The first step was easy: Get back up to Emily.
The problem was that, as much as he wanted to only do that, he couldn’t just abandon his original purpose. He’d come down here with a clear mission: Discover if the facility was safe for Emily and the others to join him. He couldn’t very well run back up to Emily and bring her down here while there were still crazies roaming about. Even if he wanted desperately to do just that. Besides, to eventually get back up to her, he needed to get the elevator operational again. And to do that, he needed to reach Sal.
So why not kill two birds with one stone?
“What about Emily in the meantime?” the Voice asked. “You heard what the conniving bitch said. She’s in trouble up there.”
Emily can handle herself. Besides, she’s got the others.
“Are you trying to convince me or yourself?”
She can handle herself.
“Okay, then. I guess you don’t have to worry about her, huh?”
Cole didn’t answer.
“That’s what I thought,” the Voice said.
Cole opened the pouch behind him and counted the remaining shotgun shells.
Five.
He had five left, including the four he’d already reloaded the Remington with. Of course, he still had the Glock, but it was loaded with its one and only mag. Emily and Greg had the rest ten floors above him.
“We’ll make do. We always have,” the Voice said.
Cole said, “Once I step outside, which direction do I go?”
“Left,” Sal said. Then, with just enough obvious doubt in her voice to leave Cole worried, “I mean, right. Coming out the door, you would go right, not left.”
“Are you sure about that?”
“Yes.” There was a moment of silence. It was just two seconds but it might as well be an eternity because of what it represented—Sal’s uncertainty.
“Sal?” Cole said.
“Yes, I’m pretty sure about that.”
Cole sighed. “You better be.”
“I am.”
“How many of those crazies are between you and me?”
“Three. At least three that I can see. I told you about the blind spots, right?”
“Yes, you did.”
“So, three, with the possibility of more.”
“How many more?”
“A dozen, give or take.”
“A dozen?”
“That’s actually good news.”
“You don’t say.”
“Two days ago there were almost thirty of them down here, but they’ve been killing each other off at a good clip. I was hoping they’d finish the job, just leave me alone down here, but the survivors are getting smart. Hiding. Waiting.”
“Like the one that was playing dead in the hallway,” Cole said.
“Yes, exactly.”
“You knew he was playing possum, didn’t you?”
“No.”
“She’s lying,” the Voice said.
“You’re lying,” Cole said.
“I’m not,” Sal said. “He looked pretty dead to me. Until he jumped up and tried to stab you in the face, anyway. He totally fooled me, too.”
“I still don’t believe her,” the Voice said.
It’s not like we have any choice.
“Yes, we do. We can exit this door and run right back to the elevator, and back up to Emily.”
You heard what she said about that.
“She could be lying.”
And what if she’s not?
“But she could be lying.”
The Voice had a point. What if Sal was lying? Could she really shut off the elevator from wherever she was hiding?
There was only one way to find out for sure…
“Okay,” Cole said. “So turn right as soon as I step outside. Then what?”
“The coast looks clear from there and about halfway to me,” Sal said.
“‘Looks clear?’”
“Um, yeah.”
“So you’re not sure.”
“I told you—”
“Blind spots.”
“Exactly. Plus, Darwinism.”
“Darwinism?”
“You don’t know what Darwinism is?”
“Survival of the fittest.”
“The ones that are still alive are the fittest of the bunch. The weak ones got killed off days ago. The ones out there, waiting for you and me, are the alpha predators. So when I say this isn’t going to be easy, you should believe me.”
“You didn’t have to convince me of that. I already know.”
“Right, you were out there when all of this began. Must have been a hell of a scene.”
“It was something, all right.”
“I only saw it on the news, but it looked like the end of the world.”
“It is.”
“What is?”
“The end of the world.”
“That bad, huh?”
“Yeah, it’s that bad.”
“So maybe I should stay down here instead.”
“You probably should.”
“But I can’t.”
“Why not?”
“One, I’m running out of food and water. And two—well, that’s it. I’m running out of food and water.”
“How many days of supplies do you have left?”
“How many days does nada give me?”
“Come again?”
“I don’t have any supplies.”
“You said you were ‘running out’ of food and water.”
“I meant, I’ve run out of food and water.”
Cole sighed.
He thought Sal might have chuckled through the speakers, but he couldn’t be completely sure.
“Let’s get going, big guy,” Sal said. “Ain’t none of us getting any younger. And your friends aboveground definitely ain’t getting any safer while we’re down here chatting up a storm.”
Chapter 8. Emily
“Are you sure you want me to watch your back?”
“Yes.”
“Why not Bolton?”
“I need Bolton to keep the others safe.”
“But he’s got the gun.”
“I don’t need a gun to watch my back. I need you swinging that big spear thing. Can you do that?”
“Maybe.”
“Don’t say ‘maybe.’ I don’t need ‘maybe,’ Greg. I need ‘yes.’ I need a confident ‘yes.’”
“Yes.”
“Show me.”
Greg did, swinging the makeshift spear side to side with his left hand. The bloodied metal swooshed each time. Emily paid attention to the force of the swings and decided she’d made the right choice. Even with his weak hand, Greg had enough power to make use of the weapon. It was originally half of a much-longer flagpole that had been whittled down and sharpened into a foot-long blade at one end.
“How’s that?” Greg asked.
“You’ll do,” she said.
He might have rolled his eyes. “Gee, thanks.”
Emily grinned. “The name of the game here is to defend the warehouse and conserve as much ammo as possible while doing it.”
“That’s where this comes in handy,” Greg said, holding up the spear slightly.
“Yes.”
“You sure—”
“Yes,” she said before he could finish. “Don’t ask again.”
“Okay, okay. Geez.”
She looked toward the semi-truck in front of them, looking very much like a metal whale beached on top of the toppled door. Somehow the rest of The Welcome Room had remained intact even with the impact. She wasn’t sure if that was because the warehouse was that well-constructed or if the door itself wasn’t.
Then she thought about Cole.
Be right with you, sweetheart. Just hold on for a bit.
She might have been more worried about Cole if she didn’t know him as well as she did. The things that Zoe, Fiona, and Dante had seen of Cole wasn’t everything her husband was capable of. They
’d only seen the recently-out-of-retirement man, not the Cole in his prime that she knew. She was worried about him, yes, but she was more worried about them, up here.
“What’s the plan again?” Greg asked when they were within a few yards from the truck. He’d lowered his voice noticeably and she could see him tensing up slightly out of the corner of her eye.
“Watch my back,” Emily said.
“And then?”
“And then nothing. Just make sure no one comes up behind me.”
“Okay.”
“Okay?”
“Okay,” he said, not that she fully believed him.
Greg was a big man, much stronger than her or any of the others, including Cole and Bolton, but he was also gimpy right now. But the phrase “Beggars can’t be choosers” kept coming to mind.
Glass crunched underneath her shoes as they got closer to the truck. Sprinkles of fragments from the semi’s pod mounted lights were scattered around the impact site. The grille, along with the front hood, resembled a giant accordion in its currently crumpled state. The bumper was lying five yards to the right of the vehicle, along with one of the side mirrors and the right-side exhaust that had been knocked loose. The fuel tank was intact, which was why she couldn’t smell an abundance of leaked diesel in the air. There was some but not enough to worry her that the tank had been punctured by the collision and was a danger to them. The remaining exhaust was bent backwards and embedded in the roof of the cab. Both front wheels, resting at a noticeable incline on top of the downed hangar door, were flat. The windshield, shockingly, was fully intact.
Nevertheless, the state of the truck looked a hell of a lot worse up close. She didn’t have very much faith the big red machine would start up when she climbed inside and grabbed the keys that, according to Tommy, were still in the ignition where he’d abandoned it.
“Be careful,” Greg whispered as she rounded the damaged front hood and moved toward the driver-side door.
The metal box underneath the open door had fallen loose, exposing the tools inside. The step up was slightly bent but not enough that she would have trouble navigating it and reaching the vehicle. Not that she jumped into the semi right away.
Instead, Emily completely rounded the vehicle, the Glock whipping up to take aim at…
…nothing.
There wasn’t a crazy or psycho or, as Tommy called them, bloodies anywhere immediately outside the warehouse. Not that she expected to see one so obviously exposing himself. They were too smart for that. The dumb ones had died off the first four days, leaving only the most dangerous of them.
She looked out at the massive field of open land beyond, along with the surrounding hills in the background looming like patient sentries underneath the bright afternoon sun. The only sounds came from the wind that washed across the flat ground, whipping dirt and tumbleweeds across the opening before her.
Not that Emily allowed her inner alarm bell to go quiet at the somewhat peaceful sight. Or even lower its decibel one tiny bit.
Because they were out there. Tommy had seen them coming. There was absolutely no way there were only three of them—the one she’d shot, the one that man had killed, and whoever had unleashed the second scream. Emily couldn’t see the other two bodies from inside the warehouse, but she had no doubts if she stuck her head outside and glanced around she’d find them nearby.
Somewhere behind her she could hear Greg fidgeting, the soles of his work boots squeaking slightly as he shifted back and forth. He was nervous. Of course he was nervous. He had every right to be. She was nervous. But the gun in her hand allowed her to calm down.
Somewhat.
She glanced back at Greg, meeting his eyes. He looked as if he’d been waiting for her to do just that for a long time now, and when she finally did, he might have breathed a sigh of relief. She wasn’t sure why. Maybe because he was relieved she didn’t see anything out there. Emily just hoped Greg didn’t think they were completely out of the woods yet.
She backtracked slightly until she was next to the open driver-side door. Emily grabbed a piece of the slick metal frame and pulled herself up, careful to avoid cutting herself on the twisted remains of the metal steps.
The keys were exactly where Tommy said they were, sticking out of the ignition. Emily settled inside the vehicle’s plush upholstery. The interior was just as red and bright and shiny as its exterior paint. Either the owner really liked red or—no, there was no or. The guy—and it was a guy, given the half-naked picture of a woman with massive boobs clinging to a stripper pole dangling off the rearview mirror—had a thing for red.
Emily took a breath, then switched the Glock from her right hand to her left before reaching for the keys and turning it.
Nothing.
She got nothing.
The semi didn’t even try to roll over.
It didn’t do anything.
Not a damn thing.
Shit.
Emily looked out the front windshield at Greg, standing near at the front hood of the truck. He was expectant, waiting for her to turn the engine, and not knowing that she’d already done so and got nothing. The deflated look on the former contractor’s face when she shook her head told Emily that her guess was right.
The loud creak! of the passenger door as a man with red eyes jerked it open.
“Emily!”
Greg, shouting, but she was too busy aiming the pistol across her lap and pulling the trigger. The loud bang! of the gunshot in the close confines of the semi was way louder than it had been earlier when she’d shot the first psycho.
Emily wasn’t very good with her left hand—most right-dominant people weren’t—but her target was close enough, and she’d had plenty of time to somewhat aim that she hit the man in the right shoulder.
He spun slightly, lost his grip on the door, and fell off the step, disappearing from view. A thump! as he landed against the floor.
A flash of activity outside the windshield, and Emily turned as a woman in white joggers and a hoodie tackled Greg and drove him to the floor. The spear flew from Greg’s hand and rolled away even as the woman scrambled to get on top of him, a bloody screwdriver glinting against a ray of the sunlight in her right hand.
Emily scrambled out of the plush semi seat and jumped through the open driver-side door, bypassing the steps completely. It was a mistake, and she knew it as soon as she landed on the dented hangar door and lost her balance, then almost went down face-first.
Fortunately, she managed to retain her footing just in time, even as she careened forward and hopped off the bent sheet of metal resting crookedly between the semi and the warehouse floor.
She couldn’t see the woman in the jogging suit’s face as she fought to get on top of a struggling Greg, but what were the chances it wasn’t covered in blood? Or, at least, had blood dripping from her eyes?
Not a chance in hell, she thought as the woman squirmed like a cat in heat even as Greg grabbed her arms to keep her from plunging the screwdriver into his chest. Fresh dust on her clothes flitted from the woman’s white joggers and hoodie sweatshirt as she squirmed, arms and legs and body moving wildly.
The woman was so much smaller than Greg that it made Emily wonder how in the world she’d managed to broadside him like a linebacker and put him on the ground. Not that she spent more than half a second wondering before she raised the gun and—
“Behind you!”
Dante, shouting as he ran—no, rolled forward at a blazing speed in his wheelchair—across the warehouse floor. She wasn’t sure what he was doing—
Wait. What did he say?
Behind me?
Emily turned just in time to see the crowbar coming straight for her head. She ducked, heard rather than felt the air parting as the steel tool sliced by above her head and clanged! against the open truck’s door. Sudden heat as sparks filled the space above her head.
She stumbled backward, lifting the Glock.
A boy—he couldn’t be older than fourtee
n—charged at her, his clothes, like that of the woman’s fighting with Greg, covered in a thick layer of dust from his journey across Terry Flats to the warehouse. He was wearing a black Metallica T-shirt and torn jeans, but all Emily could see was the blood dripping from his eyes, which were stretched impossibly wide.
A kid. He’s just a kid.
He’s just a kid!
She shot him anyway.
The boy was pulling back the crowbar to swing again when the round struck him. For a second or two—or maybe three, possibly four seconds—he looked down at the hole in his chest that hadn’t been there earlier, almost as if he couldn’t understand what it was. At that moment, he looked incredibly young, and innocent.
Then he looked up at her, just before he collapsed.
A wild ear-piercing scream came from behind her.
Emily spun around just as the jogger jumped up from Greg, still lying on the warehouse floor on his back. The psycho had dropped the screwdriver because she needed both hands to pull the spear out of her body.
The spear that Greg had lost when the jogger jumped him.
The same spear that…
…Dante had picked up and run through the psycho. The kid was rolling back in his wheelchair, staring at the woman with that too-familiar look. Emily had seen it before in young soldiers that just realized they’d ended the life of another human being for the very first time. It was shock and exhilaration and a knowledge that things were going to change forever for him.
The woman staggered up from Greg and stumbled around, both hands gripping the spear as she slowly and painfully pulled it out of her an inch at a time.
One inch…then another…
…then another…
Blood dripped from her eyes and chin and chest as she weaved around the warehouse, reminding Emily of a drunk trying to regain her equilibrium and failing miserably.
Finally, the jogger gave up pulling the last foot or so of the spear out of her body and collapsed onto her side, the blood-smeared portion of the flagpole that wasn’t embedded in her clanging loudly against the concrete.
The threat in front of her gone, Emily turned around to make sure no one had creeped up on her in the meantime. The Glock in her hand was rising, ready to shoot.
But there was no one in front of her.
Fall of Man | Book 3 | Firebase: Page 7
