Push Back: A Post Apocalyptic Thriller (The Disruption Series Book 2)

by R. E. McDermott

  The first few boatloads of convicts fled through the gap under the bow, but a collision soon blocked the only escape route. Boats jammed together in a confused knot, unable to flee the tightening ring of approaching Cajuns, who poured fire into the convicts as they came. Some convicts fought back while others raised their hands. All of them died.

  M/V Pecos Trader

  Bridge

  Hughes reached for the radio as the gunfire died. “Kinsey, this is Pecos Trader. Request SITREP. Over.”

  “We’re good here. Can you contain the fire? Over,” Matt Kinsey replied.

  “Unknown. We’ll try, but please get all the boats you can spare to our stern so we can start evacuating our nonessential folks in case we can’t. Over,” Hughes said.

  “Roger that. Do you need manpower? Over.”

  Hughes looked over at Howell and Gowan, who shook their heads in unison.

  “Negative your last. Please just concentrate on getting our families off. Over.”

  Kinsey acknowledged, and Hughes hung up the mic and turned to the others. “All right. Let’s break out the fireman suits and see if we can get some foam—”

  Gowan reached over and put his hand on Hughes’ shoulder. “She’s gone, Jordan. If the cargo piping was shot up, the firefighting systems were as well. And even if they weren’t, everything on deck has been engulfed in flames, and if it’s not melted, it’s red hot or close to it. We go pumping cold water into it, it will crack wide open.” Gowan paused. “I don’t want to write her off either, Cap, but the only thing we’re likely to do if we try to fight this fire is get more people killed. That’s the bottom line.”

  Hughes looked away and stared out the bridge window, his view of the raging fire distorted by the water gushing over the glass from the hoses rigged on the flying bridge. He could feel the heat, despite the water curtain, and he knew Dan Gowan was right. He blew out a sigh.

  “You’re right, but we might be saving these people just to starve to death. Most of our extra supplies were in the containers on deck, and they’re toast. And even if we get everyone ashore, there’s no way we’re going to have time to even save what we have here in the deckhouse.”

  Gowan rubbed his chin. “We might be able to do something. Let me and Georgia work on that while you figure out where the hell ‘ashore’ is. I expect there’s still plenty of pissed-off convicts on the other side of the river, and there’s nothing over here but marsh and mosquitoes.”

  ***

  Thirty minutes later Hughes stood at the stern rail, alternating between casting worried glances forward at the raging fire and watching his crew help the families over the stern rail and down the rigid aluminum ladder to the deck of the barge below. He’d been relieved when Lucius Wellesley pushed the empty tank barge up against the stern and held it there with the Judy Ann. It was a much shorter drop and allowed them to use one of the aluminum extension ladders they had on board rather than subject everyone to the terror of the swaying rope ladder dangling over a small boat.

  It also freed up Kinsey and the Cajuns. They transferred a machine gun back down to the Coast Guard patrol boat, and Hughes nodded as he watched the well-armed patrol boat providing security for the evacuation. On the other side of the ship, Cormier and his Cajun Navy were moving among the convicts’ boats, scavenging weapons, ammunition, and the boats themselves if they weren’t too badly shot up. Hughes looked over as Georgia Howell joined him at the rail.

  “All done,” she said as the rest of the crew filed out of the deckhouse and took their place in line to descend to the barge. “We formed a human chain and passed things hand to hand down to the engine room. All the storerooms are cleaned out, but we just had to stack it wherever we found room down there. God only knows if we’ll ever be able to find anything, but if the deckhouse goes, the stuff should be all right until we can come for it.” She looked back toward the fire. “Whenever that is. How long you think it’ll take her to burn herself out?”

  Hughes shrugged. “Until the cargo’s gone, I guess. God knows she won’t sink; we’re only a foot or two off the bottom.”

  Hughes heard the muffled wail of the CO2 sirens and looked up as Dan Gowan and Rich Martin rounded the corner of the machinery casing, both red-faced and sweating.

  “We got the engine room closed up tight, and we’re flooding the space with CO2,” Gowan said. “Kind of strange, actually, using something designed to fight an engine room fire to prevent it from happening to begin with. But whatever works, right?”

  “Whatever works,” Hughes agreed. “That it, then?”

  Gowan nodded. “I’m leaving the emergency fire pump running to keep the water curtain on the deckhouse as long as possible. It might not help, but it can’t hurt.”

  “Then let’s get out of here while we still can,” Hughes said, and the group took their place at the back of the now short line waiting at the ladder. Hughes was the last one down and took a last long look at Pecos Trader as she died a fiery death. It was almost like losing a family member, and he swallowed a lump in his throat and climbed over the rail and onto the ladder.

  But his real family waited on the barge, and he gave Laura and the girls a hug as crewmen lowered and stowed the ladder and the Judy Ann pulled the barge away from the ship. He left his family and made his way down the length of the barge to climb down one of the push knees to the short foredeck of the Judy Ann. From there he made his way up to the wheelhouse.

  “Captain Wellesley?” Hughes asked as he stepped into the compact wheelhouse.

  Lucius Wellesley extended his hand. “Call me Lucius.”

  Hughes took Wellesley’s hand. “Only if you agree to call me Jordan.”

  Wellesley smiled. “Deal,” he said. “And it’s nice to meet you face-to-face, Jordan.”

  “I expect it was nicer for me,” Hughes said. “Y’all saved our asses.”

  Wesley shrugged. “That was those other fellas. I’m just the bus driver.”

  “It was a bit more than that, and you know it. But I’ll say I’m grateful and leave it at that,” Hughes said. “You know where we’re going?”

  Wellesley nodded. “I’ve been up the Neches a time or two.”

  The men fell silent as the Judy Ann pushed the barge upriver under Wellesley’s expert hand. In less than five minutes, the river widened dramatically into the expanse of the McFadden Bend Cutoff, home to the US Maritime Administration’s Reserve Fleet. Clusters of empty, unmanned ships, most far beyond their useful economic life, floated moored together in groups, held in reserve against a far different, and now unlikely, type of national emergency.

  Wellesley nodded to starboard. “Which one?”

  Hughes pointed. “We may as well check out the biggest group.”

  Wellesley nodded and steered toward a group of ten ships of various types and sizes moored side by side near the center of the wide expanse of water. He moved in slowly, looking for the best place to put the barge alongside.

  Hughes studied the aging ships as they approached, his seaman’s eye focusing laser-like on spots of bleeding rust and other signs of indifferent maintenance. He shook his head and sighed.

  “Welcome to home, sweet home,” he said under his breath.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Bear Mountain Bridge

  Hudson River—West Bank

  Appalachian Trail

  Mile 1400 Northbound

  One Day Earlier

  Day 32, 6:35 p.m.

  Wiggins moved the last few feet through the thick woods and stopped at the six-foot-high wooden fence, Tex at his side. They’d left the Honda hidden in the woods almost a mile away while they checked out the bridge approach.

  Wiggins grasped the top of the fence and pulled himself up a few inches to peek over the top, holding himself there a few moments to study the approach before lowering himself back down to stand beside Tex.

  “Well?” Tex said.

  “It’s manned all right,” Wiggins said. “But I’d have been amazed if
it wasn’t.”

  “FEMA?”

  Wiggins shook his head. “I don’t think so. It’s more like an ambush setup. There are cars parked haphazardly, like they stalled, with a zigzag gap through them about a car-width wide. It looks passable, but you’d have to take it dead slow. Whoever is manning the roadblock is staying out of sight between the pillars of the tollbooth. I spotted an elbow sticking out from behind one and what looked like cigarette smoke drifting up from behind another, so there’s at least two of them. I’m thinking freelance. FEMA will likely get around to it sooner or later, but they’re probably concentrating on the interstate crossings up- and downstream. This is about the most remote crossing we’re likely to find.”

  “Maybe we can buy our way across,” Tex said.

  Wiggins shook his head. “More likely they’ll kill us and take everything we have. And I doubt there’s only two of them. On a positive note, if this end is blocked, the other side is probably open. We need to watch a while before we figure out what to do. Let’s pile some deadfall and rocks against the fence to stand on.”

  Tex nodded, and they set to work. Ten minutes later, they had a serviceable if somewhat rickety platform, which allowed them both to peer over the fence at the tollbooth fifty yards away. They didn’t have to wait long.

  Three bicyclists approached from the west: a middle-aged couple and a teenage girl of perhaps sixteen. All had bulging packs on the handlebars of their bikes, and all looked dirty and road weary. The man and woman wore sidearms.

  The man held out his hand and stopped in the road, eying the blocked tollbooth warily. There was conversation, and the woman pointed to the gap between the cars. The man nodded, then drew his pistol and started forward alone, steering with his left hand.

  As he neared the tollbooth, there was a sharp crack, and his head exploded in a geyser of blood. He dropped the pistol and rolled forward a few feet before death overcame inertia and the bike toppled over.

  Two rough-looking men in camo leaped from behind the tollbooth pillars, both bearing ARs pointed towards the woman and the girl.

  “RUN, CARLY,” the woman screamed, clawing at her holster, obviously intent upon covering her daughter’s escape.

  “She does, she’s gonna have a big hole in her,” said a voice behind the woman.

  She spun, leveling her gun at a third man ten yards behind them, with a shotgun leveled at her daughter.

  “Drop that shotgun and get out of the way, or I’ll kill you,” the woman said.

  The bearded man laughed. “Maybe you will, but the question is, can you put me down before I pull the trigger and blow a great big hole in Carly here? And even if you do, don’t you figure my friends are gonna kill you? And they’ll be pissed you killed me. Too bad there won’t be anybody but Carly here to take it out on. So go ahead and shoot, bitch.”

  Wiggins watched the woman’s shoulders slump; then she slowly lowered the gun. The man was on her in a heartbeat, backhanding her so violently the gun flew from her grasp and she went down in a tangle with the bike between her legs. The girl screamed and scrambled off her bike to help her mother, but the men from the toll booth dragged her away to duct-tape her hands behind her as the third man knelt and did the same to the fallen woman.

  Wiggins heard footsteps on the pavement to his right and saw four men running toward the action from a stately stone building across a narrow parking lot.

  “Well, what have we got here?” said the first to arrive. “A little feminine company for the night.”

  “YOU ain’t got shit, Atwood,” said one of the men from the tollbooth. “You know the deal. Whichever watch takes spoils gets first dibs. And that ain’t you.”

  “Don’t be an asshole, Hollingsworth. You guys all have the watch until midnight. We’ll just warm these ladies up for you. How about that?”

  “How about you go catch your own pussy,” Hollingsworth said. “’Cause these bitches are stayin’ tied up in one of the cars until we get off watch. You guys can have sloppy seconds tomorrow afternoon.”

  “All right, if you’re going to be like that about it. They have any other good stuff?”

  “We ain’t exactly had time to look, now have we?” Hollingsworth said. “They got a couple of pistols for sure. We’ll sort through the packs together at change of watch, just like always.”

  Wiggins saw Atwood nod, and as the excitement of the encounter faded, so did the volume of the conversation. He heard no more. He touched Tex’s arm, and they lowered their heads slowly to avoid attracting attention, cautious despite the distance and their cover. When they were fully concealed behind the fence, Tex spoke first.

  “We won’t be negotiating with these assholes,” she said.

  Wiggins nodded. “We have to take them out. One good thing is at least we know how many of them there are. I’m thinking they must be holed up in that stone building over there, and that they all turned out at the sound of gunfire. Four guys came from the building, so I figure two watches of four guys each. The fourth guy on each watch is probably—”

  “Hiding in a car on the bridge,” Tex finished his sentence, “so he can cut off the escape of anyone coming across the bridge who has second thoughts when they suspect an ambush at the tollbooths. Just like the guy that sneaked up behind the two women on this side.”

  Wiggins smiled briefly. “Great minds.”

  Same Day, 11:55 p.m.

  Wiggins knelt behind a rock in the dark, trying to ignore his stiff muscles. He’d moved into position hours before, and kneeling motionless was taking its toll. The fence had covered his move away from the tollbooth to the west end of the bridge approach, but then things got dicey. Without the fence for cover, he’d waited for the partial darkness of dusk to work his way back through the scattered foliage into a position behind where the backup man hid in the strip of wooded verge bordering the highway. He’d moved cautiously, torn between rushing to take advantage of the fading light, yet terrified a snapped twig or stumble might betray him.

  An unnecessary worry, as it turned out. He’d heard the faint sounds of a heavy rock beat as he got close to his target’s position and realized the man was listening to music turned up loud enough to leak around his headphones. Wiggins had breathed a relieved sigh and settled in to wait.

  They’d decided to strike after the midnight shift change, on the theory they were all at an equal disadvantage in the dark, and if they were able to get past the toll booth, the man on the bridge would be unsure what was happening until they roared past him. That was the theory, anyhow.

  Wiggins tensed as he heard someone approaching from the road, then ducked further behind his rock as he saw a flashlight bobbing closer.

  “Who’s there?” asked a voice.

  “It’s Baker, numb nut. Were you expecting the friggin’ Easter Bunny? Besides, don’t tell me you broke the night-vision glasses.”

  “I didn’t break ’em. The battery is low, that’s all.”

  “Didn’t you bring a spare?” Baker asked.

  “I forgot it. Don’t you have one?”

  “Yeah, I got one,” Baker said. “Just like YOU’RE supposed to—”

  “Give it a rest, Baker. Squattin’ out here in the bushes sucks, and I’m not in the mood to take any crap. Just once I’d like to get the bridge side and sit in a nice soft car seat. Who’s got the bridge end for your shift, as if I didn’t know.”

  Baker snorted. “Atwood, who else? Rank has its privileges.”

  “Yeah, well, I’m getting a little sick of that too. But whatever, I’m hauling ass. I don’t want the party to start without me. You have a great night.”

  “Yeah, screw you too, Hardy,” Baker said.

  Hardy laughed, and Wiggins heard him moving back toward the road. He flinched, startled, as Baker turned on the red night light of a headlamp and sat on a nearby rock. The man sat facing away from Wiggins with his head bent, apparently changing the battery in the night-vision goggles.

  Wiggins fingered the thick, tw
o-foot section of rebar he’d found on the roadside and hesitated only a split second before rising and closing the gap separating him from Baker. He raised the club as he came, and it struck the man’s skull with a crunch of sickening finality. Baker toppled over soundlessly, and Wiggins stood staring down, his heart pounding.

  Slowly his heart rate dropped, and Wiggins glanced at the luminous dial of his watch. It was just after midnight, and Tex was due in less than thirty minutes, but their opponents’ night-vision capability changed everything. They’d assumed the sentry on the bridge was out of the equation until they’d taken out the men on the toll booth and started across the bridge. However, if the bridge sentry clearly saw what was happening at the toll booth and engaged too soon, not only could he pin them down, the firing would alert the others off watch. Game over.

  Wiggins looked down at the dead man and cursed. He’d seen the opportunity and reacted without thinking it through, but he should have waited. Maybe he could have faded back and cut through the woods to intercept Tex on the road, and they could make a new plan that accounted for their enemy’s NV capabilities. But what if he missed her? She’d be heading into a trap without a clue things weren’t going according to plan.

  He muttered another curse. It was too late for second-guessing anyway. If they pulled back now, the dead man would put the marauders on high alert, and he and Tex would have zero chance of surprising them. No, he had to make it work. He’d just have to take out the bridge sentry first, quickly and quietly, then run back to support Tex.

  Wiggins stooped and pulled the still-glowing headlamp from Baker’s head and put it on, ignoring the wet stickiness, then scooped up the fallen NV goggles and examined them in the red glow of the headlamp, relieved to find the battery compartment closed. The man had made the battery swap, so Wiggins didn’t have to hunt through the weeds for an errant battery. He doused the headlight and powered up the night-vision goggles. The night became like an eerie green day, almost like an old video game.

  He stuck the rebar in his belt and turned to go, then stopped. The dead man was about his size. Wiggins swallowed his distaste and wrestled the camo shirt off the corpse and pulled it on over his own. After a stop at his hiding place to scoop up one of the M4s they’d taken from the FEMA SUV, Wiggins trotted back the way he’d come; he didn’t have time to waste.