Rise Again Below Zero Read Online Free PDF Page A

kid.
    “He don’t talk,” Topper said.
    “Silent kid, huh?” Danny pronounced. “I like ’em that way. What the hell kind of dog is that?”
    “It’s his,” Topper said. “I never seen one like it.”
    “It’s a Boston Terrier,” Amy Cutter said, coming around from behind the White Whale. “Smallest of the bulldogs. A miniature breed, unlike the French or English Bulldogs, which are dwarf breeds. Mike’s foot isn’t broken, by the way; it’s sprained. Did you make the cut on his head?”
    “Do I carry a machete?”
    “In your car, you have one,” Amy said, kneeling.
    The dog seemed to know she was an ally, because he immediately hopped out of the pannier and bounced up and down in front of her.
    “Well I didn’t cut him,” Danny grumped. She often found herself bickering with Amy the same way they did as young girls. It was ridiculous, irritating, and comforting at the same time.
    “Thanks for not smashing Mike too bad, Danny,” Amy said. “He’s scared out of his brain.”
    Amy gave the dog a quick examination out of old habit, checking ears, eyes, and abdomen; although she was the Tribe’s doctor, Amy had been a veterinarian in the time before. Her straightforward brand of medicine was ideal for the life they led: She could set bones, stitch wounds, and sling antiseptic; she could do surgery in the back of a pickup truck. If somebody had cancer or a chronic illness, those were problems for God.
    The dog inspected, Amy then examined the boy in much the same way: She soon determined he was suffering from ringworm and malnutrition. Amy was good with kids. They seemed to understand her better than a lot of adults did.
    “You sure don’t talk much,” Amy said.
    The silent kid said nothing.
    •   •   •
    Twenty minutes later, the remaining scouts came back: Ernie and Conn had gone on another thirty miles down the highway, with a detour down a southward fork that ended in a burning town they couldn’t possibly get through, unless they waited for it to burn out. It looked like Mike’s biker gang, the Vandal Reapers, had gone through that way. There were a lot of fresh corpses, some of them reanimated, the bodies hacked and shot. The Tribe could go straight on or straight back, and the rumors were true: The zeroes got real thick after mile twenty in the easterly direction.
    “There’s a big old truck stop about halfway,” Ernie explained, mopping the grease off his spectacles with a blackened handkerchief. “There’s a crossroads there, route goes north-south, but the fire closed the south end. We saw some travelers on foot, regular folk it looked like, coming the other way, but they bugged out when they saw us.”
    “So we got this kid,” Danny said. “And a kidnapper. There’s zeroes to the east and fire to the south. Marauders to the north. This party never ends. Okay,” she barked, turning to face the main group, “we roll out at sundown, people. Let’s get to the truck stop, and then we’ll see if we can locate a route around the swarm and keep going east. If not, we backtrack three days. I’m going to do a little recon before dark. Now, can somebody figure out why the fuck our radios don’t work?”
    “I’m on it,” came a response from the crowd.
    Danny turned to the silent kid, who hovered not far away, his dog at his ankle. He reminded Danny of her sister Kelley when she was that age, big-eyed and quiet, worried.
    “I’m gonna keep you safe, you understand? That’s a promise,” she said.
    By way of reply, the boy raised his arm and pointed an accusatory finger at the crooked outline of the Leper. Danny bounced her damaged hand against her thigh, framing a response.
    “That . . . that’s my kid sister,” Danny said. “Guess you figured out what’s wrong with her. She doesn’t bite, okay? I promised I’d keep you safe. She will not hurt you.”
    The kid lowered his arm. But like so many of the others in the Tribe, he didn’t take his eyes off the