Jordan Rose Duology (Book 2): Homecoming

by Favreau, Jeff

  Rose’s view was obscured by Giant’s body, but she thought she saw flashes of people’s faces, the room growing steadily darker. Jamie, Dr Knight, Dr Faraday, even York’s grisly visage seemed to flash in front of her before it all became a deep, impenetrable blackness.

  ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

  “I Can’t Quit You Baby.” That was it, Rose was sure of it. She knew she’d heard that song before. How could she forget Led Zeppelin. Where was she? Taking stock of herself, Rose found the room was dark, pitch black actually. Rose wiggled her toes and felt soft blankets on her legs. She did the same with her fingers and felt more of the same soft blankets. Her arms itched badly and felt oddly heavy. Rose tried to open her eye lashes and at first, found them sealed closed. Redoubling her efforts, she was able to pry them open breaking through the seal of gunk pinning them closed.

  Immediately upon opening her eyelids, she slammed them shut. She’d been wrong, it wasn’t dark, it was blindingly bright. Being more careful on her second attempt, Rose opened her eyes fractionally before closing them, again and again until they eventually adjusted enough for her to see, but she still squinted, surveying her surroundings. And herself.

  Rose was lying in a hospital bed, many wires and tubes connected to her, a cast on one arm, a sling on the other, a large bandage on her head and many bandages around her midsection. Just lying on the bed and looking around made Rose dizzy, but she fought back the nausea and looked around her hospital room. There was a bright window overlooking Boston. That was a good sign, they hadn’t all died. On the nightstand next to her bed was her phone playing the Zeppelin song that had brought her out of the darkness.

  On the opposite side of the bed from the nightstand, in a reclining chair, was Jamie. She was asleep, dressed in her hospital scrubs, her chest rising and falling as she slept. Rose just laid there and watched her sleep for some time, possibly hours, content with how this situation seemed to have turned out. They had, once again, survived. A full on attack...Rose didn’t even want to think about how many people had died. There’d been talk of a baby but it was all still fuzzy.

  Rose must have dozed off again because when she opened her eyes again, it wasn’t as bright as before. Jamie was standing over her, tender and nimble fingers running through Rose’s hair. Rose looked up at Jamie and smiled.

  “Welcome back to the land of the living,” said Jamie softly. “We were all a little worried for a while there.”

  Swallowing, her throat dry, Rose attempted to answer, her voice cracking. “How...How bad was I?” Her throat raw, her words hoarse.

  “Internal bleeding, broken ribs, broken elbow, dislocated shoulder, likely concussion and so many cuts and bruises we just stopped counting. You were lucky Rose, it was a long couple weeks waiting for you to wake up.” Jamie leaned in and gave her a kiss on the lips. “On the bright side, you’ll have some pretty cool scars.”

  Rose closed her eyes and smiled savoring the kiss as well as Jamie’s wit. “The city?” she finally asked.

  “Still here,” answered Jamie. “Your squad took the most losses, just you, one of your squadmates and Sergeant York survived and she’s almost as banged up as you. There were losses in South Boston and the barrier wall needs some repair, but I think we fared well. It was worth it Rose, they say the Alpha threat around here has almost completely disappeared with Giant gone.”

  Rose was starting to remember now. “The baby? They were after a baby? Is that what this all was about?”

  “Dr Knight seems to think so. He is under the impression that Giant was the child’s father. I’ve been put in charge of the little guy’s care while he’s at the hospital. It’s actually been pretty easy, taking care of a baby and a vegetable, lots of down time.” Jamie gave Rose a wide smile and a wink. “I’ve named him Marshall.”

  “Marshall?” Rose thought aloud. “I like it.”

  Sitting back against the pillows on her bed, Rose again looked out the window at the city beyond. Tom Petty’s “It’s Good To Be King” began to play in the background. She’d made it. All the horrors, all the death, the struggling to get by, they’d done it. Rose and Jamie had the rest of their lives ahead of them now. Humanity’s next chapter was just now beginning.

  Epilogue

  The room was pitch black, nothing to be seen except the clock in the corner; it’s red digital numbers displaying a time that had to be wrong. It was much too early in the morning. Groping through the darkness, he searched for his shorts. His hand knocked over his cell phone instead sending it clattering to the hardwood floor. The human-shaped mound in the bed that was his wife mumbled something incoherent as she rolled over returning to sleep.

  Locating the phone, he grabbed it and held it tightly as he yanked the power cord from the bottom. It was an old phone, many years beyond what could be called an extended lifespan, but there were almost no phones left in the world now, it was a connection to his past, his childhood. The songs contained within it were like part of a time capsule, a glimpse back to a simpler time, to the apex of humanity. The songs weren’t just on his phone of course, they’d been saved many times in many places so the music would never be lost, but he kept the “originals.” They were almost as important to him as the phone.

  Slipping from the dark bedroom, he made his way down the hall as quietly as possible, the wooden floor creaking with every step he took. Pausing in the hallway, he opened a door just slightly, the ambient light from the hall casting a shard into the bedroom beyond the door. The twin beds inside the room each had child size mounds sleeping in them, their soft breathing in tandem. He didn’t expect either of the boys to be awake at this hour of the morning, but he always liked to look in on them before he went away.

  There were many bedrooms in the duplex that he and his family lived in, the dividing wall mostly removed making a spaciously large single-family home. Their family was four but would be five in only a few short months. The man sighed. He felt guilty leaving his wife alone with the twins in her condition. He made a mental note to call his mothers before leaving the city to check in on her. They both loved their grandchildren and would drop anything to help out with them.

  On the far side of the house was a bedroom he used for exactly this morning’s purpose: changing for early or late night deployments. He would never hear the end of it if he happened to wake one of the boys getting ready for work this early. The last thing he needed was a fight.

  Loaded down with all his military gear, a heavy jacket and sturdy boots, he stepped out into the bitter cold, the hairs in his nose freezing on contact with the arctic air. Winter hunts were the worst; slow moving, cold and typically unsuccessful if the intelligence was bad or stale. Deployments this early in the morning were rare, but happened from time to time. Being the leader of his squadron, his departure was especially early; it would not do for him to arrive after to his men. His way was to lead by example.

  Even in the Humvee, the drive through Boston was slow. The snow was at least a foot deep, two foot snowbanks on either side of the street. It was like driving through a tunnel of white, flakes of snow flying at the windshield adding to the effect; the only light source the two beams of the headlights. Marshall Tucker Band’s Running Like The Wind was playing softly over the speakers, his phone plugged into the jack.

  As he drove on, the darkness started to slowly release its grip on the city, the black night giving way to an early-morning gloom. Boston’s barrier wall loomed to his left as he drove appearing like a white-grey wall of ice. The wall itself was little more than a security blanket now, a relic of the past but handy should they ever need it. It was his job to make sure they never did. Many people lived outside the walls these days, slowly taking back the suburbs and countryside left abandoned and neglected for so many years. That was something he wasn’t interested in.

  The hunts were effective. All of Boston and large swatches of New England had been mostly purged of Alphas, but not completely. The Pentagon estimated that at least 60% of the country was f
ree of Alpha infestation, but it was the 40% that worried him, that kept him and his men hunting.

  He’d made a career of hunting Alphas just like his mother had done when he was a child. Boston had always been safe, it hadn’t been attacked since he was a newborn, but as they started to expand out past the walls, they’d needed what his blood had carried more than ever. Without him, none of it would’ve been possible. Their wounded would’ve become the very things they were fighting, but not any more. His blood had broken the cycle.

  Despite all this, he’d always been an outcast, a subspecies, anything he did was never enough, he was always looked on with suspicion. Only in the military, following in the footsteps his mother always tried to sway him from following, had he found the acceptance he’d been looking for. Starting from the bottom, training and working his way up the ranks, was he finally accepted not for the gift he’d given humanity, but rather what he’d earned protecting it. His children, his children’s children and so on, they would always be slightly different, but he would never let them take that for granted. Everyone had to earn their keep in this new world.

  The snow had dropped off as he approached State Street, the flakes falling from the sky randomly now. The sun had crested the horizon, but was still hidden behind grey cloud cover, only a small portion of its light making it to the ground. He could see the entrance to the military base now in the distance, bright lights adding to the gloom. The underground base had been expanded significantly over the years and spread for several blocks in all directions, but the main entrance still remained on State Street.

  There were men out shoveling snow around the entrance to the massive underground structure but they stopped and moved to the sides as his Humvee approached, headlights passing over them making them squint. They were all boys, new recruits. If they’d been his men, he’d be out there with them.

  Continuing past, he drove under the shelter of the outer lip of the complex’s tunnel entrance. The morning gloom was replaced with the yellowish-orange of fluorescent lights lining the walls. As he approached the guard shack, he only had to pull up to the window for the guard to recognize him, salute and open the gate. Thankful he didn’t have to open his window to the morning air, he continued on down the tunnel into the heart of the complex.

  The snow had delayed him enough that his men had already started to gather for their morning briefing as he arrived. The soldiers in the briefing room stood as he entered, all conversation stopping. He nodded and gave them a quick salute before continuing into the room, his troops sitting and returning to their conversation: girls, guns and tales of valor. The talk of the young still eager for adventure. That’d been him for many years, but time makes old men and women of everyone. He still accompanied his soldiers on hunts, but he was not the one at the front of the formation anymore. He was their leader and he was happy to let the next generation take over.

  Within the hour, the remaining members of his team assembled and he was joined by their squadron’s logistical expert, Lieutenant Perry. Perry was a good man, but going out in the field, especially in the winter, was not something he was remotely interested in. Smart and methodical, if given accurate intelligence, Perry’s operational plans would get them there and back without issue.

  Seats full and everyone’s attention focused at the front of the briefing room, Lieutenant Perry stepped forward and began addressing the details of their mission. It would be a two-day trip, out past Worcester and back. There’d been numerous sightings of infected and their team would scout the area and determine if a larger force was needed. The Worcester area was still largely abandoned and so the information was spotty and unconfirmed. Wrapping up his presentation, Lieutenant Perry turned. “Major Rose, would you like to add anything?”

  “Perry, how many times do I have to tell you, you can just call me Marshall in these meetings,” he said stepping forward, chuckling. “No, I think you covered all the important points. As always, I want to remind you to live up to the standard of those that came before you set. We must resist our enemy in any and every way, and try to leave to those who come after us a better world.” He looked around to the faces peering down at him, despite them having heard that short speech before every mission, they all seemed determined, ready for whatever they might face ahead of them.

  “Dismissed,” Major Marshall Rose stated simply.