Emergency Transmission

by Sean McLachlan

  David had been close enough to shoot at the vehicle. He had slipped around in front of the New City group to cut them off, and was working his way down a steep slope when he saw the vehicle pass right below him. It would have been an easy shot. He could have put his M16 on full automatic and raked the vehicle with bullets, but he had been so in awe that he didn’t even think to. And afterwards he had no regrets. It would have felt like a desecration to destroy something so rare and precious.

  He felt the same awe now. The vehicle sped across the plain, coming straight for him and his little camp. David took a few steps away from his tent and raised his hands in greeting, and also to show that he carried no weapons.

  The vehicle slowed. It was painted white and appeared battered, with several round patches that looked like repaired bullet holes. The windows were not the closefitting, seamless ones you saw in old magazines, but flat slats of metal with slits in them.

  David raised his hands a little more as the vehicle came to a stop a few meters in front of him.

  “Stay where you are and don’t make any sudden moves!” a voice shouted from inside the vehicle.

  The doors opened and three white men stepped out. Each wore Kevlar and carried guns. One had an M-16, and the other two had 30-.06 rifles. The fourth man, also white, stayed in the car in front of the round thing that steered the vehicle like a tiller. David couldn’t remember what it was called and he had more important things to think about right now.

  Like the fact that these men looked ready to kill him.

  “Righteous Horde or New City?” one of them demanded.

  “I’m a scavenger.”

  The man who questioned him gestured with his 30-.06. “Take that knife out and lay it on the ground. Slow.”

  Using only his thumb and forefinger, David slid the Bowie knife out of its sheath, bent down, and laid it on the ground. Then he stood up and raised his hands high above his head.

  “Kick it over here.”

  David did as he was told.

  The man with the M16 approached him.

  “Where you from, boy?”

  David looked him in the eye. “I’m 26 years old.”

  Mr. M16 frowned. “I didn’t ask how old you were; I asked where you were from.”

  David frowned back. “You called me ‘boy’. I haven’t been a boy for more than ten years.”

  A short laugh behind him. The third man had circled around and to investigate his tent and pack.

  “We got a live one here. Hey, he’s got some Blue Cans.”

  Mr. M16 glared at David. “I don’t like your attitude, boy. You ain’t in New City now. We don’t have to pretend to like you.”

  “The Doctor wouldn’t be pleased if he heard you speak like that. I’ve been told he’s a good man.”

  David was surprised at his own boldness, but he’d been through too much to be intimidated by the likes of these fools.

  The man behind him laughed again. “Hey guys, he thinks we’re from New City!”

  David looked to each man, confused. “Aren’t you?”

  “We ask the questions,” Mr. M16 said. “Now tell me where you’re from. Your clothes look too good to be a scavenger’s. You got full camo and good boots, just like some of the Righteous Horde. Now tell me straight, you one of them? Answer honest and I might let you live.”

  Oh, I doubt that.

  “I looted these things. The Righteous Horde is marching south. They’re about two days south of here and leaving a lot of dead in their wake. The whole cult is falling apart. People are shooting each other every night and the bodies are left dumped along their route. I’ve been following them at a safe distance and scavenging from the bodies.”

  “A parasite,” the man behind him said. “Just like you people were in the Old Times. But tell me, boy, you expect me to believe the Righteous Horde left behind a sack full of Blue Cans?”

  Without turning around, David replied, “You can take your beliefs and shove them up your ass, boy.”

  David heard the man rush him. He counted four steps before he ducked down and swung around his leg.

  He timed it perfectly. The butt of the man’s rifle jabbed the air just where David’s head had been. David’s leg cut the man’s feet from under him.

  But he fell the wrong way. David had hoped to knock him to the side and grab his rifle, but the guy had been moving forward too fast and instead fell right at David.

  David grabbed him under the arms and his knee went up and planted in the guy’s stomach. Rolling backwards, David threw him straight into Mr. M16.

  David grabbed for the 30-.06 just as the third man raised his own rifle.

  David had the rifle by the barrel. No way to turn the gun around and get his finger on the trigger before that third man blew his head off.

  Leaping forward and extending his arms, he swung the 30-.06 by the barrel. The butt of the rifle cracked the man on the jaw and laid him out.

  But David didn’t see, because he was already flipping the rifle and turning towards the two men he’d put on the ground.

  Mr. M16 was rising, his assault rifle coming into position, while the man he’d flipped fumbled for a boot knife.

  David put a bullet through both their skulls.

  With a glance at the third man to check he was still unconscious, he rushed at the vehicle. The man behind the tiller leaped out, drawing a pistol and using the vehicle as a shield.

  David’s first shot was fired from the hip and panged off the metal window. His second shot was better aimed and made the man duck behind the vehicle. The driver’s hand came up with the pistol and let out three unaimed rounds that kicked up the dirt around David’s feet.

  David ducked behind the vehicle. The man crouched on the opposite side. David got prone and fired under the vehicle. His opponent’s ankle spouted in gore and he fell hard on the ground.

  David’s next shot was made too hastily and caught the man in the Kevlar. It pushed him back a bit and shoved a grunt out of him, but otherwise did no harm.

  The man reacted remarkably quickly for someone who had just had his ankle shattered. The pistol barked and a bullet tore up the dirt between them, spitting grit into David’s face.

  David sprang up and circled the vehicle. Once again hate almost killed him, because as he rounded the vehicle the man fired again, the bullet whining past David’s head. David ducked back around the vehicle made as if he would come around the other side, then retraced his steps.

  The man was just turning to meet him when David came around behind him and put a bullet through his brain.

  David glanced back at the man he had clubbed to check he was still unconscious. Satisfied, David examined the vehicle.

  It was still running. With a feeling of trepidation, David poked his head inside. He saw seats, and an open bag of food sitting on the floor. David’s eyes roved over the unfamiliar sights. The wheel that acted like a tiller poked out of the front part next to some dials and numbers. Below these was what looked like a radio. In red glowing letters a readout said, “CH 1”.

  David flinched as the radio crackled to life.

  “Base to mobile. Come in, mobile. What’s going on?”

  David stared at the radio.

  “Base to mobile. You said you were being attacked. Is it New City? Come in, mobile.”

  Suddenly David felt afraid. All this technology, and what could he do with it? He didn’t know how to use a two-way radio, let alone a vehicle. For all the wonders the bunkers had given them, they had never found radios. They had never found a functioning vehicle either until that last bunker. It had never even occurred to David to try to use it.

  “Base to mobile. Come in!”

  David felt an uncontrollable urge to shut this machine off, but how? His gaze roved over the radio. There was a button that said “Power”. Was that it? But what about the vehicle? Surely that little button couldn’t turn off something so big?

  Then David spotted a key stuck in the little column that h
eld the tiller wheel. It was on a little metal ring from which dangled several other keys.

  Could a key turn on a vehicle like it opened a lock?

  David grabbed the key and pulled. It didn’t budge.

  “Base to mobile, come in.”

  That disembodied voice disturbed him. He yanked on the key tried to work it free, but it was stuck fast.

  “Base to mo—”

  The key turned and slid out. The radio cut off, as did the engine.

  David drew back. Had he broken it? He stared at the keys in his hand, unsure what to do.

  A groan snapped him out of it. The man he had clubbed shifted his legs as his hand moved to cradle his bruised face.

  Putting the keys in his pocket, David strode over to him, the rifle cradled in his arm. The man saw him coming and reached for one of the guns lying nearby.

  “Don’t.”

  The man froze.

  David stood over him, aiming for his face.

  “You said you weren’t from New City, so where are you from?” David asked.

  “Weissberg.”

  “Where?”

  “It’s a settlement Abraham Weissman and some of the Merchants Association made. We broke away from New City. Please don’t kill me.”

  “From what I saw, New City’s the best place anywhere. Why would you break away?”

  The corner of the man’s mouth twitched. Despite his fear, he couldn’t keep the hatred out of his eyes.

  “Because The Doctor let noncitizens inside the wall.”

  “You mean when the Righteous Horde attacked? New City didn’t usually let everyone in?”

  The man nodded, the growing fear on his face showing that he had figured out where David was from.

  “Yeah, that was new. Threatened all our property.”

  David snorted. These people had faced annihilation and they had been more worried about their property?

  “So you broke away. Where is this Weissberg?”

  The man’s face hardened.

  David gestured with his rifle. “I asked you a question.”

  “I got a wife and kid there. I’m not going to tell the likes of you.”

  “You mean a black man?”

  “I mean a psycho cultist. Go ahead and shoot me. I’m done talking.”

  Their eyes met. David could see he was serious. He pulled the trigger.

  David stared at the man lying at his feet, his skull broken open and a fan-shaped spray of gore spread out on the ground above his head. He had been a husband and father and wanted to spare his family the fate David himself had meted out on far too many innocents.

  And David had killed him for it.

  He looked out at the other three bodies lying scattered around this dead plain. Hadn’t he just made a promise to the Lord only a few minutes ago to give up killing? The words had barely been out of his mouth when the vehicle showed up.

  David looked up at the sky angrily.

  “Why are you playing with me? What do you want? Are you even there?”

  He slumped, knowing no answer would come. David had prayed for food and was given concrete. He had prayed for peace and was given four crackers with itchy trigger fingers. The Lord never gave him what he needed.

  David slowly turned to the vehicle.

  Or maybe he was just looking at things the wrong way.

  Maybe the Lord had delivered him this vehicle, both to punish the sinners who drove it and to give him leverage with New City. It sounded like New City and Weissberg were enemies. The vehicle was no good to him, he’d never learn to drive it, but he could use it for trade. That Doctor everyone talked about would trade a lot for something like this.

  He went to his tent and retrieved the camera he had found in The Pure One’s tent. The technos had shown him and Aaron how to use it. Turning it on, the back lit up and he saw the image of himself holding the decapitated head of the man he used to think was God’s emissary on Earth. His hand hovered over the button to erase this image and he paused.

  No, best keep it. That might prove as useful as this vehicle.

  David held up the camera, angled himself so that none of the corpses were visible, and took a photo of the vehicle.

  He put the men’s weapons and gear out of sight inside the vehicle, took the bag of food, figured out how to lock the door, and looked around at the barren land around him. He’d like to hide the vehicle, but couldn’t think of how. He had to put faith in the Lord to keep it safe until he returned.

  David bedded down to sleep. Tomorrow he would be back out to sea, heading for New City, and now he had a bargaining chip.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  Damn it, why did he have to ask me that? If I lied he would have known! Now he’s going to sulk for weeks.

  Roy furiously wiped the bar while Tammy, his daytime bartender, busied herself elsewhere. It was rare for his employees to see Roy in a bad mood. He always tried to keep up a positive front. Positivity was what people needed when they came here.

  But goddam, what about what he needed? Like some peace of mind? How about being able to have a drink with one of his oldest friends without the guy staring at him with puppy dog eyes?

  Maybe he got the message now? Yeah, right. This has been going on most of our lives!

  It seemed like all their lives. He’d only been sixteen when North Cape fell in a final conflagration—a coup against the reigning oligarchs kicked off by a wild contagion. He had been the only member of his family to survive and join the ragged exodus south. The refugees had coalesced under the last representative of the Red Cross, Crescent, and Star—a lanky twenty-two-year-old doctor who patched bullet wounds, coaxed the malnourished back to health, tried to isolate everyone from contagion, and who never seemed to sleep.

  For a time, Roy hero worshipped him.

  He needed a hero. His first one had just died.

  Tyrone was four years older than Roy and everything a big brother should be—cool, fun, protective of Roy and the family, tough, supportive, but most of all cool. Tyrone always looked out for his little brother, teaching him how to shoot and use a knife, getting him booze and food, even hooking him up with girls. He was one of the few bright spots in an increasingly grim life.

  In those last days at North Cape you had to be aligned with someone to keep safe. Mom and Dad aligned with the Business Association, basically an arm of whatever government was in power that year. In exchange for obedience, members could operate without too much harassment from the militia or gouging from the tax collectors. Nonmembers couldn’t open a business at all.

  Mom and Dad ran a brewery and distillery, which should have brought them prosperity except one year their grain silo got blown up during some factional fighting and another year their store got firebombed by a member of the New Klan. What passed for law in North Cape hanged the culprit, but Mom and Dad had to go into debt to rebuild.

  Tyrone chose a different path. He aligned with a gang. While Roy learned his parents’ trade, Tyrone ran around with a group of hoods called the Hellraisers. They stole, broke into houses, and were probably responsible for a lot of the banditry out in the countryside. His parents—decent, hardworking folks—tried everything to stop him. Dad smacked him. Mom pleaded with him. They kicked him out of the house a dozen times.

  But Tyrone was not a lost child. Mom and Dad always took him back. Anytime Dad whooped him, treating Roy to the strange sight of seeing a short balding man slapping around a tough teenager who could have snapped him in half if he had dared, Dad would feel guilty afterwards. Then there’d be a reconciliation, and more pleading and reasoning.

  None of it worked. Tyrone would disappear for days, even weeks at a time, and when he came back Roy would notice the sack of grain in their pantry would be a little fuller, the stock of canned food a little more plentiful. They never wanted for little luxuries like light bulbs or toothpaste, things many others had learned to do without. Mom and Dad pretended not to notice where these things came from. They were proud peopl
e, and it tore them up to accept these things, but like everyone else they lived close to the precipice and didn’t have the luxury of avoiding hypocrisy.

  It was during one of Tyrone’s absences that the contagion hit.

  No one knew where it came from. Whether some farmer dug up an old bioweapon, or some traveling merchant had brought it with him, or if one of the many radical factions had unleashed it on purpose.

  One morning, Roy was heating up the mash to make some whiskey, staring absentmindedly out the window hoping to see Tyrone’s broad shoulders swaggering down the street past the coal plant and armory. Dad stood behind the counter in the front room talking with a bartender about a delivery, when Roy heard a shout. The front door slammed and he heard the bolt slide into place.

  Roy grabbed the pistol Tyrone had given him and hurried into the front room, thinking they were getting robbed.

  Instead he found Dad and the bartender piling up furniture behind the door.

  “What’s going on?” Roy asked.

  Before they could reply, Roy saw his answer out the front window. A man staggered down the street, blood pouring from every orifice. People ran away from him in all directions, and within a few seconds the street was deserted except for the sick man. The man stopped, swaying from side to side. He tried to say something but his words got drowned out by the blood bubbling past his lips.

  He fell to his knees and moaned. In the distance, a militiaman came into view around the corner. The soldier stared for a moment, then leveled his rifle.

  Dad slammed the shutters closed just as the shot rang out.

  A few minutes later they heard a pounding and shouting on the door.

  Mom. She’d been at the market, and reported that three others were already afflicted. The bartender begged to stay. Mom and Dad weren’t the kind to turn him out.

  A few minutes later, the emergency loudspeaker system crackled to life.