The Redeemers

by T. J. Martinell

  “Wake the hell up!”

  He rubbed his eyes. His ears rang like church bells. His vision cleared as he struggled to his feet. A moment later, he regained full awareness.

  He was behind a makeshift barricade of cars and a corner building. Tom knelt between the cars, shooting up, then straight ahead. He dropped to unjam his gun.

  He looked at Carl frantically. “Help me!”

  Still disoriented, Carl hurried to the barricade and peered through a slit.

  It couldn’t have been worse for them. The intersection was crawling with ISA agents. Their armored cars blocked off the roads, the Humvees parked by the opposite corner building. Sporadic gunfire hinted at a leisurely mood among the officers. They weren’t in a hurry.

  Carl let out his breath. They were trapped. It was just a matter of time before they ran out of ammo.

  “You alright?” Tom asked.

  Carl inspected his side, discovering the blood on his chest. A steady, throbbing pain spread across his body. He dabbed at the wound. It was from the car crash, not a bullet. That didn’t make it any less severe. He wouldn’t be able to run.

  Tom turned to face him as he reloaded. At his feet were two empty mags, two full. He took one and hesitantly shoved it into his gun.

  He let out a dark laugh. “I didn’t think it would end like this.”

  Carl glanced at the vehicles in front of them as the ISA fired another barrage. The shots were deliberately wild; they were hoping to scare them into surrendering, to avoid further deaths.

  He behind them. The corner building was secure, but it would be breached as soon as they could flank them and demolish the walls. In the meantime, the two of them could get out through the back.

  But the ISA would have to be occupied, distracted.

  Struggling, Carl brought Tom back inside the barricade. “I’m going to draw their fire. When I do, you’re going to run into the building and out the side exit. They haven’t gone there yet, so there’s still time. Before you do, take off your jacket, hat, and tie. It’s an old department store, so there must be some old clothes in there. Put them on and look for the nearest group of people and bribe them to let you mingle with them until get to one of our people.”

  “What about you?”

  Carl’s face was aloof. “This escape is designed for one.”

  “No way. I’m not leaving you here to die like this!”

  “Either we both die or one of us dies, and I can’t move.”

  “Then we both die.”

  He went to grab Tom’s arm, but his friend brushed his hand away and ran back to the cars. One of the sharpshooters had him in their sights and fired, but Tom moved just in time. The bullet nicked his shoulder, leaving a flesh wound. He bit his lip and fended off the urge to scream.

  Carl pulled him back and held him close, handing him the documents.

  “Go,” he said. “I’ll be alright.”

  “Why do you want me to go?”

  “Because it’s not your time.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Just go!”

  Snatching the gun from him, Carl shoved Tom back against the building and pushed him in through the entrance. Fighting back the ache now throbbing in his entire back, he returned to the cars and caught his breath, preparing himself for what was to come.

  Expelling all distracting thoughts from his mind, he focused on a single objective. The brief pause hardened his resolve and calmed his nerves.

  He approached the barricade. Whispering a short prayer, he stepped out and exposed himself, aiming for the sharpshooter on the rooftop. He hastily took a shot at each, then trained his sights on the officers hiding behind the mailboxes and the Humvees. He fired at the armored cars and at the radio jammers, destroying them. His actions were so fast and so precise the men temporarily withdrew, retreating to find better cover.

  Still he targeted them, taking another two down. He was determined to make his last stand count.

  He dropped to reload with the last magazine; Tom was nowhere to be seen.

  “How do you like that, you bastards!” he cried. “Come out without your guns and fight me like a man!”

  “You first!” someone yelled.

  “Twenty of you, one of me. Good odds.”

  Another agent called to him. “You’re a dead man! You and your friend aren’t getting out of this one!”

  Carl raised his gun. “Come here and tell me that yourself!”

  This time, a sharpshooter’s aim was true. The bullet went through a gap between the cars, striking Carl’s gun’s stock. The impact torn it apart, the wooden splinters cutting up his face. He yanked his hands close to his chest, his fingers paralyzed from the force. He fell against the car and slid down to the pavement. Dazed, he was unable to stand. He huddled against the wall, drawing his revolver.

  “How is that?” someone called.

  Carl didn’t answer. He reached into his wallet and took out a small snapshot photo of him with his father, the last one they had taken together. The young version of himself seemed happy beyond description, and although his father was smiling there was a sadness to him that had puzzled Carl ever since.

  The countless hours he had spent studying his father’s expression had not given him any insight as to what he had been thinking in that moment.

  He kept studying the photo in-between wild shots from his revolver to remind them he remained a threat. When he fired his last round, he tossed the gun aside, sat down, and held the photo with both hands.

  “Well, father,” he whispered, “you said someday I’d be where you were. Was this where you were? This isn’t how it was meant to be, was it?”

  He thought of the people watching the standoff, the reporters from every paper who would get wind of it as soon as the smoke had settled. Maybe Tom would write the obit. He’d do as good a job as any, but the real story wouldn’t be there.

  Staring blankly at the building, he waited for the unmistakable presence of death to arrive. Then they’d be there to finish him. He couldn’t stop it. He’d laugh, anyway, look death right in the face. He had learned long ago to never fear it.

  Their footsteps were like a lock-step march. Shadows swirled and swept across the pavement in front of him and then stretched out across the sidewalk.

  Three ISA officers appeared in the barricade, their rifles pointed at him.

  “Where’s the other one?” one of them demanded.

  “Gone.”

  “Are you going to come quietly?”

  “No.”

  They thought he would go for his gun. He didn’t even look at it, his eyes searching beyond them. For some reason, he didn’t feel an imminent sense of doom.

  “Put your hands up,” they ordered.

  “No.”

  “Put them up or we will shoot.”

  “Then shoot.”

  No one moved.

  “Guess you’ll come quietly,” the officer chuckled as he cocked his gun. “Real quiet.”

  He pressed his rifle against his shoulder and stepped closer to Carl, closing one eye as he aimed.

  The man’s head abruptly exploded. The rifle shot went wild and struck the wall. The two officers beside him also were blown apart to the booming sound of explosive shells.

  A second of total silence.

  What followed was the loudest roar Carl had ever heard. It bellowed through the streets like an ancient battle cry, joined by the sound of dozens of rifles and machine guns and bombs. The surveillance drones hovering above him fell like swatted flies as hundreds of tiny tracers blanketed the sky, resembling a Fourth of July fireworks display.

  Crawling across the barricade, Carl came to the edge and looked out. On the street were at least a hundred Cascadian men. Armed with Tommy guns and rifles, they rushed at the ISA’s position with the fanaticism of Viking berserkers.

  Leading them was Fred, who had his rifle out in one hand as he urged the men on. A deep long cry reverberated from their ranks as th
ey swarmed into the area, dispersing into cover or occupying buildings.

  The initial attack caught the ISA by surprise. The explosions rocked their armored cars but inflicted no serious damage to their thick plating. In the confusion, the officers scrambled for better defensive positions, allowing Carl’s companions a chance to pick off bewildered foe. They were joined by three cars with mounted machine guns poking out their doors. Their shots obliterated the Humvees’ tires, immobilizing them, while cutting down the ISA officers on the mounted turrets before they could get any shots off.

  Other cars arrived and directed their gunfire at the drones flying above them. A crisscross of bullets blanketed the sky with lead. More drones fell until the remainder flew away from the area.

  One of the men got to Carl and examined him. “You badly hurt?”

  “I’ll live.”

  Another man came, and together they assisted Carl to one of the cars. When they passed Fred, he had them stop and shook his hand.

  “Thanks for the save!” Carl said.

  “Don’t mention it, kid! I owed you one, remember?”

  As they reached the car, Carl insisted on making the final steps on his own. The doors were hardly shut before they drove off. The gunfire tapering off behind him, Carl groaned and felt at his wounds, the many cuts on his face.

  “Get me to the paper,” he said. “I’ll deal with this bullshit later.”

  “You look like hell.”

  “I feel it, too. But we’re doing this, anyway?”

  They had to help him out to the lobby, but there he also demanded to walk on his own. His legs themselves didn’t ache as much as the whole of his body. He had to concentrate to maintain balance, leaning against the inside of the elevator as he pressed the button for the newsroom floor.

  The entire newsroom was there waiting for him when the door opened. He waved off their concerns and dragged himself over to his desk, using the chair to prop himself up. There was no time to talk.

  Childs came over to him with a look of genuine shock. “We heard what happened. It’s amazing you’re alive”

  “Yeah. Let me get this done, then we can talk.”

  “Need anything?”

  “Yeah, a drink.”

  Childs poured him a shot of thirty-year-old rye whiskey from his private stash. Carl downed it and then rubbed his face with his hand. He still wasn’t over it.

  And now he was beginning to sense death. Was his wound fatal?

  Or…

  “Where’s Tom?” he asked.

  “He’s getting checked out,” Childs said. “He was able to get a hold of us in time, so we could muster up something to rescue you.”

  “Is he alright? Did he give anyone the documents?”

  “He seemed alright last time I saw him. I doubt that’s changed since.”

  Childs handed him a folder with their contact’s documents. “He somehow knew you’d make it out, and that you’d want to write the story before doing anything else. Good to have a friend like that, eh?”

  Carl didn’t say another word until he was done with the story. The reporters sat and watched him type, as though still in disbelief that he had survived. The rumors might have gone wild by then, exaggerating the situation.

  At that moment, he didn’t care.

  It wasn’t hard to glean the needed facts from the documents. They affirmed everything the rest of the story said: people in the world on the other side of the water were so dysfunctional they paid a king’s ransom to access drugs that would take them out of reality, but only for a while. They couldn’t leave it for good.

  A copyeditor was there to take his story as soon as he had pecked the last sentence. Carl then quietly smoked along with the other reporters. For the first time he could recall, there was a raw, sincere affection in their eyes normally concealed behind banter and facetious insults.

  “We were worried you hadn’t made it,” Ian said.

  “They can’t kill me that easily.”

  “Ha! ‘Killer Carl’ is also invincible,” Duong remarked.

  “Don’t forget Tom.”

  “Yeah.”

  A commotion broke out in the hallway. A man swore bitterly. Heads turned, and a few went over to see what was happening. As soon as they disappeared around the corner whispers were uttered.

  The questioning ceased.

  More joined in the hallway and repeated the same until it was only Ian and Carl left in the newsroom.

  “What is happening?” Ian asked.

  Duong and the others came back in. Their heads were hung low, their cigarettes held like small vigil candles in their hands.

  “What?”

  Childs stepped into the room. A lump was in his throat. “It’s Fred.”

  “What about him?”

  “He’s dead.”

  No one spoke.

  “He was shot as they were pulling out,” Childs continued, his voice low. “They got him out of there, but he was hit in the head, near his good eye.”

  Carl stared at his desk. It was like experiencing nightmare at the most horrifying part. That was when the dream ended, and he woke up and realized it had never happened and all was well.

  He waited for someone to wake up him. That person would probably be Fred.

  Minutes later, he was still in the newsroom looking at his desk. None of the men had moved.

  Childs refilled Carl’s whiskey glass, but he brushed it aside.

  “I’m going home,” he declared as he pulled himself up.

  “No, you need to get looked at,” Childs said.

  “I’m going home!”

  “You don’t even have a car anymore.”

  “I’m still going home.”

  He barely made it to the hallway, assisted by Ian and Duong. The crowd of men parted and let him through. The sympathetic looks were hard for him to ignore.

  Ian drove him home, and when he reached his place he bolted every lock on the door. He turned around and fell to his knees and wept harder than he thought was imaginable.

  At that moment, he didn’t care for how it might affect his reputation or his image or his status among his friends. None of it compared to what was now gone and he could not get back. He hoped that Fred couldn’t witness it from wherever he was in the afterlife.

  Yet he knew if Fred did, he would understand. He had seen those tears many times before.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Fred’s funeral was a small affair held at one of Norton’s facilities.

  Norton ensured that it was a well-done affair, his body carted out in an open pine casket to the sound of military taps. As his body passed by them, the men rose and took off their hats. The handful of military veterans among them saluted, all wearing their most formal attire.

  The ceremony itself was short and to the point. Norton took center in front of the casket and praised Fred for his service to the Cascadian, his invaluable work training the reporters, the years of experience he had been able to use for the betterment of the men he worked with.

  He made no mention of Fred’s drinking, which had cost him his reporter position. Rather, he focused on his last, heroic act saving Carl. By then, the skirmish had become the talk of the town, and it had only cemented Fred’s status among his peers in death. It had left such a profound impression that the ISA was launching an internal inquiry into what they had deemed a disaster for their operations.

  The reporters all sat in the front, closest to the casket. All except for Carl, who chose to sit in the back near the door. Kaylyn sat beside him with her hands in her lap. She had driven him to the place with the intent on taking him back, but her aloofness hadn’t helped him prepare for the final goodbye to his friend.

  At the end of his speech Norton placed his hand on Fred’s body, cleaned and prepared by a mortuary at his expense. He then motioned to the crowd and one by one they came out and formed a line in front of the casket, giving Fred one last look as they passed by him.

  Carl tried to get up, b
ut the internal pain from his injury was like a knife in his side. Kaylyn steadied him and brought him to his feet. Sweat trickled down his forehead as he resisted the urge to cry out in relief from the throbbing in his gut. He had refused all medication.

  He reached the casket and looked at Fred. The mortuary had done an incredible job fixing up his face, a glass eye where his patch had been and a serene air pervading over his body. Carl placed his hand on the side of the casket, but he could hardly glance at the corpse.

  Fred’s expression didn’t disturb him. It was now just a dead body. It was the loss of what had once been inside it that tormented him.

  They went to the back of the room. Kaylyn tried to sit him down, but he wouldn’t budge. Once the last man had seen Fred and offered their respects, men came and sealed the casket and rolled it out. Norton reminded them that Fred had died according to his principles, that he had given his life because he believed in their cause.

  Carl couldn’t bear it. Their cause. No. Fred had died for one man, him. Carl couldn’t accept it. He was meant to die, not Fred.

  “Let’s go,” Kaylyn said. “I don’t want to stay.”

  “Then go. I’m staying.”

  He let go of her hand and turned away. There was so much he wanted to tell her, of how he could hardly stand the thought of never seeing Fred again. He wanted to relief, but he sensed that it would only drive her from him.

  The ceremony done, Norton immediately went to Carl. “Come with me.”

  No protest or questions. He left Kaylyn there, first telling her to go back to his place and wait for him. The newspaper building just across the street, they took their time heading to it. Norton was patient with Carl’s struggle, having refused a cane or any kind of aid. He hated the pain, he but needed to feel it.

  Outside of Norton’s office, Carl stopped.

  “What is it?” Norton asked.

  “I can’t do this.”

  “Do what?”

  It was like another person spoke through him. “I don’t know how else to say this, but I’m leaving the newspaper.”

  Norton was expressionless.

  “I have to,” Carl added. “I can’t stay.”

  “Come inside.”