Still lost in his thoughts, Duncan flinched when Lev placed an arm around his shoulder and drew him in. “Shouldn’t have happened like this,” Lev said. “Fuckers had numbers, no doubt. And had no problem taking advantage of it.”
Duncan said, “It was no kind of a fair fight, that’s for sure. They didn’t even know what hit them.” He turned abruptly and padded to the southeast corner of the garage where he recalled the hidden trap door was located. He pulled the floor covering aside and flung the door open rather unceremoniously, letting it bang to the floor. “Come on ... let’s get this done.”
“Oh man,” said Lev, crinkling his nose and rubbing his eyes. “You said you already cleared the place.”
“Logan did.”
“Then where’s that stench coming from?”
Daymon interrupted. “There’s a woman and her kids down there.”
“Rotters?”
“Stationary,” said Duncan. “The mom poisoned the kids. Then cut her own wrists ... fucking awful scene.”
Lev replied, “Fucking awful smell.” He covered his nose with his shirt. Flicked on his tactical flashlight and disappeared down the stairs, its white beam cutting back and forth, drawing and quartering the inky black. A second later, he pulled the chain to the hanging bulb below and a warm yellow light chased the shadow from the gloomy stairway.
***
Forty minutes later, with Lev and Daymon performing the manual labor while Duncan kept watch, the weapons and gear were transferred from the catacomb of Conex containers into the three vehicles they were driving back to the compound.
Remembering the old dually that he’d been forced to abandon alongside Cade’s Sequoia on the road outside of Boise, Duncan said, “Dibs on the dually Dodge.” Then quickly added while gesturing at the dual whip antennas, “Figure the CB in that thing might come in handy down the road.”
“You’re racist,” countered Daymon in jest as he passed by carrying an armload of ballistic vests. “Only reason you don’t like that Land Cruiser is because it’s Japanese.”
Duncan shot back, not so much in jest. “Blow it out your ass, Daymon. In my opinion, even after you pranged it against the fence, the thing drives like a lifted Cadillac DeVille. All pillowy and refined. Not for me, my man. Has nothing to do with slanty eyes or skin color. If Nam didn’t cause me to hate ‘em ... their take on what a 4x4 is ain’t gonna.”
“All right my Truck Trend Magazine-reading brothers. You haggle over the Dodge ... I’m taking the Silverado.” Lev looked to Daymon for approval. Arched a brow in order to hasten a reply.
“Cool with me,” replied Daymon. He tucked a stray dread behind his ear. “’Cause I’m easy like Monday morning. Plus, I’m used to the Tahoe. Drove it all the way here from Wyoming.”
“Settled,” said Duncan. “We siphon the gas and leave the worthless DeVille in the garage.” He bowed his head and looked at the twin blood stains. Said, “But first, I’m gonna take a walk. Clear my mind and maybe go see what the buzzards are buzzin' about.”
***
Duncan had been curious to see what dead thing the vultures were circling. But overpowering that was his desire to get away from the place where Logan had drawn his last breath. And as far as the buzzing part of his parting quip was concerned, he wished it had never left his lips. Because the closer he got to the patch of briars just east of the front gate where a number of colorfully hued and rust-mottled heavy earthmoving vehicles sat, the louder the buzzing in his ears became. And as he skirted the chin-high bramble patch where a couple of half-ton pickups languished, the undulating carpet of flies responsible for the incessant noise took flight suddenly, revealing to him something entirely unexpected and altogether sickening.
Chapter 30
The melted stretch of I-70 proved to be more mirage than anything else. Light playing tricks with their minds had added depth to the shiny black surface where there was none. Still, upon Cade’s insistence, sticking to their plan, they transited the Interstate one at a time, slaloming between the particularly gooey areas at a snail’s pace. Forty minutes later, both vehicles were sitting idle on solid roadway six hundred feet farther west on I-70, the only damage a thick coating of black tar from the wheel wells down.
“Wasn’t so bad,” stated Brook.
“Not a single T-Rex rose from the depths,” added Cade with a wink delivered to Raven. “What’s next on the map?”
Brook said, “Green River.”
“Beeson said we should avoid Green River at all costs. Unfortunately we have to go over the river and skirt the city pretty close, and then just west of there we’ll part ways with the Interstate.”
“Then what?” asked Brook.
Cade said, “Unless conditions have degraded substantially over the last three weeks, the rural roads will be sketchy but passable.”
“The flip side of that?”
“Let’s not go there until we have to.” Cade shifted into Drive and moved over and accelerated briskly, the yellow centerline blipping by, thin membranes of tar peeling away from the sidewalls and going airborne in lazy arcs before pattering back down.
“Should we trust the GPS navigation?”
Shaking his head, Cade said, “Not entirely. Gotta go with your common sense on the back roads ... things were known to be wrong before Z-Day.”
“Then we need to stop at the first gas station or mom and pop store and try and find a local map.” Brook tapped the laminated topo map provided by Beeson. “This isn’t going to cut it. As it is, we’ll be driving off the edge of this thing before our turnoff.”
Cade picked up the two-way from the center column and pressed the talk button. “Green River will be on our right forty some odd miles ahead. Ignore it. Keep tight formation and do not stop for anything.”
Wilson answered the call. “Copy that,” he said.
“How are you holding up?” asked Cade.
“My first gunshot wound,” replied Wilson. “I’ll let you know next time we pull over.”
***
Nineteen miles west of the spot they’d stopped last, Interstate 70 suddenly headed off on a northern tangent before the gray ribbon visibly doglegged off to the south. At first Cade thought the deviation was due to some kind of immovable geological feature. But after nothing became evident, he began to suspect some kind of an engineering hiccup. Perhaps the surveyor had called off sick the day the graders went through, forcing them to wing it. That is, until he saw the sign that read: Exit 187, Thompson Springs, Pop. 39. Affixed below that sign was a smaller metal rectangle, the words on it indicating that no services were available for the next twenty-five miles. Green River, thought Cade, as the Ford slid by the only exit from the Interstate and he saw that Thompson Springs was little more than four square blocks of clustered farm houses and fields surrounded by high desert with the Box Cliffs—a geological formation jutting hundreds of feet into the air—crushing in from behind. And as the sign had indicated, Cade saw no services near the freeway. Just flat earth and rocks and scrub. And among the clustered dwellings he saw nothing that might indicate the presence of a post office or even a telltale flagpole flying Old Glory.
All of the windows in the houses were dark, their curtains drawn. Nothing moved on the roads or the yards or in the fields. Save for the heat waves rising up from the expanse of brown desert encircling the lush green habitable area, he saw nothing moving for miles in any direction.
It didn’t take more than this cursory glance to come to the conclusion that for all intents and purposes, Thompson Springs, like all of the other tiny burgs and towns that he’d had the misfortune to set eyes on during his extensive travels throughout the Western United States, was just another American ghost town.
In a blink of an eye Thompson Springs was behind them. And less than a hundred feet beyond the onramp providing all thirty-nine residents of the sprawling metropolis access to the Interstate and all points west, a second road sign rose from the scrub a dozen feet off the right-hand shoulder.
Written on the bullet-riddled sign, in white reflective letters, was the same warning about the impending lack of services. Below that it read: Green River 25 miles. But the sign had also been defaced, and Cade had to take his foot off the gas and tap the brake and slow down a bit in order to read the second warning spray-painted in silver on the sign’s bottom margin. It read: Beware of bandits and River had been sprayed over with the word Acres.
The sign wasn’t lost on Brook. Nor was the part about bandits or the stylized skull-and-crossbones. Green Acres, my ass, she thought. Without a word, she retrieved her M4 from the footwell, pulled the charging handle towards her, chambering a round, and then tilted the weapon on its side and looked and made sure the safety was set. Then, with a firm set to her jaw, she looked sidelong and caught Cade’s eye and nodded subtly.
Inside the Raptor, two truck-lengths behind and slightly right of the F-650, Wilson, who was growing weary of riding shotgun, also read the sign, and at once felt the first feathery tingle of fear creep into his gut.
“Did you see that?” asked Taryn, eyes never leaving the road.
“How could I miss it?” said Wilson. “Whoever wrote it used effin silver paint. Pretty eye-catching in the desert.”
Sasha popped up between the seats and asked, “What did I miss?”
In unison, but not very convincingly, both Taryn and Wilson said, “Nothing.”
Quarry
The sight greeting Duncan when he rounded the back side of the briar patch finished the process being near the site of Logan’s murder had started. The flock of juvenile buzzards took flight first. Then the source of the buzzing, disturbed by the frantic flapping of feathered wings, took flight, changed direction and flew en masse around his head and into his open mouth.
Falling to his knees, he projectile-vomited the contents of his stomach onto the damp gravel. Yellowed bile made all the more bitter from a night of hard drinking burned as it sluiced over his teeth and shot from his nose. Thick with squirming flies that had failed to escape his mouth, the initial torrent pooled right where he had planted his hands. On all fours, back arching and falling, he emptied everything that was in his stomach—and then some. And when he was finished and had dragged his forearm across his lips, she was still there. In the same contorted pose that was instantly burned into his memory from only a split second’s glance. Arms and legs twisted at unnatural angles. The sight of her, staring Little Orphan Annie-like, black jagged openings in the hollow sockets where working muscle and soft tissue used to reside, sent a chill up his spine. Her tongue was purple and flayed and rested on her chin, having no doubt been tugged from her throat by the carrion feeders.
He collapsed to his stomach and rolled over onto his back and, while watching the voracious raptors wing across the azure sky, began calling for Lev and Daymon—in a normal voice at first—then, when the shock began to dull and he’d regained a modicum of breath—at the top of his lungs.
“Get the fuck over here, now!” He crossed his arms over his eyes and added, “You’re gonna need to bring some sheets!”
Chapter 31
Thirty minutes after hearing Bishop deliver his cryptic promise, Elvis had finished with bulldozing the makeshift landing spot and then jumped right into his next assigned task.
An hour and a half into his newest chore, the head-heavy splitting maul was beginning to feel like a natural extension of his body. However, swinging the eight-pound tool with the same repetitive motion to bone-jarring completion was taking its toll. Already destroyed by fifteen hours of straight driving, made worse by a measly four hours of sleep over two days, he knew from past experience—and an ever increasing flurry of twinges—that his lower back was about to go out on him.
So he thunked the axe into the manhole-sized round of wood and left it there, its yellow fiberglass handle sticking into the air. Then, looking towards the trailer Bishop had entered two hours prior, he cracked the seal on a fresh bottle of water, took a couple of long pulls, let the hot liquid reconstitute his tongue, and set it aside. With muscles aching like he’d just spent a day on a Georgia chain gang, he sat on a round, removed his Huskers ball cap and wiped the beaded sweat from his forehead. Once again he regarded the eighteen-wheeler. He drained the water and tossed the bottle on the brittle brown grass. Means to an end, he told himself as he worked up the courage to go and see for himself what the former Navy SEAL was up to.
After crossing the road running between the lakeside homes and the newly cleared expanse awaiting Carson’s fleet of helicopters, Elvis saw Bishop leap from the back of the trailer. Mind racing to come up with one good reason—besides the truth of course—to explain why he was taking a break before he’d finished splitting the wood, Elvis stopped dead in his tracks. Pulse rising a few extra beats per minute, he watched Bishop wipe his face with the bottom of his sweat-stained wife beater then drop the tank covering his toned six-pack abs.
Busted, thought Elvis just as Bishop looked up.
“Perfect timing,” called Bishop. “I was just coming to get you. I’ve got something that needs moving. And like the saying goes, it’s more awkward than heavy.”
Slowly releasing the breath he had been holding, Elvis grunted then said, “No problem.” Massaging his lower back while envisioning it going out and causing him to drop whatever he had been conscripted to move onto Bishop’s toes brought forth the specter of the wrath a fuckup of that magnitude would likely incur. Last thing he needed was to literally ‘drop the ball’ this late in the game—just about the time that he thought he had proven himself, thus avoiding a bullet to the back of the head for his past transgressions. He had failed at Schriever. That President Clay was still alive and very few soldiers had perished in the zombie outbreak he had orchestrated was common knowledge. Furthermore, he should have known, with his luck as of late, that Bishop would eventually learn of Robert Christian’s order to assassinate him. Stating that he had only said yes under duress had apparently been enough to get him a shot at redemption. So here he was. Toiling away to earn the right to keep on breathing. Then, with Bishop’s smile fading, Elvis heard his mother’s voice in his head. Work hard and everything else falls into place. And then his father chimed in from the grave. Carpe diem.
Seize the day indeed, he thought. He nodded at Bishop and swallowed hard, trying to mask the growing pain. Then the fit and tanned stone cold killer said, “I think you’re going to appreciate what I’ve been working on.” He about-faced and retraced his steps between the two vehicles. A tick later one of the trailer’s rear doors hinged all the way open, barely missing the wrecker’s boom, and banged against the slab-sided trailer. “Spoils of war,” bellowed Bishop, gesturing to the cargo. “Come and see.”
Sparing his back from the sideways shuffle between the two trucks, Elvis took the long way around. He skirted the apparatus hanging off of the tow truck’s boom and caught his first glimpse of the object of Bishop’s swelling pride. Sitting there on the wood-plank floor, about chest-high to both of them, were two neat rows of footlocker-sized cases, six on the left side, and five on the right. Each box was made of some kind of brushed metal and had multiple latches on the lid. They were positioned lengthwise in the trailer and secured to the floor three feet apart at all corners with thick canvas shipping straps that Elvis guessed would be sufficient to keep a baby grand from sliding around. Box number twelve, however, was sitting horizontally near the rear edge of the trailer, its lid hinged open.
“I’ve got a present for you,” said Bishop. He closed the lid and grabbed a handle before Elvis had gotten a good look inside. “Give me a hand. But a word of caution ... the modifications I’ve made require that we handle it with care.” He smiled again. “That, and the fact that there’s enough boom here to boil all of the water from the lake.”
Elvis smiled as he looked into the gloom at the other eleven boxes and wondered what twelve boiling lakes would look like.
“OK. Lift,” said Bishop.
Surprisingly the case and its co
ntents were much heavier than Elvis had guessed. He figured his half of the box would be about fifty pounds or so. He was mistaken. The device, when combined with the weight of the lead-lined box it was nestled in, weighed closer to three hundred pounds. Elvis’s back, however, seemed to think the box weighed that of a small automobile. Setting the box to the ground brought on a twinge, making the muscles rapidly contract and expand uncontrollably. A sharp stab of pain came next, shooting instantly at light speed from his lower lumbar region to his brain and nearly causing him to lose his grip.
But he clenched his teeth and sucked it up and, with Bishop manhandling most of the burden, together they wrestled the box from the trailer and placed it gently on the ground. Then, for the second time in as many minutes, Elvis released a captive breath and collapsed against the wrecker’s quarter panel, his face a mask of pain.
“You going to be OK? asked Bishop.
Elvis said “Yes,” but his body language conveyed the opposite. He leaned against the trailer, grimacing.
Pussy, thought Bishop as he popped open the box lid, fully exposing the hidden innards. Sitting lengthwise, held down by a pair of sturdy-looking metal bands, was a two-and-a-half-foot-long cylinder, ten inches in diameter, roughly as big around as a basketball. It was polished to a high gloss, smooth to the touch, and looked to be milled from some kind of space-age metal—probably titanium, guessed Elvis. And true to the movies, the cylinder had been labeled with the instantly recognizable trefoil symbol consisting of three magenta blades around a like-colored center radius, all overlaid atop a yellow background— an instantly recognizable visual warning pointing to its radiological nature. Coils of wires in varying colors snaked from some kind of sealed-cell battery pack to what appeared to be an Apple iPad, its display currently dark. And pointing to the work Bishop had put into prepping the thing, pieces of wire in varying lengths, some stripped of their colorful coating, most not, littered the ground around the open box.
Warpath: Surviving the Zombie Apocalypse Page 16