The convoy arrived at the parking lot of a hotel that had become the community center for the survivors in Wrightsville Beach.
“Remember, I don’t want my name or even mention of me appearing anywhere. I’m sort of a behind-the-scenes type of girl.”
“Yeah, sure,” he agreed.
As the reporter walked off into the hotel, Nina exited the Humvee and stretched. A mob of Wrightsville Beach survivors descended on the trucks and picked the contents clean. She watched them remove everything in a fast but orderly manner. This group impressed her; they had maintained their dignity despite the hardships they had endured. It felt good to have been a direct part in liberating them. Usually her work kept her at a distance from the survivors who benefited from her team’s missions. Maybe that had been Shep’s intent when he assigned her this task; to show her the good her bloody work produced.
Around eleven, Nina prepared to depart from the hotel parking lot and return to her headquarters at City Hall.
“Hey, let’s get going,” she called to the soldier standing at the hotel entrance who served as her driver. The young man busied himself talking to one of the liberated ladies who gazed into his eyes like Lois Lane staring at Superman.
As Nina jumped in to the passenger seat of the roofless Humvee, a man approached calling, “Excuse me! Excuse me!”
“Yes?”
“Hi,” he caught his breath. “Sorry, I spotted your cars and I didn’t want you to leave without getting a chance to thank you.”
Nina squinted and examined him. Probably in his early thirties, maybe a little thin but otherwise in decent shape.
“I remember you,” she said. “You were with the kids, right?”
“Jim Brock,” he extended his hand. “And thank you, Miss..?”
“Captain,” Nina corrected. “Captain Forest.”
His smile faltered and a little red shot to his cheeks.
She reconsidered her harsh tone and said, “Had we found out about it sooner maybe we could have got there before your two friends were killed.”
Brock’s soft features hardened and his eyes cast to his feet.
“Yeah, well, I mean, I can still…I can still…”
“You can still hear the screams,” she knew. “That’s what Mutants do; they like to hear people scream. It’s how they’re wired, I guess.”
He said, “At least all of the children made it out safe. Maybe, in some way, their deaths bought time for you to get there.”
“I guess that’s one way to look at it.”
Her driver—a smile on his face—slid behind the wheel and turned the ignition key. The Humvee rumbled to life.
Nina asked Jim Brock, “What were you doing with all those kids? I mean, the guy said something about them being a part of your orphanage or something.”
“Before the world went to hell I was at a day care center. You wouldn’t believe how many people went to work on the day of the Apocalypse. The parents never came to get their kids. You know, dead or injured. Maybe just trapped. We got a couple of phone calls. At least some of the children had a chance to speak to their moms or dads one more time. But the parents never came.”
“Oh.”
It seemed to her there were a million stories of that day, a million angles and new perspectives. She had never thought about the day cares or schools. Probably because she had no children or close friends with kids.
Or any friends in those days, Nina thought.
“Well done,” she told him.
“What’s that?”
“When all this started, I was heavily armed, with a group of trained police officers, and, honestly, I barely survived the first day. I’m guessing that instead of machine guns and grenades, you had diapers and juice boxes. I’m just saying, you did a good job.”
“All of it would have ended if it weren’t for you. We were not getting out alive. No matter what. Those things, they wanted to kill the kids. It would have happened eventually. They want to kill every living thing that was on this earth before they got here.”
And we want to kill everything that wasn’t here before then, Nina chewed on the irony.
“Well, good luck and all. See you ‘round, Jim.”
“Nice meeting you, Captain.”
She nodded to the driver and as the Humvee pulled away, she told Jim Brock, “That’s Nina.”
–
Half an hour later, the Humvee parked outside of City Hall. A minute after Nina and her driver exited the vehicle, a corner of the canvass tarp covering crates in the Humvee’s cargo bed lifted and a pair of young eyes peeked out.
The overcast weather hovering over Wilmington for several days had moved off, painting the cityscape in warm, gold rays and giving the air a fresh, almost spring-like flavor but a flavor that—to the little girl’s nose—was drown out by the overriding smell of beef jerky radiating from one of the crates she hid among.
Denise Cannon slipped out of the vehicle quietly, crouching near the rear bumper. She wore torn blue jeans, a dirty t-shirt, and one-size-too-big sneakers she had found in an empty motel room two months ago.
She prepared to cross to the sidewalk but stopped when voices neared.
Two men dressed in grease-stained overalls approached one of the many trucks parked along the curb. They opened the hood of one and mumbled something about a fuel pump.
As she waited, Denise surveyed her surroundings.
To her left across the street she saw a fancy, modern building about two-stories tall with windows and glass being the primary design element, all of which were now shattered. That modern building warped and sagged to the point that she guessed the next strong wind might cause it to collapse.
To her right stood a thin, long building painted white with four tall pillars in front. Scruffy green lawn surrounded the place, as well as decorative trees that had been nearly picked clean of leaves, probably the work of Sloths. She also saw a statue of somebody holding his or her arm aloft.
City Hall.
She spotted a pair of nasty-looking dogs sitting at the top of the flight of stone stairs leading to the main entrance. She spied two more under a covered porch at the side entrance to the building.
She used parked cars—some belonging to the new military force in town, others long-abandoned—as cover to work her way down the street until finding a safe route to cross the sidewalk and slip onto the grounds behind City Hall.
There she found a first floor window with a hole in it just large enough for a petite eleven-year-old girl to slip through.
Despite serving as the army’s base, few people walked the corridors of City Hall. In fact, Denise saw more dogs than she saw people. She avoided both, although she figured the dogs must have caught her scent but because she was human, they did not pay her any particular attention, despite the lingering odor of the beef jerky she had stowed away with.
The musty smell of the place might have helped, too. City Hall looked and felt like a museum with exhibits, memorials, and even a theater.
Denise stepped softly as she followed voices echoing through the halls. One of those voices sounded like it belonged to the woman. She eventually tracked the conversation to a small group of soldiers gathered around a table in a large, long room.
A sign at the door said that the chamber once hosted press conferences and town hall meetings as called by Wilmington’s long-gone city governors. Row upon row of mostly knocked-over chairs lined the rectangular room.
The soldiers conversed around a crescent-shaped table at the front of that room on a raised platform covered in red carpet. Three large windows behind the table allowed the sun to streak in.
Denise peeked but knew she could not stay at the entrance, so she withdrew and followed a cramped stairwell to a small mezzanine level. A wooden banister offered Denise cover as she crouched low and listened in on the meeting from above.
She was there, the woman with the ponytail. The one who outfought that beastly thing at Airlie Gardens. The one who sh
outed orders to men and who was not afraid of the nightmares.
Her ear caught bits and pieces of the conversation.
“…they swept through Pine Valley Estates and killed a bunch of Gremmies…”
“…the track out there is operational, just needs…”
“…Intelligence places them about a hundred miles northwest of here…”
“…HQ says no re-supply on those for the rest of the week…”
Another solider dressed in black ran into the meeting hall panting and shouting with a German shepherd on his heels
“Captain! Captain Forest,” the newcomer sounded panicked.
“What? Whatchya got?”
“Sh—Shadow—”
All of the soldiers around the table grew rigid, as if tensing for battle.
“Now? Where?”
“No,” the man, still out of breath, reported. “Not here, not now. But we found something. Had to be a Shadow. Right down the damn street.”
The woman named Captain Forest grabbed a mean-looking rifle from the table.
“Show me.”
Denise stayed still as the group marched out of the room beneath her. As they moved, the little girl noticed that Captain Forest still possessed the sword she had won from the big-mouthed ugly thing. She carried it in a scabbard strapped to her leg.
“Wow,” Denise whispered aloud.
She waited until they were out of the room then went downstairs again…
…Denise used the smashed, rusted cars lining the streets of Wilmington as cover to follow Captain Forest and her group of soldiers in black uniforms. On several occasions, Forest turned her head as if sensing a stalker, but each time Denise managed to remain hidden.
The group came to a very large intersection littered with more dead cars and buses and trucks. In the center of the intersection sat a big, circular fountain surrounded by shrubs.
On one corner of the crossroads stood an impressive brick and stone cathedral. The damage done to that cathedral was equally as impressive and quite strange as well.
Something had removed a chunk of the building.
No, not a chunk; more like a scoop. As if a ball had bounced against the cathedral and every part of the wall it touched disintegrated into nothingness. A surgical and nearly beautiful piece of destruction, leaving a concave wound with no sign of debris.
Whatever had removed such a huge piece of brick and stone had to be pretty huge itself. And powerful.
“…definitely…”
“…radiation readings?”
“…we don’t have the firepower to…”
“…call Shepherd maybe he can…”
Denise heard only fragments as she hid behind a destroyed Mustang at thirty yards, yet she noticed the soldiers fidgeting nervously as they surveyed the unusual damage.
The group turned about and retraced their steps toward City Hall, nearly stumbling upon Denise in the process. After they passed, the girl followed once again. About half way to headquarters, Captain Forest separated from the men, heading off on her own.
This impressed Denise a great deal. This woman felt confident enough to walk by herself along the streets of Wilmington? A few days ago, that would have been a death sentence.
Her curiosity piqued even more, Denise followed as the woman left Fifth Street behind and traveled an alleyway.
Denise crept between those buildings, too, rounding a corner into a courtyard of sorts, surrounded by the backsides of several small shops. She saw employee entrances and dumpsters. Multiple paths led away from the hidden clearing toward larger, primary streets.
Her quarry nowhere in sight, Denise stopped and stood straight.
“You’re pretty good,” the woman’s voice came.
Captain Forest emerged from behind a dumpster, smiling but holding an assault weapon ready in her hands.
“You forgot one thing though. Your shadow. Not much of one this time of day but just enough to give you away from around the corner. Remember that, next time you’re stalking someone.”
“I wasn’t stalking!” Denise nearly shouted.
“Hey, easy does it,” Forest calmed. “I’m just saying, next time you decide to follow someone you need to think it through a little more.”
“I followed you all the way from City Hall,” Denise boasted. “And I was watching you meet with the soldiers in there, too.”
Captain Forest tilted her head. “Is that a fact? Tell me, what’s a little girl like you doing walking around by yourself in this town?”
Denise narrowed her eyes and answered, “I’m not little; I’m eleven. Besides, what are you doing walking around this town all by yourself?”
Forest held her rifle a little higher and asked, “Where’s yours?”
Denise said nothing.
Captain Forest stepped in front of Denise and ordered, “Turn around.”
Denise hesitated, not sure what the woman meant until she swiveled her fingers in the air to make the point.
Denise then understood what to do, but not why. The Captain examined the back of her neck, lifted her shirt, and—despite a series of protesting grunts from Denise—examined under her arms.
“Just looking, don’t worry.”
“Looking or what?” Denise chirped.
Forest completed the examination, stepped off a pace, and said, “Voggoth sucks.”
“Huh? Who’s Voog—Boog–Bugg-eth?”
“Never mind. That’s good,” Forest answered. “You’d be surprised how many of them give themselves away like that. Easy to provoke and all.”
“What are you talking about?”
Forest‘s eyes widened and realization swept across her face.
“Wait a second. You’re that girl from the chapel. The one who was almost Mutant foo—. I mean the one who was in the chapel.”
She straightened her clothes with a look of indignation and replied, “Yeah, well, my name is Denise.”
“Hello Denise, I’m Nina. Mind telling me why you were following me?”
Denise glanced around, looked at her feet, looked at the sky, and then finally answered, “I don’t know. I was bored. Like, super bored. Something to do, I guess.”
“I see.”
“Hey, I don’t need you to tell me what to do. I can do what I want. I can take care of myself.”
Nina said, “I can see that. You move pretty good. Got some real potential.”
A smile exploded onto Denise’s face. “Really?” But she quickly suppressed the grin, nearly turning it into a frown, and mumbled, “I mean I know that.”
The sound of an explosion rolled in from the distance, passing overhead like the calling card of a distant thunderstorm. Both women shot their eyes to the clear blue sky above.
Nina said, “You know, I think we can both take care of ourselves pretty good. What do you think?”
“Yeah. I mean, yes. Sure we can.”
“But you know the first thing that you do to take care of yourself?”
“What’s that?” Denise asked Nina.
“You’re smart about where you go. You don’t put yourself in bad spots.”
“Yeah, sure, I know that, geez,” Denise rolled her eyes.
“Let’s get out of this spot for now. Come with me.”
Denise mulled it over for all of two seconds before answering, “Well, okay. I’ve got nothing better to do right now, anyway.”
–
When they had first came onboard, Jon thought he would never get accustomed to it, but in reality it had only taken him four days to adjust to the constant droning pervading the sub; the combined sound of engines and equipment creating a vibration of noise that served as background to everything.
The first few days after departing Hopedale, he occasionally sniffed fresh air from the conning tower. Once entering Baffin Bay, Farway kept the Newport News submerged. Jon suspected Farway felt naked cruising on the surface, no doubt an impulse dating to the cold war.
Jon became mindful of the wat
ertight doors and remembered many Hollywood movies where a sub Captain sealed crewmembers in flooded compartment to save the ship. That thought put a flutter in his belly nearly as constant as the vibration through the boat.
As they did each evening, Jon Brewer and Reverend Johnny joined Farway and his Executive Officer for dinner, after which they swapped stories.
One night Jon and the Reverend presented a detailed accounting of the Battle of Five Armies. Another time, Farway had told them about arriving at their homeport of Norfolk and finding it infested with fluffy horned guinea pig things walking five feet tall on hind legs.
“Sort of like a chia pet gone mad,” the XO had said.
This evening in the small cubicle that served as the Captain’s dining room, the conversation turned to the Newport News’ missions for Gordon Knox. More specifically, inserting spies overseas.
“We went through the straits of Gibraltar last year and dropped a team off in Algeria. We were supposed to make a pick up in Sicily but the group never showed.”
Of course, John Brewer reviewed the data gathered by intelligence agents. Reverend Johnny had also seen much of it. Yet that did not stop the Reverend from taking the conversation in his favorite direction.
“Pray tell, Captain, what words are being spoken in whispers about our best friends?”
The Reverend’s question bewildered Farway, who paused in the middle of sipping pseudo-tea from a mug. Jon Brewer stepped in to explain.
“He means The Order. Rev here has a special place in his heart for that group.”
Reverend Johnny said, “The last time we had contact with that vile band was in Baltimore. We brought the Father’s fire upon that nest of heretics. You should have seen them burn.”
While Johnny boomed a laugh, Brewer translated, “We destroyed several of The Order’s bases over the past five years. The first was in Allentown, Pennsylvania. Then there was a smaller one in Deptford, New Jersey; two outside of Harrisburg and the last one we’ve seen was in a Baltimore suburb. We think we stamped them off the continent before they could gain a real foothold.”
What little Farway knew came as no surprise to either of his passengers, but it spurred talk of Voggoth which the Reverend wanted to hear, the same way grandchildren begged to be told their favorite stories again and again.
Beyond Armageddon: Book 02 - Empire Page 19
