So Mother Nature was against them as well, eh? Well, that figured.
Buck slipped. Almost went to one knee. Righted himself. Ken thought it was mostly because he didn’t want to let Hope touch the ground. The big man grimaced as he ran. Ken couldn’t be sure if he’d twisted something or if he was just mad at himself for the near fall.
They were almost halfway through the field. A surprise: Ken hadn’t thought they would make it this far.
Not that it mattered much. He glanced back.
Aaron was still coming. Not impossibly fast, but fast enough. Slow and steady in the downpour – but this wasn’t a story of tortoise and hare, but tortoise and slower tortoise. He was going to catch them. If not in this field, then in the next one. Or the one after that.
Ken looked around for something they could use. A weapon. A way to even the odds. But all he saw was empty land, broken only by crops and farm equipment. There wasn’t even a tractor they could use to escape. Just watering equipment, a few sheds that he knew simply housed pumps or electrical relays. Maybe a few tools, but that wasn’t worth the time it would take to check out.
Aaron had a gun. And in the game of gun, water, tools, gun beat everything.
Ken kept looking around. Just water and tools, water and tools, water –
He almost stumbled. Realizing….
“Buck,” he said, and pointed. “Do you know how to get that thing moving?”
Buck looked. “Yeah.” But he looked confused. “So?”
Ken grinned. “Where do we go to start it?”
64
Ken veered to the side. A slight angle that would hopefully get them there without lengthening the run so much that Aaron caught up to them. He also hoped he was taking them to the right spot.
Apparently he was, because Buck didn’t object. Halfway there, the big man suddenly realized what they were going to do. Not just what his part was, but what the point was. He glanced back and said, “I don’t know if we have time for this.”
“I’m open to better ideas,” said Ken.
Buck was silent. Nothing better, apparently.
“Guys, what are we doing?” said Christopher.
“I’ll tell you if you promise never to call me Bucky again,” said the big man. He was barely panting, Ken realized. Apparently the contractor was in good shape.
Ken realized he wasn’t panting, either. The workouts at the dojo had kept him in good stead.
Christopher didn’t respond. Either because he’d figured out where they were going or because the deal Buck had offered just wasn’t worth it to him.
Maggie said nothing. Still focused entirely on the run. On saving her children.
Sally, as ever, padded in silence. Wet and likely tired, but uncomplaining. Touching the sleeping/unconscious girls, licking and nipping at their trailing feet. Kisses from a cat that normally would consider preying on something so small.
They made it.
Buck didn’t put Hope down, just started fumbling with the controls. He glanced back. So did Ken.
Aaron was still coming. Near enough now that they could see his bad arm dangling at his side. His good hand holding the gun.
“This is going to be close,” said Buck.
65
“Is it going to start?” said Christopher. Apparently he’d figured out what they were doing.
“Should,” grunted Buck.
He made a last movement.
The sound of rushing water. A sudden increase in the rain-sounds. The squeak and grind of metal and rubber.
A lot of people didn’t know that, before the Change, Idaho was actually a high-tech state. Over seventy percent of its exports were in the science and technology sector, and it had been one of the leading areas in semiconductor technology since the nineteen seventies.
For all that, though, most people thought of it as a primarily agrarian state. And one of its most interesting features was the integration of science and agriculture, of suburban life with rural industry. Subdivisions of upper-class homes sat surrounded by farmland.
The farms were everywhere. Everyone grew accustomed to them. And not just the farms, but the features of the farms. The propane tanks that sat on so many of them. The rusted farm equipment that seemed to be part and parcel of many plots. The tractors chewing their way across fields like solitary locusts.
Even the huge center pivot irrigation systems just became part of the landscape; one more invisibility to be seen but unseen.
Still, they never failed to amaze visitors, to arouse curiosity when seen for the first time.