It was a lewd image – the colors of life totally stripped away and muted into a bizarre kind of brown and grey sterility. The leaves of the tress had all dropped away and were being blown about in a lifeless breeze. The wind came forth as a kind of mocking, gentle current that only added to the lasciviousness of the specter. Even the branches of lifeless trees seemed to lift up twisted, knotty fingers, screaming towards the heavens in their own kind of bitter, pleading death-throes. To Warren it was a scene not just of desolation and devastation, but it was also one of hopeless terror. He shuddered at the panorama of such complete horror frozen in the radiant sunlight of lifelessness all about him.
“Damn you! Stop right where you are!” he screamed at his friends, who had wholly disappeared behind a sheer rock facade.
As Warren rounded the rock face, he saw Wattenbarger leaning over Mel who was kneeling and vomiting, her whole body convulsing again and again. Her small son was lying beside her, still unconscious, his skin appearing a ghastly light purple in the appalling light of the devastating sun.
Warren quickly stepped beside them, snatched the boy and tossed him over his shoulder like a bag of grain. “Grab the woman, Dale, and let’s get back, NOW!” he shouted, turning to lead the way.
Mel leapt to her feet and lunged at Warren . “Give me my son! You monster, give me my son!” she screamed in desperation, a sickly, discolored drool running down her cheeks and chin as she began to claw at Warren’s arms.
Warren gripped her firmly by the chin and held her at arm’s length. “I see there’s no blood in your vomit, Mel. You might just live after all,” he said firmly with no compassion. Then he thrust her toward Wattenbarger, stating, “Dale, if you value your life or anyone else’s, latch onto this woman and follow me. And be quick about it, minutes count here! Lance, you with us?” His eyes darted to Charles’ who stared back at him with contempt and said nothing in return.
“Grab her and go!” Warren commanded again as they all just stared at him - even in the full light of the brilliant, dangerous sun. With that, he led the way in a half-run toward the entrance to Miller’s Cave. As he did so, he looked back and saw Wattenbarger toss a sobbing Mel over his shoulder and begin to quickly follow along with Charles.
The trek back seemed inordinately long. To Warren , his feet moved in slow motion. While no one really knew how long it would take being outside in the mid-afternoon sun to get a fatal dose, there were many estimates floating about and much conjecture. Some of it depended on sun angle and the actual stage of the storm itself. But the most significant variable was the condition of the organism receiving the radiation. The very young and the very old were particularly susceptible. Body weight, body composition and state of the immune system also had a lot to do with survivability.
But the standard estimate was that some period less than one hour was the longest even the most adept and strongest human could hope to survive outside in these conditions. While they had been out far less than that, none of them would escape the effect of the radiation dose they had just all received. And Warren knew that the chance that the child would survive had already plunged to as close to zero as anyone could without catching a glimpse of the already heavily overworked Angel of Death.
As he finally rounded the uneven path’s corner to face his sanctuary, he paused to see where his friends were. Charles led and needed no encouragement as Warren pointed the way into the cave. “Get inside, Lance, get deep!” Warren shouted as he ran by.
Then he saw it.
Sitting on a rock outcropping just 10 feet above the opening to the cave was a rocky knoll. Atop that was the largest coyote Warren had ever seen; reclining, head up, staring down on them. The face of the animal was focused down on where he stood, and he met the great creature eye-to-eye. The coyote’s eyes stared back at him in crystalline perfection. They were wide, black and commanding eyes, but they were also very dead. The powerful animal had died there and the radiation had perfectly preserved it as it sat overlooking their cave. It had probably been there for many weeks, yet in the night, they had simply not seen it. But its image transfixed Warren where he stood as Wattenbarger ran by.
As he passed Warren, Wattenbarger stopped and looked up, seeing what Warren saw. He, too, paused, but just for a moment. “Warren, snap out of it pal, seconds count!” he warned, slapping Warren ’s bare right arm then yanking on it.
The contact snapped Warren out of his spell. “Yeah, of course,” he said, breaking his focus on the animal. Then he ran quickly into the shelter of the cave followed by Wattenbarger, hoping never to see the sun again as long as he lived – and hoping he lived never to see it.
They retreated to the security of their subterranean chamber, falling to the sand, exhausted. Wattenbarger gently laid Mel down onto the sand, but she immediately jumped to her feet and rushed toward Warren .
“Give me my son!… give me…” she said, her hands grasping in the air.
Warren rose onto his knees to brace himself against the rushing woman. He laid the boy out in front of him, balancing him on his hands, closely examining him. His fingers touched the boy’s neck and he felt a strong pulse. He lowered his ear to the boy’s nose and observed a strong and steady breathing. For all intents and purposes, it appeared as though he were in a deep sleep.
But Mel fell short of him and began to retch uncontrollably.
“It’s called radiation sickness, Mel, and you just tripled whatever dose you had before, along with the rest of us,” Warren said evenly. “By this time tomorrow, we’ll all be joining you. But I need to know some things about you and this boy, here. Where did you come from? I know for a fact you haven’t been hiding out in that outer vestibule for very long – not even a day. You got here last night, am I right? And how did you find us?”
“One question at a time, Lew,” Wattenbarger replied for Mel, as he knelt beside her, gently laying his hand on the small of her back.
“Each one of those questions means life and death for one or all of us,” Warren responded. “And we need to know the answers in very short order.”
“We came from our own cave along the ridge to the south of here,” she responded, wiping the mess from her mouth, still eyeing her child in Warren ’s hands. “Our stream ran out and we went looking for water when we got caught by sunrise, so we hid out here. I took my chances outside there because I didn’t know what you’d do to us if you found us. I was going to leave just like I came in at dusk. I hoped you’d never know we were there.”
“In your other cave, do you have any food stored?” Warren asked with brutal and relentless efficiency.
“Not much. There’s some, but not much.”
“Anybody else there with you?”
“My brother-in-law, but he’s dead. He died last week.”
“How?”
“Shot himself, the coward,” Mel said as she literally spat in his memory.
“I’m startin’ to like this woman!” Warren said, suppressing a full laugh. Then, without warning, he added bluntly, “You can stay.”
“Don’t do me any favors, you SOB,” she responded without hesitation. “We don’t need your help.”
“Keep talkin’ lady. I’m beginning to like you more and more. Your son – why’s he so sick? Was he exposed before today?”
“I don’t know. He just got more and more tired and then wouldn’t wake up,” she responded, her voice breaking from a thin-edged grief.
“Chronic radiation sickness,” Warren replied. “It affects children first, then the adults in the same way. Your cave, was it higher up on the ridge than here?”
“Yes, I think it was,” she responded flatly. “So what?”
“Your shielding was inadequate. You were too close to the surface to filter enough out. You didn’t get a fatal dose, but you got one that made you sick. Your son here, he got it worse than you because children are more sensitive. What’s his name?”
Mel just stared back at him suspiciously and did not reply.
“His name is Alex.”
“Thank-you. We’ll have to rig up an IV immediately and force fluids on our pal Alex here. Minutes count, let’s get it done.
“Lance, over there in my field first aid kit…”
“Is he gonna be okay?” Mel asked, frightened, not turning her dirty face or taking her eyes off of her little son.
Warren nodded slowly. “The signs… they all look good.”
“Please help him mister,” Mel desperately pleaded in a whisper. As she watched, Marbles approached the sleeping child warily, sniffed him, then curled up comfortably beside him.
“Let me guess, Lew,” Charles said, now more characteristically cynical. “You got an IV set-up along with everything else in that little bag?”
“Yes, I do.”
“Figures,” Charles said as he stood and headed toward Warren ’s well stocked supply shelf.
“Y’all have a dog?… Here?” Mel asked, surprised.
“Well, he’s not much of a dog, really,” Warren explained. “He’s kinda touched in his empty, black little doggie head; you know, he rode the little poochie short-bus. But he doesn’t eat much and Lance has kinda taken to him.”
“Okay folks, let’s get a move on,” Warren warned abruptly, as he placed Alex across his shoulder and began to gently pat his back and rock him. “Fatigue is gonna set in big-time for all of us. By midnight none of us will feel like movin’. By tomorrow morning we’re all gonna be pukin’ our guts out. If you have anything to do, better get it done now. We’re all gonna be out of commission for about three or four days. It’s gonna feel like the flu from hell, so get ready.”
Charles returned carrying Warren ’s huge first aid bag and dropped it at his feet.
Warren gently laid Alex on the sand and pulled off the boy’s underwear.
“Damn!” Charles exclaimed as they both recoiled from the stench of the dirty pants.
“This boy needs a serious bath,” Warren responded with a wrinkled nose.
“I’ll do that. Let me do that; he’s my son,” Mel said weakly.
“Here’s the way this is goin’ down,” Warren countered quickly. He reached into his bag and recovered three squares covered in paper. He withdrew his knife and sliced them in half, tossing one of them to Charles.
“You get to be first,” he said, “right after I clean up the boy.”
“Soap? Why do I need this?” Charles asked. “That stream stinks a lot worse than me!”
Warren tossed another half-bar to Wattenbarger. “You may join him; this is no longer a negotiable issue.” Then he tossed a half-bar to Mel. “You may actually go first, or last, since you’re our newest resident – it’s your choice.”
She clutched her bar tenderly then looked back at Warren and said in a weak voice, “Thank-you; I appreciate this more than you can ever know. I’ll go last so I can take my time.”
“Good plan. But knowing these guys, you won’t have to wait long anyway. I’ll be third then I’ll make sure no one is peeking when you get your turn. Take as long as you’d like. The water smells a bit, but it’s really crystal clear, relatively cool and has no germs I’ve been able to find.”
Then Warren looked more serious, as he said, “And after bath time, we’re gonna have a community dinner and meeting, right here.”
“Oh, brother, here it comes,” Charles said, shaking his head slowly.
“Let’s try and make it less than an hour, people,” Warren suggested. “We need to get as much food digested and energy in our systems as we can before the nausea sets in”.
Mel looked back at Warren with tears streaming down her face, and said, “I just can’t tell you how hungry I am… thank-you so much for everything…”
Warren smiled back, gently picked Alex up from the ground, and looked at Mel. “I’m gonna get this boy washed, cleaned up and make him a new pair of skivvies. Then I’m gonna start his IV and break out dinner. You’re invited to make yourself at home, Mel. By the way, I’m sorry I said those things before; you really are welcome to stay and share whatever we have. I may be a curmudgeon with a big ugly boot stickin’ outta my huge mouth, but I at least believe I have a heart once and awhile…I least I think I do.”
Wattenbarger and Charles just stared back at him with gaping mouths as though they had never heard a civil word from his mouth. Then Wattenbarger tossed his soap into the air and smiled weakly at Charles. “I believe you’re first, bro…”
Just over an hour later, dinner was served. Everyone had bathed and Alex lay quietly in a deep sleep on his own pallet with a IV drip expertly placed in his right arm. They each donated various articles of attire to Mel who sat in clean but grossly oversized clothing. They ate ravenously while she explained how her family had all succumbed to the radiation while holed up in a woefully under-shielded home tornado cellar. She explained how her bother-in-law, she and Alex had barely managed to climb to a cave he had discovered in a nearby ridge of the mountain. His illness and misery had become so severe that he shot himself in the head while she slept. She then related how she and Alex remained in the cave for another week, scavenging food and water where they could find it. When the creek nearest the cave ran dry, they were scouting the ridge for new provisions when they stumbled upon Miller’s Cave.
At the end of dinner, Warren walked to his tent and emerged holding a camouflaged bag. He approached the trio and sat before them.
“Now, on to the purpose of this meeting,” he said with a sly smile.
“Oh brother, here it comes,” Charles responded, rolling his eyes back.
“Why do you keep saying that?” Mel asked, her skin noticeably more pale now that the grime was washed away.
“You’re about to find out,” he replied. “He thinks he’s in charge of everything and everybody.”
“If this meeting is called to elect you president of Miller’s Cave, forget it!” Wattenbarger said, laughing and reclining back on his elbows.
“How do you get all this electric power? Where does it come from?” Mel asked suddenly.
“Later!” all three men responded in unison.
Warren laughed and removed the bag covering four bottles of Coors.
Wattenbarger’s eyes blazed as he sat straight up, staring at the bottles.
“It’s warm beer, but, hey, it’s beer,” Warren said with a proud smile. “I’ve been saving it for just the right moment. I saved it - the last of the stash from our old friend, Teddy Jack Eddy, rest his soul.”
“Holy cow! It’s real beer!” Wattenbarger said eagerly.
“And you may have the very first bottle, my friend,” Warren said, handing Wattenbarger the bottle end-first.
“He’s buyin’ votes!” Charles exclaimed, pointing his finger at Warren . “Damn if he ain’t shamelessly buyin’ votes! No way, don’t take it! I’m not takin’ mine!”
Wattenbarger stood where he was, gripped the bottle, twisted off the top and guzzled it all down without stopping. As soon as the last drop had been emptied into his mouth, he tossed the bottle with a crash against a far wall and whooped loudly. “No way am I voting you for President, Lew! Hell, I’m voting you Grand Pompous Overlord of the Freakin’ Universe! And I’ll be your campaign manager!”
Then Mel stood beside him, twisted the cap off her bottle and upended it, just as Wattenbarger had done. She, too, drank every last drop in a single swig. Then, looking over at her son lying where Warren had placed him, she said, coughing, “Yeah, me, too… You can be anything you want.” Then she shattered her bottle against the wall. “And I’ll be your body-guard. Anybody says anything nasty about you, they have to answer to me personally!”
Every eye turned toward Charles. Long seconds passed. He finally stood, twisted the cap off of his bottle and drank it down in a single gulp then said, “Don’t want to cross no drunk. Don’t want to cross no fairy. Don’t want to
cross no woman. Don’t want to cross no genius. Don’t want to cross no politicians, no preachers, no Ayatollahs, no used car salesmen and no quantum storms.” Then he smashed his bottle against the cave wall, whooped loudly, shook his rear and shouted, “I’m in, baby! Count me in!”
The rest of the evening was recorded in Warren ’s journal as one filed with laughter, jokes, and extra rations. For the first time, they truly functioned as a unified family.
The next morning they would all awake with much more than a simple hangover.
43
Striker Legend’s eyes scanned the multi-colored panels and displays all around him. In the black ocean depths there was no vision except for a complex electronic view interpreted from acoustic energy. No submariner ever looked out his window to see his enemy because there were no windows. Vision underwater was all formed by carefully and specifically developed sonar imaging reconstructed from reflected sound.
The image Legend saw relentlessly approaching them was reflected from the powerful backwash of a nuclear engine. It was pieced together by his constellation of hovering SROVs all depicting the same thing – a six thousand ton juggernaut homing in for the kill, armed with a rack of Shkval rocket powered super-torpedoes that could travel in excess of 200 knots under water. These three ton torpedoes, some twenty seven feet in length, were so deadly and so fast that no vessel could ever hope to evade them, especially not the Phoenix that hung silent and nearly motionless in the deep blue Pacific void.
“Baker, what’s the status of your little robot number eight?” Legend whispered evenly, referring to the ROV that carried the homing device left by the hand of the late Dr. Adams.
“It’s headed away from us at top speed,” Baker answered quietly, sitting at his control panel. It was Baker whose fingers commanded the remarkable acoustic defenses of the Phoenix . In his command was the constellation of SROVs that all hovered between the approaching Chinese submarine and the Phoenix hanging motionless some 75 feet beneath the surface of the Pacific Ocean.
Quantum Storms - Aaron Seven Page 34
