Морин Макхью - Wastelands - The New Apocalypse

Carrie Vaughn’s latest novels include the post-apocalyptic murder mystery, Bannerless , winner of the Philip K. Dick Award, and its sequel, The Wild Dead . She wrote the New York Times bestselling series of novels about a werewolf named Kitty, along with several other contemporary fantasy and young adult novels, and upwards of eighty short stories, two of which have been finalists for the Hugo Award. She’s a contributor to the Wild Cards series of shared world superhero books edited by George R. R. Martin and a graduate of the Odyssey Fantasy Writing Workshop. An Air Force brat, she survived her nomadic childhood and managed to put down roots in Boulder, Colorado. Visit her at carrievaughn.com.

Kath sat on the roof of the beat-up Tesla S, legs draped down the back window, shotgun in both hands, looking out into the dark for whatever might hurt them. They’d come forty miles or so to an encampment in what had once been a park with a picnic area and duck pond. A playground with a plastic slide and jungle gym was still intact, though weeds came up through the bark mulch footing. A collection of trucks and campers clustered here, circled together with space for a campfire in the middle. The fire was banked now. Some tents and lean-tos had been set up a little further out, along with a couple of rickety sheds. In summer, people didn’t need much more shelter than that. Winter, the camp would pick up and move south, if they could get the gas for it. Getting hard to find gas, though. The place was starting to look permanent. One of the trailers had a chicken coop built next to it, and a couple of roosting chickens were visible, feathers plumped out. The camp probably housed about thirty, but this late, everyone had gone to bed.

The packed-dirt mounds of four graves were lined up outside the circle of campers. The doctors didn’t ask about them, the ones they couldn’t help.

Turned away from the light, Kath kept watch. Nothing around the area moved. No one seemed inclined to charge in and grab such a valuable commodity as a doctor.

They’d parked the Tesla next to a medium-sized RV, from which came the groans of a woman in labor. Only this box of a room was lit up with candles and lanterns. The waiting and noise of effort made the air thick. The tenor of the groans had changed over the last twenty minutes, becoming more urgent, and also more exhausted. Kath could try to peek in the door, at the woman tucked up on her cot, straining. But she just listened.

“You’ve got this. One more push.”

That was Melanie’s voice. Did Dr. Dennis have her handling this delivery? She usually assisted him.

One more loud groan, then came silence. Kath held her breath until a tiny wail sounded, the new baby successfully announcing itself. A ruckus followed, the handful of people in the RV talking over each other, making admiring noises.

Unless something went wrong in the next little while, which could involve anything from the mother bleeding out to the baby showing some kind of illness or injury, Dennis and Melanie would wrap up and they could be on their way. Might be smarter to wait until dawn to make the trip back to the clinic. But the road between here and there was still passable, and Kath wanted to get home.

The light from the open door changed as figures stood in front of it. Dr. Dennis was standing with the thirty-something bearded man who’d summoned them here that morning. Dennis was giving him instructions.

“We’ve still got vaccines lying around. Bring her to the clinic in a couple months, we can give her a good start.” The man, presumably the father, nodded with a distracted air. Leaning forward a bit, Kath could peer through the doorway and catch a glimpse of the camper’s interior. The new mother was there, nested on a narrow couch, sweat matting her hair to her face, sheets tumbled around her. Melanie was helping her bundle the new baby against her skin, probably explaining everything she could about nursing in a handful of minutes. The mother didn’t look up at what Dennis was saying.

They might or might not bring their baby to get her shots. They might decide they had bigger problems than worrying about measles or whooping cough.

Dr. Dennis came down the aluminum steps and paced a moment, hands on hips, looking into the night air. “Everything okay?”

“Yeah. No trouble,” Kath said.

“Good. I want to get out of here as soon as we can.”

So he was on edge, too. The unfamiliar settlement, the warm thick night, might draw out people they didn’t want to talk to.

“You okay, Doctor?”

“Six months. I give that baby six months, based on the condition of the rest of the camp. It’s so goddamn pointless.”

Dennis and the other doctors at the clinic went over the statistics all the time. Without proper nutrition, clean water, medicine, without so many little necessities, infant mortality spiked. And there didn’t seem to be anything they could do about it. If they were in the area, maybe one of the doctors could come out to vaccinate. Or maybe the parents really would bring the baby to the clinic.

The man returned to the door and handed over a threadbare pillowcase, half-filled. “Here. It’s what we can spare. Thank you. Thank you for coming.”

Grimly, Dr. Dennis took the makeshift sack by its bunched-up neck. “You’re welcome. Just keep her as safe and healthy as you can, right?”

Dennis took a quick look in the sack, which Kath knew would be filled with canned goods, maybe some wire or screws, some glue. Odds and ends. Whatever salvage the parents thought worth the doctor’s attention. Barter. Dennis used to get paid thousands of dollars for delivering a baby.

He looked up. “Kind of a weird question. Do you have any golf balls?”

The man pursed his lips and shook his head. “No, I don’t think so.”

“Well if you find any, maybe save them for me?”

“Yeah. Yeah, sure.”

Two other women came to the doorway to look out. One of them was pregnant, maybe five months. She seemed worried, brow creased, lips tight, hands laced over belly. As if she could use her fingers to cage her unborn child to keep it safe. The other woman looked tired.

Dennis frowned at them. “You all aren’t using any birth control at all around here, are you?”

Both women cringed, and the man crossed his arms. “Not like we can pop into Walgreens for condoms.”

“It’s just… never mind.”

The man added, “I mean, so many people have died—don’t we need to think about repopulating—”

“Oh Jesus fuck, no ! Look, repopulating the planet or whatever can take care of itself. You—you just worry about keeping the people you already have safe and healthy. Fed . Grow some fucking potatoes!”

For just a moment the man’s glowering gaze hardened. He was thinking of trouble, of taking the doctor down a notch for the outburst. Kath straightened, shifting the shotgun on her lap. To show she was watching.

He backed off. “We’re trying, here. We’re trying.”

Dennis sighed and came around to the other side of the car to wait for Melanie.

She emerged a moment later, shrugging the strap of an equipment bag over her shoulder and pushing a strand of black hair out of her eyes. She looked the most tired of all, even more than the mother, who at least was smiling when Kath glimpsed her.

Kath hopped off the car and opened the back door. “You okay?” she asked.

“I think so,” she said, sighing. “Doc made me handle the delivery on this one.”

“How was it?”

Melanie shook her head, her eyes widening in a look of half-panicked disbelief. “It’s a lot different when the baby is falling into your own hands. I just kept thinking, God, don’t drop it.” She closed her eyes and sucked in a breath. “I hope everything stays okay.”