Fire, Ruin, and Fury (Embers Saga)

by Matthew Taylor

  “Fine, I guess. He is what he is, ya know? But the food,” she echoed. “And the swimming pool!” She sighed, wistfully. “The weather there mild. You’d like it. It’s getting there and back that really gets me. I’m terrified to travel. And . . .” she paused to calculate her next words. He looked at her eagerly. “I still don’t trust him,” she whispered. “I don’t trust any of ‘em.”

  Alias reached up to his shoulder and enveloped her hand in his. “We’ll always have each other,” he said quietly. “No matter what.” She savored the words, despite the whisper of doubt echoing in the recesses of her mind. She smiled at him, consciously telegraphing all the devotion she felt for her beloved brother. Her friend and confidante.

  “I need to get back,” he sighed. “I’ll talk to Rashid again about security for your trips.”

  “You should come back as much as you can,” Jasmine pleaded. “We need to see you. Dad needs to see you.” Alias shuffled his feet uncomfortably. “We don’t belong to them, Alias.”

  He offered her a half-smile of acknowledgement, but he didn’t commit. She gave his shoulder one last squeeze and followed him back inside the church, where he said his goodbyes. A tight embrace and a kiss for his mother. One for Jasmine. An awkward handshake for George Anderson and an even more awkward sideways hug with their father.

  Jasmine recognized heartbreak in her parents’ eyes as they watched their son leave the church for a waiting autocar, which whirred to life and shuttled him down the dusty road towards the Nautilus. She wedged herself between her parents and wrapped her arms lovingly around their waists. They gazed out the window until the autocar was out of sight in the valley’s thick haze.

  Her father turned to her, pulled her in close, and kissed her forehead.

  “Well,” her father pronounced, “Back to it, I guess.”

  Jasmine smiled up at him before releasing her hold and mustered her resolve to face another long stretch alone in the whirlwind.

  Chapter 18: No Admittance

  (Paul Lancaster)

  Paul Lancaster plunked himself down in a fold-out chair beside the fire pit at the center of the dirt plaza in their campsite. He kicked off a boot and relished the relief of his foot instantly cooling in the fresh air. He untied the laces on his second boot when his mother emerged from a narrow path between two of the trucks that encircled the plaza.

  “I uploaded the work schedules to your wrist-plats,” she said with her characteristic cheerfulness. But Paul sensed disappointment in her voice. His Uncle Christian and Shay trailed behind her, deep in conversation as they marched to the small meal table.

  Awakening to his location, Christian broke-off the conversation, opting instead to bend over to plant a kiss on his daughter Emily’s forehead and pass a loving stroke over her hair before sitting down next to his wife, Honey. Paul’s Aunt Honey, whose widely known mental illness put Paul on guard, caught Christian’s eye, and a frustrated look descended over her face. Christian rubbed a few consoling circles on her back and gently lifted a lock of hair behind her ear. Paul shifted his stare to Shay, who now stood near Nessa, offering her some mollifying whispers.

  Paul didn’t need to be told it had happened again. Nevertheless, he slipped his toes back into the irritating heat of his work boots, got up, and trundled over to Shay and his mother.

  “They denied us again?” he asked in a hushed voice. He looked back at his sister Victoria, who was oblivious to the malaise that had descended over the camp. His mother slid past Shay and cupped Paul’s cheek with her hand, confirming his fears.

  “Sorry, Sonny.” Shay’s deep, gravelly voice wasn’t enough to quell Paul’s rising anger.

  “Goddamnit,” Paul spat, losing his ability to keep his voice down.

  Shay, who generally had no appetite for whining, quietly withdrew. His mother’s gaze trailed after him before she returned to Paul.

  “Yes, well, work starts at first light, so we should all get some rest.”

  “How many times are they gonna to deny us our rights?” Paul protested, his voice less constrained. He fought the urge to project his frustration onto Shay—still a virtual stranger—who had already done so much for them.

  “Paul.” His cousin Emily’s hushed voice came from behind him. “Come sit with me by the fire.” Paul tried again to calm himself. He drew a deep breath and reluctantly nodded in agreement. She took his hand and led him back to his chair. “It just takes time,” she soothed.

  Emily had been the first to urge him to lower his expectations, months ago, when they were still on the road from Denver to Sioux Falls. She had been through it herself, which somehow comforted him when their applications for residency in Troy Township were first denied.

  It had taken Emily and her family months to get their residency permits, and they had arrived at the township gates with a better case. But after his own family had endured so much on their trek from California-Sur, he nearly boiled over when the township guards only agreed to admit the Goldblooms, Shay, and Dorian Lee. When they callously directed Paul and his mother, sister, and Uncle Joshua to the afueras—the shanties outside the township’s walls—his anger hijacked him, compelling him forward to push his civ-cert into the guards’ faces to demand his rights. It was a foolish gesture, and he knew he was tempting fate. But he was cold and exhausted—emotionally and physically.

  “Paul!” his Uncle Christian interjected sharply, pulling him away from the guards by the arm. Paul had never seen his uncle so red-faced—so embattled to contain his fury. “Bite your goddamned tongue before you get someone hurt. We knew this was a long-shot. We already told you can stay at the worksite until we figure it out, so just calm the hell down.” Although he had only been around his uncle for a short time, he knew that Christian rarely spoke in such harsh tones, and his words startled the entire family to attention.

  Paul caught the imploring gaze of his mother, then his sister, and he knew he had to relent. Without another word, he started back to his uncle’s truck in a haze of humiliation and anger.

  His uncle’s scolding had the fortunate side benefit of appeasing the guards, who were on the verge of throttling Paul. From the corner of his eye, he saw them re-sheath their shock-batons, and he was grudgingly grateful for his uncle’s composure.

  “Don’t worry,” Emily assured him, wrapping her arm in his. “We started this way when we first got here. Dorian and Shay’ll help. We still spend most of our time outside the walls anyway, and we’ll see you guys every day until this all get sorted out. You’ll see.”

  At that point, Paul had no idea what it meant to live on a worksite, but he figured it had to be better than being a new stranger in a shanty. Still, even this came as a courtesy of Shay and Dorian Lee, and he didn’t like relying on charity, which in his experience was always fleeting—especially when it all came from a violation of his legal rights as a citizen. There was no choice, though, so Uncle Christian wasted no time dropping off Emily and Honey before getting the rest back into Oscar and away from township guards.

  They said little on the road to the worksite, giving Paul a few minutes to calm down. When they arrived, he could hardly believe his eyes. His uncle flashed a badge to an armed guard and they rolled through barricades of high fences and thickets of barbed wire surrounding row upon row of doublewides, busses, campers, yurts, and tents. Paul stared incredulously at the makeshift town, its hundreds of workers hurriedly scurrying about. He was transfixed by the bustle, the machines, and the rising structures of concrete and steel.

  Uncle Christian brought Oscar to a halt in a tight space of vehicles circled almost bumper to bumper.

  “Home sweet home,” Christian announced, casting a warning look at Paul.

  Paul felt his mother give his hand a gentle squeeze. Uncle Joshua smiled at him reassuringly. More than a little jealous of Joshua’s indefatigable faith, Paul relented.

  “You’re tireless,” he joked.

  “Time to be grateful for what we have,” his mother implo
red.

  He didn’t need much convincing, once he was out of Oscar. The camp was as good as any outcome he could have realistically expected when they abandoned their lives in Cali-Sur. His mother and sister would have a roof over their heads. The fortified fences, armed guards, and the multitude of workers gave him a welcome sense of law and order.

  The feeling of outrage he felt at the violation of his citizen’s rights at Troy Township’s gates faded. It was a matter of principle, of course, but the principle of citizenship had never actually brought him anything as valuable as what he saw around him. It was his Uncle Christian, and the charity of two strangers, who had delivered them from disaster.

  “This plot is where we stayed when we first got here,” Uncle Christian said. “We’ll meet here every morning before work.” For reasons Paul couldn’t put his finger on, that was the moment—the first moment in his life—that the boundaries of his loyalty extended beyond his mother and sister. He was now bonded to his uncles, aunt, and cousin. His head began to swim as his universe of responsibilities expanded, the waves of obligation churning with a terror, like being too far from shore, hopelessly out of his depth.

  “Paul,” his Uncle Christian called out. “Come meet Shaymus Gray.”

  His mother grabbed his hand again and gave an almost imperceptible tug, as if urging him back to dry land. He swallowed the angst in his throat and regained his focus on the people around him.

  “Just Shay,” the round and scraggly man in dirty coveralls corrected, extending his hand. Paul shuffled forward to shake, albeit reticent to abide by custom long deemed unsanitary.

  “And this is Dorian Lee,” Christian continued. Paul shook the hand of the small, weathered man, whose ethnicity he struggled to place.

  Pacific Islander?

  “Pleased to meet you both,” Paul heard himself utter, still oddly disconnected.

  “This is a wonderful surprise,” Emily interjected, releasing Paul to give enthusiastic hugs to both Shay and Dorian.

  The two strangers then revealed a small store of food stocks to welcome back their partners and extended family. Paul eagerly accepted the simple meal, his appetite still nearly insatiable since their trip.

  The festivities were short, however, and soon the sun was setting over their sheltered dirt plaza. Shay led the new arrivals to a small yurt spotted just inside the perimeter of vehicles. The inside hosted four cots with thin plasti-foam mattresses and light, threadbare blankets. A sheet draped from a rope separated Paul and Uncle Joshua from his Victoria and his mother. Shay’s best effort to provide a modicum of privacy. It was less than what Paul hoped for when they set out, but having so recently experienced much so much worse, he readily joined in the thanks being offered by Victoria and his mother. It was harder to swallow when the thank-yous turned into goodbyes, and Uncle Christian climbed back into Oscar and set off back up the road to Troy Township, Shay and Dorian Lee following in their own work trucks.

  Paul endured a fitful sleep, waking with every foreign sound he heard in the night. He was bleary-eyed when he emerged from their borrowed yurt the next morning to find Victoria and Nessa greeting Shay, Dorian, and his relatives, who had just arrived back to the work site. Paul sat down at a long table in the dirt plaza and listened as Shay handed out assignments and tasks for the day ahead.

  This is it, he realized. This is my life.

  Shay and Dorian had arranged for his mother, a nurse by trade, to work part-time in the work-camps’ infirmaries as the group traveled. Victoria, a gifted coder, would shadow Shay on his rounds. Emily, following in her father’s footsteps as an engineer, had become the apprentice to Dorian Lee. Uncle Joshua and Paul were to follow Christian, presumably to start learning in the ins and outs of the business to begin his own education in power generation.

  Within an hour, Paul was thankful that so much of their work was indoors or below ground. There they were insulated from the frequent haboobs and shearing winter winds that raped the region. Uncle Christian carefully timed their hours on the outdoor solar generators to avoid the worst of the cold.

  Paul returned to their camp with the others that evening, bone tired, but thankful they were all safe—and a little richer.

  Again, Paul was surprised to share food in quantities and quality that he had never experienced. Over the course of dinner, as he savored the strange discomfort of a full belly, Paul began to realize that his mother, aunt, and uncles were getting increasingly drunk on a flask of cinnamon hooch that Shay had drawn from his coveralls. Despite his nagging urge to sleep, he forced himself to stay awake when they started trading tales of old acquaintances and life stories.

  Shay had spent most of his childhood outside St. Louis, where his family had migrated as squatters. He recounted arriving at a small gated community, where his father made a deal with the remaining residents—rump elements of waning Ellie families. Shay and his family would keep the place functioning—repairs and infrastructure—in exchange for one of the vacant houses, a weekly provision of food, and a small stipend. This is where Shay got his start building or fixing almost anything, and his first real exposure to weapons, ammunition, alarms, and basic defenses.

  “Thins was goin’ perdy good there . . . for a while anyways,” Shay explained. “Then, the Pig Flu epidemic made its way to the Commonwealth. “Alotta’v ‘em tried to run away. I reckon they prob’ly bought it on the road. Then again, mosta the ones that stayed got it too. Perdy soon there weren't enough people left to pay us—even when they realized we could shut the place down, if we wannid to.”

  Even that leverage soon didn’t matter, he added. His parents and two brothers succumbed as well, and Shay was left to fend for himself. He buried them, one after another, and then made his way to the city, where he signed up for the Commonwealth Expeditionary Force to escape starvation.

  “I wasn’t gene-modified to be a super-soldier, but I was a big lad. An’ they needed new boys, on account of the flu and the water wars. Didn’t even matter I was too young neither.

  “Saw combat against the chinks, you know,” he drew another swig from the flask. “Even fought against them mezclado pirates off Cali-Sur. Lost a chunk of my calf and got burned perdy good.” He paused in somber reflection, pulling up his pant leg to show a mess of scars. “But limped me way back, dinn’ I? An’ I learned a whole bunch more ‘bout buildin’ defenses. Proper ones. Line-o-sight, defilade, obstacles, all that. Turned out to be a perdy big business back home too.”

  Big business indeed, Paul agreed. Despite the limp Shay brought home with him—the kind of visible weakness that attracts predators and begets an early death—Shay had thrived. Paul figured it was the improbable combination of his disarming affability, grit, and skill. He’d made a good living designing facility-defenses. Factories, farms, reservoirs, and aqueducts. Walled Ellie estates and villages. Provincial militia outposts and private security sites. Township defenses, including the one at Troy.

  Paul marveled at Shay’s disheveled, scrappy appearance when he thought of how much Shay was probably worth after all his business ventures.

  He’s not an Ellie, but he must have made important allies along the way, Paul figured. He’d only share this if he knew he was protected—or he trusts the Goldblooms a helluva lot. I s’pose that trust extends to us.

  Shay’s stock was rising by the minute with Paul, though the limits of Shay’s influence were clearly on display at the gates of Troy Township.

  “How did all that lead you hear?” Paul’s mother asked. Paul had been so attuned to Shay’s story that he hadn’t noticed his mother gazing at Shay admiringly. Paul looked to his sister for confirmation, which she provided with a smirk and a shrug.

  “Well, this here job opened up ‘bout a year ago. Not sure why they wanted to build a fortification right here. ‘An now they wanna squeeze in these little churches too.”

  “They?” Paul couldn’t help but ask. Bit Shay didn’t bite.

  “First thing I done was to get in touch with
ole Dorian here,” Shay continued, now focused more intently on Paul’s mother. Dorian Lee had been Shay’s off-and-on business associate over the years—ever since they’d met on a job for Baumgarten Industries in the Mid-Atlantic Province.

  “Fast forward, met Christian here, and figured he’d be a big help, since this job is some bit bigger than we’d done before. Long story short, everyone got along so good that we we’ve takin’ on more ‘n more business. Finally got ‘em into the township for our basecamp—same as us. Still spend most our time on the road, though, ‘course. …An’ here we are.”

  Only later did Paul piece together the longer version of the story from his cousin Emily—that the start was a lot bumpier, and they nearly fell out early on over money and security on the road.

  “And then there was the thing with Dorian, “Emily explained. We knew almost as soon as we joined up with them that our whole future depended on getting over Dorian’s suspicion that Shay brought Daddy in to replace him.”

  “That’s how I wouldv’e taken it, if I were Dorian” Paul replied.

  “Me too, I guess. Dorian pretty much ignored Daddy for a week, and we worried he was plotting to get us thrown out of the work-camp.” She lowered her voice. “Then, one day last summer we were driving home from the shanty marketplace when we came up on Dorian—unconscious on the side of the road. A group of thugs were circling him like vultures.

  “I nearly had a heart attack when Daddy pulled over and jumped out of Bambi with his shotgun. He fired off on shot just above their heads before me and mom even got hold of our pistols. Those boys ran, thank God. Daddy dragged Dorian into the back of Bambi, and we split before the mob could form up. But we’d been denied at the gate of the township—just like you—and we couldn’t get him home. So, we brought him back to the yurt, right here, and prayed the mob wouldn’t track us down. We called Shay, but he didn’t seem too surprised, and told us to hang on to him ‘till he’d slept it off.”