Cascade (Book 3): Mutant

by Phil Maxey

  CHAPTER 23

  The remaining hour before sunrise passed without incident. Zach sat with Travis in his small office area, both were drinking coffee.

  “I’m sorry if I came across too hard, hours ago, it’s just the observatory takes a lot of power to operate. Obviously it’s power we need for other things. I still don’t know how he managed to use it.”

  “If you did decide to stay, I was thinking we could go out with your people on a supply run.”

  Travis nodded. “That would be extremely helpful. Water and medical supplies I would say would be our biggest requirement.”

  “Have you mentioned to the others about leaving?”

  “I mentioned it briefly last night, told them to sleep on it. I know Corey wants to stay. He say’s he prefers the devil he knows and all that. The others I’m not sure.”

  “And yourself?”

  “That would depend on the others. I’m an old man. Would I be better off in a bustling metropolis, where it’s every man, woman and child for themselves? Or here, where I get to control what happens to me?”

  “They are making a go of it in Bravo, it could really be something.”

  “But they are still being attacked by E.L.F’s daily? What if what happened to Portland happens there? Here we are not any kind of target for the creatures.”

  Zach finished his coffee, placing it gently on the desk. “Well, I need to know soon because if you are all leaving with us, then there will be no need to go on a supply run, if however any of you are staying, then we need to go soon, so we can be back on the road shortly after.”

  “Of course, I will gather my people together shortly and get you an answer right after.”

  Zach got up and returned to where most were now sipping on hot drinks, including Cal and Fiona that were back in their original positions against the wall. Zach approached them both.

  “How are things?”

  Cal looked straight ahead and continued to sip on his drink.

  Fiona smiled best she could. “Coffee makes everything better.”

  “That’s…good. We might be going on a supply run, to help these folks out. Cal, maybe you sit this one out.”

  “Okay.”

  Zach then looked directly at Fiona. “You up for that?”

  She hesitated.

  Cal looked at her. “It’s okay, I’ll be fine. You go.”

  “It depends on if any decide to stay here or not, if they do then we will see what we can find for them locally. We won’t go far, just check out the local mall.”

  Thirty minutes later, Travis appeared, and approached Zach who was sitting on the sofa studying the maps he had. “Zach, can we talk?”

  Zach got up and they both returned to Travis’s office.

  “I’m staying. So is Corey, but Caroline and Esther want to return with you, if you’re okay with that.”

  “That’s fine,” they both sat down.

  “Are you sure, you are going to manage here alone?”

  Travis sighed, looking into his coffee mug. “Like I said, this is my home, this town at least. If there are just two of us we can last years just on what we already have. Also we are a useful outpost for the General.”

  “Okay then. You know this area, where’s a good supply of bottled water and medical supplies? I was thinking one of the large Malls.”

  “There’s Nate’s. It’s a large store, just a few miles from here. We tried exploring it a number of times, but we can never spend long enough there before E.L.F’s show up.”

  “Okay, we will check that out. We will just be taking one vehicle. The team will be myself, and three others. Do any of your team want to come with us?”

  “Do you have any doctors in your group?”

  “No.”

  “Then maybe Caroline should go, she has done some basic medical training before she got her doctorate in anthropology. She’ll know what we’ll need.”

  Zach nodded.

  It wasn’t long before, Zach, Caroline, Fiona and Michael were sitting in Caroline’s white pickup. Corey closed the large boarded door, and she started the engine.

  Zach, who was sitting in the passengers seat, looked at Caroline. “How far?”

  “We head back to where I met you yesterday, then it’s about two miles, and you will see it on the left. A large bright yellow store.”

  Michael leaned forward from his position sitting behind Zach. “That doesn’t seem far, what has been the problem getting supplies from there?”

  “If we’re lucky there won’t be one,” as she pulled out flickers of white ice fell from an almost opaque grey-white sky.

  They sped past bland fields, until they were passing large office buildings and then restaurants and hotels, eventually arriving at the junction from the night before. They turned right, and had to slow to avoid all the vehicles including semi trucks that were lying on their sides, and cars looking like they were tossed aside by an angry child. They weaved in and out, and moved quickly between clear spaces when they could.

  Zach looked over his shoulder, looking at Fiona. “See anything?”

  “All clear, but the cloud cover is low, there could be anything above us and we wouldn’t know it. What attacked you before?” Fiona looked at Caroline.

  “Usually it’s from the skies, but there have also been these, things, they are hard to explain, they are like a mass of…”

  “Smaller creatures, moving as one?” said Zach.

  Caroline took a left and drove into the parking area of the building. “Yes, you have seen them before?”

  “A few times. How big were the masses?”

  “About the size of this pickup,” she shivered when remembering them. “It was one pack of them that killed Abigail, Travis’s wife.”

  They stopped a few feet from the open glass doors. An ice machine sat on its side to their left, as did garbage bins to their right. Inside, only silhouettes of shelves and goods could be seen, resisting the light from the outside.

  “They appear to come from underground, so listen for any strange rumbling noises from below. If you hear anything like that, let us know. Two teams of two. I’ll go with Michael to find water, Caroline and Fiona you get the medical supplies,” Caroline went to get out, but Zach stopped her. “You got your radio?”

  She pointed to her pocket, and then picked up her shotgun from the side of her seat. “And this,” she said with a smile.

  “If you run into any problems, let us know.”

  She nodded and they all got out.

  Back at the museum, Travis looked at the image of the night sky on the monitor. It was wrong. He stroked his chin.

  “And this is what that man positioned the reflector to look at?”

  Corey sat back in his chair. “Yup.”

  Travis leaned in further to examine the pixels even closer. “Are you sure it’s not a glitch?”

  “Without switching the scope back on, I can’t be sure, but it doesn’t look like one. I think it’s something in the sky.”

  Travis’s expression changed to one of confusion.

  Corey sat foreword. “You do realize what it looks like don’t you?”

  “I know what it looks like young man,” said Travis dismissively. “But for there to be a black hole of that size, let alone three of them, let alone this close to the planet, the gravitational tidal forces alone would have already torn us apart.”

  “But what do we really know about black holes? It’s all theory.”

  Travis shook his head. “Maybe they are black satellites, stealth technology. From what Zach told me, some of his people are military, perhaps this guy too, Cal I think his name is. Maybe he was aware of these devices in space and for some reason pointed our telescope at them.”

  “Why would he do that? What’s the point?”

  Travis stood upright. “Who knows, he was not very lucid when we got to him. Anyway, there’s not much we can do with this information.”

  “Are you going to mention anything to them?�
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  “To Zach?”

  “Yes.’

  “I don’t see what good that will do. Don’t delete it though, it might make for an interesting project,” Travis, then left the security room, closing the door behind him. Jacob was looking at some of the fossils that were on the racks.

  “Oh, hello, I don’t believe we have met?”

  Jacob smiled, and held out his hand. “Names, Jacob.”

  “You have an interest in fossils?”

  “I’ve always thought we need to know what went before to know what lies ahead.”

  “Indeed, what you were looking at, that’s Dinosaur Dendrolithus Hadrosaur.”

  “The Duckbill dinosaur.”

  “Ah, you know your dinosaurs.”

  “Had an interest when I was younger,” Jacob continued browsing the shelves. “These E.L.F’s, how do we know they are just creatures from our past returning? Maybe it’s cyclical.”

  “There might be some truth to that, but the creatures that I’ve seen and I’ve heard about, they are more like extensions of what we already had. Mutations that would have naturally, well I say naturally, but who knows what ‘natural’ really means anymore? But would have usually taken millions of years to evolve. Instead they took a few months and in some cases it seems less than even that.”

  Jacob looked at the makeshift sleeping area. “You have made quite a home for yourself down here.”

  “Thank you. We do what we can. If you don’t mind me asking, what did you do before the Cascade?”

  “I was a sheriff, of a small town in New Mexico.”

  “Long way from here.”

  Jacob smiled. “It sure is.”

  Travis went to speak again, when Megan ran in front of him, stopping abruptly.

  “Hello, little one.”

  Megan looked up at the eagle like features that framed Travis’s face, and then ran back from where she came.

  Travis and Jacob both laughed.

  Zach quickly pulled gallon plastic bottles of water from the shelf and piled them into one of the two shopping cart’s he had tied together. Michael was a few yards further along, doing the same.

  “How’s your side?”

  Michael winced a little as a heavy water container landed in his cart. “Painful sometimes, but I’m not dead, so there’s that.”

  “We were lucky Morgan was with us when she was.”

  “I hear that.”

  Zach starting to talk then stopped, grappling with how to frame his next thought.

  Michael stopped working and looked at him. “You want to ask me about Cal?”

  “Yes.”

  “I know about as much as you do, probably less,” he continued placing the water in the cart. “We haven’t been doing much in the way of talking since the base.”

  “So you’re saying something changed, then?”

  Michael stopped again. “Maybe, I don’t know. Who knows how any of this shit affects our brains? I mean, he killed that young guy, it wasn’t self-defense, he just killed him. He has to be pretty scrambled about that. You should talk to Fiona, she’s with him all the time now,” Zach noticed a slight tinge of resentment in his words.

  “I think this is about as much as we’re going to be able to take back,” Zach, heaved the two carts sideways then pushed them forward. Michael threw one last bottle into his cart and joined him. The clear plastic bottles, threatened to spill over the sides as they both moved along the aisle.

  When Zach, Fiona and Michael entered the food store they were taken aback by the sheer chaos that was strewn across the floors in front of them. The building was full of most of its former content’s, except instead of being where they should be, neatly arranged on shelves, they were across the smooth surface at their feet. Smashed bottles, blown packets of all varieties of chips, cookies mashed into dust and hundreds of cans, all lying in a cacophony of opportunity. Michael commentated that it might even be possible for an E.L.F to be lying in wait under all this ‘goodness’ and they wouldn’t know. The others weren’t sure if he was joking or not.

  Caroline picked up small bottles of pills and white packets with hardly visible bumps, examining them before either putting them back or dropping them in the cart. “So how long have you all been together?”

  Fiona watched into the darkness of the back of the store, her gun in both hands. “For a while.”

  “You were in the army together?”

  “Something like that.”

  One of the bottles, Caroline opened, dropped one of the tablets in her hand, then quickly popped it into her mouth before twisting it shut, and continuing her search. “So it’s your job to bring back survivors to the camp near Austin?”

  “Yup.”

  Caroline stopped and looked at Fiona. “You’re not much of a conversationalist are you?”

  “No offence, but I’m here to make sure you don’t become monster food, not become best buds,” Caroline turned and continued searching. Fiona sighed, her words came out angrier than she meant. Making female friends was never something she found easy. “We find people and bring them back to Camp Bravo, but we’re not part of the main convoy with most from the Portland camp, that’s been headed up by someone else.”

  “They are taking heavy losses from what Travis told me.”

  “They have a lot of protection, I’m sure they will make it back to Bravo,” Fiona surprised herself by how well she lied.

  The sound of carts, creating a path through plastic wrappers and broken shards came from the front of the store. Zach’s voice came from Fiona’s radio. “You done? Over.”

  Fiona looked at Caroline who heard the question. “Tell him, almost…I just need to find a few more things.”

  “Few more minu…” Fiona stopped. A sound like a distant train suddenly filled the small space of the pharmacy they were in. “Zach, you here that? Over.”

  “Yes, we have to go now. Over.”

  Fiona ran forward and grabbed the handles of Carolines cart. “We need to go, they are coming.”

  Michael stood looking anxious, his brow furrowed from the icy rain hitting his face. “Man, I don’t know to watch the ground or the sky.”

  “Just help me get all of this in the back,” Zach pushed the carts best he could, not being able to stop them from giving another slight dent to Caroline’s pickup.

  Fiona and Caroline appeared running from within the gloom with a packed cart. It bumped over the curb, causing a few packets of pills to fall and scatter across the concrete. Grabbing them up, they then started scooping up the contents and throwing it in the back of the vehicle.

  The low drumming sound was less pronounced outside, but it was still there, lingering in the recesses around them.

  Finishing up, Zach closed the tailgate, and jumped back in the pickup to join the others eagerly wanting to leave.

  “Anyone see anything?” said Zach putting his seatbelt on.

  “No, I can’t hear anything either,” said Fiona.

  As Caroline drove away, the glass in the buildings around them, which was vibrating to a silent battle cry, stilled.

  CHAPTER 24

  A young child, with short dark hair sat watching Sam. “So you’re like a robot or something?”

  “That’s exactly what I am, do you want to see my robotic leg?”

  Isaiah rolled his eyes, sitting next to him on the bus.

  Sam pulled his pants leg up, revealing a steel and carbon fiber prosthetic.

  “Whoa, that’s so cool. Can you like run really fast?”

  Isaiah sniggered. “Shit, he can’t even hop fast.”

  Sam gave him a disparaging look, then returned to his enthusiastic audience. “If I’m chased by a six legged bear, sure.”

  The young boy laughed.

  Irene and Mary, both sat in silence, Sam’s conversation with the kid clearly audible from their place on the bus.

  Irene leaned towards Mary. “He seems a good guy, why don’t you talk to him. I know you like him.” />
  “Ssshhh” said Mary slightly embarrassed.

  “What are you waiting for! For the world to end again?”

  “I know, I know, I just…I have responsibilities, anything could happen. Maybe once we get to the camp. Anyway, if you like him so much, why don’t you talk to him?”

  Irene leaned back in her seat. “Maybe I will.”

  They had been on the road for an hour. Esther had been in tears leaving Travis and Corey, but the supplies Zach and the others brought back had given those leaving hope that the two remaining would survive okay. Zach asked Travis for some time with their long range radio, so he could talk to General Trow and told her they should be back in Roswell in a day or two, roughly the same time the large Convoy should pass through there as well. They had decided to avoid going through or even near Salt Lake City, and instead headed due south, taking them close to the route they took on their way to Portland.

  Frosted clumps of yellow-beige grass surrounded by white crisp snow stretched to the horizon on both sides of them, as the small convoy sped along.

  “I can’t believe I’m going to say this but, it’s good to be back in the desert,” said Abbey admiring the barren ice blue landscape around them.

  Zach smiled. “Yeah yeah, let’s see how you feel by time we get to Brad’s.”

  Fiona’s head was down, looking at one of their maps. “In another hour, we will pass within eighty miles of the Prison outpost, if we needed to make a stop.”

  “That’s too far out of our way, and I want to get a good amount of miles done today.”

  “What is our destination by nightfall?” said Jacob in Zach’s direction.

  “Whatever the closest town is to us around 4 pm. When we are closer to that point we will narrow it down,” Zach glanced in the mirror at Cal sitting passively between Fiona and Jacob. He wasn’t completely at ease with him being back there with an assault rifle close at hand, but he also didn’t like the idea of him being on any of the buses and out of reach. Zach hadn’t had time to decipher what had been going on with him, that was Fiona’s job.