“Can you hear anything?”
He looked back to see his cousin’s freckled face looking out from the upturned beds expectantly.
“No. I think I should yell out. They would normally have come and got us by now to start cooking the evening meal anyway, right?”
The look on her face said she didn’t quite agree with his suggested course of action but nodded anyway.
Robert banged on the door.
“Hello! Is anybody going to let us out!?”
Bang. Bang. Bang.
“Hello!”
After five minutes of intermittent banging and shouting, he put his ear to the door one last time. The door handle rattled unexpectedly, and he jumped away with his hand over his heart. The rattle was followed by a thud. The door shook in its frame.
Robert retreated to the barrier with his cousin.
“Who is it,” he called out, embarrassed at the shrillness in his voice.
The handle rattled in answer and Jennifer’s hand gripped his forearm hard enough to leave white indentations in his skin. That rattle was followed by another thud, except this one sounded more like someone falling on the floor than someone trying to break in.
Robert crept back to the door and got down on his hands and knees to peer through the gap under the door. It was too small to make out much, but he could see enough to make out a dark shape on the floor.
“Someone’s lying on the floor,” said Robert, turning to his cousin. “We need to break out. I think someone attacked the Chinese. This might be our only chance to escape.”
Jennifer looked excited and petrified at the same time but came out from behind the makeshift barricade.
“How?”
Robert inspected the door. It opened into the room, so they wouldn’t be able to bash their way out, the stops on the door jamb would make it a difficult job. The doorknob itself had a simple key lock and it appeared to be quite flimsy, but five inches above it was a newly added deadbolt. That would also be hard but bashing it to oblivion would be their best bet.
They had already rummaged through the room for anything they could use to escape in the early days of their captivity, so when Robert’s eyes fell upon the upturned cot and realized the outer frame was made of L-shaped lengths of steel his eyes lit up. Luckily the four spans of steel were bolted and not welded. It took some doing but he managed to loosen one of the nuts at the foot of the bed enough to twist the frame until the bolt snapped. From there it was an easy task to do the same with the other corner.
He took the short length of metal to the door and began to hammer at the deadbolt. Sparks flew, but not much else happened until he misdirected a hit and punched the end of the shaft through the facade of the door.
It was then he realized that it was one of those cheap hollow core doors that his grandfather, a master carpenter, used to hate.
For Robert, it was happy days. He began to knock the end of the metal through the shell of the door until he’d created enough of a mess around the deadbolt that he was able get the shaft behind it and lever it free of the strike plate with a decent jerk.
The door knob only lasted two strong blows before it clattered to the floor. He gripped the door by the two ragged holes and with two sharp tugs, pulled it open, almost falling on his ass when it came free.
Robert regained his balance and Jennifer joined him. On the floor in front of them was a teenager wearing a blood-soaked Chinese army uniform, with a bleeding wound on his neck and blood dribbling from his ear. On the floor near his outstretched fingers, was a pistol.
Part Three – School’s Out
36
Robert knelt beside the injured, possibly dead, kid.
“Jen, turn one of the cots over, we'll put him on that,” he said. They would certainly help the stranger if he was alive, but, first things first.
He reached for the weapon, half-expecting the teenager’s hand to suddenly close over it. It didn’t. The barrel of the gun was still warm. Robert tucked it gingerly into the waistband of his jeans, then checked for a pulse. It was strong and regular. He was certainly not dead.
He leaned over to inspect the wound on the side of the unconscious teen’s neck. On closer examination, he realized it had been made by a bullet. The deep furrow was about an inch long and looked like it had missed anything vital. It was still bleeding but not badly.
“Pass me that towel, Jen.”
Normally Jen would have scolded him for not saying please, but in the circumstances she barely noticed. She handed him the one threadbare towel their captors had allowed them, and he bunched it up before pressing it to the open wound.
“Let’s put him on the cot.”
“He’s so heavy,” said Jennifer struggling to hold up the stranger’s legs. When they finally placed him on it, she covered him with a blanket and looked at Robert. “What now?”
“I guess we see if we can find a first aid kit. His pulse is strong, so maybe he’s just passed out from shock or something.”
“What about the guards?”
“To be honest, if they let him get this far without coming for him, I don’t think there are any left. You stay here, I’ll go and look.”
“No way! We’re sticking together.”
Robert opened his mouth to argue but closed it just as quickly when he saw the determination on her face. He nodded.
“Come on then.”
Robert took the pistol out. Jen’s eyes widened but she didn’t say anything. Robert had no experience with guns, not even enough to check if it was still loaded, but certainly knew how to pull a trigger. He just hoped it didn’t have a safety or whatever they called those things you had to click to shoot. If they ran across someone hostile, he would just have to squeeze the trigger and hope for the best.
In the corridor, Robert was careful to keep Jen behind him. They slowly crept along the wall. In the distance, where the hallway opened into the foyer of the main building, Robert spied the broken body of a Chinese soldier. He didn’t try to protect his cousin from the gory sight, they had both seen enough death and violence recently to have become hardened to it.
The foyer was a mess. Bullet holes, splintered wood, blood. That was nothing compared to the carnage they could see through the doors to the two rooms their captors had used as their own.
At the door to the reception, Robert looked around. He wasn’t concerned with the ordinary soldiers he saw lying in pools of their own blood. What he was interested in was the body of Senior Field Officer Chiu. It was lying in the entrance to the building. He decided to check if she really was dead. The camp leader had been a cruel mistress, the now healed whip marks on his back from their first night proved that. With his heart beating fast and Jennifer gripping his arm just a little tighter, they approached.
The cruel woman was on her back with her eyes closed. She wore pants and boots but only a bra besides. Her eyes were swollen and there was a bloody gash across the bridge of her nose. It was bent at a nasty angle.
“Is she alive?” whispered Jen.
He didn’t answer. There were no obvious wounds, but the woman’s chest wasn’t moving. Robert knew to be sure, he had to check her pulse. He knelt beside her and cautiously reached out.
His fingers touched her skin and… her eyes snapped open.
Robert scrambled back in fright as Jen shrieked in terror. Chiu rolled over and got to her knees. With her hair disheveled, and blood coating her nose, mouth and chin, she looked for all the world like a character from a bad horror movie. Robert suddenly remembered he held a pistol and pointed it at her chest with a trembling hand as she struggled to her feet, pulling a hidden knife from her boot as she did.
“Don’t move!”
She paid no heed to the gun. Simply held up the knife and took another step.
“Where is he? Tell me and I won’t gut you like a fish.”
Robert and Jen took a step back.
“Stop and drop the knife or I’ll shoot,” Robert threatened.
&
nbsp; Chiu spat a gob of blood on the floor and took another step forward.
“Go on then.”
Another step.
“Shoot her Robert!”
Robert pulled the trigger. Nothing. No click. No shot. Just a hard nothing.
The woman laughed and raised her knife as she ran at him.
37
“Get down!” roared a voice from behind them.
Robert, already in the process of moving to push Jen out of the way, tackled her to the floor just before the air above them was stitched by hot metal. The burst of shooting was short and when it was done, Robert looked back at the camp leader. She was on her back staring at the ceiling with glassy eyes as wisps of smoke coiled up from the wounds in her stomach and chest.
Jen poked him in the shoulder, drawing his attention away from their dead captor and tormentor. Robert climbed to his feet and helped Jen up without taking their eyes off the now conscious kid who had just saved them.
He was watching them warily as he swayed, holding the automatic weapon he’d picked up from the dead soldier in front of Chiu’s office.
“Thanks,” said Robert, opening the dialogue.
The other guy nodded.
“Sorry, I should have finished her before, but I heard you calling for help.”
He bent his knees to put the weapon on the floor and promptly fell to his backside. Jen rushed over to him before Robert could stop her.
“Where is the towel? You need to be lying down.”
The stranger waved vaguely down the hall.
“Robert go get it please. And water.”
Slightly put out at being ordered around by his younger cousin, Robert nevertheless did as he was asked.
“My name’s Jen,” she was saying when he returned. “What’s yours?”
“Huh?” said Jack, pointing at his bleeding ear. “Sorry I think my eardrum is busted.”
Jen leaned around to speak in his good ear.
“I said my name’s Jen, what’s yours?”
“Oh. It’s Jack.”
Robert returned and handed Jen the towel. Her patient winced when she put the towel against his neck.
Robert poured water from the pitcher he’d carried from their cell into a plastic cup and offered it to Jack.
He took it and guzzled it down.
“Thanks…?”
“It’s Robert.”
“Thanks Robert.” Jack pointed at the discarded pistol on the floor between them and the body of Senior Field Officer Chiu and smiled. “You know those work better if you flick the safety.”
Robert grinned sheepishly.
“Yeah, I’m not really good with guns.”
They talked while Jennifer held the towel hard against Jack’s neck. He told them how he had come to be there, leaving out some of the more painful parts of his story.
“What about you two?”
“We’re cousins. Jen lives with me and my… lived with me and my Mom.” He looked like he might cry but then held it together. Jack noticed a tear in Jennifer’s eye. “She died the day after Christmas. We lived in Greenhaven.”
Jack had heard of Greenhaven, the suburb wasn’t much of a drive from his own. By the time they’d talked about the invasion and the things they’d experienced, Jack’s wound had stopped bleeding.
“I think it’s started to clot. We should bandage you up,” said Jen.
Jack nodded then tensed.
“Wait, what time is it?”
“Maybe 11am,” answered Robert. “Why?”
Jack relaxed again then looked at him with fierce eyes.
“Because we have to set a trap.”
“What?”
Jack climbed to his feet, keeping the towel over his neck.
“A trap for the rest of the camp soldiers when they come back.”
Robert raised his eyebrow. He hadn’t really thought ahead but taking on the guards was not at all on his radar. In fact, now that they were talking about plans, he thought the best course of action would be to take Jen and get away clean.
“No. I don’t think that’s a good idea. I think we should escape now.”
“What?”
Jack’s face was incredulous.
“Well… I… you know, it’s just that we should run now while we have the chance-”
“We can’t Robert,” said Jen. “It wouldn’t be fair to the other kids. Who knows what would happen to them after all this.”
“Jen, we’ve talked about this. About Texas.”
“Yeah but that was before Jack came in and went all Terminator.”
Jack smiled, not displeased at the reference.
“What about Texas?” he asked.
“Not yet,” said Jen. “We’ll tell you while I’m patching you up.”
Robert dragged the dead naked soldier behind the desk before Jen went in and located a first aid kit in the Commandant’s office. She had Jack sit on the desk while she stood and tended to his wound.
“So, what about Texas?” asked Jack, wincing as the girl dabbed alcohol swabs on his neck.
“We heard the Commandant talking on her phone,” said Robert. “Not sure why she was speaking in English, or who she was speaking to, but I heard something about rebels in Texas. North of Houston. We had an idea that if we escaped, we would head there.”
“Dude, you know that’s like 2000 miles, right?”
“I’m not an idiot,” he said. “I worked out it would take us like two months.”
“Yep, through deserts and shit. There’s no way.”
Robert looked at the floor, his face dark.
“What about a plane or a helicopter?” said Jen as she stuck a large adhesive patch over Jack’s bullet graze.
As they continued their discussion, she also tended to the shallow stab wounds he’d suffered in the struggle with the female perimeter guard, sterilizing and then taping them.
Robert guffawed.
“You going to fly it then Jen?”
His cousin reddened, but Jack looked thoughtful.
“You know what, that’s not a bad idea.”
“Oh right!” said Robert, standing up and throwing his arms in the air. “I suppose you have a pilot’s license now?”
Jack laughed.
“No, but I remember near the zoo there’s an airport that a company used to run joy flights of Sacramento from. We took my grandparents there. We’d need a pilot though. Probably have to kidnap one.”
“Once this mess is found,” said Jen. “Won’t they be on high alert?”
“Good point.” He thought on it a bit longer. “We’d be better to steal one of the vehicles and travel as far by road as we could before trying.”
“Why not forego the whole kidnapping/ helicopter thing and go the whole way in a vehicle then?” asked Robert, reasonably.
“I don’t think we’d make it all the way,” said Jack. He wasn’t sure why he’d been so easily convinced to go to Texas, but Robert was right, kidnapping a pilot and stealing a helicopter seemed ridiculous when he heard it put that way. “I guess we could start out that way and see what happens.”
Robert nodded, happy that Jack had finally given one of his ideas some merit.
“We’ll need to dress in Chinese uniforms if we’re going to make it further than a block. See if you can find some clean ones while I gather up some weapons.”
“So, we’ll leave as soon as we’re ready?” asked Jack.
“No. After I show you how to use an automatic and we ambush the guards. Here’s what we’ll do…”
38
As the buses turned into the school parking lot, Lieutenant Ju Wang, his assault rifle hanging over his shoulder, headed to the front of the bus, gripping seat backs for balance as he went. Oblivious to the children in his charge, he was dying for a cigarette and hoped to get a few puffs in before ‘Iron Pants’ Chiu came out.
The first through the door, he yelled at the children to stay put before jumping out. Chen and Liu followed him off and the drive
r stayed in his seat with the engine running. The other bus pulled up behind and the two soldiers on that bus joined their three comrades.
Wang offered his girlfriend and fellow lieutenant, the very lovely Eva Hao, a cigarette. She looked nervously at the front door of the office building.
“Come on,” Wang insisted. “Iron Pants has been taking her own sweet time lately. Probably in their porking Vincent again.”
The men laughed. Eva Hao just shook her head.
“I’ll just have a puff of yours.”
Wang handed over his Camel and watched rapt as her pretty lips closed over it. The look in her eyes was anything but innocent as she took a deep drag and touched her tongue on the butt before handing it back. Wang felt his manhood twitch in response. God, he loved this girl.
“Where the fuck are the home guards,” said Chen, his chubby face annoyed. “I need a piss.”
His attention diverted from Eva, Wang looked back at the building. It was unusual for the guards to take this long to come out and take charge of the brats.
“Maybe old Iron Pants is having a fuck party?” This drew sniggers from his comrades. “Come on Chen, we’ll put a rocket up their asses.”
Wang handed Eva his smoke and raised his eyebrow cockily before heading for the closed door. Smiling, she shook her head and took a final drag before dropping it to the ground and stamping it out.
She had barely looked back up when gunfire shattered the quiet afternoon. Eva saw a tall man firing from behind a dumpster in front of the first bus. Ju Wang and Chen didn’t stand a chance, they jerked crazily as the bullets tore into their backs.
Eva screamed in horror and took a shocked step towards the broken body of her beloved as the soldiers around her began pulling their guns and firing. The shooter disappeared back behind the dumpster.
Gunfire erupted from a window above her and mowed down the soldier beside her. Eva ducked, glancing up and recognizing the kitchen boy immediately. What the…?
More gunfire sounded near the buses, but Eva was preoccupied with the kitchen boy who had just aimed the muzzle of his gun at her. She turned and ran, unslinging her gun as she raced for the door of the second bus. They needed to get out of the school grounds until she knew what they were facing. She flinched as a burst of fire from the front of the first bus took down the last of her comrades. She ran on, waiting for bullets to rip into her. Twenty feet. Fifteen feet. Ten feet. The bus door closed.
Lone Wolf: A Post-Apocalyptic Survival Thriller (America Falls - Occupied Territory Book 1) Page 12