“Let me know if you need any help,” Diane said to Naomi before leaving with Vernon.
Another call window appeared. Naomi spent the next eleven hours begging for campaign donations.
73
Derek and the Stew
Derek and the chosen gladiators had been segregated according to race and gender. Like gender, race was separated in two. Whites and niggers. The nonwhites weren’t a homogenous group. Many spoke different languages and had very different cultures. Derek was universally shunned as an outcast. Initially, Middle Eastern men spoke Arabic to Derek, but, when he couldn’t respond, they turned their backs to him.
The Aryans had warned against any violence overnight, but, despite the warning, two men in the nonwhite locker room were attacked as they slept, their heads split open on the concrete floor, their cries muffled by the heavy rain outside. Derek had been terrified, finding a tight corner to defend. He’d stayed awake all night, afraid to sleep.
The next morning, the men who had bloody knuckles were executed in front of all, their throats cut from ear to ear.
Now Derek was exhausted. He leaned against the outfield wall, by himself, eating some sort of meat stew. It smelled like death, a strangely familiar smell that he couldn’t quite place. The whites were near the backstop at the other end of the field, eating the same slop. The women were in their own corners. Groups of nonwhite men made alliances and plotted over their breakfast.
After breakfast, a group of Aryan trainers forced them to do calisthenics. Push-ups, burpees, sit-ups, six inches, and bear crawls. More than a few men vomited their meat stew on the field, much to the delight of the trainers. Derek did better than most, despite his lack of sleep. They ran wind sprints from one end of the field to the other, the last man punished with a leather bullwhip across his bare back. Again, Derek did better than most, never feeling the bite of the bullwhip.
Then they were given wooden swords and taught the proper grip and how to strike with the proper footwork. They were paired with partners and forced to practice their striking and blocking. Derek was paired with the one man everyone seemed to fear. Even the Aryans showed him deference. He was the only other man to stand apart from the groups, despite having the right skin color. The dark-skinned man was over six feet tall, with 230 pounds of pure muscle. During the morning workout, the man easily outshone everyone, winning every race, breezing through every calisthenic. He was like an NFL athlete practicing with a high school team.
Derek held out his hand and introduced himself.
“Jordan,” the man replied, shaking Derek’s hand with an iron grip.
They practiced, Jordan clearly better, but careful not to hurt Derek, even though he had ample opportunity. After an hour of swordplay, they switched to wooden knives. With the wooden knives, Jordan excelled above and beyond even the trainers. Again, Jordan was merciful and patient, instructing Derek on the finer points of knife combat.
With the sun high in the sky, sapping what little energy the men had left, an Aryan trainer said, “Lunchtime.”
The men ran and jostled for the front of the line.
Another trainer said, “Now you got fuckin’ energy. You’re like a bunch of fuckin’ pigs, linin’ up for your slop.”
And that’s what they were given. Lukewarm meat stew and water.
Derek and Jordan stood at the rear of the line, not interested in fighting more than they had to.
“Thanks for helpin’ me,” Derek said.
Jordan nodded.
“You know a lot about… combat. Were you in the military?”
“A long time ago.”
“How’d you end up here?”
Jordan tipped his head, his eyes narrowed. “How’d you end up here?”
A commotion came from across the field. Jordan and Derek turned and watched as Mark, Connor’s overweight friend, was hauled from the field.
“He’s not coming back,” Jordan said.
“How do you know that?” Derek asked.
“He’s been struggling all morning. Probably dehydrated.”
“Why wouldn’t he come back?”
“Our breakfast and the lunch they’re serving now? You know how it has that funky smell?”
“Yeah.”
“It’s human flesh.”
Derek bent over and retched, remembering the familiar smell. He closed his eyes and saw burning bodies falling from apartment balconies. A little water and bile spewed from his mouth, but his stomach was mostly empty. Derek spit and stood upright.
“I know it’s nasty, but you gotta eat,” Jordan said.
Derek and Jordan were served their stew and given cloudy water. They sat against the outfield wall. Derek retrieved a piece of meat from the stew, examining it. As a farmer, he’d butchered chickens and pigs, but this meat looked different. The fibers were very small. A patch of skin was attached to the meat, along with a few coarse black hairs.
74
Jacob and the Stock is Down
Jacob had contacted Cesar without Rebecca’s knowledge, and they’d made an agreement. Jacob wouldn’t finance the rescue mission without guaranteed results. With the guarantee in place, Jacob agreed to go to the Virgin Islands to support Project Freedom and the search for Derek. By “support,” Jacob understood that meant giving them money and paying Eric’s mercenaries.
Rebecca had been optimistic about the trip, even though Cesar had admitted that they’d never rescued a single island prisoner. She’d reasoned that, with their financial backing and Eric’s mercenaries, Derek could be the first.
Eric had arranged for the flight to Jamaica, the ship to Saint Thomas, along with the best mercenaries money could buy. Tentatively, they were set to leave next Tuesday. In the meantime, Jacob had business to attend to. He sat at his desk, across from his CFO, Ramesh Patel.
“The stock’s down 18 percent today,” Ramesh said. “It’s down 53 percent since the Chinese started selling.”
Jacob thought about his rapidly appreciating short position. I could walk away from everything. Quit. Move to Panama with Rebecca and the kids.
“Jacob?”
Jacob blinked, focusing on Ramesh again. “Sorry.”
“Are you all right?”
“I’m fine. How long until we need a government bailout?”
“It depends. If the stock stabilizes, and interest rates remain low, we can borrow more to cover our expenses and pay the interest on our debts, but that’s not sustainable.”
“How long?”
“Could be a year. Could be two or three months.”
Jacob nodded. “I’m taking a trip next week. I may be unreachable for a few weeks.”
With the company in crisis, Ramesh winced at the timing.
75
Summer and Soda
Summer was groggy as she and Javier launched their canoe from the point. The dawn sun provided the first rays of light. Gavin and Eliza launched their canoe as well. The four of them formed a scavenging crew for 1776. They paddled away from the ocean, into the bay. Summer and Javier were in a rhythm, the whoosh of the water behind their oars the only sound. Summer thought about Connor and their brief reunion on the beach. Tears pricked at the corners of her eyes.
One hundred feet away, a caiman slipped under the water. They scanned the shore for the aggressive alligatorlike reptile, not wanting to accidentally encroach on their territory. Only a few green iguanas. They beached at an airport, about a mile from their fort. They hid their canoes and paddles in the swath of jungle between the water’s edge and the airport. Each year, that swath of jungle got a little wider since the hurricanes had effectively banished mowing, pruning, and herbicides.