John Birmingham: After America

Caitlin climbed into the chopper and sat in the front of the cabin, refusing to make eye contact with anyone. Wales strapped himself into the seat beside her and placed one arm around her shoulders. That was all it took. She fell apart and started crying, covering her face with her hands as the chopper lifted off from the roof. "I believe 'I told you so' would be appropriate at this point, Miss Jules."

The roar of the helicopter's takeoff was loud enough that Julianne could have pretended not to have heard the Rhino, but she was past caring anymore.

"About Cesky and Rubin, you mean?" she said. "You never told me anything about that other than your plans for spending the money."

"No," he insisted as they left the roof of the office building on East 60th Street behind. "I meant that." He pointed out of the cabin behind her, over toward Central Park. Jules had to lean forward to see past the door gunner who was covering their ignominious exit from New York. She had no idea what was going on with Wonder Woman and the old guy up front. She looked like she'd dropped her entire bundle in the last two minutes.

The sky over Central Park was swarming with helicopters just like theirs, Blackhawks full of troops. Sleeker, deadlier-looking gunships weaved through the congested air traffic, protecting the airborne assault, just as the Rhino had predicted. Unlike him, she was not a military enthusiast, and she had no idea how many men were involved or what it meant beyond a dramatic escalation of the war that was tearing the city apart block by block.

"What is that?" the Rhino bellowed over the racket. "One hundred first Airborne?"

One of the soldiers riding shotgun in the cabin-literally riding shotgun, Jules thought as she took in his armament-nodded. "The Screaming fucking Eagles, man," he shouted back. "Playtime is over."

As the helicopters stacked up one behind the other in a sort of layered effect to begin landing their troops, two of the waspish-looking gunships peeled off and began to pour a storm of machine gun and rocket fire down onto an unseen target over on that side of the city. And then Jules's chopper banked around and swung out toward the East River, taking them away from the action, the worst of the danger, and off toward the unknown. She had a package of papers tucked away inside a ballistic vest the flight crew had given her. She hoped they would go some way toward securing her immediate future, even though she had no idea what was in them, just that they had guaranteed her passage out of the trap Henry Cesky had set for her.

Jules ground her teeth and bit back on a throat full of bile when she thought of him. Her father had long ago advised her against investing in any scheme that had vengeance at its heart. But Cesky had invested heavily in his plan to settle up with her for leaving him and his family behind in Acapulco. What side of the equation did that leave her on now? Was she the vengeance seeker or the one upon whom vengeance was to be visited?

She had no idea.

Texas Administrative Division Miguel could not shake the creeping fear that wanted to run wild as they mustered the cattle out of the little valley. But at least it was a sensible fear, not like the preternatural dread that had stolen over him back in Leona. This was merely a rational fear of being caught by the road agents he had observed the previous day. The vaquero had no illusions about how such an encounter would go. Oh, they would give a good accounting of themselves for sure, possibly taking down one or two agents for each of their own who fell. But in the end, they would be overwhelmed. Of that there could be no doubt. And then Sofia, if she lived, would be their prey.

And so, in the hours before dawn, they snuck away from Pineywoods Lake. With the agents so far to the west, there was no need for any elaborate displays of subterfuge. Still, he could not help keeping his voice down as he spoke to the other riders and called out to the dogs as they orbited the edge of the herd. Protesting cows, the muffled crunch of thousands of hooves on soft ground, a few whip cracks and whistles, his daughter riding high in the saddle next to him-it was all so familiar yet so alien in this empty landscape.

The coming sunrise had not yet burned off the early-morning fog as they began to move north, heading for the Johnson National Grasslands up near the border with Oklahoma. Miguel's head felt thick and fuzzy with the lack of sleep and the four or five glasses of red wine he had shared with Miss Jessup last night. After finishing the first "corked" bottle, she had produced another and pronounced it perfect. A chilled cerveza would have been perfect for Miguel, but he had to admit that the red wine did go down without too many protests.

"Hungover, cowboy?"

He turned to find that the very woman had ridden up behind him, catching him woolgathering and unaware. She was not a natural in the saddle. Indeed, the gelding struggled a little with its inexperienced passenger. But the strange "manbivalent" woman with the cheeky sense of humor and the warm laugh rode easily enough at this sedate pace. Most folks did nowadays, at least in the countryside.

"Good morning, Miss Jessup. And no, I am not so used to drinking as I once was," he admitted, tipping his hat to her.

"None of us are, Miguel," she replied.

"Oh, Papa was never much of a drinker," said his daughter, teasing, as he she rode over. "Not much of a drinker or a rider or shooter, really."

He showed her the back of his hand, but he was only playing, of course, and glad that Sofia's mood had lifted enough for her to be able to joke at his expense. Miss Jessup's face he could not see in the gloom, but he sensed that she was smiling, too, if a little sadly.

"It used to be nothing for me to finish a couple of bottles on my own," she said. "Occupational hazard. You know, I've dropped five sizes since the Wave came. Only put one back on last year, and I like to think that was muscle mass as opposed to table muscle."

"Table muscle?"

"Fat," Trudi said flatly. "Lard."

"Ah," he replied, turning his attention back to the cattle.

The herd was a heaving, dusty river, flowing north now, away from danger. He took in the scent of morning glories and honeydews that mingled with the stink of the beasts. A hint of rain in the air, perhaps. He wasn't sure of the weather, and there was no way to check. Most of the AM band Texas radio stations had fallen behind them, and the stations outside Texas concentrated on the weather in Seattle or Kansas City, which didn't help their situation one bit. Batteries to power the one radio they had were precious in any case, and no one was in the mood to listen to the gibberish coming out of Fort Hood or Governor Blackstone.

Miguel relaxed in the saddle and released a pent-up breath he hadn't even noticed he was holding. The morning sun started to peek through the chilly fog, ready to burn the thin sheath of frost off the land. With every minute that passed he felt better about leaving, about adding so many miles and weeks to their trip.

"Penny for your thoughts?" Miss Jessup asked.

"I am sorry to be so quiet," Miguel said. "Tell me, what did you do, Miss Jessup? This last year, I mean, that you should find yourself in Texas, captured by road agents?"

As soon as he asked the question, he regretted it, thinking himself too forward and rude for inquiring about another's personal business. But Trudi Jessup seemed not at all put out.

He saw her shoulders lift in silhouette.

"First up, my name is Trudi. Remember. Second, I was working for Seattle, like everyone else," she said. "Or so I thought. Before I wrote for magazines, I used to work in restaurants and catering. A lot of it is just logistics. Knowing how much food to have in store, predicting demand spikes and troughs, organizing transport. But you'd know some of that if you worked for the Golden Arches."