by Bradley West
The blackness was the first tip that something was amiss. The streetlights were out as were the suspension bridge’s dramatic lights strung from the cables. If he hadn’t driven 101 North thousands of times, Sal would have thought he was miles from anywhere. There wasn’t any southbound traffic on the road either, a disturbing contrast to the previous steady procession of emergency vehicles. “Jaime, be ready. Something’s not right.”
“Hand me that, will you?” Jaime said to Tina, who passed up the longer of the two rifles. “Thanks.” He lowered the window, poked the barrel out and flipped on the laser optics on the civilian equivalent of the Marines’ best friend, the M27. “That explains the noises we heard earlier,” he added to no one in particular. “There was a gunfight up here.”
Sal soon saw what his sharper-eyed wingman had picked out: Burned vehicles still smoked and his headlights flicked over corpses in the street. Glass and bits of metal littered the road. Sal concentrated on avoiding the wreckage while Jaime kept an eye out for foes. A bus had battered through parked vehicles, but it lay burned out with a gaping hole in the center. Sal stole a glance and paid for it by running over a bumper with a rattle that made everyone jump. Carla and Tina looked out the windows wide-eyed, fascinated and repulsed by the horrific loss of life.
“Jesus Christ,” Jaime said. “That bus was hit with a SMAW rocket. That’s Army-issue only.”
Sal sped up, careful not to run over anything that might blow-out a tire. The highest number of destroyed police vehicles and uniformed corpses were concentrated around the Welcome Center. Fifty yards off the main road, lights flickered in the parking lot. Sal accelerated again. 101 North was pitted, potholed and cracked for the three hundred yards of the main road leading to the south end of the bridge, with more blasted and burned cars scattered about. There were fewer pedestrian corpses: This had been a mechanized assault. Zigzagging across lanes, Sal grimaced, half-expecting a flat tire as the Audi crunched through shattered safety glass. He bobbed and weaved around potholes until they were on the Golden Gate proper, which was comparatively unmarked. They hadn’t seen a sign of life other than those lights in the parking lot.
“That’s the scariest thing I’ve ever seen in my life,” Carla said. “What happened back there?”
Tina was transported back to her ER resident’s days and the shattered people she had to work on after high-speed car crashes. Words failed her when she thought of the wholesale death. What was that, fifty bodies? Eighty? And that was just on her side of the car.
Jaime hazarded an interpretation. “The mob broke through the police line and massacred the cops, but helicopter gunships mowed most of them down before the bridge. The survivors in cars made a run for it about the time the Apaches arrived. The helicopters wiped out anyone on 101 North, but didn’t have the authorization to fire rockets or canons at any vehicles that reached the bridge. The Feds want it kept intact and that means there could be trouble ahead.”
Sal was up to seventy miles an hour. “What’s at the other end?” Carla asked.
“Anyone’s guess. The Marin County police reinforcements probably crossed the bridge to support that defensive position we passed. If so, they’re dead. If any tangos made it across to the north side, there’d have been another battle if any police were left behind. Whoever won will block the road. If the blockade is on the bridge, it’s the insurgents since that protects them from the gunships. If it’s beyond the bridge, it’s the police. We’ll find out soon enough.”
Carla rolled down her window. “Does anyone mind if I fire the M-4?” she asked.
“Do you know how to use it?” Jaime asked.
“Travis showed me at his office a few days ago. I think I know how. Safety’s off and it’s on semi-auto.”
“We’re traveling fast, so aim behind what you shoot at and jam the butt into your shoulder to control the recoil,” Jaime said. “Tina, hand up three magazines. Sal, let’s hope they want the car in a drivable condition. If they’ve put down spike strips, we’ll end up in the shit. Buckle up, muchachos.”
When the Audi reached the north end of the bridge, they saw a pair of flashlights tracing red circles. Sal kept coming hard and steered toward the lights to bring both rifles into play.
“When you get close, slow down and be ready to dodge obstacles,” Jaime said.
“If they just fought a battle, they haven’t had time to put up permanent barriers,” Sal said. “I’ll drive until I’m stopped, then I’ll move what’s in our way. You and Carla shoot. Tina, how well do you drive?”
“I’m from Manila. We all drive like ISIS truck bombers.”
“Perfect. If I get out, you take over. If you see a way through, take it: Don’t stop. I’ll be on my phone and you can pick me up later up the road beyond the bridge.”
They had halved the distance and saw more flashlights switch on. The invisible arms worked the twin red signal lights with greater urgency and signaled to a designated pullover point in the emergency lane.
“Insurgents,” Sal said. “I’ll slow down and pretend to stop, then take a shot if I see an opening.”
“Left, left, LEFT!” Jaime shouted as the first shots sounded from behind the signalman. As Sal accelerated and turned, Jaime’s controlled bursts suppressed the fire from their right.
Sal cut the wheel back and hit the high beams to reveal men moving barricades across the middle two lanes. He floored it straight at the white-and-orange polypropylene waist-high obstacles. Carla opened up with the M4 a foot from Sal’s head and deafened his left ear. Jaime switched out a magazine and resumed shooting.
“Hold on!” Sal shouted as he swung the wheel hard right and stomped on the brakes, sending the A6 into a controlled skid that caught a plastic barricade with the left front bumper and sent it tumbling. He straightened the wheel and saw a broad gap between two vehicles parked thirty yards ahead. Too easy. He steered back to the left and, sure enough, the headlights revealed another pair of barricades, this time with a line of people, elbows rested on top as they aimed weapons.
Carla fired until she was out. Jaime had more fire discipline, so Sal cut the wheel to the left to give him the broadest perspective. The former Marine raked the barriers before the assailants could effectively return fire. Sal rounded the barrier, passed the two vehicles and was in the clear. He hit the gas and cut the lights as the sound of gunfire faded. Sal drove by feel until he hit Robin Williams Tunnel, which required headlights. Mercifully, it was free of obstacles and they were soon out the other side and into residential Marin County.
“The medical supplies I ordered are in Sausalito,” Jaime shouted over the roaring in their ears. “Let me call and see if we can pick them up.”
Sal took the Spencer Avenue exit and halted at the police roadblock on this gateway road into the wealthy seaside town. At this stage Sal wasn’t about to be turned back, but he stopped anyway to find out what lay ahead.
“Did you just come across the Golden Gate?” asked Officer Ferrie, nametag visible on a uniform that had missed the last few wash-and-iron cycles.
Sal realized that the young officer was more nervous than he was. “Yes, you need to get men to the north end of the bridge since there are armed carjackers there. We barely made it through. Across the bridge at the Welcome Center there was a battle with over a hundred dead. The survivors are in the parking lot. No one’s in control. I’m undercover on behalf of the FBI and San Rafael PD, and we have one stop to make in Sausalito to meet a CI.” He held out Cruz’s handwritten letter for inspection.
The cop ignored the paper and looked instead at the passenger’s seat where Jaime had both tactical rifles propped up as he swapped out magazines and reloaded the empties. His lap and the floor were covered in spent brass and he had an ammo box between his knees. Sal withdrew the proffered envelope and put the car in drive. “Better call in the National Guard or the Army if you want to take back the bridge.” Then they were out of earshot and the policeman was on his radio.
Th
e past ten minutes had flown by. Sal was exhausted: He couldn’t remember when he hadn’t been tired.
Carla reached across and embraced Tina, each of them grateful to be alive. “I think I shot a man,” Carla said. “He aimed his rifle at us. I pulled the trigger and saw him jerk back and fall.” Tina didn’t respond other than to squeeze her friend even harder. Carla was in shock that she’d taken a life, but also recalled something that Churchill once said, “There is nothing more exhilarating than to be shot at with no result.”
Jaime made his call. The old pharmacist wasn’t happy to be disturbed after midnight until he heard the hook: twenty thousand in cash, plus bonuses for items not on the original purchase order. Reading from Tina’s list, Jaime said, “I will pay top dollar for Ciprofloxacin in IV bags, scalpels, sponges, needles, sutures, scrubs, surgical gloves, IV lines, propofol, plasma bags and all your remdesivir.” Jaime listened and ended the call. “He has everything except plasma bags, and it will cost us another five grand.”
Fifteen minutes later, Sal was standing guard outside a personal storage locker that served as the repository of Nicklaus Pharmacy’s unlooted inventory. His ears still buzzed, but he could hear a little. It would take an army of car mechanics to return Pat’s pride and joy to showroom condition, but he didn’t care: The engine ran and a walkaround showed all four tires still held air. Jaime and Tina walked out with three boxes that Sal helped shoehorn into the Audi’s trunk: The medical supplies could be the last they saw for a long time.
When they drove out of Sausalito, Sal took Spencer Avenue once again and saw that two more patrol cars had arrived. As he rolled up, an unfamiliar officer motioned them over. Sal slowed to a crawl but didn’t stop. “Officer Ferrie will vouch for us. We just crossed the Golden Gate. It was a slaughterhouse.” The cop stared as he drove off.
His partner walked over. “Who was that?”
“Undercover Feds, I think. Pretty cool operators, whoever they are. We lost twenty-one men trying to hold the bridge and they just waltzed across it.”
* * * * *
The rest of the drive up the 101 was uneventful, so much so that Jaime grabbed a quick nap. Sal called ahead to let Barb know they were coming and not to shoot when the front door opened. She didn’t say much other than that Greg, Travis and Pat were asleep, and the RN had left at midnight. Her tone was cold, and Sal wondered what he’d have to do to get back in his younger daughter’s good graces. Certainly, it started with recovering Steph and Tyson, but what if that wasn’t feasible in the short time left before their surroundings descended into chaos? Based on what had happened at the Golden Gate, many desperate people had targeted elite Marin County. Covid had exploited divisions in society and now a class war loomed.
Tina Francisco confirmed Travis’ self-diagnosis of incipient septicemia. Carla held Travis’ hand and exchanged whispered confidences while Tina and Jaime scrubbed up. Barb organized clean linens and towels plus hot drinks. Sal tidied up the makeshift OR and picked up the black bags plus the bowl of Maung’s effects from Travis’ aborted sort.
Tina exited the bathroom with elbow-length surgical gloves, scrubs and a hair net. She looked at Sal and said, “You need to sleep. We’ll manage fine.” Sal was too tired to argue and wandered back to the kitchen where he had the presence of mind to park his gruesome cargo in the sink before he collapsed on the sofa, dead to the world.
Two hours later, Tina had cleaned Ryder’s wounds. From his abdomen, she had removed a piece of his shirt and tied off smaller blood vessels that Hip Hop Huppert had missed. The first IV bag with 400mg of Cipro was down the hatch, and the second was on the rack. Tina sat by the bedside and monitored Ryder’s vitals with a battery-powered oximeter while the rest of the team slept. The effects of the light dose of propofol wore off and Travis stirred before slumbering again. Tina’s vigilance failed her, and she fell asleep in the armchair.
Sal awoke to pee and his mind raced with memories of yet another terrifying day. He drank a glass of water and forced himself to focus. Where was Stephanie? They had to rescue her today or there would be no salvation for any of them. Jaime had a substantial food order to collect and a truck full of vaccine lab equipment in the Mission to retrieve, so he was out. He would pick up a luxury mobile home in a few hours and close on a second one. They would need a well-armed home guard to avoid a repeat of last night’s mistakes. That further reduced the headcount he could devote to the search for his daughter and grandson.
Sleep impossible, he sat outside on the deck in a fleece jacket, booted up his laptop and searched the dark web for Covid-20 cures. The nighttime temperature had dipped into the fifties (10-14C) and knocked the cobwebs out. The onion router’s glacial browser speed reminded him of AOL and Netscape in 1995, but he stuck with it and struck gold: There was Fraser Burns on Pirate Bay in two short clips, a before-and-after Covid sequence that couldn’t be more than two days old. Sal didn’t recognize the bedroom setting for the first segment where Burns looked near death, but the second one was shot in the boobytrapped warehouse. The asking price was one hundred thousand dollars for a single dose. Sal sent an anonymous private message that he was a cash buyer and would pay two hundred thousand, but needed it delivered later today. He wrote to Burns that he had a private jet and government clearance to fly, so just indicate where to land and he’d dispatch the Gulfstream and cash. He hit the send button and took a calm breath for the first time in days.
First light broke and Sal’s stomach growled. He walked into the kitchen and examined what was left in the fridge. As his mother had always preached, a frittata could make friends of the unlikeliest of ingredients, so he emptied the crisper and pulled out Pat’s largest cast iron pan. Today was moving day, come what may.
He was about to rinse off a bunch of wilted kale when the sight of those two black trash bags in the sink reminded him of his obligation to Maung’s bereaved family. Breakfast would have to wait. Back out on the deck, he spread old newspapers on the redwood table and dumped out the bags’ contents. Half a wallet and a shattered wristwatch spoke to the force of the explosion, but the silver Buddha amulet he had wrapped in a sheet of paper was in good shape. He was cleaning the sterling silver chain of fleshy bits and congealed blood when he glanced at the wrapping paper. It was a receipt. Through the smears, Sal read the nameplate “Olson’s Meats, Healdsburg, California.” The manifest featured a single item, a dozen cartons of frozen hamburgers with McClatchy High School, Oakland, as the destination. Hot damn!
* * * * *
Katerina couldn’t sleep past dawn, not with Muller’s snoring. She didn’t know when the two of them had become a couple—a tactical blowjob wasn’t exactly her signal that she wanted to enter a lifelong pair bond—but Rolf had relegated a shaky-looking Burns, an agreeable Shuckies and a beat-up Horne to another teacher’s lounge. At least she had her own sofa, but their makeshift bedroom was a decent hike from the science lab. She brushed her teeth and examined her greasy dark hair and unmade-up face in the bathroom mirror. She’d hit the girls’ locker room after breakfast. She needed more than a shower; why not make it a spa treatment? She laughed at the absurdity, but the money she would make would pay for a personal retreat in Tahiti or Sri Lanka, or any other island paradise she desired.
With that happy thought in mind, she skipped coffee and took a walk to check out the Maggio baby. The lab door was open and the box she’d left the infant in was empty. Goddammit. The next door was also open, and sure enough, there was the scarecrow trying to feed her scrawny newborn with a pair of tits scarcely big enough to nurse a rabbit. Who should be seated in the front row of the classroom, moon-eyed like a teacher’s pet, but Shuckies?
“What in the fuck are you doing?” she asked the grinning buffoon.
Shuckies jumped to his feet. “The baby has to be fed and changed. It’s only for a short while.”
Katerina wound up to deliver a retort when Shuckies drew his pistol and pointed it in her direction. “Stop where you are.”
; She turned to see that scab-faced, bloody-eyed and limping Horne had also decided to pay Stephanie a visit in the early morning. “What, you going to shoot me, Smiley?” he asked.
“Yes, if I have to. She’s worth millions to us. Rolf said not to touch her until we’re done.” Shuckies noticed that Horne had a pair of pruning shears in his right hand. “What the fuck are those for?”
“Two big toes seem a fair trade for one of my balls and half an eye. She won’t run off without them. You stay out of my way and I won’t hurt no one else.”
Shuckies took a step to the side to clear his sightlines. “Stop it!” Katerina unloaded on Horne. “You fucking idiot, I’m extracting antibodies from her plasma tomorrow. We’re just one day away from determining if she’s worthless or worth one hundred million dollars. I don’t want her traumatized or harmed until I’m done. If you can’t get that through your thick skull, your friend will shoot you and I’ll piss on your brains.”
“That brings me to my next point,” Horne said. “I should be on my way to my cabin in Nevada. Instead, I’m risking my life to guard you crazy bastards. I want five percent of the gross or I quit.”
Katerina graced him with a thin-lipped smile, teeth hidden. “Fine, you’ll each receive five percent of profits, but not off the top. Our couriers won’t come cheap.”
“Save your receipts,” Horne snarled. “Come on, Smiley. I’ll make you some powdered eggs.”
“I’ll see you in the cafeteria in five,” Shuckies said. “I have to put the baby back.” Tyson had finished nursing and fallen asleep in Steph’s arms. Shuckies ushered her next door under Katerina’s glare and she lay her son down on folded towels on a lab bench. Then it was back to the classroom and chained to the desk. Shuckies said his farewells and left in search of Bomber.