Darker Days (As the Ash Fell Book 2)

by AJ Powers

  Moving to the rear of the barn, Clay leaned around the corner and saw there was a back entrance. He had no idea what he would be walking into, but Clay immediately decided it was the most viable option.

  About halfway to the door Clay froze at the sound of boot soles walking across a concrete floor. He pressed up against the wall and crouched down just as one of the guards walked out of the door and headed straight toward a heap of rusted metal and cracking rubber that was once called a tractor. When the guard reached the old farm vehicle, he widened his stance and unzipped his pants. Clay inched past the door while the man relieved himself on the deflated tractor tire. As the man finished, Clay stood up and aimed the rifle center mast.

  “Don’t move and don’t make a sound,” Clay said with a hushed voice.

  The man raised his hands and slowly turned around, a coldblooded grin smeared across his dirty face. He looked at Clay as if he was merely a child holding a water pistol, his expression daring Clay to pull the trigger.

  Clay was left with a decision he didn’t want to make. He had no way to subdue the man, nor did he want to risk getting any closer to him. At the same time, he didn’t want to shoot a man who had, for the time being, surrendered peacefully. Fortunately, yet unfortunately, the man forced Clay’s hand.

  He took a deep breath and opened his mouth. Clay knew he was preparing to holler for his friend back inside the barn. The man’s gamble that Clay was bluffing would be the last mistake he made. The solitary popping sound from the 208 grain A-Max bullet was quiet enough that he was confident nobody back in the farm house would have heard it, but there was little chance the man inside the barn hadn’t noticed.

  “What are you doing out there, Avery?” A voice from inside yelled.

  Clay readied himself to fire.

  “Avery!” the man yelled again. “I said, what the h—”

  The man’s words were cut off by the sound of gunfire coming from the woods. Geoff had engaged the enemy, which meant there were others headed toward the barn.

  Jumping to his feet, Clay ran inside the back door and saw the other guard running toward the front of the barn. Clay stopped, took aim, and fired twice. Both shots were true and the man went down.

  The terrorized children all screamed, frantically scrambling away from Clay. “Hey!” Clay shouted as loud as he dared. “It’s okay, it’s okay, I’m from Liberty. I’m not going to hurt you, I need you to trust me.”

  Most of them were still crying, but a few of the older ones took the time to get a good look at Clay. One of the boys recognized him. Frightened, but willing to trust him, the boy nodded. “Yeah, I’ve seen him there before.” The boy’s announcement spread a temporary relief among the group that was quickly chased away as Geoff exchanged fire with the hostiles outside the barn.

  “Listen,” Clay said, directing his words to the older boy who had recognized him, “I want you guys to go out that back door and straight away from the barn until you find somewhere to hide.”

  The boy nodded and led the group out the back door. Clay stayed inside the barn until the last child cleared the door before moving up to the front of the barn. He swapped magazines to a standard-velocity cartridge, and pocketed the magazine with the subsonic ammo.

  “Here goes nothing,” he said to himself as he leaned out from the doorway to take aim.

  There were men in two of the second-floor windows, a man at the rear of the house, and a fourth hiding behind an old SUV just in front of the porch. From Clay’s vantage, the man at the rear of the house was his clearest target.

  Steadying the rifle on the barn’s doorframe, Clay looked through his 4X scope and took aim. The shooter’s focus was squarely on Geoff, leaving him oblivious to the danger about to blindside him. Clay fired. The quiet pop of the final-chambered subsonic bullet was no match for the other gunfire and went virtually unnoticed.

  After dispatching the gunman at the back of the house, Clay exited the barn through the rear. Taking a wide path, he made his way around the house and looped around to the front, positioning himself behind the man using the SUV as cover. The attacker popped up over the hood of the rusted vehicle to take a few shots at Geoff before concealing himself from Geoff’s return-fire. When the man stood up again, Clay took the shot. The bullet’s initial blast was as quiet as the subsonic loads, but the loud crack of the sound barrier being broken alerted the shooters inside the house that Geoff had backup.

  The two men inside shouted at each other as they tried to find a way out of their predicament. While they had the tactical advantage of owning the high ground, they were also at a major disadvantage of being contained inside the house.

  The standoff lasted the better part of a half hour before both men suddenly stormed out the front door. They had their guns raised, one aiming in Geoff’s direction, the other in Clay’s. The men had foolishly put themselves right in the middle of a crossfire.

  Neither stood a chance.

  After waiting a few minutes, Clay and Geoff cautiously regrouped in front of the porch.

  “Thank God for Plan Bs,” Geoff said as he approached Clay.

  “No kidding,” Clay replied as he wiped sweat from his face. “I sent the kids back behind the barn. Do you want to go track them down while I check inside?”

  “You sure you don’t need help?” Geoff asked as he looked at the open front door.

  Clay glanced over at the house before looking back at Geoff. “If anyone was still in there, I think they’d be shooting by now.”

  “That’s a fair assessment,” Geoff replied. “All right, I’ll go catch up with the kids. Meet you back that way in a few minutes?”

  Clay nodded before turning toward the porch.

  The steps groaned in protest as Clay carefully walked onto the porch and into the house. Though he was confident nobody was left inside, he still exercised due diligence. His lack of focus in the past couple of months had nearly killed him on multiple occasions; sloppy tactics and poor discipline was unacceptable. He cleared each room on the first floor as if someone waited to ambush him inside. Thankfully, it was empty.

  As he made his way to the second floor, he expected to find more of the same; nothing. But as he reached the top of the stairs, a loud thud from down the hall shattered his assumption. Clay let his rifle hang from his sling and reached for his Glock. The old, picturesque farmhouse had a long, narrow hallway leading to the bedrooms. Though the AR-15 was an SBR—the barrel just ten and a half inches—the added length of the suppressor brought the length closer to eighteen, which was not all that great in such tight spaces.

  Keeping his 9MM close to his chest, Clay inched his way down the hallway, listening for the sound again. It was quiet. He started in the bedroom at the end of the hall at the back of the house. There was a dead body clutching to an old hunting rifle—a result of Geoff’s solid aim. The amount of blood soaking into the carpet was a strong indicator that the man had died immediately and wasn’t the source of the sound.

  Directly across the hall was another bedroom. Clay stepped across the hallway and entered the room; quiet noises came from inside the closet. Stepping back and raising his pistol, Clay spoke sternly. “Come out now! Slowly,” he ordered.

  The sliding closet door shimmied open a few inches before long, slender fingers wrapped around the edge of the door, sliding it the rest of the way. A young woman stepped out; she was fifteen, maybe sixteen. Her eyes were blood shot and her cheeks streaked with tears. She wore an oversized shirt, but no pants. She twisted her body so that her shoulder was toward Clay, a passive attempt to shield herself from the armed man in front of her. Her stare was hollow, her expression haunted.

  Clay slowly put his hand up and eased his pistol back into its holster. He didn’t recognize her. “I’m not going to hurt you,” he spoke with a soft voice. “Were you…Did you come with the others out in the barn?”

  The girl’s blank stare was unfazed by the question, but after a moment she gave a subtle nod.

  Clay
picked up a blanket off the floor and walked over to her. She flinched as he swung it around her shoulders. “It’s okay,” he said. “You’re safe now.”

  The girl looked up at him, revealing a spark of life in her eyes for the first time since she stumbled out of the closet. She didn’t say anything, but Clay understood the question she wanted to ask.

  “They’re all dead,” he said with an almost satisfied tone in his voice.

  The girl looked out the bedroom door and saw the corpse in the room across the hall. Her expression remained unchanged. With her eyes still fixed on the corpse in the next room, she said, “Please take me home.” Her voice was all but gone.

  Chapter 18

  It had been two days since the attack, and there were far more questions than answers—at least for Clay. Shelton had been in and out of meetings since Clay and Geoff had returned with the kids, and there still was still no official word of what had happened and what Liberty’s response—if any—would be.

  The entire town was on edge, including the visitors. No one knew if the attack was isolated or if they should expect more bloodshed. And getting Shelton to comment on the matter had proven quite difficult. Earlier in the morning, a group of people showed up outside the town hall demanding answers. Shelton told them that the town officials were still putting the pieces together, and that the security teams had been doubled and were more than prepared to repel future attacks. His words brought relief to some but did little to bring comfort to the distraught parents whose children were still missing. They insisted the town leadership come up with a plan to bring their kids home. Shelton graciously took their misdirected anger and finger-pointing, willingly allowing himself to be their punching bag.

  The jubilant little settlement that always seemed to be bustling with excitement was now eerily quiet. Despair filled the air like a thick smog, suffocating those who lived within. It was a disturbing sensation that was magnified with the wails of mourning families as they laid loved ones to rest. As Clay looked down at the small grave he had just finished digging—the final resting place for a seven-year-old boy—the war inside his head raged on. It was sorrow pitted against fury, and which was winning changed by the minute.

  Clay saw a young man and his wife walking toward him. The woman sobbed inconsolably as she embraced a frightened toddler. Her husband struggled to find the will to keep walking forward as he carried the small body in his arms. The stained, white sheet draped over his son flapped in the breeze, which grated at Clay’s nerves. Walking next to them, Pastor Rosario prepared for his fourteenth funeral of the day, with still more to come. The sight filled Clay with both grief and gratitude. Grief for those having to say goodbye to their loved ones, a pain Clay knew all too well. Gratitude for the fact that none of his loved ones were among those going into the ground this chilly evening.

  Hearing footsteps approach from behind, Clay turned and spotted Megan walking up to him. She didn’t say anything; she just put her arm around her brother and rested her head on his shoulder. Watching as the family approached, Megan’s stomach twisted like a pretzel as she recalled what that long, dreaded walk to a small grave felt like. She said a silent prayer for them and their departed child. There were few feelings worse than what this family was going through.

  Megan let go of Clay and stepped back, swiping at her eyes before the tears had a chance to slide down her cheeks. “Uhm,” she said in a gravely, exhausted voice, “he’s starting to wake up, if you want to come say hi.”

  Clay looked down at the grave before looking back at Megan, “Yeah, okay,” he said. “I still have to finish up here first, but I’ll come after that.”

  Megan mustered up a supportive smile and put her hand on Clay’s shoulder. “You want me to stay?”

  Clay wrestled with his response. He wanted her to stay, but there was no reason she needed to subject herself to the emotional toil of witnessing a mother and father burying their little boy. That was not a burden Clay was willing to hoist onto Megan’s shoulders. He looked at his sister and replied, “No, that’s okay. I’ll meet you over at the infirmary in a few minutes.”

  Megan nodded. “Okay,” she said before stepping closer to her little brother, answering the call to his unspoken request. She stood up tall and brushed away another tear. Standing shoulder to shoulder, Clay and Megan silently watched on as the memorial commenced.

  As with every other burial Clay had attended that day, he found himself fighting back tears as Pastor Rosario read the same passages from the Bible that he had probably long since memorized. However, unlike the others, Clay knew the boy being buried. He and Tyler had become friends over the past week, which made this service even more difficult to witness.

  When Clay and the boy’s father lowered the body into the grave, the woman started screaming. She dropped to her knees and clutched on to her only living son as if he were life itself. Pastor Rosario’s attempts to comfort her went unnoticed by the lamenting mother. As Clay and the boy’s father stood up, Rosario immediately went into prayer to end the service.

  Afterwards, Rosario escorted the family back to their home, and Clay got to work carefully covering the body with soil. Megan picked up a nearby shovel and helped him finish the unbearable task. He welcomed the help.

  The walk to the infirmary was cold and breezy. The sweat from the day’s work might have chilled him to the bone had his mind not been so utterly consumed with other matters. It was as if his brain couldn’t process everything that was going on, so it stopped registering physical needs like hunger and shivering.

  Clay knew Megan was speaking, but he didn’t hear a word she said—she might as well have been speaking Swahili. He tried to force himself to pay attention, but quickly gave up on the matter. His thoughts were galaxies away, obsessing on what he was going to tell Vlad…how he was going to tell his friend that his daughter was still missing.

  Megan was still talking as they reached the door to the infirmary. She stepped in front of Clay and swung around. “Clay, are you hearing me?” she said, knowing full well that he wasn’t.

  “Huh?” Clay said with a confused look on his face. He blinked his eyes a few times and cleared his throat. “Uh, yeah, I’m listening.”

  “Clay,” she said with a grim face, “it’s a miracle that we were even able to save him, but you should know that he’s never going to walk again.”

  “Uhm…Wow, okay…” Clay said, still a bit consumed with his own thoughts. “Does Vlad know yet?”

  Megan shrugged. “If Doctor Sowell hasn’t already told him, then I’m sure he’s figured it out for himself,” she said, almost heartlessly. She made a face and sighed. “Sorry, Clay, I didn’t mean to—”

  “It’s okay, Megs,” he said with a weak smile. Clay wasn’t mad at her for being a bit insensitive about Vlad’s injuries. Being a doctor in a well-equipped, sterile hospital was a brutal job that required a thick skin. Being a “doctor” in the apocalypse where a minor injury could lead to death faster than Clay ever thought possible had to be monumentally worse. It was only human for her to find ways to disconnect herself from her obliged occupation. What was amazing, though, was that Megan’s cold response, in fact, wasn’t normal for her. How she could care so much, even after losing so many loved ones, and continue pushing forward was nothing short of remarkable.

  Megan, knowing what Clay was about to do, gave him another hug. “Good luck.”

  “Thanks.”

  Clay hesitated for a moment before he pulled the door open and walked inside. The room was still packed with wounded people, though not as bad as the night of the attack. Most of the room was open, rows of beds lined up against the wall with about a foot and a half of space between each one. Toward the back of the room, several sheets had been hung from the ceiling to create some privacy for the more critical patients.

  Standing near the back, Clay heard Doctor Sowell talking to Vlad on the other side of the curtain, so he waited outside for the doctor to finish up.

  �
�Olesya?” Vlad whispered.

  Vlad’s first words after waking up were the same as the last ones he uttered before passing out, and it sent a nauseating concoction of emotions through Clay.

  “I’m sorry, Vlad, but I’ve not left this building much in the past two days. I’m not up to speed on everything going on,” Doctor Sowell replied sympathetically.

  A single cough from behind the adjacent curtain distracted Clay from the depressing conversation currently in progress at Vlad’s bedside. He leaned around the edge of the sheet to see the girl he had found in the closet at the farmhouse sitting up in her bed, a look of hopelessness in her eyes. He wanted to say something to her, maybe ask her how she was doing. Before the words reached his lips, Vlad’s curtain was tossed to the side and Doctor Sowell came out, nodding at Clay as he walked into the girl’s room.

  “How are we feeling, Madeline?” the fatigued doctor asked, trying to sound as upbeat as he could.

  Clay remained outside as he struggled to figure out the best way to tell Vlad the news—as if there was an easy way to tell a father that he might never see his daughter again.

  “This sucks,” Clay said quietly through a deep sigh before pulling the sheet back and stepping inside. Vlad lied on a rickety old bed that was more akin to a cot found inside an Army barracks rather than a hospital, but it beat sleeping on the floor. Barely.

  Vlad looked over at his visitor, and after a severe coughing fit, he finally gathered enough energy to speak. “It is good to see you again, my friend.”