After (Book 3): Milepost 291 by Scott Nicholson Page A

talking.”
    DeVontay
stood in the cold water, unsure of what to do. His feet were numb and the river
ahead boiled with shallow rapids. Even if he wanted to, he wasn’t sure the
kayak would skid to the deeper pool below them, where the current seemed to
swallow its anger and grow still.
    And,
of course, the unseen man might have a gun.
    “What
do you want?” DeVontay said.
    Two
middle-aged men stepped out from the brush. They were dressed in camouflage
fatigue pants and plaid shirts, but little else about them suggested they were
military. One wore a bright orange baseball cap and the other’s face was nearly
hidden behind a scraggly mass of curly hair and aviator sunglasses. Both
wielded firearms, and their rifles were pointed in DeVontay’s direction.
    “Come
over here, boy,” said the man in the orange cap.
    Shit,
are these rednecks trying to pull a “Deliverance”? The first humans I’ve seen in two weeks, and they
have to be racist assholes.
    “Some
Zapheads back that way, and I want to get as far away as I can.” DeVontay
nodded upstream toward the little community. “You know what Zapheads are?”
    The
bearded one cackled and the man in the orange cap said, “Everybody knows what
Zapheads are, or else they’re dead.”
    “I
don’t have a gun.”
    The
bearded man aimed his weapon at DeVontay. “Then you better get your ass over
here, hadn’t you?”
    DeVontay
glanced at the bow and arrows in the shell of the kayak. Even if he reached
them before getting shot, he would never nail both of the armed men from thirty
yards away. He could also duck into the water and swim downstream, but he
didn’t think he could hold his breath long enough to get out of range. That was
assuming the rapids ahead were even deep enough to conceal him.
    “What
do you want?” DeVontay said, stalling for time.
    DeVontay
heard a crack, then a small splash in front of him, followed by the keening
whine. The sounds occurred almost simultaneously, so it was only after a small
puff of blue-gray smoke wended from the man’s rifle barrel that he realized a
shot had been fired.
    He
raised his arms, releasing the kayak, which slid downstream and turned sideways
before scudding down the rapids.
    “Get
over here or this river’s gonna be running red,” said Orange Cap.
    DeVontay
slogged toward the bank, slipping once on the algae-coated stones and going to
one knee. The rifle barrel tracked each step. By the time he reached the shore,
he was soaked to the waist and chilled to the bone. Neither man made a move to
help him out of the water, so he clawed his way up by grabbing fistfuls of
slimy weeds.
    When
he stood on trembling legs, DeVontay found the tip of a rifle barrel against
his nose.
    “You
normal?” asked the man with the sunglasses.
    DeVontay
risked a little defiance. “Are you?”
    The
man took off his sunglasses and shoved them in the pocket of his hunting vest,
not lowering his weapon. “You traveling alone?”
    “Yeah.
You’re the first people I’ve seen in two weeks.”
    “But
I bet you seen a lot of Zaps.”
    “Upriver.
Dozens of them.”
    “They’re
ganging up,” said Orange Cap. DeVontay could now see that it bore a white T
logo, for the University of Tennessee. “We were picking them off one at a time,
a stray here and there, but lately, we’re trying to lay low.”
    “What
do you want with me, then?” DeVontay asked, glancing down the river where his
goods floated on the green surface. “You made me lose my supplies.”
    “You’re
coming with us.”
    “Why?”
    “For
one, because we said so,” said the bearded man. “For another, this is war, and
you’re either with us or against us.”
    “Who
is ‘us’?”
    “We
got a little gang together. A few locals, a few oddballs like you. People who
don’t want to go down without a fight.”
    DeVontay
unbuttoned his wet shirt. “I don’t want to fight. I want to run.”
    “Ain’t
nowhere left to run to. It’s all Zap country now. From sea to