Man Hunt (22 page)

At full dusk, Obe came to the perimeter poles. These counterparts to the city's wide white line of paint stood like sentinels in the pouring rain. They, too, guarded the sector borders that he was not permitted to cross.

Under penalty of death!
Rhonda had told them on their day of release. He remembered the man from that morning who had broken this rule, the man in green who had run so long and so hard only to be killed so effortlessly. He knew the threat was not an empty one.

He stood staring at the long straight line of white poles, the rain pouring over him in full sheets now. He shivered constantly, knowing most of the men were deep in the thickest grasses, under trees, or up against building walls. Anything to block the worst of the downpour. Even the women were probably inside, though even now he stood with his ears alert. He had seen them hunt in the rain more than once.

But not today,
he thought.
Not in this rain. They'd rather be warm in bed and do twice as much hunting tomorrow.
Neither the rain nor the closest perimeter pole argued with his logic
.

His confrontation with Jain had been bad, though not unexpected. But worse than that, Obe hadn't come across a single other man in the time afterwards, and his stomach was beginning to rumble. He drank whenever he wanted to now. Puddles were everywhere, and even on the sides of hills little rivulets could be found. But none of it would last. By tomorrow the earth and the sun would soak and dry them all away, and he'd be left to slowly dehydrate.

Yet his hunger, Jain and his friends, and even the cold, pouring rain weren't what bothered him as he stared at the painted pole before him. For several hours now he had been hearing things that weren't there, and his fears over what this meant were growing.

The child's laughter was worse than the unseen helicopter. The laughter, he had surmised, was like a kind of ghost.

But both sounds had continued to pop up throughout the afternoon, and he had learned they seemed to coincide with any kind of bad news. Every time he jabbed his toe or stepped directly on a pebble, the laughter came. Whenever a gust of wind sent a chill running up his spine, the invisible rotors
thwapped
in the distance. And they'd gotten more frequent over time. Now they seemed to come with every drop of rain. He knew only that the sounds weren't real, and that he was starting to feel like he had during the worst of his days inside the fortress.

"It's a memory," he said to the nearest pole.

Yeah?
the pole seemed to mock.
Which one?

But he somehow knew it wasn't a memory. Not his, anyway. "Maybe it's from a movie. Or a dream," he said. "Or just something I'm wishing had happened. A good day with my brother. That's all.  Just… something I know will never happen now."

Well at least you got that part right,
the pole said.
You'll die here. Probably within a week. Jain said so. And Doov and Leb can't help you. In fact, Rein will probably break your neck at the next grocery day.

"Shut up," he told the pole, and the pole was suddenly just a pole again. It stood there impassive, as drenched and cold on its glistening white surface as he felt down to his core.

He imagined crossing the invisible line the many poles made, stepping back into the green sector where he knew the layout of all the streets and would be considered king among men. Men of the blue sector had sometimes visited when he had worn green. They had always looked so confident, so strong and healthy. He had envied them.

But Obe was nothing like those men of blue. He was battered and beaten. His nose was broken and his feet were little more than pads of ground beef. He was hungry and without food. He was thirsty in the pouring rain. He had made no real friends and at least one real enemy, and the sneakers he had almost died to get had been stolen even before he had gotten the chance to try them on.

The rain teemed down and he stood unmoving, taking every drop like a little hammer of justice. Thousands upon thousands of miniature gavels. The women were inside their sturdy walls, underneath their sturdy roofs. He knew this. He could easily step across the line and no one would ever know. He could walk along its border all the way to the sea itself. Maybe he could even find a stray man in green who was only a few yards away or who had come to stare with his own ache of desire at what lay on the other side. He could attack such a man. Steal his food. Bridge the gap between this hell and the next when he'd need to fight in the scrum just to stay alive.

But all Obe could manage to do was stare at the pole in front of him and hear the child's laughter and the ceaseless thump of rotors that weren't there.

And as they continued to attack his mind's ear, a matching picture soon began to form. It was a place he'd been told about but hadn't yet seen. A place all the men of the green sector had talked about like legend. "The Cliffs of the Moon" they had been called. And supposedly they existed on the northernmost edge of the blue sector within sight of the perimeter poles that separated it from black.

Without realizing he was doing it, Obe soon had the perimeter poles to his back and was trudging slowly northward.

CHAPTER 11

Josie left Gertrude's office in a daze. She didn't remember passing through the grand foyer, arriving at her room, or even packing her things. She first realized what she was doing halfway to the heliport on top of the fortress.

In her left hand was the small brown suitcase that now held her only personal belongings. It felt strangely heavy this time, as if her mission were truly that much more important. Reaching for the door to the roof, the questions came to her.
Why do I keep doing this to myself?
And then, of course…
How could I possibly stop?

The helicopter was there, and so was Monica. Her pilot's license was real enough, and Josie gave her credit as a skilled aviator, but that never took the unease away from being whisked away by the giant black bird. This would be only the second time she was the lone passenger. The first had been the day she arrived. That had been just two months after the incident with Charles.

"Afternoon, Josie. All packed?" Monica said.

"Yes," Josie muttered.

"Good. I'm anxious to get ahead of this storm. I'll be ready in five."

Despite the spacious rear quarters and the privacy it provided, Josie sat in the co-pilot seat. She liked the view. Soon Monica tried to break the silence with more idiotic talking.

"I don't know exactly what Gertrude has you doing, but I'm sure it's important. You know how much we all need you to help The Cause. You are so very good at recruiting, Josie, and that's the backbone of our organization. I'm sorry I had to tell her about your problem, but you're on such dangerous ground and we really can't afford to lose you."

"It's ok," Josie said. "I understand."

Minutes later the rotors churned and
thwumped
the air around them, and then they were airborne. The view, as always, was spectacular. Every foot they ascended, more of the island revealed itself. Despite the run-down buildings and the ugly line of perimeter poles that extended the white lines in the city all the way to the ocean, the landscape was breathtaking. From up there everything was serene. Peaceful. Nobody screamed for their life. Nobody pressed for more efficiency. Josie inhaled, sighed, relaxed.

They rose some more and the island's sharp edges defined themselves.

Monica twisted and pulled on the yoke and the helicopter rolled up and left. Josie's view slid gently aside and changed to nothing but the dark clouds to the west and the unseen stars above them. She frowned, wishing they had left on a clear night. The view then was somehow the most beautiful of all. They were two hundred miles from the nearest outdoor incandescent bulb, so the island offered no light pollution to diffuse the horrendous dark of the sky and the incredible brightness of the stars. Nature surrounded them. Each star in this monumental blackness shot out like a bullet hole in a black cloth.

Josie sighed and tried to picture where the Big Dipper was hiding. She followed the imaginary line pointing to the North Star. It would have been so brilliant, so close, that she would again think to reach out and grab it. The helicopter continued rolling, though, slipping the celestial dot out of view before she could do so.

Monica rolled the stick now to slide their view across the southern hemisphere and Josie knew somewhere out there was Orion. She imagined the three, almost-straight line made by the stars that made up his belt and wondered how far apart those worlds were.

Almost as far as I am from home,
she thought.

Soon the helicopter was headed north toward the Hawaiian islands. They flew low over the blue sector, scattering tree leaves and tall grasses like so many frightened cockroaches. Josie saw several men down there. They always stood still and looked up at them. Again her heart ached knowing how much they yearned to be away from the island. She was sure Monica flew low simply to torture them even more.

When they had cleared the island and were chasing down nothing more than whitecaps and blue seas, Monica opened her mouth and turned a serene two-hour flight into hell. She took it upon herself to use that time as an additional, unauthorized session. Josie could do nothing to stop her and grumbled because she knew she wouldn't dare talk about it upon her return.

Monica brought up Charles again. And although her strength wasn't as potent while preoccupied with piloting the helicopter, Josie nearly broke down into tears for the third time that day. Her emotional instability was primed, and she learned it was all but impossible to stop her tears completely. Once the faucet had been turned on, it was likely to always drip. Like torture. And while she fought to hold back, she learned that sometimes it was simply better to cry. For the majority of that trip, she yearned for it. Only thwarting Monica's smile of success gave her the strength to bear the long flight alone with the skilled counselor.

A little while before they arrived at their destination, Monica finally let it all rest, but not without first emphasizing how important it was that she do a good job on this mission. Josie had played the part as best she could for the entire flight. She would have liked to explode at Monica, but again she simply agreed.

Finally, they received clearance and landed. This was the real world.

The little airport was relatively deserted for 4:30 in the afternoon, yet it was bright and inviting even as the storm picked up strength outside.

"How long did she give you?" Monica asked as they walked through the back doors and into the terminal.

"Ten days," Josie said.

"Really?" Monica looked sideways at her. "That's generous."

Josie didn't respond right away. But Monica's sickening stares and heavy breathing exposed her frustrated curiosity in a way that Josie couldn't simply ignore. "It's a difficult mission," she said finally. "But at least it's on the west coast."

"How many?" Monica asked.

"Just one," Josie said, and somehow managed to hold back a smirk. She could see the counselor was dying to know
all
the details, but this time Josie held her resolve and said nothing more. She had revealed only enough for Monica to do her job and be there for pick-up when needed. It wasn't Monica's right to know any more. Those were the rules. The small victory that it was, Josie nevertheless loved and enjoyed every second of her held tongue. To Monica's credit, and Josie's frustration, she didn't ask and further questions.

They reached the counter, and a far too cheery Hawaiian woman smiled at them. "May I help you?"

"One round-trip ticket to California," Monica said.

"What city?" the attendant asked.

"Doesn't matter. We'll take whatever you've got that leaves soon."

"Oooo," the attendant said.  "We're a small airport, ma'am. We don't have that many flights. The best I can do is…" and they all waited in tense silence while her computer brought up the relevant info. "We have one open seat on a flight to San Diego leaving at four tomorrow morning." She paused then added, "Though it is first class. If price is a problem the next one wouldn't be until noon. That one goes to San Francisco."

"That would be better," Monica said.

Thank God it wasn't San Diego,
Josie thought.
Frisco is so much closer.

Thank God for that first class seat,
Monica thought.
That's going to make this so much easier.

The attendant quoted a price and Monica produced the amount in cash from a leather zippered wallet she always carried to the airport. The attendant did her thing, punching buttons and asking pointless questions about luggage and fruit or vegetable parcels. Finally satisfied, she smiled at them while the computer printed out the tickets.

"Ok, you're all set for a round-trip ticket to San Francisco. You'll be arriving at San Francisco International Airport at five-forty-two p.m., and your return flight will leave from there on… Wednesday the seventeenth at eleven a.m. Thank you for flying Hawaiian Airlines."

Josie's ears perked up. The seventeenth. But of what month? When she got the ticket she looked at it. The letters 'JUL' were printed neatly halfway down.
July
, she thought.
How the hell did it get to be July already? Christ, that makes today the seventh.
She allowed the date to sink in a little further.
We missed the fireworks.

They found a short row of chairs where Josie could sit and wait away from the main entrance doors. Monica double-checked the ticket. "I'll see you in ten days, then. Good luck. Remember what I've said." Josie nodded, anticipating her departure.

Then Monica turned and left to go fill another much-needed shopping list of such strangely linked items as groceries for twenty women, crates of fruit for over two hundred men– ripeness was not a priority– case upon case of water for everyone, more gallons of gasoline, and perhaps a new pair or two of green sneakers.

Watching her go, Josie once again battled with an overwhelming mixture of exaltation and fear. She knew the fear would dissipate soon enough and tried to enjoy her freedom. Still, there was something to be said about being left behind without food or money and only one small suitcase filled with ridiculous items. It was always this way. The women had been taught how to fend for themselves, and they never failed to do so.

There will be food on the airplane,
she thought.
In the meantime maybe I can persuade some single guy waiting for his flight to buy me dinner.

She looked at the clock on the wall and the time stamped on her ticket. It was not yet 5:00 yet the afternoon light was entirely gone, replaced by more clouds and rain.

'Noon,' the ticket said. Not '12:00' or even '12:00 p.m.', but 'Noon.'

Like 'High Noon',
she thought.
Great. And I get to spend the next twenty hours in this place. Even better
. She lay down across the triple-connected blue plastic chairs and used her little suitcase as a pillow.

Sleep came quickly. It had been a long day.