The day after: An apocalyptic morning (174 page)

              As they came closer and closer it occurred to Stinson that he should probably contact the guards out front on the radio. He no longer remembered the code word that had been assigned so long ago but he didn't think that really Mickered anymore. He fished in his backpack for the portable radio, finally locating it beneath some cans of chicken noodle. The radio hadn't been used since his surrender to the Garden Hill forces. He wondered if it even still worked. Well, there was only one way to find out.

              He clicked it on and tuned the selector to the guard frequency. He took one last look at the men but none of them seemed particularly interested in what he was doing. Were any of them worried about Barnes' reaction? It certainly didn't appear so. He keyed up the radio. "This is Sergeant Stinson," he said into it. "Acting commander of what's left of the task force. We're approaching the town and request entry."

              He waited, knowing that the demands would start very soon. What had happened? Where was everyone else? And then there would be an extended debriefing. Would Barnes make him a scapegoat? Would he execute him or exile him for surrendering? He found that he didn't really care one way or the other. He was too numb to care.

              His level of interest in his surroundings came up a little however, when he heard the reply on the radio.

              "Mr. Stinson," a female voice said. "This is Madeline Rook, acting leader of the town of Auburn. Welcome back to town. You will find things have undergone a fundamental change while you've been away."

              Everyone stopped in their tracks as they heard this. Even the wounded in the litters raised their heads to stare. "That was a bitch!" someone said in disbelief. "Did she say acting leader of Auburn?" asked another.

              Stinson chewed his lip thoughtfully for a moment before keying the radio again. "Please clarify exactly what you mean by a fundamental change," he said. "Where is Colonel Barnes and the rest of the men?"

              "Barnes is dead," Madeline answered. "So are most of the other men in town. We cut their throats while they slept and assumed power for ourselves. Barnes himself had his genitals removed from him and then was burned alive. Only a few of the men that had been on guard duty at the time survived. We are in charge of all of the town's weapons that have been left behind - which, as I'm sure you're aware - includes the majority of the automatic weapons. In addition, those of us that have prior military training have taught the other women how to use them. At this moment you have a whole lot of guns pointed at you and a whole lot of fingers just itching to blow your raping asses away. If you do not wish that to happen, you will disarm yourselves immediately and approach the maze. You will be given further instructions at that time."

              Now the men were fully awake and aware. They began to talk back and forth, asking each other if what they were being told could possible be true. The bitches had taken over town? They had killed Barnes and the other men? They were pointing weapons at them right now?

              "If what you say is true," Stinson said into the microphone, "then what are your intentions towards us?"

              "That depends upon what your intentions towards us are," Madeline answered back. "We are prepared to fight off all four hundred of you if need be. That is what we have been training for and I believe that we are quite capable of doing it."

              "As you can see," Stinson said sourly, "there are considerably less than four hundred of us at the moment. Nor do we have any weapons except for our pistols. Do you intend to slaughter us?"

              "We do not," Madeline said. "It is our wish that you surrender to us peacefully. If you do so, I will guarantee that you will not be harmed. However you must understand that you will not be allowed to leave. If you attempt to flee we will pursue you."

              Stinson looked at the other men for a moment, seeking their input. His answer was no more than a bunch of weary shrugs. He keyed up the radio. "We have nowhere to go," he told Madeline. "And we have very little food with which to get there on. I guess we don't really have a lot of choice in the Micker, do we? Will you take care of our wounded?"

              "As best we can," Madeline answered. "Now if you will all remove your weapons and drop them to the roadway, we can go about bringing you into the town."

              Another shrug was passed among the men and everyone unstrapped or unbuckled their pistols. No one bothered trying to keep one hidden. There was really no point in it. Once they were disarmed, Madeline directed them to approach the maze.

              "Stinson," she said over the radio, "I want you to come through first and alone. Pass the radio to the next man and he will be given instructions shortly. I would like to have a few words with you before the rest come in."

              "I copy," Stinson said. He handed the radio over to Jack Thomas, who just happened to be standing next to him. "See you on the other side," he told him.

              "Is this really a good idea?" Jack asked him, starting to have doubts about being at the mercy of the women they had once dominated.

              "I don't know," he said. "But it's the only idea in town right now." With that he began walking through the maze. It took him a few minutes to navigate through its turns and he was cognizant of the weapons that were undoubtedly tracking him the entire way. What would be his fate on the other side? Would they shoot him in the head? Would they imprison him? Or would they cut off his genitals and burn him at the stake?

              Madeline herself was waiting for him on the other side. The former junior wife of the second-in-command of the militia, he recognized her immediately. She was very beautiful and had been lusted after by many of the other men. Offers to trade two women just for her had once been common. She was, if anything, even more beautiful now. She no longer had that hollow, cowered look that had been the signature of Auburn women. She had a pistol strapped to her waist and an M-16 slung over her shoulder. Standing to the sides of her and slightly back were several other heavily armed women.

              "I trust you're not dumb enough to try something stupid," she said to him as he emerged onto the roadway.

              "No," he said. "I seem to be a little short on aggression these days. I trust that you'll keep your word and not shoot us down like dogs?"

              "As long as you behave yourself," she told him, taking a step closer. "What happened to the rest of the men?"

              "Dead," he said. "Or deserted. Mostly dead though."

              "The Garden Hill forces killed more than three hundred of you?" She seemed to be having a little bit of trouble with this concept. It was understandable.

              "It wasn't even that hard for them to do," Stinson said. "They landed troops in our path with their helicopter and chipped away at us the entire march. The hit us from the air at night. Some of our people ran off and took our food and ammo with them. By the time we got into position to fight we were already beaten. Bracken and the other leaders were dead by then and Stu was leading us. The hundred or so of us that were left went up against prepared defenses. They murdered us with each attack that we made. They dropped homemade napalm on us from the air. Finally I killed Stu myself and surrendered to them."

              Madeline searched his face for signs of deceit and found none. She knew that Stinson was telling her the truth. "It would seem," she said slowly, "that they knew you were coming?"

              "They did," he agreed with a sigh. "Jean and Anna told them."

              "Jean and Anna?" she said, pleased. "They made it there safely?"

              "That's what we were told," he said. He explained the conversation between Stu and Skip that had taken place just before the final battle. "So that's how they knew to look out for us. That's how they were able to start hitting us on our second day of the march."

              "All those people dead," Madeline said, shaking her head a little. She was still trying to come to grips with the idea that the men outside the maze were all that she would have to deal with. Her war was over before it could even begin.

              "And a few more on the way back," Stinson told her. "And it was all for nothing."

              "It depends on whose point of view you're looking at it from," Madeline told him. "Because Barnes was so hot to take that town and because Bracken was so hot to send so many men after it, we were able to do what we did. And guess what, Stinson. The little bitch you used to call your wife is the one that organized everyone. What do you think about that?"

              "Jessica?" he said, not even considering that it might've been one of the other two.

              "That's right," she said. "Yet another gift to us from Garden Hill. You managed to piss her off just enough to rally everyone behind her."

              "And where is she now?" he asked. "Are we going to be turned over to our former wives and dealt with that way?"

              "Jessica has been exiled," Madeline told him. "She turned out to be somewhat of a mixed blessing. She rallied us up to take over when the time was right, but she proved to be an even worse leader than Barnes was. She was last seen heading in the direction of Grass Valley and Nevada City. And as for your other question - no, we're not going to turn you over to your former wives. To tell you the truth, I'm not really sure just what we're going to do with you now. We've been so busy concentrating on keeping you from taking the town back that we haven't gotten that far in the equation yet."

              "I see," he said, staring at her. "So you may decide to burn us all alive after all?"

              "I don't think so," she told him. "I think we've all had enough death and enough cruelty to last us for a while. Calmer heads are in control now. Besides, men do have a certain use in a biological sense, don't they?"

              "I suppose we do," he agreed.

              "You'll be locked up with the other men for the time being," she told him. "You'll work during the day and you'll be fed at night. Other than that, you'll be segregated from us until we decide what your place in this society will be. Maybe we'll be as controlling and oppressive as you were - but I like to think that we won't."

              "I guess time will tell then, won't it?" Stinson asked.

              "I guess it will," she agreed. "Now let's get you searched and get the rest of them inside, shall we?"

              That evening, in Garden Hill, Stacy was lying in bed, wearing nothing but a flimsy maternity nightgown, trying to get herself to sleep. Her body was curled up against Jack's bare back, her enormous stomach pushing up against him. He was snoring lightly, his arms wrapped around Sara, who was sleeping quite soundly on the other side of him.

              Stacy was uncomfortable, which was a very relative term since she had been quite uncomfortable for most of the entire third trimester of her pregnancy. The last seven days had been the worst of all. The baby had dropped down and engaged in her pelvis, releasing the pressure on her diaphragm, which made it a little easier for her to breathe, but putting tremendous pressure on her bladder, which now felt as if it was constantly full. It was feeling like that now even though she had emptied it less than twenty minutes ago. Also she was having strange aches in her back, cramping pains that felt as if someone were sticking hot wires into her kidneys.

              "And we have Eve to thank for all this shit," she muttered, rolling out of bed and standing on her feet. She grabbed a candle and a disposable lighter from the nightstand by feel and then walked across the bedroom to the adjoining bathroom. Once inside she lit the candle, illuminating the small cubicle in soft, yellow light. She set it on the sink and then lifted the hem of her nightgown up. Sitting down was an exercise in gravity control and she did it very carefully, finally coming to a soft, safe landing on the cold toilet seat. She pushed a little with her bladder muscles, expecting nothing more than the pathetic trickle that usually came out, but this time she got considerable more.

              Warm fluid gushed out of her, splattering the toilet and spraying to the floor near her feet. She felt it running down her calves and dripping onto her feet. She knew at once that it wasn't urine and that it hadn't come from her urethra.

              "Oh no," she said, trying to peer over her bare stomach to see how bad the damage was. She knew to look for excessive blood or dark meconium in the amniotic fluid, signs of impending trouble with the baby. Before she could get a good look however, the first contraction hit her. She had had false contractions for the past two weeks with increasing frequency. Now, as the pain rippled through her from back to front, seizing her like a vise, taking her breath right out of her lungs, she wondered how she could have ever mistaken the false contractions for the real thing. She groaned painfully, not quite screaming as the pain increased in intensity, seemed to level off for a moment, and then finally began to fade. By the time it was over she was panting.

              Shakily she stood up and made a half-hearted attempt to wipe some of the amniotic fluid off of her. She was gratified to see that it was as clear as water. She picked up the candle and then walked back to the bedroom, already nervously anticipating the next contraction. "Jack, Sara," she said as she approached the bed. She had to say it again before they stirred awake and looked up at her.