by James Frey
They don’t bother with helmets.
No point. Not like anyone’s going to pull them over and write them a ticket.
There are hardly any vehicles moving around. Sarah guesses that the blast from Abaddon, while devastating to large areas of the eastern seaboard, had the added effect of washing at least half of the country in a giant electromagnetic pulse, frying nearly every circuit east of the Mississippi. And she is correct. This is why no one’s out driving around—their cars simply don’t work. The motorcycle works because its engine is purely mechanical—including its kick-starter. As they take their ride and begin to get a ground’s-eye view of what Abaddon has wrought—even over a thousand miles away way from the point of impact—it dawns on Sarah that if people could go somewhere, they wouldn’t know where to go. Most of them must be holed up at home, taking stock of food, water, batteries, fuel, clothing, pets, livestock, and, this being America, guns and ammunition. People are hunkering down and waiting, trying to get news from the radio or neighbors or whatever authority figure they can find.
People are scared.
Sitting on the back of the bike and using a paper map, Sarah navigates them around St. Louis to the north, crossing the Mississippi River on a completely dead I-270, which cuts over Chouteau Island. The four-lane highway is peppered with derelict cars, abandoned right where they died. Many have their doors open. Many overflow with personal items and things that will soon be thought of as supplies.
Might as well be zombies out here, she thinks as they motor over the short causeway into Illinois.
After a short ride on the Illinois side Sarah squeezes Jago with her legs and they exit the highway, taking local roads that wind east and south. Monks Mound is very close. She sees it on the map, but more than that she feels it in her skin.
They turn onto Horseshoe Lake Road. Jago goes right down the double yellow line. No cars, abandoned or otherwise. A wall of hardwoods and power lines on their right. A grass tract on their left abutted by a line of modest two-story homes. A few people run into their houses when they hear the prattle of the motorcycle engine. One man doesn’t run. He has a long hunting rifle, the butt parked on his hip. He waves them down. Jago brakes to a stop.
Sarah pulls the respirator from her face. “Need any help, mister?” she yells.
“Sure I do! Can you clear the skies and turn the power back on?”
“Wish I could.”
“Yeah, well . . . I was flagging you ’cause you probably shouldn’t go that way, less you want trouble.”
Sarah runs a finger over her map, scanning it for the name of a nearby town. “Unfortunately we have to go that way. Got a big sister over in Shiloh with two little ones,” Sarah lies. “Haven’t heard from her since before. Need to make sure they’re all right.”
“I hear you, then. You know where all this ash is coming from, by the way? Ain’t nothing on the radio. Can’t be that Abaddon, can it?”
“Nah. I heard that Yellowstone blew up. Abaddon probably triggered it or something. There’s a huge volcano under there.”
“Yellowstone? Old Faithful Yellowstone?”
“That’s the one.”
He runs a hand through his hair a couple times, clearly distressed. “Goddamn. I mean, I know this is Illinois and all, but we ain’t in Kansas anymore, are we, miss?”
Sarah nearly laughs. She’s happy to be home, if only for a short visit. “No, we’re not.”
Jago says quietly, “What’s he mean?”
“I’ll explain later,” Sarah says.
The man says, “Well, be careful out there, you two.” He leans to the side and squints, eyeing the pistols on their waists and the rifle-shaped duffels strapped to their bike. He says something to himself that Sarah can’t hear, but she can read his lips: “Looks like you’re being careful.”
“We will, mister. You too.”
They wave to one another and Sarah and Jago take off.
But not more than half a mile away they stop again.
A black Ford police cruiser is ditched on the right side of the road. Its front doors and trunk are open. The communications console mounted to the dashboard is shot to pieces, probably by a shotgun blast. But far more disturbing is the taut rope that leads from under the car’s rear bumper, angling toward the crossbeam of a nearby telephone pole, and over it, to the lifeless body of a uniformed cop hanged 15 feet above. They can’t see his face. He’s missing his shoes, and a black sock is bunched around the arch of his right foot. His gun holster is empty. His hands are purple. One is clenched in a fist.
Jago bounds off the bike to inspect the car. Sarah slides forward in the saddle and draws her pistol. “Nada,” Jago says. “Weapons are gone. Handcuffs, ammo, pepper spray, all of it.”
She stares at the dead man. “Bad omen, huh?”
“Bad for him, anyway.”
“Yeah. We should cut him down.”
Jago rummages through the trunk. “There’s a tarp in here. We could cover him, no?”
They work together to get him on the ground and laid out and covered at the base of the telephone pole, which takes on the double purpose of a grave marker. Sarah makes sure to close his swollen and bloodshot eyes before laying the tarp over him. She lays stones around its edge to keep the wind from blowing it off. She says a quiet prayer for him in her old Cahokian tongue.
They carry on.
They turn right onto Bruns Road, a meager strip of frost-heaved asphalt, and head south. The land is flat and dark, the road straight. The soybean plants on either side of the road are, like everything, covered in a thin layer of volcanic ash. They pass a farmhouse and a huge willow tree. They turn right onto another farm road and then left. The land begins to roll. More trees. Sarah looks at her map. Closer now. The road passes over I-55/I-70. They see more abandoned vehicles on the highway. One car creeps along in the distance, its yellow hazards flashing and its headlights cutting eerie beams through the dusty air.
A scavenger who, like them, lucked into finding a functioning vehicle.
Sarah looks to her left. If her memory serves her, it should be there. And yes, over the tops of a stand of trees she makes it out. A flat-topped earthen pyramid covered in grass, about 92 feet high and 951 feet long. Sarah knows from her studies that it’s also 836 feet across, meaning that at its base it’s a little larger than the Great Pyramid of Giza.
Jago banks the bike onto Collinsville Road. And then they slow down abruptly.
Yes, Monks Mound is there, waiting for them. Maybe Sun Key is hidden in its depths. Maybe not. And to the south is the Maker weapon Sarah wants to find.
But first they have to deal with the danger that the nice man warned them about.
Sarah twirls her finger next to Jago’s face, asking if he wants to turn around to avoid trouble.
He answers by gunning the throttle and rushing toward it.
A hundred yards later he pulls to a stop, the bike angled across the road at 45 degrees. He cuts the engine and kicks down the stand. Neither gets off.
They stare straight ahead.
“This is gonna get ugly, Feo.”
“Sí. Stay sharp.”
“You know me.”
Eight motorcycles are pulled to the edge of the fields. As many men in leather vests and dirty jeans and dark leather boots are nearby. A car, apparently still functioning, is hemmed in by the bikers. One bike has a pair of black boots tied to the bitch bar. An argument is well underway.
“Hey!” a towering man built like a castle yells to Sarah and Jago when he notices them. He points. “Whose bike’s that?”
“Ours, amigo,” Jago says through his respirator.
“I ain’t your friend.” The biker walks toward them to get a better look at the Harley. “And that ain’t gonna be yours for much longer, hombre. Like the look of that gas mask too.”
“Es bueno,” Jago concedes.
Sarah gets off and rests her good hand on her pistol. “Not to point out the obvious, but by my count each of y
ou already has a bike. How do you plan on taking ours also? You use some pixie biker dust to ride two at once?” While she talks she peeks past the biker at the car. It’s an early 2000s silver Ford Taurus, a lot like the one they keep at her family’s Niobrara River compound in western Nebraska. This one is dinged up badly, as if it’s taken a few direct hits with baseball bats or, as is more likely, falling debris. It has no plates. There appears to be a single occupant, a driver, probably male. She can’t tell if he’s speaking to the bikers surrounding him, but she can tell that he’s locked himself in and that the bikers are growing frustrated.
“Hey, Curly,” the large biker shouts over his shoulder, “we got us some more smart-asses.”
Curly leans from behind a man much bigger than him and says, “Who’s that, Misty?”
Misty? Sarah thinks.
Jago laughs quietly.
“These two. Got a nice ride. Eighty-something XLS.” Curly gives the giant an order and extracts himself from the car situation. Curly isn’t much taller than five feet. He’s as thin as rope and moves like it too, in a loose, boneless gait. He carries what is clearly the hanged police officer’s shotgun in his left hand and in his right a buck knife, which he twirls expertly.
“Howdy, travelers. Name’s Curly. And you are?” He addresses Jago.
Jago shrugs. He slouches nonchalantly in the saddle. “Sólo hablo un poco de inglés. Sorry.” He makes a point of rolling his Rs.
“We’re just passing through,” Sarah answers for them.
Curly turns to her. “Friend’s a spic, eh? Guess I’m talking to you then.” He spits a thin stream of clear saliva onto the road. “Maybe you are passing through, miss. But it’d have to be after we make a little trade. You give us that bike, and I’ll let you keep your pretty little face. I assume there’s a pretty face under all that. Best offer you’re gonna get today, I’m sorry to say.”
Sarah’s eyes are hidden behind her goggles, so Curly can’t tell that she isn’t bothering to look at him while he talks. Instead, she watches the giant brandish a tire iron in the background. “Last warning!” he yells to the man in the car, his voice a high-pitched whine that completely contradicts his stature.
Sarah points. “Can we help you with anything back there, Curly?”
Curly half glances over his shoulder. “That? Nah. Nice motorist got lost and needs some directions. Funny thing is, he won’t take ’em.” He spits again. “Can you believe what the world’s come to? Aliens on TV, killer asteroids, teenage assassins playing some kind of apocalypse game, and now this guy who won’t talk sense with us simple road warriors. Folks are losing their minds these days. Along with lots of other things.”
“And here you are to shepherd them to sunnier pastures,” Sarah says, raising the riding goggles onto her forehead. “Figuratively speaking, of course.”
Curly raises an eyebrow. “I like that. Mind if I use it? In the future like?”
“It’s all yours.”
“Say, you are pretty. Pretty eyes, anyway.”
Sarah fakes sounding scared when she says, “Thanks.”
“Speaking of using something that isn’t mine . . .” He raises the shotgun and rests it across his right forearm. “Sorry for pointing this at you, miss, but I can see you’re armed, so—nothing personal.”
Sarah holds up her hands. “All right, all right.” She nods at Jago. He puts his hands up too. “The bike’s all yours. I’m just going to take the key out of the ignition. So I can slide it over to you. Cool?”
“Cool.” Curly tilts toward the other biker without taking his eyes off them. “I like this one, Misty.”
“Me too.”
Sarah pulls out the key and wraps her gloved fingers around it. The giant raises the tire iron and takes a step away from the Taurus’s passenger-side window. She sees the driver’s eyes in the rearview mirror, wide and intense and, oddly, looking straight at her instead of at the man who’s about to attack his car. Sarah waits for the right moment, and then instead of sliding the key to Curly she tosses it directly at him.
He fumbles as he instinctively tries to catch it with his knife hand. He fails. At the exact moment that the key hits the ground, the giant smashes the glass and it shatters and rains down onto the pavement. Misty glances at Curly. Jago jumps backward off the bike and draws his blade in one motion. The giant leans into the car and, to his surprise and Sarah’s as well, he is pulled halfway inside. Something causes the back of his leather vest to tent upward and then it quickly falls, and the giant’s legs lift off the ground and shudder and shake. He’s dead, his nervous system just doesn’t know it yet.
Meanwhile, away from the car, Sarah drops and rolls, her bad arm stinging, as Jago flings his knife, hitting Curly square in the neck. Curly twists away and squeezes the shotgun’s trigger, but the blast sprays harmlessly into the air. Curly drops in a heap. The men around the car hoot and yell, and Sarah hears more glass breaking and a lot of cursing from the bikers and she pops up right in front of Misty with a short knife in her hand. He swings a meaty paw in her direction but she ducks under it and jams her fist toward his neck, catching it full bore with the blade. It sinks in four inches, severing everything Misty needs to eat, breathe, and deliver blood to his brain. Sarah whisks the knife free. Misty falls to his knees and brings his hands to his throat and blood spills over them.
Sarah and Jago rush toward the car and draw their pistols. The five bikers on the driver’s side have retreated a few steps and hold up their guns. Not aware of what’s happening with Sarah and Jago, they fire freely at the car, peppering its side with bullets and, unfortunately for them, masking the sound of the shots that are simultaneously being fired in their direction. Within three seconds Sarah and Jago hit each biker in his unprotected head—they’re not wearing helmets either, not that it would matter—the last two facing them, their eyes full of disbelief and a little bit of terror.
Keeping their guns in the ready position, Sarah and Jago advance on the car, Sarah in the lead and Jago half a step behind her. His gun dances from biker to biker, making sure they’re well and truly down.
Holes perforate the car’s side panels and the glass is broken and scattered on the pavement and the seats inside. The giant’s head lies across the center console. It took a few shots and it does not look pretty or very head-like. Both tires on this side are flat. The air reeks of cordite. The driver’s seat back is fully reclined. A large black mound of cloth takes up what’s left of the rear seat.
There’s no sign of the driver.
Sarah looks at Jago quizzically.
Where could he be?
But before Jago says anything a voice from under the black mound says, “Sarah?”
She knows that voice. She’d know it if it were whispering under the screams of thousands.
“D-dad?”
The black mound, a bundled pair of ballistic vests, is pushed away.
And jutting above these is the beaming face of Simon Alopay.
KEPLER 22B
Teletrans chamber on board Seedrak Sare’en, active geosynchronous orbit above the Martian North Pole
His large hands are immersed in plasmastone—a molten rock-like substance—all the way to his forearms. A three-dimensional map of Earth spins before him, midair. The two Nethinim are at the far end of the room, occupying the transpots. Each has a svelte pack with supplies strapped to his back and each is dressed in a paper-thin jumpsuit that bends and reflects all light, rendering the Nethinim virtually invisible. These suits extend over their long hands and fingers, and are pulled tightly over their heads and silvery hair. A see-through flap can be pulled down to cover their faces, but these are up for now. He looks at their faces. The trace of their braided hair moving back from their foreheads. Their flaring nostrils. Their obedient eyes.
He makes final adjustments with his fingers in the plasmastone.
Go, he telesays.
He twists his arms, the far end of the room grows unspeakably frigid, the portals op
en, shimmery yet dark, like the one that took them to the Great White Pyramid for the Calling. Their suits activate, and the Nethinim all but disappear, their faces floating seven feet above the ground.
Return as soon as you’ve achieved your objective, he telesays.
Each nods.
Each takes a step backward.
And each disappears completely from the room, and the ship that sits idly in space.
AISLING KOPP, GREG JORDAN, GRIFFIN MARRS
Approaching 45.1646, 98.3167, Govi-Altai Province, Mongolia
“Bum-fuck nowheresville,” Jordan says, his feet packing the loose earth one step at a time, his gaze wandering over the high Mongolian desert.
“Yeah,” Aisling mutters. “This place is dead.”
More than anything it reminds her of pictures of Mars she’s seen over the years—the planet, not her adopted CIA case officer. She suspects that the sloping land in this part of Mongolia is carpeted in stout green grasses at the end of the wet season—and she sees little clumps of dried plant life here and there to support this—but right now it’s reddish-whitish-grayish dirt and pebbles and rocks that culminate in a range of stark but beautiful mountains in the near distance.
Nowheresville, like Jordan said.
Yet, here they are. While Sarah and Jago and Hilal and Shari are all airborne, Aisling and her team have already touched down in Mongolia and are hoofing it to the Donghu monument to search for Sun Key.
The flight from Thailand took a few hours. It was completely uneventful. There was no turbulence, no sign of Abaddon’s aftermath, no problem with ground control systems. The only rough things were landing the plane, which they had to do on a long flat expanse of desert a few miles south of a mountain range, and this hike they’ve embarked upon to get to the target hidden in said mountain range.
Oh, and dealing with Pop.
