The Dead and the Restless (Completed with undergoing editing)

Chapter Twenty-Eight

The precinct we had to go to wasn't far into the city, only a few miles in. Either way, I was still not crazy about the idea. Towns were bad news, I couldn't even imagine cities. We needed those guns though, and I knew that even if those people were still alive, there'd be more guns there at the city police department. Jackal even told us how he knew some city cops down there that had a few rings going. They'd take the guns from the gangbangers, then they'd take them around back and sell them to whoever had the highest bid.

Jackal wanted to drive again on the way there, so I agreed. My head was still throbbing and I didn't trust myself to drive. There was silence the whole way there, and it was now that I realized how calm Jackal had been, keeping the shock of the destruction around us to himself. He was a good man, just like Liam was. I couldn't picture him in uniform, though. He seemed a little too rough for it, with his tattoos and such.

I looked at the gas gauge, and I realized that we'd need to get a new car when we got there. Luckily we still had a few more hours of daylight, which is mostly the only reason we were going today. The town we were in was just outside the city limits, and it would take probably an hour to get there. But at our speed, we'd be there in half that time. It also helped that there were no people going into the city, so we didn't have to deal with moving cars. Once we were in the city though, I feared that we'd have to ditch the car and go on foot, or at least get out and move the cars out of our way.

We were on the express way now, and the tall buildings loomed in the distance, ghosts of what they used to be. I remember going into the city when I was younger, riding the trains and going to see baseball games with my father. He used to work down there as a business man for the Grangrier Corporation. I was never really sure what they did there, but I think it had something to do with the environment. I always loved that my father tried to improve the world we live in, but now, everything he did was practically pointless.

"You' were right," Jackal said, snapping me out of my thoughts.

"About what?"

"How we won't always have moments to mourn our dead," he said, letting out a sigh. "But she was a good woman, her an' her husband."

I instantly felt a pang of guilt. He still didn't know that Parker was dead. I didn't want to tell him back there because I thought he wouldn't be able to handle it, but maybe I was wrong. Either way, I knew what the right thing to do was.

"Jackal," I said, my voice trailing off. How exactly does someone tell them that one of their good friends is dead? "About Parker...he-"

"I know," Jackal said, cutting me off. "I knew it was him since I saw him there, cuffed to that cage. Even though he wa' rotted, I knew it was him."

I looked away from him and out the window. So he had known. He didn't know about the letter, though.

"He left a letter," I said, sighing. "He said that he'd done as much as he could to help the people with him, and that he had to give them the guns, because it was the last thing he could do to serve and protect."

I saw Jackal clutch the steering wheel for a few seconds, and then his grip eased after a while. I just looked at the growing buildings in front of us, counting how many broken windows I could find while I waited for him to process.

"He was a good man like that," he finally said after a few minutes. "I taught him ever since he was just a cadet. I chose him to fulfill my place when I retired. He was a good, humble, respectable man that put other's before he put himself."

He shook his head as we began to pull off into the exit for the city.

"The good one's never make it in this world," he said. "If they do, it's only a matter of time."