by James Harden
"Do we go around?" I asked.
"I don't think there is an 'around'." Maria informed me.
I looked back at the map on the GPS. She was right. The golf course was surrounded by block after block of suburbia. The next golf course was the only difference in the landscape.
"Our best option is to take the most direct route," Daniel said. "We sprint down this road, sticking to the middle of the street. It’s only for a few blocks. And then we’re out on the other side, on to the next golf course."
We all knelt there for a second, catching our breath, trying not to imagine all the horrors that could be hiding out of sight.
"I thought you said all the golf courses were connected, one after the other?" Jack asked me.
"Well, they are," I said. "Except for this one. And it’s only separated by a few blocks. The next golf course is just down this road."
And on the map it didn't look that far at all. But in reality, down on ground level, it looked like a never ending sprawl of houses and side streets and picket fences and two car garages.
"But anything could be hiding in these streets," Maria said. "These houses could be full of infected people or spider monsters or whatever."
Kenji shook his head. "I’m not so sure. I think most of the people living in the suburbs closest to the city would’ve been evacuated or forced to leave their homes."
"By the military?" Jack asked.
"Yeah. So there’s a good chance they could be deserted."
"But there’s also a good chance these houses aren’t deserted," I said as I started to feel guilty for suggesting this route. "Just like the fuel station."
Daniel stood up and took a step towards the suburban street. "Look, we don’t have a choice. This is the most direct route. This is the quickest way. If we take any longer, if we deviate from our course, we could get lost. Or worse, we could get stranded. It’s already mid-afternoon. We’ve only got a few hours of sunlight left. I do not want to be walking these streets at night."
He was right. We really didn’t have a choice. We just had to grit our teeth and run for it.
"All right let’s go," Kenji said. "Everyone keep your eyes peeled. And stay alert."
We made our move, sticking close together this time. We were in sort of a diamond formation. Daniel was at the front and Kenji and I were at the rear. Jack and Maria we’re in the center.
We stuck to the middle of the street. There was no real point in checking down each driveway or down each side street to see if anything was there. We just had to keep running. We only had one destination and that was the golf course a few blocks away.
I think we initially tried to run as quietly as possible, making sure our footsteps were soft and our breathing was controlled. But after awhile, we started running faster and faster. Our footsteps became louder and so did our breathing.
About five minutes later the road swerved around to the left and ran alongside the golf course. We jumped over a small fence and made it back out into the open of the fairways.
Being back out in the open was a huge relief, like a huge weight had been lifted off my shoulders. I felt like it was easier to breath. I wouldn't be able to live with myself if I had led us into a trap.
We followed the course as it connected to the next one. We then skirted around a large water feature that was big enough to be a lake. The terrain then turned into sort of a marshland or swamp. Up ahead we could see the airport.
We were about two and a half miles away from the very edge of the airport’s boundary fence. Luckily the natural vegetation, the trees and the long grass of the swamp provided us with plenty of cover so we weren’t exposed.
Daniel was out in front of the group when he stopped. He was hiding in amongst a patch of long grass, like a lion would as it watched its prey.
He waved us over.
I made it to him first and we had to wait a few minutes while Jack, Kenji and Maria caught up. When they finally arrived they were breathing hard. But to their credit, they each had a quiet and determined look on their faces. Amazingly they seemed to be coping quite well with all the running. I guess their fitness levels had increased over the past few weeks. It was pretty amazing how the human body could adapt and make itself stronger when it was forced to.
"Remember the plan," Daniel said. "Rebecca and I will go in and make contact. If anything goes wrong we’ll be running back here while Kenji provides cover fire."
We nodded our heads in agreement. Although I think we sort of ignored the fact that if we were running away from the military it would be slightly different than running away from the infected. The biggest difference being they would have guns. And bombs.
But I guess we still had one major advantage. We’d be running back into hostile territory. And I'd bet my last dollar they wouldn’t chase us very far. No freakin way.
"OK, who has the radio?" I asked, looking at Jack.
"I don’t have it," he replied. "I thought you had it?"
"I don’t have it."
I looked at Maria, pleading with my eyes but she shook her head.
"Kenji?" I asked.
"I never had it."
"We must’ve left it in the Humvee."
In my mind’s eye I could picture it resting on the dashboard of the Humvee. Just sitting there, completely out of reach and completely useless.
"What about your suits?" Kenji asked. "Do they have built in comms?"
"They do," Daniel answered. "But they’re only tuned to communicate with a specific frequency. To each other basically."
"So if you can communicate with each other, one of you stay and one of you go."
"My radio doesn’t work," I said. "I think it was busted when I fell out of the Osprey."
"What’s an Osprey," Maria asked.
"It’s like an airplane."
"You fell out of a plane?"
"Yeah. We were attacked in midair."
"We don’t know that we were attacked," Daniel said, as if he was in denial.
"Well, an engine blew up or something," I continued. "But yeah, I fell out. Luckily I was wearing a parachute but I still hit the ground pretty hard. If I wasn’t wearing this suit I would’ve died. After the fall, I tried using the radio thingy built into my helmet but it didn’t work. There was just too much static and it was making too much noise. I had to throw it away."
"So, basically we have no radio," Jack said. "Is that what you’re trying to say?"
"This doesn’t change anything," Daniel said. "Rebecca and I will still get as close as we can and try and make contact. We’re still running the same risks. Nothing has changed. The radio was a piece of crap anyway," he said in an attempt to calm everyone down.
I guess playing the blame game did more harm than good. We needed to stick together, not tear each other apart.
"Just like before," Daniel continued. "We go in with our cloaks activated. And Kenji will cover us. How much ammo do you have left?"
"I’m out," Kenji answered.
Daniel slid the magazine out of his rifle and handed it to Kenji. "I think there’s about half a clip in there."
Kenji put his empty magazine in his pocket and re-loaded with Daniel's half clip of ammo.
Wow. Half a clip. I'm no expert in guns or anything but half a clip of ammunition was not good. It couldn't be any more than fifteen or so bullets. If we were attacked right now, we wouldn't have the option of shooting to defend ourselves. At least not for very long.
"All right, let’s get this over with." I said.
"Wait, how will you make contact with the military?" Maria asked.
"We'll find a way." Daniel said.
Jack then suggested something about how we could make a smoke signal. And even though he was joking around and trying to lighten the mood it was actually a good idea.
"Good luck," Maria said.
Kenji finished loading his rifle and moved off to find a vantage point. I felt like hugging him, hugging all of them. I wanted a proper good bye. J
ust in case. But maybe it was better to get this over with as quickly as possible.
Daniel and I activated our cloaking devices and headed towards the airport.
We made our way through a few hundred yards of swamp land. Pretty soon we were knee deep in muddy water.
On our right was a main road that was choked with abandoned cars. The road curved around in front of us and elevated up on to a bridge that passed over the swamp.
We approached the bridge cautiously and walked underneath it. On the other side of the bridge was the road that circumnavigated the boundary of the airport. And just on the other side of this road was the perimeter fence.
All along the fence were temporary machine gun bunkers made up of portable concrete barriers and sandbags. Each bunker contained at least two heavy duty machine guns.
But these were all abandoned. Every last one of them.
And all around the bunkers were empty bullet shells and dried blood. Lots of dried blood.
On the other side of the fence, directly in front of us was a small rectangular building. According to the sign on its wall it was the home of ‘Scenic Sydney Helicopter Tours’. And behind that building was an enormous parking lot that was either for rental cars or maybe long term parking.
Beyond the parking lot were the runways and airport terminals. The runways spanned in all directions. It was a huge, flat, wide open space.But strangely there was no movement. There were no jets, no choppers, no tanks and no Humvees. There weren’t even any helicopters at the scenic tour place. There was nothing.
"What do you think?" I asked Daniel.
"I think it’s abandoned. I think they’ve bugged out."
"Maybe they’re all hiding?" I suggested.
"It’s possible. But why would they leave these guns here. Why are there no jets? No choppers. Nothing."
Daniel looked through the scope on his rifle up at the air traffic control tower.
"See anything?" I asked
"Nothing. It’s ghost town in there."
"So what do we do now?"
"I don't know. But I think we should get the others and check it out. It looks pretty empty. Maybe we can hide out here for a few days. Maybe we can find some more supplies. Stuff they left behind like ammo and food. Maybe another Humvee."
"Maybe a chopper," I said hopefully.
"Yeah, maybe. Although I’m guessing if they retreated they would’ve taken every available bird they had."
"But if we find one, maybe a civilian one, would you be able to fly us out?"
"If there’s any sort of aircraft. And I mean any sort. I’ll be flying us out right away."
"Even a hot air balloon?"
"Well, that would be painfully slow but yes, even a hot air balloon."
Daniel’s confidence brought a smile to my face. It was good to know that even when his back was up against the wall he would keep fighting the very end. He had lost so much on this mission. He was the last man standing from his team. He was stranded. Surrounded. On the run.
But he would never give up. He reached across then and held my hand. He didn't say anything though. He didn't need to. When he squeezed my hand it said everything that he couldn't. I squeezed his hand back as we stared at the huge expanse of Sydney Airport.
Chapter 37
We made it back to the others, deactivating our invisibility cloaks when we were only a few feet away. As a result we accidentally scared them.
"Jesus!" Jack yelled as he stumbled back. "Can you please not sneak up on us like that?"
"Sorry."
"What if my ninja training had kicked in and I’d accidentally killed you both?"
"Shut up, Jack." Maria said.
Kenji then appeared from his hiding spot. He seemed to be able to become invisible without the aid of a special suit. I guess he was sort of like a real life ninja. He’d definitely had a lot of training from his father. I was always amazed at how much stuff he knew when he used to teach me in his basement.
"So what happened," Kenji asked. "Did you make contact?"
"No," Daniel answered. "It looks like they’ve abandoned the airport. No one’s home."
Jack threw his hands in the air. "Why am I not surprised? Of course it’s abandoned. They’ve been gone for awhile now. We’re totally on our own here. Why do you think no one came to the aid of that convoy at the SCG?"
"So, what now?" Maria asked.
"I say we go in," Daniel said. "We could find another hiding place. We could find supplies. Ammo, food. Maybe even a car. If there’s a chopper or any sort of aircraft, I can fly us out of here."
Jack and Maria's faces lit up. There’s nothing like hearing a piece of good news in the midst of absolute horror to lift your spirits. Although Kenji didn’t seem too phased by this revelation. Maybe he thought all the usable aircraft would’ve been taken.
"But even if we can’t find any choppers or vehicles," Kenji added, in an attempt to bring Jack and Maria back to earth. "Like Daniel said, we should be able to find a place to rest up for a few days."
And rest was valuable, I thought to myself. We had been running for our lives non-stop. We needed to rest. The human body can't be this jacked up on adrenalin for this long without crashing.
Kenji looked through the scope on his rifle in the direction of the airport. "All right guys, lead the way."
We trudged back through the long grass and the muddy water of the swampland to the perimeter fence. Daniel and I led the way. Kenji brought up the rear. Jack and Maria were in the middle.
When we arrived at the perimeter fence, Kenji and Daniel briefly checked the closest machine gun bunkers to see if there was any spare ammunition for their rifles. But there was none. All they found were empty bullet shells and dried blood. No bodies, though.
We were starting to realize there were never any bodies.
The red dust seemed to be less oppressive out here. Visibility was pretty good. The sky still had a weird red tinge to it, like we were on Mars but it wasn’t as thick. We could even the sun as it began its descent over the western horizon. The sun looked weird, like a blue orb instead of its normal orangey, yellow color.
We slipped underneath a hole in the fence and made our way past the helicopter tour place and through the huge parking lot of what we assumed were rental cars. We were walking through row after row of small cars and mid-sized cars and large family cars when suddenly, way off in the distance; we heard the buzzing noise of a propeller engine. A small aircraft was flying towards us. It was coming in fast.
Kenji heard it first and motioned for us to get down. "Take cover underneath the cars!" he said. "All the way underneath. Make sure your arms and legs aren’t exposed."
Jack and Maria dived under a large family sedan. Jack had his arm around Maria, pulling her close into his chest. Kenji and I hid under the car next to them.
But Daniel had remained standing. He quickly activated his cloaking device and moved out into the open. He moved away from the Toyota we were hiding under to see if he could get a better look at the jet or airplane or whatever it was.
"Can you see it?" Kenji asked.
"Yeah. It’s a drone. Looks like a Predator."
"What’s a drone," I asked.
"It’s an unmanned aircraft." Kenji answered. "Mainly used for reconnaissance missions."
"So there’s no pilot in that plane?"
"No. It’s all automatic. It has sensors that..." Kenji trailed off like he’d just thought of something important. "Daniel. I think you should get under the car. The Predator’s have infrared sensors. You’re not invisible to infrared!"
"It’s fine," Daniel replied. "The suit reduces the heat signature of the wearer. It can’t see me."
"Are you sure?"
"Yes, I’m positive. Besides, it’s not even looking over here. It seems to be doing a wide, low circle of the airport terminals. Definitely a recon mission. Looks like it’s checking out the airplane hangars."
"The hangars?" Maria asked. "What's it lookin
g for?"
"Not sure," Daniel said. "Maybe the military want to see if it’s safe to return?"
"So they don’t know we’re here?" Jack asked.
"I don't know," Daniel replied. "I don’t think so."
"So what the hell is it doing here then?"
"Maybe it's not looking for us," Maria offered. "Maybe it's looking for something else."
Eventually, after a few minutes the noise of the propeller faded off into the distance.
"It’s heading back out to sea," Daniel said.
"What do we do now?" I asked.
In front of us was nothing but wide open space for at least several miles. Off to the right was one terminal and off to the left was the other. I guess, the smaller one was the domestic terminal and the bigger one was the international terminal.
The domestic terminal was a bit closer, not by much but we decided to go their first. The only problem was once we started to cross the runways we’d be totally exposed. If another drone or spy plane or whatever decided to come back we’d be screwed.
We talked about how maybe Daniel or myself should go first with our cloaking devices activated. But we figured there was no point in waiting any longer. Now was probably the best time to go for it. The drone had obviously flown back to an aircraft carrier somewhere off the coast, probably to refuel. This meant that while it was flying back and refueling we had a small window of time.
So we ran for it. We stuck close together in our little diamond formation.
We ran fast.
Chapter 38
About halfway to the domestic terminal Daniel realized something was wrong. He held his hand up, motioning for us to stop while he looked ahead through the scope on his rifle.
"What is it?" Kenji asked.
"I don’t know. It’s just...I don’t think the military would’ve set up their base of operations near the terminals. Too many civilians."
"So maybe they didn’t set up there," Kenji said.
Daniel swiveled around and looked back down the main runway, out towards the ocean. "There!" he pointed. "It’s over there."
We all turned and looked back down the runway to where he was pointing.
"Are you sure?" Kenji asked as he looked through the scope on his rifle as well.