“More than both of us,” he said and paused. “This may sound strange, but I hope that both of their cars are out of commission.”
“I had the same thought. Driving around isn’t a good idea right now.”
“Especially for those two. The worst would be if one of the cars started on the first try, and they just drove into town, still oblivious. They’d lose the car at their first stop, or worse.”
“Limerick is a tight community. I wouldn’t worry about them,” said Kate.
“What we saw tonight is the tip of the proverbial iceberg. Ed’s Jeep carries more real-world value than the combined bank accounts of everyone in Scarborough. Don’t be surprised if we end up walking back from Boston.”
“Just stay in touch with the phone. Use your portable solar unit to keep it charged.”
“Unless we’re talking all day and all night, the phones should last pretty long,” said Alex.
“Humor me. If you end up walking back, we might not see you for several days.”
“I may have to talk Ed and Charlie into hiking a little further than I suggested. We can’t afford to lose the Jeep.”
“Good luck hauling Charlie and Ed that far,” she said quietly.
Alex leaned in, bringing his smelly body closer to hers. She tried not to react to the strong aroma of stagnant, rotting mud.
“Between you and me, I’m not taking either of them across the Charles—unless the situation requires it,” he whispered. “If I can convince them to guard the Jeep, all the better. Getting in and out of the city with our kids will require mobility and concentration. They’ll slow me down.”
“These guys came through for you before. You’re not exactly a trained commando.”
“Compared to Ed and Charlie, I’m Delta Force. I’ll bring them as far as I can without jeopardizing the kids’ safety,” said Alex.
“Yeah, and good luck trying to talk Ed out of rescuing his daughter.”
PART III
“ROADS LESS TRAVELLED”
Chapter 15
EVENT +23:58 Hours
Scarborough, Maine
A thin line of dark blue light pushed gently against the black velvet curtain, barely noticeable through the distant trees. From the second-floor corner window of the Walkers’ house, Alex flipped his night vision goggles (NVG) down and surveyed the green image. The eastern half of the neighborhood was dark. He stared at a fixed point for several seconds, trying to register any movement in the limited field of vision afforded by the goggles. All was still. He moved to one of the front windows and knelt, scanning the houses along their departure route. The green imagery betrayed no signs of artificial light within the homes. He clicked his radio.
“Charlie, you showing anything on thermal?”
“Looks clear,” Charlie replied.
“Same here. First run leaves as soon as you reach the garage. Everyone set?” asked Alex.
Ed’s voice broke into his earpiece. “Loaded and ready.”
“That’s it, then. Drop Charlie at the top of the street, then straight to the fire station and back. No lights,” Alex instructed.
“Got it.”
Alex rested his arms on the rifle attached to his chest by a one-point sling and silently counted the seconds. He heard a deep rumbling by the count of seven and Ed’s voice at nine.
“Door is up. We’re on our way out,” said Ed.
“Route looks clear,” Alex said. “See you in a couple minutes.”
He scooted back from the window and raised his rifle, scanning over the sight through his NVG set. His left finger rested on the toggle switch for the dual-aiming laser. The garage door slid along creaky tracks, breaking the morning silence, followed by a V6 roar. He panned from left to right, focusing on each house momentarily. Even a small flashlight deep inside one of the homes would show up as a bright green flare. The engine idled for a moment; then Ed brought the Jeep down the driveway without headlights. He wouldn’t use them until they reached Harrison Road.
Alex stared over the Jeep, studying each house along the route for light. Clear so far. He checked the Jeep. Charlie stood on the left running board, holding onto the two bicycles bungeed to the roof rack. The Jeep’s tires sucked at the deep mud as the vehicle staggered down the street. Ed was playing it safe. Too safe.
“Come on. Get out of here, Ed,” he mumbled.
He didn’t think the mud was deep enough to trap a 4X4 vehicle, but Ed routinely took the Jeep off-roading, so it was his show. At this rate it would take more than a couple of minutes to make the round trip. When the Jeep disappeared behind one of the lifeless structures along Durham Road, he turned his attention back to the northeast half of the street, drawn to his own house next door. He was too exhausted to process the flood of emotions, so he stared, nearly convincing himself that they would be back to salvage whatever remained. He knew better. They all knew better.
He continued the sweep. The neighborhood represented a mixed bag of memories and emotions. They’d enjoyed a pleasant life on Durham Road, raising two children, tending to the yard, and paying the mortgage on time. Throw in a big vacation each year, and anyone would agree they had a nice thing going. They did—until a microscopic organism changed everything. Changed everyone.
Eventually, the neighborhood emerged as one collective group of strangers. Adults avoided eye contact, children were kept close at hand, and doors were locked. The more he thought about it, the less he’d miss the place. His home was with Kate and the kids.
Light bathed the side of Jamie’s house, blinding him. He raised the goggles and searched for the source.
Shit. Come on, Ed.
“Ed’s on his way,” said Charlie.
No shit.
“Ed, turn off your lights,” he said, straining not to yell.
“We almost hit a tree on Harrison Road. I’m not taking any chances.”
“Copy. We’ll be waiting for you in the garage,” Alex said, clipping the radio onto his rifle sling.
He dashed out of the bedroom, still partially blinded from the night vision flare caused by Ed’s headlights. He hit the flashlight toggle switch on the rifle’s hand guard, illuminating the stairs for his descent. Samantha waited in the candlelit kitchen.
“They’re inbound,” he said, blowing out one of the candles on the kitchen island.
Alex flashed his rifle light toward the mudroom to make sure he didn’t collide with anyone lingering in the house. He reached the mudroom door just as Ed’s headlights swept through the garage, spotlighting the group waiting to load up for the last trip.
“I can’t believe we’re just leaving everything,” said Samantha.
“I’m trying not to think about it,” he said.
“Fifteen years down the drain,” she added, following him into the garage.
“Hey, you won’t have to pay the rest of the mortgage,” joked Alex.
“I’d rather make payments.”
“Start bringing everything out,” barked Kate.
Daniel, Ed and Samantha’s son, said, “We need a light.”
Alex lit up the bike carrier with his rifle’s LED barrel-mounted flashlight.
“Here, I got it,” said Samantha, activating a handheld light. “I’m not comfortable with you pointing a rifle at my kids.”
“The safety’s on,” said Alex, lowering his rifle to help with the bikes.
“Humor me.”
Standing on the side of Ed’s Jeep, Alex caught the last glimpses of his home superimposed against a thicker, lighter blue ribbon of twilight.
Chapter 16
EVENT +24:47 Hours
South Portland, Maine
Alex stood on the Jeep’s passenger-side running board and surveyed the intersection before turning his attention to the rapidly approaching mob. This hadn’t work out so well.
Lesson learned.
He’d wanted to stage their departure from a less conspicuous location further back along Route 1, but the water and mud had reached furt
her than he’d expected. By choosing the parking lot, he had traded one problem for another. Human activity.
Tents and makeshift shelters proliferated on the grassy areas surrounding the hotel, spilling onto the sidewalks and edges of the parking lots. A sea of useless cars provided additional shelter to the refugees, who must have arrived yesterday to find that the hotel was full. The remnants of jumbled letters on the hotel’s roadside sign welcomed some kind of conference or gathering.
Their initial arrival had attracted attention, which had grown from a few dazed, exhausted, early-morning risers upon the first drop off, to an increasingly agitated mob of thirty by the time he had returned with the third carload of bicycles and family. Like zombies, the entire group shifted its collective attention to the working vehicle, sensing salvation and opportunity. Alex weighed their options and decided for a hasty departure. He activated his handheld radio.
“Charlie, get everyone up and moving while they’re distracted. Next rally point is the Maine Mall offramp. We’ll keep moving the Jeep until you guys are clear of the parking lot.”
“Roger that. Hey, I don’t have a bike,” replied Charlie.
“Run alongside the bicycles, and make sure they get out of the parking lot. I’ll pick you up at the intersection.”
“Copy. Moving out.”
Alex dropped into the front passenger seat and shut the door. “Pull back from the crowd and reposition near the conference center entrance. That should give Charlie enough time to get them out of here,” he said to Ed.
“Make sure the doors are locked back there. Yours too, Ed.”
The crowd had nearly reached them by the time Ed shifted into reverse and put some distance between the Jeep and the mob. The crowd continued to press forward, yelling a simultaneous string of incoherent and indistinguishable demands at his open window. In the growing daylight, he could see a few rifle barrels in the crowd, most of them pointing upward—for now. He had no intention of letting this group near the Jeep.
“Samantha, put your packs against the doors and have everyone squeeze into the middle. Stay low,” he said, hoping to put a little more than thin metal jeep framing between Ed’s family and a bullet.
While Samantha rearranged the back seating area, putting two packs against the door next to Daniel, Alex peered past the crowd.
We aren’t moving fast enough.
“Charlie, Kate—get them up and moving. We’re running out of time here,” he said into the handheld radio, getting no response from either.
“Alex, this is stupid. We need to get the hell out of here,” said Ed.
“They’re all up on their bikes. Twenty seconds. Move back further, but don’t get us cornered,” said Alex.
“We don’t have a ton of parking lot left. If they grab one of the bikes off the Jeep, our plan is screwed,” said Ed, driving them at an angle to the hotel and conference center.
“Slow us down.”
“Slow us down? Fuck that. We’re out of here. Charlie and Kate have plenty of room to get them out of the parking lot.” Ed stepped on the gas and propelled the Jeep toward one of the exits for Route 1.
“Stay down back there!” said Alex, hoping that the mob’s rifles stayed silent.
He was relieved to be moving away from the mob, which was now running in a futile attempt to catch up with the Jeep. Ed drove them to the southernmost exit, which drew the crowd further away from the other group. By the time they turned north on Route 1, Kate and the other cyclists had reached the gas station and accelerated. Charlie trailed them by fifty feet. Kate’s group would be long gone before elements of the mob arrived, but he wasn’t so sure about Charlie.
As soon as Ed floored the Jeep, pointing it toward Route 1, the crowd chasing them split apart. While the majority of the group continued in a straight, zombielike path toward the vehicle, a smaller group sprinted toward Charlie. Alex did the math and didn’t like the outcome. As their Jeep turned onto Route 1, he began to lose sight of the pack behind loosely spaced rows of thick, flowering bushes along the sidewalk between the road and parking lot. Ed jammed on the accelerator, speeding them toward the intersection. Alex glanced through the windshield and saw Kate’s group cross Route 1 headed west onto the Maine Turnpike Approach Road.
“This is guaranteed to get shitty,” said Alex.
“I’m not risking the Jeep, Alex—or my family,” said Ed.
“If Charlie starts shooting—you’ll lose the jeep. The police will be all over us before we get to the tollbooth. We have to get him out of there before he panics.”
“I’ll wait in the intersection, but that’s it,” he said, as the Jeep rapidly approached that terminal point.
“Slow down for a second.”
“Are you crazy?” Ed bellowed.
“Ed, get us out of here!” screamed Samantha.
“Stop the Jeep, and wait for me at the intersection. Do it now!” ordered Alex.
The Jeep jerked to a stop, giving Alex enough time to jump down onto the street before it lurched forward again. He hit the street in a dead sprint, slicing between two thick sections of beach roses and emerging on a collision course with the man catching up to Charlie. Alex’s sudden appearance caused Charlie to lower his rifle, which averted the first of many disasters ripening at the moment. With several hotels in the immediate area, he could almost guarantee a nearby police presence.
He emphatically waved his hands at Charlie, silently imploring him to keep running. As he barreled closer, the first runner caught movement in his peripheral vision and turned his head.
Too late.
He tried to bring the SKS rifle around while decelerating out of a full-speed run, but Alex stopped the man’s rifle with his left hand and landed his right elbow into the man’s neck. Momentum did the rest.
The controlled collision flattened the attacker, leaving him gasping for air on the gritty pavement. Alex ripped the SKS rifle out of his grip, stumbling to the ground. Loose bits of blacktop dug agonizingly deep into his knee. He scrambled to his feet and reassessed the situation. Not much had improved.
“Keep going!” he screamed at Charlie, who had slowed down again.
The next threat, a mid-twenties, stick-thin guy wearing jeans and a salt-stained black T-shirt, arrived without a plan. Alex swung the SKS by the barrel, smashing the wooden butt stock against the right side of his head. Skinny tumbled to Alex’s left, hitting the ground hard. His beefy replacement, half muscle and half fat judging by his stretched blue polo shirt, didn’t hesitate to close the gap. Alex barely found the time to shift his grip on the rifle and jam the butt stock into the man’s oncoming face. Surprisingly, Beefy managed to deflect some of the rifle’s momentum, taking a glancing blow to the head. He collapsed to his knees, out of the fight.
His third threat, a longhaired guy wearing fatigue pants and a white tank top, widened his rapid approach.
Time to gain some ground.
Alex turned and sprinted for the intersection, unfolding the SKS’s spike bayonet as he ran. He’d taken several strides when something solid struck the back of his head. The dull thud surprised him more than it stunned him, and he kept running. When he heard a metallic object strike the pavement, he risked a look back. A large hunting knife clattered to a stop on the black and gray pavement several feet behind him.
Wild Man raced toward him at full speed. Even if he could beat the guy to the intersection, which was doubtful, Wild Man would be on the Jeep before they could mount up and leave. Alex saw no other option. He reversed direction and squatted low, thrusting the business end of the rifle up through his outstretched hands. The spike bayonet penetrated the man’s upper abdomen, just below the xiphoid process, disappearing deep into his chest cavity. The collision’s momentum buried the metal barrel deep into the gap opened by the bayonet. Warm blood sprayed onto Alex’s arms.
He released the rifle and ran, drawing his pistol to discourage anyone else. He hated to leave the rifle, but trying to remove it from the man’s che
st could take considerable time and effort. They’d be long gone before anyone could put it into action against them. He reached the Jeep a few steps behind Charlie, pushing him through the open passenger door and holstering his pistol.
“Christ,” he huffed. “I almost beat you to the Jeep.”
“I wasn’t expecting Olympic sprinters in the group,” replied Charlie, out of breath.
Once Charlie was inside, Alex slammed the door and jumped onto the running board.
“I’m on! Let’s go!”
The Jeep pitched forward, nearly yanking his bloody grip from the front passenger window. He hugged the side of the Jeep as Ed accelerated down the Maine Turnpike Approach Road, risking a glance behind them at the rapidly disappearing intersection. The bulk of the mob emerged from the bushes and swarmed the far side of the intersection, bringing at least thirty men and women into the open. From what he could tell, none of them crossed the intersection.
“Slow down!” he yelled through the window.
He heard Charlie repeat the request and felt the stiff wind weaken.
“You all right?” asked Alex, leaning his head near the window.
Charlie poked his head partway out of the window, staring at the bright red arterial spray covering Alex’s hand. “I’m fine. What about you?”
“Good to go!” he said, forming a scarlet red thumbs-up.
He was far from “good to go.” He’d just run a man through with a bayonet, leaving him to bleed out onto a dirty asphalt parking lot. The man represented an imminent threat to their group, just like Jamie’s husband.
Both of them had to go.
Emotionally and intellectually, he didn’t like his ease of transition into this frame of mind. Rationally, his experiences more than justified the evolution. His reluctance to embrace a “kill or be killed” mentality during the Jakarta Pandemic had resulted in disaster. He couldn’t make that mistake again. Threats to his rescue mission would be neutralized with extreme prejudice. Terminated if necessary.
THE ALEX FLETCHER BOXSET: Books 1-5 Page 54