Beyond Green Fields #2 - Regrets: A post-apocalyptic anthology Read online

  Wise words—and the gentle kick in the ass that I need right now. I start the engine, and off we go, charging down backroads into the setting sun.

  We drive until we have to slow down to a crawl not to end up in a ditch somewhere. The sky is overcast, turning the darkness even darker than it usually is, right in sync with my mood. I finally call for a stop when I almost slam the Rover into a felled electricity post angled across the road. Zilinsky quickly calls out watch order, going for the short cycle—by first light we will be back on the road. Dinner is a subdued affair, nobody daring to speak too loudly or joke. I spend it pacing at the edge of the light, barely tasting a bite of the food I force myself to ingest. Wisely, Zilinsky kept me off the schedule tonight because she knows I will be too distracted to be of much use. None of the others speak up about unfair treatment; I think they are too afraid of me going off in their faces if they antagonize me in any way. And they are damn happy that I’m calling the shots because that means one thing above everything else: this is all my fault.

  And it’s true. It is. It was my idea to go snooping around the settlements; it was my idea to play dress-up and make it so damn easy for them to grab her. It occurs to me that, just maybe, they don’t have a fucking clue who she is. Maybe if they’d known, they never would have dared to poke that anthill.

  A bad metaphor, not one my mind should dwell on right now.

  I’m not stupid, nor delusional. I’m well aware of what happens to women in situations like this. I know that she’s strong. I know that she can fight. I also know that there are limits to what she can do, but very few to what can be done to her. While I was driving, it was easier to distract myself, but now? Not so much.

  Unbidden and very welcome at the same time, Zilinsky appears by my side, extending a steaming mug of coffee as a peace offering. Extra strong and black as the night—there’s no other way to brew coffee. I accept it with a nod, only then noticing that my hand is shaking—from rage and pent-up emotion, both barely contained. She notices as well but doesn’t offer up any platitudes. She never does, and even less so when she knows all too well that my concerns are valid.

  “You know that she will be terribly ill-equipped to deal with the fallout? Just like you are,” she remarks out of the blue.

  I nod, not having to ask what she’s referring to. That’s another layer of shit I don’t want to consider, but she’s right to peel it all back and expose what I don’t want to think about—because Bree will survive, and I will get her back, and there will be dealing happening.

  “Any clue what I should do? What I should say?” A pause. “What I shouldn’t?”

  I get a vexed look for that, probably because she must feel like I’m being dense. I’m not, or at least not deliberately so.

  “What would you want someone to say or do after you got gang-raped for days?”

  Point taken—it was a stupid question.

  “I can’t just hand her a shotgun and say, ‘Let’s go.’”

  Even in the near-darkness, I can easily catch Zilinsky’s glare. “And why not? It’s what you always do.”

  “And look where that got us.” I only whisper the words but she still catches them. Rather than lay into me for feeling sorry for myself, she keeps looking at me, silently urging me to go on. I pace some more, feel scalding coffee turn my stomach upside down. I halt when I’m back to where she’s waiting patiently. I stare into the darkness before I whip around, confronting her directly. “Am I just imagining things? Is this my doing? Is this all happening because I bit off more than I could chew, and now she’s paying for my sins?”

  Zilinsky wisely doesn’t comment on my dramatic phrasing but gets to the point instead. “Is someone targeting you? We know Hamilton was, and I doubt they rescinded his order just because we got away. But you don’t know who was behind that, or if it’s connected to what is going on right now. Have you considered that it’s a trap? They must know that you both survived, and that she’s one of us now.”

  The thought has occurred to me, but it’s not in my top three theories. “You think they could have caught her so they can brainwash her and turn her against me?”

  Zilinsky shrugs, if not very convincingly. “If someone had too much time on their hands but wanted to make sure to kill you, it would be the best way to go. You won’t expect it, and you won’t be able to prepare for it. Even if she fails, it will leave you as a broken shell. Mission accomplished.”

  Guess it says a lot about me that the idea that someone would break Bree’s spirit and turn her inside-out is still preferential to what is much more likely happening. Maybe I’m simply full of myself, but I’m convinced I could bring her back from that. It would also mean that, eventually, they will send her back to me. Otherwise, there’s a good chance I will never even find her mangled, mutilated corpse.

  Just a few weeks ago, I got way too close to that very scenario. It’s nothing I’m willing to spend any time on now. Chasing ghosts is much easier.

  “Do you think there’s any chance that he’s still alive and pulling the strings?” I ask her, although I’m really musing to myself. “Why wait until now? They could have easily found us at the bunker, or at any of the stations since then. Hell, consider how much they would pay Rita if she’d deliver me to them on a silver platter.”

  “She wouldn’t.” Zilinsky’s expression almost makes me crack a smile. Saying anything favorable about one of her least favorite people in the world comes with a high price.

  “Maybe they have something on her?”

  “No. She wasn’t stupid enough to fall head over heels in love and make herself vulnerable.”

  Sure, it’s a jibe, but a soft one. Contrary to Rita, she likes Bree; considers her a friend, and worthy of the place in my life that she grabbed for herself.

  It can’t be a coincidence that, twice in a row now, someone has honed in on the weak point of my defenses and scored a hit. Sure, the first one turned into a glancing blow, but it’s the same mark. It has to be connected. It makes all the sense in the world—

  Except my gut tells me otherwise.

  “What if it was a random grab-and-dash?” I ask the night. “How do we find randomness?”

  “By finding the pattern,” Zilinsky points out. “Remember what Sadie told you? Women have been disappearing. That’s why Bree wanted to investigate the settlement, to find out more. It fits with what you told me about the soldiers that you killed on the way to the Silo as well. We just need to find more dots so we can connect them.”

  “And the bases might know.” She nods. I fall silent, thinking. Maybe Rita was the wrong one to call; maybe the bases are the wrong lead entirely. I still haven’t heard back from the Silo but now I’m doubly glad I called them. Jason and his men might have found out something by now as well. After all, they went to where we know that midwife—

  And that’s when I finally make the connection.

  Swearing under my breath, I run back to the Rover, ignoring the curious looks the others cast my way. It takes me forever until I find a working frequency on the radio, and all I get is Dispatch. I’m about to belt out our identification code but instead switch to one of the fake ones before I ask, “Hey, can you give me an update on Luke’s Chargers? We were supposed to rendezvous with them later this week but might not make it. Can you relay a message?”

  I don’t like the long silence that follows.

  “Negative,” the operator finally responds. “We got a call from them earlier today. They got hit by some bullshit attack this morning. They’re returning home. Must have forgotten to call you.”

  I hang up without another word. At least that sounds like they made it out alive. That can’t be a coincidence, that both of our groups got hit on the same day. But why didn’t Rita mention that earlier?

  Because Zilinsky is right, and Dispatch doesn’t have the entire picture. Dispatch is scavenger central, while the problem is located at the settlements.

  I’m about to leave the car when the rad
io blinks, indicating that someone is hailing me.

  “Lucky Thirteen alpha? This is Silo actual,” a different voice from earlier says.

  It takes me a moment to recognize her. “Petty Officer Stanton, is that you?” Wilkes’s assistant herself—that bodes well, or not at all. I guess I’m about to find out.

  “In the flesh, Miller. I hear you’ve been harassing our techs?” She doesn’t sound pissed so I don’t apologize.

  “You got something for me?” No sense beating around the bush. The late hour of her call makes me presume she doesn’t want too many ears listening in.

  “Not exactly,” she’s quick to reply. “We have a lot of traffic coming from that settlement, but we haven’t been able to pick out a single car that’s not supposed to have been there. Sorry to tell you, but whoever kidnapped your wife did so under a previously set-up trader or scavenger identity. The three trading caravans are legit, as we’ve confirmed with Dispatch already. Nine scavenger groups left Yuma, yours not included, and all of them are registered as well. All have confirmed previous drop-offs in settlements, and only one of them has a strike against them from a small altercation. We know them personally, and while I’m not going to say they are harmless, they are your level of easily provoked. If I had to take a guess, I’d go for any of the others but not them.”

  That isn’t what I want to hear, but matches what I’ve been expecting. “So they didn’t just kidnap my wife, but also someone else’s identity.”

  “That, or, more likely, they turned rogue.” Stanton falls silent for a moment. “Things have been in flux all summer long. People are desperate. If someone were to offer them weapons, ammo, rations, and gear, don’t you think someone would volunteer to make a few people disappear that nobody would go looking for?”

  “We are looking for her.”

  She doesn’t debate that. “But you’re the only ones, and you’re only nine people. I know Dispatch carries lists of people who have disappeared, and they are hundreds of names long. People fall sick, or get killed out there all the time. I presume your next step is to go for a pattern? There isn’t one. We have people working on it, but I doubt they will find anything. Miller, I’m sorry. I got nothing else for you.”

  The news doesn’t crush me, but it doesn’t make it easy to keep my spirit up. “Thanks. I do appreciate your help, even if I may sound like an ungrateful asshole right now.”

  “Don’t mention it,” she’s quick to assure me. “And I get it. Keep us updated if you need anything else.”

  “Will do.”

  We say our goodbyes and the radio goes silent. I sit there for what feels like a small eternity, staring at the darkness beyond the hood of the car. Eight and a half hours have passed now. I have nothing to do, nothing to go on. I’m a useless sack of meat, waiting for the fucking sun to rise.

  Shit, but this is even harder than watching her die. Back then, at least I was there. Now? I can do nothing. Absolutely nothing.

  We don’t waste time with breakfast—as soon as it’s light enough to see the road and any obstacles on it, we’re on the move again. We have all we need to go on—luke-warm coffee and what’s left of the food we picked up in Wyoming and Yuma. The base we are gunning for isn’t that far away—only around a hundred miles now—but Colorado is a fucking nightmare filled with more undead than we’ve seen in weeks. That forces me to slow down to a crawl and go off-road more often than not, making driving a real travesty. At least I’m occupied with something else other than glum thoughts of what is happening to Bree right now. Driving over the odd shambler gives me only so much satisfaction, but I tell myself it’s better than doing nothing.

  At first, I don’t even see the dust clouds, but Zilinsky points them out to me. We’re still fifty miles and hours from our destination—and it could be a trader caravan as well. Yet Rita’s claim is echoing inside my head—no confirmed army base is anywhere near here.

  Thirty minutes later, and we’re close enough to get a glimpse at who we are chasing—two Humvees, unmarked just like the ones that Bree and I happened upon with the weird trader group on the way to the Silo. Could be coincidence, but I’ve lost faith in that. Just to be sure, I call into Dispatch—if it’s an official convoy, they would have checked in just as we usually do. Not that I did when we left Yuma, or before that, but I would have if I’d found someone hunting me.

  Before I get a response, the white tail of an RPG coming toward us gives me a different kind of confirmation.

  It’s on!

  The RPG ends up hitting the road where we would have been if we hadn’t seen it and had continued to accelerate. I curse as I swerve around the newly created crater while Zilinsky barks orders over the team frequency, telling everyone to disperse but keep up the chase. There are two of them to the five of us, and only one car with a single driver who doesn’t have a copilot itching to spray bullets—and this isn’t our first rodeo.

  It takes us two hours to chase them down and force them to stop, but from there, things go as bloody and quickly as expected. Zilinsky’s orders were clear—maim, don’t kill as we need someone who is still able to talk. But they are tough bastards and our lives are worth more than theirs, so only one of them ends up surviving. There’s no rank on his dirty, bloody uniform, and it’s pretty obvious he’s way too young to know much, but I still beat the shit out of Corporal Dipshit. He doesn’t know names. He doesn’t know bases. He doesn’t know fuck-all—but he makes sure that his parting words are, “I hope she rots in hell.”

  I do the world a favor and put him out of his misery.

  We did a good job shooting up the Humvees, but those things can take a beating or ten so they are still operational, one more so than the other. No idea if we’ll need them, but we make sure to divest the corpses of their gear and uniforms. They go into one of our spare bleach tanks for cleanup; not much we can do about the bullet holes, but they are scuffed and patched in places already so that might be less of an issue. We scour the vehicles for any scrap of information but they don’t even have maps, let alone ones with “secret base” circled in red.

  It was worth a look. At least we have the decoy Humvees now, and they have gas for a few hundred miles—enough to get to the base. So that’s where we’re headed once we pull the half-naked corpses into the field at the side of the road and leave them for the scavengers to pick clean. Except for a few scratches and bruises, we’re fine. A win, but a very hollow one.

  We almost miss the way to the base as we draw closer, but at the third not-quite-natural road block, I get the hint. Stopping for a moment, I get out and climb on top of the car to get a better look around. A few miles to the east there’s a rise in the terrain, not quite a hill but enough elevation for what I have planned. We make for it, but as soon as we get there, I see that my idea to position snipers won’t work—they have watchtowers in forward positions out from the base proper, and while the base looks a little worse for wear, it’s well-maintained. They are flying the flag, and showing insignia of three different units in residence. When I see a few cars mixed in with the military vehicles I’m immediately suspicious, but there are people moving around them who look like bona fide traders. My first idea was stealth; now I decide that, this once, we might just knock on the door instead. What could possibly go wrong?

  Zilinsky doesn’t want me to go, but there’s no debate about that. She ends up sending Burns, Clark, and Taylor with me, after opting out herself with a terse, “You’ll need the best to get you out of this if it turns out to be another trap.” She’s not wrong, but I ignore that possibility as I get ready.

  We take the better of the two Humvees, which still looks the worse for wear. I can’t say why but the idea of handing Bree her car back with even more bullet holes in it than it has—again—acquired sounds like blasphemy to me. And hand her back her Rover I will, there’s no doubt about that in my mind.

  We’re still a mile out from one of the watchtowers by the base gate when a column of people starts to form
in the middle of the road—behind the fence. I tell Taylor—who is driving—to slow down to appear less threatening. The column splits apart and three people walk out the gate, two heavily armed guards and the third likely the base commander or his right hand, if I’m not completely wrong. That looks like a damn trusting move to me, but it’s a smart one if they hope to de-escalate the situation before it can escalate in the first place; it’s something I would do.

  We stop the Humvee well inside shooting distance of the base but far enough out to appear polite. The guards and officer cross half of the distance until they stop and wait once more. I hesitate again before I nod at Burns and we get out to join them. I feel like I’m standing in front of a death squad the entire time but there’s no way around this, unless I want to fight my way into the base—and if I can avoid that, I will.

  The officer—a First Lieutenant, a few years my junior—tries his best to appear relaxed, but I can tell that he’s just as tense as I am. Like the guards, he has a name tag—Martin—and all their weapons and gear look as close to regulation as a year into the zombie apocalypse makes sense. Their boots are clean, their faces are washed and shaved, and this close to the base I can tell that it’s in a similar state, except for what looks like tornado damage to the barracks. I stop but don’t salute—I’ve seldom been more aware that I lost that privilege, but maybe Lt. Martin can restore some of my faith in the organization I joined back when the future was much, much brighter than it is today.

  “Nate Miller, I presume?” Martin calls out, his voice a clear baritone.

  I nod, mirroring his position with my arms crossed at the small of my back. “Lt. Martin.”