Radio Hope (Toxic World Book 1) (7 page)

Pablo looked at his mother, his face falling.

Roy tousled his hair and gave him a handful of coins. “I’ll check in on you. Here, don’t let anyone give you a bad trade.”

“OK.” Pablo mumbled.

“Cómo se dice, Pablito?
”
Annette prompted.

“Thank you.” Pablo shuffled to the door.

Roy looked at her. “Take care in the wildlands, now.”

Annette nodded. “I will.”

As they walked out the door Annette took her son’s hand. “Got a surprise for you.”

“What?” Pablo asked without enthusiasm.

“One of the people I’m going on patrol with works at the radio station. That’s where we’re going right now.”

Pablo perked up. “Really?”

“You’re getting a free tour.”

Annette left her weapons at the gate, with a sharp reminder to the guards that Abe would hear of it if the rifle was touched, handled, or even looked at funny, and led
Pablo around the warehouse to the low concrete shed with the tall radio tower next to it. Above the door was a painted sign reading, “New City Radio”.

Mitch Evans lounged on a wooden bench by the door. A pack and an AK-47 leaned against the wall next to him. Mitch was a tall
, muscular man in his late twenties. She knew him because he was a regular at the bar. Most citizens didn’t venture out of New City after dark but Mitch liked to go to the whorehouses after getting liquored up. He had cold blue eyes and a crew cut. A bit of flour clung to his cheek.

Looks like Abe made him work his shift at the bakery before heading off into the wildlands. Typical.

“About time you showed up!” he barked at them.

“Good morning to you too,” Annette grumbled.

“We need to get going. Abe wanted us gone an hour ago!”

“Abe can wait,” Annette dismissed him, pulling her son through the door.

The little building was all one single room divided by a wooden partition with a large glass window. The front half was cramped with tables full of unfamiliar electronic equipment. Through the window Annette could look into the back half and saw Ha-Ram Lee sitting at a table that had a computer, more electronic equipment, and something she had heard called a microphone.

Although the radio technician was barely out of his teens, he was an expert at anything electronic thanks to his fath
er, who had died from cancer a few years before. Fresh faced and eager, with straight black hair above a round Asian face, he sat talking into the microphone. She could hear his voice faintly through the glass.

“Next up is an oldie for all you oldies out there
,
Born to Be Wil
d
by Steppenwolf.”

Ha-Ram pushed a button and a guitar riff started. He pushed another button, looked up, and motioned to them to pass through a door in the partition.

“Don’t touch anything,” Annette told her son.

“Hi guys!” Ha-Ram said.

Annette looked nervously at the microphone. “Can they hear us?”

“No, I turned it off,” the radio technician laughed.

Annette looked around at all the switches, dials, and flashing lights. Pablo did the same, eyes wide as saucers.

“Hi, you’re Annette’s kid, aren’t you? Would you like to be on the radio?”

“Really?” Pablo turned to his mother. “Can I?”

“Sure,” Annette said. She had hoped
something like this would happen.

Ha-Ram stood up. “Sit here in my seat. Can you read?”

Pablo nodded.

“Great! See this piece of paper here? This is an ad spot for Marcus Callahan’s market stall.”

The child looked up at him. “An ad spot?”

“It’
s to tell people what he has to trade. Now read over that while I get everything ready,” Ha-Ram fiddled with a few buttons while Pablo read the piece of paper and Annette stood to one side beaming. “OK, ready? Now when I push this button here I want you to read what’s on the paper slowly and clearly. Just speak in a normal voice. Get right up to the microphone. You don’t have to shout or anything; they’ll be able to hear you.”

“But the music is still on,” Pablo said.

“Oh, we’re recording. I’m storing your voice on this computer so I can play it back anytime. People are going to hear you every day until the market closes. Ready?”

“OK.”

“Go.”

Pablo stood up straight, put on a serious face, and announced, “Marcus
Callahan has a great selection of items for trade at stall fifteen. Items include apples from his personal orchard, walnuts gathered from clean trees in the mountains, five sun hats, a civilian issue gas mask with spare filter, a variety of pens, several kilos of raw wool from his personal herd of sheep, and several kilos of flour. Other items are being added daily. Come on over to stall fifteen for a good deal.”

Ha-Ram hit a button and smiled. “Wow! You read great! Better than a lot of adults I know.”

Annette grinned. She’d made sure he wasn’t illiterate and ignorant like so many of the kids in the Burbs.

“Did they hear it?” Pablo asked eagerly.

“Not yet, but they will. Listen.”

The song played out and Ha-Ram hit a button. Pablo’s voice sounded through
the studio. Annette grinned as her child pumped his fists in the air and bounced up and down in his seat.

A woman whose name she didn’t know came into the front half of the room. Ha-Ram put on another song and turned to them
, suddenly serious.

“That’s my replacement. I’ll get my gear and me and Mitch will meet you at the gate.
”

A cold feeling settled in Annette’s stomach. Ha-Ram didn’t look too happy either.

“All right,” she said.

Annette led her son out of the studio as he chattered on about how he was going to talk on New City Radio all the time, and how he was going to drive a fork lift too, and maybe he should go up in the
mountains to tap maple trees so he could make his own candy, and on and on until she led him to Marcus and Rosie’s house. She kissed him goodbye but he was too excited to really notice what was going on, that the moment he’d been sad about all day had finally arrived, and he was too busy chattering to Rosie about all his adventures to notice that his mother was crying when she left.

CHAPTER EIGHT

The Doctor was in good spirits. After Marcus helped him back to his quarters for his noon rest he sat down at his desk and pulled out a little vial, holding it up between his thumb and forefinger and grinning.

“Know what this is?” he asked.

Marcus shook his head. “Saw you trade four Blue Cans for it. Must be something good.”

“It’s a blanket antiviral.
One of the late batch they produced with extended shelf life. Just as reliable as Blue Cans but for medicine instead of food. Good as the day it was made.”

“Will it cure you?” Marcus exclaimed.

A shadow passed over The Doctor’s face. “There’s no cure for what I have. This only works on common viruses, but if I get sick this winter it will take it away.”

“And if you get sick a second time?”

The Doctor rolled his eyes. “Jesus Christ, Marcus, can’t you see the positive side to anything?”

“Well, it’s good news, I guess. But we still need to find you some meds. And you still need to eat.”

“I ate a little this morning,” The Doctor said in a tone that didn’t leave Marcus convinced. “Anyway, I need to rest now, as you always remind me. I had to deal with Clyde and his patrols at dawn, Abe all morning, and I need to go to the Burbs this afternoon. I’m taking a nap.”

“You’re going to the Burbs?” Marcus asked.

“Ahmed tells me a scavenger came in with a nasty cut. It’s infected.”

“Ahmed can deal with that.”

“It’s not the cut I need to check out. The guy says he survived an attack by the Righteous Horde.”

The scavenger lay on a bedroll inside an old shipping
container, one of many that civilians rented out to the people in the Burbs. This one was shared by a dozen scavengers. A small window had been cut at the back, but it was still murky inside. Filthy too. Marcus wrinkled his nose in distaste. Yet another reason scavengers lived here and citizens lived inside the walls. Gear and dirty rags everywhere, and many of the scavengers were none too used to bathing. Near the back one of them lay curled up on his blankets, stripped almost bare yet sweating despite the chill.

Marcus
put a hand on The Doctor’s shoulder.

“You’re not going in there,” he told him.

The Doctor opened his mouth to object. Clyde, who had tagged along on this visit, cut him off.

“I agree with Marcus. I’ll go get the wounded guy and bring him out.”

As Clyde ventured inside and talked in low tones with one of the scavengers, The Doctor muttered under his breath. “Great, another flu case. Just what we need.”

“This happens every harvest market
,” Marcus reassured him.

Clyde emerged leading a man whose forearm was encased in a thick bandage.

“You The Doctor?” the scavenger asked. He was a young man, but skinny, his cheekbones sticking out through thin, leathery skin. Sunken eyes teared with pain.

“I am.”

“I want to thank you for sending out your assistant. The wound’s been leaking pus. He put some iodine on it. Imagine, iodine, and not a word about trading!”

“We take care of the sick for free here.”

Now the man’s eyes filled with tears that spoke of more than pain.

“Ahmed tells me you got cut by a machete,” Clyd
e said, sitting the man down at the entrance to the container.

The scavenger paled. He nodded and cradled his arm.

“What happened?” Marcus asked.

“It was tho
se cultists, those crazies calling themselves the Righteous Horde. Righteous my ass. We had a little settlement by a river about fifty miles from the eastern end of the Northern Pass. Nothing like this, just thirty people, but we had a good setup. Clean water in the river, enough rabbits and squirrels to keep us in meat, and some decent scavenging in a few valleys most people don’t know about. Then they came.”

“When was this?” Clyde asked.

“A week ago.”

“They were two days march from the Northern Pass a week ago!” Clyde’s voice ran into a high octave.

“Calm down,” The Doctor said. “None of the outlying farms have reported anything. They’re not going to come storming through the gate this afternoon.”

He turned to the scavenger. “So tell us everything you can.”

The man swallowed, rubbed his arm, and replied, “They came charging at us from across the eastern fields. No attempt at hiding, no coming up through the gully off to the west like they could have, just right over the horizon and straight for us. So damn many we knew we couldn’t fight, so we legged it. Then we found out why they didn’t try to hide. They had already gotten us surrounded. Appeared to the south, then the north, then pouring out of the gully like the river was puking people. There were so many we didn’t try to resist, no point in that. Threw down what guns we had and threw up our hands. They surrounded us, stripped us of everything but our clothing, and lined us up.”

“How many were there? What kind of weapons did they have?” Clyde asked.

“Thousands. More people in one place than I’ve ever seen in my life, even here. Some had guns. Nothing heavy that I saw, just rifles and pistols and some shotguns. The rest had machetes or clubs with nails stuck through them. Whole crowds of them had spears made from tying old steel knives on the end of sticks.”

“Did you see their leader?” The Doctor asked.

The scavenger nodded, trembling a little as he remembered. “Once they had us lined up he stepped forward. A young guy with long hair and wearing a white robe, like he was trying to look like Jesus. Sure as hell didn’t talk like him. I’m a Christian and nutcases like that give religion a bad name.”

“What did he say?” Marcus asked.

“Gave us a long speech filled with nonsense about how they were going to make the world clean again. Take all the toxins away. Said to do that first they had to purify humanity.” The scavenger’s face darkened. “Then he pointed at Diane. She’d come across a leaking chemical container and got a rash something terrible. A couple of his men grabbed her and told us that unclean people weren’t permitted to live. They cut her down with their machetes right in front of our eyes!”

Marcus and The Doctor glanced at each other. The scavenger went on.

“After that they made us join the column and carry their gear. They had a whole bunch of prisoners. We were made to do all the heavy work. If anyone stepped out of line they were cut down without a thought. The young women were taken by the leader’s bodyguards. ‘Married to the faith’, that’s what they called it.”

“Which way were they headed?” Clyde asked.

“South. We stayed in the area for a couple of days as they swept it clean, then we headed south.”

“
Toward the southern pass?”

The scavenger shrugged. “I don’t know. They didn’t tell us nothing. Hardly fed us anything either. Anyone who dropped by the wayside exhausted got cut down.”

“Did they look hungry?” Clyde asked.

“Half starved, the lot of them. Well, except for that Jesus imitator and his bodyguards. Th
ey looked as well fed as you do.”

“How did you escape?” Marcus asked.

“Slipped away. I knew none of us would last so I lit out in the dead of night. Made it out of camp but one of the sentries spotted me. Gave me this gash on the arm with his machete. I smacked him upside the head with a rock and ran. Just ran.”

The scavenger’s eyes stared off into space, seeing visions that Marcus hoped he’d never see.

“Anything else?” Clyde asked.

“Ain’t that enough?” the scavenger whispered.

The Doctor fished into his pocket and pulled out a little packet of folded paper. Opening it he revealed some fresh marijuana buds. Tearing off a couple, he handed them to the scavenger.

“For the pain,” he told him.

“Gee, thanks!”

Marcus
cocked an eyebrow. Maybe Doc really did eat today.

Walking back to the gate, Marcus was silent. Every time he talked to a scavenger he was grateful for living in something that resembled the old civilization. That m
an had seen horrible things, yet accepted it with despondent resignation. This probably wasn’t the first time he had lost all his companions. Anyone who lasted out in the wildlands was a survivor, but it took them all sooner or later.

Clyde was fretting as usual.

“We need more ammunition. If we’re facing that many we need more ammunition. The scavengers aren’t trading any, though. They’re scared and want to keep it for themselves, even when they don’t have guns. Probably waiting until the last minute to trade it to us at a higher rate!”

“We don’t have to kill every cultist to make them retreat,” The Doctor said.

“Don’t be so sure,” Clyde said. “This isn’t your usual bandit group. The Skullsplitters we could deal with, same with the other bandits.”

Marcus nodded. Most bands were too small to threaten New City and contented themselves with raiding the outlying farms.
Clyde’s patrols sent them back to the wildlands quickly enough. The Skullsplitters had been bigger, almost a hundred well-armed men, all long hair and leather jackets and attitude. A motorcycle gang with no motorcycles. Five years ago they’d taken over the Burbs and extracted tribute in exchange for going way. They’d come back twice since then. Each time The Doctor decided it was better to pay than fight. Better to lose some sacks of grain than a bunch of citizens.

But now the Skullsplitters were gone, wiped out by a group far bigger than
any they’d ever seen, and it didn’t sound like the Righteous Horde could be bought off with sacks of grain.

For once Clyde wasn’t being panicky; he was being all too realistic.

The Head of the Watch hurried back to his operations center and Marcus made The Doctor go back to his room and lie down.

“Smoke more of that herb you
never told me about and eat something,” Marcus told him.

“Yes, mother
. How about you go back home and take a break too?”

“Probably should
,” Marcus grumbled. “Pretty soon none of us will be getting any downtime.”

He found Pablo playing outside his home. The window was open. Music from New City Radio filtered out from the kitchen, where Rosie stood at the si
nk dicing carrots and watching the boy with a big smile on her face. Marcus suppressed a sudden sadness and waved to Pablo.

“Hey there, how you settling in?”

Pablo ran over and grabbed his hand.

“Come to the window, the song is about to end!” he exclaimed, pulling him
toward the house.

“What’s all this about?” Marcus asked.

“Shhh,” Pablo said.

Rosie smiled at him through the window and put a finger to her lips.

The song finished. A thin, high voice came on the air, “Marcus Callahan has a great selection of items for trade at stall fifteen. Items include apples from his personal orchard. . .”

Pablo’s face lit up.

“That’s you!” Marcus said.

“Yeah, I got to sit in the radio studio and everything. Ha-Ram told me they’re going to play that every day until market ends.”

“Wow, that’s really something. Thanks!”

Marcus felt an overwhelming urge to scoop him up and give him a hug.

This isn’t your child
,
he reminded himself.

“Pablo has been a big help too,” Rosie said with a smile. “He swept the floor and cleaned all the dishes.”

“Mom makes me do that at home sometimes,” Pablo told her.

Marcus saw a trace of hurt flicker over his wife’s features. An instant later she was smiling again.

Oh Rosie, don’t get pulled in
,
Marcus thought
.
He’s a Burb child.

“So what’s for lunch?” Marcus asked to change the subject.

“Well, since there’s such a chill in the air I’m making more stew, but I think you’re going to have to wait to eat it,” she replied, gesturing to the street behind him.

Marcus turned around and saw Clyde leading The Doctor to the gate.

“Aw hell.”

Marcus stomped over.

“Now what?”

Clyde looked at him, his face blank with worry. “A big group of
scavengers outside. Want to have a meeting. Wouldn’t say what for.”

Marcus turned back to The Doctor. His eyes were red.

“You eat something yet?” he asked.

“I was about to,” The Doctor replied
, a slight slur blurring his words.

“Go eat and go to bed.”

“I should go see them.”

“I’ll handle it. Go to bed.”

The Doctor grinned. “Beginning to think you want my job.”

“Hell no.”

The Doctor headed back to the warehouse while Clyde and Marcus hurried to the gate.

Clyde
was right, there was a large crowd, and it was growing. They kept a respectful distance from the gate but the two guards fingered their rifles nervously.