James Van Pelt - Summer of the Apocalypse

Eric thought for a minute. “The only reason I can think of that they are coming this way must be the same one why we are going their way. They want to get around the Flats.”

“What about the guns, the uniforms?”

“A military base somewhere north, perhaps. I can’t imagine they’re manufacturing the ammo. There must have been a well protected cache of it. Maybe if it stays cool, it lasts longer.” He considered some more. The fire crackled softly. “If M-16s still work, I wonder if they have other munitions, grenades, napalm.” Teach sighed. “I guess we’ll have to find out. If they’re going to tramp through Highwater.” Silently, Eric stared into the fire. Twists of flame danced along the edge of a log, the heat baking his face and shins. The trip to Boulder seemed almost impossible now. First, the wolves, then Phil and his odd museum, then the Flats, now an army between him and the library. He thought about turning around. Troy would be glad to see Dodge again, of course, and Eric could imagine explaining why he’d left. Maybe the illnesses will pass, thought Eric. There are seasons of bad times. The crops grow rich one year and they grow thin another. People might be that way too. What could make facing men with M-16s worthwhile?

A small voice asked, “Could you tell us about the Gone Time monsters?” Eric looked for the questioner. A girl, maybe ten years old, lifted her hand shyly. She said, “My grandma used to scare me—I remember—about the Sudden Death Playoff and the Twilight Double Header. Were they terrible? Did they really come for little kids?”

Eric laughed. For two hours he answered questions, and the people listened. They hung on his words, and all the time Ripple sat quietly, her head cocked to one side, intent. Eric was convinced she’d not forget a word that he said. And while he was speaking, while the fire burned low until it was just embers and the cool breeze swept gently past his face, he thought over and over again, maybe she is right. These are the natives. I am an alien in my own land.

“What are they doing, Grandpa?” Eric slid over on the stone ridge so that Dodge would have a better view into the canyon at the camp below. Eric looked for Rabbit again, but the boy had taken a different path once they started climbing, and Eric knew that saying anything to him would do no good.

“Keep your heads still,” said Teach. “They might notice us poked up like this, but only if you move. Motion’s the key.” He lay on Eric’s other side. Beside him, Ripple slowly moved into a position where she could see too. Now that it was light, Eric got a better look at her. Her short, cut red hair framed a serious, pale expression. Freckles sprinkled across her cheeks only made her seem more frail. Her eyes were green, and intense. Her movements, deliberate. She might be sixteen, he thought, but I wouldn’t have put her at twelve. He looked back at the camp.

Sixty yards away and fifty feet down, a handful of drab, green tents stood in a small clearing beside the highway. Thin, gray streamers of smoke stretched straight up from a pair of campfires. Beyond the tents, farther down the valley, the rocky sides of the canyon covered the road and choked access. A shallow lake at the rock wall’s base reflected clouds and sky.

Three soldiers were unpacking bulky metal pieces from green chests and assembling them on the other side of the road from the tents.

“Looks like a gun emplacement,” said Eric. “That’s some kind of heavy machine gun they’re putting together.”

“It’s the Gone Time sickness coming back,” said Ripple. “The head has died, but the body still twitches.”

“What do you mean?” asked Eric.

“The guns and technology are irreplaceable. They can’t be remanufactured. Their ammo fires now, but even stored in perfect conditions, it will become inert.”

“Why can’t they make new shells? All the equipment exists.” Annoyed, Eric rolled to his side so he could face her. “The Gone Time is not gone, just forgotten. If the children will learn, then the machines will run again. Our great-grandchildren could live in cities under the lights. We aren’t starting from scratch you know.”

Below, the men had nearly finished their work. A black, swiss-cheese-looking sleeve covered the barrel, and twin, heavy kegs rested at the butt end. One of the soldiers reached into a keg and pulled out a bullet-lined strap. The leading end he clamped into the gun.

Ripple said, “The delivery system is gone. No more mining. It’s high tech and there are too many missing pieces. We’ll never be able to do what the Gone Timers did. Their ancestors had it easy. Metal ore was easy to find. It was on the surface. As they made better tools from the easy metals they mined, they could dig deeper, work less productive ore, extract using more complicated processes…” Eric could hardly believe that a person as young as Ripple could talk the way she did. She’s not just a prodigy, he thought, she’s a genius.

“…but now the knowledge and tools are gone. We can’t start from scratch again.”

“What about the metals that are already out, cars, buildings, all the stuff that won’t work but are already processed? Wouldn’t it be easy to use them as our raw material, even easier than the easiest mines for primitive man?”

Ripple glanced at him. “They’re not raw. Even if you could melt them, they’re blends. I’ll bet we couldn’t find pure iron anywhere, and the more time passes, the more difficult it will be. But even if we could do it, we shouldn’t. We’d start the sickness all over again. What would be the point?” The soldiers at the gun flurried into motion. One picked up an M-16 and strode across the road into a tent. The others swung the gun around so it pointed at a large boulder thirty feet from them. Then, from the tent, the soldier backed out. A older man followed him, not in uniform, his light hair catching the sunlight. Then a second man came out, a younger one with the exact shade of hair. They could have been father and son. The soldier gestured with his gun and the two men walked across the road. As they approached the machine gun, Eric realized their hands were tied.

“They’re prisoners!” said Eric. “Do you know them?”

Teach said, “No, but Federal has all the roads into Boulder blocked. They could be from the city.” The soldier said something to the men. From this distance, Eric couldn’t tell what it was, but the tone was angry, commanding. The older man held his head high and said something back. The young one looked frightened and defiant.

“Does he take a lot of prisoners?”

“I don’t know,” said Teach. “This is the first I’ve seen them on this side of the blockade. They’re moving up canyon, that’s for sure. Maybe they’re trying to get into south Denver.”

“I could go down and talk to them,” Eric said, “and find out what they want.” But even as he said it, he knew he wouldn’t. Something felt bad about the men. His urge was to run.

The soldier pointed to the boulder. The older man sagged. His head dropped, as if all the life had been taken from him. He turned and walked toward the rock. The younger man hung back until the soldier prodded him with his M-16.

“What are they doing?” repeated Dodge.

A swell of sickness rose in Eric. He could feel it pushing against his ribs. “Oh, god,” he said. Teach said, “They wouldn’t.”

Keeping his M-16 trained on the two men, the soldier directed them to stand with their faces to the boulder, their backs to the machine gun. One of the soldiers manning the gun put his shoulders into a yoke on the gun and aimed the barrel at the men.

Eric’s jaw dropped. Even as he watched, horror filling him up like ice water, he thought, I’m not going to see this. I can’t, and he reached out to cover Dodge’s eyes. In the distance, crows cawed loudly. Someone yelled, “No!” The soldier beside the gun buckled to the ground, his limbs loose. “No!” yelled the voice again. In the bushes at the base of the cliff, Rabbit stepped forward and threw a baseball-sized rock. It zinged off the barrel of the gun. The other soldier swung around his gun and let fly an angry rip of sound. A line of dirt jumped up in front of Rabbit, and he ducked into the bushes. Firing stopped. The soldier pounded on the clip of his gun, cursing. Rabbit burst from the bushes, running low away from the men. Eric could see the cleft he must have climbed down to get into the valley. Ponderously, the muzzle of the big gun swung around toward Rabbit.