She keyed her radio again. “Willie Pete! Use everything you’ve got!”
A moment later, dozens of grenades flew from the defensive works, landing among the approaching swarm. But the effect was not at all what the defenders anticipated. There were so many harvesters now that when the grenades exploded, the white phosphorus was contained within a small circle of bodies, clinging to a few individuals, rather than being spread in a wide arc.
Somewhere behind the defenders, along the shoreline of Lake Michigan, batteries of mortars went into continuous fire, laying down more white phosphorus rounds perilously close to the barricade. Harvesters died, for the mortar bombs were a lot bigger than the hand-held Willie Pete grenades, but the chitinous horrors surged forward.
“Christ, look at ‘em all!” Menendez screamed. He had stopped using controlled bursts and was just holding down the trigger of the M-60. The gun’s barrel was so hot from the continuous fire that it was smoking, and Sheridan burned her hands on the weapon’s receiver as she clipped on the next ammo belt.
That was when she was hit by the stench, an overpowering wave of the infamous harvester reek that brought tears to her eyes and made her cough.
She and Menendez ducked down as a brace of rockets streaked overhead, blasting dozens of harvesters to bits and adding to the growing conflagration of burning bodies. Glancing up, they saw one of the two Apaches that had been prowling around, now hovering overhead, just behind the barricade. The helicopter added its 30mm chin gun to the rocket fire, showering the men and women below with hot shell casings as it killed more of the monsters.
Sheridan poked her head back up and stared in horrified amazement as the things continued to press forward.
She and Menendez were still firing their weapons when the harvesters swarmed over their position.
***
They found Melissa beneath a tree at the southern end of what Dale called Symphony Lake. She was wearing a tattered flannel shirt that came halfway down to her knees over a too-large pair of jeans. On her head was a black knit cap, and a frayed blue scarf covered most of her face.
“You promised.” Her words were an accusation directed at Dale, who followed Jack and Terje from the truck.
“I know I did,” the old man told her. “But they come looking for ya, and this one,” he nodded at Jack, “says they won’t take you ‘less you say so.”
She didn’t reply, but her bright hazel eyes said enough. Dale shifted uncomfortably.
Terje kept watch while Jack came and knelt beside the girl. “Melissa, my name’s Jack Dawson. I was sent here to find you.”
Her eyes narrowed. “I’m not going back to the hospital. Not ever.”
Shaking his head, Jack told her, “We don’t want to take you back there. Melissa, I was sent by the President of the United States to find you and take you to a place where you’ll be safe.”
“The president?” Her eyes widened. “Am I in that much trouble?”
Both Jack and Terje laughed. “No, you’re not in trouble at all. The truth is that we need your help. We need it very badly. It’s sort of hard to explain — I don’t fully understand it myself — but the condition you have, the Morgellons disease, there’s something in it that we might be able to use against the harvesters. You might be able to save us all, Melissa.”
She blinked a few times, thinking over his words. “I won’t go to another hospital.” She looked up at the old man. “They can’t make me, can they, Dale?”
“He promised, girl,” Dale said, pointing to Jack.
“It’s not a hospital,” Jack told her. “It’s a big military base that has the country’s smartest people waiting for you to help them. One of them’s my girlfriend, I guess you might say. She’s very nice, and so are the other people who work there.”
“I don’t want to go.”
Jack sat back, and Terje gave him a look. To the south, the rate of artillery fire had quickened, and more aircraft were flying in, dropping a flurry of ordnance. Overhead, one of his Apache escorts made a pass over the man-made lake before turning back toward the barricade. He used the distraction to give himself time to think. He wanted her to go willingly, and didn’t want to have to carry her off kicking and screaming.
He was about to say something else when Alexander, in the carrier strapped to his back, voiced his annoyance.
Melissa’s eyes widened. “What was that?”
“That’s my cat, Alexander. Here, take a look.” Jack shrugged off the carrier and set him down so Melissa could see. The big cat stared up at her with his green eyes and meowed.
“Is he nice?”
“To people, yes. To harvesters, not so much. Here, you can pet him. He won’t bite.”
Melissa tentatively stuck a finger through the mesh top of the carrier, and Alexander licked it, then rubbed his chin against it as he began to purr.
“Wow, he really likes you. He doesn’t purr like that for just anybody,” Jack lied. “You like him?”
She nodded. “I’ve never had a kitty, or a puppy, either. My parents never would let me have one.” Her eyes suddenly welled up with tears. “They’re dead, aren’t they?” She whispered.
Jack held her gaze. “I don’t know, and that’s the truth. A lot of folks have made it to safety, but with the phone and computer networks down, it’s really hard to figure out who and where they are. I won’t lie to you: they might be gone. But there’s also a good chance they made it. We won’t know until we get out of here.”
Wiping away the wetness from her eyes, she said. “Can I hold your cat?”
“Sure.” Jack took hold of the end of the leash protruding from the top of the carrier where he’d wedged it into the zip-up top, then opened it up. “Here,” he said, picking Alexander up and putting him in her lap. “Watch out. He’s heavy.” He leaned closer as Melissa started running her hands through the cat’s fur. “There are lots of cats at the place we want to take you. You can have one of your very own if you want.”
She looked up at him, her eyes wide. “Really?”
He nodded. “You bet. And because you’re so important — even the president says so — you can probably have two cats.”
Melissa glanced up at Terje, who nodded.
Jack’s radio suddenly came to life. “Alpha Yankee Nine Seven, this is Foxtrot Romeo One Eight, come in, over.”
He glanced up at Terje. “It’s the Apache flight leader.” Jack keyed his mic. “Foxtrot Romeo One Eight, go ahead, over.”
“Be advised that we’ve got movement just west of the barricade,” the pilot told him. “Lots of movement. Recommend you evac, ASAP.”
Gunfire erupted from the barricade to their north and south just before the defenders to their west, closest to the cemetery, opened fire. Alexander hunkered down in Melissa’s lap, a low growl in his throat.
“Roger,” Jack told the Apache pilot. “We’re packing up now. Have the Black Hawk standing by to pick us up. Alpha Yankee Nine Seven, out.” Turning to Melissa, he said, “Honey, we’ve got to go, right now. Are you with us?”
Still clutching Alexander, she nodded.
“Okay, let’s get the hell out of here.” He stood up, then helped Melissa to her feet. He grabbed the empty carrier and slung it over his shoulder, not bothering to try to get Alexander back in. The cat was spooked now, and Jack knew he wouldn’t take kindly to being shoved back into the nylon cage.
“Do you hear that?” Terje said.
It took Jack a moment to hear anything over the gunfire. Then he did: the hissing, shrieking noise that harvesters made. The sound turned his blood to ice. “Hurry,” he said, pushing Melissa toward the truck.“Dale, let’s go.”
The old man was staring at the west wall, his face a mask of calm serenity. “You go on ahead. I’ll see to the Lord’s judgement.”
“Uncle Dale!” Melissa reached for him, but Jack picked her up and put her in the truck. Terje piled in after her, while Jack grabbed Alexander and got into the driver’s seat.
“It’s okay, girl,” Dale called to her. “Don’ cry for me. Go on, now.”
“You’re not going to see God,” Jack shouted as one of the Apachea, directly overhead, loosed a pair of rockets toward the barricade, “you’re going to see the gates of Hell! Get in here!”
Dale threw Jack a quick salute, then started walking toward the west wall.
“Shit!” Starting up the truck, Jack slammed it into gear, then took off along one of the winding roads through the cemetery that he hoped would get them to the landing zone before everything fell apart.
The Apache opened fire with its 30mm gun, and a moment later a rising wail began to sound throughout the zone.
Melissa grabbed his arm. “The sirens! That means the barricade’s broken! They kept telling everyone that in the hospital.”
The sound of gunfire along the barricade just west of the cemetery died off as the defenders were swept away. The only weapons still firing in their sector were the mortars somewhere to the east, which were now dropping shells right on top of the interstate, and the two Apaches assigned to cover Jack’s team, both of which were now in play, hammering targets that were far too close. The screeching and chittering of the harvesters grew ever louder.
Toward the far end of the cemetery, he saw the Black Hawk coming in to land. “Get on the radio,” he said to Terje, “and tell Hathcock to make sure the LZ is secure.”
“Understood.”
In the rear view mirror, Jack caught sight of dark shapes loping along the road behind them. More swarmed over the manicured grounds, dodging between or leaping over the headstones. The swarm grew into a black tide.
He jammed on the brakes before sending the pickup into a skidding right turn, then a quick left, tossing Melissa and Terje back and forth in the cabin before he put his foot to the floor, pushing the truck to fifty miles an hour around another of the man-made lakes.
“Hang on!” Spinning the wheel to the right, he left the road behind a big mausoleum and tore across the grave sites, taking a shortcut toward the landing zone. Melissa cried out as they slammed into a headstone, the right front fender crumpling as the marble shattered. Jack struggled with the wheel, trying to keep them from spinning out of control and dodging around a much larger gravestone that tore away the mirror on his side.
The truck bounced across another road before sailing into the next section of burial plots. Holding the accelerator to the floor, Jack drove through row after row of low-set headstones that ripped and tore at the truck’s suspension.
Their luck ran out as the truck’s rear axle caught on a headstone and tore the entire rear end out. The impact deployed the airbags. In the footwell on the passenger side, Alexander cried out, more in fear than pain.
“Dammit!” Jack tried to shake his head clear as the air bag deflated. “Are you two okay?”
“Ja,” Terje said.
“I think so,” Melissa answered.
Alexander whimpered.
“Terje, take her. I’ll get Alexander.” The Black Hawk was on the ground, only a hundred and fifty feet away.
Taking Melissa’s hand, Terje helped her out of the truck as Jack picked up Alexander, holding him close against his combat vest. He saw that Hathcock had positioned the Humvee just northwest of where the Black Hawk had set down, putting the vehicle between the helicopter and the mass of civilians running down the road toward them. The sniper was still on the vehicle’s machine gun, while the other three men were spread out, weapons leveled in the direction of the civilians.
“Oh, no,” Jack moaned. “Hurry!”
As they ran across the cleared landing zone, the Apaches fired rockets that exploded on the far side of the lake they had just passed. The 30mm guns chattered, blasting dark shadows that moved beneath the trees behind them.
He tried to key his radio, but it was impossible while holding the squirming cat. Alexander settled the matter by biting Jack’s hand. “You little shit!” Jack dumped the cat to the ground and held onto his leash. He keyed the radio again, hating himself for the words he had to say. “Hathcock! Do not let those civilians get past you! Scare them off if you can, shoot them if you have to. Understood?”
“Roger.” A heartbeat later, Hathcock raised the muzzle of the machine gun slightly and fired off a few warning shots. The stampede faltered for a moment, until some among the crowd saw the harvesters dashing through the cemetery from the west. Hundreds, then thousands, of mouths gave voice to screams of terror, and the crowd lunged toward the only way out: the Black Hawk.
“God, no,” Jack whispered as the panic-stricken people charged Hathcock and his men while he and Terje ran toward the helicopter, Melissa between them. Alexander, who Jack expected to have to haul along by his leash and harness, was in the lead, straining so hard that the leash was digging into Jack’s wrist. “Please, no!”
He cringed as the big machine gun opened fire, the index finger-sized bullets blasting through the helpless people at the front of the crowd. The M4 rifles of the other three soldiers also opened up.
It made no difference. When confronted with death by gunfire or death by harvester, the crowd instinctively headed toward the guns. In a heartbeat they’d swept past the Humvee, and Hathcock ceased fire. The three men he’d positioned in a defensive arc to protect the helicopter went down, trampled to death by the crowd.
The Black Hawk pilot gave Jack a frightened look before he hauled up on the collective, trying to get the helicopter into the air.
It was too late. The leading wave of the crowd reached the helicopter before the wheels left the ground, and people punched, kicked, and tore at one another to get aboard. The crew chief thrown to the ground, where he disappeared under the onslaught.
The helicopter’s engine screamed as the pilot fed full power to the collective, and the Black Hawk staggered into the air. The cabin was packed with people, with some hanging out the doors and more clinging to the landing gear. A few were even holding on to the rear stabilizer.
Using the distraction, Hathcock, who had somehow survived the mob, was bulling his way through the crowd in the Humvee, making his way toward them as the Black Hawk see-sawed in the air. Some civilians tried to jump into the vehicle, and Jack winced as Hathcock shot them with his pistol. The limp bodies fell back into the crowd, which pulled away from him.
“Don’t look,” Terje told Melissa, holding her to him and covering her eyes as the Black Hawk’s tail sank back toward the ground. A cloud of red spray went up as the tail rotor swept through half a dozen people just before it came apart, killing even more. Without the tail rotor to keep the helicopter’s torque under control, the Black Hawk began to spin, tilting to one side as it went down right into the middle of the crowd.
Jack closed his eyes, shutting away the horror as the rotor blades butchered dozens of people before the helicopter hit the ground. The blades splintered and went flying, killing and maiming as the Black Hawk flipped on its side and came to a shuddering stop. A chunk of the titanium spar from one of the rotor blades scythed through the engine compartment of the Humvee, and Hathcock’s hands flew up to protect his face as the hood and windshield were torn away. The vehicle rolled to a dead stop, and Hathcock, miraculously still alive and rifle in hand, staggered out, blood covering the left side of his face.
“Come on!” Jack grabbed him by the arm as they ran by. “Run like hell!” Keying his mic again, Jack called the lead Apache. “Foxtrot Romeo One Eight, this is Alpha Yankee Nine Seven. We’re on the ground just to the south of where the Black Hawk went down, heading east. Do you have us in sight?”
“Negative, Alpha Yankee Nine Seven. Too many people are down there. I can’t see you in that mob, over.”
“Understood. Just keep the harvesters off our backs as long as you can, and see if you can get us an evac!”
“Wilco, but be advised that your best egress may be to keep heading east toward Lake Michigan. It’s only a mile to the boats.”
“That’s a long goddamn mile when you
’re trying to outrun harvesters,” Jack panted, elbowing someone out of the way before they could step on Alexander, who was still straining at his leash. “Alpha Yankee Nine Seven, out.” Taking up the slack in the leash, Jack said, “Come here, you stupid cat!”
As Jack leaned down to pick up Alexander, unsnapping the leash from his harness before it became tangled and could strangle him, someone from the crowd crashed into Jack from behind, sending him tumbling to the ground.
He was spitting out grass when Hathcock yanked him to his feet and got him moving before they were separated from Terje and Melissa.
Only then did Jack realize that the cat’s harness had slipped from his hands.
Alexander was gone.
ONE WAY FORWARD
Naomi stared at the paper Kiran had given her, on which the symbols for the receptors on harvester cells had been drawn. Trying to force down her disappointment that the information wasn’t revelatory, she looked beyond what was written on the page. It told her the harvesters were serious. They could have given her a great deal less.
Did that mean she trusted them? No, not at all. But she believed, now more than ever, that their request for an alliance was genuine. They might be harboring some deeper motive in the long run, for the harvesters — at least the original generation — crafted their strategy on a time scale that could span decades or even centuries, but their immediate intent of joining forces with their human foes seemed genuine.
She looked up as Renee came over to her desk. Setting the paper down, she said, “Please tell me you have some good news.”
Renee only frowned. “I think you should see this, hon.”
Getting up from her chair and stretching the cramps out of her back, Naomi followed Renee to the workstation she used down in the lab. She had a desk here and one in the operations center, and split her time between the two. “What do you have?”
“I’ve been banging my head against the wall over the reproduction estimates,” Renee said after taking a gulp of coffee. “The figures from CIA and Homeland Security are just way too high. I put some of that down to people just overestimating the number of harvesters, because it’s hard to count the ugly buggers when they’re running around eating people. But looking at what’s been happening in the major cities here and cross-referencing what other countries are seeing…their estimates are right. Actually, they’re probably a bit low.”
Reaping The Harvest (Harvest Trilogy, Book 3) Page 12