The Last War Box Set, Vol. 2 [Books 5-7]

by Schow, Ryan

  “They’re a festering disease.”

  “Why do you hate them so much?” he asked the former head of the DHS.

  “Because they don’t contribute as much as they consume, and litter. We live in the waste of humanity. We’re constantly building and destroying, consuming and throwing things away. It’s a never ending cycle.”

  “So you did this for the earth?”

  “I did it for the meek, who will one day be gods and kings.”

  “Everyone is sold on a dream, Miles. This was yours. In a year, you won’t even recognize this country. And all you’ll be king of is your own little hovel.”

  “It a year, it won’t matter.”

  They were now on the 15/501 heading to Frederick. The three planes they saw go down weren’t the only ones. All along the horizon, plumes of smoke rose in the air. The two men didn’t speak and when things were slow moving, Ben rolled down the window and tried not to get sick. He’d seen enough green to last a lifetime, and there was still more of it. What he needed was concrete, stores, hotels, something…urban.

  By the time the sun sunk into the horizon, they drove into Frederick. From what they could see, the city looked like a veritable nightmare. Downed drones littered the streets, along with broken down cars, trucks and SUVs. They nudged along the metal guard railings, drove on the shoulder where there weren’t railings and along the grassy hillsides where they had to get around stopped cars.

  “We need gas, but we need a place to stay, too.”

  “There’s a place up there,” Ben said, thinking he could choke the life out of Miles in his sleep. Then again, with the threats he’d been leveling on the man, Miles just might do what he should have done in the first place, which was kill him before he could get the upper hand.

  They pulled over to the side of the road, tucked themselves into a nest of cars. Both men got out, jumped the guard rail and trotted into a low grass gulley. Up on the other side was the parking lot of a health services building. Miles pulled ahead; Ben caught up with him a moment later carrying a fist-sized rock.

  “Where’d you get that?”

  “Grabbed it by a drainage ditch back there.”

  Ben crossed the nearly empty parking lot, went to one of the building’s back doors and overhanded the rock at the glass door. The rock punched a hole through the glass, leaving it smashed but still intact.

  Miles kicked the rest of the glass in, then said, “You find a pair of couches, maybe some blankets somewhere, and I’ll find a vending machine or something we can eat from. Start with the first floor. Move up to the second if there’s nothing.”

  There were endless offices. Many of them had locked doors Ben tried to kick down, but couldn’t. He just didn’t have the strength. He finally found a conference room stuffed with boxes. He opened a few of the boxes, found all kinds of work supplies, but nothing he could use. Then he found another open door leading into an employee lounge. There were couches, a refrigerator, a microwave and a mini kitchen.

  Inside the fridge, there was food he could eat. He pulled out a plate with foil over the top. He peeled back the foil, then taste-tested what looked like a half of a burrito. It wasn’t bad. He didn’t care that someone else’s germs were probably on the half eaten face of it or that it wasn’t as cool as he’d hoped. Regardless, he was absolutely famished.

  Miles joined him a few minutes later with a stack of blankets. When he saw Ben was eating, he said, “What the hell, man?”

  Ben was chewing a huge bite, so instead of answering, he pointed at the fridge where there was a sandwich and a half-empty jar of dill pickles. He took one of the pickles, ate it, offered the jar to Ben, which he took.

  “In the morning we’re going to need gas,” Miles said.

  “I’m not coming with you,” he said. “I’m going to stay here.”

  “You’re coming.”

  “Let’s eat,” Ben said, “then we’ll talk in the morning.”

  Rather than fight, Miles relented, getting to work on his sandwich just after he pulled out the warm, wilted lettuce.

  In the back of his mind, all Ben wanted was for Miles to go to sleep. After that, he’d be on his own and ready to…to what? What the hell was he supposed to do now? Looking at Miles, he knew that whatever he did, he had to be able to live with it. But if he did nothing, could he live with that, too?

  Would he?

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  The second the seawater hits me I’m going under knowing that even though it’s not terribly deep, if we get caught under the boat as it goes down, things can get really bad. Trapped is trapped. Then again, clarity of mind hits you hard when everything happens so fast.

  The boat goes down, spikes the bottom of the Newport Bay fairly quickly, but all of us are scrambling toward the blown out side and swimming furiously for freedom.

  Marcus and I help the girls, going last, perhaps to our own detriment. Rather, to my detriment. I’m sure Marcus will be fine. In those last seconds before breaking the surface, the pressure on my chest and the rising panic in my mind threaten to undo me, which makes me swim harder and faster.

  I explode out of the water, take a deep, gasping breath and relish the air.

  The world we reunite with is not a pretty scene. The sun has been dimmed and nearly blotted out by the smoke. The air is hardly breathable. Covering my mouth with a hand, getting low in the water, I look around. What I see is terrifying. I’m in the water, but there are boats half sunk and in flames. All along the water’s surface, there’s an oily looking residue.

  I count five heads, breathe a sigh of relief.

  “Get up against the boat’s hull,” Marcus says, gesturing toward a nearby yacht that hasn’t been hit.

  We move together to the tall side of the yacht while Marcus scans our surroundings for a better place to hide. It makes sense. If these drones are blowing up boats, even if it’s random, then hiding out alongside a boat might not be the wisest choice.

  “Under the docks,” Marcus says, heading toward a long dock extending into the bay.

  The five of us follow Marcus to where we can stand without going under. He ducks under the metal dock. We all do the same. Other than Abigail, who can’t touch the bottom, Corrine is the shortest at maybe five foot three. Amber is a bit taller, but Marcus is taller than me and I’m almost as tall as him.

  I guess I’m thinking of this because if we’re going to be under here for awhile, Marcus is slightly bent over to keep his head from sitting on the damp underside, and Abigail can’t touch bottom without moving further down into the darkness where she’ll most certainly feel all alone. Thinking of what this terrified child must be feeling, I don’t want her away from the group. We are the poor girl’s only sense of safety.

  God, these logistics are numbing. Amber will have to hold onto her daughter and that won’t work for long periods of time in these conditions and under this kind of stress. Who knows how long we’ll be here? Bailey will have to spell her off, or Corrine who’s closer to Amber’s height than Bailey. I want to help, but I can’t. We’re men in a society that in some degree has men being extra, extra careful of how they behave around women who aren’t family or friends.

  For heaven’s sake, what has this society become?

  Looking at Amber, I say, “We’re going to be okay.”

  She starts crying and this has me feeling helpless. I want to reassure her, but how can I? What do I even say?

  “I have a daughter, too,” I finally tell her. “I want to protect her the same way you’re protecting yours.”

  “Where is she?”

  “She’s back in San Francisco.”

  “At least she’s safe,” she says, not dismissing me, but letting me know it’s not the same thing.

  “She’s not safe. San Francisco is under attack, too. She’s stuck in the city. I don’t know where she is, or if she’s even alive.”

  Saying this, I feel something sad and desperate wiggle up in me. My chest jumps the slightest
bit and she sees this. I look away because I feel the shine of tears in my eyes. I didn’t realize how much of my own helplessness I’ve been holding back. All I can think is that if I can survive this, and survive the next thing, and continue making forward progress in getting home while holding my emotions at bay, that perhaps I’ll be okay.

  But I’m not okay.

  Choking down a sob, telling myself to man up, to weather this storm, I’m surprised by the hand that comes to comfort me. It should be Bailey, but it’s not. It’s Amber.

  “Are you a good father?” she asks.

  It’s a strange, unexpected question—one I answer right away.

  “I am.”

  “Does she know you love her?” she asks.

  “She does.”

  “Then let that help you on your way home. If she knows this, she’ll gather up the strength she needs to survive, or at least not go down without a fight.”

  “Is that how you feel about your father?”

  “Yes.”

  “I want to help you where I can, but only if you want it.”

  “I do.”

  Slowly, the tears still standing in my eyes, I nod my head and realize that in the midst of this chaos, stuck in the middle of hell with the walls coming down all around us, we can get past the horrible things we do to each other in society and just be good people helping each other out.

  For whatever reason, this matters to me. Maybe it makes me soft in the eyes of people like Marcus, but maybe it’s what makes me human as well. Maybe this is the good part of me I need to recognize for those dark times when I dream of Tyler, or think of people like Quentin and The Warden.

  The way things are shaping up, before this thing ends, a lot of people are going to die. Maybe the people I’m with. Maybe my daughter. I hate that this is true, and I might not be ready for it, but I will be. I have to be. And with people like Amber reminding me that I’m doing what I can and the rest I have to put in God’s hands, or whatever, I feel some of the burden of this journey coming off my shoulders.

  So now that we’re safe, things have slowed to a crawl. Marcus says this is what “Hurry up and wait,” feels like. It’s maddening.

  “Can you hold her for a few minutes?” Amber asks me. “My arm needs a break.”

  “That okay with you?” I ask Abigail.

  She looks down and thankfully Corrine steps up and says, “I can hold her if you want.”

  Abigail reaches for her and honestly I’m secretly thankful. I’m good with kids, but some kids aren’t good with strangers unless there’s some connection, even if the only connection is gender. Other than that, the only true connection amongst any of us is between me and Bailey. And even that is sketchy at best considering she has a fiancée at home and we’ve been…intimate.

  Man I soooo don’t want to think about that right now!

  So we hurry up and wait. And some of us pray for strength and guidance. And others of us rest and plot and strategize. Looking around, we’re all in this thing together. Same as when the four of us—Marcus, Bailey, Quentin and myself—were thrown together in a car, in a hotel room, racing down hotel stairwells and suddenly on a boat together.

  We’re all just strangers. Strangers in need of each other. Strangers trying to protect ourselves and each other in the midst of extraordinary circumstances.

  With the underside of the dock inches above our heads and the cold water lapping at our chins, it’s damn near impossible not to feel claustrophobia setting in. We’re trying not to freak out listening to each other breathing, listening to the air around us as we try to decide if we’re going to die here together, or make it.

  “Something just brushed my leg,” Corrine says. Her eyes are full of terror, and now she’s frozen stiff. Abigail climbs higher up on her, looking down in the water. She finds her mother, reaches out to her.

  Bailey says, “I can take you, Abigail. Your mom needs a rest. Reluctantly she goes to her as Corrine stands there looking down at the water with that same terrified look still on her face.

  “I felt it, too,” I tell her. “It’s probably just fish.”

  “What if it’s a snake?” she asks, her teeth chattering, honest to God fear swimming in her eyes.

  “It’s not,” I say, even though I can’t be sure. I’m a city boy, not a marine biologist. I couldn’t tell her what was swimming in these waters. Fish and more fish I suspect. “All I know is, whatever it was that brushed by us is a lot better than those drones.”

  “Shhh,” Marcus says, lightly.

  We return to a hush, standing cool in air too damp and too dank for comfort. Sediment seeps into our shoes, there are things swimming around us and our skin is turning to a hard prune-like texture. Within an hour, we’re all shivering, our skin cold to the touch, and every single one of us ready to not be under the damn dock anymore. But we have to be sure it’s safe...

  I turn and look at Marcus and he shakes his head, like he gets it, like he knows it’s time.

  “Yeah,” he says to me.

  “I’ll go first, check it out,” I say.

  Bailey sneaks her hand into mine under the water, gives it a quick pump then looks at me with that look in her eye. The look that says be careful. The look that says she wants me to be okay, to live. My blue lips curl into a smile. I like her and she knows this. She likes me, too. What in God’s name did I get myself into with her?

  “I’ll be right back,” I say, then drop down and swim out into the bay, relishing the open space once more. It’s still a gut wrenching sight. There’s so much smoke! So much so that it’s still a little difficult to see with the polluted air burning your eyes.

  I duck back under the dock and say to Marcus, “It’s really bad out here, but I think it’s clear.”

  “What’s the likelihood that it’s not?” he asks.

  “Fifty-fifty. Maybe more. I can’t really see too far, but nothing’s blown up for awhile and I don’t hear anything beyond a few burning boats.” He starts to speak, but I cut him off because he needs to know. “There’s also this oily looking slick on the surface of the water I don’t want to be in or around. I’m not sure if it can catch on fire or what.”

  “What kind of slick? An oily slick you said?”

  “Gas maybe? Oil? I can’t really tell. It’s too hard to see out there and I’m not really good about that kind of thing anyway.”

  The six of us leave the safety of the dock and swim out under the cover of gross, dusty skies. We follow Marcus to the shore. He puts his hand up to keep us from following him, makes a fist to say stop.

  He heads up the shore and a few minutes later, he returns and says, “We’re good. Let’s go.”

  One by one, we pile out of the water, follow Marcus through the streets, marveling at the destruction a few flyby’s left behind. Not everything is destroyed. Some homes are only half burnt, some are still on fire and some are now catching others on fire since these homes stand nearly shoulder to shoulder with each other.

  “This is crazy,” Amber says taking it all in. Abigail walks beside her mother, holding her hand and weeping. When we get to the house we were staying at, we’re grateful to see it’s still standing and not in any immediate danger. By the look of it, Amber’s home survived, too.

  “Do you think they’ll be back?” Amber asks.

  “Not likely,” I say, “but we can’t really be sure.”

  “You should stay with us,” Bailey says, forgetting or ignoring the fact that there are six of us and three rooms and I’m not anxious to sleep on a couch when we can all have beds.

  “That’s okay,” Amber says. “We can stay in our own home.”

  “Then you should at least come to dinner and we can talk about getting off the island. That is, if we can still use your boat. How many bedrooms does it have?”

  “Three,” she says, still looking a little lost and frazzled.

  I’m doing the math, thinking if Marcus sleeps on deck, Bailey and I can share a room, Corrine can have her
own room and Amber and Abigail can have their room.

  Yeah, this could work.

  “If my father comes back and sees the boat gone, if he doesn’t know where to find me, I’m not sure what that’ll do to him.”

  “How do you know he’s coming back?” Corrine asks, deadpan.

  Amber wipes her eyes and says, “I don’t know that he’s coming back.”

  “I get it,” she says.

  “Do you?”

  “My dad was killed in front of me. When I left with Marcus, at least I knew he wouldn’t be looking for me. At least I knew he’d want me safe.”

  “What about your mother?”

  “She left us.”

  I take a deep, involuntary breath thinking of this poor girl. She loses her mother to neglect, loses her father to a pack of murderous thugs, gets indoctrinated into the seedy underworld of child trafficking all before she’s old enough to go to college.

  No one really says anything because it’s hitting all of us hard, even Marcus, who almost never shows emotion.

  “I’m sorry,” Amber says. “We’ll join you for dinner. What time?”

  “Maybe an hour before sunset?” Bailey answers. “Unless something else happens…”

  “What if it does?”

  “Then we’ll make our way toward each other,” Marcus says. “Same as we just did.”

  Amber and Abigail return that evening with a bottle of wine and fresh clothes. They still aren’t put together that well because there’s no water or electricity, so being clean and doing your makeup isn’t going to be as high a priority as say digging bits of fiberglass out of your skin. Not that I care. People are not their looks and anyone who says otherwise is bound to have a reality check in days like these.

  Dinner is a little quiet, the wine takes some of the edge off us and in the end we all enjoy what we can of the evening before the important conversation takes place.

  What to do about the boat…

  “I think you should take it,” Amber says. “Abigail and I don’t really have anywhere to go, but we don’t want to leave either. I’ve come to terms with the fact that my father is probably dead and that I don’t want to leave the only thing I have left, which is this house.”