43
Jack drove through blowing dust toward the berm Micah had pointed out. The visibility was terrible, and grit was getting in his eyes, caking his face with a desert mask. It even made its way into the mask, making him take short breaths through pursed lips. Thinking he might need help from Archie after all, he looked up to see where people were pointing, and though it was difficult to make out the details, the tourists did not appear to be pointing or shouting at all. In fact, they all seemed to be kneeling. Archie, meanwhile, stood above them, holding something up. What was it? A book? Jack had to keep driving, but this was not a good sign. He tried to remain calm by telling himself that this was all going to make for a great story, and that one day a long time from now he’d be able to tell it to Ben, to laugh about it, to explain how he’d risked everything to help a hero.
The path was bumpier than he remembered from the early days, and the Jeep jounced around as it crawled toward the center of the field. In his mind, he pictured Che crouching behind the berm, perhaps with his firearm drawn, squinting through the swirling sand for a way toward the exit. Or else he’d be treading slowly, silently forward like a cat, his senses alert to every motion around him, every sound. When he found him, Che was lying on the ground, half-hidden by blown dirt—he’d only seen him because of Rockette, who stood over Che’s prone body and whose barking he’d heard above the howl.
Jack quickly climbed out and went to the man; he put his head to Che’s chest to make sure there was a beating heart inside. The man was unmistakable from his picture, but he was thinner, filthy, and barely able to lift his head. Jack lifted his small body off the ground and put him in the back of the Jeep, then opened the door for Rockette, who jumped in the front seat beside him. This man was clearly in trouble—though Jack couldn’t see the cause of it—and he spun the Jeep around as quickly as he could without flinging his passengers, and himself, into the air.
Jack reached out to pet the dog’s head but she flinched and growled.
“Where’ve you been, girl?” he asked. “And how the hell did you get into the Run? Did you come in with the trucks? Is that what you did?”
Rockette looked different, he thought, but he couldn’t figure out why. He looked back at Che’s supine figure, crumpled in the seatless back. The man looked entirely spent, and seemed to be wheezing. Was he even conscious?
“You alright, back there? I think I would’ve missed you entirely if it weren’t for this here dog.”
Che groaned.
“Good,” Jack said, “stay with me.”
He drove as fast as he could without jostling his passenger too much, and the exit suddenly appeared, feet from his bumper, making him break too fast and lurch forward against the steering wheel. He grimaced, looking back to make sure no additional harm had come to the man. For her part, Rockette wasn’t put off balance at all. She merely sat on her seat, still as the center of a storm. Something was strange about her, noticed, something in her posture, perhaps, or her coat. Jack nudged the gate open with his front bumper, and waited for the heavy wooden door to swing wide enough to allow them passage.
Once outside, the first person he saw was Micah, whose face was pinched against the wind and who waved them forward a foot or two, then told them to stop. Jack thumbed into the back, signaling his success, but Micah’s strange expression told him something was wrong. It was as though Micah was looking right through him, all business, and Jack felt a wave of nausea run through him at the thought that they’d been caught. Where was the car?
Where was Jo?
Rockette started growling, and what happened next happened quickly, too quickly for Jack to intercede. Micah walked around to the passenger’s side of the car to look more closely at Che, and when he did Rockette leapt from the truck directly at him. In her speed, her small body seemed to stretch, a long arch of teeth and fur spouting from the vehicle. But as quick as she was, Micah was still quicker, and with the dog still in midair between the two men, a gunshot filled Jack’s ears, and the airborne animal froze, hung in space for a moment like a ghost, then fell to the ground.
“No!” Jack cried, unable to hear himself.
He leaned over the passenger’s seat until he could see the dog lying on the ground, breathing its final breath. He looked at Micah, bewildered, as his hearing returned. Micah stepped closer to the lifeless animal, toed it with the tip of his black boot, and just then something changed, something Jack couldn’t quite place right away, but gradually recognized as the absence of wind. The moment stretched out as the dog had, and again Micah was the one to kill it.
“That wasn’t your dog, Jack,” he said. “That wasn’t a dog at all. It was a Skinwalker. What did I tell you about the old stories?”
Micah sneered down at the fallen animal, laying in a glistening pool of blood, then raised his weapon and pointed it at Jack.
“Now step out of the vehicle and put your hands on the hood.”
People from the Busk began gathering, Jack did as he was told, and within seconds they were crowded around. Micah waved his gun at them, telling them to keep their distance and, amazingly, Angel stepped up beside him. Jeeps and runners were nearing the gate behind them from inside the run, and Micah motioned to the doors. Angel quickly closed and locked them.
Jack was astonished. “You too?”
Angel shrugged, his mouth opening in explanation, but lurched suddenly forward, falling on his face.
Behind him stood Paco in the thinning dust, holding a long board. He spat on the ground before Micah.
“I draw the line at dogs,” he said.
“You disappoint me,” said Micah. “Now put down your weapon.”
Paco bent down and put the plank gently on the ground, then stood back up and backed away. Two men, apparently with Micah, came through the crowd and started for Jack, and several others grabbed them. The men struggled, but were overpowered by the large locals.
“What the hell is all this, Micah,” Jack said.
Micah pulled an ImPass badge out of his pocket and showed it to Jack, and then to the gathered people. “This is you,” Micah said, pointing at him with his gun, “being caught assisting an illegal border crossing.”
Jo appeared, wearing a large bruise above her left eye. Jack longed to run to her, to hold her.
“Keep your distance,” he said instead.
“Por favor,” said Che from inside the Jeep, “help me.”
Jack looked to find Che taking short, rapid breaths. “If your plan is to arrest this man,” he said, “you’d better do it fast. It doesn’t look like he’s got much time.”
“We need him alive, sir,” said one of the immobilized men.
Then another man stepped forward, an Indian. He was the one who’d approached Jack after the burial, and for the first time Jack saw that they were everywhere, that the protesters had swarmed into the parking lot and were standing among the festival goers, outnumbering them. Jack remembered his strange interaction with the old man, and tried to think of what he’d said that so unnerved him.
Suddenly, Jo said something about asthma and ran toward the Jeep. Jack lurched forward, his instinct to protect her, to come between her and Micah, but to his surprise Micah let her care for the gravely ill man. It seemed almost rehearsed, so comfortable did Jo seem giving care. She laid him out, tilted his head. She listened to his breath.
When Micah sent him to get Paco’s car he wasted no time, but when he returned he’d already missed something, for Jo, the Indian, and Che were each brought earthward in quick succession, and it was clear a change had come.
He leapt from the car, but seconds later a war cry shattered the air, and as though they’d simply been waiting for the right time, Indians swiftly moved in to immobilize Micah and his men. Jack met Micah’s eyes as he was led through the crowd toward his fate, and in that moment the man struggled free, and drew one of Marci’s burnt shards from his pocket. He squatted and drew a black X in the hard packed earth, and soundlessly mouthed the word here, here, here.
I have a son, Jack thought. It was all he could think. I have a son.
