D. MacHale - Storm

“No,” I said. “We saw his boat explode.”

I said that with far more certainty than I was feeling. “What could be past that fog?” Olivia asked as she gazed out of the window at the mysterious white wall.

“It’s not a place we want to be,” I declared. “Not if it’s a SYLO base.”

Both Olivia and Jon looked glum. They had hoped to find a secure home in Kentucky. What we discovered was something far different.

“I… I’m not sure I want to go to Nevada,” Olivia said, obviously shaken.

“Let’s not decide anything now,” I said. “I say we find a place to hole up and rest. We’ll spend the night and decide on what we’ll do tomorrow.”

I got no arguments. I think it was a relief to put off any decisions, at least for a while.

Tori opened the map and did a quick check of the area. “The closest town is Elizabethtown,” she said. “Head west, and then find a way to go south.”

Kent didn’t have any sarcastic comments about how tricky it was going to be. I think he was too numb to complain. We rode in silence as he continued along the edge of the dirt stretch. We passed the spot where the SYLO trucks had crossed in front of us to see a paved road that cut across the empty expanse. “It’s like a moat,” Jon said. “A dry moat. I’ll bet it circles the whole base. They must have leveled everything and cleared it away so that if anybody tries to approach, they’ll see them.”

“So what’s with the smoke?” Kent asked.

“It hides what they’ve got,” Jon said. “They shot down a lot of those black planes. They must have some serious artillery going on in there. If it can’t be seen from the air, there’s less chance of getting hit.”

The sound of incoming fighter jets shattered the silence. They came in low, directly over our heads, on their final approach for landing. Their gear was down as they flew wing-to-wing, dropped closer to the ground, then disappeared into the fog.

I stared after them, straining to see something through the smoke.

“What are you thinking, Tucker?” Tori asked.

“I’m thinking that base is alive,” I said.

“And?”

“That’s all.”

I was actually thinking a whole lot more, but I wasn’t about to share it.

Kent found a road the led us west and away from the dry moat. We traveled through more farmland until we found a major road that led south.

“Time to start looking for a hospital,” Kent said.

“No,” Olivia said quickly. “I can’t spend another night in a place like that.”

It wasn’t exactly a densely populated area. The buildings were few and far between. While Kent navigated past multiple bomb craters and downed planes, Tori continued to scan the map. “There’s a library,” she announced. “Would that work for you?”

She asked the question with total sarcasm, but at least she was honoring Olivia’s request. It seemed like their moment of mutual emotional support was brief, and over.

“Whatever,” Olivia grumbled. “Anything’s better than spending another night in a cold, dark hospital.”

Tori called out the directions to Kent until we arrived at the Hardin County Public Library. It was a big brick building that rose up in the middle of empty farmland.

“Looks like another hospital,” Olivia said with no enthusiasm. “Tough. We’re staying here,” Tori declared and got out of the car.

The tension between them had definitely returned. Inside, we found it was a warm, inviting place. Olivia was right. It was a welcome change from the antiseptic hospitals we’d been staying in.

“Only one problem,” Jon said. “No beds.”

“Or food,” Olivia added.

“How about if Kent and I find a store while you guys figure out how we’ll sleep,” I suggested.

Olivia glanced at Tori.

Tori stared her down.

“I’ll come with you guys,” Olivia declared.

“Whatever,” Tori said. “I’m starving. Hurry up.”

The three of us went back to the Explorer and drove on. It took a while to find anything that resembled a town, but we eventually came upon a big place called the E. W. James Grocery Store.

We loaded up a cart with bottled water, powdered drinks, cereals, cans of tuna fish, and various types of crackers. I also found some packages of dried seaweed, figuring it might be our best shot at getting some vegetable-based vitamins. Olivia scowled, but I took it anyway. Kent went for more Doritos and cookies. Whatever. When we brought our bounty back to the library, we found that Tori and Jon had set up a comfortable place to sleep in the kid’s section using pillows and cushions they had gathered from all over the library.

“You going to read us a bedtime story?” Kent asked, while putting his arm around Tori.

Tori gave him a cold look, and he backed off.

We brought the food to a small kitchen that was probably for the staff. We all silently grabbed whatever box, can, or jug we wanted and ate. There was no attempt to make it a civilized meal. When we were done with whatever we were eating, we’d drop it down for somebody else to grab. It was more depressing proof that we were moving further away from civilized behavior.

It gave me the resolve I needed to make a move I had been planning since the moment I’d heard Granger’s voice. It was something I had to do alone. If the others found out, they would stop me. I was certain of that.

When we were finished with our uncivilized meal, we left the empty containers where they had fallen and drifted back into the library.

“I want to show you something,” Tori said to me. She led me to the reference section. It was getting late in the day, and the library was growing dark. We had to put on headlamps in order to read. Tori pulled out a heavy book and opened it on a table.

We sat together, staring at the text by the light of our headlamps. “What is this?” I asked.

“A Latin-to-English dictionary.”

I had almost forgotten.

“Sequentia yconomus libertate te ex inferis obendienter,” I said. “Does this tell you what it means?”

“Not exactly. I found meanings of individual words, but I have no idea about tenses or conjugations. All I can do is string them together in some rough translation.”

She flipped through pages and said, “Most of what Luna told us is correct. Sequentia roughly means ‘the following.’ Obedienter can be translated to mean ‘obediently’ or something.”

“What about the gates of hell thing?” I asked.

“ Libertate te ex inferis . That could mean ‘liberated or protected from the gates of hell.’”

“So the wild card is yconomus .”

Tori stopped on a page she had dog-eared. “I found a definition but it took a while. I guess it isn’t that common.”

“As opposed to all the other really common Latin words we use all the time?”

“I mean not common for Latin. I had to look through a couple of dictionaries before I found one that had it.”

“So what does it mean?”

She pointed to a spot on the page.

I read, “ Yconomus. A ‘guardian.’”

I looked at her and added, “What the hell does that mean?”

“Put it together like it was English. These guardians obediently protect us from the gates of hell.”

I let the concept roll around in my head for a few seconds. “So SYLO thinks they’re protecting the world from falling through the gates of hell?”

“Or guarding the gates of hell so they don’t open up.”

“Bull,” I snapped. “You don’t protect people by imprisoning them and killing them.”

“Unless they were guarding against something even worse,” Tori countered.

“Are you serious?” I asked, incredulous. “They chased us down. Granger tried to kill us. He killed your father. How is that justified?”