Gray Skies: Book 3 in the Thrilling Post-Apocalyptic Survival Series: (Darkness Rising - Book 3)

by Justin Bell

  She turned, weapon raised.

  “We’re friends!” shouted one of the people, a woman holding a pistol.

  “Mom!” shouted Winnie from behind Agent Fields, and the redhead turned around, seeing the young girl sprinting across the floor in a clumsy, limping gait.

  “Watch out!” shouted Orosco, but it was too little too late. A swift burst of gunfire echoed from down the hall, and Winnie gasped, lurching left as she moved, toppling clumsily forward, skidding along the tile.

  Rhonda and Phil screamed in anguish, while Fields moved in and opened fire, shooting towards the back side of the mall.

  “Get her out of the line of fire!” Fields yelled and Winnie’s parents each grabbed an arm, half carrying her and half dragging her towards the edge of the aisle, working their way to the candy store where Orosco was still stationed. He moved out and helped them drag her back in, then knelt to examine her.

  “She’s still breathing,” he whispered. “She’s okay; try not to worry, we want to get you out of here. Where’s Agent Liu?” he asked.

  “He was right behind us,” Rhonda replied and turned. Liu was there, crouch walking across the floor, which was now pock marked with bullet-carved divots. He had a pistol and was firing back at the assailants but was looking massively outgunned as he maneuvered towards the fountain, trying to grab some cover. Orosco moved to watch him and saw he was heading for Harrison.

  Angel saw what was happening as well and charged forward, firing his semi-automatic, angling right as bullets flew in, smattering against the floor to his left. He fired and took down one of the dark uniformed gunmen, freeing Liu up a bit more to move faster. The CBP agent slid to a halt next to Harrison’s prone form and pressed fingers to his exposed neck. He looked over towards Orosco and shook his head.

  Orosco chewed his lip and bent his head. Harrison had volunteered; Orosco hadn’t forced him. Orosco had told him to just drop him off but no, he wanted to pick up a gun, and he wanted to get his hands dirty…he was always that way, and Orosco knew that. Did a part of him ask Harrison for help knowing he’d volunteer for door-busting duty? Maybe. Whatever the hidden motivations, Orosco’s simple request had gotten a man killed. It wasn’t the first time, but things felt…different somehow. Worse.

  “Make your way to us!” he shouted. “We’ve got the parents; we just need to withdraw! Get to the copter and evac!”

  “We’re not leaving!” Rhonda shouted. “Cavendish knows where Lydia is! He said so!”

  Orosco looked over towards her. “Who is Lydia?”

  “Our daughter,” Rhonda pleaded. “Our oldest daughter. We need to find her; that’s why we came here! We need to find Cavendish.”

  Liu gestured to Max to follow him. Max nodded and glanced out from where he was, looking over at Brad inching his way towards him, pistol in hand crouching along the store fronts along the right side of the aisle.

  “Can you move her?” Liu yelled over to Rhonda, who was crouching above her fallen daughter. She looked down at Winnie who was moving but uncomfortable. A deep red stain had formed on her left side, soaking up through her armpit and half of her upper arm. Rhonda couldn’t tell where the bullet had hit, but she clearly needed medical attention.

  “Winnie, honey?” Rhonda asked, touching her daughter’s face. “Are you with me?”

  Winnie’s eyes fluttered, and she mumbled somewhat incoherently.

  Rhonda turned towards Phil. “There has to be some kind of drug store in here somewhere. Some place that hasn’t been completely cleaned out. She needs our help.”

  “And we need to find Cavendish.”

  Tears brimmed in Rhonda’s eyes, blurring her vision as she tried to think of what was more important. The health of her youngest daughter, or the location of her eldest. How could she make that choice? What mother could?

  Over in the central aisle, Fields levered up her shoulders and blasted a swift burst down the way, then brought the weapon down and charged towards them, ducking her head. A few scattered gunshots echoed in her wake, but nothing came close to her.

  “You,” Fields said, pointing to Phil. “Take off your shirt!”

  Phil was wearing a ratty flannel shirt over his tee and he shrugged it off.

  “You have a belt?”

  Phil shook his head.

  “I’ve got mine,” Orosco replied, slipping his belt out from the loops, letting his holster fall to the floor. He handed it off to Fields as she started running her hands over Winnie’s side and arm.

  “Okay, I’ve got it,” she said. “Wound is in her left side, it may have grazed her ribs. I think the bullet’s still in there somewhere, but I can’t be sure. Bunch up that shirt,” she barked at Phil and he did, wadding it thick and tight. Fields held out her hand and Phil gave her the shirt, and she pressed it hard into the wound. Winnie groaned in pain, but Fields held it fast, then tucked Orosco’s belt to it, wrapped it around her opposite shoulder and cinched it tight, buckling it close to as tight as it could go. Winnie’s shoulder lifted oddly, but the belt tightened and held the shirt in place.

  “This should slow and absorb the blood. Keep her alive, anyway. We need to keep her conscious.”

  Rhonda looked at Phil, her eyes focused on his. “Phil I need you to stay with her.”

  Phil shook his head. Out in the main lobby of the mall, brief exchanges of gunfire barreled over the smooth tile.

  “No. I’m going with you. I can handle myself, Rhonda.”

  “I know you can,” she said, taking a step towards him and holding his hands in hers. “But you’re the only one I trust with our daughter. The only one I know will keep her alive.”

  “That’s bull,” Phil snapped. “I’m the weak link when it comes to shooting. I’m the worst shot.”

  “Not everyone can be a soldier,” Orosco replied. “Some jobs are more important than that.”

  Rhonda smiled weakly at him. “You know he’s right. You know.”

  “I want to help.”

  “Keeping our daughter alive is the most helpful thing I can think of. I need you to do this for me, Phillip. For me and for Winnie.”

  Phil closed his eyes and lowered his gaze towards his fallen daughter, then nodded. “Come back alive, Rhonda, okay? Just come back alive.”

  “We will,” she replied, placing a hand on his shoulder.

  “M…mom?” Winnie’s voice was weak, but Rhonda heard it immediately and turned towards her, kneeling.

  “Winnie, honey, are you okay?”

  Winnie shook her head. “I’m cold, mom. I hurt. I…I can’t feel my hand.”

  Rhonda felt tears spilling from her eyes. “I know, sweetie. It’ll be all right. It’ll be okay. We’ll be back.” She pressed a warm hand to her daughter’s cheek and caressed, using her thumb to push away a stray lock of hair. “Be brave. Your dad’s here.”

  Winnie nodded. “There’s a…a big box store. Other side of the mall. That’s…where the loading dock was. I bet that’s where Cavendish is.”

  Rhonda nodded. “Good. Good girl. Thank you, honey, that’s where we’ll go.” Rhonda bent down and kissed her daughter on the cheek, marveling at the pale coolness of her flesh. It felt like she was kissing a frog.

  Max looked over at them both from where he was across the aisle, his eyes focusing on Winnie and her barely moving form on the ground by his mother. Brad came up on his left.

  “What’s the plan?” he asked.

  “I think we’re going after Cavendish,” Max replied. “Dad’s staying with Winnie, but the rest of us are going.”

  Brad nodded.

  “You ready for this?” Max asked, turning towards him. Brad’s mouth was a narrow, straight line, his eyes firm.

  “I’m more than ready.”

  ***

  Orosco, Liu, and Fields performed each turn and check with ease, drawing upon thousands of hours of practice and real-world situations. Greer, Angel and the two boys were sloppier, trying to mimic the movements of the federal agents, drawing on t
heir recent practice with firearms to help guide them along. Orosco and Liu led the squad, Fields crouch walking third, every weapon up and level, pointed in a different direction. With each orchestrated step, they swiveled wrists, twisting to cover each spare inch of the wide aisle in the mall, making sure no area remained uncovered. Calculated close quarter combat scenarios.

  Since dispatching from the main lobby, they’d taken out two gunmen, and the rest had scattered, pulling back deeper into the mall, and as they progressed forward, they realized that they were getting about as deep as they could get. The aisle bootlegged to the left, then went on for a short distance before it ended at what used to be a large electronics store.

  “So far so quiet,” Orosco said as they came up to the left-hand turn and prepared to make a final approach towards the box store.

  “A little too…” Liu started to say.

  “Don’t say it,” Fields interrupted.

  All three of them carried the M4A1 automatics, with both Greer and Angel flanking them with their rifles. Rhonda, Max, and Brad brought up the rear with their pistols, moving forward along with the group, eyes scanning for movement but finding none.

  “They must have all pulled back into the store,” Liu said quietly.

  “Then I guess we go in after them,” Orosco replied.

  Fields reached up and clutched his arm, turning him. “Don’t do anything stupid, Ricky, you get me?”

  Orosco nodded. “Trust me, okay? One goal in mind here.”

  “Good.”

  Liu held up a closed fist and everyone halted, looking at the store ahead of them. The front entrance was open, like most of the mall stores, but concrete posts scattered every five feet or so, and a carriage return sat near the front of the shop still full of abandoned shopping carts. A series of register counters lined the front of the empty store at forty-five degree angles. Beyond the cash registers, the store itself appeared empty, though many of the shelving units and aisle configurations were still set up, furthering the disturbing feeling of apocalyptic end times that the entire mall had presented.

  What had really disturbed Rhonda was that she figured the mall had looked like this for years. For anyone who had been in here, the world ended when the big internet retailers came to life, not when the nuclear devices detonated three weeks prior.

  “All right, folks, listen up,” Liu whispered. “We know there are hostiles in here, probably quite a few of them, and I believe they are well armed. We need to play this carefully.”

  Rhonda nodded.

  “I know you all feel like tough guys with those guns,” Liu said, looking towards Max and Brad, “but we are the trained experts. Don’t go off half-cocked; trust in what we tell you and where we send you. If we follow the protocols, we’ll all get out of here alive, got it?”

  Everyone in the group nodded.

  “On three,” Liu whispered, then held up one finger. Then two. Then he popped up the third and waved towards the store as he spun up and around, charging at the opened area. Moving past one of the posts, he shimmied between register counters and moved in toward the store itself with everyone moving close behind. A stutter of gunfire exploded from the left.

  “They’re here!”

  Liu darted forward as Orosco came up behind him, swiveling towards the fire and firing his M4, dropping the shooter. More weapons erupted from the aisles ahead, and Liu broke left just in time to avoid a barrage of oncoming gunfire. Fields moved up where he was and returned fire, sending the gunman scrambling for cover, though she didn’t hit him. Rhonda charged forward and vaulted over one of the diagonal register counters, landing somewhat painfully on the other side, her shoulder and leg screaming in pain. Bullets thwacked at the counter behind her, but she moved forward and right, then twisted left and fired several times, knocking back a gunman.

  “Got him!” she shouted.

  Nobody gave her high fives, nobody gave her props, nobody acknowledged her victory; they just hunkered down and kept on going. Angel came up behind and to the right of Fields, breaking down an aisle just as three hostiles came down from the opposite side. Angel’s first wild onslaught threw one of them against the metal shelves and sent a second one diving for cover, but the third fired back, coming dangerously close to putting a round through the ex-convict’s chest. As Angel backpedaled out of the way, Clancy came up behind him, aimed over his shoulder and dropped the man who almost killed Angel. After a pair of shots, he moved back, wincing and pressed a hand to his chest.

  “You all right, old man?” Max asked as he slid past Greer with his revolver and came around the shelf, firing down towards the opposite side.

  “You tell me how you feel with a bullet in your boob muscles, kid!”

  Liu charged past them on the right, looking down the aisles as he ran towards the edge. Orosco came up close behind and they stationed themselves on either side of the last aisle, preparing to swing around and charge down. Orosco went low and Liu went high, swiveling around the edges of the shelving unit, and weapons fire exploded from that area, bullets clattering and sparking against metal, full auto firing on full auto.

  Liu shouted and stumbled backwards clutching at his shoulder as Orosco moved further forward, aiming and firing, dropping one gunman, then sending a second scrambling for cover. Seeing the melee, Fields charged over that direction herself and came around the shelf, providing Orosco with cover fire. As he continued down the aisle, she lowered herself to Liu.

  “Are you all right?” she asked, touching his shoulder. The cloth of his shirt was tacky with dark blood and pressed tight to his bony shoulder. He nodded but grimaced, trying to roll over onto his feet.

  “Just go after Orosco. Dude’s got a death wish.”

  “Tell me something I don’t know.”

  She continued on down the aisle. Greer reached the center aisle himself and curled around the edge, making sure the rest of the way was clear. It was, so he pushed forward, running, his feet slapping on smooth tile. Angel came up behind him while Rhonda, Max, and Brad broke off for the first aisle already cleared. Gunfire echoed in the large, cavernous shop, the empty space reflecting the sound back at them with cascading escalation of thunder.

  “Is he even here?” Brad shouted.

  “Only one way to find out!” Rhonda replied as they moved faster down the aisle, weapons at the ready. Coming around the rear of the long aisle, they saw the back of the store, and Rhonda looked to her left at a sign on the wall which identified the loading dock off behind her. Ahead and to her left was a sign on a door that announced Employees Only. Along the back of the store, there was a small group of Green’s men huddled at the end of the aisle, waiting for Orosco and Fields. Rhonda pulled left, aiming her weapon, then fired, letting her pistol explode with bright roars of flame. One of the gunmen sprawled to the ground as the others turned, firing back at her. She, Brad, and Max dove back behind the shelves they’d emerged from, scrambling for cover.

  Halfway down the rear section of the store, Greer and Angel swung around their aisle, drawing down on the same group, and opened fire, their semi-automatics throwing three men to the ground. Orosco and Fields caught up at the far end and caught them in a crossfire, and the intersecting paths of bullets sent them thrashing to the ground like a heap of falling bones.

  “Clear, we’re clear!” shouted Orosco, coming around the corner and seeing Greer, Angel, and Rhonda. Liu came shambling behind them, his left arm dangling useless, his right hand clutched around a pistol now instead of the M4. No use trying to fire the rifle with one hand at this point.

  “You see what I see?” Orosco asked, gesturing towards the door marked Employees Only.

  “Brad, Max,” Rhonda said. “You guys grab some cover behind aisle three in case there are gunmen in there, you got it? I’ll hang back and provide cover.”

  Liu came up on Field’s right and held her back with his injured left hand.

  “Orosco’s got lead,” he said quietly. “I’ve got his back.”


  “I’ve got your back,” she reported.

  Orosco approached the employee door slowly and carefully, his weapon trained on the flat slab of particle board. Reaching forward, he tested the doorknob, and it rotated, showing no signs of being locked.

  He turned back and looked at Liu and Fields. “On three,” he whispered. They nodded.

  He bobbed his head for one. Liu lifted his pistol, cradling his firing hand on his wounded arm for support. Fields shouldered her M4, keeping it trained on the door.

  Orosco bobbed his head for two.

  Everyone, all at once, seemed to draw and hold a breath. Angel and Greer held firm from two aisles away, their weapons pointed, fingers on the triggers, ready for anything.

  Orosco cranked the knob and flung the door open, stepping back to allow for a clear shot.

  The tripwire snapped followed by a blinding scream of white light, a concussive wham of shock waves, and a roiling wall of scalding fire.

  Chapter 11

  The smoke was thick as cotton, crawling down Rhonda’s lungs and choking her from the inside out as her ears rang with the deafening din of explosives. Shredded sheet rock and broken plaster scattered all over the tile floor of the old electronics store and an entire row of shelving units had tipped over, leaning on a second one for support. Barreling, billowing dark smoke reached out from the employee entrance, spreading throughout the aisles, reaching like cloudy, black fingers towards the sprawled bodies left in the bomb’s wake.

  Orosco lay on his back, bent and broken, flaming shrapnel from the door and wall scattered over him, parts of his uniform in an active burn state. Liu lay on his stomach several yards away, picked up and tossed by the explosion like a discarded doll that there was no longer any use for. He’d struck one of the shelves on the far side of the rear aisle and knocked it over, sprawling on top of it as it lay there.

  Fields stirred, finding herself halfway down the center aisle, her eyes cloudy and ears submerged in a clogged, ringing deafness. She couldn’t see much and could hear even less, the entire world cloaked in a thick, gray fog, the only sources of illumination the scattered fires of burning bodies or superstructure.