Milepost 291

CHAPTER TWENTY

At first, DeVontay thought only a few children were lurking back in the dark pens.

But more and more small faces appeared, pressing against the wire and looking out.

“These are my friends,” Stephen said. “I guess you call them that. Rooster calls them something else.”

“Rooster?”

“The man who runs this camp,” came a female voice from the shadows.

She stepped out into the dim circle of light cast by the kerosene lamp. She was vaguely Asian-looking, although she could have been a Pacific Islander of some sort, with exotic almond-shaped eyes and straight dark hair. She was as filthy as any Zaphead, and she nervously glanced at the door.

“Hello. I’m DeVontay.”

“So you know Stephen?”

“We’re traveling buddies. We got separated two weeks back.”

“We thought you were dead,” Stephen whispered.

“I thought…” DeVontay forced a smile and rubbed Stephen’s frowsy head. “I thought you guys would already be at Milepost 291 waiting for me with a big cake and silly party hats. So where did you lose Rachel?”

“The other night. We were out in the woods and…” Stephen’s head tilted in shame and his shoulders shook with a sob. “I got scared and ran. I tried to be a little man like you told me.”

DeVontay knelt and gave him a hug. “Hey, hey, my man. We’re all scared these days. It’s okay.”

He wanted to know more but until he made sense of their current situation, he didn’t see any way he could find her or help her. He looked at the woman, who now clutched a kid at each hip. They were about eight or nine years old, with runny noses and dirty faces, and had slipped out of the darkness without a sound.

“Why is everybody hiding back in the dark?”

“When we hear the doors open, we hide.”

DeVontay let that sink in for a moment. “How many are in here?”

“Fourteen. Three of us are women, the rest are kids.”

The little boy at her left flank looked up with anger. “I’m not no kid.”

She patted his shoulder. “You’re right, James, we’ve all had to grow up fast.”

Apparently sensing the two armed men had gone and the door locked and bolted from the outside, others began to emerge into the light. They were all unkempt and sallow, as if suffering from lack of sunshine and poor nutrition. “How long have you been in here?” DeVontay asked the woman.

“Some of us have been here since the beginning,” she replied. “Rooster’s gang picked me up the day after the Zap. West Jefferson was packed with Zapheads so I got out of there. I was so relieved when I finally found some humans…”

“I was hiding in a sewer pipe,” James said, proud of his ingenuity. “When I saw men with guns, I thought they were the Homeland Security.”

Her face darkened and she bit her lip. “They’ve been collecting us.”

“They ain’t Homeland Security,” DeVontay said. “I don’t know what they are, but they shouldn’t be locking you up in here.”

The woman put a finger to her lips. “No need to scare the children.”

DeVontay nodded. “Okay,” he said to Stephen. “Why don’t you show me around, and then we’ll figure out what to do next?”

Stephen took DeVontay’s hand, and then James ran forward and took his other hand. The woman collected the kerosene lamp.

“They make us keep the lamps hanging by the door, in case they need to come inside,” she said. “They get really mad and don’t feed us if we take them. But I don’t think they’ll be back tonight.”

DeVontay’s anger rose but he suppressed it. The door was far too thick for him to break through, and the only windows appeared to be high narrow slits that were covered in wire mesh.

“What’s your name?” he asked the woman.

“Keikilani.”

“You ain’t from around here, are you?”

“Are you? Just call me ‘Kiki.’”

“Zappers would love that name, they way they repeat everything.”

“She’s nice,” Stephen said. “She takes care of us.”

“That makes her an angel in my book.” DeVontay’s eyes adjusted to the dim interior and he could make out the big pens with open doors. Hay was strewn around on the floors and pushed into piles, with blankets spread on top of it. An older woman, maybe fifty, sat cross-legged on one with three toddlers sleeping around her. A feeding trough had been turned upside down to serve as a makeshift table, and plastic wrappers and Styrofoam containers littered the dusty floor around it. A plastic jug of water hung from a wire on one wall.

“This is the dining hall,” Kiki said. “No need to put on airs, we’re casual here.”

“Good to know,” DeVontay said.

“That’s Carole McLaughlin, totally Irish,” Kiki said, and the blue-eyed older woman gave a wave. Despite the trying conditions, she appeared tireless and young at heart. “You can meet all the kids later. It may take a few days for you to get everybody’s names straight.”

“I ain’t staying here a few days,” DeVontay said.

“That’s what the last guy said, too.” Kiki carried the lantern down the concourse to reveal other pens. The next resembled the first, except a young woman barely out of her teens waited by the opening. She was clad only in a bra and panties. DeVontay figured false modesty was the first thing to go when you were imprisoned and there were no men around.

“Your turn?” the woman said. She smelled of liquor.

“He’s not one of them,” Kiki said. “Not yet.”

She rolled her eyes up and down his body. “Too bad.” She turned and sauntered into the darkness and whatever comforts she may have had stowed away there.

“What’s that all about?” DeVontay asked Kiki, keeping his voice down so Stephen and James couldn’t hear.

“Guess.” She moved on to illuminate another pen. Two children slept on a bare mattress, curled against one another for warmth. They were covered with only a thin blanket despite the chill in the big unheated building. More kids slept on another mattress nearby.

“They’re keeping you guys here like animals,” DeVontay said. “Why?”

“You’ll have to ask Rooster, but I’ve got a good idea. You’re the third to come along. The first man refused to play their game, and they took him away.”

“Took him away?”

“I can’t say for sure what happened, but I heard a single gunshot.”

DeVontay wished Stephen hadn’t heard that. Bad enough to watch the world go to hell and mutant Zappers tear people from limb to limb, but to see humans reveal their worst natures when they should be working together—

He dug in his pocket and pulled out a couple of the Slim Jims he’d pillaged from the store. They were still dry inside their wrappers, or at least wet with only pork grease. “Stephen, why don’t you and James go round me up something to eat? I’ll be up front in a minute.”

“Don’t go back there,” Stephen said, staring bug-eyed at the darkness behind Kiki.

“I promise I won’t leave the light,” he said, giving the boys the Slim Jims.

“Race you!” James said, grabbing his treat and sprinting down the midway. Stephen bolted after him, momentarily just a boy again instead of a witness to the world’s horrible ending. After they were out of sight, DeVontay said to Kiki, “Look, I don’t know why they’re holding you guys prisoner, but we’re getting out of here. One way or another.”

“Don’t you think we haven’t tried? The second guy they put in here jumped them when they brought us dinner. They beat him to a pulp and we didn’t eat for two days.”

“So what’s their ‘game,’ if that’s the word you want to use for it?”

Kiki gave him a rueful smile. “We’re breeding stock. Rooster wants us to provide him with an army.”

“He can’t be for real.”

“You’ll find out.”

DeVontay looked past her into the darkest depths of the barn. “What’s back there that Stephen didn’t want me to see?”

“The bathroom. And we had to bury two children. Plus there are more dead in the very back, in what used to be the loading bay. Those are from the Zap, as far as I can tell.”

“They wouldn’t even take the bodies out?”

She shrugged. “Rooster.”

DeVontay shook his head. “When things go to shit, crazy fuckers sure seem to ascend to the throne, don’t they?”

“I’d better hang this lamp by the door in case they come to check on you.”

DeVontay clenched his fists. “I hope they do. I sure hope they do.”

After a quick meal of cellophane-wrapped snack foods that left him thirsty, DeVontay went to the pen where Stephen slept with James and another boy. The lamp flame burned low and then faded to nothing, leaving the building in darkness. A child cried softly somewhere deep in the building. DeVontay lay down but his mind raced too fast for sleep to dig in its hooks.

“DeVontay?” Stephen murmured.

“Yeah, Little Man?”

“Are you awake?”

“Yeah. What about you?”

“I’m glad you found me again.”

“I’ll find you no matter where you go. And we’re going to find Rachel, too, one way or another.”

Stephen yawned audibly. “I may have done something bad.”

DeVontay turned toward him in the dark. “What?”

“I told that man Rooster about Milepost 291. He was acting all friendly and asked me who I was with, and he gave me candy. He said he knew Franklin Wheeler. That’s Rachel’s grandpa, isn’t it?”

DeVontay thought about it. Rooster had his own fiefdom here. Maybe he saw Franklin Wheeler as a territorial threat, but the man seemed more interested in consolidating his power here. “Yeah. But you didn’t do anything wrong. Milepost 291 is like a whole other country.”

“Are we still going there?”

“As soon as we can, Little Man. Now stop talking and get some shut-eye.”