by Harley Tate
She exhaled, her shoulders lowering as she thought over how to answer. “You don’t strike me as the bygones type. After what happened to Peyton, I figured you took care of whatever threat presented itself.” Brianna turned and set the water on the counter. “Am I wrong?”
Walter shook his head. “No. You’re not.”
“Good. Because whoever tried to kill Peyton deserved whatever they got.”
Tracy knew Brianna shared the same type of ethos as her husband, a sort of warped golden rule where another’s actions determined their fate. “Have you changed your mind about this rescue attempt?”
Brianna scoffed. “No. It’s a terrible idea.”
“But you’ll do it?”
She glanced at Tracy before answering Walter. “Yes. But only because it matters to Madison. If she changes her mind, I’m fine with it. We have the medicine, we’ve had a chance to stop moving and clean up and eat. So far, the benefits have outweighed the costs.”
“But?”
“At some point, those scales will tilt the other way and I’ll regret ever stepping foot on Chico State’s campus.”
Tucker spoke up from the entry to the hall. “Found a radio. If we’re going in, we should do it soon. She’s sounding pretty desperate.”
Tracy steeled herself. All too soon, her husband and daughter would be leaving her again. She just hoped they would once again make it back.
CHAPTER TEN
MADISON
Parking lot, CSU Chico
4:00 p.m.
Madison replayed Mandy Patterson’s last broadcast over and over in her head as they staked out the communications building. She’d claimed their water and food had run out and that one of her friends wouldn’t wake up.
If there was even a chance she told the truth, then Madison couldn’t turn her back. They might not be able to take Mandy and her friends with them to Brianna’s cabin, but they could at least save them from certain death locked in a building.
She crouched down next to her father as he used the binoculars she had purchased at the sporting goods store in Davis before the CME hit. “I see no activity from the outside. It’s a black box as far as we know. There are five entry and exit points, one of which is on the roof.”
“Where do you think she’s broadcasting from?”
Tucker pointed at the radio tower. “The booth she’s using is probably in a direct line from the tower, just to save on component and cabling costs.”
“It’s a one-story building, so we’re looking at somewhere in the middle of it. If it’s anything like the radio stations I’ve seen on TV, it’ll have glass walls and plenty of equipment inside.”
Tucker nodded. “That’s right. Even college campus radio stations are built like the real thing. Their broadcast reach isn’t as far, but they have all the capabilities of a full-scale commercial station.”
“How do you know so much about radio stations?”
“I had a vintage transistor radio as a kid and played with it all the time. You can pick up AM stations from hundreds of miles away.”
Madison nodded. She did the same thing. “All right. So we all go in together. Which entrance?”
Her father lowered the binoculars and pointed. “The west side. It’s only one door, and appears to enter into a hall or vestibule. That’ll be our best bet. It’s far enough away from the broadcasting booth that we can get inside without being right on top of them. And with only one door, there’s not as much to defend if we have to retreat.”
Madison exhaled, her breath shaky as adrenaline kicked in. She knew this was risky. She knew she was asking her dad and her friends to put their lives on the line for a stranger. “Thank you all for coming with me. I know it’s dangerous. But I can’t leave her here.”
Brianna shifted beside her and checked to ensure her shotgun was loaded and ready. “We’ll always have your back, Madison. Even when you’re being an idiot.”
Madison managed a small smile. “Thanks.”
“Let’s do this before it gets any later. I want to use the daylight to our advantage. No more breaking into unknown buildings in the dark.” Her father pointed at the tree line. “If we keep to the trees until we’re past the door and circle back, they won’t see us coming. There’s no windows over there.”
He shoved the binoculars into a pocket of his pants. “Let’s do this. First sign of trouble, we retreat, understood?”
Everyone agreed.
Ten minutes later, Madison stood behind her father, scoping out the parking lot as he tried the door handle. Locked. At least that part of her story was panning out.
“You think it’s locked from the inside?”
“Only way to find out is to break in. Give me five minutes; it looks easy.”
True to his word, her father unlocked the door in a handful of minutes with nothing more than a pair of paper clips. Yet another example of a skill Madison wished she’d learned.
He turned the handle, but Madison reached out to stop him. “I love you, Dad.”
“I love you, too. Now get ready. We’re going to get this girl and get the hell out.”
Madison’s father eased the door open and the sunlight from outside cast a ray of light down an empty hall. “Prop the door open. At least that way we’ll have a rendezvous point.”
Brianna shoved a rock underneath the bottom of the door and wedged it open. “Done.”
“Then let’s go. Single file, everyone behind me.”
Madison’s hands shook as she held a shotgun in her hands. The butt of the gun dug into her shoulder as she pressed it tight, trying in vain to quell her nerves.
All she could see inside was the shaft of light. The hall seemed to stretch on forever, leading into a cavern of dim open space and what could have been a wall of windows beyond. How would they ever find the broadcast booth?
The hair on her neck rose as her father stepped into the communications building and momentarily disappeared. Madison rushed to keep up with him, gun raised and ready. Maybe it would all work out. Maybe they wouldn’t be walking into a trap.
Every step they took deeper into the building, her fear and regret rose, threatening to close her throat in panic. Why did I insist on coming here? Why are we doing this? Her breath came in shallow bursts, in, in, out, out. Her cheeks flushed hot, fingers trembling as the grip of the shotgun slipped against her palm.
Brianna eased up beside her. “Just keep walking. It’ll be okay.”
Madison nodded and took another step. Her father had cleared the first portion of the hall, trying door handles and opening the rooms that gave, ignoring the ones that were locked.
“Do you want me to go ahead?”
Madison nodded again. “Yes. I’ll be right behind you.”
“Okay.”
She watched as Brianna eased past her and hurried to catch up to her father. Together the two of them worked as a team, one opening a door while the other swept a gun and flashlight over the room.
Watching the pair of them work so efficiently brought a modicum of calm to Madison’s mind. Maybe they could do this. Maybe it would all work out.
Madison followed her father and roommate to the end of the hall with Tucker on her heels. The building opened up before them in a large waiting area. The windows Madison spotted when they first opened the building door sat straight ahead. She squinted, unable to make out the interior without light.
Tucker pulled out his flashlight and walked past her. Easing up to the dark windows, he made eye contact with Madison’s father. As soon as her father nodded, Tucker turned on the light and lit up the broadcast booth.
Empty.
A lump crashed into Madison’s stomach, churning in a sea of acid as she stared at the empty space. Was Mandy somewhere else inside the building or was the whole thing a trap?
She backed up, retracing her steps to the directory she passed ten feet back. If she read the map, maybe they could figure out where else she could be. A cafeteria or break room. Maybe a green roo
m for guests.
Madison never saw the shadows shift behind her or the looming shape materialize out of the dark. By the time the hand wrapped around her mouth, a knife point lodged into the soft space beneath her chin. The blade dug into the unprotected flesh, deep enough to draw blood, but not slice an artery.
Lips landed hot on her ear, stubble scratching against her naked lobe. “If you scream, I kill you. If you try to hurt me, I kill you. If you try to escape, I kill you. Understand?”
She nodded into the blade, wincing as it cut a bit deeper.
“Good. Now back up.” The man who held her pulled with the hand around her mouth, half-dragging Madison further into the dark. Panic threatened to overwhelm her. Hot, burning tears filled her eyes and clouded her vision. This is all my fault.
She blinked against the temporary blindness, willing Tucker or her father or Brianna to see her. They were all busy with the broadcast booth, scoping it out while she was meant to keep the rear secure.
In seconds, she would be too far away to see, too far gone to do any good. The last week replayed in her head. All the times she doubted herself and gave other people too much credit. When things had gone right, she had stepped up and taken charge. Done something.
When she stood by and let the world lead, only pain and regret followed. Where would they be if Brianna had listened to her and not followed the semi-truck off the causeway? Where would they be if they had killed the man who broke into their house instead of tying him up and talking it out?
Before the power grid failed, structure and rules and propriety held people together. Madison could take her time and be content to watch from the sidelines. She could be weak.
But now?
The man dragged her toward an open doorway, twisting her around as he angled into the space. His belly pressed into her back, pudgy and thick, and the scent of stale beer hit her nose as they neared the door.
She couldn’t let him take her. She couldn’t let him get inside or she may never make it out.
Madison shifted her grip on the shotgun. Why he hadn’t taken it, she had no idea. Maybe he couldn’t figure out how without removing the knife, or maybe he thought she would scream without a hand on her mouth. Either way, it gave her an opportunity.
She couldn’t waste it. Not this time.
With her teeth clenched tight, Madison braced for the knife’s blade as she twisted in the man’s grasp. She jabbed the butt of the shotgun back past her side and directly into his soft middle.
The man grunted from the impact, the hand around her mouth shifted, and the knife dug deeper into her neck. Madison opened her mouth and bit down, digging her teeth into the knuckles of two fingers.
Blood welled across her tongue, bright and tangy and she bit harder as she twisted, the knife cutting across her throat like an arc of lightning searing her skin.
The pain gave her focus and courage and Madison broke free, stumbling back as she brought the shotgun back up. It was cocked and loaded. No more hesitation. No more doubt. This man she could barely see in the dark had tried to take her away from her family He’d used her sympathy to lure them here.
She wasn’t going to be a fish on a hook. She wouldn’t take the bait.
The shotgun blast boomed through the hall, sending a giant, reverberating echo through the building. Madison’s attacker groaned and fell to his knees. Madison fired again. In the flare of the shot, she watched the man’s face explode.
Muffled shouts sounded from down the hall followed by the vibrations of footsteps on the hard floor. A flashlight beam bounced and wobbled closer and closer until her father stuttered to a stop a few feet away.
The light landed on the dead man five feet in front of Madison and then flicked up to her face. She couldn’t see anything but the light.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
WALTER
Communications Building, CSU Chico
6:00 p.m.
Madison. Walter moved the flashlight away from her face. Blood spatter pocked her hands and stained her clothes, but it wasn’t the carnage that twisted Walter’s insides.
It was the look in his daughter’s eyes. The cold detachment, a body removed from the mind, stuck in a never-ending loop of horror and static.
She wasn’t supposed to be here in this moment, experiencing this fresh evil. The world should be keeping her safe. I should be keeping her safe.
If anyone should be killing people, it should have been Walter. The man trained to fight and defend and keep his country safe. The man who took an oath to protect and swore to defend. Not a nineteen-year-old girl who a week ago bent over tomato plants in a greenhouse without a care in the world.
Madison should be making friends and falling in love and learning all about the joy and wonder of life. Not standing in a dark hallway staring down at a man she killed.
I failed her.
Walter reached for the gun and pried it out of his daughter’s hands. He remembered her first wobbly steps across the living room in their old house and the first time she said Daddy. The first day of school and first bike ride. First school dance and first date.
Now he could add first kill.
Brianna rushed up to his side, gun tracking the empty hall. “We need to clear the room. If he intended to drag Madison inside, there’s probably more of them.” Her nose wrinkled as the copper tang of death hit her nose. “I knew it was a trap.”
Walter handed Madison’s shotgun to Brianna. “Take this. I’ll clear the room.”
“Do you need—”
He didn’t give the teenager time to finish. No, he didn’t need any help. Not now. Screw holding back. Screw trying to do the right thing. The new world didn’t give a damn whether the innocent lived or died or had to do the unthinkable.
After checking the handgun he carried still held a full magazine, Walter reached for the rifle slung across his back. In tight quarters he preferred the ease of the handgun. Concealment, weapon retention, and lethality with lower risk of penetrating a wall or shooting an innocent bystander.
But now none of that mattered. He would clear this building and kill everything that breathed. The handgun fit snugly inside his waistband and the rifle was wedged securely against his shoulder. One deep breath and he was as ready as he would ever get.
Walter leaned close to his daughter and planted a kiss on her temple. “Don’t worry, honey. Everything is going to be all right.”
He turned to Brianna who waited across the hall in the pale shaft of light from the still-open door. “Stay here until I clear a room, then barricade yourselves in. Don’t come out until you hear my call.”
“A cardinal?”
“That’s the one.”
Brianna closed the distance between herself and Madison, gun ready, eyes alert.
Walter gave her a nod and clicked on the small flashlight he’d taped to the barrel of the rifle.
Three, two, one.
He stepped over the dead body clogging up the entrance to the room and pushed the door wide as he scanned the room. A flutter of movement caught his eye behind an overturned table. Was that a scrap of fabric? The edge of a hat brim?
Didn’t matter.
Pull. Pull. Pull.
Walter fired three rounds into the table. From fifteen feet away, the high-velocity round dug through the wood and spit out the other side like a kid landing a cannonball in the deep end of a pool.
A grunt and a slump and a muffled scream. A hand flopped onto the floor, dangling and dead.
One down.
He tracked the scuffling of another body behind the table. Another casualty whose heart hadn’t stopped yet.
Walter pulled the trigger another three times.
A second one bit the dust. Or, more accurately, the grimy linoleum of a student-run communications building. Give it a few years and the dust would settle, but for now there was more blood and misery than dust.
Blinking to wet his eyes, Walter stepped further into the room. No more movement. Were there only t
hree of them? Why would they broadcast if their ranks were so thin? What did they hope to accomplish?
No. There had to be more somewhere else. That meant Madison and her friends were still in danger. He needed to speed up and eliminate the threat for good.
Walter cleared the room in efficient grace, sweeping every nook and cranny almost like a MARSOC operator on patrol. It wasn’t an air strike with designated targets and bomb drops, but taking out the enemy up close and personal engendered a similar rush.
Adrenaline and fear and pride. War was a perverse enterprise.
He paused to assess the dead. One woman, two men, if he included the one in the entryway. Too old to be college kids. If the brunette with a tattoo snaking over her shoulder and track marks up her arm was the radio star, Mandy Patterson hadn’t seen a college class in years.
Meth or heroin were her star subjects. Not communications, nor broadcasting, nor agriculture.
On some level, Walter had always known the end of the world would give strength to the fringe of society. An addict stood a better chance of surviving and adapting than a normal person.
They were used to hunger and base need. Hustle and manipulation. Doing the hard thing if it got them what they needed.
Had this group already tried to break in to the pharmacy? Were they kept out by the very people Walter took out at the health center?
Walter kicked at the torso of the woman. Her mouth fell open to reveal rotting teeth, half gray and black and reeking of decay. A drug addict’s downfall would be the very thing that kept them alive. Without ready access to dealers and drugs, how long could they last?
The enterprising could learn to make their own. With enough pharmacies and chemicals around, meth could still be produced for a while. When it ran out…
They would perish, but only after wreaking as much havoc as they could. Walter crouched beside the woman and bit back his disgust. At least he would end this.
After searching her for weapons and anything useful, he moved on to the man beside her. Same sullen skin and sunken eye sockets. Same bad teeth and scars from prolonged drug use. Such a waste.