The Horns of Avalon (Purge of Babylon, Book 8)

by Sam Sisavath

  “What about Mercer’s people? Any problems with them since Starch?”

  “Luckily we’ve been able to avoid them, too. They seem to be confining their operations further inland. Probably have more FOBs out there all set up and ready even before they launched this little adventure of theirs.”

  “FOBs?”

  “Forward Operating Bases. Places they’re using to launch their attacks.”

  “Like that airport outside of Larkin.”

  “Exactamundo.”

  “How many of those do you think they have?”

  “As few as one more, as many as a hundred.”

  “That’s…a big number, Danny.”

  “Mercer’s had a year to think this up. The guy’s… Well, momma always says not to say anything if you don’t have something nice to say.”

  “That’s never stopped you before.”

  “I’m learning, Lara, I’m learning…”

  She smiled. “Good to know. What about this Mason guy?”

  “What about him?”

  “How useful has he been?”

  “Got us around a couple of ambushes, so he’s not been a terrible investment in time and duct tape. But I’m thinking I might have to cut him loose real soon the closer we get to a new and less soldier-infested exfil point.”

  Lara didn’t press for details; she didn’t want to know. Images of Gage being tossed into the ocean while she slept flashed briefly across her mind. She only needed to know that Danny would do what he had to in order to come back just as she had on the Trident. Just as Will had before them…

  “How’re you guys for fuel?” Danny asked. “You’ve been doing a lot of running around out there. Did the tank finally get topped off?”

  She exchanged a brief look with Blaine standing behind the helm to her left. The fuel. How many times had they discussed the topic? How many times had she stood right here on the bridge and gone through all the scenarios with Carly and Maddie and Bonnie? Too often, and every single time the results were the same.

  But Danny didn’t need to hear that right now, so she said into the radio, “We’re fine, Danny. Concentrate on finding your exit point, and we’ll be ready to pick you up.”

  “Was it my imagination, or did it take you a while to answer that one?” Danny asked.

  “It’s your imagination,” she said, hoping it was at least semi-convincing.

  * * *

  She watched the kids cannonballing off the swimming platform at the back of the Trident and into the crystal blue water of the Gulf of Mexico. Most of them were out there—Dwayne, Elise and Vera, and the other kids she had never really made time to get to know. Their energy was boundless, and the cold water didn’t seem to have much of an effect on them.

  Lara found herself envying their carefree spirit and at the same time was glad they didn’t know what was happening in Texas at the moment—with Danny and Gaby, or what Mercer’s men were doing to the collaborator towns.

  “To let everyone know there’s something worse than the ghouls out here,” a man named Gregson, one of Mercer’s men, had once said to her.

  They know now, don’t they? They know now…

  “Ah, to be young and clueless,” a voice said behind her.

  Lara looked over as Zoe pushed against the railing next to her. They were on the uppermost deck of the yacht, which gave Lara a great view of her surroundings, including that of the kids jumping into the water in front of her.

  “There’s definitely something to be said about not knowing too much,” Lara said. “Besides, they’ve seen enough horrors to last a few lifetimes.” She paused for a moment. “They deserve this. We all do.”

  “You partaking?”

  “Not in this weather.”

  “I can’t believe they’re not freezing to death by now.” The doctor tightened her jacket’s collar around her neck. “I have a feeling I’m going to get some new patients very soon.”

  “Do we have flu shots?”

  “Fully stocked.”

  “Good.”

  “Don’t worry, boss, I got the sickbay handled. You just take care of…every single other thing that matters.”

  Lara smiled and sneaked a look at Zoe. They hadn’t known each other all that long, but Zoe had come to her with the best reference—Will’s. Over the months she had proven invaluable, and Lara wasn’t sure if she’d even have Danny now if it wasn’t for Zoe.

  We’re all doing our part, Will. You’d be proud of us.

  “Danny?” Zoe asked.

  “Still out there with Gaby and Nate.”

  “But okay?”

  “In one piece,” she nodded, and thought, Thank God, because I’m the one who sent them out there. If anything happens to them, it would be my fault.

  “So are we,” Zoe said.

  Lara gave her a curious look.

  Zoe smiled sheepishly. “We were just talking…”

  “Again?”

  “We’re always talking behind your back, Lara. You should know that by now.”

  “So what was on the agenda this time?”

  “We decided to make it clear to you that we believe in and trust you. That whatever you decide, we’re behind you. We know you’re going to get us to the Bengal Islands one way or another. We have faith.”

  “Jesus, how long was this meeting?”

  Zoe laughed softly. “And we mean every word of it. We know you’ve been second-guessing yourself. About Keo, Danny, about everything. And I’m telling you—we’re telling you—that you don’t have to.”

  “Don’t I?”

  “No, because none of us could have done a better job. And most importantly, we know it.”

  “I shouldn’t have sent Danny and Gaby out there.”

  “You made a calculated decision, and Danny agreed.”

  “If they don’t come back, it’ll be my fault.”

  “They’ll come back. Danny’s an ex-Ranger. He’ll make it back.”

  “I wasted a lot of fuel getting to Sunport…”

  “Because Keo called. And Keo is… Keo.”

  Lara pursed her lips and couldn’t help but smile appreciatively back at the other woman. “Question.”

  “Shoot.”

  “When do you guys have these chats, and why am I never invited?”

  “Because besides talking about you, we do a lot of talking about you.”

  “Makes sense.”

  Zoe looked back across the Trident, past the kids and at the open waters beyond. “And, oh, we also talked about this Mercer guy. He sounds like real bad news.”

  “From everything I’ve heard, he is.”

  “What do you think’s going on out there right now?”

  “I try not to think about it too much. Whatever’s happening, it’s out of our hands. Mercer, the collaborators…” She focused on Elise and Vera, the two girls holding hands as they cannonballed into the water side by side. “This is all that matters. The lives on this boat.”

  Zoe nodded, and the two of them watched Dwayne landing hard enough into the water that it splashed not just everyone in the area, but also his mother Kendra and Carrie standing on the platform watching them.

  “Thanks,” Lara said after a while. “For the pep talk.”

  “Normally we’d let Carly do it, but we thought you might need to hear it from someone else from time to time.”

  “Who’s up next?”

  “Bonnie. Then Blaine. And I think Carrie called dibs after him.”

  “I hope you guys at least wrote down the order.”

  “Oh, we did. Sarah’s in charge of all the paperwork.” Zoe turned around. “If you want to talk, about anything, you know where to find me.”

  “Thanks,” Lara nodded and realized she meant it.

  “Sure,” Zoe said before pushing off the railing. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to go tell Bonnie she’s up next.”

  Lara glanced after the doctor before turning back around to look out at the clear blue horizon. The Trident
was anchored far enough from land that she couldn’t make out Texas in the distance, which meant no one along the coastline could see them, either. At least not without high-powered binoculars, and what were the chances someone was scanning the ocean this moment?

  Below her, Carrie let out a scream as Kendra grabbed her from behind and pushed her into the water. Carrie went under for a moment before resurfacing, wet clothes and rifle clinging to her.

  Lara smiled to herself and thought, I’ll get them to the Bengal Islands, Will. I’ll keep them safe. I promise…

  * * *

  “You’re going to catch a cold. Again.”

  Elise pouted but didn’t stop turning around in a circle so Lara could wipe her dry from head to toe. The girl didn’t completely stop shivering until she was wrapped in a big, fluffy cotton bath towel that Lara had laid out. She should have been annoyed at the puddles of water the girl had tracked into her cabin, but she was strangely okay with it. Maybe it was because it was Elise, and Lara had forgotten how much she enjoyed these moments.

  She sat down on the end of her bed and watched Elise slip out of her bathing suit and into a pair of long pants and a sweater. She was growing up and filling out, and Lara barely recognized the skinny kid she had rescued from Dansby, Texas, nearly a year ago. Elise hadn’t gotten any taller—not yet, anyway—but she wasn’t as rail thin as before thanks to the plentiful food in the ocean that regularly graced their lunches and dinners.

  “You’re getting better at swimming,” Lara said.

  “Practice makes perfect,” Elise smiled back.

  “You’re not there yet.”

  “Maybe one day.”

  “Maybe one day,” Lara nodded. “Until then, it’s going to get colder, so this might be the last time for a while.”

  “It’s not that cold.”

  “Cold enough. Doctor’s orders.”

  “Zoe said so?”

  Lara made a face. “Clever.”

  Elise grinned. “When are Danny and Gaby coming back?”

  “Soon.”

  “I miss them.”

  “Me too.”

  “Hey,” Elise said suddenly, as if something had just occurred to her.

  Lara smiled. The way the girl’s thoughts shifted from topic to topic was something to behold. “What?”

  “We were outside one night, and we thought we saw something.”

  “Who is ‘we’ and when was ‘one night?’”

  “Me, Vera, and Jenny, and it was last night.” Elise’s head tilted slightly to one side, a clear indication she was lost in thought.

  “What were you guys doing out at night?” Lara asked.

  “Jenny said it was a boat,” Elise said, ignoring her question.

  “Was it a boat?”

  “I don’t know; it was kind of small.”

  “What color was it?”

  “Black, I think?”

  “You’re not sure?”

  Elise shook her head.

  “Did you see it again today?” Lara asked.

  “Nope.”

  “And you’re sure it was a boat?”

  “Maybe…”

  “If you see it again—or something like it—you need to come and tell me or one of the adults right away, understand?”

  Elise nodded. “Will do, boss.”

  Lara rolled her eyes. “Not you, too.”

  * * *

  “A boat?” Blaine said.

  Lara nodded. “She said Jenny thought she saw a boat.”

  “But she’s not sure.”

  “That’s the problem. It could have been a boat. Or it could have been anything. Or nothing.”

  “Maybe it was Blaine,” Carly said. “He’s pretty dark.”

  Blaine smirked. “What does Danny see in you?”

  “Must be my winning personality.”

  “It’s not that winning.”

  “Personality is what I call my vagina.”

  Blaine groaned. “I hate talking to you.”

  “I love you, too,” Carly said, and blew him a kiss.

  Lara ignored them, said, “If it was something, it was too far for either girls to make out. Who was on watch last night?”

  “Carrie,” Blaine said. “But she would have said something if she saw a boat out there. The same for Maddie; she relieved me at midnight as usual and was up here until morning.”

  “Vera didn’t mention seeing anything, either,” Carly said.

  “Elise didn’t even want to mention it,” Lara said. “I think she just did because it came to her at the moment.” She shook her head. “We need to do a better job letting them know to report what they see.”

  “Could be another body,” Blaine said.

  He was looking through his binoculars at the surrounding ocean. From up here, on the upper deck of the Trident, they had the next best view of the Gulf of Mexico. The only better vantage point was on the roof above them. Lara didn’t need binoculars to know there was nothing out there right now. At least, nothing she could see with the naked eye.

  But that’s the problem, isn’t it? It wouldn’t be trouble if it didn’t sneak up on us.

  “We still don’t know where that body came from,” Carly was saying. “Or what or who put it in the water in the first place.”

  “There are a lot of things going on out there that we don’t know about,” Lara said. “For all we know, there’s more than one body floating around. It’s a big ocean. It was a one in a million chance that one would come close enough for us to see it.”

  “Like winning the lotto,” Carly said, and wrinkled her nose. “A really smelly, bloated lotto.”

  Blaine let his binoculars hang around his neck and glanced over at her.

  “What’s wrong?” Lara asked.

  “I don’t like the idea of another boat out there watching us.”

  “I don’t like the idea of anything out there watching us,” Carly said, shivering slightly. “Maybe it was a perverted whale.”

  “And Elise said it was black?” Blaine asked.

  “She thinks it was black,” Lara nodded.

  “That’s a good way to blend into the night if you were on a scouting mission. You don’t usually find a lot of black-painted boats precisely because you don’t want to get run through at night by another vessel.”

  “You think someone painted their boat black as camouflage?” Carly asked.

  Blaine shrugged. “That’s what I would do. Not exactly a lot of chances you’d run across another boat all the way out here. So what other reason would there be to paint a boat black?”

  No one said anything for a while. Carly looked back out the bridge and Lara joined her.

  After a while, Lara said, “Exactly how far are we from land, Blaine?”

  “I’ve kept us steady at twenty miles out,” Blaine said. “No one should be able to spot us from the coastline. Especially at night with our lights manually shut off.”

  “Damn, I wish Danny were here already,” Carly said, reflexively crossing her chest with her arms and rubbing her shoulders.

  “Who’s got guard duty tonight?” Lara asked.

  “Gwen,” Blaine said.

  “Ask for volunteers to join her. I want to double all the sentries until otherwise noted. We’ll also need to post someone permanently at the back, too.”

  “I’ll draw straws with whoever doesn’t volunteer to back up Gwen tonight,” Carly said.

  “One last thing,” Lara said. “I want all the adults armed again, including Dwayne, even if they’re not on guard duty.”

  “Dwayne too?” Blaine asked.

  “He’s really good with that bolt-action rifle of his,” Carly said. “Scary good, for a thirteen-year-old.”

  “I thought he was twelve,” Lara said.

  “He turned thirteen three weeks ago, remember?”

  No, she thought, but said, “I guess I forgot.”

  “Well, you’ve had a lot on your mind.”

  Lara nodded and gave her friend an a
ppreciative nod.

  “What about Claire?” Blaine asked. “Gaby’s been training her…”

  Lara shook her head. “She’s not ready yet.”

  “So it’s settled,” Carly said.

  “I’ll bring my cot back up here and tighten the shift between me and Maddie,” Blaine said. “I’ll make sure someone’s always up here every hour of the day from now on.”

  “Maybe bring two cots, one for Sarah,” Carly said. “You know, in case you guys want a little late-night boom-boom action.”

  Blaine groaned. “Please don’t ever say ‘boom-boom action’ ever again.”

  “Trouble in paradise?”

  “Something like that.”

  “You guys should do what I do. Send one of you out there. Distance makes the heart grow fonder, or some crap like that.”

  “You get that out of a Hallmark card?” Blaine asked.

  Lara stepped closer to the windshield and could barely hear them going back and forth behind her as she looked out at the never-ending expanse of blue ocean outside. Her mind swam with all the potential hidden dangers she hadn’t seen—or even tried to look for—before. She had almost convinced herself there was no one out here but them, even though she knew better. There had been the dead body they had fished out of the water off Sunport, and later, that voice on the radio asking her to make contact.

  They had been floating around the Gulf of Mexico for so long, safe and sound onboard the Trident that she had almost made herself believe they could be safe so long as they stayed far away from Texas. She should have known it wouldn’t last forever, and maybe she always did but had just done a very good job of deceiving herself.

  The girls could be wrong. There might not have been another boat out there last night watching us.

  Yeah, right…

  3

  Gaby

  This must be what God feels like.

  The man’s head drifted slightly left, then right in her rifle’s ACOG scope. It had been a while since she found herself in possession of an optic that could shoot long distance, and this one had come courtesy of a dead man.

  I can kill him right now. It would be so easy. Just squeeze the trigger…