World of Ashes (40 page)

After parking the H
umvee inside a Jiffy Lube so it would be out of sight, Lee and Ethan donned their best camouflage and dug in for a stakeout. Ethan checked around the corner, nothing but the wind and a one armed Zim shuffling along the interstate as if he were looking for his long eaten away appendage. “I don’t want to tell you how to do your thing, but I need you to stay in the open.” Ethan said to Juan, wishing he didn’t have to. It exposed him to Newton, sure, but also to every thief and zim within sight.

             
“No problem. I’ll make it look good, I’ll go around and start popping the trunks of cars.” Juan pointed to a car sitting in the Walgreens parking lot, the only one that had tires that still looked okay. Juan walked over to the Jiffy Lube and used a couple towels to make the Toyota Prius look like it had been driven recently. It wouldn’t start, the battery was beyond dead, but he was able to push it onto the road without much effort. There was a minimal chance Newton had seen the car before, it had only been visible from a certain angle and Juan had almost missed it at that.

             
Ethan began shadowing Juan from the bushes while Lee found a grassy null and kept vigil with Ethan’s M14. Newton could run, but he would just die tired. They had been prepared to stay in town for over a week, but as if God wanted them to carry out his righteous will in a quick hurry, Newton’s patrol car appeared over a hill in between two BBQ restaurants just before sunset. Lee spotted him first and radioed Ethan and Juan before contacting Sullivan and Labadie. Labadie responded that they had three artillery pieces sighting in their coordinates. All three of them knew the risks if Newton escaped. The lives of hundreds rested squarely on their shoulders now. If he ran they might never catch him again.

             
It didn’t take long for Newton to take the bait and move in closer. Apparently Juan’s kicking of the Prius and tossing the gas can across the street got Newton’s attention from afar. He had no problem finding people who didn’t know how to hold still. Believing Juan to be a stranded refugee looking for a way to fuel his hybrid, Newton casually followed the speed limit and yield and stop signs as he made his way to Juan. His patrol car was clean, the rims and tires polished. This was a science for him. Ethan and Lee’s first impulse was to just shoot him, the impulse of a Soldier who’d laid an ambush and wanted to spring the trap. No one would have blamed them, and in hindsight it was the best thing they could have done, hoping Lee could make that one perfect shot through the windshield. It’s a shame time travel doesn’t exist.

             
The siren blipped three times. It would attract Zims, but none were in any shape to make the effort enough to do harm. “Hi there.” Newton said as he climbed out of his patrol car with a smile. His stereotypical, 1970’s throwback porno mustache tilted up as his smile broadened at seeing Juan’s faked relief. If he was suspicious of Juan, Newton certainly didn’t show it. This was just another day in the life of the only shark in the fish tank. Ethan and Lee held their breath, gambling with the life of an innocent man. 

             
“Oh, man, am I glad to see a cop!” Juan shot to his feet. “I didn’t think there were any police left. Thank God for you, man!” Newton walked around the front of the Charger to greet Juan. They shook hands. To his credit Juan was one hell of an actor. “Man, I’ve been wandering around here a while. I was trying to go around St. Louis, not really sure how I ended up here, or where here might be.” Juan continued, almost making small talk. “So where’s Sullivan?” He pointed to the lettering on the Charger.

             
It seemed, only for the briefest of moments, that Newton was going to buy it. That he would invite Juan into his car, and Ethan or Lee could shoot and incapacitate him. Naturally, they weren’t that lucky. Newton didn’t let go of Juan’s hand, even though they’d stopped shaking. Instead, from behind his ridiculous aviator glasses he looked off and to the left and leaned in, sniffing Juan. How they could possibly have overlooked the signature refugee smell!? Smell was a big part of the world they lived in, and those who lived in town were privileged enough to have access to a couple different laundry businesses and running water. Juan had made the common enough error of washing his clothes, something no one in a wilderness filled with stores stocked to the brim with brand new clothing would ever bother to do. Either you stank because you didn’t change clothes, or you smelled like a clothing store with a turd underneath.

             
Newton smiled, his teeth stained with coffee and tobacco. He whispered to Juan, “You stink right purdy, boy.”

             
Acting on impulse Ethan jumped from behind the bush, the orange arrow of his ACOG tactical sight right in the middle of Newton’s forehead. The face of the Devil turned to face Ethan very slowly, still not releasing his grasp on his new hostage. It must have been a death grip because Juan began sweating bullets and leaning like he was in great pain. Newton was not physically imposing, even with a second chance vest on he was barely bigger round than some children. Once, during Ethan’s time in Iraq, a prisoner had rushed one of the other Soldiers in the detention facility where they were stationed. The prisoner was smaller than Newton by a long shot and skinnier than a fence post and still managed to put the one of the larger MP’s through a wooden door before the others could help. After that, Ethan never underestimated the small guy, though he’d forever cherish the memory of SPC Lyll getting cut down to size by a half starved Iranian insurgent.

             
For the longest moment Ethan and Newton just locked eyes in silence. Ethan didn’t demand Newton lay down his arms, or even let go of Juan. It wasn’t that he didn’t remember how to be a cop, or even that he’d never actually memorized the Miranda speech. He just didn’t care. “Give me a reason.” Ethan hissed finally.

“
Why, Sheriff… How good to see you.” There was no mistaking the tone of his voice. Instead of nasally and slightly annoying as it had been, Newton had the air of a rock star. This was his domain and he wasn’t scared of anything, least of all an upstart punk who’d taken his job. The briefest fear that Newton might have backup crossed Ethan’s mind, but if that were true he’d just fucked himself by jumping out in the open like it was a game of hide and seek. That he was still alive meant there was no sniper.

“Let him go
.” Ethan steadied his breathing as best he could. He’d faced gangbangers and zombies, but never a true apex predator. Someone who understood that animals were not the most glorious prey, but who also knew deep down inside that the most exciting hunt, the only
equal
hunt that could truly prove what a man was made of, was to hunt his fellow man.

             
“And then what?” Newton made no effort to undo the clasp of his holster. He was too fast a draw for it to be a bother. Ethan knew this only because he’d seen the man put down more than his fair share of Zims with the sidearm and return it to its holster before the brass hit the ground. Probably watched too many Westerns in between torturing small animals as a child.

             
“And then I decide whether or not to kill you or hand you over to Kenly.”

             
Newton nodded, “Which one did you find?” He smiled. Always smiling. What in the hell was there to smile about?

             
“Let... him… go.” Ethan repeated himself. He didn’t plan to ask again.

             
“Probably my cave.” Newton still wouldn’t release Juan, but then Juan was now frozen in fear. The situation had gone from Plan-A to FUBAR in seconds. “Yes… I suppose  it was sloppy of me to do God’s work so close to home, but hey, someone had to do it. It’s an ongoing learning process, ya know?”

             
“You sick fuck...” Juan, in a move that seemed too well practiced for a California surfer dude, elbowed Newton in the throat. The psychopath released his grip on Juan, surprised mostly that the fake refugee had gotten the drop on him. He must have convinced himself the terrified young man was no threat.

Ethan jerked the trigger as adre
naline dumped through his veins. He missed. As good a shot as Ethan was, he couldn’t believe how fast his foe could move. His M14 did little more than pop out the rear windshield and put holes in the patrol car as Newton slammed the accelerator, knocking the derelict Prius off to one side. At the last moment Ethan grabbed Juan by the collar of the shirt and threw himself and his friend off the road into a ditch before the patrol car could take them out. The tumbling hybrid spun off the road like a Frisbee, missing Ethan’s back by less than an inch while it cartwheeled over the top of him.

Lee had slightly better luck
, and even through the closed door of the cruiser Newton took a high velocity round to the right shoulder. It was intended for his face, but the angle of the glass and plastic film in the windshield deflected the bullet some. The explosion of glass from the inner layer ripped Newton’s face to a bloody pulp. His foot stomped on the gas, but he drove on screaming and crying and shouting like a schoolyard bully who’d just gotten what was coming to him. Newton slammed into every car in his path, unable to cope with the shock of this turn of events, and with all the blood that was running down his arm. With only seconds to react Lee dropped the rifle and picked up the radio, a difficult choice, but his last resort when impulse failed him. Ethan saw his brother let his rifle fall and pushed himself and Juan farther into the ditch. The sky was about to fire and brimstone on the wicked.

Lee keyed the mike and shouted, “Alamo Six to Texas Holdem Six. Target is in the open, prepare for firemission. Break. Observer Identification, Warning Order, Immediate Suppression, break. Target know
n grid coordinates 37Charlie by 57Baker, Creeping Fire, Projectile Three: Anything heavy! Over.” Ethan listened to the precision warfighting machine that was his brother, a mixture of pride and envy rushed through him, but mostly of concern for Lee’s exposed position. The artillery would take only seconds to reach Eureka from Labodie, and then this one serene ghost town would be a wasteland like the WWI No Man’s Land of France.

             
The first shot obliterated the nearby firehouse, despite being a 105mm marker round shrapnel and debris impacted everything, including the cruiser. Lee watched with morbid fascination as the car continued on with part of a ladder protruding from the passenger door. The second round, which must have been a 155, hit the still moving cruiser as if it were a standing target on a range. The concussion shook the men so hard they fell to their hands and knees, the intense fireball of high explosives and gasoline leaving no trace the cruiser had ever been there. Lee grabbed the radio and called off the rest of the strikes, but two more hit the pizzeria and a small subdivision of tacky looking apartments, probably improving the scenery when the fire stopped spreading.

             
An eerie silence marked the minutes after the explosions, as if all the world stood back in awe of the firepower of a motivated Soldier and his radio could weild. Lee was the first to crawl out of his hideaway when Dodge-made confetti stopped raining down on them, his expression as blank as Ethan and Juan’s. They stood there for some time before the signature
thump thump thump
of a Blackhawk helicopter was heard in the distance. It was over. They’d won. Score one for the OK Guys (because Good might be stretching things a little bit.)

             
Juan lit a cigarette. “I’m
soooo
getting laid tonight.”              

10

“Libertatem aut Mortem”

             
What was a normal life in the absence of a civilization that spanned every continent? What was life without cities, without airliners soaring overhead or cell phones bleeping every moment of every day, idiots who looked like zombies walking around with a wireless headset in one ear, oblivious to their surroundings, their pants sagging below their butts in the name of prisoner inspired fashion? How would they get along, not having to worry about monopolized gas prices or the scum of Washington DC circumventing the Constitution like it was worth no more than a roll of toilet paper? How would the people survive, not having to choose between the lesser evil of two out-of-touch millionaires running for President, only to have the Electoral College nullify their vote in the end? A world without Brittany Spears or Paris Hilton or Brad’jolina or that insufferable Justin Bieber, or even the bewilderingly pointless show about mentally handicapped Guidos living on the New Jersey shoreline. What was life like after the Apocalypse you might ask yourself?

             
Peaceful.

             
Serene.

             
Uncomplicated.

             
Fulfilling.

             
These are some of the words Ethan would have used to describe his world the day Samuel was born. There are a million thoughts that go through a new parent’s mind. Most involve pride and fear. Pride in accomplishment, fear in what to do next and the long, long, long long road ahead. In Ethan and Mary’s mind, Samuel Robert Cally was the most beautiful thing either had ever seen. Bogey decided instantly the infant belonged to him, and so slept beneath the crib from that day forward, keeping a constant vigil.

             
There hadn’t been much fanfare when Keith and Paula had Serenity, people’s lives were still under threat, and though not much had changed there seemed more time for the little things like celebrating new life in a world turned to ashes. Those in the circle of friends and respected coworkers came by to see the child Ethan and Mary had made, some perhaps to make sure no ancient Mayan prophecies had been fulfilled involving Ethan and the Antichrist, but most just to wish them well. The town was now walled in like an ancient fiefdom, or a massive Forward Operating Base for those who’ve seen one. The irony that Ethan would feel safer behind a wall than free on the other side of it wasn’t lost on him. The Ethan from a decade ago would have thought he had gone completely, bat-shit insane.

             
The sadistic rein of terror perpetrated by former officer Newton was a bad memory of late spring for most people. His castles of doom had all been burned to the ground. Ashes to Ashes, Dust to Dust. However, there didn’t seem to be any more refugees than before. Most people were headed South towards Texas, but with major Red Zones like the Missouri, Mississippi and Meramec Rivers and the wasteland of St. Louis all to the North of the town, few came their way. This suited most just fine, fewer fights, fewer mouths to feed and fewer people to watch over.

             
The Texas Marines eventually pulled out to be replaced by a Texas Army unit that would be rotated every six months. The irony that, should her life not have changed so drastically, Mary would have been going back to civilization had she stayed in the Texas Marines was not lost on her. She also didn’t seem to mind, though. Her quaint, boring little life was what she’d always wanted, even if she didn’t know it. Her job was fun, never the same from one day to the next, and sometimes she got to blow shit up.

             
“So what do you wanna do today, Brain?” Ethan asked as they sat on a bench outside the truck stop chow hall. Mary was breastfeeding, but had brought Ethan lunch so he didn’t have to suffer whatever was being cooked.

             
“The same thing we do every day, Pinky.” Mary’s imitation of the fat-headed mouse was surprisingly accurate, “Watch me pop my boob into this kid’s mouth, then change his diaper when he poops himself immediately after.” Ethan laughed so hard Diet Pepsi squirted up his noise, burning all the way as it dribbled out both nostrils onto the pavement. Several other people who were sitting nearby started laughing too.

             
“I hear they’re playing
Legends of the Fall
and
Mr. & Mrs. Smith
in the high school gym tonight.” Ethan offered after wiping his face off. “Seems someone has a thing for Brad Pitt.”

             
“Now, c’mon.” Mary sighed, “No one likes it when you bring a baby to a movie. I hated it, and I know people will hate it now… Even if I am an obsessive Brad Pitt fan. I mean, I’d totally go bi for Jennifer Aniston, but Brad? Oh my gawd, the way his back meets his ass… and the other side too…” She rolled her eyes and bit her lip, pretending to be extremely turned on just thinking about an actor who was probably dead. Ethan ignored her and briefly mused about what Mr. Pitt might look like as a Zombie. Was his new wife a zombie? He’d seen pictures of Miss Jolie in the morning. It might be hard to tell. Maybe one of their foreign adopted pets survived. Best 1 outta 10.

             
“Fine. I guess we can just sit at home and do naughty things to each other like we always do.” Ethan’s pretend sad voice sounded like Bullwinkle.

             
“Or not.” Mary looked up at him, “Forgetting what Keith said already?”

             
“Oh yeah.” Ethan lowered his head. Keith had made it very clear that getting pregnant a second time was super easy right after one child was born, and the birth itself had caused some tears that still needed to heal. They’d have to wait. Why oh why had Ethan thrown all his porn away!?

             
“Wanna go to a tower and shoot at Zims?”

             
“Can’t take a baby into a machinegun nest, Ethan.”

             
Ethan looked down at Sam as he happily sucked away at something that had once rightfully been Ethan’s to play with. “You’re a real cock-blocker, kid.”

             
“And how’s my Godson?” Keith walked up from behind with his own daughter in his arms. Serenity wasn’t even a year old, but she was crawling and getting into everything. Keith set her down in the grass next to the table and let her play with Bogey, or let Bogey play with her, either way.

             
“I heard Kenly is looking for someone to go on the next flight to Texas. Apparently we’ve been invited.” Keith took a potato chip off Ethan’s plate and crunched it. “I’m thinking about volunteering. It’s only for a couple of weeks.”

             
“Suit yourself. I’m not going.” Ethan chuckled. “I have enough right here.”

             
“Yeah, well Lee’s already on the flight if you didn’t know.”

             
“No I didn’t.”

             
“Yeah, he and Reynolds are going. They have two more seats.” Keith took another chip.

             
“Take Allen. I’m sure he’d love to be exposed to a whole new world of…” Ethan stopped himself from being crude.

             
“Pussy. It’s called a pussy, Ethan. It’s okay to say that word, honey, remember, we talked about this?” Mary patted Ethan on the head like an embarrassed child.

             
Ethan rolled his eyes, “What she said. But seriously, I don’t want any part of it.”

              The Airport wasn’t big enough for a C-130 to make regular landings on, but smaller civilian cargo planes were able to land if they didn’t linger in the clouds too long. Texas had seen fit to leave a few aircraft mechanics in Sullivan, along with regular fuel shipments. It made getting men and some smaller material to the power plant faster and safer than an airdrop. The Texans had managed to take on several small gangs in the area since the summer began, but hadn’t been able to root out the gang inhabiting St. Clair, although they did control the bridges who’s roads linked to Union and Washington off of I-44. These were the towns where most of the supplies were gathered and they couldn’t afford to have a gang cut them off. Eventually they’d have to start raiding other towns, but that was blessedly months away, which would give Texas time to finish the job with the hood-rats in St. Clair.

             
Lee, Allen, Keith and Reynolds were standing on the tarmac the next morning, waiting for a plane to arrive. It was already overdue when Ethan came rolling up in his signature beefed up golf cart. He was only running a few papers to the office at the airfield, and after delivering them he came out to shoot the breeze with his friends. Except Reynolds. The man was pissed and wanted to go back to bed, grumbling something about if he wanted to hurry up and wait he’d have stayed in the Marines.

             
“So what’s the first thing you’re gonna do when you get there?” Ethan asked Allen as the young man made himself comfortable, using their bags as pillows.

             
“Besides score some bitchin Mexican purple sticky-icky? Get laid.” Allen answered frankly. “Then get drunk, stoned, and laid again. The order could be varied, depending on my itinerary.” He opened a copy of one of the last Captain American comics to ever be produced and went back reading, is if the information inside were vitally important to the mission at hand.

             
“I figured. Do you have anything
productive
planned for the trip, I should ask.”

             
“Oh… Then no.”

             
“And you, oh dearest brother?”

             
Lee shrugged. “I’ve been to Fort Hood before. I doubt it’s changed much even after the end of the world.”

             
Ethan laughed, “Well, let’s be grateful it was Texas that made it and not Georgia. Can you imagine civilization restarting in a swamp?”

             
“You’re just bias because you didn’t like being stationed there.”

             
Ethan narrowed his eyes at his brother. Ethan’s loathing of the state of Georgia knew no bounds, though his pure hatred for Cook County, Illinois bordered on zealous antisocial behavior. “Whatever.” He had more to say, probably another rant about how disgusting the weather was down there, but behind them Reynolds vomited on the tarmac and collapsed like he’d been turned off with a switch.

             
Stunned, they rushed over to him to find him passed out. Keith tilted the man’s head so he wouldn’t choke on his own vomit, “He’s burning up. I don’t know why I didn’t think to examine us all first. I need to get him to the hospital. He might have pneumonia.”

             
“What? The flight could get here any second.” Lee protested.

             
“My clothes fit Ethan. If the plane shows up, make him go.” Keith lifted Reynolds, who had lost a lot of weight by this point, into the passenger seat of the side by side and drove off, leaving Ethan and Lee slack jawed. To make matters worse, the drone of aircraft engines could be heard approaching.

             
“Oh, no. No no no. I’m not going anywhere.” Ethan backed away from the bags. “Every time I go someplace something bad happens. I’m not going. I’m an albatross, like the Summer Glau of sci-fi shows.”

             
“The hell you’re not going.” Kenly, wherever the hell he had come from, said with a puff from his cigar. His omnipresence and occasional micromanaging was getting annoying. “I’ll tell yer misses where you went and why. That plane has a thirty minute window to land, offload, and take off again, end of story. There’s a weather front moving in and this is the last ride out for a week!”

             
“
No. And that’s final
.” Ethan repeated to himself angrily as the plane bounced in the turbulent sky, climbing above the cloud layer. “Fat lot of good that did.” Allen and Lee could see he was cursing them, since they were the ones who physically carried him onto the plane against his will. He flipped them both off for good measure, since speaking over the din from the engines was pointless. Mary was going to kill him. At least they’d been able to bring their guns, a novel experience bringing a gun on a plane that wasn’t destined for Kuwait. For Lee and Ethan it uncomfortably reminded them of a cramped Omni Air International flight bound for the Suck.

             
The flight was long, it was boring, and was forced to make a pit-stop in Southern Arkansas. They weren’t even allowed out of the plane, apparently the area was “unstable”. Whatever that meant. Several hours later the plane again descended below the clouds toward an airstrip with more planes on it than any of them had ever seen before. They touched down in what more resembled a controlled crash than a landing and were guided to a strip for government chartered aircraft. Everything from Airbuses and Boing 747’s to Russian Antonov An-225s, C-17s and even some military aircraft from nations formerly not friendly to the US littered the horizon. If Ethan saw correctly, there were even a number of Israeli F-15s parked near two aged looking Iranian F-4 Phantoms.

             
As soon as the hatch lowered Ethan jumped out, barfed, and kissed the ground a few feet away from the mess he’d made. Lee kicked about a dozen bottles filled with piss under the pilot’s seat, because he was an asshole, and got out. Looking around the airstrip it was more and more obvious this hadn’t been a public airport before the plague. The runways were that crappy metal grating used in WWII emergency airstrips, and half the planes were covered in so much dust there was no way they’d flown since before the winter. Some, which were parked well off the strip, had wooden structures and tarps acting as lean-to’s for shade. People were living in them, mail boxes and stores completing brand new towns. How overcrowded was Texas now?

             
“Hello, my name is Sergeant Kyle Winters, 52
nd
Engineers, Texas Active Guard Reserve. I’ll be your guide and liaison for anything you’ll need during your stay.” A voice said from behind.

             
Ethan stood and faced Sergeant Winters. He was short and used to be fat too, his uniform hung on him like he was a child playing in his daddy’s old Army gear.

             
“I’m Captain Lee Cally, and this is Deputy Allen Broadwick. The one kissing solid ground is my brother,
Sheriff
Ethan Cally.” Lee said. “We’re from the town of-”