by Billy Dering
Shoving the book into her coat pocket, Heidi stood up as Kid and 801 walked in.
“Everything come out alright?” she asked. It was a stupid and immature question, but while scrambling, Heidi had blurted out the first thing that came to mind. She hoped Kid was not onto the plotting in his short absence.
“That’s kind of a personal question to ask amongst mixed company, right 801?” Kid commented, as if offended, and then smirked.
Smiling to hide her relief, Heidi saw no signs that he had picked up on anything.
“We would’ve been down sooner, but 801 kept staring at himself in the mirror. He does that every time. What is with them and mirrors?” Kid asked.
Heidi said, “He’s probably fascinated because he’s never seen himself before. They don’t have mirrors on those ships.”
The group started setting up their makeshift beds. Heidi helped Kid and Drex flip the conference table up against the wall to make more room on the floor. They had enough blankets so that each person had two, which would be sufficient given the two propane heaters they had secured from the workshop building.
“I’ll stay upstairs and let Jess come down and get some rest,” Drex said. “Poor guy nearly got scalped today.”
“Did that all happen today? No wonder we’re so exhausted,” Maria added.
“Someone needs to be on watch at all times,” Kid reminded.
“Drex, in a few hours, come get me. I’ll take the shift after you,” Heidi offered. She did not feel tired at all. He acknowledged with a wave of his hand and headed up to the widow’s walk.
801 lay covered with two blankets. He stared wide-eyed until 9:00 p.m., at which time he dozed off in an instant. Kid looked at his watch. “These soldiers really are like clockwork.” Turning to Heidi, as he lay side by side with her, he said, “Try to get some sleep since you only have a few hours until it’s your turn upstairs.”
“I’ll try. Don’t worry about me. Get some sleep yourself.” Her eyes were wide open as she contemplated getting the walkie-talkie from Mr. Hyland’s house.
Chapter 37
January 3, 2045
Tuesday, Midmorning
Bayville, New Jersey
Eight days after the event
The exhausted group had a hard time getting up the next morning, including Kid. Just ten more minutes of sleep, he kept telling himself as he dozed. It wasn’t until midmorning that Kid woke up and searched for the keys to the marina’s small fleet of extended-cab pickup trucks. All three vehicles were painted the same red color red as the marina buildings, but had dull and dirty silver toolboxes mounted in the bed. He went into the conference room and laid the keys on the table.
Walking into the room, Jess saw them through his bleary eyes. “Oh good. We need to take a ride and find propane for the heaters, and an electric hot water heater that we can run using the commercial generator we found in the workshop building.”
Without hesitation, Heidi jumped in and suggested, “While you’re doing that, Maria and I need to go find some new clothes. I’m not staying in this,” she added as she motioned toward her Utopia Project uniform. “We can get fresh clothes for everyone. Then we can grab food from a supermarket on our way back.”
Maria opened her mouth to say something, but Kid had already started speaking. “Fine, but grab as much bottled water as you can find. Get those multi-gallon jugs. Take a walkie-talkie, and we should all tune to channel two.”
Heidi looked to Maria, who exhaled and said, “Fine. You grab the walkie-talkie, but I’ll take the keys. I’ve driven with Mrs. Formula One over here before, and it wasn’t pretty.”
“Remember, these cheap walkie-talkies only have a 20-mile range,” Kid added as he handed one to Heidi and one to Jess.
After having used the bathroom, 801 walked up the hall. His chaperone Drex was right behind him and asked, “Who should we go with? Who needs help?”
“You can jump in with me,” Jess offered.
“I guess I’ll stay here and be the lookout,” Kid said. “Jess, are you taking 801 or do you want him to stay here with me?”
He shrugged his shoulders. “He can come with us. We could use some muscle with the heavier stuff.”
Kid was glad that the anxiety over 801’s presence seemed to be diminishing. His hands were no longer bound and he was no longer being treated like a captive. Not only didn’t the soldier seem like a threat, but he found him to be quite helpful and did as they asked.
“Listen everyone,” Kid started and raised his hands until he had everyone’s attention. “Keep your eyes and ears open, and your vehicle headlights off. I will keep watch and if I see anything, I will give a distress call. In that case, hunker down wherever you are until I give you further instructions. Are we clear?”
After getting confirmations from all, he asked, “Does everyone have a firearm?”
Everyone nodded.
Heidi herded Maria out the door.
Heidi checked her watch. The clock starts now.
As they approached one of the trucks, she whispered to Maria, “Let’s hurry. We have some stops to make before we go to the Hyland house.”
“I guess you’re still set on doing that?”
“We have to.” Heidi jumped into the truck.
Shaking her head, Maria whispered, “Something in my gut is telling me I’m going to regret this.”
Heidi gasped upon seeing a multitude of vehicle crashes as soon as Maria reached Route 9. She couldn’t believe there was so much destruction in such a small area. Cars and trucks had veered into telephone poles, trees, buildings, or each other. One car had come to rest inside the large front window of a furniture store.
“Hold tight,” Maria said as the vehicle started a slow power slide. They had just passed a van parked on top of a fire hydrant that had released enough water to make a lake-sized sheet of ice. She let off the gas and regained control of the truck without hitting anything. As she flexed her fingers and loosened her death grip on the steering wheel, she asked, “I assume you want to make a beeline for the Hyland house?”
“Oh no, we need to hurry, but I was serious about wanting new clothes. We have to lose these uniforms.” Heidi feared that she and Maria dressed in a uniform only served to remind them, and specifically Kid, of Sara’s final days.
“What a surprise.” Maria smirked as she navigated around the obstacles on Route 9.
The girls found a clothes store with a full shoe section in one of the many New Jersey strip malls. The parking lot was empty, save for one car parked with a flat tire. Maria drove up on the sidewalk and used the heavy push bar mounted in the front of the truck to bust open the front door. “This truck is great. It’s a battering ram on wheels,” she said approvingly.
Casing out the well-stocked store, Heidi and Maria put on new coats, sweaters, socks and blue jeans. Heidi was more than happy to leave her uniform behind. “Finally, real female underwear,” she said as she walked out of a dressing room. They proceeded to fill several bags with clothes, coats, and sneakers.
They made haste as they headed toward the Hyland house in Fort Dix. As they went further west, they were surrounded more and more by the pine forest. The ride became quiet and Heidi started to feel the woods closing in on them, until a voice burst from the walkie-talkie.
“Kid, are you there?” Jess radioed.
The girls both jumped and Maria fumbled for the volume knob.
“Go ahead,” Kid responded.
“We already picked up propane for the heaters. Now we’re trying to find an electric hot water heater and some pipe. See anything? Any problems?” Jess asked.
“No problems. How is it coming along Maria and Heidi?”
Heidi thought for a second and then picked up the walkie-talkie. She knew they would be out of range soon, so they needed to be unreachable without arousing suspicion. “It’s coming along fine. We are going to turn the walkie-talkie down and try to finish shopping. But call us if an emergency comes up. Over, and out.
”
“Will do, Heidi,” Kid answered. A few minutes later, his voice came through the walkie-talkie again. “Hey Jess, I assume we’ll need… connect… plumbing tape…”
Hitting the gas, Maria concluded, “He’s breaking up, which means we’re getting out of range, so let’s hustle.”
Out at sea, on the main deck of the middle ship, a group of elders examined the davits.
“Bloody hell,” Elder-24 muttered with his British slang. “We cannot reach land without tenders, and as we know, the ships cannot move any closer to shore given the shallow depth of the water.”
Elder-2 stood at the deck rail with her hands behind her back. The freezing cold wind rippled her short crew-cut, but her face didn't even flinch. Her early days in Siberia had hardened her with winter blasts far worse. “We will assemble a team to retrieve a fleet of boats from the nearby marinas. And we have other, unfinished business, ashore." She spit over the deck rail in disgust. "There are obviously still survivors to be eliminated, preferably by cutting their throats.”
“But, Ma’am, we first need to get ashore,” Elder-24 noted.
Elder-2 turned and smiled through her gritted teeth. “They were quite crafty in cutting our tenders free, but let’s just say they did not leave every stone unturned.”
Having been on the road for some time, Heidi had fallen deep into her thoughts. Is Kid going to be mad about this? If so, how mad? And for how…
“I hope we can get in,” Maria blurted out.
The words jolted Heidi back to reality. “What?” she asked as they approached the guard house and entrance to the Joint Base McGuire–Dix–Lakehurst.
“It is a military base. They have gates,”
“Look. Somebody left the gate open!” Heidi said as they got closer.
“Of course they did.”
Heidi could tell that Maria would be content to abort this mission. But they could not. It was too important, and frankly, necessary.
Once inside the Hyland house, the girls opened the laptop bag on the dining room table. They found the five batteries and a walkie-talkie that Heidi thought seemed much more sturdy and powerful than theirs.
Maria said, “I’m dying of thirst. Do you know where they would keep bottled water?”
“No idea. Check the kitchen.”
As she stepped away, Maria asked, “You need one?”
“Sure,” Heidi answered as she stood at the table and glanced around. Her eyes settled on the first bedroom door up the hall. Feeling drawn, she took slow, quiet steps and pushed open Sara’s door. She took a deep breath and stepped inside with trepidation.
Heidi’s eyes adjusted to the dim light and her mouth fell open as the captivating mural came into full focus. She hadn’t had a chance to study the artwork the first time she saw it. The painting depicted the back of a woman dressed in white flowing chiffon as she stood on a weathered dock. Somehow it was clear that the woman was filled with torment and longing, yet her face could not be seen. She had long, brown hair and her arms were outstretched to her sides as she stood before a full moon. The orb was over a deep blue ocean, and its radiance highlighted a small island at sea. Ghostly clouds floated in front of the moon, blocking many of the rays of light from reaching the woman. A small cluster of moonbeams had made it through and were touching her left arm and hand. With her fist clenched, the mysterious woman seemed to be drawing strength and resolve from the rays. Heidi found it strange that the mural initially made her feel a sense of despair and hopelessness, yet after looking closer and falling deeper into the scene, she found embedded signs of hope. Given that it was Sara’s painting, she was not surprised. She went to touch the wall, and stopped her finger an inch from the surface. The last time she had reached out to touch it Kid had snapped and made it quite clear that the mural was not to be defiled by the touch of a human hand. Retracting her finger, she abruptly turned around.
Heidi went over to Sara’s dresser with the large mirror and was overcome by a sickening feeling. It was a moment of déjà vu, but it was followed by the quick flash of a painful memory. She fought to suppress it, but as she stood in front of the dresser and turned her eyes up, her heart jumped at the reflection. Like a magic mirror, her step-sister Lisa appeared. The image was clear, including the color and detail of the Bobcat on the front of her cheerleading uniform. She then made the connection. Sara’s mirror looked just like the one her step-sister had in her room. The dark wood frame was the same, as were the fancy caps on each side, like the tops of two fairy tale towers. The similarity was remarkable. What was different was Lisa’s face. She was around Heidi’s age, maybe 20 years old, and her skin and features were perfect. Heidi’s stomach tensed and she bent over as a chill ran down her spine. The image was all wrong. Lisa was disfigured in a terrible…accident when she was 15 years old.
She shook her head and tried to refocus as she rubbed her sweaty palms together. “I’m freaking myself out. What am I doing in here anyway,” she whispered as her eyes wandered. On the right side of the mirror frame was a neat vertical column of pictures. She felt a conflict between her overwhelming curiosity and her fear of what she might see and feel as she looked closer. Some were images of Sara and her father, General Hyland, at various locations with many people she did not recognize. She was familiar with some of the locales, like Niagara Falls and the White House. One picture was of a woman standing on a terrace, holding a piece of paper that said, ‘Hi Sara!’ The bright green eyes of the woman, a pretty brunette, were offset against the blue body of water behind her. She pulled the picture from the frame to examine it closer. She shivered as she noticed a gargoyle in the corner of the terrace, barely in the picture. It was mounted atop a Roman-style column which made it stand taller than the woman. Turning the picture over, she read the words, ‘Adele’s incredible house in Anacapri, Italy. Summer 2044.’ Underneath that, in parentheses, it noted, ‘(Sorrento Peninsula in background).’ After staring for a few seconds, she wedged it back in the mirror frame.
As she moved her eyes to the photographs along the left-side edge of the mirror, her hand came up and covered her mouth. The pictures all included Kid. There were ones of them together, and some of just him. Her lips trembled as she looked closer. She recognized one of the pictures. Another copy of it had been tacked on the wall inside the Ironside Gun Club cabin in the woods. It was the one of Kid and Sara laughing while holding each other on the cabin’s roof deck. She was careful as she pulled the picture out from under the mirror frame and held it in front of her face. Turning it over, in Sara’s distinctly neat script were the words, ‘The day at the cabin. The day I found my soulmate.’ Tears welled up in Heidi’s eyes. They were so connected, she thought, and it pained her on some deep level. Could Kid ever hold me that way, and love me that much? Dropping the hand with the photograph down to her side, she gazed up at the ceiling and exhaled a trembling breath.
Hearing a sniffle, she swung around to see Maria standing inside the door with two bottles of water in her hand, and tears running down her face. Heidi handed her the picture.
“We all miss her. I just can’t imagine what Kid’s feeling,” Maria sighed as she read the words on the back of the photograph. “They truly were soulmates…” she added, and then stopped after seeing Heidi’s outpouring of emotion.
“I know,” she whispered with her hands over her mouth.
Wiping her eyes, Maria handed the picture back and said while walking out, “Come on, we have to go. We’ve been out of walkie-talkie range for too long. I’ll grab the computer bag.”
“I’ll be right there.” Heidi loosely wedged the picture back into the mirror frame. It was then that she noticed a piece of jewelry on Sara’s dresser. She picked it up and discovered that it was an arrowhead shaped locket. She opened it and peeked inside and as she expected, it contained a picture of Kid. A pained smile came to her face as she brushed her finger against his cheek in the small photograph. She closed the gold locket and held it tight in her hand, unable to put
it down. Feeling conflicted, she eyed the doorway. Maria was nowhere in sight.
Chapter 38
January 3, 2045
Tuesday, Late Morning
Joint Base McGuire–Dix–Lakehurst
(Fort Dix Army Base), New Jersey
Eight days after the event
Heidi continued to hold Sara’s locket in her hand. She knew it was not hers and that she should just put it down. But she could not. It provided an interconnectedness that could not be fully understood or explained in a rational way. She almost felt empowered, as if through it, Sara’s deep connection to Kid could somehow transcend. Coiling the thin gold chain and putting the arrowhead locket in the front pocket of her blue jeans, she walked out the door and did not look back.
“Hey! Come in!” Jess radioed while driving.
Kid jumped to his feet in the widow’s walk. Something was wrong. “Go ahead!”
“Listen to me,” Jess started. “After we grabbed the electric hot water heater, Drex wanted to stop by his house and grab a few things. While we were there, I was watching the ships out his window with the spyglass, and I saw them drop a raft in the water and head toward shore. When we were cutting all of their boats free, we didn’t see any rafts!”
“No, but I guess it was just a matter of time before they found a way ashore. I just wish it took them longer,” Kid said, resignedly. “Where are the girls?”
“Hey Maria, are you there?” Jess radioed.
The answer was taunting silence.
“Listen Jess. I’ll keep trying them. You just focus on the road and get back here as fast as you can.”
Maria and Heidi were driving east on Route 530 when they turned on the walkie-talkie. About 20 miles away from the marina, Jess’s voice started coming across, in choppy, fragmented word clusters. “I can’t tell what they are saying.” Heidi turned up the volume. “Shh.”
Maria, who was not talking or making noise, just shrugged her shoulders.