John Birmingham - Without warning

‘And how did you end up doing, you know, whatever?’

Jules’s smile was genuine now. ‘Smuggling, Phoebe. I was a smuggler – I still am, I suppose. It’s one the few jobs still paying these days.’ Jules gave a quick shrug and settled deep into the safety and comfort of the chair. ‘I loved my father, in spite of his faults. Because of them, in some ways. He was very different from the sort of people we mixed with. Or rather, he was just like them, but more honest about it.’

‘But you said he stole money’

Jules smiled again, fondly. ‘He did. He was a terrible crook, but he only ever stole from the rich – and believe me, Phoebe, if your family has been rich for nine hundred years, somewhere some of that loot was stolen. Most of it, even.’

Lightning and thunder flared and crashed so closely together that Jules was unaware of any lag between them. The flat, white light illuminated a ghastly vision outside of the whole ocean in turmoil, of living, waterborne mountain ranges boiling up around the ship.

‘You didn’t tell me how you became a smuggler,’ Phoebe continued, pressing for more.

‘No, I didn’t,’ said Jules, who pushed herself up out of the chair and headed for the nearest grab bar. ‘Don’t worry, Phoebe,’ she called back over her shoulder, ‘you’ll be fine. The only reason you’re on this boat is because you were quick enough and smart enough to react to the Disappearance. You got some of your old money out and turned it into new money, very quickly. Most people aren’t like that – they’ll sit and wait for the situation to bury them. You, you’re a survivor. Plus, a family like yours, it would’ve had investments all over the world, wouldn’t it? Not all of them would have tanked.’

The American said nothing to that and Jules smiled again. ‘Don’t worry, sweetheart. You’ve paid for passage, I’m not going to ask for any more. But tomorrow, or the day after, when this storm clears and those Peruvians have a clear run at us, if we can’t outpace them, you’ll have to earn your passage. So get some rest.’

She pulled herself up the rising deck and out into the companion way. The journey to her own cabin, the former owner’s quarters, was a hand-over-hand trek that took another six or more minutes and came close to exhausting her.

‘Maya? Maya?’

A woman’s voice, Mexican, made her look up. Mariela Pieraro was clawing her way along the corridor towards Jules, a frantic look haunting her eyes.

‘It’s all right,’ Jules called out. ‘Maya’s in the big lounge. With Phoebe.’

The two women hauled themselves along, hand over hand, holding on to the safety rails that ran the length of the companionway. The look of animal fear disappeared from Mariela’s face, but a deep, abiding worry remained. The storm, Jules supposed. Your first big storm at sea was always terrifying. How much more so would it be for a woman who had spent her life on the edge of a desert?

‘Miss Julianne. I am… sorry… I… not to find her… I…’

The boat slipped sideways and Jules nearly lost her footing as she waved away the mother’s concerns. Mariela didn’t speak English with much confidence, although Jules didn’t know why. Her grasp of the language seemed fine, but after the scene at the Fairmont she and the other villagers had very much kept to themselves, doing everything asked of them but trying to remain as unobtrusive as possible.

‘Just down there a little way,’ Jules said, pointing back to the way she’d just come. ‘Through the big doors. She went to the loo… to the toilet, sorry. And got lost. She is fine, Mariela.’

Pieraro’s wife nodded gratefully. ‘I worry. I cannot see her and I worry.’

‘She’s fine,’ Jules repeated.

The woman grabbed at her arm as they passed each other, a strong, almost vice-like grip. ‘You are a good person, yes?’ she said. ‘A good person to save my family. All of us. Thank you, thank you…’

Embarrassed, as any Englishwoman would be by flagrant neediness and raw emotion, especially from a stranger, Jules blushed slightly and tried to shrug it off.

‘No,’ insisted Mariela. ‘You did not have to take us all, but you did. You helped when no one else would. You are good person, Miss Julianne. Good person.’

‘It’s fine,’ replied Jules, not knowing what else to say. ‘She’s in the lounge. Best go get her.’

‘Si Si’

Mariela continued on her way, muttering ‘Thank you’ repeatedly as she receded. It was the longest conversation Julianne had had with her or any of Miguel’s people, save for Pieraro himself, of course. Truth be known, she had avoided them, not wanting to grow attached to people she had promised herself she would cut loose at the first opportunity.

Putting that uncomfortable thought out of her head, she resumed the journey to her cabin, taking another few minutes to get there. She was sticky with salt and sweat, and filthy from the day’s exertions, but the sea was too rough to have a bath or shower. Instead, Julianne stripped down to her underwear, crawled under the covers and turned out the light.

There was nothing she could do about the storm or the men chasing them. The storm would pass. The men would not.

She fell asleep haunted by visions of the little girl called Maya being tortured by faceless ghouls.

Jed Culver stood at the back of the auditorium, stirring a sachet of Sweet ‘N Low into his instant coffee, regarding the deteriorating fiasco of the convention with mute detachment.

Reggie Guertson had the call again. He’d firmed up as the point man for what Culver was calling ‘the Beer Hall Putsch’ – the broad-based faction of neo-con Democrats, national security fetishists, wingnut Republicans and a grab bag of survivalist whackjobs, chancers, urgers and shameless self-aggrandisers who had all come together behind the banner of the so-called Reform Movement. They were his enemies. That’s how he thought of them. His enemies, and the enemies of the old Republic.

And they were winning, at least on the floor of the Constitutional Convention. Their crazy, fear-driven idea of a new Constitution, enshrining military representation at the heart of civilian government, was actually gaining traction. If he didn’t have such a low opinion of human nature he’d have had a hard time believing it. Didn’t these fools understand that the US military couldn’t even sustain itself now, let alone run what remained of the country?

The hard truth didn’t seem to matter to them, though. It was as if they’d all joined hands and stepped through the looking glass.

Up on stage, Mayor Guertson was haranguing a section of the audience that was attempting to shout him down. Spittle was flying from his lips and the public address system distorted every time he banged the podium with his fist. For their part, the hecklers were giving back as good as they got. Screeching and even throwing things at him.

‘This is what we’re fighting against!’ railed Guertson. ‘This sort of anarchy and subversion is what will destroy us all – it has to be stopped!’

‘Sieg heil. Sieg heil,’ chanted his detractors.

‘This is going well then.’

Culver wasn’t surprised to find James Kipper at his elbow. He’d been expecting him here. He knew Kipper often cruised the buffet tables looking for treats to take home to his daughter. In fact, before Jed could speak, the engineer fessed up.

‘Just came up here looking for more army chocolate,’ he admitted sheepishly.

‘Here. For your kid,’ said Culver, producing a carefully hoarded packet of Milk Duds. ‘I traded my cigarette ration for them.’