But not enough that anyone would see anything Raine and the girl were doing.
He followed her as she went ahead cautiously, looked, then went farther from the lights.
She knew what she was doing. Probably grew up doing this.
And probably was still growing up.
She turned to him and put a hand up. Stop. Wait.
He nodded.
Voices off to the left. Some workers standing there, just talking.
He and the girl had to remain crouched, waiting.
Eventually, Raine could hear the rhythmic sound of the people saying goodbye, or good night, or whatever the hell it was they said to end their middle-of-the-night conversation.
When they moved away…
“What’s your name?”
She turned back to him, eyes narrow, face set, as if he had asked a bad thing.
“You do not need that. You don’t need name.” She looked around. “We go.”
She led the way across a road, both of them in the light for a bit before hugging a building across the way.
He realized that he was completely in her hands. • • •
He didn’t have to worry-at least not at this time-for she led him to his buggy.
“I moved it,” she said. “After everyone asleep. Your guns-they in there.” She ran to the fence, which looked perfectly intact.
That is, until she pulled at a corner, and like rolling up a piece of paper, it made an opening. Big enough for the buggy to get through? Guess he’d find out soon enough.
“C’mon. You go. Now, hurry.”
“You’re not going to want to hear this again… but thanks.”
Nothing. A world without thanks. Without helping people. The total land of tit for tat.
So much for preserving civilization.
He turned to the buggy, then stopped and turned back to his savior.
“My knife?”
She quickly shook her head. Different rules for that, for stealing.
But she smiled again.
Here’s the lesson, Raine thought… not all bandits are the same. They are just existing in whatever way they can, with whatever code they have. Kill? Yes. Steal? Yes. But at least this one, from whatever group she came from, had some kind of rules.
Rules that saved his life.
But could probably just as easily end his life some other time.
He got into the buggy. Flipped the switch. It started, the roar seeming horribly loud.
Best to get the hell out of here fast, he thought.
He pulled close to the opening in the fence.
The buggy’s front cleared the opening, but then the roll bar above the driver’s seat got caught. He stopped. The girl wedged herself against the car and yanked the metal mesh up a bit higher. The roll bar popped free, and she jumped away, rolling in the dirt.
And he was outside the fence.
Still night, morning hours away. The old-fashioned luminescence of the compass showing a direction.
He turned to look back for the girl…
But she was gone. He should be, too.
And now, guest in this world or not, he had a score to settle.
NINETEEN
Raine rode back to Hagar, rifle in hand, waiting for either bandits to swoop down from nearby hills or Outriggers to come roaring from behind. Could they have found the two dead guards?
Chances were such things like killing guards and escaping didn’t go down too well here.
He looked at the radio. Not that he was tempted to use it.
No, he figured a surprise return was in order.
Were there other options?
He could just head out, on his own. Find some other settlements, town, a city. But where? What direction? There was only one place he knew, and that was the Hagar Settlement.
And he wanted to look Dan in the eye when he confronted him.
A plan? Get some supplies. Get them to give him some idea of where to go, what to do. Because he knew that the Hagar Settlement couldn’t be safe. Not when the Outriggers discovered he was gone. Not when the Authority discovered they’d lost their prize.
And why the hell do they want me so much? Raine wondered. Just because he was a survivor?
None of it made too much sense.
Like the rest of this world.
I’ve gone down the rabbit hole, he thought.
Was there any way out?
The settlement took shape in the shimmering waves of the sun blazing down, half blurry illusion, half real. He kept driving toward it, wondering if the guards had been told not to expect his return.
But they lowered their weapons as he came close, and backed away, permitting him to enter.
Raine slowed his buggy, gave them a nod.
Just back from a little drive, gents.
Already he saw that much of the debris and destruction from the other day had been cleared. Life returning to normal.
He turned left, around to the makeshift infirmary, past Halek’s weapons workshop.
And every few feet-much as he didn’t want it too-he felt his anger growing.
He walked in. The wounded in the back, the dead bodies removed.
One of those attending the wounded looked up.
“Yeah, can we-”
“Where’s Dan?”
“He’s-I dunno-with his brother, I guess.”
The person went back to looking at an IV drip. No meters hooked up to the wounded. This was medicine circa 1912. They probably had it better in the trenches. But this was the stuff his life had been traded for. If anything, that made him angrier.
He turned, walking past his buggy and heading toward where he hoped he’d find Dan.
He pushed open the door, a rattling piece of metal hanging lopsided off its hinges. The push was hard enough so that Dan, standing at a table, looked up, startled.
Nearly went for his gun, Raine thought.
Raine held his at a nice forty-five-degree angle, fingers wrapped around the trigger.
“Raine? You’re here?” Dan stood up, noticing the gun. “Alive?”
“Funny, isn’t it? Yeah. Guess your deal didn’t take. Though I see that you got your medical supplies.”
“They told Halek that… you had been wounded. Killed.”
Raine took some steps forward. Clanking sounds from the back. He was experienced enough to be aware that Halek was back there with all his gun stocks and barrels.
“They said-wrong.”
Now Raine released his gun and took a swing at Dan, fast and hard. A good old-fashioned crash to his lower jaw. And Dan Hagar went flying down to the ground. Raine leveled his gun…
And then put it down on the table.
This was how he saw it: he still-in some way-needed these bastards. So a bit of payback-and punching someone in the face always felt good-and then he’d get their help. If not, then someone would really get hurt.
Dan rubbed his chin.
“What the hell are you talking about?”
“C’mon, Dan. Get the hell up.” Raine held his hands open. “See, gun down, no weapons. Stand-the fuck-up.”
Dan did.
And Raine threw a left this time. But Dan-now aware-moved fast. He deflected that blow with his right forearm, while he threw a punch at Raine’s head, a punch that fell short by a mere inch.
“What are you doing?” Dan yelled. “I saved your goddamn-”
Raine reached out and grabbed Dan by his jacket, pulling him close as he brought his head forward and smashed his forehead right into Dan’s face.
Dan staggered back, blood now coming from his nose.
“You’re crazy,” he said.
“You dealt me to Outriggers! For medical supplies, remember? Is that what you were planning to do the whole time? Hold onto me until the opportunity was too good to pass up?”
Then he saw Dan freeze.
He turned, rubbing his bloody nose, and looked to the back-toward Halek. Dan didn’t face him now, expecting the next punch.