Dogsoldiers by James Tarr

Author:James Tarr [Tarr, James]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9798616570864
Published: 2020-03-23T22:00:00+00:00

“What part of the city you grow up in?” Barb asked Quentin. They were walking back toward the general store after dropping off the case of energy bars with the rest of Theodore. Barb had ten loaded magazines weighing down her shoulder bag, but she wasn’t complaining. They were sharing an energy bar and a bottle of water.

“I didn’t.”

“Oh? I thought you were a local.”

“Grew up in Toledo. Only came here a couple years after the fighting started, once I started thinking for myself and figured out who the bad guys really were. Which…feels like my whole life.”

“I hear that.”

Quentin glanced at her. Barb had a lot of gray hair. “You’ve got kids, right?”

She nodded. “Grandkids.”

“In the city?”

“No, they went south. Begged me to go too, when all this craziness started, but I guess I’m stupid and crazy. Least that’s what my girl Jackie told me. This is my city, so I’m going to stick by it.” She shrugged. “I never thought I was political, but after working two jobs and raising four kids to always do the right thing, a government shutting down websites and putting people in jail just for criticizing it was enough to get my back up, and that was before they doubled my taxes to pay for all the new government programs, gave the right to vote to illegals and unending free shit to lazy asses who don’t do nothing but vote for more free shit for theyselves.”

Quentin snorted. “You sound like my uncle.”

They reached the last house before the market. It was almost directly across the street from the boarded-up two story brown brick building where Curly kept all the good stuff, and Quentin guessed Ed and Weasel were inside there now. He glanced over at the building, but couldn’t see anything on the second floor through the reflective tint on the windows.

“I’m gonna hang here, wait for Ed and Weez to finish their business,” Quentin told Barb. He didn’t want to hang around inside the market, not with half a dozen soldiers there.

“You mind some company?”

“No ma’am.”

“Don’t you do that. Don’t you dare. I already feel old enough. You call me ma’am again and I’ll kick your ass. And don’t call me auntie, I hate that shit too.”

They were both laughing as they moved into the shade of the front porch. Quentin sat down on one of two chairs that somehow hadn’t been stolen or vandalized. Barb stepped up to the front door and knocked, getting a surprised look from her companion.

“Plenty ‘a houses in this city look abandoned, but ain’t,” she told him. “Doesn’t pay to advertise you might have stuff to steal. But if we’re going to sit on their porch, it’s only polite to ask permission first if someone’s here.”

No one responded to her knock, and after peering through one of the grimy windows, she took the chair opposite Quentin. They sat for a while on the porch, staring off in the distance, lost in their own thoughts.

“It’s going to come back.

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