“Getting us out and finding Tilly. I need a lift.” Zanzi showed her the hole in the ceiling.
“You’ll get us killed trying to escape,” Josie said.
“They’re going to do that anyway.” Zanzi tugged another piece of drywall down. “Cup your hands like this.”
“Wait a minute.” Josie pulled her away. “They’ll hear you. What then? They’ll rape us and possibly kill us.”
“We have to escape now. It’s our best chance. Listen. What do you hear?”
Josie turned away and cocked her head. “A party. So what?”
“Right. They’re drunk. Reactions are slow. We must do it now. Tomorrow, we’ll be in that cage fighting Rabids. If we somehow survive that, the gang will continue to use us as entertainment until we’re dead.”
“I don’t want to risk it.” Josie made to leave the bathroom, but Zanzi grabbed her arm.
“Listen, Doctor. What the hell do you want? Yesterday you wanted to kill Offenheim and those responsible for Harriet’s death. Now you’re willing to wait while these animals do what they want with us?”
“After seeing their display out there, I’m thinking that maybe ReinCorp and Offenheim were right. The world needed a reset. To be rid of people like that.” Her face softened, her mouth twitching into a firm smile. “They’ll come for us. ReinCorp men. We just have to be patient.”
“All the more reason we need to leave.”
“I’m staying. They’ll come.”
Zanzi groaned and let go of the scientist’s arm. “I had this friend in high school. She would come to school, always wearing thick make-up. The mean girls would tease her, and the jocks would call her horrible names – you know, the usual crap. I had suspicions why, but I never had any proof. She never invited anyone over, she always came to our house. Some days she wouldn’t wear any make-up, and she would smile and be happy, make jokes, come swimming with us. But the make-up always returned, along with her sullen moods. Whenever I asked her, she deflected.
“After my brother died, I went to grief counseling. My friend was there too. It was only then I learned that her mother beat her. Blamed her for her father’s suicide. The sad thing is, my friend believed her mother. Said she was the reason. Said she wasn’t good enough. I found that heartbreaking. Offenheim killed billions of people. Innocent people. Your daughter. Now you’re defending them?”
“Better ReinCorp than these creeps.”
“You’re being ridiculous,” Zanzi said.
Josie turned away and faced the wall, ending the conversation.
Regardless of what Josie thought, Zanzi was still going to attempt escape. There was no way she was going to wait and see. Tilly needed her help. She owed the young woman that much. Tilly had helped her in The Eyrie with her chatter, with her stories, her optimistic character. Zanzi shuddered to imagine what the bikers were doing to her.
Using the walls of the shower stall, Zanzi climbed up into the ceiling like scaling a chimney. The air in the cavity was stale and had a slightly moldy odor. She knocked eddies of dust motes as she crawled over the ceiling joists. Using the HVAC system as a guide, she made her way across their prison and into the rest of the house. It was slow going and painful on her hands and knees. Zanzi paused at a ventilation grate and peered through. It was another room with captives, three that she could see. Two African American females and a scrawny white guy with blue hair. She wanted to call out a greeting and give them hope, tell them that she was working on a way to free them. But she didn’t.
The next bedroom was empty. World War Two memorabilia adorned the walls and shelves, mainly German, with some Russian. Nazi symbols and helmets. Knives, and a uniform in a frame.
Zanzi moved on, hunting for the access panel. She found it next to a room from which loud punk music blared through the sheetrock. Singing and stomping reverberated as she slid the panel over and peeked out. The access opened into a hallway, the carpet stained and old. She risked a quick glance, looking for a back door or something similar, but found only trash. Beer cans and fast-food wrappers were everywhere. Lying against a doorway was a comatose man, a Jack Daniels bottle gripped in his hand. She moved the trapdoor back into place and carried on. It was tough going, moving over the sharp edges of the timber. She had to remind herself why she was doing it. Why she had to do it.
Grub was easy to recognize as he lay in bed. Traci, the woman the gang had tormented during the fight, lay with a thin arm covered in track marks draped across his tattooed chest. Then she saw Tilly. Tilly was handcuffed to the bedpost, both arms behind her head, her naked chest exposed. She was shivering, her eyes puffy from crying.
Zanzi pulled back from the ventilation grate and steadied herself, catching a sob that threatened to escape her throat.
Grub stirred on the bed and propped himself up on one elbow, roughly shoving Traci off him.
“Hey. What the fuck?” she grumbled.
“Get off me, dumb bitch.” He shoved the junkie again and looked at Tilly. “I want to fuck this one now. She’s watched; now it’s her turn.”
Tilly brought her knees up to her chest and shook her head. “Go away. I don’t like boys.”
Grub laughed. “Don’t like boys? Lezzie then, is it?” He pulled Tilly’s legs out straight and tried to crawl on top of her. “Traci here likes girls too. You can have both.”
“Get off!” Tilly screamed, so loud dust rained on Zanzi from the rafters. She kicked out at the biker, which only angered him. He slammed his fist into the side of her head, dazing her.
Traci jumped onto his back, scratching and yelling obscenities. Grub hollered and threw the junkie off. She landed in a heap against the wall. Grub kicked her a couple of times.
“Stay out of this, bitch.” He kicked her again, brutal blows that lifted the skinny woman off the floor. “No more meth for you, worthless whore.”
Zanzi had seen enough. She jumped through the aging drywall. A fine mist of plaster rained into the room as Zanzi plummeted the eight feet to the bed. Despite her outrage, she had judged her entry well, falling directly onto Grub’s head, first with the sheet of drywall, then her knees. He grunted and cried out as he hit the floor.
Zanzi rolled away and winced as the force of her drop vibrated up her legs and back. Quickly she scanned the bedside table for keys to Tilly’s handcuffs and pulled out her weapon—the crossbow bolt.
Grub stumbled as he rose, throwing the sheetrock away. His eyes widened when he recognized Zanzi. “What the fuck? You?”
Zanzi breathed out, took two steps forward, leaned back slightly, and swiveled from her hips, aiming a roundhouse kick for his head.
Grub flinched away, taking the blow on his shoulder. “Fuck you!” he spat.
She ignored his curse and glanced at the other bedside table. There were the keys! She had perhaps ten more seconds before the guard came rushing in. She had banked on the fact that he had drunk too much, but was that going to be enough?
Grub was opposite the door. She was blocking his escape. Traci was nearest, on her hands and knees, gasping from Grub’s attack.
“Traci, get up. We need you.”
All the junkie could manage was a pitiful moan. She was down. Spent, with nothing left to offer.
Grub growled. He leapt at Zanzi, arms and hands outstretched like a Rabid hoping for a meal.
Zanzi twisted and ducked, rolling across the bed. She grabbed the keys and shoved them into her pocket.
The biker scrambled toward her. She whipped the crossbow bolt out of her bra and held it like a knife, eyeing up the side of his neck where his jugular would be.
“Is that your weapon?” Grub said, smirking.
“It’s all I need.”
The room shook with a tremendous explosion. Glass shattered. Metal shrieked.
People screamed and shouted out as rifle fire pounded over the party noise.
Grub staggered back and caught himself on the bed. He shook his head as if shaking the ringing from his ears. He unlocked the d
oor and glared back at her. “I’ll deal with you later,” he snarled.
To Zanzi, the threat sounded empty, like he was saying it more as an assurance to himself. More people screamed as smaller explosions tore through the Outcast Mongrels’ fortress. The bikers were answering the attack with gunfire of their own, but it sounded sporadic and messy compared to the controlled bursts of the attackers.
Zanzi unlocked Tilly and kissed her on the forehead, brushing her messy hair aside. “Are you okay? Did he violate you?”
“I don’t think so.” Tilly shook her head. “I mean, I don’t know what violate means.”
“Did he touch you where he shouldn’t have?”
“Ew, no.”
“Good. We need to get out of here. Whoever’s attacking isn’t going to differentiate between friend and foe.” Zanzi pointed up. “Through there.”
Tilly shrugged into her top and pulled it down over her waist.
The battle outside grew in intensity. The rifle fire was joined by shotgun blasts and Harley Davidsons’ throaty roars as bikers fled. On a hunch, Zanzi checked under the bed and smiled at the stash of weapons. She discounted the AR-15s and AK47s. The Mossberg’s were too bulky as well. She pulled out a silver metal case and flicked open the lid. Four Sig Sauer P229 Compacts gleamed at her. She took three, and all the magazines, cramming them into every available pocket. She double-checked hers was loaded and, with Tilly’s help, moved the bedside table under the hole in the ceiling.
Traci groaned and tried to stand. “What’s happening?”
“The bikers are under attack. Can you stand?”
Traci groaned again but managed to stay upright. “There’s a tun—” She gasped and held her side.
Zanzi wanted to help her, but with her injuries – most likely broken ribs – she wouldn’t cope with the crawl through the ceiling cavity.
“There’s a tunnel,” she gasped out, and moaned as she opened one of the drawers. She brightened as she pulled out a bag of crystal meth. Without hesitation, she opened it and swallowed a couple of chunks.
“A tunnel? What do you mean? For escaping?”
“It’s where they hide this stuff.” Traci wiggled the bag of drugs. “And in case the pigs raid us. Bull, the former president, made them build it.” She swallowed another chunk of meth.
“Where is it?” Zanzi asked. She moved to the door and strained her ears, trying to determine where the battle was taking place. The gunfire had slowed, with only an occasional pop of rifles and boom from shotguns coming now. There were the distant sounds of screams and pleading before single shots rang out, silencing them. Whoever had attacked, they were executing, not taking prisoners.
Black Skulls? It had to be. Maybe they did care about Doctor Josie Lahm after all and had sent a squad to track her down. With the noise the motorbikes had made, it wouldn’t have been hard. The Black Skulls must have waited until the bikers were drunk and wrecked from the party before attacking.
“The tunnel’s in the middle, between all the houses. Behind the main bar,” Traci said.
Zanzi nodded and looked back at Tilly. Her priority was Tilly’s safety, and her own. Josie had made her choice, deciding to stay. It was too risky to try to help the doctor as well, but they needed her knowledge. Indecision twisted her stomach. More gunfire erupted, much louder this time. She sighed. “Let’s go, then.”
Traci bounced back to the bedside table. She yanked out the drawer and flipped it over. A key was taped to the underside.
“Grub thinks he’s clever, but he’s just an asshole.” She smirked and unlocked the door. Zanzi stopped her with a tug on the shoulder. “I’ll go first.” She handed Tilly one of the P229s and showed her the safety. “Just point and shoot. Don’t hesitate. These men will kill us. Okay?”
Tilly turned the gun over, feeling its weight.
“Careful,” Zanzi said. “Keep it pointed at the floor, away from your body and me. Only bring it up when you see a bad guy.”
“How can I tell if he’s bad?”
“Assume they’re all bad.”
Zanzi dropped into a crouch and creaked open the door. The drunk guard had gone, leaving the hallway empty. She tried to remember the route back to the bar and the cage. That was their destination, but first she had some prisoners to rescue.
Twenty-Five
Somewhere over the Bering Sea
The cockpit door banged open, jolting Ryan awake. He reached for his gun, habit dictating his actions.
“Easy, old fella.” Booth grinned. “We’re being hailed.”
“Hailed? Who?”
“USS Nimitz.”
Ryan stood and shook the fuzz from his head. Ever since the first combusting incident on Koya, he couldn’t shake the feeling of doom whenever he slept. After Yamada had knocked out The Nameless, his anxiety had grown.
Allie glanced up as Ryan entered the cramped cockpit. She held her hand over the microphone on her headset. “I told them we’re American citizens heading home from Japan.”
“Did you use any of our names?”
Allie shook her head. Ryan sat in the co-pilot seat and eased the headset over his head.
“This is Captain Jordan.”
“Jordan. OS Waugh from the USS Nimitz. Your co-pilot has informed us of your point of departure. What is your intended destination?”
“Good to hear your voice, Waugh. We had a hell of a time leaving Japan. Do you have any idea what’s going on? It’s like World War Three out there.”
“I’m afraid I don’t have that information, sir. Please state your destination.”
“We’re heading home to Portland, Oregon, but we have to refuel in Dutch Harbor.”
“Stay your course. I have an escort to guide you in. Do not stray from your current flight path. Any move to do so and you will be fired upon. Understand?”
“That’s highly unnecessary, OS Waugh. We’re American citizens.”
“Stay your course, Captain Jordan. F-18s will be there shortly. Over and out.”
Waugh’s voice was replaced with white noise. Ryan shifted in his seat and looked out the window. OS Waugh was true to his word. Screaming out of the clouds, two F-18s approached. They flew close enough to tip their wings and give him the thumbs up.
“Unknown aircraft. Keep on your current flight path to Dutch Harbor.”
“Wilco,” Ryan said, giving them his own thumbs up. The F-18s moved away but stayed close.
Allie clicked off the radio and let out a long breath. “Holy crap. I thought that was it.”
“Really?” Booth said.
“Can you understand why? With what’s going on out there, I thought they’d just shoot us down. Protect our borders.”
Ryan nodded. Allie made a fair point. If he was being honest with himself, he too had some fear, but OS Waugh had given no indication apart from a warning. “Booth, inform the others. What’s our ETA, Allie?”
“Thirty minutes out. It’s going to be bumpy. There’s a storm brewing.”
“Okay. We must keep up the charade, even on the ground. You can tell them your real name, but we can’t – at least not until I know they’re on our side.”
“They’re US Navy, though.”
“Even so. Yamada told me that OPIS went deep. They had men and women in power all over the world. Everywhere. Until I know, we go anonymous.”
Allie turned her attention back to flying the Learjet. She used the radio to inform their escort of any small tweaks as they began their descent into Dutch Harbor.
Allie’s prediction was spot on; the private plane bumped and jolted as it dropped below the gray clouds and swooped over the Bering Sea, the F-18s mirroring their every move. Allie circled the runway, checking for any litter. A plane sat at one end, unmoving. Apart from that, it was clear.
Five minutes later, Allie taxied the jet to a halt outside the small terminal building. The two F-18s landed too and took up flanking positions alongside the Lear.
Ryan entered the cabin and looked at
everyone. “Keep your wits about you. Stick to the story. We lost our passports in our escape from Japan and the Siphons. If they separate us, remember what we must do, what’s at stake.”
The Nameless and Ebony answered him with grunts and nods. He didn’t want any more delays. They had maybe eighteen hours to stop the second wave. Sofia needed all that time. Ryan’s job was to get them into the NSA spy station. Was anyone there alive? If so, were they OPIS?
Booth and Allie pushed open the door and the stairs unfolded in one smooth motion. Ryan waved at the two pilots. One had exited his aircraft, while the other stayed in his.
“Captain Jordan,” he said as he walked down the stairs.
The pilot kept his pistol trained on Ryan. “Bring everyone out.” The tell-tale thump of a helicopter’s rotors echoed over the windswept bay.
Ryan turned and beckoned everyone out. They stood in a small huddle. Pre-planned by Cal, it was all about giving the pilots, and whoever was in the chopper, what they expected to see. The lie was that they were tourists, stuck in Japan, chased by creatures and the defense force when all they wanted to do was to get home. Huddling together gave off a non-threatening vibe, like they had a shared experience. She hoped it sold the lie.
The SH-60 Seahawk bumped to the ground a short distance away and disgorged six heavily armed men. Once The Nameless were surrounded, the F-18 pilot jumped back into his cockpit. The leader of the armed men – a colonel – slung his rifle and took off his helmet.
“Peter Booth.” He laughed. “What the hell are you doing out here?” The colonel pivoted and waved the F-18 pilots away. The scream of their jet engines was deafening as they took off and banked southwest. The colonel signaled to two of his men. They entered the Learjet and began searching the cabin.
“Well, Booth?” the colonel said.
“Dudek.” Booth shook his head. “I had a spot of bother in Sapporo, met up with these guys, and here we are. Can you tell us what’s going on? One minute I’m enjoying the company of a lady and the next, she’s a pile of ash.”
“You haven’t changed a bit, Booth. Still knocking around with that agency?”
Shadows of Ash (The Nameless Book 2) Page 19