Shadows of Ash (The Nameless Book 2)

by Adrian J. Smith

  Ryan cursed himself for not trusting his gut. At times, his desire to see the good in everyone led to moments like these.

  He handed his Glock to the soldier and joined them in the elevator. He wanted nothing more than to disarm them. He knew he could. Back at the Lodge, they had trained over and over for situations like these. Confined spaces were difficult at best, but not many people attempted it, and guns gave people a sense of power. The soldiers’ rifles were no use in the elevator. Allie stared at him as if waiting for the signal. He shook his head with the barest of motions. Not with Dudek down there with Cal, Sofia, and Booth.

  Twenty-Eight

  Portland, Oregon

  Battles were messy. Not the ordered action people expected. It wasn’t like the 1700s when the British and French would line up and shoot each other, launching cannonball after cannonball. Cease fire at two for a cup of tea and cakes.

  No. They were chaotic and crazy. Bloody and noisy. People screamed. Not only in terror, but screamed out orders, each side trying to get the upper hand.

  The Outcast Mongrel Motorcycle Club had the firepower, but none of the training the Black Skulls had. A single glance told Zanzi how the battle was going to play out: everyone dead. The bikers might hold off the commandos for a short while, they may even kill a few, but they’d be lucky to survive. Herself and Tilly included. If what Traci said was true and there was an escape tunnel, they had a chance.

  They crept down the hallway as gunfire and shouts echoed around the bikers’ HQ. Zanzi used the same key to unlock all the rooms as she passed. She was met with gasps and stares. One or two of the captives stared back blankly, their hair stringy and their skin raw from scratches. Limbs with bruised skin. Meth, she guessed. She had seen the photos of what the drug did. Addicts scratched their skin, thinking there were bugs underneath. The addicts cringed at the sight of Zanzi and shooed her away.

  “C’mon, we can get out. Now’s your chance,” Zanzi said.

  “Leave us alone,” a girl said. A tattoo of a bulldog decorated her neck. Zanzi left them and urged Tilly to follow. Being an addict meant you wanted to be close to the source of your drug. Grub and the bikers knew this. Kept them fed. Kept them hungry. They demanded loyalty and got it, regardless of the danger.

  Zanzi unlocked the final door. One of the African American women and the scrawny white guy with blue hair turned, eyes wide. The other African American woman didn’t move.

  “What’s going on?” the one who’d turned said. “It sounds like SWAT are raiding the place. Are they raiding the place?” She laughed, nervous and shallow. “That would be a first – a black person wanting SWAT.”

  “It’s not SWAT. Worse. These guys will kill you,” Zanzi said.

  “Honey, you obviously never lived in my neighborhood.” She laughed again. “White girl, come in here, tell me what’s what.”

  “I’m Zanzi. We have a way out.”

  “Jacqueline. But call me Jacqui. Well, don’t stand there staring. Let’s go.”

  Zanzi couldn’t help the grin that spread across her face. Despite the death all around them, some people had a way with words, a way to make you smile. Her group now numbered four. Blue hair didn’t follow. He sat in the corner of the room, rocking back and forth. Nor did the second woman.

  “What about her?” Zanzi said.

  “Meth withdrawal. She’s not going anywhere,” Jacqui said.

  Like the prisoners in the other rooms, she was too strung out. It pained Zanzi to leave them behind.

  Traci guided them out a side door. The bar was twenty meters away. Problem was, standing behind it were Grub, Mutton, Axl, and several others, firing M4s, sweeping them from side to side. The Black Skulls had used an SUV to smash through the front gates. It had crashed into a row of motorcycles and become wedged. Bullet holes were everywhere like a chicken pox rash.

  “Traci. Where’s the tunnel exactly?”

  “In the beer cooler. That shed.”

  Zanzi followed her gesture. To one side was a square shed, white, like an outdoor walk-in refrigerator. If they circled both houses to her right, it was possible they could reach it.

  There was no more time to think. She grabbed Tilly’s hand and took off at a run. They ducked under beer-stained clothes hanging on a crude line, jumped over engine parts stacked on narrow concrete paths, and over dead gang members with pools of blood leaking from head wounds. They kept as low as they could.

  At the back of the first house, Zanzi saw a chance. A dozen or so Rabids had been locked inside another cage and were agitated, worked up into a frenzy. Maybe they could smell the blood. Maybe they could just sense the humans they craved. Several wildly rattled the wire mesh, so desperate to get out, the mesh was slicing into their ivory flesh. Saliva dripped from their clenched teeth.

  Zanzi checked her perimeter. They were out of sight here. The battle was taking place at the front of the HQ. Something puzzled her; why hadn’t the Black Skulls attacked from the rear at the same time? She shook away her questions and refocused on escaping.

  “Wait here. I’m going to release those creatures as a diversion.”

  “Oh hell no. You mad?” Jacqui said.

  “It sounds crazy, I know, but it’s the best way.”

  “It just doesn’t sound crazy. It is.”

  Tilly grinned. “You remind me of my friend Tenisha. She was sassy too. I think that’s the word… sassy. Where does that word come from?”

  “Your girl all right?” Jacqui said.

  “This is Tilly, and she is,” Zanzi said. She took off, not looking back. The suckers howled as she drew closer. The door was locked with a single padlock and a bolt. She glanced around for keys but saw only tools next to a partly dismantled Indian motorcycle. Zanzi grabbed a ball-peen hammer and smashed the lock. It fell to the ground as the suckers screamed and rattled the cage with newfound fury. They were hungry. Starving. Their need for spinal fluid had whipped them into an uncontrollable frenzy. Before she could second-guess her decision, she unlatched the bolt and sprinted, waving her little group toward the second house. Thankfully the Rabids ran straight into the battle, toward the louder sound. Shouts and screams replaced the shooting for a few moments as the opposing forces refocused their attentions. Zanzi had nailed the diversion, and she needed to use it.

  She rounded the corner of the house and nearly ran into a biker. He was holding his stomach, blood pooling through his fingers. His skin was pale and clammy. His eyes focused on her, lids drooping.

  “A little help.”

  Before Zanzi could answer, Jacqui brushed past her and slammed her fist into the biker’s face. “Racist piece of shit. See that wound. That’s a gut shot. You gonna die nice and slow like. And don’t think you’re gonna meet Jesus. No, you gonna see Lucifer himself.” She punched him again as bullets thudded into the bricks above her head.

  Zanzi yanked her down and scanned the vicinity. She didn’t spot anyone. The firefight was still around the front of the house, and the high fence stopped any snipers. The HQ was in an industrial area – no tall buildings. Where did the shots come from? More bullets smacked into the house, pinning the group down.

  “Under here,” Traci said. “I hide from Grub when he’s too rough.” She kicked open the access door to the crawl space. Jacqui grumbled and muttered, but she followed.

  It was a tight squeeze, and full of cobwebs and trash. Candy bar wrappers and beer cans. Old take-out boxes and the smell of rotting food.

  Zanzi ignored it and crawled on, Tilly beside her. Traci opened a second access door. The beer cooler and their chance of freedom was only thirty feet away.

  “Tell me about this tunnel, Traci.” Zanzi turned to look at the strung-out girl who dipped her finger in the bag of meth again. “Where does it lead?”

  “I don’t know. I’ve only seen inside once. Grub told me to get something and not to try to escape. Said it was their emergency route or something. These guys feared the pigs big time. Mostly those DEA guys…” Her vo
ice trailed off as she dipped her finger into the bag of meth once more.

  “How do we get inside?”

  “There’s stairs and a trapdoor.”

  Zanzi looked toward the bar. Dead Rabids lay amongst bikers and Black Skulls. A few were only injured, and still trying to crawl toward the humans. Grub and his bikers were crouched behind the bar, reloading. Some bled from wounds.

  “I’m scared,” Tilly whispered.

  “It’s okay to be scared. It means you’re alive. Stay close to me, okay?” Zanzi said.

  As they watched, something snapped inside Traci. Maybe it was seeing all the blood and carnage. Maybe it was seeing her tormentors vulnerable, pinned down by armed men. Zanzi would never know.

  Traci, screaming curses, burst from the crawlspace firing a P229. Most of her rounds went wide or hit the bar, but one scored a hit. Right through Mutton’s throat. Grub whipped his head around and he gaped. The Black Skulls reacted and charged, their rifles cracking as they released three-round bursts. Traci’s body jolted as bullets tore into her body – and those of the remaining bikers. First Axl and then Grub went down, holes blown out in their skulls, lifeless eyes staring at nothing.

  Zanzi knew this was their chance. She hauled Tilly and Jacqui out and fired a couple of rounds at the commandos to keep them guessing as they ducked into the beer cooler.

  Boxes upon boxes were stacked inside, leaving barely enough room to move. Like Traci had said, there was a trapdoor in the back room. With Jacqui’s help, Zanzi lifted it and blinked. Lights flickered on. It was crude, but efficient.

  The motorcycle gang had used stormwater concrete pipes, over two meters in diameter, to build a storage/escape system.

  Rounds hit the shed. The sound echoed, rattling the metal siding. “Hurry,” Zanzi said, and shut the trapdoor behind them.

  “White girl leading me into a tunnel like she’s some savior on the underground railway,” Jacqui muttered.

  The storage area consisted of several small rooms branching off from the entrance. Zanzi ignored them, but spotted what looked like bales of cannabis, cocaine, and crystal meth. One room had unopened boxes of electronics. LED TVs and laptops. Another held crates of ammo. She paused at the ammo room and cracked open a couple of crates. She grabbed some boxes of nine-millimeter rounds, cramming them into her pockets. Jacqui followed her and whistled when she found a case with more P229s. She took one and clicked in a magazine.

  “Now I feel better,” she said.

  As they left the ammo room, a dull explosion rumbled above. Had the Black Skulls finally stormed through the back?

  On they walked. The tunnel was clear of trash, swept clean, and well lit. It didn’t take them long to reach the end – perhaps twenty minutes. Rough concrete steps had been cast, leading up to another trapdoor.

  “I’ll go first,” Zanzi said.

  “Damn right,” Jacqui said.

  Zanzi spent a few seconds waiting, listening. There was no sound from the other side of the trapdoor. Carefully she cracked it open. Darkness greeted her like silence in the night. Scents of oil and grease wafted in the still air, and there was no movement. Once they were all through, the light from the tunnel revealed that they were in a mechanic workshop, down in the trench where the mechanic can work on the underside of the car. The doors were down, and the windows shut. Vehicles in various stages of repair sat around the workshop, and a pile of ash was between two of them. Someone had returned and closed the workshop after the event.

  The three escapees huddled in the back office to look out the grimy window. Gray smoke poured from the bikers’ HQ, clouding the early morning sky. If they bothered to search the HQ, the Black Skulls would find the tunnel and follow it.

  “What now?” Jacqui said. “Who the hell were those guys?”

  “We call them Black Skulls.”

  “Did they cause all this?”

  “I don’t know. Tilly and I have been trying to avoid them. They’re rounding up survivors and taking them to camps. There’s something about them I don’t trust. I’ve seen them wearing FEMA jackets, but more often than not it’s plain black fatigues. They’re ruthless, gunning survivors down.” Zanzi checked her magazine and clicked it back in. “I have a friend on the other side of Portland. He can help. He has food and water. A warm place to sleep. But it’s imperative that we’re not observed going there. You’re welcome to come.”

  Tilly hugged Zanzi, her arms squeezing tight.

  Jacqui looked at the two women and glanced back toward the tunnel. “I was heading up to Seattle. See if my family were still alive. No one I knew was. All…” She pointed at the person-shaped pile of ash. “Everyone was like that. Did y’all feel that pain and black out?”

  “More or less,” Zanzi said. She wanted to tell Jacqui everything. Warn her what was really going on. She deserved to know. Or was ignorance better?

  “Well, after I came to, I checked on everyone I knew. No one was left. I stayed home for a few days, too scared to move. Ate all my food. But you know what finally drove me out?”

  Zanzi shook her head.

  “Damn coffee. I ran out of coffee. I was in the store helping myself when the bikers showed up. Next thing I know guns are pointing at me and I’m in the room with those other two.”

  “If you take back roads, you might make it to Seattle. But like I said, you’re welcome to come with us.”

  Jacqui smiled. Small at first, spreading into a wide grin. “Food and water. Hot shower?”

  “Should be. Yes.”

  “Honey, you had me at food. Better be some coffee too. Look, I’m shaking from withdrawals.” She held up her shaking fingers as if to prove her words and grabbed a wrench off a nearby tool chest. “Just in case.”

  They found a set of keys hanging in the office and used them to let themselves out. Jacqui offered to guide them, as she was a local. Zanzi glanced over her shoulder at the gray smoke. Whatever Josie had decided, she vowed to find her again and ask for help. Her knowledge of nanites was vital. If they were to have any chance at beating Offenheim, they needed her on their side. Josie understood how they were programmed, how they could be used against their masters.

  Zanzi laced her fingers into Tilly’s and followed Jacqui deeper into the wooded area, toward the Willamette River.

  Twenty-Nine

  Makushin Bay, Aleutian Islands

  Colonel Dudek was waiting for Ryan and Allie as the door of the elevator opened. He had his Beretta M9 pointing at Sofia’s head. Cal, hands raised, stood to one side, two meters in front.

  Booth was slumped against the wall, a scorch mark on his neck. Allie brushed past Dudek, crying as she knelt next to Booth. Ryan flicked his eyes over the mark. From this distance, it was hard to tell what had caused it. He just hoped the nanites were healing Booth.

  “Ah, Connors. Thanks for joining us.”

  “Why are you doing this? We both serve the United States.”

  “Yes, I do. And there is your answer. You and your team are on the traitors list sent out by President Ward. To be taken dead or alive, like a good old-fashioned bounty.”

  “President Ward?”

  “Newly sworn in,”

  “I thought we’d already cleared that up?”

  Dudek said nothing to Ryan. He took a phone off the wall. “Come on down.” The colonel looked back to Ryan and pressed the barrel of the M9 harder against Sofia’s temple. “I have orders to stop you and bring you in. Someone wants to see you and your wife badly.” He grinned.

  Sofia drove her elbow into his sternum and stomped on his foot causing the colonel to release his grip. At the same time, Ryan dropped, pivoted and swept out a leg. He caught the two soldiers completely unaware. First one tumbled over, then the next. As Sofia and Ryan sprang into action, Cal dove forward at the soldiers. She grabbed Ryan’s Glock from the soldier’s waistband and tossed it to him. In one fluid motion, he shot both soldiers in the head.

  Bang!

  Bang!

  Dudek shot
Ryan twice in the arm, causing him to drop the Glock. “You guys have balls, I’ll give you that.” He laughed, pulled out a wicked-looking cattle prod and zapped Sofia in the chest. Her body jolted and she fell. Ryan barely saw Dudek give Cal an electric shock. Her head jerked back, and she gasped and staggered, her eyes searching for Ryan’s. She tried to stand up, but Dudek shocked her again, twice, in the chest. Next, he zapped Allie in the back. She slumped over Booth, twitched, and lay still.

  Ryan grimaced at the pain and clamped his hand over his already-healing wounds. He was struggling to comprehend what had just happened. The Nameless, taken out in seconds. Defeated by a single man.

  “You see, Connors, you’re no match for me. I don’t only serve the United States. I serve something greater. Something that’s going to take us to the next phase as a species. Wednesday was just the beginning. For too long we’ve stood by and watched the weak and insignificant suckle at our teat. I traveled the world, saw the filth, and wanted better. I was given that chance. A seat at the table. Now we are just mopping up the dregs, tying up the loose ends.”

  Dudek holstered his M9. “I heard rumors that you could fight. Really fight. How about we settle this like warriors of old. With our hands and feet. No weapons. If you defeat me, you can finish what you came here to do.”

  Before Ryan could answer, the elevator dinged, and the two helicopter pilots emerged. They glanced around but didn’t seem surprised at the carnage.

  “Set the charges. I’ll be done in a minute,” Dudek instructed, waving them away.

  The pilots did as he asked, pulling explosive charges from a bag as they went.

  Ryan looked at his arm. The bullets had gone through the fleshy part of his forearm. Already the blood had clotted. The nanites were doing their job. Did the colonel know that he and the others had elite status?

  He kept his eyes downcast and slowly flexed his muscles. Yes, he could fight. John Stapleton – his mentor – had trained him hard, breaking him over and over as he taught him martial arts. Brawling, wrestling. Anything and everything. Techniques to disarm and kill a man in a blink of an eye.