THE COLLAPSE: Seeking Refuge (18 page)

Carrie turned her head towards Fish and frowned at the “big, tall woman” description.  She would rather have preferred,
“Athletic and Attractively Big-Boned”.

Long gray snarled at Fish, “I know who she is, dummy.”

Short gray added, “Yes, everyone knows Carrie.”

“Well, if that’s the case,” Fish cocked his head at long gray, “then why don’t you ladies let her do her job?”

Carrie didn’t mind the onlookers, but she was worried that Fish might get himself into some trouble if the women didn’t let up on him.  He was, after all, only doing what he was ordered.  So she called out to the gray ladies, “You may know who I am, but I don’t know either of you.  You both seem like really nice people, though.  Could you please do me a favor and leave the area so I can concentrate on this inspection?  I would really appreciate it!”

Long and short gray looked at each other.  Fish hoped that Carrie’s politeness would be effective, and the two persistent old bats would just fly away.  He didn’t want to harass them anymore than absolutely necessary.

Short gray looked past Fish and curiously asked Carrie, “When will we know what happened?”

Carrie sighed and said, “If you fancy some answers, you’re more than welcome to stop by my campsite and see me tomorrow.  I’ll tell you everything I know.”

Long and short gray looked at each other again and nodded silently to each other.  Long gray turned back to Fish, stepped toward him, and then sneered down at the automatic rifle in his hands for at least five seconds, then she slowly turned her head up and sneered at his face without saying word.  She was silently expressing her disapproval of him, his weapon, and his tactics. 

Fish could tell that she was disgusted with him, due to the over-dramatic sneering.  It was so over the top that Fish wanted to laugh-out-loud, but he maintained his composure.  For a moment, anyway, until long gray finally spoke over her shoulder to short gray.

“C’mon Zelda, let’s get out of here.”

Now, Fish might have been able to stop himself from laughing if the name hadn’t been “Zelda”.  As a heavy gamer from his childhood during the 80’s all the way up until The Collapse, Fish knew
exactly
who Zelda was, and he couldn’t believe there was actually a real person out there in the world with the same name.

All of the air in Fish’s lungs burst forward in a huge raspberry sounding *BMPHH*, and he thought that some of his spittle might have even hit long gray in the face.  Her facial expression instantaneously went from a sneer to shock and dismay.  Her long hair had even flown back a bit from the force of it.

Zelda violently came forward and shouted at the still-laughing Fish, “What’s so funny, you tall sonofabitch?!”

Long gray wiped her face with her jacket sleeve, then promptly slapped Fish hard across the face.

“Da fuck is wrong with you?!!!” Fish cried out and raised his rifle up to block a second slap coming from ol’ Zelda herself.  They were ganging up on him!  And there was nothing he could do about it, either.  He couldn’t hit them back, they were just old ladies!  All he could do was continue to back up and avoid their swings.  He shouted over his shoulder, “Carrie…help me, please!”

Carrie was already airborne from her crouched position after she had heard the first slap.  She bounded forward and forced herself between Fish and the furiously swinging grays.  Carrie reached out and snatched up a handful of each one of their jackets under their chins and pushed them backwards, nearly toppling them both in the process.

“Alright,” Carrie shouted at the women, “fun time is over.  You’d better leave now.”

“Get your hands off me!” Zelda shouted and batted pathetically at the fistful of jacket in Carrie’s powerful hand.

Carrie threatened the two crazy ladies by shouting, “Just know that if either of you take a swing at me, I
will
hit you back!  Now…get out of here so I can finish up my analysis.”

*****

Stephen’s mind raced as he pedaled his new bicycle toward wood station #1.  As expected (thankfully), his woodcutters were still there.  A few were taking a break as the others were diligently clearing brush and smaller trees to make way for a decent-sized Maple that was about to be felled for fish-smoking purposes.

Stephen dismounted and hollered to his boys, “Guys, gather up around me.  I have some questions for you.”

Many of the boys suddenly looked at each other worriedly, as if they had done something wrong.  Stephen quickly eased their minds by saying, “It’s okay, you fellas didn’t do anything wrong.  C’mon…gather up.”

Stephen questioned the boys about Hal’s whereabouts during the day, and they had all concurred that Hal had, in fact, been busy constructing the herring smokers, and had not left the area, not even for lunch.  They followed up with the fact that he had been informed of the three o’clock meeting’s location by Meghan somewhere around 1:30 PM, and walked away for meeting at 2:45pm.  Fifteen minutes was definitely not enough time to walk all the way out to the north beach, commit a murder, and then walk all the back to Forest Loop where the meeting was held.  No way.

Stephen wanted to solidify their claim of his presence, so he asked, “What about bathroom breaks?  He never left for that, either?”

Prince responded for the rest of the boys, “Umm, Mr. A, we don’t actually leave for that.  We just…ya know…piss in the forest.”

Stephen nodded.  He wondered if the woodcutters took dumps out there, too, but didn’t ask.  Regardless, he had ascertained all the information he needed to get Hal released from Alexis and the Probsts.  And…speaking of Alexis, what was up with her, anyway?  Why was she so eager put Hal in handcuffs in the first place?  What type of police officer
was she
before The Collapse?  Maybe she was just reliving her old life, and was once again in her comfort zone as an enforcer of the law.  Maybe that’s why she had been so exuberant.  Stephen summed it up to that as he got back onto his bike.

Before departing, Stephen yelled to the boys, “Oh, I almost forgot, the leadership was able to score you guys some new saws.  Two really good ones.  They are still at site 30 where we had the meeting today.  Why don’t some of you go and pick them up before they walk away?”

“Woohoo!” a few of the woodcutters cheered happily.

Stephen smiled and then pedaled away to speak with the Probsts about a good man named Hal Hollingsworth.

*****

Carrie said to Fish, “It’s pretty obvious that she had been asphyxiated for a few moments, then her neck was broken – probably right here on this trail.  By someone pretty big, too.”

Fish threw his head back and said, “Why are you looking at
me
like that?  I was sleeping all day!”

“I’m not looking at you like that, I’m just telling you what I think!  Geezus!” Carrie laughed.

“How do you know all that stuff, anyway?” Fish asked.

Carrie pointed at Julia’s mouth and explained, “See that lipstick smeared around her lips?  Someone had their hand over her mouth, probably trying to keep her quiet.  Then, when she wouldn’t shut up…SNAP!”

Fish flinched as Carrie made a violent motion with her right arm, mock-snapping an invisible person’s neck.  He then tried to play it off as if he was adjusting his weight, then asked, “What about her fingernails and stuff, don’t they always check those on TV?”

“I already looked, and I couldn’t find anything.  If there was a struggle, it was very short-lived.  Like I said, the perpetrator is a very strong person.  There probably won’t be any evidence on the man’s face or arms.”

“Carrie,” Fish asked, “you keep saying ‘man’, but what if it was a woman?”

He was trying to be very equal-opportunity about the whole thing.

“Not likely.  I am probably one of the only women strong enough in The Park to do anything like this,” Carrie answered, shaking her head.  She then watched Fish put his hand to his chin, pretending to be deep in thought.

“Hmmm,” Fish began to question, rubbing his chin, “and where were
you
all day?”

Carrie frowned, then retorted with a laugh, “Shut the fuck up, Fish, you’re such a jackass!  And yes, I called you a ‘jackass’ because that’s what Tarra calls you all the time.  She told me all about you, my friend.  Now, let’s get off this trail and take this information to the Probsts.  We will also need to notify Walter Pullman, so he can get the body moved in preparation for a ceremony.”

*****

Pharaoh was tied to Fish’s truck with a fifteen foot line attached to the trailer hitch.  That way, he could defend both sides of the truck, if need be, from anyone that decided to check out what might be inside the cab or under the big blue tarp topside.

While on guard duty, Pharaoh spotted a young boy walking toward his master’s domain.  The young human was immediately recognized as an “acceptable” by his master.  His master had labeled the acceptable little human as “Wolf”.  Acceptables weren’t harmed, unless the dog smelled mischief or threat. 

The human slowly walked toward the dog and called out his name.  Pharaoh signaled to the boy that it was okay to approach by intently wagging his tail in a friendly manner.

Wolf greeted Pharaoh and pet him for a few moments, then asked, “Where’s Fish?”

Pharaoh wanted to tell the acceptable human that his master had left him tied to the truck.  He wasn’t sure of his master’s exact whereabouts, but he sensed and smelled that he wasn’t far away.  Less than a quarter mile to the northwest.  Pharaoh barked to the boy what he knew, but the young human couldn’t understand him, of course.  Humans were stupid.  The dog could easily understand most of what humans communicated to him, or to other humans, but none of them could understand what he was saying!  It was very frustrating, indeed.

But wait!  Maybe the little human
did
understand, because he pet the dog one final time, and then left down the trail that was adjacent to his master’s domain.  The trail led in the same direction that Pharaoh had sensed and smelled his master.  He had also smelled death.

*****

It didn’t take long for Stephen to convince the Probsts to have Hal released.  Alexis apologized to the angry man as she removed the handcuffs.  Hal didn’t say anything or thank her as he rubbed away the irritation on his wrists.  He was just glad to be out of them.

Jason Oxnard wasn’t far behind Stephen, toting Dakota along with him.  Upon spotting his father, the boy picked up into an awkward run and flew into Hal’s arms.  At least the little guy didn’t have to witness his father being detained in handcuffs.

Ox said to Hal, “He was with Sydney.  She asked where Julia was, and I told her that she had been murdered.”

Hal still had his son in his arms as he asked, “Did she know anything?  What did she say?”

“Not much,” Ox said in a frustrating tone.  “After I told her what had happened, her face went pale and she started crying.  I tried to question her but she kept waving me off, telling me that she didn’t want to talk about Julia anymore.  Your son was there, I didn’t want to cause a scene.”

“I understand.  Thanks, Jason,” Hal said.

Claudine and William were standing close to each other, watching the reunion of Hal and his son with sorrowful eyes.  Stephen sensed that they felt bad about what they had done.  But did they?  Or was it all just a show?

Claudine stepped forward and said, “This crime will not go unpunished, Hal.”

“Oh yeah?” Hal angrily barked at her.  “And how can you be so sure?  It could have been anyone!”

Claudine and William looked at each other, then William said, “We have thoughts on narrowing down some suspects.  There’s going to be a park meeting tomorrow.  The first town hall style meeting since we have established this place.  We should have started doing these meetings sooner.  People need solid information instead of just rumors.”

Hal wondered how the hell a meeting was going to accomplish anything.  Was the killer just going to raise his hand and come forward?  No.

Stephen was about to say that he agreed with the meeting idea, when Fish, Carrie and Wolf were seen on the road walking towards them.

The Probsts hurriedly met them on the road, and began push the group further away from where Stephen, Ox, Hal and Dakota were still standing.  They were about to pry Carrie for information.  Claudine almost asked her first question, but stopped herself and pointed at Wolf.

“Wait, who is this little guy?  I’m not sure if he should be here.  This is an adult conversation.  Some of this information might be privileged,” Claudine stated.

Fish laughed, “He’s not the killer, trust me.  Don’t worry, he can handle it.  He’s a smart little guy.”

“No, he needs to leave,” Claudine sighed, then pointed toward Stephen and the rest of the people standing in front of the Probsts’ massive RV.

Wolf looked at Fish, who reluctantly said, “Go, little buddy.  We’ll be there in a minute.”

As Wolf pranced toward Stephen and the others, Claudine asked Carrie to provide her with a summary of what had happened to Julia.