Road To Babylon Box Set [Books 1-3]

by Sisavath, Sam

  “Most of them.”

  “But not all.”

  “Like I said—”

  “Right, you didn’t ask.”

  “No, I didn’t. What’s your point?”

  “The Buckies,” Keo said. “The ones that were at Winding Creek and the ones out here this afternoon. They’re not amateurs. They’ve had some training. I mean, real training. Not the collaborator’s idea of training.”

  “Makes sense, seeing how easily they took the towns,” Jonah said. He looked over at Keo. “And you’re telling me you don’t know who they are? Or what that M of theirs stands for?”

  “Not a clue,” Keo lied.

  Jonah narrowed his eyes at him, clearly not believing Keo, but before he could push further, the pop-pop-pop of automatic rifle fire exploded outside again. The gunfire came from nearby, to Keo’s left.

  Then someone else joined in, and the shooting continued for ten seconds before the last shot finally faded, and there was just the crickets and the waves again.

  “What happened?” Jonah said into his radio.

  “It was me,” someone answered.

  “Jameson?”

  “Yeah,” the voice said. “Sorry, I thought I saw someone in the grass.”

  “Did you?”

  “I… I’m not sure.”

  “I shot, too,” someone else said through the radio.

  “Did you get anyone?”

  “No, I don’t think so. I thought I saw something moving out there, but I don’t—I don’t know.”

  Johan shook his head and gave Keo an exasperated look. Then, into the radio, “All right, all right. No one fires unless they’re absolutely sure. You’re just giving away your position every time you do. As long as we stay out of the open, they’ll have to come get us. When they do that, then shoot the hell out of them.”

  “Copy that,” Sherry said. “Everyone, calm down. Just…calm down.”

  Jonah put the radio away. “Does that answer your question?”

  Keo smiled. “Hey, at least they’re not shooting at each other.”

  “Yeah, there’s that, I guess.” He glanced back at the window for a moment. Then, “You got any ideas?”

  I got a few thousand ideas, but all of them involve me running away on horseback, Keo thought, but he said instead, “I’ll let you know in about an hour.”

  “Why an hour?” Jonah asked.

  “Because the first thing that immediately pops to mind is absolutely idiotic, and it’s going to take me at least that long to even convince myself to do it.”

  Twenty-Two

  It actually took him two hours to convince himself, and it was five past midnight when Keo told Jonah about it.

  Shorty laughed when he was finished. “You’re insane. But it’s your life, man. You wanna do it, it’s your call. I’m not gonna stop you.”

  “You could at least try,” Keo had said.

  “I stopped trying to make people do something they don’t wanna do a long time ago. All it gets you is a bullet.”

  “You saying I want to do this?”

  “I’m saying this is probably not your first time doing something this stupid.”

  Keo had sighed, and thought, He’s got a point.

  He didn’t blame Jonah for thinking that way, and the truth was he thought it was kind of crazy, too, but it wasn’t like he had any choice. The snipers were proof that the Buckies had set their sights on Jonah’s and everyone inside it. By morning there would either be more snipers out there or the entire Bucky Nation. Either way, Keo liked his chances better if he knew exactly how many were out there, and if the number was manageable, then cut it down to give the people at Jonah’s a fighting chance in the morning.

  He got everything he needed from Jonah’s well-stocked supplies. The MP5SD fit into the waterproof bag, and a strip of rawhide rope was enough to keep it in place. He added a second bag for spare magazines and a knife, and a third for clothes, socks, and a pair of sneakers. He had considered dropping a handgun in there, but he was already going to be carrying too much weight and the submachine gun had to do. And besides, if everything went according to plan, he could always acquire a pistol later.

  Yeah, if everything goes according to plan.

  Positive thoughts, positive thoughts…

  Sherry warned him that the water was going to be cold, but he had no idea until he dipped a testing toe into it and immediately pulled his entire foot back.

  “I told you,” Sherry said.

  “Yeah, yeah,” Keo said.

  “Maybe you should wait for morning.”

  “It’ll be too late in the morning.”

  “You don’t know that.”

  “I don’t know a lot of things, but I do know the best defense is always a good offense.”

  They stood on the sand, in the darkest part of the beach that Keo could find. The fact that no one had shot him in the last minute or so was proof he had chosen the spot wisely. Sherry didn’t share his confidence and kept looking around them at the darkened corners of the shoreline. For someone who had been shot very recently, she looked pretty okay, though of course he didn’t discount the wonders of the meds he’d given her, then the others she’d gotten once Jonah’s people fixed her up properly.

  She turned back to him now. “God, this feels like such a bad idea.”

  “It’s the only one I can think of,” Keo said. “Can’t just stay put and wait for them to surround us. And that’s exactly what those snipers are out there for—to keep us pinned. If they had enough men, they would have attacked by now.”

  “So you’re going to do what, go out there and kill them?”

  “Best case? Yeah. Worst case, I can find out how many are actually out there and adjust accordingly. Right now, we’re just guessing.”

  She sighed. “What if you drown?”

  “I’m a very good swimmer.”

  “How good?”

  “Really good.”

  She didn’t look convinced, but maybe it had something to do with him standing in nothing but his boxers while shivering against the chilly night air. Or he could have just read her wrong. It was a little difficult to see much of her in the darkness, even standing just a few feet away.

  “When was the last time you swam in an ocean like this?” she asked.

  “A few years ago.”

  “A few years ago?”

  “I haven’t exactly been around large bodies of water lately, Sherry, so the opportunities were slim.” He stared at the black Gulf of Mexico, its breeze and cold water washing against his bare legs. “But it’s not something you forget.”

  “Should you really be naked? Or mostly naked? It’s really cold in there.”

  “I’ll warm up once I’m inside.”

  She shook her head. “I thought you were nuts before this afternoon when you tried to talk your way out of getting shot, but this…”

  “I don’t see another way. Do you?”

  Sherry gave him a resigned look before shaking her head. “I guess there’s nothing left to say, except good luck.”

  He shook her hand and glanced over at Jonah’s building. The man himself was leaning over the railing on the side deck watching them. Or, at least, Keo thought that was him. It could have been a human-size pole, given the lack of details.

  He turned back to Sherry. “See you in the morning.”

  “I hope so,” Sherry said. Then, almost hesitantly, “Hey, thanks.”

  “For what?”

  “For saving my life yesterday, idiot.”

  Keo smiled. “Didn’t think you were ever going to admit it.”

  “I can be a little stubborn, too.”

  “I’ll see you in the morning, Sherry,” Keo said, and tightened the straps around his body.

  “Yeah, see you in the morning,” Sherry said, but he could hear the doubt in her voice.

  He didn’t blame her. Keo had nothing but doubts about the plan.

  Think positive thoughts. Think positive thoughts…<
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  He took the first step into the water. A shock of electricity rushed through him as the cold ocean licked at his ankles.

  This is such a bad idea, he thought, but instead of turning around, he continued forward.

  The water reached up along his legs to his knees, then over the bandage along his right thigh, before sloshing around his waist.

  He held his breath, thought, This is such a bad, bad idea in so, so many ways, before vanishing under the surface.

  It was cold, but he’d been in colder waters before. A lot colder. The middle-of-December type of cold in San Diego’s Mission Beach. Not that that was much comfort as he went out a hundred meters just to be safe, before turning and starting north. He kept the shoreline within sight out of the corner of his left eye at all times, using the lights coming from the houses as a guide so he wouldn’t stray too far.

  His legs were starting to ache, but that was not unexpected; he hadn’t gone swimming in such a long time, and his body was having to remember how to do it. By the second one-hundred-meter mark (this time northward) he was doing full strides and barely felt the waves rippling against the side of his body.

  He wasn’t entirely sure how long it took, but eventually he located the beach again, and after running up the slanted floor, went into a quick crouch and looked around. The lack of gunfire was the best thing he could have hoped for, and he allowed his eyes to adjust to the new darkness while catching his breath. The months of living in the cabin by himself, with daily treks into Winding Creek, had kept him lean, so Keo wasn’t too fatigued.

  Jonah’s was visible to his left farther down the shoreline. He could just barely make out the shapes of a couple of buildings, mostly thanks to the LED lanterns that hung off the second-floor decks. The snipers would probably stay as close to the structures as they possibly could without coming into danger themselves in order to keep an eye on the residents. What were the chances they would anticipate someone swimming out of there?

  Or maybe the better question was, what were the chances the snipers would anticipate someone being stupid enough to swim out of there?

  His breathing had slowed down when Keo unslung one of his bags and ripped it open with his fingers, then took out the MP5SD. In his experience, the H&K would have worked just fine after being submerged in water, but he hadn’t wanted to take the chance, especially since it was his only gun. He pushed up to his feet and hurried up the beach and toward the field on the other side. He didn’t stop until he was surrounded by grass.

  It took him five minutes to change into his dry clothes—cargo pants, T-shirt, and thermal sweater. He slipped the sheathed knife behind his waist and took out the night-vision binoculars that Jonah had lent him. Keo scoured the area just to be sure he was still alone, even though he was pretty sure he was. After all, someone would have shot him by now if he wasn’t.

  Good thoughts. Think good thoughts.

  He let the binoculars dangle off his neck and got up again, then started moving up the field. It would have been nice to have night-vision goggles so he could see in the dark without having to hold the glasses to his eyes, but Jonah didn’t have any to give him.

  Beggars can’t be choosers.

  He took his time, grateful that he had at least four hours before morning sunlight. That was plenty. He didn’t make a lot of noise as he pushed through the endless sea of sod, thanks to the lightweight running shoes he’d chosen over the heavier, thicker boots.

  With hours to spare, Keo felt no urgency and stopped multiple times to get a better sense of his position in relation to Jonah’s while making sure he wasn’t putting himself into the line of fire unnecessarily. Eventually he reached the tree lines and slipped inside. With the cover of the woods finally, he was able to start making his way back toward Jonah’s, all the while looking, listening, and feeling for evidence of Buckies in the area.

  What were the odds that Buck—or whoever was calling the shots out there, this Copenhagen guy, maybe—wasn’t coming at all? Maybe the snipers, however many there actually were, were just here to cause trouble. Then again, they had killed five Buckies yesterday. True, it was really just him and Sherry, but Buck wouldn’t see it that way. Keo wondered if a “But they shot first” defense would work.

  Probably not.

  His hair was almost completely dry by the time Keo finally stopped and went into a crouch with the MP5SD gripped tightly in front of him. He spent five minutes—then just for good measure, another ten—listening to everything around him.

  The wind whistling through the trees, the flutter of branches above him, and creatures big and small on the ground. But no sounds of movement by something big enough to qualify as human. Or voices. No threats.

  He faced the tree line ten meters in front of him and eased toward it. The snipers would be out there on the other side, though not close enough to hear him coming. They would have crawled their way through the brush toward Jonah’s to get a better field of fire on its inhabitants. How close? That would depend on how good they were and what kind of optics they were carrying.

  He sat down again, and surrounded by the sounds of the woods, found himself thinking about what he was doing. He glanced behind him, into the thick army of trees. Somewhere out there was Emma and Megan. Maybe in trouble, needing his help. Instead, he was wasting his time out here dealing with snipers that had Jonah’s in their crosshairs.

  What the hell am I doing?

  What did he really owe Jonah and Sherry and the others? Nothing. Nothing at all. He’d come here to find Emma and Megan, but they weren’t here. There was no one in Jonah’s that mattered to him. There was Christine, but did he really know her that well? They’d had dinner a few times, but that was it. As for the rest…

  You gave Jonah and Sherry your word. So what’s that worth?

  He’d lied before. Gave his word and then went back on it. Six years ago, he would have done it without batting an eye.

  But that was then…

  Back when you were smarter.

  Remember?

  He sighed and turned back toward the shoreline.

  He checked his watch. He had made better time than he thought—

  A brush of air against the back of his neck!

  Keo spun, the submachine gun swinging up, his heart hammering in his chest.

  Nothing. There was nothing behind—

  The hairs along his arms stood up straight and the smell came out of nowhere, striking every part of his body like a physical force, coming from—

  Above!

  No, no, no, no! his mind screamed as he looked up and saw it—glowing blue eyes piercing the darkness above him.

  It plummeted out of the sky like a reverse bat out of hell and landed with almost no sound in front of him, and Keo thought, Oh, fuck me.

  He was trying to squeeze the trigger on the MP5SD (The head! Shoot it in the head! It’s the only way to kill the blue-eyed ones!) when the creature moved, its hands a blur as it grabbed his throat with five long, bony fingers, the contact sending a jolt of electricity across Keo’s entire body. Razor-sharp bone joints pressed against his skin, digging into his flesh and threatening to slice their way to the muscles underneath.

  It effortlessly slammed him backward and into a tree trunk, knocking the breath out of Keo’s lungs before it ripped the submachine gun out of his hands and tossed it away like an adult taking away a child’s toys.

  His mind was still trying to process what had happened, what was happening, and failing badly. The sight of it—here, now—made him hesitate, made him doubt everything he thought he knew.

  It was rangy and stood much taller than him, its skeletal frame a different shade of black than the ones he’d killed back at his cabin, then later with Jim and Duncan at the bungalow. There was an innate intelligence in its eyes—deep blue, like twin throbbing stars—that peered back at him as if it could see through him and into his soul. Moonlight gleamed off its dome-shaped head, and sections of its hairless dark black skin seemed to
ripple with every slight movement it made.

  Keo had seen its kind before. He had fought one and almost died because of it. He had even become friends—or as much of “friends” as you could get with an undead thing—once upon a time.

  He shivered now, every inch of him recoiling from being so close to it, and something he hadn’t felt in a long time—fear, overwhelming fear—seized every single one of his bones.

  It held him against the tree as if he were nothing more than a gnat to be disposed of at its whim. Keo could barely breathe because it was choking the life out of him, even though it didn’t seem to be exerting any pressure at all. It stood casually, looking at him from one angle, then another, as if trying to decide if it knew him or not.

  He had forgotten just how inhuman they appeared up close, even more so than the black-eyed ones, despite the blue eyes’ ability to almost pass for human. Maybe that was why they were so much more inhuman. It was a hard concept to grasp even to his own mind, but that kind of contradicting logic wasn’t anything new when it came to the blue-eyed ghouls.

  And they were so different from the black eyes. Deadlier, smarter, and much, much tougher to kill. It had been years since he’d heard of someone running across one of them after The Walk Out. They had gone into hiding, back into the shadows. A slayer he had spent a few days with around Dallas had mentioned hunting one down, but that had been the last known sighting. It was easy to think they were all gone, that somehow The Walk Out had vanquished them, too.

  But Keo always knew better. He had never fully believed that they weren’t still out there, plotting, waiting, biding their time.

  And here it was. God, here it was.

  Finally, it pulled its head back slightly but didn’t relinquish any pressure around Keo’s neck. His windpipe threatened to break against its fingers—bony fingers that shouldn’t have been so strong, and the fact that they were, impossibly so, was so inconsistent with how the creature looked. Frail and desiccated, and yet so unnaturally powerful.

  Its eyes pulsated, the things it called lips—little more than thin razor wires—forming something that could pass for a smile.