Dad but we’re going to have to move on today after all. There’s a windstorm heading this way.”

  I look at him in surprise and awe then look all around at the quiet, still desert that surrounds us.

  “How do you know that? Are there some kind of signs on the land that tell you that?”

  He gives me a strange look before pulling a thin, black, shiny box from his pocket and holds it up for me to see.

  “Uh, no. Satellite weather app?”

  He says it like I should know what that means so I just nod like I get it. Charlie sees right through me and laughs.

  “Old tech, child! We still have a few toys that help us out. Many of our older people had university educations and know how to hack past the North’s firewalls to get us information we can use.” My face must still show confusion at words I’ve never even heard before because he tries again.

  “They went to schools before the wars and know how to use the tech. The north still has everything we used to have so we use their satellites to help us down here in the south.”

  Ok, that I understand, so I ask John a question maybe he can answer. “Can your box tell you where the government is still handing out rations? Maybe we could go there?”

  John looks at his Dad with a sad expression before answering. “I’m sorry Claudia, they’ve closed all the stations. The only choice people have now is to go to the labor camps for rations or try and find a way to survive out here. To be honest, I’m surprised they lasted as many years as they did. You could try northern Utah. I’ve heard that there are still some communities farming there but it’s a very religious area with strict rules. I’m sorry I can’t help you more than that.”

  Charlie pats his son on the back and sends him to get us some water jugs while I think about everything he’s said. The only choices we have are the same as when we left home, the valley or north to the camps. I have a flash of an image of my mother laying on cool, green grass on the other side of the wall and feel burning anger at her for abandoning us. I shake the image away and focus back on Glo and Beck. There has to be another option.

  “How do you get over the wall?”

  His expression turns to pity as he shakes his head. “Many, many people have been asking that question for years now. There’s only two ways that I know of. They’ll take you if you have a high degree of education but you’ll spend the rest of your life working for them to pay your passage over. The other way is if you have enough money to bribe one of the wall guards to smuggle you through but it would take huge amounts and our dollar is worthless.” He looks down at Glo and then at Beck and I. “Go to the valley. If it’s dry...head north and try and find a community to take you all in. That’s your only choice now if you won’t go to the camps.”

  He looks around at the activity in his camp that has picked up in the last few minutes as people started pulling down tents and packing up their belongings.

  “We had planned to stay here tonight and travel the rest of the distance to Avi tomorrow but with the storm on the way, we will be leaving shortly. I’m afraid we will no longer be able to have a meal together. I’m sorry, I was looking forward to hearing more of your grandmother but perhaps it’s best if you get going. Coyote Rock is less than a hundred miles from here. That’s where Lucas always left Tilly and went into the mountains on foot. I went and brought the cart back to your grandmother after Lucas was found. You know to take the next junction where the tracks split? If you don’t switch, they curve south and go deeper into Arizona on the way to Mexico. I can tell you there’s nothing left alive that way.”

  Beck steps forward with his hand out. “Thank you, sir, for the water and the information. We’ll let you get packing and be on our way.”

  I echo his words and offer my own hand to shake but Charlie pulls both me and Glo into a fatherly hug. When we pull back, he has tears in his kind eyes.

  “I’m so sorry I can’t...”

  His words are interrupted by men yelling out in concern, causing all of us to turn and look in the direction of the commotion. I feel a cold shiver race down my spine when I realize they’re pointing at the direction we came from. I feel Beck put a hand on my shoulder from behind and turn to see him start stepping back with fear in his eyes. He reaches out and snags Glo’s arm and pulls her with him as he moves back further towards where our cart is waiting. I’m shaking my head in confusion at him when he says one word that has me moving too.

  “Boyd!”

  Charlie grabs my arm as I try and move past him. “What? What is Boyd?”

  I see Beck scoop up Glo and run for the cart so I turn back and watch as Charlie’s men form a line between their camp and some kind of vehicle that’s heading towards us alongside the tracks. I’m only half relieved by all the rifles and bow and arrows that are starting to be aimed at whoever is traveling this way. A shake of my arm has me meeting Charlie’s eyes and I swallow hard before answering.

  “Boyd is the leader of the gang that attacked us and killed Abuela. Beck is his younger brother and he betrayed Boyd to get us to safety. If it’s him, he’s coming for his revenge!”

  Charlie gives me a hard nod and the grip he has on my arm turns into a push.

  “Go, go now. Whoever it is, my men will hold them off until you are away. Good luck, Claudia!”

  I stand frozen for a heartbeat as he strides away barking out orders but then I hear Glo yelling my name so I turn and sprint toward the cart. We need to get out of here and put as much distance between us and whoever that is. I can’t really believe that Boyd would travel so far after us just to get revenge but I’m not willing to stick around and find out.

  I fly up the steps and see Beck already standing by the control panel waiting for me to get on the cart. As soon as the door latches behind me, he hits the button to engage the engine and the cart starts moving with a lurch. I rush to the front windows while Beck goes to the back ones. I see the bridge a few feet ahead and it spans a
deep river basin that has only a small stream of dirty water running through the center of it where once a mighty river flowed that provided life to millions of people. The wooden ties that support the steel tracks are white with age and I wish I had thought to ask Charlie if the bridge was still strong enough to support the weight of the cart and us in it. I look down at Glo who’s come up beside me and pull her against me. If we crash through this thing then I hope it’s over quick for all of us. Our speed increases, sending us out over the basin as I hold my breath and squeeze my eyes shut. I swear I can hear the beams under us creaking and groaning with every revolution of the wheels. Glo laughs and claps her hands making me open my eyes and releasing the stale air in my lungs. We’ve made it over the bridge and are back on solid ground.

  I squeeze her against me for a second and then turn and rush back to the other end to see if we’re being followed by whoever was approaching the camp. Beck’s got both of his palms pressed against the glass and his lips are a hard, thin line as the group we just left gets smaller and smaller the further we travel.

  “What did you see?” I ask him.

  He shakes his head and blows out a breath, never taking his eyes off of the scene in the distance.

  “I think it is Boyd. Look! They’re backing up. I think they’re leaving!”

  I push closer to the glass, trying to make out what’s happening and see the vehicle moving further away from Charlie’s people. I’m about to smile in relief when the car or whatever it is makes a wide arc around the men standing between us and them and then heads back towards the river.

  “They can’t get across without the bridge, right?” I plead desperately as we watch it turn again and travel parallel to the river until they disappear from sight.

  Beck pushes off the window and turns to slump back against it.

  “I don’t know. I don’t know if there’s another way across it. I can’t believe he followed us! What does he want? Why can’t he just let me go? It’s not like he ever cared about me. I was just his dog to kick when he felt like it.”