Cheyenne, WY
It was not a happy reunion. Grace and Asher stood by one of the police cruisers as Shawn Runs Hard laid into his son. She pretended to focus intently on the wreckage strewn across the landing strip, though there wasn’t much to look at.
The dull gray metal remains were rectangular, with a smooth outer shell. The side facing her was intact, but the ends were frayed and mangled, like someone had broken the piece off a much larger ship. She took it for granted the far side of the craft was exposed to the elements, too, but she didn’t see the need to go look. She was far more worried about Shawn and Logan.
“We have to find a plane so those two can get where they’re going.” Grace turned away from the spaceship fragment. “Then we can get on with our trip. My dad sounded like he was going to take some time to drive his boat across the country, but I want to be in Denver well before him.”
Asher checked his watch. “Yeah, I think we still have enough time to make it to Denver before the sun goes down, but we should leave right away. It’s two hours, at least, depending on traffic.”
The rest of the airport remained silent, reinforcing what Shawn said when he came out of the terminal. If there was no one inside, where would they find a plane for her Crow friends? It still mattered to her to have TKM lose the legal battle for the piece of asteroid on the reservation.
She snapped her fingers, then ran over to Shawn. “Excuse me. I’m sorry to interrupt, but it looks like this airport is shut down. It couldn’t have helped them to have this big wreck blocking their runway. I’m thinking Denver will be in better shape.” Asher had mentioned the airport in the Mile High City was immense. If anyone was still operating their planes, it would be them.
The father looked at his son for a few seconds, though no longer with anger. After a moment of consideration, he turned to her. “I do need to go to Washington to help my people…but having my boy here changes everything. I’m thinking of borrowing a truck and taking him back to Crow Agency myself. From there, I can find another way east.”
“Are you sure? We don’t mind taking you.” She wanted to be polite after all he’d done for her, but she also preferred to get back to her own mission.
“I’ll make you a deal,” he said to her. “Let’s drive into downtown Cheyenne and see if we can find someone to explain what the heck happened to their airport. I’d like to know if air traffic was shut down all over the country. It would save me the trip of going to Denver, or anywhere else, and not being able to catch a flight.”
“Makes sense,” she agreed, starting the walk to the truck. When they got there, Shawn chose to sit in the back seat with Logan. Obviously, he wanted to keep a close eye on the young man.
She drove them off the airport property and into a residential part of the city, but Shawn directed them to the downtown area. When they reached what she guessed was the main part of the city, he motioned for her to pull over.
“Why stop here?” she asked. The downtown reminded her of Billings. There were few buildings taller than five stories; most were one or two. However, they were spread out, with wide streets separating them. She’d stopped in front of a long brick building.
“This says it’s a police station,” Shawn replied.
The reddish-tan brick building was unusual compared to the rest of the city. It took up one city block and wasn’t higher than four stories. The first floor was made up of small glass cubes, which probably let in a lot of light. The second floor was solid brick, with no windows. The top two levels were designed to look a bit like a castle’s ramparts. It was made of twenty-by-twenty-foot compartments, though every other one was empty along the outer wall, creating an architectural style that was a mixture of medieval fortress, prison, and art museum.
Shawn jumped out of the truck, ran around the hood, then went up a small staircase to the front entrance. He pushed into the glass door, intending to go inside, but bounced backward and fell to the pavement. Logan laughed.
Grace held back her chuckle. The bigger problem was the locked door. Why would a police station be closed? She scanned up and down the street, searching for anyone who could give them a clue about what the heck was going on. As before, there was no one.
Shawn banged on the doors but not with much zest. He seemed to wilt at not getting the answer he’d hoped. After a short time, the man came back down the steps at a slow pace.
Grace rolled Asher’s window down to talk to Shawn. “Hey, were there any signs up there? Do we know what’s going on?”
He shrugged. “There’s nothing at all. It’s locked. They’re gone.”
Asher wasn’t paying attention; he tapped his watch and seemed consumed by whatever he saw in his tiny rectangular smartphone screen.
Grace made up her mind not to lose the momentum, so she spoke with her park ranger voice. “Sir, I’m going to need you to get back in. We’re driving until we find a living person, no matter how far we have to go.”
The drive on the highway from Crow Agency had been lonely from the get-go, but she tried to remember the last time they’d passed another vehicle. Grace couldn’t say for sure. An hour, perhaps.
Once Shawn was secure, she smashed down the gas pedal. In her mind, it was important to show she had the situation in hand, though her spiking adrenaline and shaking hands belied the truth.
The boomerang of bad luck kept slicing directly toward her face.
St. Louis, MO
Ezra turned around slowly. The voice demanding the surrender of weapons had come from a nearby police truck. An officer in a light-blue shirt stood at his open door with a bullhorn, aiming it toward various parts of the park-like grounds underneath the six-hundred-foot Arch. A small crowd had gathered behind it; a second officer took guns and tossed them into the rear cargo area of the SUV.
He grabbed Butch by the arm and guided him back onto the steps, taking them out of the line-of-sight of the police. “I’ve worked too hard to protect these rifles. First, when my house burned to the ground. I saved these two bad boys and left my wedding album. Susan never said anything about my choice; she knew what was necessary to survive. However, she would never forgive me if I willingly gave these away while that album went to ash.”
“I’m with her. We’d be dead without this hardware.”
They went all the way to the bottom of the giant staircase. The river blockage suddenly seemed minor compared to enforcers of law and order talking confiscation. He hadn’t thought any red-blooded American would willingly turn in their guns, but he was in St. Louis, not rural Kentucky, and things were obviously different. Men and women had been lined up at the back of the truck doing what he didn’t think possible: handing over their guns.
“We have to do something, or those cops are going to mosey our way and take what belongs to us. I don’t know that we could prevent it.” Ezra tried to stop the rising panic. Susan’s Grace sat a hundred yards away, south of the rapids below the blockade. The police were one staircase away from seeing them and the boat. What he did next might affect his entire trip to reach Grace.
“You’d really give up your guns?” Butch asked dramatically.
“If they came to my front door and politely asked for them, I’d tell them to come back with a warrant, then I’d promptly go out and have a boat accident with them.” He used finger quotes around boat accident, which was a well-known euphemism among gun-enthusiasts for hiding firearms from prying eyes. “However, if they walked down here and held a gun to my head, I don’t think I could refuse. I won’t kill a cop, you know?”
The big man shrugged, then touched his cowboy hat. “Yeah, maybe I’d agree with you if that’s how things went down, but if police knew there was a cost to pay for taking our rifles, maybe they’d think twice. Police back home in Kentucky would never obey the order to take our firearms, you can count on it.”
Ezra caught his meaning. “People around here are turning them in willingly.”
Butch glanced back up the staircase. “You think they saw us? These pop gun
s are obvious on our backs.” He half-turned as if modeling his AR rifle.
“I don’t know.” He looked at the boat. “We need to move it or lose it, though. There has to be a way we can get her from that side of the blockage, over to this side.” The upstream stretch of river had several isolated bridge pylons left standing after the bridges collapsed, but there was nothing blocking their escape to the north. Of the few vehicles parked on the cobblestone incline, most looked like they’d been washed in with the flooding, or at least been bogged down by it. More important to their escape, there were no boat trailers anywhere in sight.
Ezra tried to keep thinking up ideas. “We need Colby and his Jeepers. They could hitch a tow cable to Susan’s Grace, pull it out of the water, then drag it a hundred and fifty yards to the safe side. It’s not complicated.”
“Could you patch the holes in the pontoons while it’s out of the water?” Butch asked, always concerned about the worthiness and safety of the boat under his feet.
“Yeah, the water might drain out. We’d just need to patch it. Even duct tape would do in a pinch.”
Butch craned his neck, looking left and right. There were a small number of non-flooded trucks and cars along the riverfront incline, which also served as a parking lot for the Arch, but he didn’t seem to find what he wanted.
“What?” Ezra asked.
“You said we needed Colby and his buddies. What if there are others like him already here?”
Ezra rubbed his hands tighter, as though he’d solved a complicated equation. “Yes! Find a big enough truck and we can ask them to pull us out of the water.” Even a relatively normal car could probably pull the boat by dragging it, but it would be safer with a larger truck.
It took them about ten minutes to find what they sought. The monster pickup truck sat up high enough for him to see it far down the roadway. The pair hustled along the street, ever wary of the police in the park above them, though they made it to the bright orange truck without incident. Fortunately, it wasn’t one of the abandoned vehicles. Five or six people loitered near the oversized front tire.
He waited until there was a break in their conversation, then stood closer. “Excuse me. I’m looking for someone who can give me a tow.”
A black man leaned around from the front side of the chest-high tire. “Who’s asking?”
The guy was tall and muscular, with black track pants and a white St. Louis Cardinals T-shirt. He sported thick black sunglasses, completely hiding his eyes, so it was hard to gauge his mood.
Ezra held out his hand. “I’m Ezra. This is Butch. We’re from Kentucky, but we’re stuck here in the city. We only need a short pull.”
The man stopped leaning on the tire and took the offered handshake. “I’m Darius. Wish it was nice to meet you, but, you know…the end of the world. I’d love to help you, but I’m stuck here, too. I ran out of gas waiting for the bridges to open up.”
“Bridges?” Ezra asked, sure he meant the remains in front of them.
Darius pointed across the river. “I can almost see my place from here. I just can’t get over there.” He patted the lower part of the orange truck’s side, which was at about shoulder-height. “And I’ll never leave my baby.”
It was a sentiment he was familiar with. He wondered how many Jeepers, truckers, and sports car owners were standing on the side of the road, unwilling to walk away from their vehicles. Some people seemed to treat their rides like kids.
A cascade of revelations came to him. He felt the same about Susan’s Grace. There were other boats. Other cars. He didn’t absolutely need the one with his name on it. Yet, he did. Now that it had almost magically come back to him, he was unwilling to walk away from it.
“We have five gallons of extra gas. We’ll give them to you to start your truck if you’ll help us out.”
The man appeared interested; he’d said the magic words. However, a few moments later, Darius continued to look at him. He motioned toward Ezra shoulder.
“How about you give me the gas plus a rifle? I used to have my own pistol, but those mall cops up there made me surrender it. Took them from all of us.” The men standing around Darius rumbled in agreement, making them seem a bit menacing. If they all ganged up on him and Butch…
He had to decide if having Susan’s Grace was worth one of his two precious rifles. He slowly reached for the rifle’s strap, in case Darius didn’t take no for an answer.
Chapter 22
Cheyenne, WY
The city of Cheyenne continued to remind her a bit of Billings as she drove out of the downtown, across a wide rail yard, and into another residential area. All that was missing to complete the comparison were the burning fuel storage tanks. And, of course, the people.
Grace took advantage of the abandoned streets. There were no cars in her path, so she ignored whatever speed limit had been set for the four-lane thoroughfare. The speedometer said she was at seventy-five miles per hour; the little houses and strip malls passed by in a blur.
“Miss, do you have to go this fast?” Shawn spoke respectfully, almost reluctantly.
The high RPMs soothed her nerves. Speed meant less time traveling in the ghost city. It meant arriving sooner in Denver. It meant, she prayed, getting Logan and his father to safety. Grace didn’t want to slow the process down.
“Empty. It’s all empty. We have to find out why.”
Asher caught her attention. “My phone doesn’t have anything about Cheyenne. It connected with the internet for a second and I did a search, but nothing came up. It says the same boring stuff you normally find: sixty thousand people live here. Will have the biggest outdoor rodeo in America in a few weeks. That type of stuff. Nothing about why people are gone.”
He swallowed loud enough for her to hear. “And I got a text from my sister—”
“Really? Is she okay?” she shot back.
“This message is from days ago. It says the asteroid is coming down. It also says TKM officials wanted her on a plane so they could take her to safety.”
The good news made her let off the gas a little. “Great! It means you can stop worrying about her. Maybe those TKM goons were wrong about her being in trouble.”
“Yeah,” he replied.
“But?” she asked, hearing doubt in his voice.
“I don’t know what she’s been doing since this message. She could be in trouble. Lost. Who knows? I really need to hear her voice.”
Grace let her foot become a hammer again. “I’m sure she’s fine, or at least in less danger than us. My job is to get you to Denver.” She looked in the rearview mirror. “And get those guys in front of someone who can help them. Keep your eyes open for help.”
She slowed for a wide intersection, out of habit, but there was no cross traffic. Seconds later, she was back up to speed.
“Come on!” Grace pleaded. “Someone has to be here!”
They passed parks, schools, corner gas stations, fast-food restaurants and a little bit of everything in between. Before long, she started to run out of Cheyenne.
“There!” she snapped, spiking the brake pedal. “Hold on!”
Everyone lurched forward as the tires fought against the anti-lock brake system. They didn’t stop in a long smoking trail of rubber, but there was squealing of tires involved. Grace brought the Suburban to a full stop in the middle lane of the roadway. When she had her chance, she pointed to a small strip mall on Asher’s side. A blue sign said Books over one of the shops; several figures stood near the rear of a pickup truck backed up to the door of the place. A box truck and some other vehicles sat in the front row of the adjacent stores, giving the impression of an evacuation.
“Now we’ll get some answers.” There were no police around, so she drove the truck off the edge of the roadway, over a narrow row of grass, and into the parking lot of the strip mall. The truck popped over a parking curb, bumping Shawn and Logan about a foot out of their seats.
She whipped the wheel around, straightening the truck a sec
ond before it rammed the parked cars in front of the store. Men went scurrying. Blood surged through her temples as the pressure and excitement of the last few seconds caught up to her. However, she rolled Asher’s window down and shouted toward the people she hoped would finally explain the mystery of where everyone had gone.
“Hey! Where are all the people?”
A man came out from between two of the cars. He was tentative at first, but then straightened and walked up to the passenger side of her truck. Others regained their wits, too, and made their way toward her.
“Uh, Grace,” Shawn said with nervousness.
She continued to watch the man. He was older, perhaps in his forties or fifties. He wore a nice brown leather jacket, blue jeans, and cowboy boots. To her eyes, he’d come straight off the ranch.
The man smiled for all the world to see, at least until he got up to her window. He looked inside, saw her and Asher’s uniforms, then stepped back with a bit of haste. “You’re cops?”
She yelled across the front seat. “No, we’re park rangers.” The last thing she wanted was to be mistaken for—
Wait. Why would he care?
Grace used a second or two to reevaluate the scene. The pickup truck was backed up to the bookstore, but the shop’s door was closed. Men stood around the entrance of the next place over, watching the commotion as if to see what it meant for them. Other vehicles had their lift gates and trunks open, too, and most of them were parked to her left, toward the group of men.
The rancher guy tripped over his own feet as he went another step backward. He bounced off the parked pickup truck and took half a spin to catch himself. His maneuver revealed the stub handle of a pistol tucked behind his back.
Shawn whispered, “They’re thieves.”
“Of books?” she said, incredulous.
“No, of that.” Asher pointed to the sign over the next storefront. It was also in big blue letters, like the one for the bookstore. There was only a single word listed: Jeweler.
Impact Series Box Set | Books 1-6 Page 57
