by Justin Bell
She was too far away to see it clearly, but Rhonda could picture the rounds piercing the layers of rubber, separating them from the underlying stacks of reinforced material, shredding the bonds, flaying the tire like skin, and suddenly, as she watched, the pickup flinched right, tried to compensate by swerving left, then dipped and jerked, the backend swinging swiftly around with such momentum that it carried the truck over into a sideways barrel roll, slamming concrete, flipping, slamming again, then lifting at the end and finally crashing down one final time against the gray asphalt, shattering glass and punching out windows.
Rhonda drew herself back, then inside the van, breathing low and long, trying to steady the rapid slam of her beating heart.
“Mom?” Max asked in a low voice from the row behind her.
She turned. “What, Max?” she asked, trying to hide her fear and exasperation.
“When did you turn into an action movie star?”
Rhonda shook her head, chuckling, turning back forward in her seat. She was laughing off the comment, though deep inside, she knew that what she’d just done, and what she’d been doing for pretty close to the past month, had all been taught and orchestrated by her parents. She was at once deeply thankful and equally petrified of what they were now grooming Lydia for and who else they might have recruited to their nasty little group.
Looking in the passenger-side rearview mirror, she saw the truck upside down, growing smaller, smoke rising from the wreck as the van pressed northbound on I-90, destined for an off ramp and a course correction for Philadelphia.
***
They’d followed 90 in relative peace, the van a mask of quiet reflection on the swiftness and unexpected activity at the downtown sports store. Just north of Euclid, Phil had gotten off, making his way toward Interstate 271 which would eventually pick up 76 and head them straight toward central Pennsylvania and on to Philadelphia. Through this stretch of the highway, congested traffic was minimal, with only sporadic abandoned vehicles scattered here and there on both sides of the lanes of traffic. Hitting a good cruising speed of sixty miles per hour, the van moved southbound, the trees and urban sprawl on each side smearing to green and gray colored smudges.
Rebecca rotated her left shoulder, trying to free up some tightness while Angel hunched over one of the banker’s boxes, rifling through the ammunition. He’d handed some out already, making sure each person had fully loaded their personal sidearm, and he’d stashed away several boxes of 7.62 millimeter for both the battle rifle and the Bushmaster they’d stolen from Lenny’s. He was making an attempt to organize the bullets in some kind of fashion just in case they needed to retrieve them quickly.
Phil stole a glance in the mirror for the hundredth time during the trip, and Rebecca noticed.
“Anyone following?” she asked.
Phil shook his head.
“What’s bothering you?” Rhonda asked, looking over and noting the firm, collapsed expression on her husband’s face below his bandaged wound.
“What’s bothering me? I mean, besides the fact that we were just in a firefight with the United States military? I mean, doesn’t that bother anyone else here?”
Fields shook her head. “They weren’t military. Not real military.”
“What makes you say that?” Phil asked.
“They were all wearing digital multicam uniforms, but not the current pattern,” Rebecca replied. “Off the rack stuff that can be purchased at any surplus store. None of the uniforms had identification or even rank insignias, and their boss, the bald dude was carrying a non-standard firearm. Those boys were all make-pretend soldiers.”
Phil narrowed his eyes in the mirror, looking more closely at Fields. “Where did they get the Humvee?”
Rebecca shrugged. “They probably either ambushed a National Guard patrol or plucked it from the battlefield in Toledo or a place like that.”
Phil didn’t reply, he just lowered his gaze out the windshield and kept driving.
“Look,” Rebecca continued, “I’m not saying they’re not dangerous. If they were able to take out some actual military operatives and steal that Humvee, they are grade A nasty. But I don’t think we just went head-to-head with the tip of the spear or anything like that.”
“So is that what this civil war is about?” Rhonda asked, turning toward her. “More pretend soldiers going up against our actual military? Trying to take a stand?”
“I could see it. That might explain Ironclad’s role in this as well. The country goes down the drain and suddenly they have an opportunity to stop being a third-party contractor and start acting as the default military machine for the entire country? There’s gotta be a serious power trip there, not to mention a pretty lucrative deal financially.”
“With what money?” Phil asked. “America’s economy is currently in the crapper.”
“For how long? I’m sure Ironclad would be more than happy to work on credit until things start rebounding. Which, if they’re involved in this whole plot, they’re convinced they’ll be able to accomplish.”
Winnie shook her head and looked out the window at trees blurring past them. Two dark-colored vehicles half off the road streaked by them, and for a moment, she thought she saw the still form of someone lying next to one of them. She snapped her head away.
“So, this whole thing… this devastation. Millions of people dead. It’s all a power trip?” she asked.
“What else is war besides a power trip?” Rebecca replied. “It’s all about the cost of victory and the end goal. If Ironclad and their partners are making a play to overthrow the United States government, it’s much easier to push over a nation of civilians who are already reeling from national disaster.”
Rhonda looked out her own window, thinking of Rebecca’s words. Her parents were involved in this. She could see the puzzle pieces starting to slide together. For eighteen years she’d lived in their house and heard all manner of talk about the state of capitalism and the condition of the nation they loved. The government overreach, the fat and happy populace too comfortable to fight back. She’d heard it all and disregarded it all as the ranting of the disenfranchised. After all, what could they really do about any of it?
Alone, probably nothing. But in conjunction with one of the largest security contractors on the planet, the assistance of several other domestic militias, Mexican drug cartels, and an entire Asian super power? If they could coordinate all of their efforts?
Then, they could do it.
They had done it.
But they weren’t done yet. Some fragments of the government were still standing, and still fighting. Toledo was proof of that.
So what was “stage three”?
She wasn’t sure she wanted to find out.
The van chortled suddenly, almost like a muffled laugh, but Phil maintained control and guided it down the road, continuing the steady pace of travel.
“This thing going to hold together?” Rhonda asked. “I don’t like that noise.”
“It’s handling a little rough,” Phil replied, “we’ll have to see how it shakes out. We just crossed the Pennsylvania Turnpike, we’re less than twenty miles outside Pittsburgh. If we can keep this speed, we’ll be there in half an hour or forty minutes.”
As if in direct contrast to the previous statement, the van growled again, laboring, threatening to die completely, then revved at the last moment, surging back forward again.
“What’s goin’ on?” Angel asked from the rear of the vehicle. “You need to pull over and let me take a look?”
Phil was visibly struggling with the van now, his fingers clamped around the steering wheel as the vehicle lurched left, then right, the engine coughing.
“All right, I’m pulling over,” Phil said, veering the van toward the right-hand side of the road as it continued to chug. He managed to get the vehicle to the side of the road, surprisingly empty this close to another major city, and let the engine wind down into grumbling silence.
“It’s de
ad isn’t it?” Max asked.
“Please tell me it’s not dead,” Winnie said.
Phil sat in the seat, his hands on the wheel. “It might be dead.”
Rebecca moved toward one of the sliding side doors and eased it aside, then slipped from the van, careful not to bump her shoulder, while Angel followed just behind, jumping out onto the side of the road where the pavement met the grass. Max, Brad, Winnie and Tamar followed next, extracting themselves from the vehicle and making a show of stretching their arms and legs to loosen cramped joints.
“For crying out loud, we’ve been in the car for like ninety minutes,” Rhonda called out from the open passenger side window.
Angel peeked out from behind the van. “Bullet pierced the fuel tank,” he said. “Small hole so it took a while to leak out, but I think we’re stranded.”
“So, it’s dead,” Winnie said, looking up at the sky as if to accuse the world at large of being against her.
“Now what do we do?” asked Max. “Walk the rest of the way to Philadelphia? That’ll take a month!”
“Just take it easy,” Rhonda said, stepping out of her seat. She walked out onto the grass and turned, looking out over the expanse of the interstate they were on, but saw no vehicles in sight. No movements, no sign of life anywhere.
“Worse comes to worst,” she said, “we’re close enough to Pittsburgh to walk there, and I’m sure there are plenty of vehicles there. We’ll find something, okay?”
“What do we do until then?” Tamar asked. “We just grabbed a bunch of guns and ammo, we can’t just leave ‘em in the van.”
“We’ve got a few duffel bags in there,” Phil said, leaning up and out of the driver’s side door. “Let’s start loading them up. We’ll start moving East and just see what happens.”
Rebecca moved away from Angel and walked over to Rhonda, keeping her voice low. “I have to say I’m not a big fan of walking this stretch of highway for twenty miles. Who knows what might be going on out here.”
“I don’t disagree,” Rhonda replied. “You have any other ideas?”
Fields looked up toward the sky, squinting into the late morning sun. “I propose we get off the highway, first of all. North of Pittsburgh where we are is a residential area, I’m sure we can find cars in driveways or office buildings pretty easily.”
“I don’t want to go to anyone’s house. Not again,” Winnie said, wrapping her narrow arms around herself. Tamar moved next to her and put his arm around her shoulders.
“It’s okay,” Rebecca said quietly. “We’ll look for businesses. We can totally do that.”
Winnie nodded softly without replying.
Fields looked around with Rhonda pulling up next to her. The interstate they were on was flanked by thick trees making it seem like an isolated stretch of road, and the pervasive silence surrounding them certainly led to that conclusion as well. But if they’d learned anything it was that the world was a much quieter place without cars, without electricity… and without people.
“Do you know this area at all?” Rebecca asked.
Rhonda shook her head. “None of us are from here,” she said. “Whatever we decide to do, it’ll be a crapshoot.”
“According to the map, Pittsburgh is a straight shot southeast. As long as we keep moving that direction, we should get there before too long. Probably tomorrow at the latest, especially if we can find motorized transport.”
“Once we hit Pittsburgh we can hopefully find some food and some fuel and pick up 76 straight to Philly.”
Rebecca glanced over at Rhonda as she said this.
“What are you thinking?” Rhonda asked.
“Same thing you are, I imagine,” Fields replied.
“Pittsburgh is a city.”
“We have bad luck with cities.”
Rhonda nodded, then glanced over her shoulder back toward the van. “Let’s see what we find for transportation. Maybe we can find a way around without going through.”
Rebecca nodded, then turned away from the guardrail and walked back to the crowd. “All right, get those bags zipped up! We’re heading south through these trees to see what we can find.”
Angel and Phil moved toward the two duffel bags that Brad had pulled out of the van and worked with the kids to load up the boxes of ammunition and weapons, evenly spacing them between the two bags so they weren’t overly heavy. Angel ran the zipper up one of the bags and hefted it up onto his shoulder. Phil repeated the motion, trying not to look as if he was struggling. They all made their way toward the two women, who were stepping over the guardrail onto the slight downward slope leading down to the trees.
They could tell by the light through the leaves that the woods weren’t especially thick, but they were thick enough that they couldn’t see what was on the other side. Rebecca slid her Glock 32 out and held it in two hands as she approached the first line of trees, keeping the barrel down and using her shoulder to nudge through the first row of narrow trees. Rhonda came up on her left, her hands wrapped around a Smith and Wesson .380 caliber semi-automatic, one of the pistols they’d stolen from Lenny’s.
“Serious? We’re goin’ in there?” Tamar asked.
Max smirked. “What’s the matter, never seen trees before, city boy?”
“These are barely trees,” replied Winnie, rolling her eyes.
“Well excuse me for actually living in civilization.”
“Civilization is apparently overrated,” Max replied. “Look at the world now!”
“Funny guy,” Brad interjected as the group pushed its way into the trees. They moved through the branches, easing their way over uneven ground, ducking under narrow stalks and around the thickening trees. As they moved through, light from the other side broadened and split, the trees spreading apart a short distance ahead.
The noise went mostly unnoticed at first. A scrape and scuffle of leaves, the sound of a body moving through the trees.
A body that wasn’t theirs. Rebecca held up a hand. “Hold up,” she whispered, her fist tightening around the handle of her pistol. Leaves rusted to their right, trees actually shifting. This was no summer wind… someone else was in the trees.
Rebecca shifted, twisting at her waist and lifting her pistol, grasping it with both hands, pointing it at where the leaves moved, jostling left and right, a handful of leaves breaking away from a branch and scattering down to the ground.
Rhonda mimicked her motion, lifting her own pistol and standing stock still, the rest of the group taking the lead and holding their positions as well, slowly flanking around the two women.
There was a moment of silence, as if whatever was making the noise was bracing itself, coiling before striking… then the trees exploded apart and the beast charged, snarling, yelling and lunging toward them, nostrils flaring and teeth bared, fangs thirsting for blood.
***
“Shoot it shoot it shoot it!” screamed Winnie as she back pedaled through the clutch of trees, pressing them aside in a desperate scramble for escape. Rebecca’s arms snapped up, elbows locked, her eyes squinting down the length of the barrel of her Glock and she fired three times in swift succession, a rapid three shout bark of gunfire.
A lithe, slender, muscular beast, the creature was layered in matted beige fur with a lighter pale swath down its front chest and massive paws thudding on the grass at its feet as it charged.
“What is it?” Tamar shouted as he broke right, pushing through the tall, thin trees.
“Mountain lion!” Rhonda screamed, moving along with his motion, lifting her own pistol and firing shots at the charging creature. It was majestic, pure, unbridled, feral energy harnessed into the long and muscular body of the creature and she was almost in awe of it even as it pounced through brush and foliage toward the scattering group.
It made no move to stop, no indication that either round of gunfire had hit it or even startled it, but the precious seconds it took the beast to alter course to avoid trees saved the group from certain death. Winni
e, Rebecca and Brad moved left while Phil, Rhonda, Max, and Tamar moved right, both groups parting like the Red Sea before the charging creature. Angel scrambled straight backwards and if not for a stump that he tripped over, might have been lion chow. As he went down, the creature leaped just over him, landing in a sideways lunge, mouth splitting into a tooth-filled roar, black eyes narrowed. Angel twisted around on the duffel bag he was laying on, looping it back over his shoulder, wincing at the pain where the weapons within had dug into his back.
“I thought they were supposed to be more scared of us than we are of them!” Max shouted, following his group back around and toward the cracks of light showing through the far trees.
“Just move for the edge of the woods!” Rebecca yelled. “Angel! Are you okay?”
Angel was already scrabbling to his feet and lurching toward them as the creature plodded right, sizing them up before striking again. Fields was the first to burst through the tree line, almost stumbling out into unkempt grass, just catching a glimpse of a brickwork industrial park as she toppled forward, using her arms to brace her fall. Brad skidded to a halt and bent over, grabbing her arm to help her up, Winnie coming around on her other side.
“Get up, Rebecca!” Winnie shouted. “We need to get out of here!”
As she stood, Fields looked back and saw Rhonda and her group charging through the trees as well, running full tilt, Angel bringing up the rear. As if in slow motion, she saw the creature leap from the trees, its body a straight line in the air as it lunged, the beige blur of muscle and fur striking Angel in the left shoulder and knocking him roughly to the ground. The mountain lion landed a few feet from the fallen man, turning as it did, back paws kicking up dirt and torn grass. Rebecca brought her pistol up again, trying to bear down on the shifting creature.
