“Hey there,” Amos said.
After a long moment, the other guy nodded. “Hey.”
“Which way you heading?” Amos asked.
“West,” the guy said. “Everything’s fucked east from here to the coast. Maybe south too. See if I can get someplace warm.”
“Yeah, things are shit all over,” Amos said like they were at a coffee kiosk and chatting about the weather. “We’re heading northeast. Baltimore area.”
“Whatever’s left of it,” the guy said. “No offense, but I think your plan sucks.”
“That’s okay. I was thinking the same about yours.”
The man smiled and didn’t go for a gun. If he had one. Not so many guns among the law-abiding Earth populace as there were in the Belt. And if the guy was willing to just shoot the shit this long without anyone escalating or making a play, probably he wasn’t a predator. Just another accountant or medical technician still figuring out how little his degree was worth now.
“I’d offer to share,” Amos said, “but we ain’t got shit.”
“I’d help, but the tent’s only big enough for one.”
“I’m small,” Peaches joked, but only sort of. Skinny as she was, she had to be feeling the cold worse, and when he paid attention to it, Amos had to agree it was getting pretty damn brisk.
“Word of warning? Head north a few klicks before you cut any farther east,” the man said.
“Why?” Amos asked.
“Militia motherfucker. NO TRESPASSING signs and everything. Took a potshot at me when I went to ask for some water. Kind of asshole that’s probably pissing himself with glee that the world went to shit and made his stashed guns and paranoia pay off.”
Amos felt something in his chest go loose and warm and thought it might have been relief. “Good to know. Take care then.”
“Peace be with you.”
“And also with you,” Peaches said. Amos nodded and turned north, trudging back along the road. About half a klick later, he stopped, squatting down by a tree, and watched the path they’d just walked down. Peaches huddled beside him, shivering.
“What are we doing?”
“Seeing if he follows us,” Amos said. “You know. In case.”
“You think he will?”
Amos shrugged. “Don’t know. Thing about civilization, it’s what keeps people civil. You get rid of one, you can’t count on the other.”
She smiled. She really wasn’t looking that good. He wondered in passing what he’d do if she died. Figure something else out, probably. “You sound like you’ve done this before,” she said.
“Shit, I grew up like this. All these folks are just playing catch-up. Thing is, we’re humans. We’re tribal. More settled things are, the bigger your tribe is. All the people in your gang, or all the people in your country. All the ones on your planet. Then the churn comes, and the tribe gets small again.”
He waved a hand at the dark gray landscape. This far out, the trees weren’t knocked over, but the weeds and bushes were starting to die from the dark and the cold.
“Right now,” he said, “I figure our tribe at about two.”
Either she shuddered at the idea or else the cold was getting to her worse. He stood up, squinting down the road. The tent guy wasn’t coming. That was good.
“All right, Peaches. Let’s get going. We’re going to have to head off the road for a bit.”
She looked north, up the road, confused. “Where are we going?”
“East.”
“You mean where we aren’t supposed to go because of some crazy asshole shooting at people?”
“Yup.”
The town had been a decent size last week. Cheap little houses on narrow streets, solar panels on all the roofs sucking in the sunlight, back when there had been some. There were still people here and there. Maybe one house in five or six where the tenants were waiting for help to come to them or so deep in denial that they thought staying put was an option. Or they’d just decided they’d rather die at home. As rational a decision as any other, things being what they were.
They walked on the sidewalks even though there weren’t many cars. A police van skidded by a few blocks ahead once. A sedan with an old woman hunched in the front seat who carefully ignored them as she passed. When the batteries ran dry there was no power grid to charge them back up, so all the trips were either short or one-way. One house had words painted across the front: EVERYTHING IN THIS HOUSE IS THE PROPERTY OF THE TRAVIS FAMILY. LOOTERS WILL BE HUNTED DOWN AND KILLED. That left him laughing for a couple of blocks. The supermarket at the center of town was dark, and stripped down to the shelves. So somebody in the place had understood the gravity of their situation.
The compound was on the eastern edge of town. He’d been worried they might walk by it without noticing, but it hugged the road and the signage was clear. PRIVATE PROPERTY. NO TRESPASSING. ARMED SECURITY ON SITE. His personal favorite was NO RELIEF SERVICES.
A wide, flat field of a yard led up to a white modular house. The transport parked in front of it looked like something manufactured to imitate military equipment. Amos had lived in an actual military design long enough to recognize the difference.
He put Peaches in place at the edge of the property first, then walked the perimeter once, taking it all in. The fence had barbed wire all the way around, but nothing electrified. He was about fifty-fifty that there was a sniper’s nest in the attic, but it might have just been a bird. Easy to forget that even with the massive burden of humanity, there was still wildlife on Earth. The house itself was prefabbed or else printed in place. Hard to say which. He also saw three tubes coming up out of the ground that looked like they could be ventilation. There were bullet holes in the bark of the trees at the property’s edge, and one place where it looked like there was blood on the leaves of the dying bushes.
This was where he wanted to be.
He started by standing at the edge of the property, cupping his hands around his mouth and shouting.
“Hey! In the house! You there?”
He waited a long minute, alert for signs of movement. Something behind the curtains of the front window. Nothing in the sniper’s nest. So maybe it was just sparrows after all.
“Hey! In the house! My name is Amos Burton, and I’m looking to trade!”
A man’s voice came, shrill and angry. “This is private property!”
“That’s why I’m out here fucking my throat up instead of ringing the goddamn doorbell. I heard you were prepped for this shit. I got caught with my pants down. Looking to trade for guns.”
There was a long silence. Hopefully the bastard wouldn’t just shoot him, but maybe. Life was risk.
“What’re you offering?”
“Water recycler,” Amos shouted. “It’s on the back of my rig.”
“I’ve got one.”
“May need another. Don’t think they’ll be making more anytime soon.” He waited to the count of ten. “I’m going to come up to the house so we can talk.”
“This is private property! Don’t cross the line!”
Amos opened the gate, smiling his biggest goofiest smile. “It’s okay! If I was armed, I wouldn’t be trading for guns, right? Don’t shoot me, I’m just here to talk.”
He crossed the line, leaving the gate open behind him. He kept his hands in the air, fingers spread. He could see his breath ghosting before him. It really had gotten cold. That wasn’t getting better soon. He wondered if he maybe should have said he had a heater.
The front door opened and the man came out. He was tall and thin with a stupid, cruel face and a long-barreled assault rifle aimed at the center of Amos’ chest. It had to be illegal as shit under UN gun laws.
“Hey!” he said with a wave. “My name’s Amos.”
“You said.”
“Didn’t get yours.”
“Didn’t say it.”
The man walked forward to take cover behind his pretend military transport.
“Nice rifle,” A
mos said, keeping his hands up.
“Works too,” the man said. “Strip.”
“Come again?”
“You heard me. You want to trade with me, prove you’re not hiding any weapons. Strip!”
Well, that was unforeseen, but what the hell. Wouldn’t be the first guy he’d ever met who got off on feeling powerful. Amos shrugged off his shirt and heeled off his shoes one at a time, then dropped his pants and stepped out of them. The cold air bit his skin.
“Okay!” Amos said. “Unless I’ve got a pistol up my ass, we can agree I’m not carrying, yeah?”
“Agreed,” the man said.
“Look, if you’re still worried about it, you can get someone to come out, look through the clothes here. You keep the gun on me, make sure I don’t try anything.”
“Don’t tell me what to do.”
That was a good sign. Made it seem more likely that the fella was on his own here. He glanced up at the attic. If there were a second person, that would be the place to put them. Tiny gray-brown wings fluttered into the attic like the answer to a question.
“Where’s this cycler?”
“About three miles down the road,” Amos said, pointing with his thumb. “I can have it here in an hour, easy.”
“That’s okay,” the man said, lifting the rifle to his shoulder and sighting on Amos. The end of the barrel looked as big as a cave. “I can get it myself.”
Before he could pull the trigger, something moved through the field of his yard like a gust of wind. Only this wind had teeth. The man staggered back, then yawped in confusion and pain. With her chemical hormone blockers having faded in the days since they left the Pit, Peaches moved too quickly for Amos’ eye to follow. It was like she’d become an angry hummingbird. The man fell to his knees, his assault rifle suddenly gone and one of his fingers broken and bleeding. As he curled to grasp his broken hand, the gun stuttered, opening the man’s chest along the side.
And then Peaches went still, her prison gown flapping around her in the breeze, blood spattered down the length of her body, the assault rifle held in one hand. Slowly, she sank to the ground. By the time Amos had his pants back on and got over to her, her eyes had rolled back and she was vomiting. He put his shirt over her and waited until the fit passed. It wasn’t more than about five minutes, and since no one else had come out of the house to investigate or take revenge, Amos was feeling pretty confident the dead man had been a bachelor.
She shuddered once, went still, and then the blankness left her eyes.
“Hey,” she said. “Did we win?”
“First round,” Amos said, nodding to her. “It like that every time?”
“Yup,” she said. “It’s really not a great design.”
“Useful when it’s useful, though.”
“Is that. Are you okay?”
“Little chilly,” Amos said. “Won’t kill me. You stay here for a bit, okay? I’m gonna go see what we’re looking at inside.”
“I’ll come with you,” she said, trying to sit up. He put a hand on her shoulder. He didn’t have to push to keep her down.
“I’ll go first. I’d be surprised if it wasn’t booby-trapped.”
“Okay,” she breathed. “I’ll just wait here, then.”
“Good plan.”
The next morning, they set off from the little compound at dawn. They both had professional-grade thermal suits, even if his was a little snug and she had to roll up the cuffs. The bunker under the house had supplies enough to last for a year or two: survival gear, weapons, ammunition, high-calorie rations, a stack of surprisingly boring pornography, and a collection of beautiful hand-carved chess sets. The best find hadn’t been in the bunker, though. The garage had a half-dozen unused but well-maintained bicycles, complete with saddlebags. Even with long rifles strapped over their shoulders and their packs weighed down with water and food, they covered the distance from the compound, through the town, and out to the highway in half an hour. By noon, they’d gone farther than three days’ walking would have taken them. It was probably seven hundred klicks from the Pit to Erich’s office. They’d been able to cover just under thirty on foot. With the bikes, they’d more than double that. Baltimore was maybe nine days away, assuming nothing went wrong. Which, given the context, seemed like a lot to ask. But still.
They stopped for lunch at noon. It was dim enough it could have been the hours just before dawn. His breath was pluming in the air now, but between the exercise and the thermal suit, Amos didn’t feel the cold. Peaches seemed about a thousand times better too. She was smiling, and there was color in her cheeks. They sat on an old bench beside the road, looking east. The view was mud and a scattering of debris.
And still on the horizon, the glow of something huge – a city or a fire – lit the clouds from below, gold on gray. So maybe even the end of the world had its moments of beauty.
Peaches took a bite of her ration bar and sipped the water from her self-purifying canteen. “Is it bothering you?”
“What?”
“What we did.”
“Not sure what that was, Peaches.”
She looked at him, her eyes narrowed like she was trying to decide if he was joking. “We invaded a man’s home, killed him, and took his stuff. If we hadn’t come through, he might have made it. Lived until the sun came back. Survived.”
“He was gonna shoot me for no reason except that I had something he wanted.”
“He wouldn’t have done it if we hadn’t gone there. And we lied to him about wanting to trade.”
“Seems like you have a point to make, Peaches.”
“If he hadn’t been ready to pull the trigger, would you have let it go? Or would we still be here, with these guns and this food?”
“Oh, we were taking his shit. I’m just pointing out both sides of the argument had the same plan.”
“Then we’re not exactly the good guys, are we?”
Amos scowled. It wasn’t a question that had even crossed his mind until she said it. It bothered him that it didn’t bother him more. He scratched his chest and tried to imagine Holden doing what they’d done. Or Naomi. Or Lydia.
“Yeah,” he said. “I should really get back to the ship soon.”
Chapter Thirty-one: Alex
“You’re in a good mood,” Bobbie said as Alex sat down across from her. Her breakfast was oatmeal with an egg-like protein crumble, sausages, and hot sauce. Her hair, pulled back in a tight ponytail, was wet with sweat, and her cheeks were flushed from recent exertion. Just looking at her made him feel out of shape. But she was right. He was in a good mood.
“Captain’s bringing my girl to Luna.”
Bobbie frowned. “Your… girl?”
“The Roci.”
“Oh. Right,” she said. “For a second, I just thought… Yeah. It’ll be good to see Holden too. And Avasarala.”
“Be good to be on my own damn ship,” Alex said, tapping pepper onto his plate of reconstituted eggs. “Now if we can just get Amos and Naomi back. Whoa. Did I say something?”
The shadow that had come over Bobbie’s expression vanished again and she shook her head. “Nothing. Just… I don’t know. Envy, I guess. It’s been a while since I had people.”
She stabbed one of the sausages with a fork and glanced around the mess hall as she ate it. Alex’s eggs were chalky and tasted more of yeast than something that came from a chicken, and it brought decades of memory with it. “Being back around active-duty folks making it hard to look forward to civilian life?”
“Sort of.”
“Things change,” Alex said.
“And they don’t change back,” she said, quoting him back to himself.
Alex broke off a piece of toast, popped it in his mouth, and talked around the crust. “We still talking about the service?”
Bobbie smiled. “No, I guess we’re not. I still can’t really get my head around it. Earth’s never going to be Earth again. Not like it was.”
“No, it won’t.”
/>
“Mars either,” Bobbie said. “I think about my nephew. Smart kid. Book smart, I mean. He hasn’t really been in the world except for going through university and then the terraforming project. That’s his whole life. He was one of the first people I knew to really get what off-world colonies meant for everything back here.”
“Yeah. It makes everything different,” Alex said.
“Except how we deal with it,” she said, then racked an imaginary shotgun and fired it off with a popping sound.
“Amazing how much we’ve managed to do, considering how we’re doing it all with jumped-up social primates and evolutionary behaviors from the Pleistocene.”
Bobbie chuckled, and he was glad to hear the sound. There was something about making the people around him feel better that left him feeling lighter himself. Like if the others on his crew could be upbeat, whatever it was couldn’t be that bad. He understood the flaw in that logic: if comforting them comforted him, maybe comforting him comforted them, and they could all drive the ship into a rock while they smiled at each other.
“I heard the relief ships are here,” Alex said.
“Yeah, that may not be as good as we’d hoped,” Bobbie said around a mouthful of sausage. “They were talking about it at training this morning. The relief ships should be getting in operational range right around now, but the scuttlebutt is the crews are all green as hell. Like first-mission green.”
“All of them?” Alex said.
“The good crews are all back at Hungaria covering our six.”
“Well. Better a bunch of teenagers flying with us than just the two frigates,” Alex said. “But you’ll excuse me if I’d hoped the cavalry coming over the hill was a little more experienced.”