Livin' In The Future

By Ottovw

2010

Chapter 2

Martin-

They gave him a pack it weighed about 40 pounds: food, long out of date MREs, a half dozen canteens, 2 1 gallon jugs of water, and ammunition. At least this time they gave him a long arm and a holster. Here was the missing bed roll, two actually. A pair of those foil sleeping bags. There was even an entrenching tool. Though he would have been happier with a machete. Neither Jorge nor Dalia, looked happy at all, and they had small packs mostly extra water. Kyle drew his pack on. He gave them that look, but he didn't have to say anything this time. At least, this time he knew the route. They were heading almost due north. To a little place that used to be called Lancaster. There was someone there who wanted to meet him.

This run was not really harder, just different. It took them two 'rest stops' of their usual 'city' runs to get to the suburbs, or what used to be the suburbs. Here there were no paths; there was the open road, a death trap, or overgrown fields and thickets. The pace was slower. The terrain, though flatter, and more homogenous, was denser, and unfamiliar. They stuck together. Jorge, their habitual point man was just ahead about 100 meters. Dalia never strayed more than 50 meters behind them. They told him there were wolves here, but the real danger were packs of feral dogs. The wolves knew enough to stay away from humans. It was a lesson the feral dogs would have to relearn. There were supposed to be mountain lion, but their preferred terrain were in the foothills and mountains they would have to cross to get to Lancaster, and of course, you can't forget the bears.

As soon as the dawn began to color the sky they sought shelter. It was a shallow depression; they put up their camouflage netting, and broke out the foil sleeping bags. They slept in pairs and in shifts. Once they had stopped moving the chill began to set in. It wasn't as cold as the desert, but it wasn't too far off, and they weren't in the desert. He and Kyle had the first watch. John kept an eye to the south, their back trail. Kyle was watching north.

He heard the sound of dry grass being crushed. Kyle snaked up beside him. From outside you would have seen a piece of dark fabric hung up in the grass blowing lightly in the wind. If you were really good, you might notice two pairs of eyes through the blades of the tawny grass.

"How are you holding up?" John could discern real concern in his voice. He began to wonder what had changed.

"I'm fine." He tried not to sound petulant.

"You sure?"

"It's colder than I expected." He flinched, inwardly, did he do it again?

"It's the city." Kyle said, not even batting an eye. "The 'Old Man' told me about it, he called it a 'heat island'."

John nodded, and pointed up over their heads, at the net. "Satellites?"

"We don't know. We assume there are some still up there, and if they are they work for Skynet, now. Also the aerial HKs may come this far north. They look for Infrared signatures."

John nodded again 'may come' they were in a 'no mans' land. A place neither side thought worthy of fighting over. "Saw some deer spore earlier."

"Yeah there would be a lot of them up here." There was a look on his face.

"You're not thinking of hunting them?"

"Nah, dressing it would only attract predators, and we can't start a fire to cook it or smoke it. Just daydreaming."

"Is this where you and Derek used to hunt?" He asked, only after it was said did he realized his blunder.

Kyle grinned, big, and gave him a curious look out of the corner of his eye. "No, that was farther south and east." He turned at him and looked him square in the eye. He seemed to be searching for something. "I got a message from Derek, at the bunker."

Golf 7, John understood. "Someone got there ahead of us?" He could hardly believe it.

"A single runner is always faster."

John nodded.

Kyle continued, "Derek's message said: That you might not understand things that you should. That you might say things; you might know things that you shouldn't. He told me not worry about it, and to keep you safe. So, I'm not worrying about it and I'm keeping you safe."

Just like that, John thought. Just like that.

Kyle belly crawled back to his side of the 'camp'.

John kept his watch. He had a lot to think about. Somewhere to their west, not more than a few miles was their house, until Sarkissian tried blowing up Cameron, and then Cameron blew up the house. He had witnessed the devastation of L.A. first hand and now he saw the desolation of North Hollywood. He understood, now that he had seen the future through his mother's eyes, and she had seen it through Kyle's. A soldier, fighting on the frontlines. Their time together had been short why would he have told her about the world beyond the war? Now John got to see that world, and John saw nothing. Not a deer, not a raccoon, certainly no metal. Well, there was the one behind his ear, he could almost forget it. It felt like a piece of gauze bandage. It was malleable but he could feel his skin tug at it, if he moved. It was very strange. There was a sound. He looked.

Kyle was waking Jorge and Dalia. Dalia took John's spot: "I thought I heard something bark out there." He told her.

Dalia nodded, "Coyote."

John looked at Kyle.

"Wolves howl, and are mostly active at dawn and dusk."

"And dogs?" John asked.

"They don't make any sounds at all, they don't bark until they want you to run. By then it's already too late." Dalia said over her shoulder as she settled in. She said it with a finality that, frankly, scared the crap out of John. He crawled into the sleeping bag and stared at the netting and the grey overcast beyond.

"John. John." He woke; he had a rather disturbing dream about Chihuahuas that didn't bark. He was glad that Kyle woke him up. Rubbing the sleep from his eyes he changed places with Dalia. Two hours later they changed again. This time he woke up without any help.

Jorge and Dalia were taking down the net. He folded up his sleeping bag. Kyle handed him the other.

It was their third night; they were in the mountains now. Their pace had been painfully slow in the suburbs. The basic design of urban sprawl was against them. There were vacant, ruined, and toppled buildings but they were separated by broad expanses of unkempt and shrubby lawns. There was little in the way of cover, most especially from directly overhead. Now having crossed into what had been protected lands during John's time, now out right wilderness, it was arduous. The four of them were almost on top of each other. Kyle had said that this was part of the old Angeles national forest. Their sight lines were almost nonexistent, at least along their line of march. They kept to game trails and valleys. They 'trended' north, their route was circuitous. Up one unnamed valley, across another, then back down a third. They followed ridges and valleys careful not to break the skyline. Despite all the switch backs they were essentially paralleling the Angeles Forest Highway. Which didn't go straight through either, It was roughly 20 miles through the forest. If things went well they might make it in three nights. In the city they did 20 miles in a night, granted that was a 'good' night.

The rules were slightly different here. Here stealth outweighed speed. Their pace was much slower. They spent a lot of time stopped and listening. With some frequency Kyle would halt them, and consult with Jorge. John sensed very early on that the runners were a lot less confident in the 'woods' then they were in the city. John noticed something that he had been missing, but only on a subconscious level. The sky was beginning to pale; Jorge and Kyle were debating a pair of camp sites. John and Dalia were keeping watch, when he heard it. "Check-check-check-check!" it was harsh and raucous. He turned his head. There it was a large bird it was white across the chest, blue in the face and grey across its back. It looked at them from a hundred feet away, and let go another call. "Check-check-check-check!" It was in a scrubby oak that seemed stunted for its age. John could tell its age because of its 'lean' it was pointed a few degrees off of north. Most of the trees around did that. At least the ones that were old enough. The older trees, the ones that bore the brunt of J-day's blast were shattered and torn; they reminded him of tornado damage he had seen in Kansas, though without the scorch marks. "Check-check-check-check!" it called out one more time. Since he was young he had always had a fascination with birds. He was glad to see that some of them had survived.

Dalia leaned close: "it's a bird, a Scrub..."

"... Jay. Yeah I know." He finished. "Just haven't seen one in a while."

"A while." She repeated. She gave him a look, like someone trying to think where John could be from where he might have seen a Scrub Jay. "You know," Dalia continued. "This is the closest I've ever seen one to the city."

"Really?"

"Yeah, really."

There was a short, sharp whistle. They turned, and Kyle waved them over.

Their camp was under a dead conifer. They hung the netting from the tree's trunk, and slept beneath it. They had been sleeping in the open now for 4 days. He and Kyle always took first watch. They woke before sunset, certainly before twilight. At first he thought it might have just been a weather front passing through, but it never rained. After 4 days with no change he began to think that this is what it was like. The dawns and dusks had a reddish tint. The sky seemed somehow hazed, not the normal L.A. smog, but something else. The sky wasn't entirely blue, and the sun seemed somehow shimmery and distant. He could look at it almost directly with little in the way of glare or discomfort. Not surprisingly, he had taken an interest in nuclear war and it's theoretical after affects. Was this the 'nuclear winter'? It was cool and dry. He had no idea what month it was. He would have to figure that out. By the time he came to that decision his watch was over.

Jorge was 5 meters ahead. Dalai about 5 meters behind. The scrub was only chest high. They kept their eyes open. John was watching the top of the ridge on their right. Kyle, the left. The starlight was bright enough to cast shadows. It was like the desert that way. They stopped. John crouched. Kyle went up to talk to Jorge. Dalia came up beside him, still watching their back trail. There was gap in the valley wall to their right.

"Pegasus" he said, with a smile.

"What?"

"That is the constellation Pegasus." He nodded towards their east.

"Oh."

Kyle came back. Beyond him John could see Jorge watching them. "Mountain Lion."

"Here?" Dalia hissed.

"These are the mountains." Kyle reminded them.

"Sonofabitch."

"What do we do?" John asked.

Kyle looked at Dalia. "We stay calm. We be patient. There is water right over there," he gestured to the left of their path. "Likely he was just getting a drink."

"This is a 'game' trail. They hunt game trails." Dalia's voice was rising.

"Yes, and we are making a 'lot' of noise on this game trail. Let's get moving."

Dalia stayed close may be 2 meters back, for the rest of the night. They made camp as the sky started to brighten. As he and Kyle sat watch, he began to think. The thoughts were hardly pleasant. During their nightly marches the lows were probably in the lower 50s may be upper 40s. The daytime highs didn't seem to get much above middle 60s; they certainly weren't getting much into the 70s. Those temperatures, even estimates like they were, were easily 15-20 degrees cooler than they ought to be. He didn't want to think about what that might entail, but he little else to think on. With nothing of import, he thought about why he was here, in the future. Weaver had tracked John Henry to Long Beach. What were they doing there? Would Skynet be based out of Long Beach? No, he would pick somewhere more central.

Cameron sat at glass top table staring blankly, almost serenely, at its surface. It was like a photograph in his head. He could see the keyboard. The bloody switchblade. The precisely cut flap of skin and hair. The empty coltan lined hole that had pulled the earth from beneath his feet. He brushed that thought aside. He had seen a Scrub Jay that was a good sign. Birds tend to be sensitive to disruptions in their ecosystems. So the mere fact that birds were once again reentering an area they had fled...

"You're not perfect. You're a machine." No, he hadn't meant it that way. Stop it. He had more important things to worry about. Like why this 'old man' wanted to see him. And why did the resistance seem to defer to him. Why, if he was so important, was he kept so far out of reach...

"You said it yourself John." He did not understand how but he was certain that he heard her voice crack. "I'm just a machine." He wiped his eyes, on his sleeve; he wanted to blame the ever present dust. Which, of course, this far from the city wasn't really a factor. He blamed himself. He felt the cool air dry the tears. She gave him her chip! She left him.

"I'm sorry John." Endlessly repeated. He set his jaw, and glared at the stunted new growth, the shattered tree falls, and the dead rotted roots of a Judgment Day more than a decade past. His rifles stock creaked against his shoulder. He was angry. He was confused. He was a blubbering fool. He was a carpenter crying over a beloved hammer.

"John." Softly, quietly, from behind him. It was Kyle.

He coughed into his dad's sleeve, to clear his throat. "Yeah." He still sounded hoarse.

"You okay? You seem a little... tense." He could hear the sound from across their 'camp' as his dad, turned to look at him. He could feel his eyes on him, from ten feet away.

"I'm fine. Just a little spooked, I guess, from that mountain lion." John didn't turn. He kept his gaze locked on the tree and shrub filled valley. It sounded lame, even to him.

"You sure?"

"Yeah, I'm fine." He set his shoulders. Looked out into the grey woods. Cameron. "I have sensation," she said once. "I feel." The glow, of a distant and diffuse sun, was too dim to answer any of his questions.

"It's the quiet." He heard his father say. "I gives you time to think."

There was a pause, John almost turned to look.

"And the solitude. It's worse when it's just two of you, and you sleep by turns, because then you are alone. And when you think and you're alone you think about who isn't there and why. Then you think about all that is lost, all that is gone."

He did turn then and look. In their tiny camp barely big enough for four people to lie prone in. He wondered if his mother had ever explicitly told him about this side of his father. He was intense certainly. He nodded his head, his father nodded back. She once told him that he had 'kind eyes'. He wondered about that. Was that what he saw in those eyes, now? That someone, that anyone who had lived through what his father must have lived through, could be willing or even able to risk even an ounce of empathy for a stranger. Was that what his mother meant?

They set out again at twilight. At moon rise, they heard them. Wolves. They were howling at the growing moon. Kyle directed them to a small rise, may be 15 meters above the valley floor. The rise was almost conical; the top was studded with boulders around it the ground was flat with a broad area devoid of vegetation. It looked like an old river bed. John liked it; with only the four of them they wouldn't be able to defend a wide area. They howled and howled the sound came from all directions. One from the south, then almost due west, another pair from the east. John thought he might have seen one, at the top of the ridge that bent off towards the north. It was unnerving. At one point they seemed close perhaps 50 meters off. After nearly an hour and a half of howling they moved off towards the south and west. They waited for another half an hour.

"Us?" Asked Jorge.

"Probably, haven't seen any other animals around." Kyle was looking up at the top of the ridge, as if half expecting them to come charging down. "It was a big pack to 15 may be 20 of them. Dalia? Stay close." They moved out.

On the third night in the mountains, the valley opened up to a broad uneven plain. Off to their right was a cluster of burned and partially collapsed buildings. John stared at it.

"Palmdale." He glanced at Kyle.

"Allison's going to be pissed." He turned towards Dalia.

"She hates coming up here." Back to Kyle.

"Everybody hates coming up here." They all looked at Jorge. "Let's get this over with." He took point.

"Why do you come up here anyway?" John asked as they started walking bearing to the west of the ruins.

"It's the runners. To the pass their tests, they run up here and back."

"Singly?"

"No usually in pairs."

"And Allison is a runner?"

"Yeah, but she wants 'tech-com', though she may end up in K-9."

"She wants tech-com?" They stopped at the edge of the road; the shrubs had grown right up to it. Grasses had come up through it.

Kyle grinned. "Yeah. Everybody wants 'tech-com." They waited until Jorge signaled. They darted across the street and didn't talk again until they got to Lancaster.

If anything the air here was drier still. The nights chill more noticeable. John wished they were running. They stayed clear of the buildings. Kyle warned him about traps and trip wires. Some humans still live up here. It was a hard life living off the land, hunting and trapping. They were still close enough that the occasional Skynet patrol would fly up and burn them out. They and the human resistance had little to do with each other. They stayed to the west, almost in the hills, and then turned north, eventually back east.

They camped just outside of Lancaster. They entered the town that night.

It used to be a convenience store. The windows which faced west were gone. The shelves had been pushed, haphazardly, against the back wall. It occurred to John that no human did this. The wind did this. Like the canopy outside, pushed back against the station. He could imagine the wind whipping up the valley, smashing into Palmdale flowing out across Lancaster on its way to the desert. He was impatient. He didn't understand why they had to stop and eat so close to their destination.

Kyle noticed. They all noticed. They were still towards the back with the toppled shelves. John was crouched next to the doorway. He could hear them.

Dalia: He doesn't know.

Jorge: How can he not know?

Dalia, again: He doesn't. He didn't know about the 'run'. Every tunnel rats know about the 'run'.

Jorge: He knows. He has to know.

Dalia: Kyle? Kyle!

Kyle: He doesn't know.

Jorge: How? That doesn't make any sense.

Dalia: He has a right to know.

Jorge: How doesn't he know?

Kyle:

Dalia: We have to tell him.

He heard the tread of Kyle's boots. "John." He turned. Kyle was at the countertop. He went. "Do you know where we are?"

"Lancaster." Dalia and Jorge were still talking. (Dalia: did you see him with the wolves? He didn't so much as flinch.)

"Do you know what's in Lancaster?" (Jorge: Stone cold. I thought this man is 'tech-com' material for sure.)

That's all you know about Lancaster?" (Jorge: You didn't see him with the Mountain Lion...)

"Yes." (Jorge: ... you didn't see his eyes. I've seen more fear in... in metal.)

Kyle waved the others over. "John doesn't know."

"What?" Jorge.

Dalia just nodded. "John... "

"Wait." Kyle cut her off. "First the rules."

They could smell it a block away. It had been a storage facility, once. The garage doors had been pulled off. They were using the storm drains as sewers. Fires dotted the complex. The smell of burning meat did nothing to hide the stench. At the gate-less entrance, Jorge puked. John quickly reviewed the rules. Stick to the center of the drive. Do not touch anything. Do not touch anyone. Do not allow anyone to touch you. Look down at all intersections (that's where the 'open' drains were). Talk, only, to the old man. Leave as soon as possible.

Of course, the old man's unit was at the back. It was one of the bigger ones. His next door neighbor was a priest. Across the way lived a pair of nuns. They stopped in front of his unit. It was like a gaping black maw. Kyle leaned towards it. "Old man! Old man!" The priest woke up; his unit was lit by a candle. He looked at them and smiled. With difficulty he stood up. As he passed he waved. Dalia, on the far side of Kyle flinched. John saw that the priest saw, but chose to ignored it. John also saw, that he had no fingers. "Wake up. You have visitors. Come on now." He entered the darkness. There was coughing, the deep wet kind of coughing. He heard a creaking sound like old rusty springs, then a loud squeal like a bad bearing. He saw light reflecting off of a chromed metal frame. It was heavily pitted. It was a wheelchair. The stir ups were missing. It didn't matter the legs ended just below the knees. There was a smell. John wanted to gag. He wondered again about the logic of stopping and eating before coming here.

The voice was nasal, extremely so. There was a wet gurgling sound as he spoke. 'Who ith it?" There was anger there. It was after midnight. "Kyle? Kyle! How ah you?" A wet sucking sound. "It hath bin tho long. What bwingth you up thith way?" All his 't's were soft, and sounded more like 'the' than 'top'.

"I brought someone you wanted to meet."

The wheelchair creaked. Fingerless hands pawed at the arm rests for purchase. The 'old man' leaned forward. John jerked in surprise. His head, when it cleared the deep shadow of the storage unit, was bald there were patches of thin wispy hair. What hair there was, was long and white, it reached down to his shoulders. The bare scalp was discolored as if from a fire. There were no ears or eyebrows. His left eye was milky white and oozing. The priest leaned out as well his hands at the other's shoulders to keep him from tumbling out of the chair. He had no nose. The lips were cracked and pealing around edges of mouth that held no teeth. The skin was pallid and stiff. There was a wet sucking sound. An inhalation, he realized. The head swiveled bringing the working eye towards him, it widened. A line of spittle ran down from the cracked lips.

"Thahn? Thahn Connaw?" The lips spread, cracking, more spittle, more blood. More of the wet sucking sounds. His arms were bouncing up and down on the wheelchairs armrests. He crashed back against the wheelchair with enough force to lift the front wheels off the ground. John thought he was having a seizure. He looked at the priest who had an almost pleasant smile on this face. Then he realized the 'old man' was laughing. "Iths me, Thahn! Iths me! Iv been waithing faw you!" There was a pause, the uncomfortable sort. Like when someone walks up to you and acts like they know you. Only you don't remember them, but this doesn't happen to John, he always remembers. He wasn't gathering his thoughts. He was warring with them. First, there was the wash of relief. That, here, for the first time in more than a week he wasn't alone. Then, as cool and bleak as the dawn, came the realization that this was not the future he had been told about. That this wasn't the man that Derek knew.

"I know, and I'm sorry, it took me so long."

"You know who I yam?"

"Of course, I do. How could I ever forget you." He said with feeling. "You're Martin. Martin Beddel."

More wet laughter. The Kyle and the others went back to the intersection. Even the priest, set the brakes on the wheelchair and went back to his storage unit. They talked. John first standing then crouched down, finally sitting cross legged in the middle of a driveway, of a storage unit/leper colony. Talking to a man who had no face.

Martin told him, in his palate ravaged lisp, of the nightmare of Judgment Day. He told him how he and two of his West Point classmates, and their families had cleverly scheduled a 'camping trip' for the week of Judgment Day. They were stationed at Fort Hood. The three of them (Martin, Sam and Lemuel) had had 6 months to prepare their 'camp site'. On their days off they had built an earth and wood shelter largely underground. Its location was supposed to be secure. Judgment Day came with confusion and confession. Outrage and anger soon followed. Sam Williston and his wife were arguing, just outside their shelter when they were attacked. Lucy was cut down immediately. Sam caught some shrapnel in his legs, but made it back into the bunker. There must have been a dozen of them, they wore gray coveralls. They had 'spirit' but little training. The fight didn't last long. They fixed up Sam, buried Lucy, took the weapons off their dead and walked to Abilene. Three days later the bombs fell again. See, he said to John, Judgment Day wasn't just one day; it was almost 2 weeks of almost random bombardment. There were eleven of them, half of them had serious flash burns, and two were flash blinded. They kept moving. They couldn't risk being out in the open if there were another attack.

There were only three this time, wearing the gray coveralls. Better odds but no cover. Lemuel's sister Esther was hit. She lingered four days. He lost Carl, his 2 year old boy, there. Martin paused. He seemed to be thinking.

John reached out to him, but Martin waved him off saying: "Ah woot theiw wules." John could only nod; he had many questions but wanted Martin to finish before he asked them.

They killed the three 'grays'. Took their weapons. They were a day's hike from Abilene, when the bombs fell a third time. He gestured to his balding discolored head. Martin himself had been blinded. He couldn't see for two days, sometime during those feverish days, he lost Paula to dehydration. They had water; she had just been losing it faster than she could drink it. The burns, he explained. Lemuel lost a brother, Philemon.

"I'm sorry," was all he could think to say. He told John it was ok. Martin wheezed and struggled on. It had been nearly fifteen years. He had mourned them. He had avenged them. He had dismantled a lot of metal. He grinned his cracked and leaking grin.

He continued: When he could see again he looked at the crater that was had been Abilene. He couldn't understand why someone would 'nuke' Abilene. There was nothing there. With Abilene gone their 'fall back position' was in the California desert.

John nodded, of course it was. It was only later. That John realized the implications of Martin's statement.

They gathered what supplies they could find, and started walking. In New Mexico the bombs fell again. They were air bursts and far enough away that they did little more than dazzle them and leave after images, and splashes, of color when they blinked. But dehydration from burns and infections, coupled with a hike through a desert are not a good mix, they were down to six now. Lemuel, never 'Lem' "his mother named him Lemuel, not 'Lem'" had lost all but three siblings. Martin and Sam were already alone. After nearly 5 weeks they were in Arizona, there were only the three of them (Martin, Sam, and Lemuel), when some resistance fighters found them.

It was in the desert that he met Sarah. John sat up at the mention of her name. Martin chuckled wetly. She dispersed us, told us to teach everyone we could find, everything we knew. Sam was sent south. Lemuel went north. He was sent west. Los Angeles. There he met a bunch of would be 'warlords'. He tried talking to them. Wills, Perry, Jones, Pilar, Unger and Bach, listened most of them are dead. But then so are most of their killers. We started playing them against each other. We had them down to seven "leaders" three of which supported you. The rest did this to me. He held up his hands. For two years after he got leprosy he continued traveling. He continued teaching. Then even that became impossible. He glanced down at his legs. Without antibiotics disease was a killer again. This camp, he gestured broadly, was one of the first things he set up. It used to have guards, to keep people in, but now they just give them food, and no one wants to leave.

The telling had been as hard on Martin, as the listening had been on John. He could hear the wheezing of his breath. It wasn't solely because his speech was difficult to understand; in fact that was probably the easiest part. What was hard was talking to a man he had known the prime of his youth. A hero who had once upon a time given his life to save his own and now ruined as he was, he still had not given up, he still fought. Could John 'measure up'? Despite his misgivings. Despite Martin's obvious exhaustion. There were questions that needed answers.

John's first question was asked almost to himself: "Why Abilene?" We had laid up some supplies there that would have helped, he said. "No, not you. Skynet." But what Martin said didn't ring true either. Why spend 6 months building a shelter, but keep your supplies a four day walk away? Was the shelter out of the way? Difficult to access with a car or truck? Or was it the supplies themselves? Could the supplies be of such a prodigious amount that they were hard to move? If so how could three soldiers in the US Army afford to 'lay up' so much materiel? Or was it because, John reasoned further, the shelter was only temporary. Abilene was going to be their home. Their base. Then he thought, why not go straight to Abilene? Because Martin, didn't want to attract attention to it, but he already had. He looked at Martin. Martin had lied. There was something in Abilene. There was something in Abilene, and Skynet found out about it, and destroyed it. He considered pressing the matter, but he decided to let it go. If Skynet didn't want it around then it would only have helped the resistance, and that was good enough for John.

"Was Paula her? The girl, the runner, you told me about at Presidio Alto? He looked away, near as John could tell, surprised by the change in direction. He breathed. Yes, he lisped, finally. Yes, it was her. He seemed please that John had remembered.

"Was it radiation poisoning?" More than likely. All the symptoms where there. Fever. Vomiting. Nausea. Death. It's also possible that a saline drip and antibiotics might have saved many of them.

"Why didn't you stop?" They had found us. Twice. Even through the lisp John could hear the venom. They knew where we were going or were somehow tracking us. They knew, John. They knew. He had been betrayed, thought John. Someone close to him had turned coat, and been poorly compensated. Then John realized something else. The day the 'grays' attacked them, and killed Charley. They had sent, two after Derek and Cameron. One for his mother, and two for John and Charley. John didn't think he had an over inflated opinion of himself, but they had sent three times as many 'grays' after Martin. Why was Martin so important? And if he was so important why not send metal? Because they were still dropping bombs. They had to protect the cyborgs from EMP. He looked up at Martin again.

"There were no more attacks after Abilene?" No. John nodded. They had put a tracking device in his mother. Perhaps there had been one in someone in Martin's group. May be the EMP got to it, or maybe it's in a shallow grave nearby the perfectly round lake Abilene.

Then the phrase 'a four day walk away' bumped into something. "You weren't supposed to walk to Abilene, were you?"

Martin grinned. He brought his bandaged fingerless right hand up, and tapped the opening where his nose used to be. He winked his good eye, and then pointed the stump at him. They had had a pair of jeeps. Surplus USPS things. They were ancient. They had no electronics. To be safe they had unplugged the batteries, but they had left them outside, the shrapnel in Sam's legs had been from the grenades they had rolled under them. Which knocked both of them out. They drove in, but had to walk out.

There was a 'cough' from the priests 'unit'. Martin's head shifted towards the sound.

"Wait, how is she?" John asked, knowing the interview was over. He didn't know. He hadn't seen or heard from her in more than 6 years. She had cut him off. Not because he was sick. She had used him for two years while he was sick.

Martin finished quickly. He gave him names. People to look for: Col. Perry he was a good one. He told him about another priest. He had a large cell in the Latino sections of LA. Those two think 'big'. He told him. Find them. The priest returned. John stood. Martin looked at him. Almost as an aside he said that John hadn't changed at all.

"It hasn't even been a year, Martin." Was all he could think to say. Martin shook his head. When Derek taught me, I was a kid. He smiled, then: When I taught Derek, he was a kid. The priest released the wheelchairs brakes. He said that Martin needed his rest. John could hear the screech of the wheelchair as it retreated into the shadows of the 'unit'. "Waith." The voice hissed from the darkness. "Thawn, you neeth to know this. Iths Aughust. Aughust eightheenth twenthy twenthy fibe."

John only nodded. He had figured out August the other night.

John was confused. He had more questions now, than answers. He walked back to the others. He looked at Kyle. "I need to meet Colonel Perry."

The three traded a significant look. "General Perry." Kyle corrected. "We will have to go to Headquarters for that. And we'll need to talk to Derek."

"Why Derek?" They started to walk to the camps exit.

"Chain of command," Kyle said it like a curse word.