V Plague (Book 17): Abaddon

by Patton, Dirk

  Banking sharply, he brought us back over his compound for a quick look. Each of us pressed our faces against the glass on our side of the aircraft to look down.

  “Got some light showing,” I said, spying a bright sliver of illumination leaking out from the back of a small building.

  Lucas turned and flew back over, peering down. Grunting slightly when he spotted it, he made a quick call on the radio. It was only a matter of seconds before someone either turned off the light or covered the opening.

  “Okay,” Lucas began. “That group came from the northeast. Direction of Coober Pedy. Think they were from the town?”

  “No way to know without checking it out,” I said. “They could’ve come from anywhere and picked up a scent on the wind. Might be time to stop cooking outside.”

  “That’s not gonna make Ziggy happy. So, you’ve had a lot of experience with these things. Should we go check the town, or what?”

  “We should, but we’d better spiral out from your house for a good distance. Could be more out there.”

  “Just fucking great,” Lucas muttered, but did as I suggested.

  Flying in steadily increasing concentric circles, we rode in silence with our attention focused on the ground below. As I watched the dark ground, Rachel’s concerns hit home. I was able to see nearly everything beneath us. Not perfectly, like it was the middle of the day, but well enough that I didn’t need the assistance of night vision to know what I was looking at.

  “Why are they still alive?” Lucas asked.

  “Who?”

  “The infected, dumbass. Who the hell else would I mean?”

  I shook my head and grinned sheepishly at being so obtuse but in all fairness, I had other things on my mind.

  “Don’t know,” I said. “I’ve been told several times that the nerve gas is fatal after about forty-eight hours. Been more than that, plus it’s spreading. Everyone here was vaccinated, so…”

  I glanced at him and shrugged my shoulders. Why they weren’t dying off wasn’t important. That fact that they weren’t was a big fucking problem, however.

  “Your guy in Hawaii have an answer?”

  “Maybe,” I said, hesitantly. “Probably not. They’ve been struggling, trying to understand this whole thing.”

  I could see Lucas nod his head from the corner of my eye, then something on the distant horizon caught my attention.

  “Four o’clock, on the horizon,” I said, giving Lucas a bearing to look down.

  “Don’t see anything,” he said after nearly half a minute.

  “Dust cloud,” I said, eyes locked on the direction.

  “We get dust storms all the time, mate,” Lucas said dismissively.

  “Did in Arizona, too. This is a different kind of storm.”

  “What are you talking about? Different kind of storm?”

  “Saw them do this in Oklahoma,” I said, remembering the massive herd that closed in and overran Tinker Air Force Base. “They form into these giant herds. I’ve seen as many as several million all moving together. When they get going, there’s nothing that can stop them.”

  Lucas stared at me for a few seconds, his jaw set and a frown creasing his forehead.

  “You’re serious.”

  “As a fucking heart attack,” I said, nodding. “We’d better go see if I’m right, and if I am figure out which way they’re heading.”

  He watched me for another few seconds then turned directly toward the dust cloud I’d spotted.

  7

  “Bloody hell,” Lucas breathed.

  We had just passed over the leading edge of a massive herd.

  “Bloody hell is right,” I said, equally as awestruck.

  Beneath us, the ground seemed to be alive. To writhe as tens, if not hundreds of thousands of feet created a dust cloud that stretched for what must have been miles. I’d been right about the virus being the culprit behind the behavior, but there was only one thing. These weren’t infected humans. Covering the desert below like an invading army were kangaroos, tightly packed and all moving in the same direction.

  “Why are they doing that?” Lucas asked, seemingly unable to believe what he was seeing.

  “You’re asking me? I was hoping you were going to tell me this was some annual migration or some weird Aussie mating ritual or something.”

  Lucas shook his head, unable to speak. He continued to fly straight and it took every bit of five minutes for us to pass over the trailing edge of the herd.

  “Christ, there must be millions of the buggers! We’re making a hundred and forty knots true air speed. Five minutes over the herd…” Lucas’s voice trailed off and he did the math in his head. “That’s bloody well twenty kilometers long!”

  He looked at me with his mouth hanging open in shock. All I could do was nod in response. I’d seen this enough to know what to expect, just never with wildlife.

  “So, I’m guessing this isn’t normal.”

  “Bloody right it’s not! Like the damn seagulls when we went down to the preserve, but… but… even then there were only a few hundred. Nothin’ like this!”

  “Do we need to be worried about them?” I asked, nodding toward the ground.

  “Not normally, no, but then there is no normal anymore,” Lucas said. “If they were of a mind, a full grown Roo is easily a match for a man. That many all at once…”

  “I’m turned around up here,” I said. “Where are they headed?”

  Lucas shook his head as if to clear it, then turned sharp enough to make me grab for something. Aligning the aircraft with the herd’s direction of travel, he held the plane steady and peered at a compass.

  “If they stay on this course, they’ll pass just north of my house.”

  “How far is ‘just’?”

  “Maybe a couple of K.”

  “Herd’s wider than that,” I said, watching as realization dawned on Lucas’s face.

  Without another word, he rammed the throttles all the way forward. The engines roared as we quickly gained speed and he adjusted our heading a couple of degrees to head directly home.

  “What are you thinking?” I asked, understanding his fear for his family.

  “Thinking we got less than two hours to get the fuck out of their path,” he said through gritted teeth. “I saw those goddamn Seagulls. If the Roos are even half as aggressive, we’re in trouble.”

  “Okay,” I said cautiously. “Where are you going?”

  “What?” he asked, looking at me in surprise.

  “We don’t know what else may be out there. If we just head out, trying to clear the area, who’s to say we aren’t going to run headlong into a herd of something else? People… hell, maybe even dingoes, or who knows what other kind of nasty beasts you’ve got in this God-forsaken country.”

  He was quiet for a couple of beats, considering my comment.

  “Okay,” he said after taking a deep breath. “What do you suggest? Way too many to fight.”

  “Two ways to deal with infected when you can’t kill them all. One, be where they aren’t. Or two, don’t let them know you’re where you are.”

  “You’re saying we hide?”

  I nodded.

  “Where?” he asked.

  “You’re asking me? This is your country, not mine. Maybe we just hunker down in the house and keep everyone quiet. If we don’t give them a reason to break their way inside, they probably won’t.”

  “Probably? I can’t do probably, mate. This is my family we’re talking about!”

  “Mine, too!” I answered a little hotly. “I’m not pulling this out of my ass, Lucas. Unless you’ve got a plan and a place to retreat to, wandering around the desert in the middle of the night isn’t a great idea, especially with kids. Safer to go down to your basement and block the stairs so they can’t get to us even if they did breach at ground level. But I really don’t think that will happen if we stay dark and quiet.”

  He was quiet for a bit, finally nodding and pushing on the throt
tles but they were already against their stops. We flew in silence for several minutes before Lucas throttled back slightly and began descending.

  “Compound is just ahead,” Lucas said, snapping me out of my thoughts.

  We both leaned forward, staring through the windscreen. Nothing but darkness beneath us.

  “Good,” he breathed. “No light showing.”

  He heaved a sigh and sat back to scan the aircraft’s instruments. I wasn’t so quick to relax. Yes, it was completely dark beneath us, but something was wrong with my eyes. Rubbing them, I blinked several times in an attempt to clear my vision. Looking back at the ground as we descended, things were still weird. I could make out Lucas’s house and outbuildings, but everything seemed to be… undulating.

  “What’s wrong?”

  Lucas had noticed and was looking between me and the ground below.

  “Don’t land,” I said, a feeling of dread forming a lump in my gut. “Fly over. Let’s take a look with the landing lights before we set down.”

  “John…” he began warningly.

  “Goddamn it, Lucas, just do it! It may be my eyes are fucked up, but we need to see before we land.”

  To say he wasn’t happy would be a gross understatement, but after a long moment he nodded. We’d already passed his compound and he banked sharply, standing the plane on one wing as he brought us about. Reducing speed, we lost more altitude as we approached the main house. Lucas flipped a switch and high intensity lights set into the leading edges of the wings snapped on, clearly illuminating everything beneath us.

  For a beat, I couldn’t understand what I was seeing. Instead of the sharp edges and corners on Lucas’s house, it was like a giant, black blanket had been thrown over the building. And that blanket was in constant motion as if there were some monster beneath, trying to find its way out.

  “What the…” Lucas asked, staring below in horror.

  He pulled the throttles back farther until we were barely above the plane’s stall speed.

  I watched in disbelief as tens of thousands of bats, disturbed by the buzzing engines and bright lights suddenly took to the air. As one, they rose straight into the sky, creating an impenetrable wall of bodies directly in our path.

  “Look out!” I shouted as the first one slammed into the windscreen in front of my face.

  8

  Irina and Igor sat huddled over a table in the wardroom aboard the Key West. It was mid-afternoon, though the only way they knew that was from a large chronometer mounted on a bulkhead behind a spotlessly clean coffee urn. They were alone, sipping strong black coffee, but their ever-present escort of two burly sailors was right outside the only access point for the room.

  They had only briefly seen the Captain since their very chilly reception off the coast of North Korea and contact with the XO had been minimal. Upon their arrival, they had been allowed to take hot showers and were provided with clean clothes and rubber soled shoes that matched what the enlisted members of the crew wore. They blended in, minus any name or rank insignia which clearly marked them as guests aboard the submarine.

  After their meal, they were taken to separate but adjacent quarters and exhaustion from their journey from Siberia to the coast took over. Both had fallen into bed and slept soundly for more than twelve hours. An hour ago, the XO had awakened them. It was time for Russian Admiral of the Fleet Shevchenko’s burial at sea.

  When they arrived, Irina saw her Uncle’s body at rest on a ramp that was pushed against the entrance to a tube used for launching torpedoes. He was tightly wrapped in immaculate white sheets with only his face exposed. Several irregular lumps were visible beneath the makeshift burial shroud and the XO quietly explained they were weights that would carry the body to the ocean floor.

  Chief Strickland, the SEAL who had accompanied them on their journey out of Siberia, briefly embraced Irina and stood next to her as the Captain moved to stand over her Uncle and began speaking. His words were somber and respectful, despite what she had assumed was disdain, if not outright hatred, of Russians. By the time he was finished, tears dampened her eyes. Stepping forward, she bent and placed a soft kiss on Shevchenko’s cold cheek then looked up to thank the Captain, surprised that he was already leaving the room.

  Four crewmen stepped forward, waiting as the XO slowly and respectfully covered the Admiral’s face with the shroud. Moving back, he nodded to the sailors who gently moved the body into the torpedo tube. One of them cycled a switch and a dome shaped cover swung into place and was secured around the perimeter by a series of steel dogs.

  At a nod from the XO, a button was pushed and a sudden loud hiss caused Irina to jump. Igor gently placed his hands on her shoulders, pulling her close as the sealed tube filled with high pressure air. When the hissing ceased, the XO nodded again and the sailor activated the relay that opened the outer torpedo tube door. There was a faint sound of rushing water as the sea flooded into the tube and the bubble of compressed air carried her Uncle’s remains to the ocean.

  “I am worried about the Captain.”

  Irina spoke quietly in Russian, leaning over her cup of coffee toward Igor.

  “Why?”

  “He is obviously extremely unhappy about our presence aboard his submarine. I fear he has lost someone he loved and blames us.”

  “It is likely you are correct,” Igor admitted, then took a sip of coffee before continuing. “But he is behaving as a professional. And he has ensured our safety by providing escorts and keeping us as isolated from the crew as possible.”

  “The crew?” Irina asked in surprise. “What do you mean?”

  Igor took another long sip, then stood and refilled his cup. He didn’t continue until he was back in his seat.

  “Any American that is still alive has almost certainly lost a loved one because of what Russia did. They are right to be angry, despite everything you and I have done and are doing. I have seen the looks on many of the faces we have passed. They do not see a difference between us and Barinov. All they know is we are Russian, and Russia killed their families.”

  “But that is…”

  She stopped speaking as Igor shook his head.

  “You have become accustomed to John and Rachel and some of the senior officers in Hawaii. These people understand and are able to make the distinction. Do not assume there is not a strong desire for revenge among most Americans.”

  Irina stared at him for a long moment, mulling over his point. She was raising her cup for a sip when there was a clank as the door opened. After Igor’s ominous warning, she was startled and spilled coffee on the table’s gleaming white linen.

  The Captain stepped into the wardroom, ignoring them as he strode to the urn and filled a giant ceramic mug emblazoned with the name and hull number of the Key West. Igor ignored him, but Irina tracked every movement.

  “Captain, I did not have an opportunity to express my gratitude for what you did for my Uncle. I understand it must have been difficult for you.”

  “Do you?” he asked, turning to glare at her.

  “Yes, I do,” Irina said emphatically. “We are here, and my Uncle is dead because we are as horrified as you at what was done to your country. I am only sorry we were unable to stop the madman before the attacks could be carried out.”

  He stared at her for several long seconds. It was absolutely quiet in the wardroom. So quiet that they could all hear the gentle sigh of air moving through vents.

  “It was done for another sailor,” he finally said, slowly raising the mug to his mouth. “Nothing more, nothing less. Now, you should be returning to your quarters. The stewards will need to begin setting up for the evening meal.”

  He started to walk away.

  “Are you afraid the crew will harm us?”

  Irina’s question stopped him in his tracks. He kept his head forward, looking at the door.

  “Captain Vostov, let’s get something perfectly clear. I have extended every courtesy while you’ve been aboard my boat. My orders a
re to deliver you and your companion to the continental US. They say nothing about your comfort during the voyage, nor do they specify your condition upon arrival.” He turned and looked directly into her eyes. “We have slightly more than forty-eight hours before reaching the west coast of CONUS and I think it best if we do not speak again.”

  With nothing further, the Captain disappeared through the door, closing it gently behind him. Irina stared at it with her mouth open, then turned to look at Igor. He simply shrugged before finishing his coffee and taking the empty cup to a bussing station in the back of the room.

  “Now I am even more worried,” Irina said when Igor came back to the table for her cup.

  “We were not told we could not share quarters,” he said pointedly.

  Standing, Irina nodded and circled her arms around his waist. He could feel her heart beating rapidly as he wrapped her up in his.

  9

  Lucas did an admirable job of getting us onto the ground in one piece, especially considering both engines were out. We bounced once when the landing gear first touched the sand, then slammed back down and quickly rolled to a stop.

  Instantly, both of us popped our doors open and leapt clear of the aircraft, looking up as we ran. I expected to see the moon and stars blotted out by millions of leathery wings as the bats swooped in for the kill, but to my amazement, they weren’t attacking.

  “Just what the bloody hell?”

  Lucas puffed slightly from stress and exertion as he came to a stop by my side.

  “Beats me,” I said, still scanning sky. “They didn’t attack last time, either, but I just figured they lost us in a bunch of rocks where we were hiding.”

  Lucas took a quick look around through his night vision as he raised a radio to his mouth. It was connected to an earpiece, allowing him to hear responses in the noisy cabin of the plane.

  “Smyth says everyone is scared, but okay,” he said, relief clear in his voice.