To the Barrens (Super Pulse Book 2)

by Dave Conifer

  Probably worried about the kids seeing the bloody man’s dead eyes, Matt scrambled over to push the lifeless body back out the window. The rest of the attackers, having seen the display of firepower, had seen enough. They retreated and were soon cowering out of sight somewhere on side of the road. Linda had been right, Nick noted with relief. These men were desperate and unarmed, but they weren’t clueless enough to continue the futile attack. The plan had worked, and they’d only needed to use four rounds of their precious ammunition.

  “So, how bad is the damage?” Linda asked Nick.

  “We lost a lot of windows,” Nick answered. “And I think all the tires are gone.”

  “All six?” Linda asked. “You know they’re double sets on the back, right?”

  “I didn’t,” Nick answered. “It just felt like however many there were, they’re all wasted. How about I go out and take a look?”

  “Okay,” she agreed. “It looks clear. But I’ll cover you anyway.”

  “We’ll still have to get through that barrier,” Nick said over his shoulder as he walked down the steps toward the door in the front. As he stepped off the bus something grabbed his ankle, causing him to lose his balance and fall forward onto his hands and knees. The shotgun clattered to the asphalt out of his reach. A shirtless man scrambled from beneath the bus and hoisted Nick to his feet and positioned him as a shield before Linda could raise her shotgun. A blade was pressed against his neck. “Drop the gun or I cut his throat!” The man barked. Linda lowered her weapon.

  “Out here!” the man ordered. “Bring it out here and put it down. Then back away from me!” Seeing no other option, Linda complied.

  Without releasing his python-like grip on Nick, the man managed to nudge both shotguns away from the bus with his foot. Nick knew it was only a matter of time before somebody else grabbed them. Then there was going to be real trouble. “Everybody comes off the bus! Nice and slow.” Nick could see attackers beginning to seep back out of their hiding places. It wasn’t over yet, not by a long shot.

  He struggled harder, hoping to break free and reach the shotguns first, but his captor only squeezed harder. The attackers were almost upon them. Nick realized with terror that once they had the two shotguns, there would be no reason for the man with the knife to keep him alive. He grabbed the wrist of the hand holding the knife and twisted sideways as hard as he could, trying to create space to escape into. The shotguns were no longer there. It all seemed to be happening in slow motion as a single shot rang out. He waited for the pain.

  It didn’t come. Instead, the man holding him released his grip and fell away. Then two more shots. When Nick regained his balance he saw the men who’d grabbed the shotguns lying in crumpled heaps, blood streaming from their heads. The wielder of the knife was on his face, his body twitching. Nick looked around, his mouth agape. It all made sense when he saw Sarah leaning out from a bus window with her pistol arm still extended.

  Two

  Linda was already pulling the shotguns away from the dead men when they heard a cannonade of gunfire up by the roadblock. Apparently the absence of the bus at the back of the caravan had finally been noticed. Two security vans were on the other side of the barricade, peppering it mercilessly with automatic rounds. Within seconds the attackers manning it were either on the ground or had scurried away. Several of the vehicles were quickly rolled out of the way, reopening the road. One of the vans remained at the barricade while the other sped through the gap and approached the disabled bus.

  Two men in military fatigues jumped out of the van, their weapons clearly locked and loaded. “Any casualties?” one barked as he ran towards Linda and Nick, his rifle aimed and ready to fire at any threats. He was a huge man, with olive skin revealing his Mediterranean lineage.

  “No, we’re all good,” Linda reported. “Except for them,” she said, pointing at the bodies. “I don’t think we’re going anywhere, though. Looks like they slashed every tire.”

  The man lowered his rifle and walked over. “I’m Carlo,” he said. “Carlo Moriarty. Glad we noticed you weren’t with us.”

  “Took you long enough,” Linda said sharply. “Did you forget about us?”

  “What was your driver doing?” Carlo asked. “When we saw so many unfriendlies along the way, we went to double-time. Didn’t he get the memo on keeping up?”

  “Nope. I guess he didn’t know,” Linda said. “But it isn’t gonna’ matter now, is it? He’s about to be demoted from driver to passenger. Whether he likes it or not.”

  The two military men huddled, apparently not sure what to do next. Carlo walked around the bus, making a visual inspection, and returned to confer with his partner again. One sped off in the van, while Carlo stayed with the bus. “If nobody's hurt, how about one of you go in and get everybody cleaned up and settled down,” Carlo said to Nick and Linda. “We’re ditching this bus. Somebody’s going to come back to pick you all up. Get all the weapons off the bus, but leave everything else. That ought to make these jailbirds happy,” he said. “Most of them, anyway,” he added, jabbing with a booted foot at the body of a man on the ground a few yards away.

  “Jailbirds?” Nick asked.

  “Not all of them. But look at what this guy’s wearing,” Carlo said.

  Nick moved closer until he could read what was stenciled on the man’s coveralls. “Camden County Jail,” he said aloud.

  “Once the power went out, the guards and wardens probably just went home,” Carlo explained. “A lot of bad people just let themselves out of their cells and walked. And this is nothing. It’s just a jail. These guys are in for boosting a liquor store or buying some weed. Imagine what it’s like near a federal prison. Thousands of hardened criminals roaming free. Probably armed pretty well, too. There’s a lot of guns in those prisons.”

  Matt stuck his head out from the bus. “Everybody’s okay,” he said. “Should I bring them out?”

  “No, leave them inside,” Sarah said, not waiting for anybody else to weigh in. “The less the kids see of this, the better.”

  “I don’t know about that,” Carlo countered. “Maybe they better start getting used to looking at this.”

  ~~~

  Eventually another bus returned to the site of the battle. Under the watch of two van’s worth of security, all the Outhouse Coalition members came off the wrecked one and boarded the other. It was tight, but room was made for all the newcomers. Nick thought it odd that there wasn’t much of a welcome. Sure, they were the newbies, he reasoned as he stared at the back of the next seat, but weren’t they all on the same side? Even though he knew it had only been a day or two since they’d joined, he worried that they’d never be accepted.

  “Stay with us, Nick,” Sarah said from behind, where she’d crept without him noticing. “We need you. Okay?”

  “I’m not going anywhere,” he answered in a monotone without turning to face her. “I have no place to go.”

  ~~~

  “How are you feeling, Tom?” Nick heard Matt ask after the caravan started moving again. “That was a lot of action.”

  “Not for me,” Tom said. “All I did was fall onto the floor. On purpose.”

  “And he didn’t look good doing it,” Penny said. “I hope the stitches hold.”

  “Check it out. We’re at Route Seventy,” Tom said as they turned right through a wide intersection onto the busiest commercial strip in Cherry Hill. Route Seventy might not be pretty, but it was the heart of the city. When it came to fast food, gas stations, box stores, and just about everything else, there was at least one of every franchise on this stretch of highway. The bus pulled into the parking lot of a shopping center built on the site of a horse racing track that had burned down in the late seventies. The other buses, surrounded by security vans, had stopped there to wait for the stray bus to rejoin them. When all the buses were in place, they moved out.

  The destruction was breathtaking. Most of the buildings were still standing, but many were partially burned and everyt
hing had been looted. Faces occasionally peered out from the spaces where doors and windows had once hung. Probably people picking the rubble over to see if any food or water had been missed by previous waves of scavengers, Nick guessed. Or maybe this was the best shelter they could find. Sometimes bands of people would emerge and watch as the caravan passed by, but the security escorts scared them off before much damage could be done, save few bricks and bottles that were harmlessly hurled. It was a good thing they’d decided to move faster, Nick thought. Traveling at twenty miles per hour was asking for trouble. This way, for the most part, they’d pass by any trouble spots before anybody had a chance to do anything about it.

  It didn’t feel right to ignore the suffering people they saw, but Nick knew there was no alternative. No longer was there enough for all. If they tried to help too many people, they’d end up out there on the streets with them. It was a hard lesson that he had to re-learn constantly.

  Even at the higher speed, the stench that wafted in through the windows was staggering. The smell was unfamiliar, but Nick guessed that it was a mix of smoke, raw sewage, and decaying bodies. It was hard to believe that just a few months earlier this was his go-to spot for whatever he needed around the house. Now, he couldn’t wait to get away and didn’t care if he ever saw the place again.

  Hulks of abandoned cars were everywhere. Luckily the ones in the roadway had been cleared. By whom, and why, nobody seemed to know. Were there other mobile groups out there? Was that good, or bad?

  Gunshots were occasionally heard as they passed through. Nick was never sure where the shots came from, but they never amounted to much. The security teams never even bothered to check those out. It was better just to keep moving, and that’s what they did.

  When they passed beneath I-295 heading for Marlton, Sarah suddenly appeared next to Nick in his seat. “Do you see where we are?” she asked excitedly. "We’re definitely heading for Medford! If they won’t take a detour, I think the girls and I are going to get off and go home!”

  Nick knew she wasn’t thinking straight. He’d already told her exactly where the bus was going. “Sarah, don’t even bother asking,” Nick said. “They’ll just think you’re nuts. There’s no way they’re going to detour this entire caravan over to your neighborhood. You know it and I know it.”

  “Well, in that case, I hope they’ll at least stop long enough to let us off,” Sarah said.

  “If you did something as crazy as that, you wouldn’t take your girls, would you?" Nick asked.

  “Why not?” she replied. “We’re a family. We need to be together. That's the whole point of finding Eli.”

  “Think about it, Sarah,” Nick pleaded. “You and a couple of young girls wandering out there by yourselves? It’s not safe. You’ve seen what’s going on out there. You have no idea what you’d be up against. Or who. Think it through. Please.”

  She paused. “If I left alone, would you look after them?”

  “Of course. But listen. Like I said before, the caravan is going up Route 206 just a few miles, and that's where we're stopping,” Nick said. “It’s not that far from your house, right? Just be patient. We’ll try to arrange a field trip from there in a few days.”

  “A few days?” she asked. “What if Eli’s at the house right now? He’s probably worried sick about us!”

  “He’s not, Sarah,” Nick said. “I hate to be that guy, but he’s in Boston. It’s that simple.”

  “You don’t know that,” she said angrily. “He might be there, and we’re not waiting any longer than we have to.” She stomped back to her seat as fast as she’d arrived. Nick looked across the aisle at Dewey, who’d taken in the entire scene without a word. Dewey shrugged. Meanwhile, Nick saw that Sarah had squeezed in between her daughters and was talking to them animatedly. It didn’t seem right to get their hopes up that way, Nick thought. She wasn’t thinking clearly.

  By then they’d reached what used to be the Marlton traffic circle, where Seventy met Seventy-three. The antiquated circle had been replaced by towering concrete ramps and banks of traffic lights. Off to the right in the dusk Nick could see the remains of Olga’s diner, its distinct red neon script sign now dark. Once a South Jersey landmark, it had been closed for several years, partially done in by the restricted access that came with the newly configured intersection.

  "Hiya, Nick," he heard, interrupting his window-gazing session. It was Penny. She was already in the seat next to him before he knew for sure who it was. "I know what Sarah was up to, and I talked her out of it. She wanted me to come up and tell you she thinks you're right. She's going all the way to the school with us. She's not going anywhere."

  "Thank God," Nick said. "That would've been suicide. Now I can relax. Sort of." He hoped she'd stay and talk, but she made some excuse about getting back to help with the kids, and disappeared into the back of the bus.

  Nick looked out the window again. They passed through the rest of downtown Marlton, which was more like a suburb on steroids than anything conjured up by that self-styled name, and then the surroundings went decidedly rural. They were now in the outskirts of the Pine Barrens, the thick forest of evergreens that filled a few hundred square miles from there to the shore. He settled back into his seat and tried to enjoy the quiet solitude.

  The curtain of blackness created by the forest lifted somewhat when the buses rolled in front of what appeared to be an isolated supermarket. Before Nick realized what was happening, a dark figure had moved noiselessly past him in the aisle, heading toward the front. Mercifully, the bus slowed nearly to a halt as the doors flopped open.

  Somebody had just left, and with a sinking feeling, Nick knew who it must have been. All he could do now was make sure the girls had been left behind. But before he’d moved to get out of his seat, somebody else slipped into the aisle and made their way forward. Even though the bus was already picking up speed, the door flew open again and somebody else leaped out.

  The seat across the aisle from Nick was now empty. Sarah and Dewey were gone.

  ~~~

  Stunned by what had just happened, Nick waited a few minutes before moving to the back of the bus. Full darkness had set in, but it appeared that Penny was now sitting between Jenny and Ashley, with an arm around each. He could only imagine what the girls were feeling; they’d already lost their father, and now their mother had disappeared into a dangerous, unpredictable world. What was Sarah thinking? He knew why she had wanted so badly to do it, but he could see two reasons, one on either side of Penny, why she shouldn’t have.

  “Do we report this to anybody?” Nick asked Matt.

  “It’s not like it’s a secret,” Matt answered. “I don’t know who’s in charge, but everybody on this bus knows that two people jumped off.”

  “True. I think we should just sit on it until the morning, unless somebody asks us,” Nick said. “What do you think about that?”

  “Sounds right,” he replied. “It’s not like we can do anything about it.”

  ~~~

  They could see the buses ahead now, as they rounded the traffic circle at Route 206 and headed north. After that, it was only ten minutes more before they reached Southampton Middle School. The buses pulled into a parking circle along a sidewalk, probably just like it had been done when students were transported every morning. They heard the hiss of air brakes, a universal sound of arrival. Before the doors opened, somebody in the front of the bus directed them to grab any baggage they’d brought and wait on the sidewalk for further instructions.

  After disembarking, there was a steady murmur of conversation. Nick wasn’t sure if this was everybody, but it looked to be a crowd of over a hundred people. Maybe closer to two-hundred. It occurred to him that he had no idea how many were part of this group. His heart broke when he met eyes with Jenny; he knew what she was thinking, and it showed, even in the darkness. He was about to count heads when he heard a familiar voice demanding attention. It was Roethke, standing on a trash can near a door.

&nb
sp; “Listen up, everybody,” he shouted. “I’m only saying it once, so let’s hush up and get down to business.” He waited for the murmur to die away before continuing. “It’s been a long day and everybody wants to settle in. Here’s the procedure. One person from each family, or group, or whatever you call yourselves these days, should check in at the table inside this door. You’ll be given a ticket with the names of your members and the rooms you’ve been assigned to. They’re classrooms, obviously. Then collect your members up and divide yourselves into your rooms however you choose. It’s that simple.”

  The crowd began to self-sort right there on the sidewalk. Nick joined the queue of leaders forming at the door. Somebody leaned over and spoke into Roethke’s ear. “Excuse me!” Roethke bellowed. “A couple more things. There are rest rooms in the athletic hall behind the main building. These are the only rest rooms you are to use. Let me repeat that. Those are the only rest rooms you are to use. Under no circumstances will anybody use any of the rest rooms in the main building. When you’re finished, make sure to scrub up on your way out. With soap. They’ll be somebody in there to remind you. Clear?”

  After the crowd indicated that they understood, Roethke continued. “You can get breakfast in the morning between seven and nine in the school cafeteria. Don’t be early, don’t be late, yada yada yada. Okay? After that, report back to the cafeteria at ten o’clock for a meeting. It’s not optional. So we’ll see you there.”

  ~~~

  The Outhouse Coalition had been designated for three classrooms. All were stocked with cots and blankets. The Helliksons and the Shardlakes each took one. Jenny and Ashley moved in with the Shardlakes, leaving Nick by himself in the third room. He wondered how they’d have divided up had Sarah been there. He and Dewey would probably have been the odd men out, looking for a place to bunk. If only that was all he had to worry about. He spent the next three hours laying in the dark wondering how Sarah and Dewey were and what they were doing, until he finally passed out.