ELE Series | Book 5 | Escape

by Jones, K. J.

  Warrant Officer Gessele relayed the present POTUS’ theory that some internal group planned to play a long game of controlling the United States once the catastrophe ended. Since the nation was bat shit crazy before R140, Mazy found this entirely believable.

  “That’s assuming the catastrophe ends,” she said.

  “Yeah,” Gessele responded. “But they won’t figure that out for a while.”

  Lieutenant Neese added, “When it bangs down the door and bites them on their ass cheeks, maybe then they’ll clue in.”

  An internal power struggle, Mazy understood in her long hours of sitting around, hearing the conversations of important people around her. Since the press was not present in any meaningful way, leaking scandals could not be utilized to get rid of rivals. Blackmail, too, was mostly gone since this was primarily contingent on the threat of media scandals. They could not have any massive congressional thingy-bob meetings against someone, since two-thirds of Congress was somewhere else. The biggest tools politicians had used now absent, they had resorted to third-world government techniques of murder. Maybe the CIA was involved, as it sounded their style.

  Why was the CIA invited into the mountain? Scuttlebutt was the black ops section of the Agency was present. Their Machiavellian tactics habitually made trouble of toppling governments and using nations as if chess pawns.

  Mazy wished she could yell at the coup, whoever they were, there was no damn long game here. The nation hung by a string. The government leadership was inside a mountain inside the red zone. Come mosquito season, the mountain would be buttoned up, entirely closed off from the rest of the suffering country.

  POTUS met with his cabinet in the next room. Mazy and the sailors heard raised voices through the doors, another set of wooden double doors. People from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission were in constant attendance on the Presidential floor. But people from the EPA made the SecDef and his camp go crazy. The pro-war camp proclaimed the EPA involved in an ‘environmentalist conspiracy.’ Apparently, concern for venting toxic chemicals was the stuff of hippies.

  The more reddened the state of Texas, the worse the SecDef behaved as if anger would stop his state from going under. Some people were like that, Mazy had observed in her life. The more powerless they felt, the more power and control they extracted from others through bullying. She hoped he’d get so stressed out, he’d keel over from a severe heart attack and need to be replaced by someone less nuts.

  2.

  They waited at an old fashion, greasy spoon, all-night diner. Some soldiers ate their late-night dinner at a booth cattycorner to the booths the group occupied.

  “Cate better have money,” Peter said.

  A soldier let him use a cell phone to contact his sister, the only phone number on the piece of paper for his family. No one remembered each other’s phone numbers anymore with Contacts in cell phones taking care of it.

  The waitress came for the dishes and refilled their coffee cups. “How was it?”

  “Fantastic.”

  Peter slightly exaggerated. The food was better than Fort Jackson, though.

  “You want anything else?”

  “Ah, we’re waiting for someone. Just coffee and water. Thanks.”

  They waited for her to walk away as if she was a spy.

  “How come you got no money?” Chris asked Pez. “Didn’t have money going into Atlanta?”

  “That was a hundred years ago, bro. You go on missions with your wallet?”

  “Your mission was in America.”

  “Think we’d stop by a Wawa and needed our debit cards?”

  “A what?”

  “Southerners.”

  “Yankees.”

  They let it end there, both too worn out to come up with more insults.

  Phebe fell asleep with her head on Peter’s shoulder.

  Flashing police vehicle lights reflected through the windows, waking Phebe and the other sleepers. Outside, patrol cars escorted a police van into the parking lot.

  “That’s them,” said Peter.

  “A bunch of cops?” asked Pez, after he finished yawning.

  “Cop family.” Peter raised his voice, “Ma’am, the cops will pay our tab.”

  She looked at them suspiciously.

  “Somebody stay as collateral. I gotta see her.” Peter hurried out of the diner.

  The convoy parked in front. Boston Police Department on the sides of the vehicles. A tall, strawberry blond woman with long legs slid down from shotgun of the van. She wore civilian attire.

  “That’s her,” said Chris.

  They watched through the windows.

  “Ready to meet your new in-laws?” Matt asked.

  Phebe sneered. She didn’t feel like anything but a bed.

  “May wanna put on a smile or some shit, girl,” Chris said.

  Outside, Caitlyn ran to her brother and tackled him in a big hug, laughing.

  “I was so fucking worried, you asshole,” Caitlyn said.

  “Yeah, I was too. Touch and go, ya know.”

  “I know some of those faces.” She pointed at the windows of the diner, staring out at them.

  A tall and wide, plainclothes police detective came out from the driver’s seat of the van. His badge hung from his blazer pocket.

  “Uncle Tim.”

  “Petey. You got us all worried, being listed dead and all.” They hugged.

  More relatives poured out of the patrol cars.

  * * *

  “They got this Internet board for the missing in the Zone.” Tim talked as he drove the van. “You people are all on it. Colleen checks it daily. You came up dead the other day.”

  Phebe’s head picked up from leaning on the window. She sat between the window and Peter. “Colleen, my mom?”

  “Yeah, your mom. She’s been hysterical since the news. Then … who’s Pell?”

  “Me,” said Brandon in the next row of seats back.

  “Your folks called. Got some kind of phone tree going on with all your folks. They got a special delivery letter saying you died.”

  “Oh, no.”

  Peter asked, “Anybody got a cell? He should call them.”

  “Yeah,” said Caitlyn. “Use mine.”

  “We ain’t got mail in over a week,” said Tim. “The letter didn’t go to the house to your mother, Petey.”

  Caitlyn said, “The only thing we get is Amazon. If it’s in an Amazon warehouse in New England, we can get it. Ya see the little Amazon vans going ‘round. But if it ain’t in New England, you ain’t getting it.”

  “The lights like to flicker lately,” said Tim.

  Brandon had the cell to his ear, waiting. “Dad? Hello?”

  “It’s been happening for the past day or two,” Tim continued. “Flickering lights.”

  “No, Dad, it really is me. Brandon. Your son. No, I am not dead. No, this is not some mean joke or scam. It is me, your son.”

  “Everybody blacking out. But we’re good. We’re on our own grid. Like back when New York went dark during that big blackout. Only a couple of towns in Mass got hit. But Boston’s on its own Mass state grid, thank God.”

  “Okay, Dad. How’s this? When I was like six or something, you bought me a green bicycle. But you insisted I keep training wheels to an embarrassing age.” Brandon listened. He laughed. “Yeah. I really am alive. I just wanted you to know that. But, listen, Dad, you cannot tell anyone I am alive. No, Dad, you can tell Mom. But only family and tell them to keep it secret.”

  Caitlyn said, “Dad’s got a triple-decker just redone but ain’t rented out yet. He’s there setting it up for you people.”

  “Yeah. No. I’m not in trouble, per se. Nothing like that. But I do not want to go back to the Corps.”

  “What did you tell the mothers?” Peter asked.

  “Had to tell ‘em something,” said Tim. “Can’t let ‘em mourn their kids that ain’t dead. Your dad told them youse all in a hospital. Can’t take calls yet. But you’re alive. Gives ya some
time to rest before it all hits.”

  “No, Dad. It’s not like that. It’s super complicated. Okay, Dad, they’re gonna kill us if they know we’re alive, cos we know too much. From the Zone, we know too much that isn’t being reported on the news. Okay?”

  “Is that true?” Caitlyn asked. “What he said to his dad?”

  Peter shook his head, no. “We really could do with a rest. Maybe for a couple of days. What about some medical for my wife?”

  “How are you gonna go to the hospital if you’re legally dead?” Caitlyn asked. “They ask for ID and insurance.” She looked back at them with the same vivid blue eyes Peter had.

  “I don’t know. Doesn’t somebody know somebody?”

  “We’ll figure it out.”

  3.

  Mullen stood watch. They had found the mainframe which controlled the base. Eric’s fingers typed rapidly on a keyboard.

  “This hack would be a lot easier if I had my equipment,” he said. “Or that sweet system on the yacht.”

  “We don’t,” said Mackey, who had picked the lock to get them in. “Your fingers gotta do the magic.”

  “It won’t take long. The security on this sucks. There’s a big gaping back door to the log-in. Really mentally challenged this is.”

  “Who the fuck would want to break into the lights here?”

  “And the alarms,” Mullen added.

  “Guess nobody figured it was important shit worth better security.”

  “Guess not,” said Eric. “Done.”

  “That fast?” asked Mackey.

  “Easy. Security sucks. I just reset everything. Alarms won’t go off. Hopefully, there won’t be any fires. The fire alarms won’t go off either.”

  “That’s kind of scary, kid. Can you steal people’s identities, too?”

  Eric shrugged. “I guess. Never tried.”

  “You may need to try one day on the path we’re on. Let’s bounce.”

  4.

  Roadblock.

  “Boston is in lockdown,” Tim said. “Strict curfew enforcement.”

  Caitlyn called on her cell phone. “Dad, we’re at the city checkpoint. They’re all starving. Order a bunch of pizzas.” She listened. “Good. Cos I think they’re gonna crash hard once there. They all look like hell. Yeah. See ya soon.” She disconnected and slid the phone into her pocket. “He got a bunch of blow-up mattresses for youse to sleep on for tonight. He brought in food, but he’ll get ya some pizzas.”

  “Hmm,” Emily mumbled. “Northern pizza. Real pizza.”

  “You have to stay awake to eat it, honey,” Brandon told her.

  “I will for real pizza.”

  5.

  “We gotta go,” said Eric. “We got more people dependent on us.”

  “You just making us all kinds of heroes,” said Mackey. “Ain’t ya? More people to rescue.”

  “We are meeting Mazy’s family. You know Mazy?”

  “No.”

  Dre smiled. “I remember Mazy.”

  Vi elbowed him in the stomach, then laughed. “Look at you, drooling.”

  “She was one good-looking sista.”

  “She didn’t look twice at your dumb ass.”

  “A man can still dream.”

  “Don’t wanna know nothin’ about what a man dreams, Lord Jesus help me.”

  6.

  They stood in front of a triple-decker house in South Boston, the place Peter talked about all the time. A triple-decker was a three-story stand-alone building. This one had a front porch for each floor. Freshly painted, handsome, and ready for move-in.

  The cousin cops escorted them there. Caitlyn and Peter talked with them from their car windows. Then they left, much to the group’s relief. Meeting people, doing that thing, they weren’t feeling it tonight.

  “Come in,” said Caitlyn. She opened the front door and yelled, “We’re here!”

  Peter placed his hand on Jayce’s shoulder. “We made it.”

  Jayce nodded, sadness filling his eyes. “Not all of us.”

  “This where you come from?” Tyler gazed around the urban street.

  The others did, too. A city, it looked like another planet. Traffic lights turned green, orange, and red. Stop signs. Small mom-and-pop corner stores. It was the Before, still alive.

  “Welcome to Southie,” Peter said.

  “SoBo, you mean,” said Tim. “We’re fucking quaint nowadays. Got coffee houses and shit. But they haven’t entirely infiltrated this neighborhood.”

  Phebe and Tyler both yawned.

  “Let’s go in before I fall down,” said Phebe.

  “I’m too tired to even think,” said Emily.

  They trudged in, their legs barely working.

  Tears filled Jayce’s eyes. He gazed up at the sky where hardly a star could be seen from the city lights pollution.

  “Hey,” said Chris. “They’re in a better place, kid.”

  “I miss them.”

  Chris sighed. “Yeah.”

  “They’re still alive.”

  Chris knew he meant his children. “I gotta believe it or I can’t go on. But you, kid, gotta go on. Your family would be mad at you if you didn’t. Got me?”

  “Yeah.” Jayce wiped at the tears.

  “Let’s go in and eat some of this Yankee pizza they keeping running their mouths about. Deal with the world after a good long sleep.”

  “Okay.”

  “And a good shit and a shower.”

  Jayce chuckled, enjoying Chris’s simplistic view of life. “Okay.”

  Phebe faced meeting her father-in-law. Mike, apparently called Mikey among kin. He was gentle in hugging her.

  “Pizza will be here soon,” Mike Sullivan said.

  A good-looking, middle-aged man. Gray at the temples and peppering his dark brown hair – the same dark, wavy hair as Peter, but Mike’s eyes were brown. He wore a camel-hair coat. Gold of a Rolex watch flashed in the overhead lighting of the hall.

  Peter was busy snooping in the first-floor apartment. He came out and received an affectionate hug from his dad.

  “Glad you’re okay, son.”

  “Thanks, Dad. How was your plane trip?”

  “Expensive.”

  “I bet.” Peter chuckled. “Do I gotta do the intros here?”

  “Would help since I don’t see name tags on ‘em. I know two of these mugs.”

  “Yeah, ignore Chris and Matt. More interesting are these new people.”

  Nonetheless, Mike gave them man-hugs, which Matt and Chris gladly reciprocated. Either Southie was a really big hugging subculture or this was what family members of Zoners did, hugged everyone, just so relieved and happy they were alive.

  Onto the introductions, down the line. Mike called Jayce, “Young man.”

  Tyler said, “Are you, like, my grandpa now?”

  Mike looked confused.

  “Yes, Dad. These are my sons. I didn’t tell you.”

  “Both of them?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Wow. You were busy in Georgia.”

  “Ya know, did what I could.”

  Obvious to Phebe, the sense of humor came from his father. She liked Mike, as much as she could like anyone while exhausted, starving, and standing in a hall.

  “Are all the apartments done?” Peter asked.

  “Yeah. They’re identical. All redone. Real nice.”

  “Think we’ll take the second floor one.”

  “Why?”

  “Well, I don’t want the wife and kids on the first floor. We’ll put the bachelors down here.”

  “You know there’s only two bedrooms each. Cate gave me the headcount, so we got the air mattresses for everybody. But where –”

  “We’re used to sleeping in the same room. So we’ll blow ‘em up on the second floor, away from these street windows.”

  Mike didn’t get it, according to his face, but he went with it. “Whatever works for youse all.”

  * * *

  They ate like starving w
ild animals, sitting on a polished hardwood floor of the empty second-floor apartment, officially called “B” according to the letter on the door. Everything in sight, they ate.

  Peter’s family looked on.

  “Wow,” said Caitlyn. “Talk about some hungry people.”

  The food tasted orgasmically good, even to Chris, who was not given towards foreign foods – any food not Southern. They downed cold soda.

  “Keep your hands away from their mouths,” said Tim.

  After the consuming orgy, and a lot of belches, including from the women, only Pez had the energy to take a shower. He had nothing clean to put on afterward and hadn’t a towel or toiletries. He didn’t seem to care.

  “We’ll hit the Goodwill up the street in the morning,” said Mike. “I mean, if that’s okay with you people, being Goodwill and all.”

  The mattresses blew up by embedded automatic pumps. A stack of mismatched bedding and comforters awaited.

  “We’re fine with Goodwill, Dad. We’re excited by beds no one else’s biological fluids are in.”

  “Wow. Okay. That’s disgusting, son. We’ll get furniture tomorrow.”

  “We should make it nice for the newlyweds,” said Mike’s older brother.

  “Uncle Tim,” said Peter. “We don’t need fancy. Secondhand is good.”

  “Nuh, nuh. Newlyweds, starting out, about to have a baby, you need good stuff. Your old man can afford it.” He slapped Mike’s back.

  “Thanks, Timmy.”

  “Any time, Mikey.”

  “You want my old couch, Petey. The nice leather one?”

  “No. I hate leather couches. They’re hot in summer and cold in winter. What’s the point?”

  “Cos they’re cool.”

  “You make all furniture cool just by sitting on it, Uncle Timmy.”

  Tim laughed. Mike smiled at his brother.

  Looking around, the others had all climbed onto bare air mattresses and fell fast asleep.

  “Wow,” said Caitlyn. “That’s some damn tired.”

  “Put some blankets on them,” said Tim.

  Pez said, “Think I’ll make mine first.”

  “Me, too,” Peter said. “Wish wifey had waited two seconds.”

  “She’s out cold. Poor thing.”

  “So,” Caitlyn said. “Before you pass out too, are we not telling everybody else you’re here or something?”