Patch of Blue swung his club up at the female that bit off his ear and delivered a blow strong enough to knock her off.
Then a raging high-pitched scream came from the beachside. Eliza came over the top, running with her gun pointed, looking for a target, a mother defending her children. It was enough of a distraction that Full Face briefly lost her lock on Jon and his finger finished pulling the trigger. The grenade launcher thumped and put a chlorine gas canister right in the middle of the fray. An extreme lung and mucous membrane irritant, the deadly gas engulfed the creatures.
Without missing a step, Eliza kept charging right into the gas, putting three well spaced bullets into Patch of Blue’s torso.
In her mind, Full Face screamed, Blue! — watching in agony as pieces of his body blasted out of his back, his hock-kneed legs kicking up damp dirt and trampled brush as he fell backward from the full metal jackets punching into him, shredding his heart and lungs. Upon seeing her friend and companion die, she grabbed Eliza’s mind in a rage. Eliza, with plenty of experience driving Hansel and Gretel out of her head, shut her mind off to the attack, surprising the female Chosen. Then both of them were hacking and coughing with the gas, tears pouring from their eyes.
Jon, suddenly free, lifted his rifle to his shoulder, spotted the female and took her out with a single head shot — her remarkably complex brains splattering across trampled grass. He dropped the gun and charged into the gas, first grabbing Eliza and yanking her out, dragging her toward the beach, then finding himself being joined by Dean, also wearing a gas mask. He let go and charged back in to pull out Gretel and the even heavier Hansel.
As the others rushed to help the pucks get to the water to wash off the toxic gas that clung to them, Dean lifted his wife and carried her in alone, cradling her in the brine, trying not to drown her.
Eliza was choking, gagging, hacking, tears pouring from her eyes, snot from her nose. She couldn’t speak, yet tried to force a smile. Dean gently wiped the tears away, cleaning her face. “You’re going to be OK, honey. You’re going to be OK.” She forced another smile, then her face grew stricken and her ragged breathing simply stopped. She valiantly forced her eyes into a loving gaze, which slowly looked off into the sky.
“No, no, no,” he said, his hand cupping water to wipe off her face, smear away the mucus. Her skin was rapidly turning blue.
Dean sobbed and crushed her to his chest, her body limp, her arms hanging loose.
Mother!
Mother!
Through their own agony, fighting off the poison gas, the children glimpsed something in the ether that was between this world and the next, something they had seen before; their mother, but something so much more. The entity offered a look that was pure love. It didn’t speak, but rather offered a thought that was deeper with meaning than any words could convey. Time is an illusion. Past present and future always are. You cannot stop this, and was gone.
Billy was the one to take charge. His father was able to go through the motions, but couldn’t keep himself from constantly stopping to glance at his dead wife’s body. He had laid her on the sail locker behind the helm, and it was almost as if he kept checking to see if she would gasp back to life.
The heavily weathered mainsail still rose up the mast and showed itself worthy of wind. Jon had some basic knowledge of sailing and helped as best he could, Dietrich and Mason as well.
Once underway, Billy steered to put the islands out in the bay between the boat and the mainland. The sloop was surprisingly watertight and he could only assume that it had been recently moved from some dry dock to the bay. He contemplated the manpower and strength that would be required to achieve such a thing. A glance at the still coughing, but surviving pucks gave the notion some sense. Humanity’s next of kin were big powerful animals. A large group of them could’ve easily carried this boat across a parking lot and down a boat ramp.
When they were far enough away to feel safe from possession from Chosen on shore, they had another burial ceremony at sea. Words somehow seemed trite, so none were spoken. Instead, Eliza was gently lifted, all of their hands, including Frankel’s, touching her one last time, and then Dean and the twins lowered her weighted body to the water, setting it free.
The weather was calm. A steady breeze filled the sail. A jib sail out front would have helped steering, but they were grateful for what they had. Dean and the twins stood watching the wake as they made way for the mouth of the great bay. They would round the tip of Delmarva and angle north toward the US. More than that, they hadn’t considered.
Colonel Donald Quale stood atop the Bank of Dover building and watched his empire crumbling. A riot of panic was happening on the streets below. Swarms of Shoremen were arriving from the countryside, adding their terror to the city’s already horrified population. The news from the South and now the center of the nation made the insanity that was Omega seem downright pastoral. Satan had released his demons upon the land, and they showed themselves to be frightfully creative with the torture and killing and eating of humans. He’d kept the bulk of his small army of sentinels in reserve, the machines spread out along the approach avenues to the city. Every human effort to repel the monsters was destroyed as minds were controlled and unspeakable things then commenced. The bulk of the small navy had been commandeered or destroyed by the Americans up north, who now had their own naval forces bearing down on The Shore. There were no boats to escape on, no bridges to flee over. They were outflanked and getting squeezed between two enemies.
The Council had dispersed. He faced a quickly assembled vote of no confidence, after which his accomplices had gone their separate ways, each fending for him or herself.
There was a sharp rap on the door. Quale turned to see a police officer standing on the other side of the glass. He knew the man, though couldn’t place his name. He said, “Enter.”
The policeman opened the door, but remained in the threshold. “Pardon the interruption, Councilman.” He had a wad of tobacco squeezed in his lower lip, and it slightly slurred his speech.
Quale, expecting more, waited. Then impatiently, “Yes, Constable?”
“I’ve been charged with… legally handling you, sir.”
Quale cocked his head like he didn’t understand the language coming from the man’s tobacco greased lips. “Excuse me?”
“You’ll please forgive the lack of ceremony, sir.”
Quale turned fully to the man. “Understand you I don’t, Constable. Arrest me on what charge?”
“Arrest? Well, yes, arrest could be defined this way. Treason, sir. Use of the armed forces without consent of the council and therefore the people, sir.”
Quale took a couple of steps toward the policeman and stopped. “Don’t be absurd. O’Shea is it?”
“O’Connor, sir.”
“O’Connor.” Quale waved his hand at the window. “Have you not bigger issues to deal with?”
“I do, sir. Would you indulge me a question before I wrap this up?”
“Questions?” Quale again waved at the window, “Are you not aware of the urgency of our situation.”
“Aware indeed, sir. For my own curiosity though; you were an ad man or something for the Air Force, correct? Entertainment or something?”
Quale sighed. Speaking of his resume was an odd direction, but he never turned down an opportunity to talk about himself. “Among other things, yes. Head of the Air Force Entertainment Liaison Office, I once was. Why do you ask?”
“Kind of a propaganda guy?” O’Connor worked up some tobacco juice and spit on the floor. Quale looked at it and the policeman with incredulous eyes. “Making up stories and whatnot?” O’Connor continued. “That gameshow you had — the one about—”
Quale turned his back on the policeman, returning his gaze to the scene below. “Get out and help the people, O’Connor.”
“Post haste, sir. But one last question if you don’t mind.”
“Get out!”
The policeman smiled. “Just
one and then we’ll be done. A simple one it is. Any regrets, sir?”
Quale let it lie for three long seconds. “Why would I have regrets?”
O’Conner spat another wad of juice on the floor. “Just curious I was, sir. Didn’t think you had any. A courtesy really. Kind of like any last words.” He removed his pistol from his holster. Quale’s body stiffened at the sound, but he continued to stare out the window. O’Connor said, “Now to the business side of things.” His tone shifted to one of an announcer. “Given the declared marshal law, and by the power vested in me by the Council during such legal status, and under the law effected by you on June 3rd of last year, known as the Plimpton Rule, I hereby find you guilty of treason and summarily execute you in the name of The Shore.”
Quale didn’t turn, but held up his hand. “Stop! I order you to stop! The Prime Councilman I am. You’ll—“ The bullet went through the back of his head and blew his face across the picture window. The resulting small hole in the glass admitted the sound of the chaos outside. The corpse dropped to its knees and fell over.
Spitting one more time, O’Connor holstered his pistol and turned away. “Asshole.”
The low Sun had been driven away by a dense cloud layer that reached all the way down to the horizon line and the distant Eastern Shore. The breeze continued to be favorable, and Billy was able to set his course for an easy reach. For hours there had been little to say. The group sat, each in their private silence, the work of the sailboat limited to the helmsman. Nikki and Jon allowed themselves the indulgence of holding hands. They’d eaten breakfast as best they could muster the desire for. Lunch was much the same. Dinner time was approaching, but no one seemed to have the energy to bring it up or offer to do anything about it.
Littlefield was doing badly. His gaunt frame was wracked with pain, and his own efforts at nutrition had come heaving back up until he could only wretch bile. “It isn’t sea sickness,” he had insisted. “I don’t get seasick.” He looked wistfully toward the land. “The remains of our country are a patchwork of toxic waste zones. As we neared the East Coast, I recall seeing signs on a fence that warned of nuclear waste.” He casually rubbed his hand across his scalp and found the notches between his fingers to be full of fallen hair. He looked at it and let out an almost silent laugh.
Nikki frowned and said, “You’ve got a nosebleed, doctor.”
Gretel offered to give the man some respite, but he denied the generosity. He never wanted a Chosen in his mind again.
“But I am not really Chosen,” she said.
“Then what are you?”
The sister glanced at the brother. Hansel’s broken arm was braced and tied off to his chest. Neither sent a thought at the other.
Before dusk turned to dark, they saw hundreds of boats along the horizon to the north.
With a practiced eye, Dean said, “Inbound, toward The Shore.”
Dietrich said, “I would venture that we woke the bear, and the bear has come to eat us. Demon Children below and a pissed off Seven States above. Woe to my adopted homeland.”
A sharper breeze hit the sail and the boat picked up a knot. They would be in the thick of it before the dawn.
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
The Bitter End
Hansel said, “They are afraid.”
“Who are afraid?” asked Dean.
“Chosen are afraid. Many are sick, like Sampson Littlefield. They are killing so many Fresh… humans, and they are full from so much feasting. That part is fun for them, but now many are getting sick.” He pointed at the gangway that led below deck. “Like Sampson Littlefield.”
Littlefield had gone below and curled up into a cramped berth. Now he lay there shivering, blood drooling from his nose. He could hear the voices above and considered the points made; the Chosen army was gigantic; yes, some had passed through the same toxic zones he had, but he was certain that many others had been spared.
“Well, good that is, right? That they are sick like that,” said Frankel
“Sure, Private,” said Jon. “Why not?”
Gunfire could be heard echoing across the water. The Easterly breeze carried the cries of humans in horror, despair and panic. Fires dotted the distant horizon, some clearly growing — sheets of flame leaping for the sky.
Billy looked at his father, who sat brooding, his back leaning into the lifelines. “Do I try to steer around it, Dad? Head further out to sea?”
Dean looked up and around as if noticing the events surrounding him for the first time. “No, Son. No going around that. We head into the thick of it and hope for salvation.”
Billy said, “But what about Hansel and Gretel?”
The pucks looked almost shyly toward the boy, who wasn’t really a boy any longer.
We are not going with you, Billy Stewart.
We are going home.
Billy said, “What does that mean?”
“You must drop us on the land there,” said Hansel, pointing toward the distant fires.
Gretel said, “Our time with humans is done. We will not be safe with you, nor you with us.”
This was accepted without argument. The pucks had made their feelings known without needing to say another word or forcing another thought into another being’s mind.
With the sail close-hauled, Billy angled for the shoreline where the fires burned brightest.
When the small sloop was comfortably cruising at roughly four-hundred meters off shore, Dean snapped himself out of his funk and glanced over the side. “Iffy territory here. No knowing the depth of these waters. Likely obstructions.”
The World’s oceans had gone through an extreme make-over during the previous two decades; the massive loss of polar ice during the run up in global warming had seen the sea encroaching heavily on low lying shores; then the nuclear winter following Omega had reversed the trend. The events created a situation where old charts were defunct. A once near total reliance on GPS had been wiped out as well, making coastal navigation a guessing game akin to the first explorers. To punctuate the point, they felt the keel briefly touch bottom.
“We are close enough,” said Hansel.
“You taught us how to swim very well, Stewart Dean,” said Gretel.
“But the water here is too cold to swim that far, and your broken arm.” said Billy.
Hansel offered an optimistic toothy grin. “We are Chosen. We are better suited for the cold. I can swim on my side with one arm.”
Gretel said, “Yes, and we can control each other’s pain.”
It was the second time that either puck had referred to themselves as Chosen out loud. No one missed it and no one chose to address it.
Hansel said, “Point us into the wind, Billy Dean, and we will go.”
Billy’s father nodded approval and the boy pointed the bow up into the wind, halting the momentum. The sail flapped hard, causing a racket of canvas and loosened rigging. Hansel and Gretel stood up to their remarkable full height, walked forward of the raging boom, and looked back on the small group of humans. They sent out a final feeling to everyone’s minds. There were no words attached, just a sensation of love and a desire to give reassurance. Then they turned and jumped off.
Even with his broken arm immobilized, Hansel swam with strength. With their powerful legs churning the water, they aimed for the tempest on the shore.
It was an hour before the dawn, but the approaching light was enough to bring the action along the Northern horizon into stark view. Staring through a damaged pair of binoculars that he’d dug out of the chart table, Dean said, “Dunkirk.”
“What does that mean?” asked an anxious Frankel.
Dean passed him the binoculars saying, “See for yourself.” Frankel scanned the distance. Hundreds of boats of all sizes stood off shore with smaller boats making urgent way to and from the shoreline where thousands and thousands of people were gathered. There were also signs of people swimming — and massive evidence of the foolishness of that choice. A carpet of bodies were fl
oating in the surf. What had been an American invasion force was now a full blown evacuation. It was clear that for most of the humans who remained on the shore, the situation was not only dire, but likely hopeless.
Frankel whispered to himself, “I wonder if my parents are there.”
“We have to help,” said Dietrich while grabbing the binoculars for himself.
“Of course we do,” said Jon.
As Dietrich stared at his terrified countrymen, he swallowed a huge lump of guilt over his escape from Manhattan and what had happened to the family who had turned back to save him.
Though most of the armada was made up of civilian vessels (everything from commercial fishing boats to large sailboats and tugs) there were also a scattering of Naval destroyers. These boats were firing their 127mm guns, sending their projectiles far over the heads of the teeming masses along the shore and into the deeper regions of the stricken nation. The impacts were far enough inland that the glow of the explosions could be seen first, then moments later matched by their delayed sound. There was no air support. The US Air Force had been long ago neutered for lack of fuel, ammunition and spare parts.
Dean switched with Billy at the helm. No one but Dr. Littlefield had slept more than a snooze here and there. The boy’s hands were stiff and painful after working the wheel for so long.
Nikki looked at the small group and said, “I’ve done this exact thing on the Horn of Africa. It’s extremely dangerous. I’ve watched boats capsize and sink when they were overrun. We’re going to have to be united as far as when to say enough is enough.”
Dietrich said, “I was in the Hudson during the end of Manhattan. I know all about it as well.” He touched the carbine, which until that moment he had mostly forgotten about. “If they are armed, they must drop their guns. If they don’t, they can’t come aboard.”
Nikki asked Dean, “How many you figure we can take?”
A House Divided: Book 3 of The Of Sudden Origin Saga Page 29