by Jerry Ahern
Sarah looked at Tom—his eyes coal-black, the whites slightly yellowed, were warm, deep against his dark chocolate skin—and he smiled at her. She felt her lips raise in a smile, then looked at her husband. He wasn’t looking at her.
She couldn’t see John’s face other than in profile, saw the cigar, unlit, clamped tight in the left corner of his mouth. His lips were drawn back, his teeth so white she sometimes wondered if he were really human. He had shaved before the meeting, before the meager meal from their stores. His face looked chiseled in stone, like she imagined somehow God should look—or if not God, some god.
His voice was low, a whisper—barely audible so that you strained to listen to him, the result that his words were always heard, always understood—and the feeling behind his words.
“Sarah’s my wife—I’m taking her with me. All of us are righting what’s happening—in our own ways. Raising Michael and Annie if we all live long enough for her to do that is the best way I know to fight the Communists, to try to make something out of America again—to rebuild. That’s what she’ll be doing. Period—end of discussion.”
If it were possible, he seemed to clamp the cigar more tightly, his jaw set harder.
Sarah—her hands shaking—fought within her thousands, millions of years of what if meant to be a woman. Standing up, she whispered, “Damn you—” and she walked away from the table, starting for the outside.
She needed to breathe.
Chapter Sixteen
“Whatchya think that is, over yonder there, Bob?”
Bob raised the binoculars he’d stolen in a fight days after The Night of The War—binoculars stolen from a five and ten cent store they had been looting in Commerce, Georgia. The man with the rifle in the store—not a very big man—had been tough enough and good enough with a gun that twelve of Bob’s friends—he thought of their names now—had died. Command had sort of devolved to him—Bob—and he had ordered a withdrawal. The little finger of his left hand was gone, shot off. A parting gift from the owner of the five and ten cent store.
He stared through the binoculars now. They weren’t made for using at night, at least he didn’t figure they were. He’d thrown away the box with the owner’s manual. All he could see were dim shapes—what looked like some burned buildings and a white fence that almost seemed to glow.
He put down the binoculars, saying to the man beside him, “Dunno, Lyle—maybe jes’ some folks hiding out from guys like us—don’t think they’s no Russians. Maybe some of them Resistance heroes—hell,” and he spat into the grass in front of his engineer boots.
“I saw me a light for a second—like some door was bein’ opened. Hey—lookee there,” Lyle rasped.
Bob followed where Lyle pointed—with his eyes.
Near the white fence—someone was walking.
“They’ll be a guard or two, betchya,” Lyle said.
“If it is them Resistances, we can get us some food, some more guns and stuff— shit—”
“We gonna take ‘em, Bob?”
Bob looked at Lyle, then up the defile behind them. He had forty men—all of them with guns of one kind or another—and all of them pretty good with their bikes.
“Fuck, yeah—yeah,” and Bob spat again between his boots.
Chapter Seventeen
She hadn’t meant it—not wanting to damn him—she loved him. But always—he was always the one who was right. No other opinion mattered—never—nothing. “Damnit,” she snarled, hitting her little fist into the fence crosspiece. The crosspiece rattled.
She heard movement beyond the barn—it would be Jack. It was his tour on guard— “Just me, Jack,” she hissed loudly into the night.
After a moment, she heard him call back, “Right, Mrs. Rourke!”
She started walking along the fence.
Her hair was up—the first time she’d had it up since the attack on the Mulliner farm. She had taken the blue denim skirt from her pack, the only skirt she had—she wore it still, with a blue chambray shirt like the ones her husband habitually wore—this given her by one of the Resistance men. It was too big for her, the sleeves rolled up above her elbows, all but the top button buttoned and still showing more neckline than she liked, and it bloused like a balloon around her waist inside the waistband of her skirt.
She only had track shoes—she looked like a clown, she thought. Like an over-age urchin. And she had her belt around her waist with the holster for the Trapper .45—trying to dress up for her husband, she still hadn’t been willing to abandon the gun.
The spare magazine for it was in the left side pocket of her skirt—she remembered that as she stabbed her hands into her pockets now, walking still beside the fence.
Why did he have to be like that?
He’d come after her—they’d argue, she’d give in. “Shit,” she whispered.
She looked up—lightning illuminated the scattered clouds, the moon bright—almost bright enough to read by.
She kept walking.
Chapter Eighteen
John Rourke stood over his children, watching them sleep. Michael rolled over—opened his eyes. “Hi, Daddy.”
Rourke dropped to his knees beside the children. It was a far corner of the bunker, a blanket hung to make a triangle with the corner walls. There was another air mattress beside the one on which the children lay—it was empty. Sarah slept there, he knew—she had shown him their quarters.
“Shh,” he told his son. He raised his right first finger to his lips, his voice low. “Don’t wanna wake your sister, Michael.”
“Where’s Mommy?”
“Outside—”
“What’s the matter?”
“Nothing to worry about—I’m taking you and your sister and your mother home tomorrow— you’ll have a ball. So much to do at the Retreat— books, music—I’ve got a videocassette recorder there—movies, educational programs—you can learn about astronomy, about the human body, about science—physics and chemistry—all of it—for you and Annie to learn from—”
“Can we play outside?”
Rourke sucked in his breath. “Sometimes—but the idea of the Retreat is that it’s kind of secret—like a secret hiding place, ya know? But you can play with Paul—you can call him Uncle Paul—he’s my best friend. And—”
“And Natalia?”
Rourke closed his eyes.
“Mommy told me she’d asked you about some Russian lady and you said her name was Natalia and she’d be living with us from now on.”
Rourke nodded. “You can play with Natalia, too—Annie’ll like her a lot—so will you, son.”
“But aren’t the Russians the ones who started everything—like The War, and all the trouble—”
“But Natalia didn’t start it. She saved my life—more than once. Natalia and Paul—the three of us have been searching for you and your sister and your mother. She’s a good friend—you’ll like her, be happy with her.”
“Is Natalia going to marry—what did you say his name was—”
“Paul.”
“Is Natalia going to marry Uncle Paul?”
Rourke closed his eyes again, then opened them, seeing his son in the gray light. “No—she isn’t—no—”
“Well, why is she staying with us, Daddy?”
Rourke swallowed. “She’s a good friend to Paul and me. And in helping us look for you guys, well, she kind of got in trouble with the KGB—”
“That’s the Russian CIA, isn’t it?”
“Yeah—sort of—but different in a lot o f ways.
“Is Natalia a spy, like you were?”
“Sort of—but she’s through with that now—just wants to be with us, be our friend, help things get right again—like that—it’s a long story. Complicated—kind of.”
“I’m not sleepy—you can tell me,” Michael insisted.
“I’m sleepy,” Rourke smiled in the darkness. “I’ll tell you all about it later—all about it. I hear you’ve been taking g
ood care of your mother and sister—give me your hand,” and Rourke reached his right hand out in the darkness, found his son’s vastly smaller, but solid, firm hand—he clasped it tight.
“Oww—”
Rourke laughed, low, soft. “You’ve turned into one hell of a good man, son. And I’ll be needing your help a lot as we go along.”
“Momma tell you that I—”
“That man at the farm—that you killed him. I’m sorry you had to do that—but I’m glad you were there to protect your mother and sister—yeah—she told me. And at the Mulliner place—looks like all those times we went out back and fooled with the guns came in handy, huh?” and he clasped his son’s shoulders in the darkness. “But you can put all that behind you now—go back to growing up. You’ve done a lot of that, but there’s a lot of growing to do and everything. I’m proud of you.”
“I’m glad you came back—Mommy never stopped talking about when you’d find us. Things would get kind of bad—we’d be cold, or there’d be Brigands or Russians all around us—but Momma always said you’d find us.”
“You think this’ll make her happy—the Retreat, I mean? What do you think?”
“Maybe—I’m not sure. But she wants to be with you.”
“I love her—being a grown-up isn’t all it’s cracked up to be, kid,” and Rourke bent over his son, finding the boy’s face, kissing his forehead.
He heard automatic weapons fire from outside. “Stay here,” and Rourke was up, running. Sarah was outside.
Chapter Nineteen
His revolver, his CAR-15—along with his other gear—were too far away. Only the twin stainless Detonics pistols, these in the double Alessi rig across his back, and the six spare magazines in the Sparks Six-Pack on his trouser belt, Rourke ran into the night, squinting his eyes tight shut against the velvet blackness punctuated by bursts of gunfire, counting to ten, opening his eyes, more accustomed now to the darkness after the dim light of the bunker through which he had run.
Both Detonics pistols came into his hands, his thumbs jacking back the hammers as his fists balled around them.
“Sarah! Sarah!”
Men on motorcycles filled the yard between the bunker beneath the burned-out farmhouse and the white-fenced corral, the house, the corral, and the shell of the burned barn making the points of a triangle. And the triangle seemed alive to him with movement, with gunfire, with shouts and curses and the revving of engines. Brigands—he lost count after he hit twelve, and there were at least three times that many, likely more, he gauged. Both pistols in his clenched fists discharged together, two men on motorcycles—they were Brigands all—racing toward him across the yard. Both men fell, their bikes spinning out, Rourke jumping clear of the one to his left, firing a third round, killing a man on foot rushing him, the man with an assault rifle.
“Sarah!” He screamed the word into the night, not seeing his wife, not hearing a scream.
His jaw set, the tendons in his neck something he could feel as they distended.
“Sarah!”
There was the boom of a .45 from his left and he wheeled toward it, firing a fourth round from his pistols at another of the Brigands. And then he saw her, a pistol visible in her hands in the glare of a motorcycle headlight, the biker bearing down on her, Rourke raising both pistols to shoot the man down, two bikers thrusting between him and the intended target.
Rourke fired both pistols again, nailing one biker only, then firing the pistol in his left hand twice more, killing the second man, the head almost splitting under the double impact, visible as the ground was suddenly bathed in moonlight.
There were two rounds apiece in each gun, no time to reload, Sarah’s small pistol—about the size of his own Detonics guns, the gun he’d seen her wearing throughout the late afternoon and evening—flashing fire twice before he could shoot, the Brigand biker’s body blown from the bike seat, the bike crashing into the glaring whiteness of the fence, splintering the wood there with a thunderlike cracking sound.
He could see Sarah, stepping away, turning, punching the little .45 out in both hands. A man was rushing her from behind with an assault rifle.
Rourke’s pistols fired, her pistol fired, the Brigand’s body twisting once, then again and again.
Rourke broke into a run, firing out both pistols before he reached her, killing one more of the Brigands, wounding another as the man fell from his bike, clasping his left shoulder.
Both pistols empty, Rourke rammed the one from his left hand into his belt, dumping the magazine for the right-hand gun, ramming a fresh one up the butt, his right thumb working down the slide stop as his left hand pocketed the empty magazine, Sarah shouting to him. “John! Behind you!”
Rourke wheeled, dropping, punching the Detonics out in his right fist, the boom of a .45 behind him, the riot shotgun-armed Brigand stumbling, falling back as Rourke’s pistol fired then, the second impact high as the man’s body jackknifed, the neck exploding as the left side of it was blown away, blood spurting in a fine spray Rourke could see on the air.
He was up then, grabbing the riot shotgun from the dead man, upping the safety on the little Detonics, wheeling, working the riot shotgun’s trigger, the stubby-barreled pump’s twelve-gauge slug flaring in the moonlit darkness, the shot column disintegrating the face of a man rushing him.
Rourke tromboned the shotgun, beside Sarah now, Sarah’s .45 booming once, a Brigand shot off his bike.
He looked at her—the spent magazine was falling into her left hand, the spare magazine between her left thumb and forefinger, encircled by the digits, going up the butt of the pistol, then her hand twisting as the magazine was thumped into a locked position, her right thumb working down the slide stop.
Rourke raised the riot shotgun, firing once, then again and again, three Brigand bikers going down, Sarah beside him shouting, “The bike!”
He jumped clear, the machine from the second man impacting against the fence, bursting through it.
Her .45 fired once, then again and again, two bikers down.
Men were pouring from the bunker now, assault rifles and riot shotguns firing, the Brigand attackers falling back.
Rourke tromboned the pump—the shotgun was empty. He threw it down, grabbing for the partially loaded Detonics.
He started forward, shouting to Sarah, “Stay here!”
“No!”
He looked at her, then started forward anyway, his wife beside him, their .45s like pulsing torches in the darkness, Brigand bikers falling as gunfire rained around them.
He heard Annie scream—it was her voice.
Rourke wheeled, reloading the Detonics as he moved, running now toward the bunker.
A Brigand with an assault rifle, a bayonet fixed at the muzzle, Annie bare-legged in a long white T-shirt, hitting at the man with something.
Rourke raised the Detonics to fire, heard Sarah screaming, “Annie!”
Rourke had the Brigand’s head under the muzzle of the Detonics. A tight shot, he started the squeeze.
There was a burst of assault rifle fire, somehow muffled-sounding, the Brigand’s body crumpling, sagging, falling forward, the assault rifle discharging into the ground, Annie screaming again.
Rourke stopped.
Michael stood in the light of the bunker doorway, an M-16 in his hands, the dead Brigand at his feet.
Rourke wheeled, fired out the Detonics pistol into two men coming up on the right, buttoning out the magazines from both pistols to the ground, reloading as he sidestepped toward his son and daughter, Sarah firing beside him.
“I’m empty,” she shouted.
Rourke handed her one of the twin Detonics pistols—their eyes met for an instant in the moonlight bathing the triangular piece of ground that made the farmyard.
“I was wrong—” He said it once, simply, as she took the pistol from him.
“So was I—”
There was a shouted curse, a rattle of assault rifle fire
and the roar of motorcycle engines, Rourke half dropping into a crouch, Sarah to his right, both firing simultaneously as four Brigand bikers roared down on them—one man down, then another, then a third, both hands flying to his chest as the bike went out of control, then the fourth man, screaming as he skidded on his bike into the wreck of the barn, the motorcycle’s gas tank somehow igniting—an explosion, orange-tipped yellow flames with a black and yellow fireball belching upward into the night air at the center.
Rourke reached down to one of the dead men— the one Michael had killed. A strap from his binoculars was tangled in the assault rifle—Rourke ripped it away. As he pried the left hand from the front handguard of the M-16, he noticed the little finger was missing—it looked like it had been shot away.
He picked Annie up into this arms—she held a policeman’s nightstick in her right hand and it fell to the ground as he crushed her against him.
He looked at his son. “Thank you—”
Chapter Twenty
It was like solving a puzzle, Nehemiah Rozhdestvenskiy told himself.
“Damn this,” he murmured, blinking his eyes as he looked up from the litter of papers. “A man could go blind—” he began, not finishing it.
He stood up, lighting a cigarette.
Tired.
A puzzle. Intelligence reports from before The Night of The War, comparing these with areas that had survived the bombing, the missile strikes.
The Eden Project. If the astronaut had not been killed—died of his heart attack so shortly after the duel between the American Rourke and his predecessor, Vladmir Karamatsov.
The astronaut might have known.
Rozhdestvenskiy inhaled on his cigarette, the intake of breath making a light whistling sound.
He returned to his desk under the fluorescent tube fixture, studying the sheaves of reports, data—
The Eden Project had launched from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida—just before the hits on the center had destroyed it. What had remained had been searched, but further searching was impossible after the complete destruction of peninsular Florida in the massive quakes in the wake of the slippage of the artificial faultline created by the bombing.
