“The one thing we can’t do is just sit here and pray,” Rachel said.
“Oh, is the holy roller losing faith?”
“Faith without works is dead,” Rachel responded, hating herself for reducing a complex passage from the Book of James into a catch phrase. “That means fighting the good fight.”
“Like chopping up Zapheads with that sling blade?”
“I plead self-defense,” she said.
Stephen scooted off the bed, tossing his cracker wrapper on the floor.
“Stephen?” Rachel said. “Did you forget something?”
“No. I got Miss Molly right here,” he said, turning the doll to face her.
She scowled and looked down at the wrapper. “Trash goes in the trash can.”
As Stephen bent to pick up the wrapper, DeVontay said to her, “You make the apocalypse so much fun.”
“Okay,” Rachel said. “Time to go.”
“Go where?” DeVontay said, sitting on the bed.
“Mi’sippi!” Stephen said.
“Stevie, you’re a little too eager to go out there,” DeVontay said to him. “Lots of stray bullets flying around.”
“We’ll be better off once we get away from the city,” Rachel said. “Fewer people, fewer Zapheads, fewer fires.”
“Back to nature, huh?”
Rachel was serving as sentinel at the window. The streets outside the motel were quiet. She hadn’t seen any Zapheads for the last hour or so. Distant bursts of gunfire had erupted intermittently, but Rachel didn’t believe that Captain America and his troops were on this side of town. For the one thing, the hunting wasn’t as good.
“We’re heading for Mount Rogers.” Rachel smiled at Stephen. “It’s on the way.”
“What’s up there?” DeVontay asked.
“Somebody who was ready for this.”
“What, you got ESP all of a sudden?” DeVontay asked. “The sun heated you up some new superpowers?”
“My grandfather has a compound there. He’s what you might call a ‘survivalist wacko.’ He got interested in self-reliant living back during Y2K fever, when some people thought the computers would go berserk and throw civilization back to the Stone Age.”
DeVontay scowled. “Well, we all saw how that one turned out.”
“Yes, but Grandpa Wheeler figured civilization had gotten too complex, that modern systems would inevitably break down for one reason or another. Like a motor that had too many moving parts and not enough oil. He also believes the world’s governments were serving the will of the very wealthy. At some point we’d have to learn to live outside the structure.”
“He got that right.” DeVontay nudged Stephen. “Get your stuff together, Little Man. We got some walking to do.”
Rachel stuffed her supplies in the backpack, rediscovering the bottle of suicide pills the pharmacist had given her. Why hadn’t she already gotten rid of them?
DeVontay pulled out his pistol, opened the door a crack, and surveyed the street. “This is as good a time as any. Unless you want to make the bed first?”
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
Jorge dreamed of great dragons, their green scales glittering in the sun as they soared over a burning land. Dozens of them poured their flames upon the earth from above. Their gaping, lipless mouths spat sparks and steam, and their brittle cries were like thick sheets of glass sliding across gritty metal.
He awoke in a sweat, not knowing where he was. The dragons faded from his mind’s eye, but the shrieks continued.
He fumbled one hand across the thin blankets until he found Rosa’s warm body, and then rolled to where Marina still slept on the cot. He checked her forehead, pleased to find it relatively cool.
The front door to the cabin burst open, letting dawn rush in. Franklin Wheeler was silhouetted in the opening, a shotgun in one hand, the other tugging up his filthy flannel underwear.
“Goddamn ya, leave my chickens alone,” the old man yelled.
Jorge rose from the makeshift bedding and hurried outside. Franklin stood in the yard, raising the shotgun to the sky as squawking hens raced for the cover of the garden and trees. As Franklin aimed, Jorge squinted against the morning sun and saw a hawk, its wings spread wide in a display of aerodynamic majesty. Its breast was mottled, the tail feathers red, the sharp beak pointing into the morning breeze.
The shotgun belched out a thunderclap, pellets spraying the tops of trees. The hawk lurched and faltered, a few feathers floating away from its body. The wings curled in against the breast and the bird of prey dropped like a wet rock into the forest beyond the compound.
“Got the bastard,” Franklin said, pumping the shotgun and ejecting a smoking red plastic shell to the dirt.
“A red-tail hawk,” Jorge said. Red-tails were common in the mountain forests, territorial and intelligent, and their keen vision served them up small rodents and birds. Mr. Wilcox’s property had harbored several mating couples, and although the farm didn’t feature chickens, Jorge had occasionally seen one of the hawks swoop down and claim a jackrabbit from the Christmas tree fields.
“Is everything okay?” Rosa called from the doorway, Marina wrapped in a blanket and standing behind her.
“Just killing a predator,” Franklin said, not realizing his words could have a double meaning.
“Is okay,” Jorge said, waving them back into the house.
The hens were still unsettled, although most of them had found clefts in the weeds where they crouched, clucking and fluttering their wings. One, however, lay in a lump by a metal watering tub, one yellow leg poked awkwardly in the air.
Franklin shouldered the weapon and walked over to the dead bird. “I’m glad it’s a white one. I got three just like it, so I didn’t bother giving them names.”
The chicken’s head had been torn from its body, ruby-red giblets hanging from the opening. Jorge looked around but he didn’t see the head. The hawk hadn’t been carrying it, so it must have been planning to eat the bird on the spot until its meal had been interrupted. The flies had already found the corpse.
“You mind getting the shovel?” Franklin asked, scanning the sky as if expecting another hawk to make a dessert run.
“Why?” Jorge asked in return.
“To bury it. Put it in the garden and the nutrients go back to the soil.”
“But it’s in good shape,” Jorge said. “Es sabroso. Tasty.”
Franklin shook his head. “I run a no-kill operation here. The chickens give me eggs in trade for their room and board.”
“It’s dead anyway,” Jorge said. “You didn’t kill it.”
Franklin’s face curdled as he looked at the hen. He shook his head. “I don’t know if I could eat it. Almost like eating one of the family.”
“Rosa will cook it very nice,” Jorge said, knowing his English grammar was slightly off but hoping Franklin wouldn’t notice.
“I…I don’t think I could pluck it and clean it,” Franklin said.
“You give me a sharp knife, the job is done.”
Franklin nodded. “Guess there’s not much use letting it go to waste. Like you said, dead is dead.”
Jorge’s admiration for the man had taken a downward slide. All the defenses and food storage and solar-energy panels meant nothing if Franklin wasn’t prepared to make use of every resource. But Jorge also felt a surge of pride. He and his family had something to contribute here. They could be part of this society and culture, as small as it was.
As Franklin went into the house, Jorge called to him, “Please tell Rosa to start a pot of water boiling.”
Jorge lifted the hen, which was surprisingly light, given its bulk. Birds were deceptive in size because of their feathers and hollow bones. This hen could feed the four of them for at least two meals, assuming Franklin’s springhouse did a proper job of cooling. Besides, the most unpleasant part of the task—chopping off the head and taking the life—had already been delivered as a gift courtesy of Mother Nature.