It was a neighborhood, or had been before petrochemical fires swept through here, and likely an affluent one. Gently curving streets wound through the charred shells of megahomes, roasted trees and skeletal shrubbery standing amid ashy lawns once groomed and immaculate. Stone and brick walls marked the boundaries of larger properties, the remains of sprawling houses set well back behind them. Garages had collapsed onto Bentleys and Range Rovers, and the black hulk of a Lexus SUV rested on its rims not far from where Evan stood. The place looked like black-and-white footage on the History Channel depicting scenes of destruction caused by German planes during the Blitz.
Evan saw that he had emerged at the neighborhood’s midway point; to the right the streets descended in tiers to the water’s edge, and on the left the roads and shattered homes climbed in levels up a hillside. He couldn’t imagine what these places must have once cost, or even the kinds of jobs and incomes people would have needed to afford them and the toys that went with such a lifestyle.
At the curve of a street not far away, Evan saw what looked like a burned-out police car but decided it was too small for that. A private security company? That would fit.
The rain and the lengthening afternoon cut visibility to the point that he couldn’t see much into the bay, only a soft, dove-gray curtain that thickened as it stretched across the water. Similarly, the neighborhood spreading to the south grew ghostly and then disappeared behind a veil of rain and mist. He shivered, wished again for a hat, and walked into the road.
Silence hung about him. Nothing was moving, but he eyed the burned structures warily. There were lots of places for drifters to hide, and they were surely out there. He had no choice but to keep moving.
A spasm of coughing racked him then, one that left him seeing little white floaters in his vision, and he took several long pulls from the oxygen bottle. The pressure gauge showed that it now held only a quarter of its original content, and he wondered again at the vile particles he must have been breathing in as he crossed the destroyed refinery fields. He decided he was grateful for the rain, as it suppressed the ash and made it easier to breathe.
Evan climbed onto the roof of the Lexus, his weight making it creak, and pulled the small pair of binoculars from his vest. The streets held only debris, blackened vehicles, and downed trees. There were a few charcoal bodies on the asphalt, but they weren’t moving. Shooting victims during the outbreak? Drifters who’d had their brains fried during the firestorm? Or the walking dead, still virulent and waiting for some stimuli to get them up and moving?
He turned his binoculars down the hillside toward the water’s edge. Surf slid up and back against the rocks and the occasional stone pier, and he caught sight of movement. Focusing, he saw a family of otters out at the end of a pier, slipping into the water and then hopping back out. It made him smile. Something had survived, and they couldn’t care less about the fate of the human world.
A gust of wind drove the rain hard at him for a moment, and he hunched into his vest and jacket, turning his back. Probably closer to forty degrees. When he looked again, the otters were gone. Evan checked his map. He was in an area labeled as Point Richmond, and to the south, beyond the affluent, hillside neighborhood, the map showed a stretch of green space, a park or preserve of some kind. Beyond that was Brickyard Cove, a place with more big houses, marinas, and yacht clubs. He remembered flying over it.
Thirst began to pull at him, and simply tilting his head back and opening his mouth wasn’t getting it done. He searched his survival vest but found nothing capable of collecting water. Maybe he could find something in the ruins of these houses, but the thought gave him pause. Was he thirsty enough to risk encountering the dead within those tangles of broken walls and fallen beams? Not quite, but he knew he would be soon.
Evan wanted to keep moving south toward where he knew the carrier to be, but he stopped himself. Did he really think he was going to walk out of here? Walk the shoreline down through El Cerrito and into Oakland, and not be eaten? Did he think he would find a boat south of his position in Brickyard Cove? He’d flown over that too, and already knew there were no boats. He was being stupid. He could walk out of here, but only into another hell. At least here it was quiet.
What would Vlad do? First, he wouldn’t have gotten himself shot down, and even if he had, the Russian would probably be halfway to Nimitz by now. But Evan was still alive and still moving, so he congratulated himself for that small victory. How long he remained alive would depend on straight thinking and a good measure of luck.
High ground. He thought about the locator beacon with its rubber antenna sticking out of his pocket. Vlad said it used satellites, like a GPS unit, so high ground wouldn’t matter, would it? Evan knew from his time aboard Nimitz and his conversations with the handful of Navy men that there were precious few of them left functioning. Would the beacon even do him any good? And the unit’s battery would have a limited life span . . . eight hours, Vlad had said? He didn’t dare count on it. No, it had to be high ground, where he might have success using his flares.
Evan headed up the curving street, walking down the center, watching the ruins to either side. The silence was palpable, and he wondered at the absence of crows. Everywhere he’d been since this nightmare began, there had been crows, a dominant, surviving species shrieking and squabbling over carrion. Not here. Had they been burned out of the sky, or was the air too poisonous even for them? He shook his head. You think too much.
The rain made sooty puddles on the asphalt, backing up in the cement gutters along the curb where drains were choked with debris. Around him, blackened trees stood behind soot-covered walls, their limbs reaching for the sky like skeleton hands, and the wind rattling through those fingers carried the scent of meat left too long on the grill. His boots scuffed along the street, his eyes constantly searching.
At an intersection he came upon what had been a landscaping truck, and a quick inspection yielded nothing of use. He turned left, taking a street that curved up past an enormous house missing its roof, a shell of walls and windows missing glass, fallen beams visible beyond.
The street climbed past several more big homes, then curved left again. Ahead of him, a Porsche Cayenne had broadsided a ’67 Camaro—someone’s pampered toy—and pinned it against a curbside electrical box. Both vehicles were burned down to their rims, and as Evan discovered upon looking inside, any evacuation supplies the vehicles might have carried had gone up as well.
The lump of charcoal pinned behind the Camaro’s melted steering wheel made a wheezing sound and tried to turn its head. Evan ignored it and went to the trunk, kicking at the lid until it popped a bit and he could work his fingers under the lip, heaving it up with a loud squeal. The spare was a congealed mass wrapped around a rim, but the jack and, more importantly, the tire iron were still screwed down on top of it. Thank God for good old-fashioned Detroit iron. New cars only had that crappy swivel wrench thing. He left the crash behind, now carrying the jack handle instead of the pistol.
Still nothing came at him from the burned houses, and at the top of the curve the street climbed again, cutting back onto a higher tier. Evan followed the incline, seeing that there were no more houses higher than the ones on this street. He’d reached the top of the hill. Rainwater tumbled down a curb gutter on his left, and he crouched to let it flow across one hand, tasting it. Then he cupped his palms and swallowed more. It didn’t taste particularly good, but it also didn’t have a metallic flavor, so he drank his fill.
There’s probably a dead thing in this gutter just up the street. Fuck it.
As he squatted beside the curb, he caught movement in his peripheral vision and jumped to his feet, gripping the tire iron once more. The thing was moving slowly, coming through an opening where a driveway passed through a decorative brick wall. Iron gates stood open to either side, one hanging on a single hinge. The thing—male or female, he couldn’t tell—was missing an arm a
nd walking with its torso bent to the left, moving in a crooked, halting gait. It was slow, clumsy, but it was still coming at him.
Evan strode to it and swung the jack handle, coming at the head from the side, like a kid aiming at a T-ball. The head disintegrated in a puff of black dust, burned black chunks, and gray sludge. The body collapsed with a cracking sound, and Evan stood over it, looking at the sluglike brain matter.
How the hell is that making it possible for this thing to move and kill? And for him, that was the single most frustrating aspect to the entire goddamn apocalypse. How? He shook his head and gave the sludge a stomp for good measure.
Ahead, he saw a house that looked like it would do. It had no wall around it and was fairly close to the street, but it was tall, set into the hillside behind it in a series of climbing floors, perched highest among its neighbors. It must have been an impressive thing once, he thought, a boxy, modern design of stucco-faced concrete and expansive windows. The glass was gone now, and the stucco was baked black and encircled the base of the walls in a ring, but the concrete remained intact. As Evan walked up the short driveway, he saw that three of its four garage doors were open and empty. Holding his small flashlight between the fingers of his slung hand, Evan readied the jack handle and went into the garage.
Fire had swept through here as well; piles of ash were heaped in the corners and the remains of a long workbench and cabinets stood against the far wall, the stainless steel doors warped from the heat. To his left, in the remaining, closed garage bay, Evan saw something that broke his heart. The former biker recognized the twisted motorcycle’s shape at once; a 1947 Indian Chief. It would have had big curving fenders, whitewalls, a fringed seat, and acres of chrome. Evan wondered if it had been red. Now it was black and warped, someone’s thirty-thousand-dollar vintage toy reduced to scrap metal.
The interior of the house was as expected; every room on every level was scorched and blackened lumps were all that remained of top-end furniture and electronics. The concrete stairs between each floor remained intact, and the roof had managed to hold up in places. Evan continued his tour of the home, finding nothing of interest but, more importantly, ensuring that he was alone.
A pair of curled-up, charcoal bodies lay in a pile of ashes that might have been a king-sized bed, but they were long dead and harmless. The oily remains of a pistol dangled from one skeletal finger. Murder-suicide. Evan turned away, suddenly ashamed for having mourned the loss of a motorcycle.
Satisfied that he was alone, he returned to the kitchen and poked through the debris until he found a stainless steel mixing bowl that wasn’t too badly warped. He figured it could hold rainwater and carried his prize upstairs to the highest room, which featured a balcony that looked out over the neighborhood and the misty bay beyond. He set the metal bowl outside.
For a while he stood in the balcony opening, staring out at the grim afternoon. It was after six o’clock, and the weather would help bring on an early night. Should he find a way up to the roof and use one of his flares? If someone was tracking in on his beacon, it would pinpoint his position. If anyone was close enough to see it. If anyone was coming.
And what else might the flare attract?
He decided the weather would cut visibility to the point that using a flare now would be a waste. He would wait until morning, and hopefully it would clear. For now he needed rest.
He’d have to take his chances, as there was no way to barricade the place, nothing he could use to warn him if a drifter entered the house. Evan sat and settled his back against a wall, trying to make his wrist comfortable and wishing for some Advil. Pistol in his right hand and resting in his lap, he closed his eyes and listened to the rain peppering the metal bowl, doubting sleep would come. He was cold, and he never slept well when he was . . .
Evan dreamed of running, holding Maya’s hand as the two of them fled from something they could not see, something that wanted to hurt them, wanted the baby. As he dreamed and night fell on the Bay Area, the long, black silhouette of a ship slid silently past Richmond, heading south.
TWENTY-ONE
January 12—Nimitz
Chief Liebs stood in what had once been a Nimitz classroom, where crewmen learned everything from first aid to the repair protocols for broken catapult equipment. It had since been transformed into a school, and twelve children sat at the tables, half of them orphans. They were doing work that ranged from junior high mathematics to the coloring and pasting of kindergarteners.
The young girl named Wind was hugging Miss Sophia’s leg, telling her about what happened in the bow, and about Michael. The chief filled her in on what he knew.
“You said Doc Rosa sent Denny back here?” Sophia asked the girl.
“He was scared to go back there,” she said, “so she told him to come find you.”
Sophia, one of the survivors whom Angie West had rescued at the firehouse, and who had taken up housekeeping with their pilot Vladimir, looked at the chief and shook her head. “We haven’t seen him.” She glanced nervously at Ben, the three-year-old orphan she and Vladimir had adopted. He was sitting with some of the other children, coloring a cow Sophia had drawn for him.
The gunner’s mate shook his head. Another missing kid? “We’ve got problems with Evan’s flight. I can’t go look for Denny right now.”
Sophia was about to say something when the room began to vibrate, the shaking growing in intensity. Children began to cry out and then scream as markers and toys rattled off tables and a freestanding whiteboard tipped over with a crash. The bigger kids held on to the smaller ones, huddled on the floor as the shaking made table legs jitter and the steel walls of the room seemed to rumble with the voice of some monstrous beast.
Then it was over. The adults moved through the room, checking to see that no one was hurt. A minute later a speaker mounted to the ceiling hummed with a voice they all knew.
“This is Father Xavier, speaking to all Nimitz residents. We have been boarded by a group of dangerous people who mean us harm. They are loose on the ship, and we are working to find them. Everyone is to lock down someplace safe, and make sure you are armed.” There was a pause, and then, “Be prepared to defend yourselves.”
Sophia looked at the chief, then at the only other adult in the room, a woman named Kay who was part of Calvin’s extended family, and who had two of her own children in this room. Calvin’s other son and two daughters were here as well. Kay saw the look and nodded toward a pair of shotguns that had been leaning in a corner and were now lying on the floor.
“I can’t stay,” said Liebs, running for the hatch. “Lock down and don’t come out until it’s over,” he called, ducking through and slamming it closed behind him.
Sophia walked to Kay and spoke quietly. “Let’s keep them all in here, and keep them calm,” Sophia said. The younger ones were already picking up fallen papers and crayons, but the older children were watching the adults.
Kay nodded. “We can use metal chair legs to wedge the handles. They should hold, and we have the shotguns.”
Sophia walked Kay to the corner and picked up one of the weapons, holding it close against her leg so the children wouldn’t notice, still speaking softly. “Denny has to be somewhere between here and sick bay. I’m going after him.”
Kay put a hand on her friend’s arm. “Xavier told us to—”
“I heard the announcement. We can’t leave him out there.”
Kay hugged her. “Be careful.”
“Lock up behind me. I won’t be long.” A moment later Sophia was in the passageway, and the hatch to the school thumped closed behind her, followed by a metallic rattle as Kay jammed the handle.
Sophia took a deep breath, racked the shotgun, and headed out.
• • •
The gunner’s mate was still in his full battle gear from when they’d brought the refugees on board and escorted them to the officer’s
mess, and so now he jogged down a passageway with his M4 up and ready. Xavier’s announcement—the equivalent of a general quarters alarm—hadn’t given any details, but it was easy enough to put together what had happened. Liebs cursed himself. This had been their greatest fear, and he’d let his guard down. Stronger even than the self-recriminations was anger. Hostiles had breached his security and were roaming his ship. He was going to goddamn well put them down.
He ducked into an office that at one time belonged to a team of flight deck officers and snatched the phone off the wall, punching in an extension.
“Communications, Petty Officer Katcher,” said a voice.
“PK, it’s the chief.”
“Hey, Guns,” the man started, “what the—”
Liebs cut him off. “Listen up, PK. You heard the skipper’s announcement. We’ve been boarded, nine adult hostiles. I don’t know how they’re armed. You packing?”
“Affirmative, I’ve got a sidearm.”
“Good,” said Liebs. “Make sure Banks is up to speed, and button up the bridge. Any luck with Evan’s beacon?”
“That’s a negative, Guns. I’m scanning the frequencies, but no contact yet.”
The gunner’s mate blew out a breath. “Okay. We can’t try a rescue right now, anyway. Keep trying, and call me if that situation changes.”
“Aye-aye, Chief.”
“And PK, report any sightings or contact with boarders. Don’t leave the bridge, don’t try to engage.”
“But Chief, if I get a shot—”
“You heard me, Petty Officer,” Liebs said.
“Copy that. And by the way, the ship is adrift.”
“I know, I can feel it,” said the chief, clicking off. He spoke into the mic for the Hydra radio attached to the shoulder of his combat vest. “Stone, it’s Guns, come in.”
The boy responded at once. “I heard the announcement, Chief. Where do you need me?”
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