Shorty landed flat on his back, his head a few feet away. Erik swung the pipe behind him in a wide circle after gathering all the speed he could, swung it down in one final blow. The pipe clipped the ceiling tiles, robbing Erik of most of his balance and all his power. The killing blow was significantly less than intended.
Dead or unconscious—either way Shorty was out of the fight.
Erik spun on his heel, ignoring lingering screams from the earlier inflicted pain on Leo. The younger man staggered backward, both hands in front of his ruined face. He hit the wall and paused, his eyes round.
"Jesus Christ!" screamed Roger. Over a clap of thunder.
Leo's eyes traveled down to the inert body of his partner and his face hardened in rage, transfigured into the mask of a demon by his own blood. He shoved off the wall and lunged for Erik, screaming like a madman.
Erik calmly sidestepped and used the end of his pipe to smack Leo on the side of the head as he rushed past. Leo grunted under the impact and staggered sideways into the wall again. He fell to his knees, clutching the side of his head, already sporting a nice goose egg.
Erik swung the pipe out, making it whistle until the tip pointed directly at Leo. "Get out of here while you still can."
Leo blinked back the pain, whimpered a little and got to his feet on shaky legs. He raised both hands in submission and nodded. “Okay… I'm out…fuck! You’re crazy, bro."
Another Jock stepped through the rain pouring in the doorway and gasped in surprise. "What the fuck is this?"
"Stay back—this guy's insane!" Leo warned with bloody hands. Erik turned and brought the bloody pipe up into a defensive position, facing the new threat.
"Hey! That's Roger!" the newcomer said.
"Shit!" Roger whined from the background.
"This ain't over," said the newcomer. "We'll be back for your bitch ass," he grinned. Lightning flashed over his shoulder. The storm seemed to approve.
Erik swung the pipe again in a loose circle, making it whistle and sing in the air. Flecks of blood splattered the surrounding walls. "Leo, get this sack of shit out of here before I decide to lay you both out next to Shorty here."
Leo nodded submissively, bent down and scooped up his unconscious friend by the shoulders. He got reluctant help from the angry-eyed newcomer and the two of them dragged Shorty out, leaving a bright red trail on the gray industrial carpet. They moved out the door and disappeared into the storm-torn night. Erik heard more hoots and laughter, then shouts of surprise and finally the sound of running footsteps through the rain. Eventually the raging storm swallowed all sounds from outside.
It was over.
A moment later Ted appeared at the bottom of the stairs. "You okay? I think they're gone—holy shit," he exclaimed, looking at the blood on the floor, the splattered drops on the walls, and the gore dripping from the end of Erik's pipe. "What the fuck did you do?"
Erik turned and dropped the pipe. He winced at the pain in his lower back where Shorty landed a blow. "I think I'm going to throw up," he said. He dropped to one knee and braced his hands on the floor. "Why can't they just leave us alone?"
Brin appeared at the bottom of the stairs. "Is everybody okay—Erik!" she gasped. "You're bleeding!"
Erik blinked at her and then brought a trembling hand to his face. He wiped blood from his cheek. "Oh—it's not mine. I'm okay."
The concern melted from Brin's face. The stony, distant Brin returned, but Erik was happy enough to have seen the brief emergence of his wife—his real wife—if only for a moment.
Chapter 52
Training
ERIK PUT DOWN HIS pipe and wiped the sweat from his brow. "No, you’ve got to do it again. Walk around the ground floor of this building and check all the windows and doors. That's all I’m going to tell you. Now do it again," he said gesturing with a tired arm.
A few of the Professor’s students groaned but dutifully trudged off to visually inspect the dormitory again. It'd been three days since the attack on the visitor's center and Roger had spread the word of Erik's fight.
As a consequence, Erik had become a living legend among the Professor’s group. No one had ever stood up to the Jocks so successfully. Word had come back almost immediately that the captains in the northern campus desired a more lasting truce.
It didn't hurt that Roger had also spread rumors Erik and Ted were only a small number of the larger group who'd recently merged with the Professor’s. The Jocks took it all in as gospel.
The temperature had started to drop and though most everyone—including a few students who were majoring in meteorology—hoped it was merely an early cold snap and not a lasting trend. The fight at the visitor's center convinced the Professor they needed to disperse more supplies throughout the buildings on campus rather than have everything centralized at the farm.
Erik had been tasked with training as many of the students as possible to recognize security faults, shore up defenses, and harden living quarters against future attacks. It had not been a hard conversation to have with the Professor.
The night of the storm, the Jocks had been bolder than ever before, actually breaking into an occupied building. It showed signs of desperation and an unwillingness to have their behavior checked any longer by assurances of medicine and antibiotics supplies.
Erik put his Newark University cap on and watched approvingly as this time the group of students figured out the ground-floor windows were prime targets. Two of them took notes while the others discussed how best to set up impromptu defenses.
Eventually one of the group broke off and trotted over to Erik. "So, we got a couple ideas we want to run by you."
Erik hefted the pipe and twirled it casually. "Let's hear it."
"Okay,” the kid said, eyeing the open end of the pipe as it sang through the air. “So we don't have access to large sheets of plywood, which would probably work best to cover the windows…"
Erik nodded. "Right. Kinda like hurricane shutters back right where I come from. But to make it worthwhile, you'll need some thick, heavy pieces. Go on."
The student agreed. "We don't have that—but we do have lots of scraps in one of the machine sheds down at the farm. We could bring those up and…we were thinking maybe to put a few across each window—”
Erik frowned. He planted his pipe firmly on the ground, resting his arm across the top. "Stop right there—you’d be wasting your time. Look at the exterior of this building. It's mostly brick-and-mortar. If you try to nail something into that, you're only going to weaken the mortar around the windows—which is a very bad idea. Also, if you just put a few boards up and leave open gaps where light can get in, what else happens?"
The young man thought for a second, scratching his head with his pencil. His eyes grew large. "Anyone outside can see in."
Erik smiled. "Right! All you're doing is warning people outside that there's something valuable inside you're trying to protect and showing them you don't have the necessary tools to protect whatever it is properly. That will invite them to check it out further and when they do…"
"They’ll be able to see whatever we have inside—or whoever we have inside…" The young man looked crestfallen.
"You're on the right track with the wood," Erik said as a way of placating him. "Just think outside the box. What would happen if you put a bunch of nails through those boards and then hid them on the ground underneath the windows."
The student turned and looked over his shoulder at the dorm, examining the bushes and landscaping—largely left wild since the collapse. "Well, they’ll have to step on it or move it to get to the window."
Erik nodded. "Right. And what does that do for you?"
"Hey… Hey, I know what you talking about! If they have to step on it…if it's dark and they step on it, they're gonna get hurt—that might be enough to make the run away.”
Erik nodded. “And…?”
"And if not, if we bury the boards in the mulch and stuff there underneath the windows, that t
hey’ll probably make enough noise so we’ll hear them rustling around. They’ll definitely make noise if they step on one!"
Erik clapped the young man on the shoulder. "Now you're thinking like a survivor. Keep it up. What's another benefit of having the nailed strips laying on the ground where they're not easily observable?"
The kid’s brow wrinkled. "Well, if we had boards up over the windows and someone thought that we had something valuable inside…if we don't have anything up…then they might think there's nothing inside and walk on by."
Erik winked at him. "You got it."
"Awesome. This is awesome—thank you!" The student scribbled more notes in his book and then jogged back to the others, shouting in triumph.
Erik picked up his canteen from the ground and took a swig of water, eyeing the sky. Ever since the thunderstorms a few days ago, the temperature had steadily dropped and now the overcast sky blocked even more heat. It felt like it was in the low 50s, maybe upper 40s.
A slight breeze tickled the back of his neck. He’d worked up a sweat tromping around with his little gaggle of students, pointing out the flaws in their current security measures. He took the opportunity to continue practicing his kata while the others examined the buildings in detail. The pipe he carried wasn't nearly as graceful as his lost katana so he worked up an awful sweat, but it felt good to use his muscles again.
He looked at the pipe in his hands. The brutish instrument still had a bit of a stain at the end where he’d bloodied the Jocks during the attack. God, I miss my sword.
Three days, he thought to himself, watching the students eagerly gesticulate toward the window and ground as they hashed out a plan for the building. Three days stuck in this medieval clusterfuck they have going on here. Three days of hiking around this campus and showing these kids how to defend themselves and not a single person has brought up the fact they have a stockpile of guns and ammunition that they won't train themselves to use. Erik shook his head. It makes no sense at all.
Lindsay's recovery provided all the comfort he needed, though. The honey-derived antibiotics they'd acquired from Dr. Norris down at the farm had already started to show results. Not only had Lindsay's fever stopped climbing, but it actually fell the night before. She was now only mildly warm and was constantly complaining she wanted to get up and walk around.
Lucy, her ever-present nurse, strictly forbade excessive movement. Erik smiled thinking about the eager-to-please sophomore nursing major. She never went anywhere without her oversized canvas messenger bag emblazoned with a crude red cross. She was quick to illustrate the dangers of life without modern medicine and ever ready to lend a hand when someone got a scratch or bruise or strained muscle.
No matter where Erik went, he always found her hanging around his group. She was a near constant companion for Lindsay and followed Brin around incessantly, always tucking that stray lock of black hair over her ear whenever Brin talked to her. Which was a lot. Erik had come to grips with his jealousy and tried to ignore it, but there it was. Brin talked more with Lucy than with him.
Wait a minute, Erik paused. He turned toward the visitor's center. She's always talking about Brin…always following Brin. A slow smile crept across his face. Maybe she's got a crush on Brin? He frowned. Good grief. Really? Get your mind out of the gutter, Larsson.
Everyone in the Professor's group had realized Erik, Brin, and Ted had taken over the visitor's center as their own private space. Most people recognized that and treated it as their house.
Roger was the glaring exception to that. The scruffy grad assistant walked in at all hours like he owned the place. It was as if by the mere fact that he’d survived the attack there now bestowed hero status on him. The other students were quick to promote the idea.
As the days wore on and Erik gained more intelligence about the Professor's operation, he came to understand just how communal it truly was. The Professor had taken the most logical course of action possible when dealing with a large group of 18 to 24-year-olds who were unarmed and essentially helpless after the collapse. Everyone stayed together in a few dorms and hunkered down at night. They only moved around during the day and only in groups of four or more. They were very cautious—to the point of paranoia—about everything.
Erik stared at the golden maples and red oaks that lined the quad. It really was a beautiful campus. He watched as his 'students' trotted back and forth between two buildings, pointing at windows and bushes.
They all seemed like so many lemmings to Erik, willing to blindly follow the Professor and do whatever he asked as long as he kept them safe and well fed. Erik was amazed the man had been able to do so much with so little for so long. Yet one intelligent raid by the Jocks or Rebels and the whole thing would come crashing down.
As Lindsay continued to improve, Erik's desire to run north grew stronger and stronger. It was an inescapable pull that constantly tugged at his soul. He wanted to be gone before that one intelligent raid took place.
Of all of them, Teddy was having the best time possible. Where Lindsay followed Brin around, Teddy followed Lucy. He was proud to be her ‘surgical assistant’ and fetched anything she needed. He wasn't allowed out of the visitor's center and though there was always someone around doing chores like raiding cars or hunting through buildings for supplies, Brin watched him like a hawk.
As the days continued to march forward, Erik felt more and more like the students were keeping tabs on his group. He couldn't blame the Professor for doing so—it's what he would have done. But it was a little disconcerting, nonetheless.
He didn't like being watched. It reminded him too much of being a Russian prisoner. Just thinking about those harsh and dramatic early days of the collapse in Florida made him grip the pipe with white knuckles.
No, first chance he got, he wanted to get everyone off campus and heading north again. They were only about five hours away from his parent’s house in Upstate New York.
Erik glanced at some abandoned cars on Main Street in the distance. Well, five hours on open roads traveling at highway speeds, he corrected himself. Now? Who the hell knows…
He sighed. They’d have to find a working car first and plenty of gas. Both resources the Professor controlled with an iron fist.
The tasks ahead began to mount in his mind and Erik felt the weight of responsibility settle on his shoulders once again.
Chapter 53
Gainesville
HAKIM STEPPED DOWN FROM the beat-up truck and adjusted his backpack. He slung his captured M4 rifle over his left shoulder and walked forward, glancing at the rows of apartments stretched out before him.
"So little damage…" observed Saldid.
"This is a college town, useful to no one…" Hakim said, eyeing the closest apartment building. "Besides, this place is too far north to have taken part in the fighting around Orlando. The refugees may or may not have made it here—but if they did, they likely continued north.” He turned east.
"That way lies Jacksonville. The Americans have their Naval Air Station there, so Malcolm will try to avoid it and head west, toward us. I believe it will be at a border town between here and Jacksonville. Several good spots for an ambush."
Saldid grinned. "And the Russians are heading north to stop him, so they will be there as well."
Hakim nodded. "The Americans chase him, so they will follow too. All we have to do is find the place they'll meet and plant the seed of our masterstroke. This, though," he said swinging his arm wide to encompass Gainesville, "is where we shall birth vengeance for Mecca.”
"I can hardly believe it. Here we are, surrounded by college students…let us celebrate our good fortune and find some young willing girls. I bet they all have alcohol as well, I have seen the videos on the Internet."
Hakim looked at his partner in disgust. It was the final straw. Throughout their long partnership of destruction over the past six months—setting wildfires in Arizona, killing citizen vigilantes along the border, stirring up the Mexicans, and
leaving a trail of dead and bloodied Russians across the state of Florida—they were at last on the cusp of their final act of defiance.
He had not arrived in Gainesville by happenstance. He knew the university here held a significant science campus. They must surely have radioactive material. He had just enough rudimentary training to make a dirty bomb the world would never forget.
True, it would not be the equal of the device that destroyed Mecca—may Allah curse the Zionists forever—but Hakim’s bomb would be a symbolic gesture to strike fear in the hearts of every American. If during this national crisis, mujahideen could reach out across the world and deliver a nuclear explosion, no American would ever feel safe again.
And on the doorstep of all of that glory, this fool is more interested in pussy and beer. Perhaps it was the heat of the day, or lack of sleep, or Saldid’s insistence on playing nothing but Ashley Sword on their trip north from Tampa—Hakim would never know. He did know it felt good to pull the trigger on his M4 and final put an end to Saldid's incessant sinful distractions.
Once the bark of the rifle had dissipated, Hakim took a quick glance around. He knelt over the twitching body of his partner and stripped off all the useful items like spare magazines and bits of explosive material. He ignored the cigarettes and threw aside the folded up pornographic magazines with disgust. He stuffed the remainder of Saldid's gear into his own bag. Hakim's anger flared anew when he rifled through Saldid’s cargo pockets and found six protein bars.
"You bastard—I have starved the last two days, yet you have been hoarding this!" He spat into the ruined face of his former partner. "You deserve more than death, but I shall leave that to Allah.”
Dux Bellorum (Future History of America Book 3) Page 33