55. Aftermath

55 – Aftermath

When Andy reached the top of the trail, he was met by a large crowd of residents, most of whom were holding makeshift weapons. In a way, he felt good seeing them there; they looked ready to fight. On the other hand, he was leading two prisoners at spear-point, and there was murder in the eyes of more than one trailer park resident when they realized that fact. People crowded close, shouting questions, and Andy had to yell to get them to listen. “Everyone, back off for a minute!”

“What’s happening down there?”

“What are you going to do with them?”

“We should push ’em off!”

The shouts kept coming, and Andy felt like he was losing his grip on things, so, again, he yelled. “I can’t answer you all at once! The fight’s over, so just give me a damn chance to speak!”

As a bit of peace descended on the scene, Andy shoved his two prisoners toward the fence, a good twenty yards away. “Sit over there with your backs to the fence. If you move or do anything stupid, I won’t be able to stop what some of these people want to do to you.”

“Stop us?” a big guy—Rodrigo, Andy thought—asked. “Why the hell would you stop us? Those assholes came here to kill us!”

Andy tried to smile, but he was sure it looked more like a grimace. “Look, man. I know that. You think I don’t know that? We need to talk to them, though. We need to learn what we can, and then we need to decide what we’ll do with them. Executing people is a little different from killing someone in the heat of a battle.” Andy hastily held up a hand as some people started to grumble. “I’m not saying it isn’t the right decision. I just think it’s worth talking about—thinking about.”

“Andy,” a masculine voice called out, and he turned to see Paul Howl, the older man who’d brought his family there for refuge. “Did you see Jace down there? My son?”

Andy nodded. “Yeah. He was…hurt. A lot of people were. We’ve got people there helping, but if anyone else wants to go down, I think they could use all the hands we can spare. We need to get them up here where it’s safe.”

“Is it safe? Are we safe?” a young woman asked—one of the ones he’d rescued from the Whistler, but he couldn’t think of her name.

“We’re safer up here than a lot of people, trust me. That doesn’t mean we’re out of danger, though. We need to keep working together.” He scanned the scene for Omar, then remembered he was down below. “Are people patrolling? I don’t think anyone could climb up here, but we need to keep watch, ’cause, you know…magic.”

Eduardo pushed his way forward through the crowd, answering as he came. “Yeah, people are walking the perimeter.”

“Good.” Andy sighed, allowing himself to relax a little as a dozen or more people started moving down the trail, intent on helping with the wounded.

“Andy,” Violet asked, moving closer and drawing him away from the crowd. “Where do you want to keep them?” She nodded toward the two prisoners sitting by the fence. “We’re running out of open trailers. I mean, I don’t think there are

“I don’t know. We could chain them up to the fence near the back of the park.” He shrugged. “I don’t think we’ll keep ’em very long.” Violet didn’t look like she liked the idea, but she wasn’t offering an alternative. Andy looked toward the people still lingering around. “Got any ideas for someone who could watch them?”

Violet followed his gaze. “Isaiah. He hurt his leg before the System came, but he almost went down to fight anyway. He wants something to do.”

Andy didn’t know Isaiah, but he’d seen him around on his crutches. They were gone, though, and he was standing there in a walking boot, holding a baseball bat. He was young and strong-looking, and he looked determined as he scowled toward the path leading down the cliff face. Andy called out, “Isaiah! Can you give me a hand?” As the young man started walking over, Andy looked at Violet. “Catch up with you soon. Gonna go do something with these two.”

With that, he walked toward the fence, motioning for Isaiah to follow along. “Hey man, appreciate you helping out. How’s the leg?”

“Ah, it’s almost better, man. Sprained it at baseball practice two days before all this shit went down.”

Andy took in the gray boot and its heavy Velcro straps. “Must have been a hell of a sprain.”

“Oh, hell yes. My ankle was black-and-blue and swelled up like a damn watermelon.” He shrugged. “Caught my heel sliding into home. To be honest, I was supposed to need months to heal up, but that chick, Marisol, did something to it yesterday—started healing real quick.”

“Really? That’s awesome. I knew she was a medic in the, uh, old world, but I guess she got a class to go along with it. Anyway, you hurt it at practice? Bet your coach was pissed.”

Isaiah laughed, reaching up to rub a hand over his short, coarse black hair. “Damn right.”

“You got a class yet?”

“Nah, man. I ain’t done shit yet. Been laid up most of the time. This is my first day off crutches.”

Andy stopped a few feet from the prisoners, a silent little war going on in his head between the side of him that wanted to give Isaiah some advice and another that recognized that he wasn’t much older than he was. The louder voice won through. “That’s cool, but you gotta get busy. People out there are getting strong. Monsters will be too. Shit’s only gonna get crazier.”

“I hear you.” Isaiah nodded. “I was about to go down that trail, gimpy ankle or not.”

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“Right, well, see these two assholes?” Andy pointed with his spear.

“Yeah…”

“I need someone I can count on to watch them until we figure out what to do with ’em.”

“Oh, hell yes. I’m your man.”

“Seriously?” Andy hadn’t expected such enthusiasm.

“Yes! I got this.” He thumped his bat into the palm of his hand.

Andy nodded. “Right.” He looked at the two men. “On your feet. Come on.” As he guided the two men, with Isaiah at his side, toward the storage shed where he figured he could look for some chain or rope, another idea struck him. The shed had a small window, and the door was sturdy and well-made. “We’ll keep ’em in the shed for now, but we'd better tie their hands behind their backs. There’s some stuff in there I don’t want them to mess with.”

“Sounds good.”

The shed turned out to be ideal; Andy found an eyelet hook screwed into one of the exposed corner studs, and he threaded a rope through it, then around the two men’s hands behind their backs. He let them sit on a stack of mulch bags, and with the door open, it was easy for Isaiah to keep an eye on them. Before leaving him to it, Andy said, “If you need a break for the bathroom or to get some rest, just make sure you trade out with someone. I’ll make sure Violet or someone knows to check on you.”

“Got it, man!” Isaiah held out a fist, and Andy bumped knuckles with him. With one headache at least put off for the time being, Andy wanted to go to his trailer to process everything that had happened and maybe get some rest, but he turned back toward the gate, instead. He had to find out who was hurt and who was dead.

When he arrived, he found the crowd considerably thinned, but among the people still present, he saw Lucy chatting with Violet and Eduardo, so he walked over to them. “What’s the situation?” he asked as he drew near.

“Hey, Andy.” Lucy’s frown tilted upwards momentarily, but she shook her head and said, “Wish it were better, but three of our people died.”

“Who?” Andy looked from Lucy to Violet and Eduardo, noting similar grim expressions. “That Jace guy?”

Lucy shook her head, then looked over her shoulder, obviously checking to see who was within earshot. When she spoke, her voice was pitched low. “He actually just got knocked out. He seems like he’ll be fine. Brian died, though, and so did Levi and Noel.”

“Dammit,” Andy groaned, picturing Brian with his spear, ready to hunt down enemy scouts with him just a few hours earlier. Frowning, he said, “Levi?”

Lucy nodded. “One of the guys you rescued from Construction City.”

“The dude with the broken wrist? What the hell was he doing out there?”

“He went down there with some others, you know, watching out for you guys. I don’t think he meant to fight,” Violet replied, taking over for Lucy.

Andy shook his head, angry, frustrated, and suddenly a lot less eager to show mercy to his captives. “We need to talk about what we’re going to do about those two. More than that, we need to come up with a general policy for stuff like that. Some of those Construction City people approached me out there. They want to defect, but who can we even trust?”

No one replied for a moment, and Andy could see they were all absorbing what he’d said. Finally, Lucy reached out to grasp his arm. “Really? You spoke to them? After we separated?”

“Yeah, when I was running from one group, I bumped into another. The ones I heard talking shit about their leader and saying they wanted to join us.”

“But that was a trick, right?”

“Yeah, I thought so, but then they said they were picked to play the ‘bait’ because the leaders don’t like them. I don’t know.”

Violet stepped closer, looking earnestly into Andy’s face. “You’re not supposed to have all the answers. We’ll talk about it, as you suggested, but I don’t think we need to involve everyone in the community in that discussion. Some people are grieving, and some are out for blood.”

“Definitely not,” Lucy agreed.

“I don’t know. Who do we involve? This is… Things are spiraling pretty fast, you guys. We might have another battle here in a few hours. Speaking of which, I need to put new traps on that trail.” He moved over to a small boulder beside the gravel roadway and sat down, leaning his back against it.

“You good?” Eduardo asked.

“Yeah, man. I just have to change my active class, and it knocks me out for a few seconds—minutes, maybe. I don’t know.”

“Active class?” He stepped closer, digging in his back pocket for a little notebook. “Andy, you have to let me interview you about some of this stuff!”

“I will, Ed. I promise. Just not right this second.”

“Do you need—” Lucy started to ask, but Andy held up his finger, interrupting her as he tried to focus on his character sheet. He stared at the Pyroglyph Invoker class and then selected “yes” when the System asked if he wanted to change. As a wave of tingles spread over his body and a piercing but thankfully short-lived headache formed behind his eyes, Andy’s head flopped forward, lolling between his knees.

When he came back to himself, the first thing he noticed was how dark everything was. Then he felt hands on his shoulders and heard Lucy’s concerned voice, “…going to be okay?”

“I’m good,” he muttered, squinting into the darkness, suddenly aware of the camp lantern burning near the gate. He’d totally disregarded it when he’d had his Reaper’s Senses active. He held out a hand, and Eduardo grabbed it, hauling him to his feet. “How long did that take me?”

“About two minutes,” Eduardo answered immediately.

“Seriously? It felt like about ten seconds.” He stooped to pick up his spear. “Anyway, I’ll go down and leave some traps on the trail. Can we, like, plan for a meeting first thing in the morning?”

Violet nodded. “I’ll spread the word. Anyway, while you were out of it, I thought about what you said—about things spiraling. Maybe we ought to elect some representatives. I mean, like a council.”

Lucy was quick to object, “I don’t like ruling by committee. Especially in a dangerous situation like we’re living in!”

“Just an advisory council, then,” Violet said, stepping closer to Lucy and putting a hand on her shoulder. “Andy needs advice, and he doesn’t want to try to listen to the entire community for every little decision.”

Before she could respond, Andy said, “I like that idea. We’ll talk in the morning.” With that, he turned and started for the trail. When he started down the first slope, he stopped when he saw a lantern bobbing its way up toward him. There were several figures around it, and they were carrying a prostrate form between them. He backed up to the trailhead to make space for them to pass. As he waited, Lucy approached.

“Are you upset?”

He looked at her, eyebrows raised, “Huh?”

“You just seem…I don’t know, pissed.”

“No. Shit, Lucy, I didn’t mean to come off that way to you. I think I’m just stressed. This night didn’t go how we wanted, you know?”

She exhaled a pent-up breath. “That’s an understatement. Anyway, I’m very relieved you got away from those people.”

“I heard you killed the leader’s horse.”

“Andy!” She threw her hands over her eyes, cringing. “Don’t remind me!”

“You weren’t aiming for it?”

“No! I was trying to hit the rider, but the horse’s head kept bobbing up and down as he was galloping, and the guy was crouched forward…” She trailed off, clearly mortified.

Andy put his arm over her shoulders and jostled her. “Well, you probably saved some people’s lives by delaying him. That dude was tough as hell.”

She leaned into him for a second, but as the people coming up the trail approached, she stiffened and stepped to the side. “Is that…”

Frank Dunlap, holding the front end of the makeshift stretcher, nodded grimly toward Andy and Lucy, “It’s Brian. We’ll head down for the others after we set him down. We figured we ought to bury ’em someplace up here—maybe say a few words.”

“Yeah…” Andy said, his words failing him as he watched them go by.

A few moments after they’d passed, Lucy shifted and looked up at him. “Reminds me of Steve.”

“Damn, Luce. I’m sorry. I was thinking the same thing.”

She sniffed, then reached up to rub her sleeve over her eyes. “Well, come on. I’ll cover you while you do your traps.”