by Dirk Patton
I looked back at the young woman and for about the thousandth time since the attacks, reminded myself to never underestimate anyone.
“I’ve seen this militia,” I said after a few moments of silence. “We had a chat with a few of them out in the desert. Earlier tonight, saw a whole bunch of them raiding the armory at an Air Force Base. They’re going to be well armed now. And probably have night vision and a few other things that will help them hunt you down.”
“I don’t think they know about us,” Caleb said.
“You don’t think the girls they captured told them?”
“I do!”
Chelsea answered before her brother could speak. He looked at her for a moment before meeting my eyes and nodding agreement. I was glad to see these kids weren’t viewing the world through rose-colored glasses.
“Can you get them back?” Tiffany spoke for the first time.
Dog had pulled his trick of slowly lying down while being petted. When his victim of choice leans down to keep rubbing him, he rolls over and suckers them into scratching his belly. Invariably, they wind up seated on the ground next to him, and he’s on his back soaking up every ounce of attention. It had worked on Tiffany, who looked up at me from where she was sitting in the dirt.
“There’s only four of us,” I said.
“Five!” Rachel corrected me.
“OK. Five,” I conceded. “And there’s hundreds of them.”
I kind of felt like a heel, making excuses.
“Why couldn’t the SEALs have found us?” Tiffany pouted.
“Young lady,” Rachel said, her tone stern. “That man right over there is a SEAL. And that one’s a Ranger, and he’s a Delta Force trooper. And that one up there in the rocks? He’s Russian special forces. This isn’t a video game or a movie. This is reality. I’ve seen these guys do some absolutely amazing things, but you don’t put four against four hundred. That’s not how things work.”
I appreciated Rachel jumping to my defense, but it didn’t make me feel any better. Glancing over my shoulder, I saw that Sam was close enough to have heard our conversation. From the look on his face, he wasn’t feeling any better about it than I was.
Tiffany didn’t flinch under Rachel’s glare, and I had to give the girl credit. She had some iron in her spine. But then, these kids had managed to survive all this time on their own. You don’t do that if you’re not made of some pretty stern stuff.
“Look,” I said, cutting off the retort that was about to come out of Tiffany’s mouth. “There’s bigger things going on in the world than six girls captured by the militia.”
I held up my hand to forestall the angry protests that started to come from all three kids.
“Let me finish. I’m not saying those girls aren’t important. But, here’s the situation. The world as you know it is gone. I know you’ve been pretty isolated, so you may not know what’s happened over the past several months.
“The US is dead. The whole world is dead, for that matter. All except for Australia. The man who started this is hiding out there, and I plan to do something about that. First, I’ve got to get to Mexico and try to rescue a downed pilot. He’s adrift in the Gulf of California right now and probably won’t survive another day if we don’t get to him. That’s where we’re headed.
“But, we’re coming back. We have friends not too far away that we have to pick up. When the pilot is safe, and we get back, I’ll do everything I can to rescue those girls. You have my word.”
I stared into each of their eyes to see if what I’d said had registered.
“Why not now?” Tiffany asked, not willing to give up.
“How long ago were they taken?” I asked.
They all thought about that for a minute, Chelsea finally answering.
“Seventy-three days,” she said, surprising me that she was so precise.
“Math major. Remember?” She grinned at my expression.
“That’s a long time,” I said, turning to face Tiffany. “I understand how you feel, but two more days will almost certainly mean the pilot will die. Two more days after seventy-three for the girls? I’m sorry, but they’re going to have to wait.”
Tiffany glared back at me and started to open her mouth, but Caleb reached out and placed his hand on her shoulder.
“Tiff. I don’t like it either, but the man’s right.”
She stared at him for a long time, her hand never ceasing its rubbing of Dog’s belly. Finally, she looked down. Her hair fell and hid her face, but not before I saw a tear trickle down her cheek. After several quiet moments, Rachel stood and motioned at Caleb.
“I’m a doctor. Let’s take a look at that arm. And is there anyone else that needs medical attention?”
21
Fifteen minutes later we were all crammed into the three Humvees. The kids were coming with us. It had actually taken some convincing, but not that much. They were tired, hungry, dirty and scared. I wasn’t surprised that the final holdout was Tiffany. She’d moved away from the group and crossed her arms over her chest.
First Caleb, then Chelsea tried talking to her, but she was having none of it. They’d signaled the remaining girls who had come running, but Tiffany wasn’t listening to any of them, either. Finally, Rachel walked over and put her arms around the girl, speaking softly to her. They stayed that way for several minutes.
“One of the girls the militia took is her sister,” Caleb said to me in a quiet voice.
That explained a lot, but we didn’t have time. I wasn’t going to force Tiffany to come with us, but I also wasn’t going to stand around in the middle of the Nevada desert with my thumb up my ass while people tried to convince her. We’d already lost too much time and needed to be back on the road. Finally, whatever Rachel said worked, and she escorted the girl to our Hummer.
Now, as we drove down the backside of the mountains, our vehicle was full. Caleb and Tiffany, apparently a couple, had stayed together and elected to ride with us. Dog was thrilled, planting himself between them and resting his head in the girl’s lap.
Behind us, Long and Igor had Chelsea and another girl with them, the remaining four riding with Sam. With all the gear, food and water we’d brought along it was a tight fit, but the kids were hungry and very quickly started going through our supply of MREs.
None of us were much in the mood to talk, and it wasn’t long before Dog’s snores turned contagious, and our two passengers were sound asleep. How they could sleep with Dog doing his best to imitate an asthmatic steam engine, I’ll never know, but somehow they did. Rachel turned around in her seat to check them, then looked at me with a smile on her face.
“How tired do you have to be to sleep through that?”
She hooked her thumb at Dog. I grinned and shook my head.
“You think you’ll be able to get those girls back?” Rachel whispered some time later.
“Maybe,” I said after glancing in the back to make sure everyone was still sleeping. “But I doubt it. Seventy-three days is a long time. And that’s just one thing that’s bothering me. The militia guy I interrogated said they’d only started coming out of their bunkers a couple of weeks ago. I’m pretty sure he was telling the truth. So… who really took those girls?”
“He could have been lying.”
“Sure, he could have. But why? Why lie about something like that? It doesn’t make sense.”
I shook my head.
“How many people did he say were in the militia?”
“Four hundred. Why?” I asked.
“Maybe they weren’t all in bunkers. Maybe some of them stayed above ground. Or came out earlier than he knows about.”
I thought about that for a minute. Rachel was right, at least about the possibilities she had suggested.
“We may have other problems, too,” I said.
“What?”
“The voice we heard on the radio. Maybe that was the militia, and the guy didn’t know about it. Maybe not. Then there were the lights we saw u
p in the mountains not long after we left Groom Lake. I’ve got a bad feeling there’s a lot more going on here than we’ve realized.”
“Why here? What’s special about this place?”
“Hot, dry and isolated. Maybe the virus died out quickly here, and there’s a whole lot more survivors out there than we thought.”
“What about where we’re going? Arizona and Mexico. Just as hot and dry?”
I nodded, not liking what Rachel was thinking. The infected were bad enough. We didn’t need a bunch of post-apocalyptic assholes running around thinking they were some kind of end of the world warrior like on a bad, made-for-TV movie.
We each lapsed into our own thoughts as I drove. The road curved gently, descending, then after twenty or so miles it dead-ended at a T intersection. I thought I knew which way to go but took half a minute to double check the map. It was a good thing I did. I would have turned in the wrong direction and wound up somewhere in the middle of nowhere on the north side of Lake Mead.
Heading the right way, the road narrowed as we moved through some particularly rugged terrain. On the right were steep, rocky slopes. To our left, I could see the dark, calm waters of the massive lake through my night vision. That was a good sign. At least Hoover Dam was still standing.
I had worried about the dam having failed. Right off, I couldn’t remember how much water it held back, but did know it was the largest reservoir in the United States. The bridge we needed to cross was no more than a quarter of a mile downstream, and in the event of a failure at the dam, there was no way it would survive the flood that would be released.
We followed this route for several miles until reaching US Highway 93. Now I was at least somewhat familiar with the area and didn’t need to check the map to know which way to turn. Of course, the road sign pointing the way to Arizona didn’t hurt, either.
The highway was clear of any abandoned vehicles, and perhaps that should have encouraged me. It didn’t. This was the only way across the Colorado river for a very long way in either direction, and it didn’t make sense to me why it wasn’t clogged up with cars and trucks.
Braking to a halt a few dozen yards short of the bridge, I saw why. It was gone. A hundred feet out into the river gorge, the bridge deck ended in a twisted mass of steel and concrete. It had been dropped into the river, 800 feet below. This had probably been an effort by the authorities to prevent the infected from easily crossing in large numbers. The road had been clear because there’d almost certainly been a road block stopping traffic before it could even get close.
“What’s wrong?” Caleb asked from the back seat.
He didn’t have the benefit of night vision and couldn’t see what I was looking at.
“Bridge across the river is out,” I said.
“Are there other bridges to the south?” Rachel asked.
“Yes, but they’re a long way, and if this one got destroyed, they’re probably down too.”
“What do we do?” Caleb asked.
“Try the dam,” I said, cranking the wheel and making a U-turn.
We’d passed an access road for the Hoover Dam a couple of miles back, and that might be our best option.
“What dam?” Caleb asked.
I glanced in the mirror and sighed. Almost said something about the public school system he’d been educated in, but bit my tongue. It wasn’t his fault he hadn’t been taught some of the basics about the very country where he’d been born.
“Hoover Dam,” I said patiently. “It’s what creates Lake Mead out of the Colorado River. Built in the 1930s, if I remember right.”
“Oh, yeah. I saw some signs for it when we were driving up from Kingman. I just figured it was an old monument or something. It’s still there?” Caleb asked in surprise.
Rachel and I exchanged glances, then both of us shook our heads.
“What?” He asked, sounding slightly miffed.
I slowed and turned onto the access road, which at one time was the only highway across the river as it wound along the top of the dam. Keeping my thoughts to myself, I drove slowly, glancing at the mirror to make sure Sam and Long were staying close.
We passed several large signs that warned we were entering a secure area where vehicles were subject to search. Not a bad thing. I’m glad we never got to find out what a few hundred pounds of plastic explosives in a terrorist’s truck would do if detonated on top of the dam.
Slowing more, I drove through a chain link gate that had been violently ripped aside and torn from its hinges. Around a sharp curve, the road narrowed, and I stopped. Just ahead, a jacked-up Chevy pickup lay on its side, blocking the way. Beyond, I could see where the asphalt transitioned to the concrete road surface on top of the dam.
“Everyone stay put,” I said, opening my door.
Long, Sam and Igor didn’t need to be told to join me. As soon as I stepped out, their doors popped open. The four of us spent a couple of minutes scanning the surrounding canyon walls but didn’t see anything of concern. Igor used the thermal scope on the sniper rifle, and I waited to get a final all-clear from him before turning my attention to the crashed truck.
Walking closer, I could see the sheet metal was riddled with bullet holes. The glass was blown out of all the windows, and three of the four tires were flat. I leaned down and looked in the cab, spotting two bodies. I think they were both men but couldn’t tell for sure. The decomposition was significant.
“We can move it with my Hummer,” Sam said, standing next to me. “Got a winch on the front bumper.”
“Let’s take a walk and check the dam, first,” I said. “If it’s not passable, there’s no point in wasting time on it.”
I called to Igor and Long, telling them to stay with the vehicles. Moving around the truck, Sam and I spread apart, our rifles up to our shoulders. The first thing we encountered, no more than thirty yards on, was a dual line of thick bollards that stuck up several feet from the road’s surface. These were just like the ones that had protected the entrance to the lab in Los Alamos where I’d met Irina and Igor.
Sam walked up to one, which was nearly as thick as he was, and placed his hand on the rounded top. It was above his waist, and the two rows of them effectively blocked any vehicle traffic from making it onto the dam.
“Shit,” he said quietly. “No way we’re moving these things.”
I looked at him, remembering how Tech Sergeant Scott had been able to lower them in Los Alamos. They’re hydraulically controlled, and he’d found a maintenance hatch where he could access the system and release the pressure. They’d retracted most of the way under their own weight, at which point we’d been able to drive across them.
“Know anything about hydraulics?” I asked Sam.
He looked at me, then turned back to look at the bollard he was touching. After a beat, he shook his head.
“No, but how complicated can it be?”
“Let’s check the dam,” I said, waving him forward.
We moved past the barricades and out onto the top of the dam. To our right was the downstream portion of Black Canyon. Sheer rock walls and 700 feet straight down to the river. To our left, the contained waters of Lake Mead. I glanced at the lake as we walked, then slowed and looked closer. After a moment, I moved to the railing and looked down the upstream side of the dam.
“Something wrong?” Sam asked, coming over to stand next to me.
“The water,” I said. “It’s way too high.”
“How much too high?”
“Been here a few times,” I said. “Never seen the water even close to where we’re standing. It was always at least 60 feet below the top, usually more. That’s what? No more than 5 feet?”
Sam looked down and nodded agreement with my guess.
“OK, but what’s your point.”
“Don’t know that I’ve got one. But think about it. If the lake is this full, probably because there’s been no one to monitor and operate the spillways, that’s a hell of a lot of pressure on the str
ucture that it may not have been designed to hold. Besides. We’re standing on almost one-hundred-year-old engineering.”
“You’re not giving me a warm fuzzy,” Sam said. “Are you saying we shouldn’t try to drive across?”
“No,” I shook my head. “I’m saying we’d better get our asses across before it fills up anymore. If this dam goes, there won’t be a bridge across the river left standing, even if there is one that didn’t get blown. And, I’m worried about coming back.”
“You’re just a cheery fucking soul, aren’t you,” he said with a grin.
I shrugged my shoulders, and we walked the rest of the roadway. On the Arizona side, we found another set of bollards blocking the way. Taking a few minutes, we scanned the surrounding cliffs, then turned and headed back to rejoin our group.
“So what do you want to do?” Sam asked as we walked.
“The bollards aren’t part of the dam. They’re in the approaches. They were added sometime after 9/11 happened. That means there’ll be maintenance hatches we can access without having to go inside the dam. We’re going to see what we can do to release them.”
Sam was starting to say something when we both froze as a deep, mournful groan sounded from all around. We looked down as vibrations traveled from the concrete up through our boots. It only lasted for a few seconds, but it spooked the hell out of both of us.
“Look at that,” Sam whispered, pointing at the water.
I turned and caught my breath. The formerly calm surface of the lake, where it met the dam, was distorted by millions of tiny ripples. It reminded me of how water looks when it vibrates in a sonic cleaner. This continued for almost half a minute, then quickly dissipated, the water returning to a smooth, reflective surface.
22
“That’s what we heard?”
Long looked freaked when I told the group about the dam vibrating and the ripples on the surface of the water. Everyone glanced around nervously when a low frequency rumble started up, seemingly coming from everywhere at the same time. It wasn’t loud. In fact, I’m not sure I so much heard it as felt it.