The Zona Read online

  “Congratulations,” Elipaz said from cover. “My assistant assumed Lead would have put up the better fight. He doesn’t understand, when attacking two marks you must spend more time assessing the situation. Lead, though younger, was obviously asleep until a minute ago Terence, though older, was obviously faking sleep and waiting to ambush us. The older man was craftier, and thus should have been taken first.”

  Eliphaz strode into the edge of light. He was dressed simply in a flak vest and camouflage pants. Both hands gripped a Browning Hi-Power. Terence turned his hostage to face the Crusader.

  “I’m willing to barter if you are, Crusader.” Terence said from behind the assistant.

  “I do not want to shoot your man, but I will.”

  The Eliphaz pointed his gun at Lead, who was on the ground clutching the gash over his eyes, blinded by blood.

  “I don’t want to kill your man either, old Preacher,” Eliphaz said. There was joy in his voice, Eliphaz relished confrontation.

  “We’re at a stand-off. One man gets to shooting and none us of will live,” Terence said. “You turn back, everyone here lives.”

  “You assume too much, old Preacher,” Eliphaz replied. “I see things differently. I’m holding a Browning loaded with armor piercing shells. You’re holding an Engholm four-pipe. Assuming your gun is not a toy replica, they haven’t made one of those since the eighteen hundreds. You might shoot my assistant in the head, or you might blow up your hand, or you might misfire. Even if you’ve taken care of that gun, and it was in firing condition, I’d be shocked if it was even loaded.”

  Eliphaz took one hand off of his pistol and reached into his backpack. He pulled out a blanket and threw it on the ground. He then pulled a bundle of yellow nylon rope and tossed it next to the blanket.

  “You know the routine. I present the question to both of you, blanket or rope? I’ll see you to Purgatory or I’ll see you to your grave.”

  “It doesn’t have to…” Terence started when Eliphaz fired his gun at the assistant.

  Two rounds tore completely through the young man and pierced Terence’s stomach and chest. The assistant yelped in confusion and collapsed on the road. Lead jumped to his feet at the sound of pistol fire. He pulled the knife out of his jacket and lunged for Eliphaz. The Crusader twisted into a fighter’s stance. Lead drove his knife into Eliphaz’s forearm. The Crusader hissed and clubbed Lead in the face with his pistol. Lead fell to all fours. Eliphaz clubbed Lead again. He collapsed in a heap.

  Before blacking out, Lead looked into Terence’s yellow-blue eyes. They showed the embers of the dying campfire. Terence’s breath was short and labored, his lips streaked red. His hands clutched wounds that bled out into the dirt and sand and road. Eliphaz put his knee on Lead’s back and pulled his arms behind him; rough nylon rope wrapped around Lead’s hands and wrists.

  “Like I said, old man. You assumed too much.”

  Eliphaz pulled Lead’s knots tight. Terence struggled to breath. Blood roared in his ears like waves against rocks. Terence closed his eyes and saw things that were not there, or perhaps had always been. On the Highway Nineteen, outside of New Pueblo, Terence Wood took his last breath.

  “You shot me!” the assistant screamed in panic. His hands gripped his wounds, his fatigues showed dark and wet with blood.

  “Boo hoo,” Eliphaz said sarcastically. “Maybe if you’d done a better job, I wouldn’t have had to shoot you!”

  Eliphaz gagged Lead with rope.

  “Say a prayer for healing and another for forgiveness. If God can find it in his heart to forgive a shitty Crusader, maybe you won’t have to die of blood loss.”

  Eliphaz finished tying Lead and struck him again with his pistol. It was unnecessary. Lead was already unconscious.

  X. Lead is held captive by Eliphaz, as mentioned in the beginning

  Lead woke tied across a horse. The sand and brush bobbed up and down in his vision. His head was numb and swollen. It felt misshapen. His wrists burned from rubbing the ropes which held his hands and feet across the horse’s belly. Lead look up to see Eliphaz’s boots.

  “Bon Jour,” Eliphaz said.

  He tugged the reigns of Lead’s horse.

  “Welcome back to the world. You are Leonard Marchez, age twenty-six, five foot nine inches, brown hair, brown eyes, medium build, and discernable scars on the left hand, right hip, left pectoral, right forearm, and chin. You are otherwise known as Lead, which is short for Lead Group Two, number 2305, your identifying number and unit.”

  Eliphaz squinted at sun. He took a long swallow from a canteen and spat onto the sand.

  “You are the only survivor of Lead Group Two or any other Lead Groups. This earned you the distinction of salvation upon your return to the Zona, despite your lack of confirmed kills and claim to any at the Battle to Purge Las Vegas. You were taken to Flagstaff Parish and given the post of Regular Guard, an honor for a boy out of the fugee camps. You served with distinction, discharging your firearm on three occasions to keep the peace, though again, no confirmed kills. Seven years of service as a Regular Guard, you were promoted twice, first to Veteran Corporal, then to Preacher, still without a kill. Do you know why they made you a Preacher?”

  Lead remained silent. His head pounded. Eliphaz raised his boot and kicked Lead between his shoulder blades. Lead’s mouth opened in muted pain.

  “Answer my question, Goodman. Do you know why the Church made you a Preacher?”

  Lead tried to bunch his shoulder against the pain, but his wrists were bound too far and straight. He could not move.

  “No!” Lead spat out between gritted teeth.

  Eliphaz laughed. “Good! I don’t know either. You were a glorified security guard, sent to the Lord’s trusted work. You were inexplicably promoted to Preacher and assigned to track a mark, Erin Briggs of William’s Town. You turned the mark into a goodman in three days, the dead kind of goodman. My report said you put five rounds in his chest.”

  Eliphaz held five fingers to Lead’s face.

  “Five rounds, all over the torso. You shot the man in his shoulder, stomach, hip, and chest. You know what that makes you, Leonard?”

  Lead remained silent. Eliphaz kicked Lead in the shoulder, heat and pain blossomed in Lead’s back.

  “I don’t know,” Lead said through gritted teeth.

  “I do. I know what that makes you,” Eliphaz said. “That makes you a nervous killer, an amateur. I guarantee that was the first man you killed. Five wild shots, spread out like you were shaking your gun and shooting with your eyes closed.”

  Lead twisted his head towards the sun. Past Eliphaz, the assistant lay slumped over another horse. Dried blood covered the assistant’s hands. A third Crusader led the injured man’s horse.

  “Despite your nervous predilections, you made a passable Preacher. In three years you converted thirty-seven marks, twenty-five by the rope, twelve by the blanket. A decent record of service, I’ve seen better and I’ve certainly seen worse. Things changed with mark thirty-seven, Aaron Century. Tell me, Leonard, what was different with that one?” Eliphaz asked.

  Lead turned his head back to Eliphaz.

  “I’m not sure…”

  Eliphaz kicked Lead’s shoulder; Lead’s body was a nation of pain.

  “Think harder!” Eliphaz yelled.

  Lead bit his lip. Speckles flashed in his vision. He struggled to stay conscious.

  “We fought,” Lead said.

  “You’re right,” Eliphaz said. “You fought Goodman Century, receiving the aforementioned scars on your left hand, hip, left pectoral. During your fight with Goodman Century you came pretty close to having a steak knife put through your heart.”

  Eliphaz held up his left forearm. His knife wound was wrapped in a stained linen bandage.

  “You were stabbed, kind of like this, but in your hip and over your heart.”

  Eliphaz kicked Lead at mid spine. Lead wheezed. The boot drove the air from his body.

  “And then what?
Church sends you to apprehend the mark Terence Wood, and you…?”

  “Don’t,” Lead wheezed.

  The bobbing desert floor was disorienting. His tongue was thick and swollen with thirst.

  “Correct. You don’t apprehend. You let your mark go free before the eyes of the Radioman Smith of Kingman. Smith alerts the Church, I come to apprehend and find what?” Eliphaz asked.

  “I don’t know,” Lead said.

  “Wrong. You know what I find. I find sin. I find your sin and iniquity and incompetence. I find Preachers who disobey that which they have sworn themselves to, and I cannot accept that.”

  Eliphaz kicked Lead in the ear.

  Lead woke to the assistant’s moans. He turned his head and watched the young man clutch the reigns of his horse with hands still caked in blood. The assistant’s lips were bluish. Lead turned his head the other way and watched Eliphaz guide his horse around an overturned van.

  “Look who’s up and squirmy,” Eliphaz said.

  “Why did you kill Terence?” Lead asked. “He hadn’t submitted to the blanket.”

  “You were there, little Preacher. He threatened my man.”

  Eliphaz gestured to the assistant, slumped over in his horse.

  “He put a gun to his head. That’s about as dangerous as things can get before someone’s life is snuffed.”

  Eliphaz’s voice took on a tone of mock solemnity.

  “It’s unfortunate that Terence was so entrenched in sin and wrongheadedness. He really was too good for all that.”

  Elipahz recited Terence’s file from memory.

  “Terence Wood, fifty-seven years old, five-foot ten, white hair, formally brown, blue eyes, medium frame, discernable scars on left calf, stomach, left and right wrists, and forehead near the hairline. He joined the California National Guard during the first Storms with thirteen confirmed kills in the Battle for Calexico. Of that battle he was one of the eight surviving guardsmen. Also, he was suspected of unleashing the chloride gas cloud that rendered Calexico lifeless after the guardsmen were overtaken. No confirmation, no admission. His unit was absorbed by the Arizona National Guard in Yuma where they continued to repel the Mexican horde. He was promoted to Sniper Sergeant First Class where he racked up another thirty-two confirmed kills. When Yuma was abandoned, Goodman Wood was transferred to Flagstaff. After the Zona Reformation, Wood was conscripted by the Church and resigned as a sniper in the National Guard. He swore his allegiance to the Church and the Bishops and all their infinite wisdom. He was immediately promoted to the rank of Preacher, making him one of the first. In his first three years he converted eighty-two Marks, twenty-three by blanket, the rest by rope. They sent him to Vegas with the forces in Bullhead, where he earned another twelve confirmed kills. He should have been promoted to Crusader, but after the Battle to Purge Las Vegas he earned a demerit for abandoning his post after the Utah bombs dropped. He was relegated to the first ring of Purgatory, the Hall of the Unclean, for six months. Upon his release he was reinstated as a Preacher and sent back out to do God’s work. His record states three-hundred eighteen conversions, two-hundred fifty by the blanket. Unfortunately, marks that Wood had registered as deceased started appearing in other places. The dead were walking, so to speak. In particular, Jackson Corning aka Aaron Century, a known sinner and anarchist, was spied in Ash Fork. You were sent to apprehend, and when it was confirmed that Goodman Century exist and fit the description of Goodman Jackson Corning, a Preacher, you, were sent to apprehend Goodman Wood.

  I can see why you were swayed by him; he was obviously a man of power and resource. Three hundred and seven confirmed kills, with maybe a few hundred unconfirmed.”

  Eliphaz shook his head and whistled.

  “There was a killer in God’s good grace. And yet, sin and doubt cloud his judgment. His mind and actions became unclean.”

  “You shouldn’t have killed him,” Lead said.

  “Don’t blame me, little Preacher. God pronounced him a dead man and I acted as His hand. You of all people should understand the grace and wrath of our Lord,” Eliphaz replied.

  Daylight burned the back of Lead’s neck. His arms and back ached. Eliphaz stopped the party.

  “Set up camp,” he commanded.

  The assistant raised his head, his eyes rolled to whites. Eliphaz glared at him.

  “Jarrod, set up camp.”

  The assistant fell out of his saddle and struck the earth like a sack. One of his feet caught the stirrup and twisted his ankle at a sharp angle. The assistant did not move or breathe. Eliphaz walked over to the body; he grasped the assistant’s face and neck.

  “Dig a hole,” Eliphaz told the other Crusader.

  Eliphaz untied Lead and gave him a sip of water and wedge of road bread. Lead was in too much pain to give resistance; he let himself be led docilely. Eliphaz allowed Lead to urinate before hogtying him to a boulder for the night. Eliphaz and the other young Crusader buried the assistant in a shallow grave. Eliphaz recited the Lord’s Prayer and then bowed his head in silence.

  Lead and the Crusaders continued in silence for days. At each sunset, the Crusaders untied Lead from the horse and lashed him to a boulder or tree for the night. Lead’s body betrayed him with pain that would not subside. He swore to himself he would not cry out and gritted his teeth against the agony. His mind stayed with image of Terrence, and his mind burned with picture of his friend’s body bleeding out on the Highway Nineteen. Lead himself was coated in small wounds and insect bites and wracked with hunger. He forced his mind away from Terence. He thought of escape. He thought of Church’s prison, Purgatory, his destination. On the third day of their journey, Lead and the Crusaders arrived at Purgatory.

  XI. Purgatory, the Zona’s representation of biblical punishment

  Lead woke as his body was untied from the Crusader’s horse.

  “We’re here,” Eliphaz announced as he dropped Lead’s inert body on the ground.

  The sun’s radiance burned Lead’s morning eyes. His vision cleared and revealed the entrance to Purgatory. A chain link fence, standing over twenty feet and crowned with razor wire circled the entire complex. Trailers and portables speckled the sandy grounds and acted as the secondary standing structures. Towards the front of the grounds, a courthouse stood as the primary building. In front of Lead stood a gate, above which a scratch-iron sign proclaimed:

  “Abandon All Hope, Ye Who Enter!”

  Beyond the gate and the courthouse and the portables and trailers was nothing but desert, as imposing and restrictive as the prison fence and razor wire. Lead had been here before. He had delivered bound marks to this very gate. The same dead smell of rot touched his nostrils.

  Eliphaz pulled a bell cord and waited for guards. Two eventually arrived, shuffling their feet in a combination of formality and haste.

  “I’m Crusader Eliphaz, I deliver on to you the Goodman Leonard Marchez, of Flagstaff,” Eliphaz boomed for all to hear.

  He held up the cross tattoo on his forearm, the sign of the Crusader, for inspection and then handed folded papers and Lead’s knife to the inspecting guard.

  “Let the magistrate know, Goodman Lead resisted apprehension and should be shown no mercy or absolution. So says I.”

  The inspecting guard, having been satisfied, nodded and pocketed the knife and papers. The guards lifted Lead by his bound arms and carried him through the gate. Having delivered their captive, Eliphaz and the young Crusader abruptly left, waiting neither for reward nor praise for their capture.

  “Where are we going?” Lead whispered.

  The guards did not respond. They were cloaked in black robes cinched with belts, the uniform of Purgatory guards. The guard to Lead’s left was marred with a scar running from forehead to neck.

  “What’s inside?” Lead whispered.

  He had heard rumors, but no one in the Church spoke specifically of what happened in Purgatory. Law forbade it.

  “You’ll find out soon enough, sinner,” the scarred guard a
nswered. “Make no stir or trouble. You’ll know the insides of this place soon enough.”

  The guards carried Lead through an arch and into the courthouse of Purgatory. They traveled through an enormous hallway of stucco walls, worn and smoothed by time and bodies. At the end of the hall, a long white table stood in front of a towering ivory podium. All was colored white or gray. The black-robed guards stood in stark contrast. Guards busily shuffled through doors and passages, but none looked to Lead as he was dragged to the table and made to sit and wait.

  Eventually a judge in billowing red robes appeared behind the podium. The judge looked older than any living creature Lead had ever seen. His skin was yellowed and crinkled like parchment. His fingers protruded from hanging sleeves like tree branches. What hair he had stood as tufts of cotton on his scalp. When the judge spoke, all guards stopped and stood in silence.

  “Stand, sinner. Stand to hear the words and judgment of this court,” the judge rasped.

  Lead was propped up and held by the guards. He was barely strong enough to stand on his own. His mind filled with fear.

  The judge unraveled a scroll with his spindly fingers. He held the scroll at arms length and squinted at the print. He raised a finger and a guard brought a lit candle to the podium. The judge’s cracked lips silently worked themselves up and down as he read each line to himself. Eventually he looked up at Lead.

  “You are hereby accused of the crimes of treachery and heresy. You have gone against the Church and our Lord in failing to complete your duties as a designated Preacher of the Church. Your charge is exacerbated by the fact that upon the commission of your sin you chose to flee the divine judgment and wisdom of the Church. Do you have anything to say in your defense?”

  Lead scanned the judge’s face. He tried to think of a defense, he tried to think of precedent or Church wisdom to act as mitigation for his crimes. He wanted to find saving words but could not think past the pain in his body, the hunger in his belly, the dryness of a mouth which had received little water in many days.