Darker Days

by A. J. Powers

  Dusty continued with her rhythmic breathing as she flicked the safety off. The jittery crosshairs slowly came to a standstill, finally resting on the man’s temple as he looked for a target of his own.

  It was almost poetic.

  Her finger rested on the polymer stock just above the trigger while she waited for the wind to die down. Knowing she would only have one chance, she waited patiently for the right moment. As quiet as the round was, there was no mistaking a hunk of lead whizzing by at 900 feet per second. If she failed to deliver a kill shot on the first trigger pull, the sniper would be gone before she could cycle the next round. It had to be perfect.

  The wind weakened, but anything more than a gentle spring breeze would affect the slow moving 40-grain projectile. She had planned to wait just a little longer but the man’s rifle suddenly stopped panning the horizon and jumped back to the left. He stayed put for several seconds, then pushed the rifle stock harder into his shoulder; his entire body tensed up.

  The conditions were not ideal, but Dusty wasn’t going to let him strike again. Calmly, she moved her finger to the trigger and took another deep breath. She exhaled slowly; halfway through, she stopped. Her pounding heart was all she felt—all she heard—when she squeezed the trigger.

  *Clack*

  The noise, along with the recoil from the Mark II was anticlimactic. Dusty never lost complete focus on the scope, but it took a moment to reacquire the target. He was still there and still holding his rifle.

  “What?” she said in quiet disbelief as she moved her eyes off the scope to cycle the next round.

  She thought for sure when she looked back through the scope the man would be gone, shouting to the others about the botched assassination attempt, but he was still lining up his shot. Miraculously, the man had not heard the miss. Dusty had no idea where her bullet had gone, and without a spotter she wasn’t even going to venture a guess. Unwilling to throw away this gift of a second chance, Dusty placed the Mark II off to her side and reached for the X-Bolt. The comfortable familiarity of the rifle allowed her to quickly chamber a round, locate her target and press on the trigger, finding that nanometer gap that separated the man from this life and the next.

  Ready to fire a follow up—and more devastating—shot, Dusty aimed at the shooter eighty or so yards out. With that rifle in her hands, however, the man might as well be sipping on a cup of coffee five feet away. She hesitated for a moment as her mind questioned her exit strategies, but she had already gone over her plan a thousand times; now was not the time for reevaluations.

  “Lights out, dude,” she mumbled as she prepared to fire, but suddenly, alarms inside her head sounded off, causing her to pause once more.

  She eased her finger off the trigger ever so slightly as she noticed a small black dot appear on the side of the man’s ski mask. Dusty reached up and twisted the zoom on her scope, maxing out the magnification which was not practical for the shot she planned to take, but enough to see the strange anomaly in more detail.

  The black dot had a tinge of red to it, and it was slowly consuming the surrounding white wool.

  Dusty fully released the trigger, but kept her eye on the scope. “No way,” she mumbled under her breath. She watched in awe as the German rifle slowly broke out of the man’s grip, smacking into a few branches before disappearing into the snow at his feet.

  After another thirty seconds, the small dot had grown to the size of a silver dollar. The man hadn’t so much as flinched since dropping the rifle, and the lack of vapor flying away from his mouth confirmed it.

  Tango Down.

  Though she was still in shock from the historic kill, there was no time to revel in her absurd accuracy. The sniper’s presence meant an assault could begin at any moment, and she needed to be back inside the walls by that time.

  She put the X-Bolt back on safe and then did the same with the Mark II. She then wriggled her way out of the sleeping bag and started her long, painful belly-crawl back to safety. Having spent nearly two straight days in the sleeping bag, never leaving once, she would not be taking it back with her. Being a patient sniper was not for the faint of heart.

  Dusty was a few hundred yards from her exfiltration point when the assault began. She climbed to her feet—her legs even wobblier than she had anticipated—and started to run. Her mission was accomplished; the sniper was dead. At this point it didn’t matter whether they saw her or not, all that mattered was getting to the other side of the fence before she caught a bullet.

  The gunfight toward the front of the town had intensified, but as far as she could tell, no one had spotted her yet. “Kilroy!” Dusty yelled as she approached the fence. The code word was the signal to toss a rope over the fence, but panic hit hard when the rope didn’t come. “KILLROY!” she shouted again, straining her vocal cords until they burned.

  Nothing.

  Convinced that nobody was around to hear her cries, she immediately started thinking of a backup plan. Then, like a nylon guardian angel, a rock climbing rope launched over the top of the fence, the knot on the end smacking down onto the other side with a thunk. Thank God!

  Dusty could no longer feel her legs, and she wasn’t totally convinced her brain was even the one giving the orders—it seemed adrenaline had once again taken over the operation entirely. But she was moving in the right direction, so she didn’t care to question how.

  When she got within a couple yards of the fence, Dusty lunged forward, expelling the last bit of strength her body had to offer. She smacked into the reinforced fence and grasped onto the rope as if the braided fibers were life itself.

  Reaching the fence was the easy part. Scaling it, however, was too much to ask of her fatigued body to take on. But she didn’t give up. Dusty screamed out in pain as she forced her muscles to work well beyond their limits. It felt like hours had passed by the time she managed to get halfway up the fence when suddenly…

  PING

  A bullet struck a lightweight I-beam just a few feet away. The deafening concussions from the impact further disoriented Dusty’s already muddled head, causing her to lose her grip on the rope. The pain from the fall was intense, but as she stared up at the rope still bouncing off the side of the fence, she watched several bullets pound the fence right where she had dangled seconds earlier. She reminded herself that if she felt pain, she was still alive.

  “Dusty!” A voice cried out from the other side of the fence. The ringing in her ears had waned enough to just barely make out Morgan’s voice. “North border!”

  Before she could get to her feet, the rope had slithered back over the top, hopefully making its way to the back of the property.

  With the world spinning, Dusty stumbled forward, increasing her speed with each step. More shots peppered the fence, a melody of metal ricochets and small, wooden explosions gave Dusty the proper motivation to not let up.

  Focused on keeping her balance, Dusty never gave her attackers a glance. Returning fire would not only be completely ineffective, but probably a fatal mistake. The only option was to run. What’s another five football fields, she thought.

  As if her mind had briefly stopped functioning but her body kept moving, Dusty couldn’t remember how she got to the north-western corner of the property, but there she was, still alive, and nearly home free.

  Another close call from enemy fire snapped her from her trance. As she reached the edge of the fence line, she slapped the corner post with her right arm, using it, and her momentum, to swing her around the back. She was now out of the sightlines of the shooters.

  The rope was already waiting for her at the nearest point without razor wire, just another fifty feet to go. Forty. Thirty.

  Dusty’s legs finally gave out, causing her to smack into the snowy ground with a breathless thud. A loud, furious voice inside her head demanded she get up, but her muscles were no longer taking orders. I was so close, she thought, her spirits throwing in the towel along with her body.

  She could hear shouting com
ing from the other side of the fence and scrambled movement between the slats, but none of it made any sense. It didn’t matter. Arlo’s men would round the fence corner at any moment. It was over.

  “Ow!” a voice cried out from above.

  Dusty mustered enough energy to look up as Morgan hiked her leg over the top of the fence trying to avoid the razor wire.

  “No, don’t come for me,” Dusty said, her words barely loud enough for her to hear, let alone Morgan.

  Morgan landed on the ground a few feet in front of Dusty, absorbing the impact about as perfectly as one could. Her hands bled and her coat and pants were sliced in several spots. “Get your ass up, Dusty! It’s time to move!” she said as she grabbed Dusty’s arm, pulling on her.

  With Morgan’s assistance, Dusty got to one knee, and then the other. Shortly after, she was on her feet again, hobbling forward. With one arm over Morgan’s shoulder, the pair limped the rest of the way to the rope.

  “Get ready, guys!” Morgan yelled as she leaned Dusty up against the fence next to the rope.

  Dusty’s world was getting darker.

  “Stay with me, Dusty, you’re almost there,” Morgan said, trying to sound calm. “Hold your arms up,” she said.

  Dusty was unable to oblige.

  Morgan fished the rope around Dusty’s back, keeping it under her armpits. She pulled the rope to the front and tied a haphazard knot across her chest.

  “Go! Go! Go!” Morgan shouted.

  Dusty felt a sharp pain as her shoulders jolted upward, and the ground dropped from beneath her feet. The awful grind of the rope sliding across the top of the fence brought her back from the grips of unconsciousness just long enough to see Morgan standing below, wounded and unarmed, waiting for the same lifeline to be thrown back to her.

  Chapter 34

  “You ready to go?” Clay asked as he peeked his head inside Megan’s room.

  “Almost. Just need to get my socks and boots on,” Megan replied casually as she pulled a sock over her foot. “By the way,” she added, “I know you’re pretty confident this place is secure and all, but I’m really not digging the idea to leave all of the pills here. If by chance someone does get in here, then we just handed over the high of a lifetime. And besides, it’s not like they take up much space in my pack.”

  It was true, the place was not exactly Fort Knox, but besting the wall surrounding the bunker itself would be no easy feat without the key code. However, once inside the walls, it wouldn’t take much effort to gain access to the bunker through the observation deck, just as Clay had done himself. But, at the same time, they were about to trek into uncharted territory, and Clay was not the “put all your eggs in one basket” kind of guy. “How about this,” Clay said, “leave one of the bags here—we’ll find a good place to hide it—and bring the other with us?”

  Megan nodded. “That seems reasonable,” she said as she fished one of the bags out of her pack.

  Clay also didn’t mind the idea of having some pain meds on hand while traveling, should a need arise. The weak, over-the-counter pills were only so effective back when they were fresh off the shelf, let alone seven or eight years past their prime.

  Slapping her hands on her thighs, Megan stood up from the bed. She picked up her pack and the bag of pills and said, “All right, let’s find a place to stash these so we can head out.”

  Clay was both surprised and relieved with Megan’s abrupt shift in mood. He wanted to prod her over the complete about-face from yesterday, but thought better of it. The need to avoid distractions while traveling today overpowered his curiosity. Sleeping dogs would just have to stay put.

  Clay pushed the call button on the elevator, and the doors immediately opened for them. They both walked inside and Clay pressed a button.

  “Oooh! SB-Two?” Megan said with a mysterious tone in her voice. “Have you been down there before?”

  “Unfortunately.”

  “Unfortunately?” Megan asked, but quickly understood what Clay meant as they were met by the god-awful stench of Sub-Basement Two.

  “Oh, sweet mother, this is awful!” Megan said, breathing through her mouth.

  Even Clay was taken aback by the appalling smell, and he had braced for it. The smell got worse as they walked down the hall, as did Megan’s gagging. She tried to distract her brain by focusing on the echoes from her and Clay’s boots. The mental trickery only lasted so long, and by the time they had reached the cell Clay had stayed in during his first night at Smith’s, the pungent odor had overpowered Megan’s stomach.

  “I’m sorry, I can’t—I mean, I-I think I’m gonna—” Megan turned and left the room in a hurry.

  “Yeah, try sleeping in it,” Clay said, certain she couldn’t hear him over the sound of her dry heaving. Shortly after, the shrill squeak of the elevator doors splitting apart filled the concrete hallway before the elevator’s grinding motor kicked on.

  Eager to get out of the toxic air as soon as possible, Clay got to work. He moved the cot in the back corner of the room, uncovering a small vent near the bottom of the wall. He used his multi-tool to break loose the crusty screws from the wall before finishing the job by hand. He placed the bag of pills a foot or so back and then quickly replaced the vent cover. Confident nobody would discover the pills inside—after all, it’s not as if the DEA would be raiding the place, checking every nook and cranny for narcotics—Clay turned around and urgently walked back down the hall. Thankfully, Megan had been kind enough to send the elevator back down.

  When the doors opened at Basement One, Clay saw Megan sitting against the wall, pinching the bridge of her nose with her finger and thumb. Her eyes were closed and her face was green.

  Clay laughed. “You okay?”

  Megan replied with a nauseated groan before she slid her thumb and finger off her nose and rubbed at her eyes. “That was, without a doubt, the worst smell I’ve ever experienced,” she said, gagging just from the thought of it. Her closed eyes began to water.

  “Well, I put the pills in there, so you have to be the one to go get them when we get back,” Clay joked.

  Megan shook her head, “Uh uh, no way. You can leave the gate open and tape a detailed map to the pills on the front door. Let some junkie have them, cuz’ I am not going back down there without a hazmat suit or something.”

  “If I recall correctly, when we were kids you once told me that you had an iron stomach,” Clay jabbed.

  Instead of taking the bait, Megan focused on not throwing up. It took several minutes before she was finally able to stand back up—the threat of horking up her breakfast finally subsiding.

  “You good?”

  “Yeah,” Megan said, blinking her eyes rapidly. “I think.”

  Clay was antsy to get going. With a snow day yesterday, and the shorter days already putting them at a disadvantage, it was imperative Clay and Megan made up time over the next few days of traveling.

  Megan opted for the stairs to avoid a relapse from the lingering smell in the elevator. Clay didn’t put up a fight. The color in Megan’s face returned more and more with each step away from the basement. And by the time they had reached the security checkpoint just inside the front door, she was back to normal.

  Clay unlatched the deadbolt and pushed on the green, metal door.

  It was stuck.

  Repeated attempts to push the door open were all met with failure. “Guess we’re climbing out the windows,” Clay said as he walked back toward the stairwell. Megan lagged behind.

  Just before they reached the observation deck, Clay stopped Megan. “Wait here.”

  He was serious about making smarter, more thorough choices moving forward. He would no longer allow time and convenience to dictate his actions; that kind of lazy behavior would stop immediately.

  Stopping just short of the doorway, Clay flipped the ARAK off safe and pushed the rifle into his shoulder. He leaned out into the room and looked around, focusing his attention mostly out the windows. His chief concern wa
s not of danger lurking around the corner, but a thief watching from afar, waiting to jump on an opportunity.

  Though the sky was gray, it had stopped snowing hours ago, providing a clear, near-white canvas of terrain that would make movement of any kind easy to spot. Clay took his time scanning his surroundings, looking for anything out of place. Apart from the tattered remains of an American flag hanging near the front gate and a few feral dogs far off in the distance, the scene was perfectly still.

  Clay turned back toward the hallway, “All right, you’re good.”

  Clay stepped through the window onto the shaky metal catwalk just outside. It creaked and groaned as he leaned over the railing, looking for the best way down. He noticed several snow drifts climbing up the wall, one nearly reaching the bottom off the catwalk. He turned around and gave a quick nod to his sister.

  “Just don’t fall and break your neck,” Megan added her two cents.

  Climbing over the handrail, Clay slowly lowered himself down onto the tightly packed snow mound and eased his weight down while still grasping the railing of the catwalk. After nearly sinking a foot into the drift, Clay was able to regain his balance and trudge his way to the ground. Even on the ground, though, the snow was up to his knees. So much for making up for lost time,” he thought to himself.

  Clay moved over to the gate as Megan climbed down, following the same path he had taken. Without a shovel, it took the better part of fifteen minutes to get the gate cleared enough to open, and even then, they had to side-step their way out. If another blizzard were to hit on their return trip, they might not be able to get back in. Clay shrugged that concern off. Today has enough problems.

  Slogging through the snow was a grueling battle of strength and endurance. By the time they lost sight of the FEMA camp’s boundaries, half the day had come and gone—a testament not only to their slowed pace but also to the massive size of the camp.