Canyon: A Post Apocalyptic/Dystopian Adventure (The Traveler Book 2) (17 page)

“C’mon. Now!” Grat called out between thick, pained huffs. “You. Can’t. Get. Away. Give it. Up.”

Sawyer wasn’t about to listen to him and ran on. The smoke was getting closer. He could smell a hint of the burning wood. He continued north. He felt the slight ping of a cramp in his right side, but he stretched to the left and eased it as he pushed ahead.

Grat was beginning to gain on the boy. He’d reached his stride and the asphalt road was easier to navigate than the pitted, uneven dirt. “Sawyer,” he tried again. “Please, boy. This. Is. Only. Gonna be. Worse. For you.”

Grat blinked back the cold as a slight gust of wind hit him in the face and he kept chasing the boy.

Sawyer’s eyes widened. Up ahead, maybe a couple of hundred feet away, he spotted someone. At first, he couldn’t tell if it was a man or woman, but the closer he got, he could tell it was an older man. He was wearing a wide-brimmed straw hat and overalls. He was pushing a wheelbarrow.

Sawyer called out to the man. “Hey!” He pushed harder against the asphalt. “Help me. Please. Help me!”

The man saw him. He had to see him. Sawyer could tell the man was looking straight at him from under the brim of his floppy, ridiculous hat. The man didn’t react. He stood there holding the wheelbarrow.

Sawyer looked over his shoulder to see how much time he had to convince the man to help him before the grunt caught up. As he did, his foot caught the front edge of a pothole and he tripped. Sawyer’s body flung forward as if he were diving into a pool’s shallow end. He pulled his arms up to protect his face as he slid along the asphalt, tearing up his forearms and knees.

Sawyer rolled over, his face squeezed tight with pain. He pursed his lips and blew quickly in and out to mitigate the burn in his arms and legs. One of his wrists felt sprained, maybe broken, from the fall.

Before he could scramble to his feet, Grat was standing over him. The grunt’s chest was heaving from a combination of exhaustion and raw ire.

Sawyer laid his head on the asphalt and closed his eyes in resignation. He was so close.

“You didn’t see this,” Grat said to the man with the wheelbarrow and floppy hat. He reached down to the chain connecting the cuffs and pulled upward.

Sawyer resisted and yanked back. A bolt of pain shot through his right wrist.

“C’mon now,” Grat growled, the softness in his eyes gone. “The game is over.” He drew his revolver from his hip and, for effect, thumbed back the hammer. “Get up.”

Sawyer reluctantly struggled to his feet. Grat wrapped his free hand around the back of Sawyer’s neck and put the barrel of the revolver into the small of the boy’s back.

Sawyer looked at the farmer. The man caught his glare and then looked away. He put his head down and resumed crossing the street. The wheelbarrow squeaked as he pushed it.

“You aren’t gonna help me?” Sawyer asked.

The man blinked, his stride hitched, but he kept moving. He adjusted his grip on the wheelbarrow and disappeared beyond the intersection.

“He knows better,” spat the grunt. “He ain’t as stupid as you. I told you I hated kids. But I saw something in you.” Grat pushed Sawyer by the neck. He didn’t bother with the rope, which dragged on the ground as they walked. “I was wrong. My brother was right. You ain’t getting any more good treatment.”

Sawyer chuckled. “That’s funny.”

Grat squeezed his neck as they turned west back toward the highway. “Ain’t nothing funny.”

“Yeah, it is.” Sawyer looked up at Grat. His eyes were somehow older than a teenager’s. He walked, even in defeat, with the proud gait of an adult. There was no childish bounce or joy. “You said you saw something? Maybe you saw yourself in me? That’s what’s funny. I had the guts to run. I didn’t accept whatever it is you have planned for me. I don’t take orders from generals.”

Grat let go of Sawyer’s neck and then shoved the back of his head hard enough to push the boy to the ground. Sawyer fell forward onto his side and landed awkwardly on his right shoulder. Grat straddled him and squatted. He stuck the revolver in the boy’s face, pushing aside his nose with the long, cold barrel.

“You don’t talk no more, understand?” Spittle sprayed from his mouth. There were white balls of dried saliva in the corners, which stretched like snot as he berated the boy. “You don’t know nothing. You’re a punk kid with a dead whore mama. You shut up. Speak again, and I’ll let Emmett cut out your tongue.”

Sawyer whimpered and nodded his comprehension of the warning. He was again a frightened little boy, beaten and confused. Tears flooded his eyes.

“Get up.”

Sawyer obeyed and walked quietly back to the horses. He’d failed. There was no point in fighting again. Lubbock and the horror of the Jones awaited him. He vacantly mounted the horse, with Grat’s rough assistance, and reflexively took the horn.

“We got time to make up,” announced Emmett. “We need to run. Your boy here cost us time.”

“He ain’t my boy,” said Grat. “He’s an orphan punk about to meet his maker.”

Emmett reached out and punched Grat in the shoulder. “That’s my brother,” he said. “Welcome back.”

CHAPTER 23

OCTOBER 15, 2037, 2:15 PM

SCOURGE + 5 YEARS

POST, TEXAS

Highway 84 ran northwest and southeast, cutting diagonally across the region from Sweetwater to Muleshoe. In what was left of Post, Texas, it ran straight north and south through the center of the dirt-gray town.

Battle had caught up with Lola and Pico south of Post. It’d taken him longer than he’d anticipated. The headwind slowed his horse and made it tougher to make up ground.

When he’d galloped alongside them, Lola had offered a warm smile of relief. Her eyes found Battle’s and lingered a moment past what was comfortable. Battle felt his face flush. He was, to his own surprise, happy to see her. Her thin angular face, full lips, and fiery red hair were a welcoming familiar sight against the dust and death of a post-apocalyptic life.

He was glad to see Pico. The wrinkled consternation of his brow and the mustache too thick for his face forced the hint of a smile from the stoic warrior.

The silent pleasure of the reunion was short lived. Battle killed it.

“We’ve got company,” he said. “Skinner, I’m guessing, is leading a posse. They’ve got vehicles. If their box truck hadn’t broken down about twenty miles back, they’d have already caught me.”

The joy in Lola’s eyes evaporated. Pico’s mustache curled downward.

“What are our options?” asked Lola, tightening her grip on the reins.

“We need to ride these horses as hard as they’ll go,” said Battle. “Hopefully we outrun them to Lubbock.”

“That’s a good forty miles,” said Pico. “They’ll catch us.”

Battle raised his voice above the clop of the horses’ shoes. “Are there any alternative routes we can take? Anything that might help us avoid them?”

Pico shook his head and sat forward in his saddle. “I don’t think so,” he said. “We could take Highway 380, but it meets up again with 84.”

The three galloped in silence for another minute. Each of them looked over their shoulder, anticipating Skinner and his posse rolling up behind them.

“How far back are they?” Lola asked.

“I don’t know,” Battle said. “I think ten or fifteen minutes. At most.”

They rode into Post, pushing the tired horses through the empty town. Highway 84 turned into Broadway Street once they entered the heart of it. Up ahead on the right, Battle noticed a large sign that read “Holly’s Drive-Inn”. It stood above a red and white striped awning that surrounded the former restaurant. He was distracted by the broken windows and spray-painted graffiti on the brick exterior. Lola pulled him back into the moment.

“Battle! Up ahead!”

Riding straight for them, three blocks north, were at least a dozen horses carrying armed men. They were Cartel. A couple of them wore the signature brown hats of posse bosses.

Battle yanked the reins and drove his horse to the left. Lola and Pico followed without instruction.

Pow!

A single shot from a Browning chased them past the intersection as they sped west, racing parallel to the remnants of a drooping phone line, which ran infinitely along the length of the road.

Battle raised up in his saddle and goaded his horse as fast as it could carry him. He lowered his head and looked under his arm to see Lola and Pico a length behind him. The posse wasn’t visible yet.

Battle approached a wider intersection and he turned right. Heading north, he bolted between a high school football stadium to his left and a dirt racetrack to his right.

Pow! Pow! Pow!

The posse was behind them. Some of the men were firing off what were no better than warning shots as they gave chase. Battle peeked under his arm again. Pico and Lola were weaving their horses back and forth as they followed. There were no people anywhere. The streets and the houses were empty. It was a ghost town.

Pow! Pow!

While Battle knew the Brownings couldn’t hit a barn from the distance between them, the noise rattled his horse. It resisted his pull on the reins and, against his command, turned right back toward Broadway.

Battle tried coaxing the horse, but it didn’t want to listen to him. It sped up, which was good. Then it turned again, too quickly, while Battle was adjusting his grip on the reins. He lost his balance in the saddle and was thrown, tumbling to the dirt as Lola and Pico rode past him.

Though he was scraped up and bruised, Battle still had his wits about him. He pulled McDunnough and took aim at the first of the horsemen coming in his direction.

He trained the nine millimeter and tracked the posse boss from left to right.

Pop! Pop! Pop!

He hit the man, sending him from his saddle and into the dirt beside the road. He rolled over, his eyes still open.

Pow! Pow!

The explosion of the Brownings was louder than the approaching thunder of the posse. Battle knew he couldn’t fight them by himself. So he turned and ran.

He slid between a pair of shotgun houses and scurried through the narrow space between them. It was too small for a horse to navigate. A pair of errant shots blasted behind him as he emerged on the other side of the homes. He crossed the street and darted down another narrow alleyway, diagonally racing toward an abandoned gas station. He’d eluded the bulk of the posse for the moment and was able to slide under the damaged garage bay door that stood open with a three-foot gap between its bottom and the concrete threshold.

Battle was hit with a familiar, pungently sweet odor that immediately made him gag. He pushed himself to his feet. The only light in the space was coming from underneath the open bay door. It revealed nothing beyond the first couple of feet inside the garage.

Battle stepped into the dark, swallowing against the fetor. He pulled his arm to his face and covered his nose with the crook of his elbow, but he couldn’t escape it. He could taste the fruity rot of it. It was the smell of death, human death.

Battle knew from experience that dead people emitted an odor different than other animals. A field medic had told him at the end of a particularly difficult day in Isfahan, Iran, that a unique selection of chemicals was responsible for the distinct odor. That odor had permeated Iran after the death squads eliminated much of the opposition. It was prevalent in Syria too.

That odor, the sour, cringe-inducing odor, was why Battle had been so quick to bury his son and wife after their deaths. He’d have lingered with their bodies for days, lamenting his inability to protect them had it not been for what he knew was coming.

He refused to attach their memories to that smell. He couldn’t do it. He didn’t want to smell it ever again.

But here he was, the odor enveloping him. He took brief, shallow breaths to avoid vomiting. His gag reflex was in overdrive. He gave in to it, bent over, and heaved. His stomach convulsed, his throat burning as he threw up what little was in his stomach. It was mostly bile. The taste, as awful as it was, muted the odor enough to make it tolerable.

There was a voice outside of the garage. “You see him?”

“I lost him,” said another.

A third man cursed. “How’d he get away? We had him.”

Battle stood quietly in the dark, his muscles frozen. The men kept talking, but their voices grew more distant.

Battle exhaled, allowing himself to breathe once the men were far enough away. He was reminded of the odor when he inhaled. Slowly, he removed his backpack and set it on the ground in front of him. He knelt down and rummaged through the pack. Near the bottom, he found a Ziploc bag. He pulled it from the pack and blindly opened it, removing a box of waterproof matches.

Battle zipped the plastic bag and stuffed it back into his pack. He pushed open the matchbook, pulled out a stick, and struck it across the rough striking surface, igniting the red phosphorus on the end of the match. It was actually a regular match that Battle had coated with clear nail polish. The polish made the tip essentially waterproof. It lit easily when struck.

Battle held the match up in front of his face, but it didn’t do much to help. By the time he’d taken a couple of steps farther into the blackness of the garage, the flame was singeing his finger. He blew it out and lit another. A few more steps. Still nothing. Another match. A few more steps. And—

Battle let the match burn to his finger and snuffed it with a pinch, a flash of what he saw still visible in the afterimage of the dark.

Against the back wall of the garage, stacked like cordwood, were countless bodies.

Battle took another match. He squeezed his eyes closed, popped them open, and struck the match. The gruesome work of the Cartel was as shocking the second time.

Old. Young. Man. Woman. Boy. Girl. Infant. The Cartel’s henchmen had not discriminated. Some of the women were nude. So were some of the men.

The match burned to his finger, stinging it again before he put out the flame. He stood there in the dark, welcoming it.

Battle couldn’t know what it was the people had done to deserve their fate. Chances were good they’d done nothing. Maybe they’d protested giving up their crops or their land. Maybe they’d mouthed off to the wrong posse boss. Maybe they were executed when they ceased being useful, for whatever purposes. It didn’t matter.