“I don’t know,” said Max. “He’s just… I don’t know. He reminds me of… If I had a son, I guess.”
“Like the son you never had? Something’s gotten into you, Max. This doesn’t sound like you at all. Since when did you get all emotional?”
Max shrugged.
“I think you’re feeding me a line of bullshit,” said Georgia, looking him right in the eyes. “I think something else is going on.”
“Maybe I am. You know me too well, Georgia. And what else is going on, then?”
“I think you’ve gotten addicted to this.”
“To what?”
“To all this. To all this running, all this fighting. It’s not fun. No one’s saying that. Mostly it’s hell. But it’s like guys who keep signing up for tours abroad again and again. They get addicted to it.”
Max didn’t say anything, but the expression around his eyes had changed.
“Things have calmed down now,” said Georgia. “And I’m doing better, so you know that I can take care of things here at camp. For now, at least. I just want you to be aware of what’s going on with you, Max. In the end, I can’t tell you what to do. It’s your decision. I just hope you realize what you’re getting yourself into.”
It took Max a long time to respond. “Maybe you’re right. But I’m not the type to overthink things. All I’m doing is trying to go rescue a kid who’s in a bad situation. I’ll take the pot farmer’s truck.”
“All right,” said Georgia. “If that’s what you want to do. I’m going to get this camp in good order. By the time you’re back, you won’t recognize it. There’s one thing that you need to know, though. One thing you’re not considering.”
“What’s that?”
“You’re going to have a hell of a time getting out of here without Mandy going along. She cares about you more than you realize, Max.”
Max said nothing. He just nodded and turned, and walked back toward the camp. He limped slightly as he walked.
As Georgia watched him walk away, she couldn’t help but thinking that this might be the last day she’d see Max. They’d worked and fought hard to carve out their little bit of relative safety here away from the madness of the collapsing world. And now Max was throwing himself right back into it all.
4
Art had been awake for an hour, lying in the darkness until dawn when the other men started stirring.
He lay there on the filthy wall-to-wall carpeting, listening to the sounds of swearing, snores, and grunts as the men tried to shake themselves awake.
They were packed in, about ten of them in a single room. The once-immaculate carpet had become filthy. No one took their boots off. No one changed their clothes. The smell was overpowering, almost gut-wrenching. No one showered. There wouldn’t have been any point, even if the water had worked.
For a while, Art had thought he was getting used to the smell. But after a few weeks, something had changed. He didn’t know if he was just suddenly noticing it all more, or if everyone was smelling worse than before. He still didn’t know the answer, and it didn’t matter. Everyone stunk. Art included.
They were packed in like sardines. They lived like rats. But Art tried to look at the positive side of things. He always had.
He was one of the lucky ones. He was still alive. Unlike many, many others.
Art’s positive outlook may have worked for him when he was living his pre-EMP life. Back then he was a graduate student, studying urban planning. He’d been popular with women, gone on plenty of dates, studied hard, and made sure to keep himself in good shape. He’d biked to work every day, braving the rush hour traffic on his road bike, telling himself that the physical benefits were worth it.
Now, his positive outlook was falling apart. How could it not be? But he still clung to it. He still tried to tell himself he was lucky. He still tried to tell himself he was doing everything he could, that he wasn’t a bad person, that anyone in his position would do the same.
It was hard to face reality. Impossible, sometimes.
Back then, he’d lived his life conscientiously. Or at least he’d liked to tell himself that. He recycled. He donated a small percentage of his graduate student stipend every year to help out kids in need. He even volunteered in the local big brother program, which saw him tutoring a middle school student twice each week in reading and math, not to mention general life skills. How to cope with problems. How to deal with adversity. That sort of thing.
Back then, his life had been well ordered. Now, it was chaos. Repeated chaos. And violence.
He’d never get used to the violence.
But he’d always been the sort of person who’d followed the rules, who did what he had to do to advance within the system. And now, those same instincts served him once again, albeit in a very different way.
Before the EMP, the rules had been to get good grades, to make friends with the right professors, to keep his wardrobe up to date. Now, the rules were to do whatever the sergeant said. Sometimes that meant just getting gasoline. Sometimes it meant finding food.
But the biggest rule of all was to complete the tasks at any cost. Usually the cost was someone else’s death. And at Art’s own hands.
The images wouldn’t leave his mind. The people he’d killed, their faces were all still as fresh as ever in his memory. Every little mark, every little pore of their faces was burned into his mind.
No matter what he did, he couldn’t shake the memories. No matter how much he drank the night before, he’d wake up early with his heart pounding and the faces as vivid as if they were right before them.
The last night, he’d gone out with the group. They’d shot two men. Art had killed one of them himself. And the most disturbing part of it was that it hadn’t even been difficult for him this time. He’d gotten used to the actual act. He’d just pulled the trigger and that was that.
It was only afterward that he regretted it.
He’d told himself it wasn’t his fault.
But it was. He knew that now.
Sure, he’d had no choice then. But he had a choice now.
When the EMP had hit, Art had stayed holed up in his small and tidy suburban apartment.
Then they’d come. They hadn’t identified themselves. Two men with big guns had showed up at his door. They hadn’t even said anything. Just dragged him out of his apartment, taken him to the street, and shoved him down onto the pavement. Art’s face had hit so hard that his nose broke. They’d told him to get on his knees.
Slowly, more people joined Art. They too were instructed to get on their knees. When Art glanced at them, he recognized the neighbors he’d seen here and there over the years. They were people he’d never talked to, and sometimes not even exchanged a glance with. No one had said much to each other in that neighborhood.
The men with the guns had gone house to house. There’d been a whole team of them, and they’d dragged everyone outside onto the street. Finally, when they had everyone left in the neighborhood rounded up, they’d given their instructions. They were crystal clear, and couldn’t be misinterpreted.
“You’re fighting to the death,” one of them had barked out, loudly. “We’re pairing you off. If you win, you’re one of us. If you lose, you die.”
To show that they were serious, the men had then, completely at random, shot four or five men dead. Right in the head. Dead in the street. They were the first dead bodies, not to mention deaths, that Art had ever witnessed.
Two of the men with guns had taken Art roughly and basically dragged him off to the side. They’d handed him a hammer. He stood there quivering, facing down his next door neighbor, a man in his early fifties. Art didn’t know first name, but he knew that he was a math professor at some college, and that his last name was McGovern.