The Holocaust Engine, page 15
Rob Calhoun had owned a collection of wing franchises, and retired to Key West in his late forties. He was one of those who’d come to the island to live a sportsman’s life. Early fifties now, tall, with a widow’s peak, his muscles were still tight, and his skin had tanned to a mulatto brown. Of all of them, his thinking was still the most rooted in the old world, and every day he asked Morenz if they had word from the Governor, but the Marlin 30-30 he carried on a shoulder strap was his own. So was the .20 gauge.
Artis Buehl was a different breed entirely. In the earliest days of the infection, before the Army closed Highway 1, Samaritans of all sorts still drove down to help. Buehl arrived right at the end. He came to the hospital—having been sent by a policeman thinking the Red Cross might have arrived—and offered his services. When asked what exactly those ‘services’ entailed, Buehl had raised both fists and said, “I got these.” Before the quarantine, Reagan would never have believed that anyone could have been so simple as to think they could punch their way out of the apocalypse. Nevertheless, Artis Buehl existed, and now Reagan knew that, truly, anything was possible. At 6’3’’, 230 pounds, heavily tattooed, with reddish-brown hair and a beard that hadn’t seen a comb in weeks, Buehl carried a Mossberg pump action .12 gauge, but held it by the receiver, a sign that he was just as likely to use it as a cudgel as he was to pull its trigger. The jet-black Mossberg had a composite stock that the others hoped could handle the abuse.
Buehl was also the source of Reagan’s most grinding frustration—not the man himself, whom Reagan found wryly amusing, but the anchor that Buehl now carried everywhere with him. Her name was Sandra Wainscott, an opposites-that-attract to Buehl, and the Beth Ann Lonneker to Reagan, who seemed determined to ruin the end of days for him. Sandra and Buehl were repulsively affectionate, but Sandra didn’t follow her man to keep him safe. A self-styled latter day feminist, Sandra “Sandy” Wainscott was out to prove that the women of the collapse were every bit as capable as the men.
Unfortunately for the Commandos, Sandy was not the best representative of a Valkyric warrior princess. She’d kept herself in shape swimming around the island, and had no visible body fat. Seen from a distance, anyone might have thought her a physically capable woman. Closer up, she had boyishly short dark hair and a voice that spoke with confident self-assurance. Yet if those observers watched her move, the illusion ended. Sandy simply lacked any sort of smooth coordination. When she walked, her arms and legs swung at odd angles, like a puppet put together by some Gepetto with an acute stigmatism. She carried a scoped Ruger .22 rifle that she’d been told was perfect because it had a ten-round clip. No one told her that the real reason it was ‘perfect’ was because it was the firearm they were all least afraid of being shot with in the back.
That was a problem, in Reagan’s mind, because if anything, the fall of civilization meant no one should have to tow the old politically correct ballast anymore. Reagan himself had shed nearly all of his old pretenses like snake skin. He never said sweet anymore. He never used his ‘clueless’ voice. Now, he was every bit as likely to tell someone—in blunt language—how he really felt as to use even a grain of tact. And how he really felt concerning Sandy was that no civilization in its right mind had ever sent its women willingly into melee combat, and that this woman was more likely to get one of them killed than she was to ever prove her mettle.
Every trip with the two of them involved some amount of verbal exchange, but even though he could jab and joke, Reagan could not really cut loose. Not like he wanted to. The Krissy situation clouded everything. Those living inside the hospital had become a kind of small town, where gossip travelled from floor to floor in a matter of minutes. The gossip concerning Reagan Castaneda was that his girlfriend had lost her looks to a military bullet, and he had dumped her like a case of rotted bananas. Of course, even the newly frank Reagan could not exactly explain his former life and the true nature his relationship to Krissy Stratton.
The other problem was the last member of this day’s group.
Christopher Papp was only a few years older than Reagan, tall, slender, already losing his hair, and—now that he could no longer get contact lenses—wearing a pair of glasses that he often needed to push back up the bridge of his nose. He was the only one of them, other than little Ricky, who did not carry a gun, holding only a wooden bat with a single hand halfway up the shaft as he walked. Papp had worked as an independent web developer when he could find the work, and made ends meet by waiting tables at the Hard Rock. He was also a member of Key West’s large community of gays.
Several of the men now living in the hospital had what could politely be called admiration for young Reagan Castaneda. He no longer slept on a pallet of clothes, but on an air mattress with a pair of soft pillows. His fists, which had quickly become legend, were now encased in a fine pair of black Neoprene gloves to keep the blood off of them. Anything he needed, someone found a way to provide. If he needed to skirt the rules, this could happen as well. No one left the grounds by themselves, except for Reagan, who came and went as he pleased, often returning with a specific prescription that Morenz wanted. No one questioned him, and except for Sandy, no one bothered him.
Because Reagan was not simply good looking.... In an atmosphere of constant danger, he served as a source of deep comfort. Anything that went wrong, tell Morenz, but get Reagan. If a patient became too unruly for the orderlies, they got Reagan. If one of the infected in the outbuilding went berserk, and threatened to tear out of its restraints, they got Reagan. He was the first to recognize that they would need to store food, and he showed them how to make cages to catch pigeons on the roof. He knew which shoreline plants were edible and how to prepare them. Morenz consulted with him almost every morning in the cafeteria. The other Commandos held him in awe, and even Sandy was usually careful how much she needled him.
Papp, like many of them, had been deeply affected by the crisis on his home island. He grew more sullen by the day. Yet no matter how much humanity disappointed him, his longing for the untouchable hero kept him on the list of the collection crews.
For his part, Reagan did nothing to encourage, but he was also careful not to treat any of his admirers with contempt. This fell under one of his critical categories: useful relationships. So far, none had proven as useful as Chris Papp. Papp was no fighter, but he knew every minute detail of the island and could think in terms of collapse. On this day, he had guided them to the school using a route that kept houses, buildings, and trees between their truck and the airport tower, where at least one sniper had started shooting at helicopters days before, and now shot at anything that moved.
Once the eight of them stepped outside the truck, Reagan shielded his eyes against the sun. A little twin-rotored drone had followed them from the hospital.
“Yeah,” said Buehl while he opened the hood and pulled the spark plugs. “You just keep watching the show.”
“Reagan?” Dr. Dave White said.
Reagan tilted his head toward the high school. “It looks the same to me, Doc. The grass looks undisturbed. Those windows—” He pointed to the west side of the main building. “—were all busted two weeks ago.”
“Not that someone hasn’t taken up residence,” said Papp, “but it has to be almost ninety today. I’ll bet the upstairs is an oven.”
Dr. White considered all this as he lifted the binoculars strapped around his neck and slowly panned over the school. “Nobody smart lives in that thing. Too many ways in and out. Makes it a viable candidate for the other kind. Reagan, is this one for little Ricky?”
“Room by room would take forever. I think we’re better off hitting quick and getting out. Unless something tips us off for infection, my vote is no.”
“Okay.” Dr. White set the binoculars back against his chest and took the antique M1 carbine off of his shoulder. “Secure the truck and spread out.”
“I just want it on record,” said Buehl, “that if I die looking for salt, fuck each and every last one of you.”
Sandy gave a smirking laugh.
Dr. White said, “Thank you, Artis. We’ll take your objection into consideration if you ever need a saline drip.”
They walked through overgrown grass browned from the last week and a half without rain. All the adults, except Wietzner, turned around at intervals, their heads swiveling left and right for threats. Ricky looked up at Reagan and turned when he turned. When they reached the nearest building, Wietzner peered through the windows while the others ducked.
“It’s a classroom. It’s clear.”
Reagan now carried a .357 magnum that he kept in a belt holster directly in front of his khaki shorts. On most trips, he still preferred his signature look of the shorts, lightweight canvas shoes, and a loose-fitting, white, button-down shirt for the same reason as always—it drew little attention and provided maximum flexibility. The only addition now was the gloves that Papp told him did not go with the outfit, but under which he now curled and uncurled his calloused knuckles. If it came to a firefight, Calhoun and Wietzner were both excellent shots. Anything else, and Reagan and his Neoprene gloves would let the others conserve their ammunition.
They entered a gymnasium. Dead leaves and footprints of dried mud marked a trail where the door had been left open. The bleachers were pushed flat against a wall painted a dozen shapes and colors of graffiti.
“Reagan?” Dr. White said.
“This is just how it looked last time. It’s been cleared out pretty good.”
“Chris?”
“Through that door and left,” said Papp, pointing to the entrance at the far wall.
They walked the hall in two lines of four, each line close to a wall. At one point they stopped, hearing running in the distance.
Calhoun scanned the hallway with his rifle scope. “Kids. They ran out.”
Ricky looked up at the lockers and over at each door, his eyes wide. The boy carried a SpongeBob backpack on all of their trips. Each time, right before they left, Reagan gave him a once-over, untucking his shirt out of his shorts, combing his hair if needed, doing anything to make Ricky look like a harmless little child. Right then, he truly looked childlike, his eyes wide.
“It’s just a school, kiddo.”
The boy looked up at Reagan, but said nothing.
“It probably reminds him of home,” said Sandy from the opposite wall.
Reagan peered in both directions. Several of the lockers stood open. Papers, books, chairs, and odd debris littered the hallway. Wires hung down from missing panels in the ceiling. Someone had stacked boxes outside of one of the rooms, but never come back for them.
“Tough schools they got back in the Fatherland,” he said.
Sandy made a face that showed what she thought of his maturity.
Papp tapped Reagan’s shoulder. “Up those stairs.”
“Up those stairs,” Reagan repeated to Sandy with exaggerated courtesy.
“Can we go through one trip without the two of you starting up?”
Reagan lifted his hands to Dr. White in appeal.
They climbed the stairs and turned where Papp directed. It was not quite an oven, but it was ten degrees hotter than comfortable. Papp dabbed at his neck with a handkerchief and took them to a room marked, Mr. Montrose. “This is the chemistry room.”
Wietzner casually pushed through the door. “Clear.”
Buehl stayed to cover the hall while the others paced through the lines of desks with mounted sinks and started to rifle through the cabinets.
Ricky stared at the sinks and their nozzles like an archaeologist just discovering an ancient ruin.
“All right,” Dr. White said, “it could say salt. It could say sodium chloride. It might say Halite. We need bricks, not granules. Any questions, just call out.”
Artis raised a hand.
“We’ve already discussed why it can’t be table salt.”
“I have a question,” said Lonneker. “Do we think any of this stuff in here is dangerous?”
“We want it if we do,” said Wietzner.
“Papp?”
He pushed up his glasses. “Chemistry was never really my forte. Lots of it will burn. I can tell you that. Montrose was kind of a character. Anything he could do to keep our attention, he’d do it. Set all sorts of things on fire. He blew up a yard gnome inside of a metal box once. I want to say it was a sodium tablet about the size of a Tic Tac. He had this little apparatus to push it into a cup of water.”
“He sounds fun,” said Sandy softly while opening a window. “Do you know if he is still on the island?”
Papp blinked away the memory and smiled without any joy. “If he is, I’m going to have Reagan kick the shit out of him. He gave me a C.”
“Well, watch yourself in here,” said Sandy, now looking at Reagan. “You burn that face of yours, and he’ll never do anything for you again.”
Buehl made a snort. “C’mon, Babe.”
Reagan stiffened, his back to them all while he inspected a set of glass cabinets. He didn’t turn. “Watch out for facial burns. Thanks for the pro tip there, Sandy.”
“Some women are more than just a pretty face, Reagan.”
“Some women need to mind their own business.”
At this she raised her voice. “God, you’re a tool. You don’t get to decide what’s beautiful and what’s not. You hear me? You and that little pea brain of yours... you don’t get to tell someone they’re all used up. What do you think she’s feeling?” She shook her head with a combination of fury and contempt. “That poor girl.”
“All right, you two,” Dr. White cut in, just below a shout. “Knock it off.”
Reagan tilted his chin up as if sniffing the air. “You guys think this is what it sounded like back stage at a Beatles concert the last couple of years? Bunch of dudes wanting to get the job done and get back to the hotel room, maybe smoke some hooch, but Yoko just keeps running her head and the guys are looking around at each other like, when is somebody gonna take that bongo out of her mitts and hit her upside the head with it?”
“Asshole.”
Reagan turned around. He held out a relaxed palm to the frustrated doctor. “No, no, she’s right. I’m an asshole and I need make amends.”
“Reagan—”
“First thing I’m doing when this is over is hooking up with someone that’s gonna set me straight, someone who can teach me everything I can and can’t decide.”
“Hey Reag—”
Reagan stepped around where Papp was trying to stop him, and held a gloved fist in front of his mouth like a microphone. He made his voice to sound like a news announcer. “Professor Ellen Prickly has a PHD in Women’s Studies. Her new book, Castration, a How To, is flying off the stands. Miz Prickly is a relationship expert whose first three husbands all faked their own deaths for some reason. We’re here with husband number four, Reagan Castaneda, to ask him what it’s like to support such a strong, independent woman.” He passed the imaginary microphone to himself and ignored Sandy’s cursing. “She’s amazing,” he said, his voice skittish. “It’s like in the Alien movies.” Then back to his announcer voice, “You mean like Ripley, a natural leader?”
“I meant like the alien,” he said, cringing over his shoulder. “With its... row after row of razor sharp teeth and its acid for blood.”
“Then just what attracted the two of you?”
“Well, I used to go for—”
“Hey!” Calhoun shouted.
“Thank you.”
“No,” he said to Dr. White while pointing to Reagan. “That was almost funny, but we still have one more stop and....” He lifted his other hand and shook it. Inside of a box roughly the size of a Rubik’s Cube, something clunked like a golf ball clattering against the sides. “I found your Halite.”
“I hope there’s more than just that.”
Calhoun nodded. “There’s more.”
They parked far down Roosevelt Street from the Home Depot. Dr. White, Sandy, Reagan, and Chris Papp all put on blue hospital scrubs before exiting. Reagan turned Ricky’s head in the direction of Wietzner and told him to stay with the pale man wherever he went.
Dr. White looked all around, and then at Reagan, who nodded. “All right, kids, worst spot on the island, hands down. These strip shops have been host to the looting Olympics, and there is almost no tree cover.” He pointed to the four-story building with many of its windows shattered. “I don’t like that. If somebody wants to take a shot at us while we’re dealing with these guys, this could get ugly.”
At that moment, a brown 4-door passed slowly on North Roosevelt. They could see it was full of passengers. It did not slow down.
“I don’t want anybody but the bikers thinking we’re medical. Artis, wait till we make contact. Move the truck where Rob and Dan can cover us from the rooftop. You’re going to be exposed.”
“Not if they move up next to that semi,” said Reagan, pointing to the opposite side of the lot.
“Their spotters will see it.”
“We’ll have to make sure we have their focused attention. I think it’s doable.”
Rob Calhoun peered through his scope at the Home Depot. “If we ever get out of this alive, I am suing the shit out of congress.”
“I’m not sure that’s how it works,” Papp mused.
“I’m not sure the post-apocalypse is gonna leave us a lot of courtrooms,” said Reagan.
“We all ready?” asked Dr. White.
Calhoun shouldered the rifle. “There’s a wooden owl by the front doors if we need to make a statement.”
Dr. White nodded.
Artis and Sandy kissed, long and slow.
“Ready, Doc,” said Buehl as he wiped his lips and slid into the driver’s seat. “Hey, Reagan, keep your dick-beaters off my girl, okay?”
