There were sodas, imported and domestic beers, as well as a couple of different brands of high-end bottled waters. Evian, he thought, lip curling into a half-smile. Naïve in reverse. Gotta be crazy to pay money for any kind of water. French, Swedish, or Martian. It did not matter to him. Never had, never would. But nothing was stopping him from liberating them. So he went into the bathroom and removed a brick of toilet paper from under the sink. He emptied the dozen or so rolls onto the office floor and transferred the bottled waters from the fridge to the plastic wrapper. He stopped and eyed the beers for a long ten-count before closing the door, willpower the winner.
As an afterthought, he scooped up a roll of TP and threw it in the sack with the drinks. The last thing he needed was to be facing a squat at the end of the world and finding himself plum out of asswipe.
Chapter 40
On the way out of Stump Town Aviation Duncan locked the office door behind him. Standing on the WELCOME mat in the hot noon sun, he taped the warning note to the door at eye-level.
After making a silent vow to come back and bury his friend should the authorities not find the means to right their rapidly sinking ship, he took a deep breath and said, “I’ll be back,” with as much conviction as he could muster.
Not sure if the words were truth spoken, or some kind of wishful thinking, he shoved all of the gruesome images accrued over the last half-hour deep down with the screaming nineteen-year-olds holding their guts in against a fighting slipstream. With the mud-spattered body bags loaded with pieces of teenagers, victim to their own Claymores being turned around on them by the VC. Safe and sound with the three co-pilots he had lost to ground fire over the course of one hellish three-month-span spent flying evac missions over the rice paddies of Vietnam.
After trudging back to the Dodge loaded down with the waters, shotgun and NRA gym bag, he swiped the keycard in the reader and learned that the power was out again. Which was only the half of his problems, because the unfortunate timing also meant that his Dodge was now stuck fast in the inoperable gate. Muttering a few choice curse words stemming from his not-so-well-thought-out decision to leave it wedged there in the first place, he tossed the bags and shotgun through the open window. Not sure what to do about the pickle he’d gotten himself into, he craned around to see if lights were burning behind the angled glass of the distant control tower. Nothing doing. It was darkened, which hadn’t been the case when he and Charlie skirted past it earlier.
What to do? Wait a couple of minutes and see if the power came back on? Or put the Dodge in four-wheel-low and force the issue, possibly damaging his only set of wheels in the process?
“God,” he said, closing his eyes and feeling a little sheepish for asking for a favor out loud. “Any help in the power grid department would be greatly appreciated.” He finished the foxhole prayer with an “Amen” and when he opened his eyes and gazed down the row of hangars at the tower the answer to his appeal was crystal clear. He was shit out of luck. First off, the glass in the tower was still as black as obsidian. And adding insult to the injury that his unanswered prayer represented, a pair of what looked like maintenance workers in pale blue oil-stained coveralls staggered from the shadows between the nearest of the three hulking hangars. The sudden realization that the oil was really blood and just thirty feet of asphalt stood between him and two more walking cadavers caused his heart to skip a beat. Remembering that his .45 was in the locked building and the pump gun was on the seat inside the closed-up Dodge made him wish he was wearing Depends.
No problem. I’ve got this, he thought none too confidently. Then, reluctantly, he turned away from the moaning creatures, hauled open the creaky driver’s door, and climbed aboard. Hair standing at attention and both hands now shaking visibly from the sudden burst of adrenaline, he labored to stick the key in the ignition.
After twice losing his grip on the purple fob and having to feel around on the floor to retrieve it, he finally managed to seal the deal and instantly the low rumble of the V8 drowned out the mournful sounds of the dead.
Eyeing the snarling corpses in the wing mirror, he dropped the shifter into Drive. With the abominations barely an arm’s reach away, he gunned the engine and was greeted with very little forward movement and an earsplitting keening of metal on metal. The unnerving rending metal sound continued as the truck inched forward ever so slowly with the card reader grating along his side, and the rolling gate doing a number on the other. Just when Duncan thought for sure he was a goner, two things happened: pale hands broke the plane of his open window, the fingers snaking into his hair and beard. And while his Stetson was tumbling from his head a violent groan ripped through the truck’s frame and the leading edge of the box bed finally broke free of the card reader box. Which resulted in the truck lurching forward and thankfully the monsters losing purchase on him before any real damage was done. A half beat later, with the dead performing a slow motion spill to the ground, the truck’s bulbous rear fender flares hit the reader box and gate producing twin resonant gongs. On the back half of that beat, with the hollow tones fading, the truck surged free of the gate, the sudden release of the pent-up horsepower causing the tires to judder and chirp.
Heart trying to beat its way out of his ribcage, Duncan whipped the big rig through the Jersey barriers on his way to Sundial Drive. Cursing the stumbling corpses reflected in his wing mirror, he braked briefly then hooked a hard right and mashed the pedal, leaving twin lines of smoking rubber as he sped off eastbound on Sundial. Angry at himself for letting his guard down back there, he swung his gaze from the rearview mirror and focused on the distant motor hotel.
With Plan B’s viability threatened due to the noisy Harleys having recently passed by on the Interstate, and made all the more dangerous because his strength in numbers had just been diminished by half, a quick pause to reset and come up with a sound strategy seemed like a prudent course of action. So with the beginnings of said plan gelling in his head, he hung a right at the “T” and set his sights on the red and blue sign rising high above the three-story Comfort Inn.
When he passed through the sign’s shadow thirty seconds later, only three cars were in the hotel lot. All were new models. Clean and shiny. Rentals, he guessed, on account of the fact they weren’t loaded with the belongings of people fleeing the city. Then again, he thought, nosing the Dodge in next to a four-door Nissan, my ride isn’t exactly pulling its weight, either.
Leaving the pump gun under the front seat overhang and his Stetson on the floorboard where it had come to rest, Duncan scooped up the binoculars and stepped out onto the parking lot blacktop. “I’ll be dipped in shit,” he stated upon seeing the lights in the lobby suddenly flare on, flicker a couple of times, and then remain lit. “You’re five minutes too late, God.”
Ignoring the red neon NO VACANCY sign, he started for the canopy-covered front entry where he had a couple of choices to make.
Still sore from the blindside tackle, he chose the ramp instead of the stairs. Thank you, Americans with Disabilities Act.
At the flat part of the landing, he saw the man behind the chest-high desk glaring and shaking his head. Ignoring the visual cues, Duncan glanced at the sign on the door stating full occupancy and also paying it no mind, pushed on into the spacious lobby. Shoulda locked it, Innkeeper, crossed his mind as he returned the glare and approached the desk fronting the swarthy-complected man.
“I don’t need a room,” he said at once to preempt any kind of a preamble coming from the desk guy’s pie hole. He placed the remainder of his previous day’s winnings on the worn counter top. “I just need a good vantage point. Big window facing east. Top floor would be optimum.”
The guy said nothing. His eyes looked like they were chipped from flint. He flicked them from Duncan’s face to the money and back again. The whole round trip lasted half a second. The action of scooping the cash off the counter burned less than that.
After the slick move, Duncan realized what the man reminded him of. And d
amn if he’d never seen a faster mongoose at the zoo.
“Turn around,” said the man, narrowed eyes fixed on Duncan’s hands.
Complying, Duncan raised his arms and saw the reason for the man’s concern. The outside of his left shirt sleeve was speckled with a constellation’s worth of tiny black dots where the blowback from the .45 had left him spattered with the security guard’s blood.
Finished turning a full revolution, Duncan said, “I had to protect myself.”
“From one of them?”
“He was already dead … if that’s what you’re getting at,” Duncan drawled. He unbuttoned the cuffs and rolled both sleeves up to mid bicep. “No bites.”
Now the man was staring at the binoculars.
Duncan said nothing.
The desk man’s lip was going white where he’d been absently biting down on it.
“I’ll be in and out,” Duncan said, holding his hands up in mock surrender. “Won’t touch a thing so there’ll be no room turnover.”
Now the man was shifting his weight from foot to foot. He ran a hand through a horseshoe ring of silver-white hair no doubt brought on by having to make thousands of similar decisions, most at zero-dark-thirty with drunken, dreary-eyed, Interstate travelers—not a squared-away former Vietnam veteran who carried himself as such … most of the time. “Can’t guarantee the power will stay on … or the phone will work for you,” he said. “Both have been spotty all morning. And I’m not in the habit of giving refunds, either.”
“All of that doesn’t matter a bit to me.”
The innkeeper suddenly went stock-still, but continued to size Duncan up.
“I’ll leave a tip for the maid,” Duncan lied. The fact he was out of cash was known only to him and the four walls containing Charlie’s corpse.
And that was what it took to break the ice. The maid hadn’t shown up for her shift. Therefore, the man with no name tag would be the beneficiary of said gratuity. Not bad for ten minutes spent doing nothing.
The electronic key card appeared on the counter nearly as fast as the money had left it.
Duncan scooped the credit-card-sized item off the desk and craned, looking for the stairs.
Pointing over Duncan’s shoulder, the man said, “Elevator’s over there.”
Not wanting to get trapped should the power fail again, Duncan said, “I’ll take the stairs.”
“304,” said the man. “After you exit the stairwell”—he gestured to a narrow hall off his right shoulder—“it’s the second door on the right. You have five minutes.”
Duncan made no reply. He palmed the card and was on his way.
***
The stairs were far from ADA-friendly on his knees. He exited the well on the third floor and found the room, no problem. And when he tried the card in the door it made the light flare green and the lock open with a snik. Firing on all cylinders … until the hall lights crashed off again. Silver lining though, he had no further use for the electronic key card.
Room 304 was vanilla. Two twin beds butted against the left-side wall. Secured to the wall opposite the beds was a Korean-brand flat-panel television barely half the size of Charlie’s pride and joy. Under the television was a small desk. Atop the desk in the right corner was a box of tissues, television remote, and pad of paper with a ballpoint pen sitting atop it crossways—no advertising present on either.
Vanilla.
But none of that mattered. Because framed by tied-back blackout curtains was a picture window nearly the size of one of the twin beds.
Duncan crossed the room and plucked a few flimsy squares of tissue from the box. He made a quick pass over his bifocals to clean them of any errant blood that might have settled there. Next, he made sure the binocular lenses were equally sparkling. Finally, he pulled the chair from the desk’s kneehole and positioned it by the window.
He trained the binoculars east and ran a finger over the focus wheel to bring the length of Interstate-84 into view, fully expecting to see Humvees and National Guard soldiers. Maybe even a whole mess of Jersey barriers recently imported on a flatbed and deposited across the road for added emphasis and vehicular stopping power. And since he had recently heard the throaty rumble of Harleys roaring by, seeing a bunch of grizzled bikers and their old ladies jawing with the soldiers in order to gain passage seemed perfectly reasonable.
Instead, what he saw chilled him to the bone. There were bikers and old ladies and several dozen bikes leaning on kickstands. A tiny pocket of civilians milled about near the head of the stoppage, their colorful passenger cars surrounded by a sea of black and chrome and hijacked SUVs—the yellow H2 standing out starkly among them. And at the easternmost point of the jam, looking as harried as the Dutch kid with his finger in the dike, stood a lone state trooper, arms extended, gloved palms facing the gathering horde.
Having seen enough to know he was now in need of a Plan C, Duncan let the binoculars dangle from their strap and uttered a string of salty expletives. He stood there for a moment with his back to the window and his sails emptying of hope.
On one hand he felt compelled to drive under the nearby overpass, take the on-ramp east and try his luck at getting up to the front and talking his way past the lawman without having any contact with the bikers.
Good luck with that.
On the other hand, already aware of what the bikers were capable of, he figured it would behoove him to forgo any kind of rash action until he deemed there was no Plan C in the cards.
***
Hearing the pneumatic hiss of the stairwell door closing, the nameless desk guy looked up from the last ever copy of the venerable Oregonian newspaper and flashed a collaborative grin. “Find what you were looking for?”
“A whole lot of what I wasn’t,” Duncan answered in a tired-sounding voice. “I lied about the tip, by the way. Sorry, friend. The last of my foldin’ cash is in your pocket.”
“Seeing as you’re coming clean with me,” the man said. “I’ll come clean with you. The maid … she’s not coming in. She no called, no showed. Figure she’s got the infection everyone’s been freaking out about. Thought you had it at first, but didn’t see any sweating or tremors. Guess it’s your lucky day.”
My luck ran dry an hour ago, Duncan thought, dragging the rabbit’s foot and keys from his pocket.
There was a long pause during which a staring contest ensued.
Finally the man spoke. “I guess it’s real bad back east. New York, Boston, D.C.—”
“Out west, too,” Duncan added. “L.A., Seattle, the Bay Area. Hell, Portland’s prognosis is looking pretty grim. Those things are on the streets all the way east to 122nd Avenue now.”
“You comin’ from there?”
“Just passing through,” Duncan lied. A stock answer he used to head off a prolonged conversation that usually started with: I lived there—(insert year, decade, etc. ...) or, I knew a guy— (insert: who worked, went to school, herded cats there, etc. … ). He just didn’t want to think about Portland, Tilly, and now Charlie if he didn’t have to.
Taking the hint, the man smiled for the first time since Duncan set eyes on him. However, it was a nervous smile that disappeared as he moved around the desk worrying a set of rosary beads in his hand. He said, “Travel safe, friend. I’m just going to lock up after you.”
Duncan nodded once and walked out the door without looking back. Even as the click of the lock being thrown registered, he was already working up a Plan C in his head.
Chapter 41
Jockeying his wide-fendered Dodge around in the motor hotel’s narrow parking lot burned off a few seconds. The two-block-drive south to the I-84 underpass lasted another half-sweep of the jittering second hand. By the time Duncan blew the light and nosed the Dodge into the cool shadows under the overpass, less than two minutes had ticked away into the past. In his mind’s eye he saw the trooper giving in to all the pressure and allowing everyone passage east. No blood, no foul. So, just drawing even with the eastbound on-r
amp, the combination of his pie-in-the-sky vision and the urge to hustle east as fast as possible and start the search for his brother grabbed caution by the collar and belt and violently hurled the notion out the window. And in the same manner as the old truck had automatically found its way into Mickey Finn’s lot the previous day, it was now turning left onto the on-ramp before Duncan had a chance to logically vet the action. The difference between then and now? What lay roughly a half mile east from where the ramp met the road was a scenario whose outcome—should it go sideways—could not be rectified by a loan from a friend or a lucky hit on a series of Keno numbers. The Grim Reaper was lurking nearby, and Duncan knew the feeling it produced in his gut. Feathery wings brushed his insides and his mouth had inexplicably gone dry. Still, all things considered, he couldn’t make himself institute Plan C. At least not until he deemed the trooper’s roadblock and knot of bikers encroaching on it to be insurmountable obstacles to Plan B.
Nearing the top of the ramp’s long run-on, he swerved right and brought the rig to a jarring halt on the soft shoulder where he guessed its roof would be hidden behind the crest of the hill, thus out of the line of sight of anyone looking west.
After checking behind him and finding the coast clear, he grabbed the binoculars, snatched the pump gun from under the front seat, and exited the truck with its motor still running. The tailgate fell open with a resonant clang. Which didn’t matter, because it was most certainly lost amidst the rattle clatter of motorcycle engines at idle and angry shouting taking place a few hundred yards from his position.
He draped the binoculars around his neck. Then he propped the shotgun against the box bed, sat on the tailgate, and swung his legs up on the ledge it created. Using the side sheet metal for support, he rose to stand on creaky knees.
ocalypse (Book 10): Drawl (Duncan's Story) Page 23