The administrator’s voice crackled over the loud speaker, telling everyone to convene in the main pavilion for work assignments. Victoria, now carrying Penny, led the way down the gravel road, taking stock of the damage.
Maybe that’s the contract extension that’ll keep us here, she hoped.
They arrived at the pavilion in the town center to find Carson Schmidt, Deputy Chief Administrator of Troy Township, making his way to the small stage in the center. Victoria knew her cousin’s heart would be aflutter at the sight of him—Grimm Lockheart around or not. Emily had developed a secret crush on Carson the minute she first saw him, and he’d became the unspoken centerpiece of her fantasy of the future. A torrid love affair, followed by a permanent job in the township. Then marriage and children. Of course, Carson’s wife, Abagail, a beautiful woman with dark-brown hair that draped like silk past her shoulders, extinguished any real possibilities for Emily. Based on Carson’s visible adoration for Abigail, Victoria reckoned that only her death—followed by a prolonged grieving process—would ever free him up, and by then all things in life would have moved on. Victoria glanced over at Emily, noting her dreamlike gaze at Carson and felt pity at the futility of the serious girl’s one childish indulgence.
Moments later, Carson had taken the podium and started rattling off updates and assignments, which Victoria realized she had been too distracted by her cousin’s issues to note.
Damnit.
Residency badges to be worn at all times . . . GEO beacons activated . . . Recovery teams on the grid, food and water, defense, medical, child welfare, sanitation, construction . . . Only designated teams beyond the Outer Edge and only with armed Civ-Def escorts . . . Two guards on every tower, 24-7 until further notice . . . Absolutely no admittance of non-residents.
A little unnerved in trying to catch up and hearing Carson’s grave tone, Victoria became even more unsettled when she was assigned to a clean-up and sanitation team at the greenhouses in Zone 10, just down the hill from the township’s perimeter wall. She had assumed the township administrators would keep her inside the walls. The faint and distant echoes of gunfire emanating from the Outer Edge made her even more anxious.
Maybe Brady did narc on me, and this is my punishment.
Her heart was sinking until she heard Carson announce Brady as her team lead again in Zone 10. She looked back to find him right behind her, shooting her a friendly wink.
“OK, people, let’s get to it,” crackled Carson’s voice at last.
She said brief and anxious goodbyes to her clan as they parted for their various assignments and passed Penny to Gretchen Lockheart for escort to the child-safe area in the Pavilion.
“Vic,” Brady said in a businesslike tone when she reached the front of the line, “check-out a wheel-barrow and help Cassandra gather-up the produce from Greenhouse 23. The storm ripped a truck-sized hole in it, so watch for shards.”
She mustered a smile and queued up behind Cassandra, who gave her a dismissive nod. Within minutes, she was swimming in the current of citizens steering electric carts, push-wagons, and wheelbarrows. Down the hill with spare parts and equipment; up the hill again with food supplies.
It didn’t take long for Victoria to realize again that her task—like all manual labor jobs—was more of a marathon than a sprint, and too much rushing would just wear her down. So she opted-out of the hurried scramble and took a more leisurely pace, occasionally catching more of Cassandra’s bitter glare.
Chapter 29: Guarding the Aid
(Benjamin Holland)
Ben Holland and Felipe Arrivillaga hoisted a crate into the back of their battle lorry and concealed it with a plastic panel before loading in the boxes of aid. Ben caught sight of Alias lugging his duffle bag of personal effects. This assignment escorting Alias and some ministers from the PetrolChurch on a humanitarian mission would at least give him few days with Alias, even if their relationship filled him with anguish, and his real assignment from Sherman left him feeling underhanded.
Trying to be inconspicuous in watching Alias from afar, Ben felt like they had only just left the Troy Township infirmary after their near-death experience at the crash site. His boss had allowed him to stay in Troy a few days, an uncommon reward, Ben figured, for landing the new security contract with the Ellies and keeping the Gang of Seven’s prize alive—even if the latter had come with help. Ben hoped to see a lot of Alias in the months to come, but his boss had other ideas, pulling Ben away before he was really ready and sending him back into the Wilds. He’d been assigned to protect the Goodwells’ ministry—the PetrolChurch—only twice since then. Once with Jasmine. Once with George Anderson. One of the times he crossed paths with Alias, but only briefly, and with no real chance to engage. It had been enough to give him hope that maybe his next assignment would bring them together, and he could barely contain himself when this one came.
But it already wasn’t working out as he had hoped.
Ben had arrived in Park City the day before to pick up Alias and a load of relief supplies—along with a discreet shipment for his boss. He exchanged the usual courtesies with the Goodwell family, brought up GEO to review their trip—an itinerary that led them into the south of the Desert Plains Territory—with Alias’ parents. He had intended for it to set them more at ease.
If their son has to go so far down into the badlands, at least they’ll know he’s with someone who has it all planned out, he figured.
Minister Goodwell and Camila were visibly uncomfortable with the entire plan, however, so the review took longer than Ben had hoped. By the time it was over, Alias’ parents were exhausted and distressed, retiring without even the basic pleasantries he had come to expect from them.
With Minister Goodwell and Camila gone, and his crew already at work loading cargo, Ben was thrilled to find himself alone with Alias, and they picked up more or less where they had left off months before. This included another awkward wake up the next morning, when Ben rolled over on the plasti-foam bed to look upon Alias lying next to him.
“Hey stranger,” Alias said groggily.
There was something about being referred to as a “stranger”—a term that rang disturbingly true—that tripped a wire in Ben’s head, and all his nagging questions flooded into his head.
Why am I, after all this time, still really a stranger? Why are we apart, when it’s so obvious that we should be together?
He tried to rationalize it by blaming Sherman for deliberately sending him hither and yon on all manner of assignments. That would make sense, though Ben was confident that Sherman didn’t know of their relationship.
Just an unhappy coincidence that our travels never seem to overlap—despite crossing the same general regions of the Commonwealth? That defied logic.
Maybe it’s by the design of Alias’s parents? Or church officials? Or may be their Consortium sponsors? All have to be eager to avoid a scandal.
Or worse, he wondered, Alias could be avoiding him. Ben had heard the rumors of his lover’s escapades with women, and he had seen firsthand the amorous looks he traded with Emily Goldbloom.
Ben couldn’t contain his need to understand the barriers between him and his lover. And before he could stop himself, his interrogation began.
“How would your father react if he knew about us?”
“Dunno,” Alias answered nonchalantly, putting his hands behind his head and gazing at the ceiling. “Not well, I s’pose.”
Ben knew this already, but he waited conspicuously silent for Alias to expound. He could see that Alias understood where the question was headed and wasn’t very interested in going down that path. But as Ben’s relentless quiet dragged on, Alias finally caved.
“As a practical matter, he’d want to avoid any kind of publicity that might interfere with the church. The petroleros—” Alias paused again, worried he had revealed something he shouldn’t have. Ben gave him a reminding look that he had been at the Nautilus meeting when the PetrolChurch deal was struck. Reassured
, Alias continued. “The petroleros might see it as a hindrance to recruiting.”
Prob’ly right, Ben had to admit, while also feeling a sting in the look Alias gave him. He would be the one left disappointed if his questions continued, but Ben was determined to have it out, ploughing through the vacant and sickened feeling gnawing at his stomach.
“Is the church against it?” Ben was now as curious as he was interrogatory.
Alias sighed, wishing the questioning would end.
“Some of the ministers might have their own personal issues with it. They’re not all as loving and enlightened as they make out.
“I don’t think my dad’s ever made a judgment on it. He’s condemned some of the pogroms—at least the ones that made the news—but only privately. He might think God’s against it, but he’s even more against killing. In any case, he’s never brought it up in sermons. There’d prob’ly be a riot if he did.”
Ben already knew about the religious and moral disconnects between Alias and Minister Goodwell. Alias wore the robes and did his duty for the Church. But he otherwise had little interest in spiritual matters. Alias also resisted his father’s moralism when it could get in the way of his family’s standing—and safety—with their Ellie benefactors. Ben had been shocked to hear their disagreement firsthand the night before, including a sharp exchange that took Ben completely off guard.
“I get it,” Alias had snarked to his father when Minister Goodwell disapproved of Alias going on the aid mission to Austin. “Seems the faith is a bit and selective. You can cry all you want about God’s will—or your interpretation of it—but it rings a little hollow when you pick and choose.”
Ben thought at the time that Minister Goodwell would rip Alias’ head off, even though Alias’ father was, to Ben’s way of thinking, an endless fount of patience—especially for his children. The flash of red vanished from Minister Goodwell’s face almost as soon as it appeared, and he merely sighed, reminded his son that God All-Powerful was watching them, and they could do more to alleviate the suffering of the world if they didn’t get themselves killed. Minister Goodwell then retired. That’s when Alias grabbed Ben’s wrist and led him off—almost as if it were spite.
Ben understood as well as anyone that there were real-world, practical—even life-and-death—implications of morality. Especially when they ran counter to the interests of the Ellies or their proxies. Ben’s travels for Farid Sherman had three times led them past the Billings Home for Children, and each time he had to force himself to keep moving. His desire for moral justice—righteous retribution (albeit tinged with a raw thirst for revenge)—was like a siren song, bidding him to make good on his promise to return and kill every one of the staff there. But the righteousness of his cause would go unappreciated by the Ellies and the foreign oligarchs who traded in sex and children there. Sherman would be forced to cut him loose, and he’d find himself destitute, or face down in a ditch.
Then there was the morality of his vocation itself—his entire existence. Ben had prospered under Farid Sherman, who would do pretty much anything for the right price, and Ben knew from his nightmares that he was living on the wrong side of whatever moral code there was left in the world. He and his crew spent most of their time moving the cargo of depravity. Weapons, drugs, and even people.
Some of his missions entailed pushing migrants and squatters from the lands of the Ellies and the industrial consortiums. Men, women, and children. Families. By force, when necessary—when the urchins tried to put feeding their kids above the rule of law. He sometimes wondered how many children had ended up in places like the Billings Home because of his obedience to his paymaster, and it made him sick.
On more than one occasion, he’d been sent specifically to kill. Debtors to Sherman or his customers—the Ellies, the consortiums, the Big Five churches, drug cartels, and mob leaders. He’d put down labor leaders. Political agitators. Messianics who’d taken it too far. Even cops who had proved too committed to the rule of law, or their own sense of morality.
Ben knew at first glance of the itinerary that, despite the aid mission, the trip would be much like the others he’d done over the years. Of course, protect the aid convoys and deliver the supplies to whatever MACs, shanties, or tent cities Alias desired. But their true cargo, hidden behind crates of aid, was a stash of weapons, spare parts, comms equipment, and explosives. Among his critical objectives, he was to trade Sherman’s contraband along the way and procure drugs to sell back up north. Depending on how long the mission lasted, it could expand to include facilitating armed pushes by coyotes to get migrants and refugees through the Commonwealth’s thin defensive network.
Most importantly, Ben’s team would deposit several large crates at a handful of the work sites near the PetrolChurch’s facilities and at major transportation intersections, while keeping a small locked bag on his person at all times. When the time came, Sherman said, Ben would get new instructions and he had to be prepared to move quickly all the way back to Sherman’s home base in Lolo Hot Springs.
Ben’s last trip through the badlands had also been different from most of his others, and it made him wary, especially with Alias involved. Ben had first noticed something was askew when his convoy rumbled past a line of rocket buggies and light-armored bullfrog jeeps. At every stop, they traded more advanced equipment to larger complements of bandits, mercenaries, paramilitaries, and coyotes. Heavier weapons to groups of ultra-nationalists and racial supremacists of the white, Asian, Black, and Latino varieties.
Steeling his nerves at every stop, he made their trades as quickly as he could, his team keeping eyes peeled and weapons poised. Any of the groups would likely take issue if they discovered that his next delivery was slated for their enemies. So, it was with some relief that they made their final drop, concealed the narcotics, and set off for base.
Their luck ran out on the way back, though, when they were stopped by “Justice Brigades” of the White Light of Christ, white supremacist militia with no discernable interest in the teachings of Christ, at least as Ben understood the teachings. They trained the same weapons on them that Ben had delivered the day before, demanding they surrender their vehicles, weapons, and cargo for violating the Brigades’ ban on supporting illegal immigrants. The inevitable war this would mean with Sherman didn’t seem to faze them, adding to Ben’s dismay.
Ben couldn’t be sure if they had been given up by someone inside his crew, or by a competitor. Maybe the White Light’s just pieced together the obvious and decided they’re ready to defy Sherman. Don’t matter. Surrendering’s a death sentence, either by the White Light, the desert, or Sherman if we survive the first two.
The gunfight that ensued stretched a mile and half before the Justice Brigades finally broke off the attack. By then, one of Ben’s lorries was out of commission, its precious cargo and five of his crew consumed in flames. Four more were wounded. Ben’s battered convoy limped along the fractured road on its way to Sherman’s safehouse in the Southern Rocky Mountain Territory. He was tempted to pull off the road to lay low and tend to their wounded, but he knew the planned coyote breakthrough had already begun, and the White Light was probably already fighting it. That battle would stretch as far as it needed to. So, he pressed on to the half-way house, knowing he would likely lose one or two of his injured people on the way.
Now, just weeks later, Ben pushed the danger out of his mind, returning to the troubling mission before him, and the pounding reality that he would never be with Alias the way he wanted to be. Their moment together would end soon—probably ruined by his interrogation—and he couldn’t help but wonder if their next steps would land them right back in the hospital. Assuming the injuries weren’t too serious, that might help them come together, if their relationship hadn’t collapsed under the weight of Ben’s baggage.
He wanted to savor this fleeting moment with Alias, despite the insecurity and frustration engendered by loving someone less than they love him in return. But there was a drum
beat in his head.
He’ll never love you. Not really. This nagging thought was more than the general malaise and self-doubt he felt about almost everyone.
As he mustered his resolve to get up from the bed and walk out, there was a knock at the door, and he watched in panic as the door handle turned and the door crept open.
How could we forget to lock it? Ben admonished himself.
Ben breathed a sigh of relief in seeing Felipe’s face appear through the narrow space in the door. Felipe already knew about Ben’s earlier encounter with Alias, as well as the flame Ben carried for him. Ben had been through thick and thin with Felipe, all the way back to the Billings Home, and he trusted him with his life.
Ben’s heart sank, however, when Emily Goldbloom followed in behind Felipe. Emily Goldbloom, whom they all knew to be infatuated with Alias, stood gobsmacked at the sight of the two men in bed. Her expression betrayed an intense calculation process, before she turned and stomped out of the room. Ben wondered whom she would tell and when, and for a split second he considered how he might kill her to keep her silent. He looked back at Alias, disappointed to find his lover disconcerted by her reaction. As Emily stormed from the room, Alias bounded after her, leaving Ben in bed alone without so much as a look back.
He’ll never love you. Not really.
He wants to be with her, at least as much as he wants to be with me. Why doesn’t he want to be with me? I’m a good person, he thought, though he wasn’t at all convinced on that point.
I’d be good to him. That much he could say with confidence.
He wants to be with other people on his travels. And why wouldn’t he? We’re never together.
If we were together, he’d see— but we’ll never be together. He’s a minister’s son. Bound to a religious life. I’m a scrapper, bound to a violent life.
Fire, Ruin, and Fury (Embers Saga) Page 35