Apocalypse (The Wasteland Chronicles, #1) (10 page)

I didn't know how she could fall asleep so
quickly. Despite my exhaustion, I lay there for a while, thinking.
I thought about how narrowly I had escaped Bunker 108. I didn’t
know if I had it in me to survive another encounter with something
infected with the xenovirus, human or not.

But at least I had Makara. Makara, who would
teach me how to survive out here.

However, the more I saw of the Wasteland, the
more I saw how the odds were stacked against me.

I just hoped I could find that fight within
me.

Makara and I woke with the sun. After eating,
we set off. It was our goal to reach Oasis by nightfall.

Any tenderness Makara had shown last night
was completely gone. She did not smile, and her face assumed a
hard, stony expression.

“This makes me nervous,” Makara said.

“What?”

“It’s so empty. No signs of life.”

“Isn’t that normal?”

She shrugged. “I prefer to see my enemy.”

“Do you think they’re following us?”

“I
know
they’re following us. Every
batt those Raiders had is in that pack you’re carrying right now.
Brux is not going to let that go without a fight. Count on it.”

I smiled. “I still can’t get over the fact
that you guys use batteries as money.”

“They’ve been the currency of Raider Bluff
for the last ten years. When you have a lot of goods going through
a place, you need something to use as money, or things bog
down.”

“Raider Bluff?”

“It’s the biggest city in the Mojave, on the
Colorado River. Five thousand people, mostly slaves.”

“Slaves?”

“It isn’t pretty, but someone has to man the
farms, or everyone starves.”

“Still…who runs this place, anyway?”

“The Alpha. I haven’t been to Bluff in a
while, but last I went, the Alpha was a man named Char. I used to
raid with him. He’s a good man, for all that good is worth around
here.”

“Why wouldn’t he be Alpha anymore?”

“Because if you’re Alpha for over a year,
you’re doing pretty damn well.”

“Why would anyone want to be Alpha?”

Makara shrugged. “Everyone thinks they’re
special, that they won’t die from an assassination attempt.”

It was hard to imagine how thousands of
violent Wastelanders could cooperate long enough to build a city.
But I guess even Raiders needed a safe place to lay their heads for
a while.

I supposed there were a lot of things topside
I’d have to get used to. Like the fact Raiders were tracking me
because I was carrying a lot of batteries in my backpack. If only
Makara knew how many rechargeable batteries there were in Bunker
108, she just might turn around and try to raid it.

“We better hurry,” I said.

“We can only go as fast as our weakest
link.”

“What? Is this slow to you?”

“We should be running, given the
circumstances.”

“I can try harder, if that’s what you…”

Makara held a hand up, and ducked. I fell to
the ground with her.

“What is it?” I asked.

It was quiet for a moment. A gust of wind
blew over the rocky ground.

“Nothing,” Makara said. “Just a feeling.”

“You fall to the ground because of a
feeling?”

Makara stared pointedly at me. “You don’t
trust your gut out here, you’re dead. It’s a mistake most people
only make once.”

We waited a couple minutes. At least it was a
chance to catch a breather.

I looked behind and saw nothing but the flat,
red expanse we had already traversed. Some low hills rose on the
southern horizon, along with several mesas against the backdrop of
the sky, pink in the morning light.

It truly did seem as if we were the only ones
alive.

“We’re not going to wait here all day, are
we?” I asked.

Makara heaved an exasperated sigh. It looked
like she wanted to hit me.

“Come on.”

We got up again, and headed in the direction
we had been going.

“We have to be careful,” Makara said. “There
are only two of us, which makes us prime targets. Raiders go after
the guaranteed kills. If I were raiding, my eyes would pop as soon
as I saw us two walking across this plain.”

We ascended a hill as we drew within a mile
of a narrowing in the valley. It was midmorning. It seemed brighter
than usual, for some reason. The weather had become more placid in
the past couple days. Maybe the dying down of the wind affected how
much dust stayed in the air.

Makara pointed ahead.

“See there, beyond that ridge of
mountains?”

I could barely see them above the hills, but
they were very tall.

“Yeah.”

“Oasis is past them. It’s just like it
sounds. There’s an oasis there, and a big town grew up around
it.”

As the morning went on, I thought of Makara’s
being a Raider. I was traveling with a Raider. Someone who had
stolen. Someone who had killed.

Maybe someone who had murdered.

I didn’t know why I was not afraid. I also
didn’t know why I was so quick to believe her story about Bunker
One. Everything seemed to fit, I guess.

“So why did you
really
decide to leave
that group?” I asked. “It must’ve been pretty bad if you’d rather
go with me.”

“It was simple, really. Brux is a bad man,
even for a Raider. Most Raiders kill because they must. Yes,
raiding turns them bad. But Brux loves killing. He’ll do it even
when there’s no reason to. Raiding is your only choice when you
don’t have a home. Most of these settlements won’t take in
outsiders – for good reason. Most outsiders are trouble. The
settlements learned from their mistakes. Raiders will pretend to be
nice, or hurt, or whatever, to get inside settlements and scout
them. It takes an amazing feat to be accepted into a settlement
these days. Either that, or plenty of batts. In a way, it just
makes the problem worse. Good people who could contribute to
settlements are turned away. They have to eat, too. So they become
Raiders.”

“Is that what happened to you?”

Makara was quiet for a moment. “Sort of.”

Suddenly Makara stopped.

“What?” I asked.

She pushed hard down on my shoulder. Both of
us fell to the ground and scurried behind a boulder. She held a
finger to her mouth. She poked her head around, and quickly pulled
it back. She rolled her eyes.

“I don’t believe it…” she whispered.

“What?”

“Somehow, they got ahead of us.”

A gun went off, sending a spray of chipped
rock into my face.

“I thought they were behind us!” I said.

“Same here. They probably guessed where we
were heading, and went to block off the only way there.”

“Where are they? I didn’t see anything.”

“There’s an outcrop of rocks maybe a stone’s
throw away. I saw one of them behind one.”

A few more bullets were fired before a gruff
male voice called down the attack.

It was dead quiet. Even the wind had stopped.
I could feel my heart beating madly in my chest.

Finally the same gravelly, slimy voice that
had called the shots off boomed out.

“Come out, Makara. We won’t kill you. I
promise. I just want the pack back. That’s it.”

Makara gave a savage laugh, only loud enough
for me to hear. “Like we’re going to fall for that.”

“How the hell are we going to get out of
this?” I asked.

She reached in her bag, and pulled out a
canister with a lever.

“This should do the trick.”

“What the…”

“Tear gas,” she said. “I hope it’s enough of
a distraction.”

“You
hope
?”

“If you have a better idea, I’d like to hear
it. After I lob this, we’ll take off for those hills to the east.
On the other side, there’s a trail that leads to Oasis.”

I looked at the twisted hills uncertainly,
not sure if there would be a way across. But what other choice did
we have?

Makara pulled the plug on the tear gas
canister, waited a couple seconds, and threw the damn thing
overhand. There were shouts of alarm, followed by a thud. The
canister popped and spewed gas into the air.

“Now,” she said.

She sprinted from the shelter of the rock
toward the hills. I took off after her.

I’d never run so fast in my life. I could
hear the tear gas hissing behind us.

A few seconds later, the shots started.

I chanced a look back. There were five of
them. Three of them, including Brux, were grabbing at their eyes,
wailing in pain. The other two ran after us, rifles trained on
us.

“Run!” Makara yelled. “Don’t look back!”

From time to time, a shot went off. A bullet
whizzed past my ear. If I had been a few inches further to the
right, I would have been dead.

After a minute, we slowed from a sprint to a
fast run. After another mile, even at the slower pace, I was ready
to die. I was in decent enough shape…or at least, I thought I was.
But I was nothing compared to Makara. The only thing that kept me
going was sheer necessity.

Despite my lagging behind, we were gaining
the lead. The backpack was heavy on me, and it bobbed up and down
on my shoulders. All this trouble for some batteries. I could hear
them jangle in time with my strides, as if they were mocking
me.

Makara had long since slowed to a steady jog,
but I couldn’t go on. I collapsed to the ground.

Makara stopped. “Sometimes I forget you
haven’t walked more than a mile a day in your entire life, much
less run one.”

I was breathing too hard to protest. It felt
like I was going to puke. Maybe I would have if there had actually
been something in my stomach.

She took me by my sweaty palm.

“You need to get up,” Makara said. She had
already regained her breath.

I still lay on the ground, my pulse pounding
in my brain. Finally, I let Makara pull me up. I walked beside her.
She was still setting a fast pace, but I didn’t complain.

We spent the rest of the morning climbing
through the line of hills, trying to break out onto the other side.
I looked back at the valley, but didn’t see our pursuers.

“Are they still going to follow us?” I
asked.

“Yes. If we can make Oasis, we should be
safe.”

“Great.”

We found a pass, and worked our way through
to the other side. When we made it, my breath caught in my throat.
Before us spread a vast expanse of red in all directions. In front
of me, miles and miles out, was a sharp, jagged line of mountains.
Their crowns were crested with snow. The entire flatland reflected
a strange, golden glow.

A long brown line snaked its way across the
plain, close to the foothills. It took me a moment to realize it
was the trail Makara spoke of. Along it a long cloud of dust rose
from the red earth.

“What is that?”

Makara squinted. “It’s a caravan. Going to
Oasis, from the looks of it.”

“Maybe they can take us with them.”

“Yes,” Makara said. “Maybe they can. There is
safety in numbers, after all.”

Before I could say anything else, Makara was
bounding down the hill. I hurried to catch up.

As we neared the dust cloud, I discerned
shapes moving within it. I saw people walking among animals laden
with goods. The animals had long necks and long, brown hair. Each
had a large hump on its back.

“Are those camels?” I asked.

Makara nodded. “Yeah.”

“Camels in California? Or was my Bunker
actually built halfway across the world?”

“No. There were zoos before…you
do
know what those are, right?”

“I’m not an idiot.”

Makara smiled, as if she might contend that.
“There was a really big zoo in San Diego, which was not too far
from here. There were zoos in other places, of course. Anyway, when
Meteor crashed down, there was no one to take care of the animals.
In the chaos, some escaped. Unlike most other animals, camels are
built for harsh, dry environments. They would have thrived here,
even if everything else died off. I imagine this cold, dry weather
is their cup of tea.” She shrugged. “That’s my theory, anyway.”

“Seems you have this thought out.”

Within a few minutes, we had caught up with
the caravan. When we reached the road, several hundred feet behind
the tail of the train, Makara raised her hands high.

“Do the same,” she said. “They won’t let us
near till we check out.”

“Check out?”

“We could be Raiders to their eyes,” she
said. “Raiders attack caravans all the time, and sometimes use
diversions. We could be a diversion, but we have to prove we’re not
Raiders or with Raiders.”

“Makara, are you going to get us killed?”

“No worries,” Makara said. “They’ll know I
was with Raine when they see this…”

She lifted the left sleeve of her black tee,
revealing a tattoo of angel’s wings.

“Every Lost Angel has one, and they command
respect, even out here in the Wastes.”

Two men approached from the end of the train.
They wore elegant, brown robes made from fine material. Each had a
large hood drawn against the cold, and each had a long, thick
beard.

“Who are these guys?” I asked.

“Looks like they’re from the south,” Makara
said. “There’s more cities down there, where it’s warmer. A lot of
caravans flow between here and there.”

“State your name and your business,
travelers,” one of the men said.

“I’m Makara. This is Alex. We are traveling
to Oasis, and wanted safe passage with your train.”

“What business do you have in Oasis?”

“Raiders pursue us. We seek shelter with your
caravan.”

“Raiders? Are you with Raiders?”

“No! I said they pursue us. If I were a
Raider, would I have this?”

Makara lifted her sleeve again, revealing the
Lost Angels’ emblem.