Desolation (Book 2): Into the Inferno

by Lucin, David

  Jenn stretched her jaw to work out the persistent buzzing in her head, then shouldered the rifle again and pointed it toward the hospital. When she found the white semi, she laid her finger on the trigger and pulled.

  The butt pushed against her shoulder, and vibrations ran up her arms. The sound exploded in her ears.

  She couldn’t tell where her shot landed, and she didn’t care. Just pin them down.

  Movement at the stairs of the loading bay caught her eye. She lined up the sights, exhaled, and fired a second time. Her target fell to the ground. For half a breath, she thought she’d hit him, but he rose to a crouch and darted away.

  Following him with the sights, she pressed the trigger again.

  The echo of weapons fire from the hospital forced her behind cover.

  “We got company!” Sophie shouted and then punctuated her sentence with a crack of her AR.

  A yellow four-door pickup stopped near the farthest line of parked cars. One of the rear doors opened, and out came a man carrying a long gun. A hunting rifle, maybe. A woman jumped out of the bed. Jenn fired at her, but she scurried behind a sedan.

  “Where the hell is this drone?” Jenn heard herself yell.

  A new flurry of gunfire erupted from the direction of the hospital. She pressed her back against the van’s bumper and clutched her weapon close. Several rounds struck metal. Each time she flinched. Valeria and Sophie hunkered down at the truck. Carter covered his ears and shouted something Jenn couldn’t hear over the shooting. Next to him, Dylan tapped furiously at the tablet.

  She pictured her brothers. Her sibling warriors. Jason, the one with her sense of humor, and Andrew, the one with her smarts. What would they have thought of her now? More than anyone else, they pushed her not to enlist. Was this why? Was it because they had gone through hell out there in India and Mexico and feared for their little sister? Jenn grew up in war, though this was the closest she’d ever come to experiencing it firsthand.

  This was what she wanted. In a way, she came to Phoenix to prove that she wasn’t the woman who cowered and hid at the first sign of danger, that she could fight for Gary, Maria, and Sam and even Barbara, Kevin, and Nicole. They were all she had left, and she had to protect them in what remained of this world.

  And she was. This was the new front line.

  A different sensation flooded her belly. Not fear. Not anxiety. Not the persistent nausea or ache that gnawed at her. No, it was warm, almost comforting. It made her feel whole after Payson broke her into a million pieces.

  Pride.

  She was a warrior, too, just like Jason and Andrew.

  Yankees Hat appeared, but he had no control over her. She shoved him away because he meant nothing.

  The gunfire quieted. From the truck, the doctor sobbed. A door slammed shut and boots clomped on the pavement. They grew faster and faster and faster.

  They were coming.

  Jenn closed her eyes and readied herself to fight. Before she left, she promised Sam and Maria she’d return home, and she had every intention of keeping that promise.

  She heard shouting from the hospital. A shrill cry came next, followed by swearing and what sounded like someone barking orders.

  A deep boom drowned it all out. Jenn felt it in her chest. Within seconds, the familiar staccato returned.

  Rusty.

  She pointed her weapon at the loading bay as the windshield of the yellow pickup exploded. Near the hood, a man dropped to a knee and lifted a rifle. He fired once. Before he could fire again, his torso burst open in a shower of gore, and he collapsed to the asphalt in a heap. Heavy .50-caliber rounds zipped above his corpse and peppered the truck, leaving softball-sized holes in the fenders.

  Far to the left, the drone, alight with yellow muzzle flashes, stomped forward atop its four legs. Bullets hammered the vehicle. One blew apart a tire. Another pierced the open passenger door, struck a man in the shoulder, and threw him backward. A woman dropped her rifle and turned to run. She made it fewer than ten steps before she was nearly torn in two.

  Sophie gripped the strap of Jenn’s backpack and yanked. Her knees wobbled as she stood. A duffel bag in each hand, Carter had Dylan in a piggyback position and was jogging for the road and the houses beyond. Valeria pushed the doctor forward. He stumbled but regained his balance.

  “Move it!” Sophie barked at Jenn, who broke into a run.

  The boom of machine-gun fire and the clap of rifles continued behind her, but she didn’t dare look.

  They weaved between two sedans. Jenn overtook Carter and led the group across the street. In the back yard of a home, he eased Dylan onto a concrete slab, then collapsed beside him, chest heaving. The others crouched or knelt to rest, but Jenn remained standing, the AR lowered but ready. After only a few shots, the weapon felt comfortable in her hands.

  Faint shouts and the echoes of gunfire floated on a breeze. “We need to keep moving.” Jenn indicated a chest-high stone fence.

  Sophie and Valeria climbed over. Carter helped Dylan to the top, and the women eased him down. The doctor needed Carter’s help as well. He even took Jenn by the waist and lifted her up. How would they have managed without him?

  Four times they repeated this maneuver. When they found the trucks, Jenn’s hands were scuffed from gripping stone and her arms hurt from climbing. She could only imagine how Carter felt after carrying Dylan and helping the doctor and Jenn over every fence.

  She tossed her backpack into the Nissan and laid her rifle in there with it. The truck looked almost empty without Rusty, whose machine gun continued to sound in the distance. Jenn wished Dylan could call it over and they could wait for its return, but they had to move and they needed the drone to keep the Major’s army distracted while they drove to New River.

  “Here.” Dylan leaned against the tailgate, all his weight on his good leg. Much of the color had drained from his face. He dug into his pants and found a set of keys, then tossed them at Jenn. “You’re driving. Please get me to the camp in one piece.”

  She smiled at him and tried to hide the trembling in her knees and hands.

  “What about the guy we left in the house?” Carter asked, his arm wrapped around Dylan’s waist as he helped him to the Nissan’s passenger side.

  “Leave him,” Dylan said. “His buddies shot me in the leg.”

  “No,” Jenn said. Leaving Ian in the bathroom, tied up to the sink, was a death sentence in the worst possible way: dehydration. Jenn was a killer, and so was Dylan, but they weren’t monsters. They couldn’t be. “That’s not our call to make. We’ll bring him to the camp. The military can figure out what to do with him.”

  Sophie had sparked a cigarette. “If you say so.”

  Jenn climbed behind the wheel while Carter laid Dylan onto the rear bench. The doctor went with Sophie and Valeria in the Dodge. Seat belt adjusted and the truck in drive, Jenn turned to Dylan and said, “Where to, Chief Navigator?”

  Dylan groaned and shifted so he could reach the tablet in his pocket. “Gimme a minute.”

  21

  Jenn woke up gasping.

  She flailed and swung a fist, but it only met air.

  Carter was clutching his gut and laughing at her.

  “I warned him to not do this,” Valeria said, hands on her hips. “To pinch your nose while you’re sleeping.”

  Jenn yawned. Light streamed in through the open windows of the same former jewelry store she’d slept in during her first night at the relief camp. The air was stuffy and smelled like body odor, and her shirt stuck to her skin. She didn’t dare touch her hair.

  Rubbing the sleep from her eyes, she asked, “What time is it?”

  “Three-thirty,” Sophie said from the empty cot next to her. “In the afternoon.”

  After returning to New River and unloading the supplies earlier this morning, the group visited Ed, much to the frustration of the nurses working the night shift. Sophie slept at his side. Dylan was stitched up and, thanks to Sophie’s demands and Lionel’s
uncanny ability to pull strings and call in favors, was given a bed next to Ed.

  “Three-thirty?” Jenn checked her watch to confirm. “I’ve been asleep for nine hours?”

  Outside, a truck honked its horn, and chattering voices filtered into the jewelry store. “I’m surprised you slept at all,” Sophie said.

  Jenn sat up and yawned again. Her stomach rumbled. “Me too. Guess I needed it.”

  “Our illustrious host, Mr. Lionel Washington, has invited us to lunch,” Sophie said. “We would’ve had it two hours ago if not for you. Just saying.”

  Sophie’s tone was flat, almost harsh, but Jenn understood the humor in it now. “Well, let’s get at it, then,” she said.

  Carter took Jenn’s hand to help her stand. “First, we see Ed,” he told her.

  “That’s right,” Sophie confirmed. “My husband has requested your presence.”

  They made their way outside. Smoke continued to hang in the atmosphere. To Jenn, it still looked like monsoon clouds, but the air was too dry and the sun was too orange.

  People filed past them on the pedestrian mall. Some were clad in hospital gowns, but most wore ill-fitting casual clothes: a man with a shirt he couldn’t button up, a woman with one that stretched to her knees. Jenn figured they should swap.

  Ed waited on his cot inside Home Plus. Though his right arm was still in a sling, his face was a healthier shade of pink already, and his breathing was slower, less erratic. When he shook Jenn’s hand, the grip was firm this time. “Thank you,” he said to her. “I hope it wasn’t too much trouble.” He threw his wife a playful scowl.

  “I told you it was her idea,” Sophie said. “If anyone’s to blame here, it’s her.”

  More sarcasm. Jenn beamed and soaked it in. “Good thing I decided to try and break out of your tire place, huh?” she joked. “Otherwise, we might never have met and you guys would’ve been totally screwed.”

  “Get your licks in while you can, Jansen.”

  Carter’s face went red, and his shoulders slouched. He turned away from Jenn. Maybe he remembered the incident. She touched his arm to let him know it was okay, just in case. He seemed to read it that way.

  Dylan lay in the cot next to Ed. “How’s the leg?” Jenn asked him.

  “Better than my shoulder,” Ed said.

  Everyone laughed at that, even Valeria.

  “It’s fine,” Dylan said. “Tis but a scratch.”

  More laughter, especially from Sophie. “Good one. Great one, actually.”

  Jenn didn’t understand the reference. Dylan snickered, waiting for her reply. “Is this another so-called classic?” she asked.

  Dylan held his arms out wide. “Monty Python!”

  She shrugged as rudely as she could manage.

  “The Black Knight?” he prodded. “Really? Man, your generation is the worst.”

  Jenn snorted at him.

  Ed, his hand in Sophie’s, gazed at her seriously now. “All jokes aside,” he started. “I couldn’t have asked for better people.” With his good arm, he gestured to the beds lining the inside of this old furniture store. “No one here could’ve.”

  His wife’s eyes glistened. “All right, enough with the sentimental BS. Mr. Washington owes us lunch and I intend to enjoy it.”

  * * *

  Jenn bit into a crunchy piece of soy bacon, then shoveled a forkful of powdered eggs into her mouth and almost melted. She used to hate this stuff, but now, after surviving on cornbread and crappy granola bars for over a week, it tasted more like a steak with a side of crab legs. She’d never had crab legs, of course, and likely never would, but for once, she didn’t care. This was just as good. Better, even.

  She, Sophie, Valeria, and Carter sat alone in a food court—the same one where Jenn had her ice cream all those years ago. The restaurants had all been stripped bare, the electric signs and LED menus gone, but she recognized the counter in the far corner. She could still see her mother handing her a cone and dabbing at her face with a compostable napkin.

  Jenn bit off another chunk of bacon. The details from last night remained crystal clear: the smell of bleach, cotton balls, and gunpowder, the pain in her ears—which hadn’t completely gone away yet—the sound of Rusty’s machine gun echoing off the nearby buildings, the look on Dylan’s face when she ran out to him. Everything felt more like a vivid dream than reality. What happened didn’t seem possible. Jenn was a robotics engineering student with a foul mouth and a habit of skipping her morning classes, not someone who raided hospitals for medical supplies and took part in shootouts.

  But she was. After Payson, she fought the idea of accepting her role in this new world, but with everything she’d been through and done since, there was no more denying what she had become. That was okay. She made peace with it. There was more of her brothers in her than she thought.

  Only one bite of the powdered eggs remained. Regret struck her in the same way it did when she took a first-pitch meatball for a strike. She should have slowed down and savored it. Who knew when she would get to eat a meal like this again?

  “Sorry I’m late,” came a kind voice from behind. Lionel. He wore a different shirt today, this one salmon pink, but the same dirty pants. In the last twenty-four hours, his hair had gone whiter, yet he sported that same genuine smile as he approached.

  Sophie dropped her knife. “Mr. Washington, how nice of you to join us.”

  “No rest for the wicked,” Lionel said. “And all that.” He sat down beside Carter. “How’s everything tasting?”

  “Great!” Carter mumbled through a mouthful of food.

  Lionel chuckled at that. “Good. You know, I had to go out of my way and—”

  “Call in a few favors?” Jenn kidded.

  He shifted uncomfortably in his seat. The smile faded a little but didn’t vanish. “Well, I, uh—”

  Sophie waved her fork at him. “She’s right. I thought you were all out of favors after getting us that drone.”

  Valeria made a sound that might have been a giggle and took a tiny bite of bacon.

  Lionel rested an elbow on the table and pointed a finger at the group. “The U.S. National Guard aren’t happy about you losing their property. If I get the bill for that, I’ll be sending it your way, Mrs. Beaumont.”

  Jenn recalled the yellow pickup truck crumbling under Rusty’s withering fire. On the drive back to New River, Dylan received a notification on his tablet that the drone had gone offline. She hoped the Major’s people couldn’t salvage anything useful from its corpse.

  “The doctors tell me Edward’s improving,” Lionel assured them. “Just in the nick of time, I hear. They want to keep him overnight again, so that means you get to enjoy my company for another day.”

  “Wonderful,” Sophie said.

  Lionel laughed at his own joke and slapped the table. “In all seriousness, you helped hundreds of people today. I don’t know how to thank you.”

  “You can thank us,” Sophie began, “by keeping your word. Convince our nation’s finest to help clear the interstate. As far as I’ve been able to tell, we’re playing on the same team. We’ve got nutjobs like the Major out there now, so it’s best we work together if at all possible.”

  Lionel scratched his chin. “The Major. We haven’t heard anything about him before today, but intel, admittedly, has been hard to come by. That fellow you brought along—Ian?—he’s been quite talkative so far, from what I understand. Maybe he can shed some light on things.”

  “As do I,” Sophie said and speared her eggs. “As do I.”

  22

  The air in Minute Tire tasted different. When Jenn left for Phoenix, the stink of metal shavings and rubber reminded her of Carter and his pipe, Sophie and the pistol in her belt, and Sam and his bloody lip. Now it seemed familiar, as though she belonged here all along.

  She dropped an empty red jerry can beside the wall of the shop. Ed, all smiles, sat in the passenger seat of the Dodge while Carter stood next to the open door. They spoke to
Dylan, who leaned on a set of crutches Lionel had given him.

  “That’s it,” Sophie said, wiping her palms on the thighs of her pants. She pulled out a cigarette and waved it at Jenn. “You are hereby relieved of all duties and responsibilities as chief navigator.”

  “I was never really bound to any. Remember? Something about me coming if I wanted to. You didn’t care either way. Ring any bells?”

  Sophie sparked her smoke and took a drag. “Yes. That. I hate to admit it, but I think you made the right choice. I’m not saying we couldn’t have done it without you, but it’s possible. God, I might have had to read the stupid map myself.”

  Jenn crossed her hands over her heart. “Is that your way of thanking me? How touching. Nobody’s ever said something so kind.”

  “Hmmm.” Sophie tapped ash onto the concrete floor. “You’re a real smart ass, Jansen. Anyone told you that before?”

  “All the time.”

  “I’m not trying to kick you out,” Sophie said, “but I imagine your people will be eager to see you, so my advice is that you leave my shop and check on that boyfriend of yours. Trust me when I tell you this: you could wake up one day and almost lose him.” Her eyes wandered to Ed. “It’s a lot easier to keep him close than fighting your way through Arizona to bring him back.”

  “I know.” Jenn threw on her backpack. Her thumbs looped into the straps, she said, “So this is goodbye.”

  “More of a see you later,” Sophie said. “I refuse to do goodbyes. Don’t be a stranger now. Flagstaff’s going to need people like us—people like you. The Major won’t be the last of his kind, and I can tell you for damn sure that I intend to be ready for the first one who tries pulling anything like that in our town.”

  Jenn didn’t want to think about that, but if there was a threat to Flagstaff and those she loved, she knew exactly what she would do, where she would stand, and whom she would fight with. There was something comforting about that.

  “See you later, then.” Jenn rubbed her shoulder. “So do we hug, or . . . ?”