I got the feeling that Martinez had expected that I wasn’t telling him everything, but that didn’t diminish the impact of getting confirmation for that. “Sounds like you had a lot of fun.”
I shrugged. “It wasn’t boring, if you mean that. Never thought I’d say that, but I was glad you weren’t along.”
“My sutures are way better than that,” he quipped.
“Yeah, but their good-for-nothing medic had to cut me up once more in the middle of the French countryside. The stumpy left middle finger is thanks to him as well. The only saving grace of that was it wasn’t you who had to do it.” I paused, remembering all too well—but also what had come next. “But when I woke up in the morning, the serum had finally kicked in and since then it’s been one fun romp of hilarity and bloodlust. You’re really missing out on so much.”
Martinez took my words with a somber nod, but grimaced at the last part. “Thanks, but no thanks. It’s hard work keeping my soul pure and light around the likes of you imbeciles. I’m not deliberately desecrating my body.”
I couldn’t help but glance at the small, wooden cross fixed to the wall by the left side of the bed—Martinez’s side, judging from where he’d plonked down earlier before joining me in the living area. I’d noticed it as soon as I’d entered the cabin, but it wasn’t like I had the right to remark on it—or had felt so until now.
“Does it help? Having faith, when the world around you turns into a living nightmare?” I more mused than asked, only on the last words looking back to him, just in time to catch his grimace “I’m serious. I’m not being a bitch, or trying to knock you down. Just…” I exhaled slowly, flexing my fingers before I finally dropped my hands in my lap, briefly staring at them. “That winter, I had a few moments when suicide sounded really damn good to me. Less of an active action but just being a little too slow in the next defense, or missing a step when I knew I had to take one to keep my balance. I sure as fuck was mad enough at Hamilton to have a reason to keep living, but, you know. There was a dark abyss there and I did a lot of staring straight into it. Does it help you to believe in something beyond our mortal coil? Or is it worse because you can have the whole ‘God, why me?’ thing going on?”
He gradually relaxed as I explained, wincing at my obvious pain but no longer looking ready to get in my face.
“God didn’t do any of this,” he said, briefly reaching behind his back to touch the scars there. “That was our fault for being stupid enough to run straight into that trap. And the fault of whoever placed the charges and detonated them. That I can walk again is partly your fault, I guess. Faith isn’t that easy. There’s no quick fix. You don’t just pretend to be pious one day and ramble off two Hail Marys, and bam! You’re saved. Everything you do, and have done, and will do, counts. That’s what I like to focus on. That my actions count, because I have faith. Because I believe. That I have very good reasons not to be the most petty fucker on earth just because I can.” He sighed, his fingers idly drumming on his drawn-up knee. “Doesn’t mean that I didn’t rail against it all a time or two. Being tested is part of the deal. It’s always easy to be good when the world is perfect and everyone treats you right.” He cracked a brief smile then. “I do get extra credit for hanging around you bunch of raging heathens, though. Pretty sure of that.”
“So we make you look good, huh? Isn’t that cheating?”
He ignored my jibe, instead getting back on topic. “I can’t tell you if it’s easier to have faith. You believe in things, too. Doesn’t always have to be religion. And you don’t seem to need faith to get the concept of a crusade.”
“Yeah, don’t remind me of that,” I grumbled. “All the good that did us.”
“It’s not all bad, what came from it,” he pointed out. “Plus, I doubt that all, if any, of it is actually your fault. People using people is way older than the Bible. You can be a terrible person in the name of God, and a good egg without. Not that you’re a good egg. But your shoulders are way too scrawny to carry the entire weight of the world.”
Staring into the air between us, I took my time formulating my reply. “I just want him back, you know? Very much unscathed, pretty please, but I can deal with a little bit of tarnish. I never wanted to incite rebellion. And I sure as hell never wanted to kill anyone. But they seem to get in my way, one way or another.”
“That’s life,” Martinez succinctly let me know. When I raised my brows in surprise at him, he laughed. “Oh, come on. You married one of the biggest warmongers around. You didn’t expect you could just disappear and pretend like nothing happened, or the past wouldn’t catch up with you? He sure didn’t; I know that for a fact.”
I hadn’t expected the conversation to go there, but it was too good an opening to miss. “What’s your take on Decker? You must have heard of him. Known someone who knew of him, at least.” I hesitated, but then went for it. “Didn’t Smith ever talk about him?” That would have been his boyfriend—who was one of the first to turn, thanks to some contaminated syrup at a coffee shop, even before that wave of zombies had chased us out of the city. Who I’d killed, with a cake knife. Thinking back, I once again marveled at how Martinez had never held that against me. He was likely the only truly good guy left on the planet.
His expression turned sad for a second as he must have thought along the same lines but quickly snapped back to animatedly neutral. “He didn’t, but then he was an NCO.” When I just looked at him blankly, he snickered. “You remember that he was a staff sergeant? Will you ever learn to understand military ranks?”
“Never tried,” I offered with a grin. “I know, how terrible of me.”
“You sure keep pissing people off with ignoring them,” he muttered but got serious again. “As far as I know, Decker only got to the officers. Apparently, built up his own little cadre of homicidal nut jobs. He’s a ghost story to most.” He paused, suddenly conflicted.
“What aren’t you telling me?” Now things had suddenly gone from idle reminiscing to interesting.
Martinez shook his head, if somewhat apologetically. “It’s personal. And it has nothing do with him, or Miller. Who never breathed a word to me, just saying, which isn’t that unusual. But I heard from another medic who was stationed at the hospital back when they discharged Rita—you know, Dispatch’s Rita?”
I’d figured he’d meant her since I didn’t know anyone else by that name, or who might have caused emotions to run high among our people. One of these days I would have to find out why the Ice Queen hated her almost with as much animosity as I had toward Hamilton. Had had. Whatever. “Sure, her. She was discharged because of the injuries she sustained when Nate’s attempt of dropping out didn’t quite go as planned.” Also due to Hamilton—yet another reason to hate his guts.
“Word is, she tried to hang herself in her hospital room first thing after they told her that she was out. I know the official story goes, it was because she lost her purpose, not being able to be out in the field anymore. But the medic told me that she’d heard it was because she was afraid where she’d end up, now that she was officially useless.”
I had a pretty good idea where that would have been, after our visit to Canada and France. That almost made me feel for her—almost.
“How come she didn’t?”
Martinez snorted at what I felt was a valid question. “Because maybe some tales are taller than the people they are told about,” he offered. “Or maybe she just got lucky. Who knows? Maybe someone figured she might be handy at a later date and she’d be wasted as a lab rat? Your guess is as good as mine. But if you ask me about her real motive? If what Nate was running from is true, she probably decided to end her own life because she was afraid of what Decker would do to her again now that whatever she went through the first time had gotten useless. Then again, nobody has a clue where she’s been between then and showing up in Dispatch, so, who knows?”
Now didn’t that paint a pretty picture? And one I absolutely didn’t care for.
�
�You think she’s compromised?”
Martinez shook his head. “Not saying it’s true. But when you and Nate didn’t return from France, she immediately upped her security, and word is, she made damn sure that Dispatch was a veritable fortress come spring. That’s why it’s pretty much the only place where the scavengers never managed to do any damage—she kicked out anyone who even looked at her the wrong way. But before you get your hopes up, she won’t help you. She might as well be one of them for how she deals with the rest of us—either you’re with her, or you’re about to get shot.”
Hearing that made me wonder if, maybe, Nate had gotten a message to her—or Bucky had decided that, just like Nate, Rita might get in his way after all and he’d warned her just like he’d warned us. The usual anger was right there, familiar and comforting, not diminished by hearing that the bastard was dead.
“Is anything still the same from before?” I harped, not caring for how grumpy I sounded.
Martinez smiled briefly, likely at my tone rather than the question. “They still won’t let you into the Silo,” he offered. “And I’m sure Emma will be about as friendly if you get too close to her kingdom of Wyoming. Since most of the country didn’t much care for you before, I’d say things are pretty much the same. It’s for the rest of us that things changed drastically.” He paused, as if to gather his thoughts. “That spring, after you disappeared, we all started fresh into a new year, into the world you’d promised us—and for a lot of people, that ended way too soon, way too bloody, with more violence than they could handle. I guess you’ve been wondering about the scavengers—the new breed of them? They got to call themselves that because none of us old dogs are left, pretty much.”
I really didn’t like hearing that. “They killed that many people? How?”
“Not killed, at least for the most part,” he explained. “Oh, they got a few shots in before people realized what was going on. Hit some of our strongest and hardest—like Jason’s guys.”
“Shit.”
He was ready to agree with me. “They’d stocked up to thirty people. Seven of them returned. Jason himself survived; Charlie, obviously, too. The rest, all new guys you’ve likely never met. Other groups met about the same fate. Remember that ranking list they had up in Dispatch when we dropped by? Of the top fifty, only four got away unscathed, mostly because they’d been hunkered down in colder regions at the time and were late to hit the roads. Everyone else either sustained heavy losses, or immediately disbanded when people decided that it wasn’t worth it. Before the heat of summer forced the entire country to its knees, most scavengers had decided that settling down sounded mighty reasonable. And they could pick and choose from several settlements, as they were next to be hit, after they did away with the roaming defenders that might have come to anyone’s help out there. I don’t have the official stats, but I think I remember someone telling us that only one in three settlements had made it until the next winter. Those that are still standing mostly did so because they had already semi-settled former scavengers calling their town their new home, or welcomed the freshly disillusioned road warriors with open arms.”
I listened to his grim tale with as little emotion as I could manage, but I felt my heart seize up nevertheless. Somehow, that was worse than what Red and Greene had told me. At least nobody could blame me for that.
“And the army? And everyone else—they’re not alone out there, I know that. Wilkes and the Silo can’t be the only ones who have marines among their ranks—and whatever navy personnel that weren’t mere paper pushers. Air force, coast guard, national guard—I know we’ve met a few on the road and heard about small groups at various settlements, but this must have gotten someone worried.”
Martinez nodded, not looking particularly happy. “The three major players—the Silo, Dispatch, and New Angeles—found themselves with a lot of support they hadn’t expected. I’m sure that some were spies, but I think after the shit we pulled at the Colorado base and everything that came with it, a lot of those who’d been sticking it out on their own for the first two years decided that civilization came with some perks, like strength in numbers, so they went where strength was already on the fence, and in numbers. We heard from a few bases that they were attacked as well but for the most part, we thought they were just watching. Turns out, they got hit just as hard, if mostly from the inside. When they vetted the former scavengers who wanted to flock to them, they were very thorough—but they missed those that had come before the wave of violence swept over the country. There are no official numbers, but I know Zilinsky did some snooping. We think that the army lost at least a third of its installations and bases. You weren’t the scourge of their existence, after all. The rest—no idea, but I doubt they fared better.”
It suddenly made a lot more sense that Bucky had bit it—and that Red had been so quick to respond when we’d gone silent. Even if he hadn’t told anyone who he was in contact with, he likely must have dropped hints that he still had an ace up his sleeve, hiding in the middle of nowhere. But that in turn posed a question—why hadn’t Red dropped by and told us about this? And not just him.
“Did any of you try to reach us?” I felt like it was a valid question. “We wouldn’t have been easy to find, but we might have found you if you’d shown up in the region.”
Martinez shook his head. “I think we all kind of agreed that if you’d managed to get away for real, you deserved to live your quiet life all on your own. I’m surprised you didn’t know anything about what went down.”
“We were pretty insistent on that stay-away-from-everyone doctrine,” I admitted, not particularly liking how that had turned out. “But we wouldn’t have stayed away if we’d known that it got that bad.”
“It was likely for the best,” Martinez offered. “They did what they did whether they had you to blame or not. If you’d been around, someone would have delivered you to them—and the only difference would have been that you’d both be dead.”
“Does anyone know why they did this?” I tried to remember the specifics of what Richards had told me. “Resources? Power? Anything?”
Martinez shook his head. “That’s the thing—they never asked for anything. Well, except your head on a pike, but that’s it. After they slaughtered people and burned down settlements, there was a lot of grand talk about equalizing things, but from what we know, they didn’t bother trying to trade or live off the land. They’re also not one coordinated faction that strikes with distinction. It’s as if suddenly, a percentage of people went insane and started going after everything they perceived as ‘other,’ no explanation needed. And no, far as I know there was no calming agent experiment involved.”
I couldn’t help but grin at him making the exact same reference as I had before, but that was a very brief moment of respite.
“And then there’s the slaver camp on the other end of the country that chose to ‘nap the wrong people,” I concluded.
“There’s them,” Martinez agreed. “Like everyone else, we’ve heard stories, but with over a thousand miles of distance between here and there, we never really considered them a serious threat. Until now.”
I stared at him for a few seconds flat before I leaned forward, placing my elbows on my knees so I could let my head rest on my hands and still look at him. “We’re so fucking screwed.”
Martinez laughed softly. “Pretty much. But what else is new?”
I kept staring at him, as if that would yield any answers. “How did it come to this? Why didn’t anyone do anything to stop it before it turned into… well, this?”
All he had for me is a shrug. “And who, exactly, should have done it? You saw yourself what you got for taking a stand, and the very same is true for the other side. We still have no government, and if the last years have yielded one fundamental truth, it’s that nobody gives a shit on a global level. It’s a dog-eat-dog world out there, often more literally than most of us feel comfortable with. You want an answer to the question you actually
want to ask—whether you or Miller could have made a difference? I doubt it. Those who blame you as a traitor and a spy, who say that all you did was tag the people who might become a problem in the long run, weren’t completely wrong, because rising up did end up getting a lot of people killed. But so did hunkering down on their own and trying to isolate themselves from the rest.”
I couldn’t help but shake my head, less in avoidance or disagreement but simply because it all went miles over my head. “And there I was about to complain that I sometimes spent days not talking to anyone because Nate was in one of his moods again.”
Despite the grim topic, Martinez flashed me a quick grin. “I know how hard that must have been for you.”
“Terrible,” I emphasized.
“Without a doubt.”
“The worst, actually,” I insisted.
He chuckled, and I could see the exact moment when he was ready to throw the curveball he’d been holding for the past several minutes. Ah, how I’d missed that as well. “I figure with everything that happened to you up in Canada, it must have taken Nate some time to get over it. But he did, right?”
I considered my answer carefully, wishing for a beer—more to have something to hold than because the booze would do anything for me, which it wouldn’t. “I’m not going to lie. It did a number on him. That I was way too occupied with myself, my pain, my anger—none of that helped. But as things between us do, eventually they came to a head and we had to pull through, together. I didn’t realize it at the time, but I think this more than anything that Hamilton said was what made Nate decide to be cautious and disappear. But neither of us did well in isolation, that’s for sure. I may be the one who’s been more vocal about it, but I know we both felt it. We weren’t so much being smart and cautious but had simply stopped the clock for a while—but eventually, it would start ticking again. I know this sounds insane, but I’m almost glad the slavers got to us, because now this diffuse sense of being suspended in weightlessness is finally gone. Now, I can act again. I have things to do and people to meet, plans to think up, and actions to set. We weren’t doing the smart thing, we were just avoiding the inevitable. That’s over now. I just hope like hell that we’ll both survive this so we can face what’s coming next head-on.”
Green Fields (Book 10): Uprising: Page 21