Time Shift: A Historical Novel Of Survival, page 20
The passenger released Zihna’s hair and grabbed Jackson around the neck with his forearm. He pulled back hard, lifting Jackson’s face toward the sky as he worked his arm around to Jackson’s throat. The man continued to pull until he had Jackson’s back down on his own chest.
Jackson tried to wiggle free, but with both his hands occupied with the man’s gun hand, it was impossible to break the hold against his throat. He began to see stars as his surroundings began losing their colors. He saw his world going gray, heading toward a swirl of darkness. He felt his grip on the man’s wrist weakening. His vision went into a tunnel, closing in from all sides toward pitch black. His last thought was of Zihna, naked from the waist down. Boom.
◆◆◆
Sounds returned to him first. The light wind rustled a nearby bush. A bird chirped. Both were distant and muted. As the sounds became more and more discernible, he felt someone’s touch on his neck. Warm fingers.
A voice spoke his name, Zihna’s voice.
The memories flooded back and he opened his eyes to see Zihna bent over him, staring into his eyes.
“For a second I thought you were gone.”
“How long was I out?” he muttered, as he massaged his throat.
“Just a few seconds.”
Lying prone in the sand, eyes to the sky, he jerked his eyes to the left. “Where are the shitheads?”
“One is dead and one is still out cold,” she said. There was a quiver in her voice.
He turned his eyes back to Zihna, saw the moisture in her eyes, and raised up. He looked around and saw the fat soldier flat on his back in the sand next to him.
Dark red blood oozed from a black hole at the bridge of his nose, between his eyes, ran down his forehead in a trickle, over his ear, and mixed with the sand next to his head. There were splatters on his shirt.
Jackson turned his head back to Zihna. “It was him or me. Personally, I think you made the right choice.”
She nodded with quivering lips. A tear ran down her cheek.
Jackson raised up, lifted his still cuffed hands over her head, brought his forearms down around her shoulders, and pulled her close. “I’m really sorry we’re in this mess and you had to go through that. You did the right thing.”
“For us,” she stuttered, “not so much for him.”
Jackson tightened his lips, held her close a few moments more, and released her. “We need to get out of here. Someone might have heard those gunshots.” He looked around. “Where’s the key to these things?” he asked, lifting his hands back over her head.
“In his pocket, right pocket, I think.”
Jackson stared into her eyes for several moments without moving. “Did he hurt you?” His eyes dropped to her jean shorts, now back in place.
“He tried but wasn’t able.”
Jackson gave her a nod and then rolled to his knees next to the dead man, rummaged through his right pocket, and came out with several keys on a keyring. One was a handcuff key. He released himself, dropped the cuffs to the sand, and rubbed his wrists. “Glad to have those off.” He helped Zihna up, wrapped both arms around her, and held her close for a full minute. He finally stepped back and held her shoulders with his hands. “We’ll figure this out.”
“Okay,” she said, exhaling deeply. She turned in a circle, finally stopping on the still unconscious driver. “What about him?”
Jackson stepped around to the side of the car and eyed the man crumpled in the sand. “Sure he’s alive?”
“He’s breathing,” she replied, stepping up next to Jackson.
Jackson ran his eyes head to foot and then turned to Zihna. “He’s kind of on the small side. I think his uniform might come close to fitting.”
She looked at Jackson with wide eyes. “You want me to wear his clothes?”
“We’re taking the car. Civilians driving a military car would look a little suspicious. I don’t speak Spanish, which leaves you. You’ll have to drive. I’ll be in the back like I’m your prisoner.”
“How do we know women drive cars around here?”
He smiled. “I guess we’ll have to take that chance.”
She turned to the unconscious man on the ground. “What do we do with him?”
Jackson looked around the area, seeing only rocks, a few bushes, but no trees. “We’ll handcuff him to the fat man. That should give us plenty of time to get somewhere safer than here.”
“What if he’s never found?”
“They’ll find him, eventually.”
Twenty minutes later, Jackson had both men behind a large rock with their wrists cuffed together.
“I found something,” Zihna called out from the front seat of the car. She wore the uniform.
Jackson checked the driver’s pockets for cuff keys and found one on a keyring with two other keys. He tossed them several yards away, checked his cuffed hands a final time, and walked over to Zihna, sitting in the passenger’s seat. The glove box was open and she had a map unfolded on her lap. He bent closer, cocked his head, and saw that everything on the map was written in Spanish. “See any landmarks or towns? Is that base on the map?”
“Yeah, well, maybe.” She pointed to a black, hand-drawn circle. “Just says base, but it’s east of the canyon, on a road heading back the way we came.”
“Is there a way around that base, back to the cave?”
She pointed out the windshield. “There is. If we continue in the direction we were going, there’s a turnoff heading south and west. It eventually joins up with our highway 89. But we would be passing through three small towns.” She tapped the map with her finger. “And it’s at least a hundred miles.” She leaned over and twisted the key in the ignition to the accessory position. “Half a tank.” She turned the key off.
Jackson leaned closer. “Any borders on the map?”
Zihna shook her head. “Appears to be a local topographical map.” She looked at the legend. “No date.”
“So, we don’t even know if it’s accurate. There could be another, even larger, base in that direction. And when they realize these guys are missing, they’ll send up helicopters.”
“If they have helicopters.”
Jackson smirked. “They have jets. I think we can safely say they have helicopters.” Jackson eyed the pistol and holster on her hip. “Have you fired one of those before? I mean, before today?”
“I’m no expert, but I know where the trigger is.”
“Okay, airman—” He focused on the name badge, “Rodriquez. Let’s shove off.”
CHAPTER 24
With Jackson in the back seat behind the wire cage, Zihna turned right onto the blacktop and accelerated.
“How long have we been off the road on that detour?” Zihna asked.
“Thirty, maybe forty minutes,” Jackson replied. “And yeah, they’re wondering where we are.”
Visible ahead in the distance stood what had to be the detention facility. It was a two-story, concrete block structure the size of a large grocery store. A chain-link fence surrounded the facility on all sides, and there was a manned gate just off the highway. Jackson and Zihna would be passing right by that guard.
“Just keep it steady,” Jackson said.
“We haven’t seen another car on this road. He’ll certainly take notice as we approach.”
“Wave at him as we go by. And smile.”
As they came up to the gate and the solitary guard, Zihna did her best Miss America impression with a wave and a big smile.
The guard waved back with his head turning in concert with the car’s passing.
Jackson twisted and turned to keep the man in sight, watching for any indication he might think something was amiss. “He picked up a telephone,” Jackson said, as he faced forward. “Around this bend, step on it.”
When the view of the guard shack became blocked by a large boulder, Zihna accelerated to the highest speed possible on the winding road.
Jackson unfolded the map and spread it out on his lap. “That turnoff is about ten miles up. This map doesn’t indicate if there’s anything there, but it would be a good place for at least a gas station.”
“I think this is really dangerous,” Zihna said. “We’re just asking to get caught if we stay on this road.”
Jackson lifted the map closer to his face and studied the various lines and contours. “About twenty miles after the turn there’s a dirt road of some sort that works its way west through the desert, all the way to the ridge on the east side of Highway 89. Do we have any water?”
“There’s a six-pack of glass bottles in the trunk and our backpacks. No food, unless you lied about that being your last protein bar back in the cave.”
“I wasn’t lying.”
The intersection included a few odd buildings, most notably a gas station with a small country store—wind blown, dusty, with its best days long past.
Jackson eyed two men standing in front of the convenience store door as Zihna made the turn.
The two men watched the car with equal curiosity.
“There’s a military truck approaching,” Zihna said.
Jackson jerked his head up from the map and immediately caught sight of a camouflage-schemed pickup occupied by two men. “Just like before, give them a wave. Drop the smile though.”
As the two vehicles passed each other, Zihna flipped her fingers up from the steering wheel but otherwise kept her eyes on the road.
Both men fixated on the sedan, especially the driver, as they passed.
Through her mirror, Zihna watched the truck continue on. “How far to that turnoff?”
Jackson checked the map’s legend and measured with the first two knuckles on his index finger along the route. “Forty kilometers, twenty-five miles. There’s a sharp bend in the road just before.” He glanced at the speedometer. “Get it up to ninety-five and we’ll be there in twenty-five minutes.”
“Ninety-five?”
“That speedometer is in kilometers.”
They passed several more vehicles on the way, but none of the occupants seemed to take notice of them.
“That has to be it ahead,” Jackson said.
Zihna slowed and turned off on little more than ruts across the sand. “Are we going to get lost out here?”
“Just keep heading west. I’ll try to keep us on the right track from this map. We have about twenty-three miles back to highway 89.” He peered over the seat back at the dash. “How much gas do we have?”
“Little less than half.”
“Should be plenty. We just need to keep from getting stuck.”
With a thick cloud of dust rolling off behind the car, they had bumped and jolted along for nearly twenty minutes when Jackson spotted a speck in the sky to the north. He leaned closer to the glass window and squinted. “I think they have a helicopter up.”
“There’s a house up ahead,” Zihna said. “Looks like there’s a barn.”
“Head for it.”
Zihna stepped on the pedal, which churned up even more dust.
“The chopper may have turned in this direction,” Jackson shouted over the noise of the car’s engine.
Two minutes later, Zihna yanked the wheel left onto a rough driveway. The tires spun and the rear end fishtailed. With no door on the barn and enough room for the car, Zihna drove straight into the open space and braked hard. The car slid to a stop, throwing dust and dirt over the assemblage of various tools, boxes, and stacks of old lumber at the back of the barn. With the car stopped, she sat there with both hands white-knuckled around the steering wheel. The only sound was the engine’s purr. She finally reached down and turned the key, killing the engine.
It was then that the wop-wop of a helicopter could just barely be heard in the distance.
“Think they saw us?” Zihna asked, as she twisted around to face Jackson.
“If we’re surrounded in about twenty minutes, we’ll know the answer to that.” He looked around, peering through the windows, nearly opaque with dust and grime.
Zihna pulled on the handle and opened the door a couple of inches. “Think anyone lives here?”
“Let’s find out,” he said, as he opened the back door.
Just as Zihna opened the door fully, banging it against a rusted hand plow, the sound of the helicopter roared directly overhead. “This place showed up just in time.”
“Luck does tend to run in my family,” Jackson said.
“I’m not sure anything we’ve gone through in the last week could be considered lucky.” She got out.
Jackson got out and scrambled over to the barn’s front opening as the sound of the helicopter’s rotors dissipated in the distance. He started to look skyward but suddenly jerked his head to the right. He raised both hands in the air and stepped back.
“What—” Zihna started.
The sight of an old man with a double-barreled shotgun pointed at Jackson interrupted her sentence. His thick gray hair contrasted nicely with his weathered dark skin.
“Estás invadiendo mi propiedad,” the man grumbled.
He wore faded denim overalls, a purple t-shirt, and roughed-up leather service boots.
With his hands still up, Jackson glanced back at Zihna.
“He says we’re trespassing,” Zihna translated.
“Tell him we mean him no harm and we’ll be moving on soon.”
Zihna raised her hands. “Nosotras nos referimos a ti—“
“I understand English,” he said with little accent, cutting her off. “I’m surprised you do.” He pointed the shotgun’s barrel at the ground and stepped inside the entrance.
“Can we lower our hands?” Jackson asked.
The man raised his chin without comment.
Hesitantly, Jackson and Zihna let their hands drop.
“I’m Jackson; this is Zihna. We just—”
“You were hiding from that chopper.”
Jackson glanced at Zihna. “Yes, sir,” he said with a wince.
“Why are they after you?”
Zihna stepped up next to Jackson. “It’s a very long story. Let’s just say, we don’t belong here and we’re trying to get back to where we’re from.”
“How’d you get here?”
“That’s another long story,” Zihna said.
Jackson gave a weak smile. “We appreciate you not shooting, but we should be on our way.”
“That chopper will be back. They don’t give up on a search. If that chopper doesn’t find you, they’ll begin a vehicle and foot search.”
Jackson turned his head and studied the military car a few moments.
“Your best bet is to travel at night. How far you going?”
Jackson faced the man. “Who are you, exactly?”
“Name’s Chayton. I own this place.”
“Is it just you?” Zihna asked.
“Why you want to know?” The shotgun barrel lifted a couple of inches.
“No reason,” Zihna said. “I used to know someone named Chayton. We worked together.”
“You might’ve worked around here, but I doubt he did,” Chayton said, shifting the barrel in Jackson’s direction. Chayton turned and started walking. “You two look like you haven’t eaten in a while. You’re welcomed to some leftover rabbit stew.”
Jackson glanced at Zihna with a shrug. “I could eat.”
The two of them followed the old man into the open and toward the main house, a dilapidated wood structure with peeling white paint.
Jackson wrenched his neck searching the sky as they walked.
The man led them up two wood steps, both crooked, through a screen door, and onto an unpainted porch, empty except for a single folding chair. He opened the front door, motioned for them to follow, and continued into the small living room overflowing with well-used furniture.
Knickknacks were scattered around the room and thin, dusty, flowered curtains indicated a woman’s touch at some time in the past. But now, empty bottles and dirty dishes revealed the housekeeping skills of a man that didn’t much care.
“Have a seat anywhere,” Chayton said, as he continued into the adjoining kitchen.
“You have electricity way out here?” Jackson asked, as he spun in a circle, surveying the interior.
“Nope,” Chayton said, without looking back. “But I have propane for the stove.”
Zihna swiped her hand over the seat of an old chair before sitting. “And they leave you alone out here?”
“Mostly. I don’t bother them; they don’t bother me. Unless there’s a reason. Like searching for two escapees.”
“What makes you think we’re escapees?” Jackson asked.
Chayton faced Jackson. “How else did you get that vehicle?”
Jackson twisted his lips with a slight nod.
Chayton continued to the stove. He pulled a match from a box, turned a knob, and lit a burner. He slid a large soup pot to the flame. “Few minutes.” He lifted two bottles of water from a wood crate next to a fifties-style refrigerator, flipped the lids, and returned to the living room. He handed a bottle to Jackson, still standing, and to Zihna.
“We don’t want to be a burden,” she said.
Chayton spun on his heels. “No burden. Jackson, is it?”
“Yes,” Jackson said, as he faced the man.
“Where is it you need to get to?”
Jackson tightened his lips and glanced at Zihna. She shrugged. “About thirty kilometers due west.”
“Ain’t nothing out there, just desert. And the canyon a little farther.”
“It’s a—” Zihna started.
“Long story,” Chayton said.
Zihna smiled and nodded. “Aren’t you taking some risk by taking us in?”
Chayton stared at her for several moments. “I suppose I am. But you seem like you might be worth the risk.”
Jackson finally took a seat on a faded settee. “Can you tell us what is going on around here?”
“What do you mean?”
“The Spanish occupation of this area,” he said. “And one of the soldiers mentioned New England.”
“Son, you two been living on the moon or something?”
