22
Frost realized at the last second their plan was doomed. They were almost there—almost to the very end of the pipe—but there were way too many variables now, with the roots shooting up through the floor. This had been Griffin’s plan when he started the stomping, though she doubted he knew it would get this extreme. Or had he known? She would ask him, if they ever got out of this alive.
Winslow was on the far end, leading them to the broken part of the pipe. She loved the man but wished he would move faster. He was going as fast as he could, though. Being the tallest of them, he was hunched over pretty far, and at his age, it had to hurt.
With a final effort, Winslow pushed himself to the end and slipped free of the pipe. Frost, Griffin and Dodge followed in rapid succession. The ground trembled as more and more of the roots fought against the concrete floor. One of the soldiers—Boyle—was gone, but the other one—Osterman—was still alive, though it looked like he was having a hard time getting past the aggressive roots.
Their hands remained tied behind their backs. Tape still covered their mouths. Before anyone could hatch a plan or take action, the concrete right in front of them crumbled and broke apart. A root sprang up, nearly as tall as Frost.
She didn’t move.
None of them moved.
They just stood there, motionless, silent, and the root swayed back and forth for a few heartbeats before a gunshot turned its attention toward Osterman. It reached out for the man, but was held back by concrete rubble. It stopped moving for a moment, and then retreated back into the ground.
Frost looked at Griffin, Winslow, and then Dodge. She made an exaggerated tip-toeing motion, telling them to walk quietly.
Each man nodded, and Frost took the lead, headed toward the door through which Osterman and Boyle had taken Charley.
They had barely gone five steps when the window beside them shattered.
Frost jumped, startled, and looked up to find Osterman on the other side of the hanger, his gun aimed at them. It was one thing to try to get past the roots with as few vibrations as possible, a completely different thing to ignore a man with a gun.
She broke out running, hoping the men behind her would do the same. More glass shattered. She had no doubt that Osterman was a good shot, but the roots hunting him kept him off balance, fouling his aim.
Frost ducked down as she ran, making herself a smaller target. She quickly reached the door. It was closed, so she spun into it, grabbed the handle and lifted it up, pushing her body back against the door as it swung inward.
Griffin, Dodge, and Winslow hurried in after her.
She slammed the door shut, just as something—a bullet or a root—hit the other side with a loud
thwack
.
She turned to find the men had already dispersed. A few doors were lined up along the corridor. Winslow poked his head into one, as did Dodge. Griffin appeared from another room, turning slightly to show the knife he now held.
Dodge was the closest. He hurried over to Griffin, turned around, and waited as Griffin turned around. Standing back to back with Dodge, Griffin looked over his shoulder, glanced down at the knife blade, and yanked up once. Then the zip-ties fell away from Dodge’s wrists. The pastor took the knife and sliced the zip-ties off Griffin’s wrists, then Winslow’s and Frost’s.
Frost peeled the duct tape off her mouth. She whispered, “How are we going to get out of here?”
Griffin took the knife back from Dodge, wielding it like someone who knew how to use it. “We take one of the Humvees.”
“You want to go back through
that
?” Dodge asked.
“I don’t think we have much choice,” Griffin said. “Sheriff?”
She shook her head. “Not without weapons. No way. And keys would be good.”
“I have that covered,” Griffin said.
“The keys?” Dodge asked.
Griffin smiled. “All of it.”
He led them back into the room he had been in only a moment before, where he had found the knife. The place was an arsenal. Not quite the arsenal Frost had imagined, but there were M16s, Beretta 9mms and even grenades.
A metal box hung off the wall by the door. Griffin opened it and there, hanging from a series of hooks, were three sets of keys.
“Let’s hope one of these works,” he said, taking them and handing them to Frost.
She stared down at the keys in her hand, and then glanced up at Griffin, as he headed over to the wall of weapons. “What are you going to do?”
He strapped an M16 over his shoulder, took one of the Berettas and slammed in a fresh magazine. “I’m going to go find Charley.”
23
He found Charley almost immediately—checked two rooms and there he was in the third, trying to open the door. Griffin nearly knocked the man over, because he was standing directly behind the door. Charley cried out when the door collided with his injured hand. Griffin noticed the swollen red fingers and the tears on Charley’s face. He didn’t bother asking the man if he was okay, because clearly he was not.
“We’re bugging out,” Griffin said.
Charley only nodded. He didn’t ask where the men who had tortured him had gone, or how Griffin had managed to come to his rescue. Griffin turned to step back out of the room, but something caught his eye.
It was a desk, one of those large steel numbers found in old factories. The desk was covered in boxes, large envelopes and papers. Griffin stepped around Charley, momentarily ignoring the shaking ground and the distant noise of gunfire. Packages like these didn’t just randomly show up out of nowhere. They had a purpose, and more importantly, they had a sender.
The same name was on the labels of all the packages. The return addresses were different, but they were all mailed to a post office box in Ashland. And the recipient on the P.O. box was the same on each.
Nelson Florider.
“Griff?” Charley was slumped against the doorframe, his lip curled down as he tried to fight back the pain.
“Did you ever hear of a Nelson Florider?” Griffin asked.
“They broke my hand.” Charley’s voice quivered. “They broke my fucking hand.”
Griffin turned back to the desk. He considered taking one of the packages, at least one of the large envelopes, but he decided now wasn’t the time. Maybe later, if they managed to get out of here in one piece. If the depot was still standing from what was now attacking it.
“You might need this,” Griffin said, pulling the Beretta from his belt and handing it to Charley.
Charley stared at it for a long moment, as if contemplating what its purpose was. Finally he took it with his good hand and nodded.
Frost, Dodge and Winslow were waiting for them around the corner in the corridor. All of them were strapped with weapons. They looked at Charley with worry, but Charley shook them off.
“I’m fine.”
“Remember,” Frost said. “The trick is to walk slowly. Make as little noise as possible.”
She started toward the door, reaching for the handle. The door burst open instead. Osterman stood before them, his right arm torn off, blood soaking his uniform. He had his gun in his left hand and raised it at Frost.
Before he could fire, though, his face disappeared. His body slumped and hit the floor. The single shot echoed loudly in the hallway.
Griffin lowered his M16. He nodded to Frost, not shaken by the violent act. Most people in town knew his past, that he’d been an Army Ranger, but few understood what a Ranger actually did. Most associated the term with park rangers, protecting nature from hikers and hikers from nature. But the Army Rangers were one of the most skilled military forces in the world, and the motto, ‘Rangers lead the way’ wasn’t just a catchy saying. When the United States went to war, the first boots on the ground, sometimes long before a war had been officially declared, were Rangers, doing what needed to be done. What no one in town really knew, or thought about, was that Griffin had killed people. And he was good at it. The images had haunted him later on, but he’d managed to control his demons through his art.
Frost whispered, “
Let’s go
!”
They started out into the hanger, slowly at first, but it soon became apparent that wasn’t going to work. There were eight roots in total now, and they seemed to all sense the group at once. Many tried to stretch toward them, but they could only go so far, stretched to their limit underground.
At least
, Griffin thought,
the town isn’t in any danger from the carnivorous trees.
Winslow whispered, “Allow me.” He pulled a grenade from his pocket, yanked the pin, and threw it toward the other end of the hanger. It hit the floor, seventy feet away and exploded, not a massive explosion like the kind you saw in the movies, but it pulled the roots’ attention like a swimsuit model strutting through death row.
Griffin put a hand on Winslow’s arm. “In case you decide to do that again, shout ‘frag out’ before throwing so we know to duck. Or cover our ears. And the effective kill radius of most frag grenades is about fifty feet.”
Winslow gave a nod. “Right. Sorry.”
They ran toward the Humvees. Griffin lingered, taking up the rear. As he passed Winslow’s charred SUV, he looked through the open driver’s door and saw his M4. He recovered it quickly, tucking it into his belt next to the Beretta. A few of the nearest roots sensed his movement, though, and swung back around. Griffin raised the M16 and touched the trigger, but something else caught his eye.
A root only yards away snapped out at him. Griffin sidestepped it, shouldered the M16, and bent to grab the flamethrower. He had no idea how much fuel was left in the tank. Judging by the weight, there was still some. He’d never used a flamethrower. They hadn’t been part of the U.S. arsenal since 1978, which made the weapon’s presence strange, but welcome. Between his vast weapons training and knowledge of how to use a backyard grill, he found the weapon very intuitive. He hefted it onto his back, ignited the pilot flame, slipped his finger around the trigger, and sprayed a steady stream of flame at the nearest root.
The other roots had sensed the group moving, and they were stretching out to reach them. Winslow shouted, “Frag out!” and then tossed another grenade across the wide hanger. The concussive force was deafening within the confines of the hanger, but none of the roots were fooled this time. Only Griffin seemed to have any luck, advancing toward the Humvee as he sprayed wide arcs of fire that repelled the roots, albeit only momentarily. He reached the vehicle seconds later, everyone else already inside. Frost was behind the wheel, the engine rumbling, Dodge in the passenger seat. Winslow kept the rear door open for Griffin, who shrugged off the fuel tank, tossed the flamethrower aside and climbed in.
The ground beneath them trembled violently. Frost floored the accelerator. The Humvee’s engine roared and they started forward—but immediately jerked to a stop.
“What’s wrong?” Dodge shouted.
Frost shook her head. She kept her foot on the gas. The engine roared even louder, but the Humvee didn’t move.
Only no—it
was
moving.
Backwards.
Griffin turned in his seat. He couldn’t quite see out the rear window. This Humvee was equipped with a machine gun mounted on the roof. He stood up and stepped between Winslow and Charley, poking his head through the ring mount. “Shit.”
Frost shouted, “What’s wrong?”
“A root has us! Probably gripping the axle!”
The root was thicker than all the rest, no doubt stronger.
“Use the machine gun!” Winslow shouted.
But it wouldn’t work. Griffin saw that immediately. The angle was wrong.
Griffin lowered his hand, shouted, “Give me a grenade!”
Winslow did him one better. He gave him two.
Griffin pulled the pins from each. He stared at the base of the root, at the space where it had torn up through the concrete. The chances of making one of the grenades into that slight space were low. Still, he would never know until he tried.
He tossed the grenades, one after another. They rattled across the concrete and bounced to a stop against the large root.
Two points, Griffin
, he thought, and he ducked into the Humvee.
“You didn’t say, ‘frag out,’” Winslow complained.
“It was implied,” Griffin replied.
Then the world exploded. The Humvee, released from the root’s grasp, jerked forward and careened through the hanger door, bending the flimsy metal and emerging from the other side like a newborn war machine.
24
Once they were past the gate, Frost kept her foot on the gas pedal. She was aware of a few other roots off in the grass, but they weren’t a threat. They could only reach so far.
The Humvee began to slow. She wasn’t sure why until she realized her foot had lifted off the gas.
Beside her, Dodge asked, “Everything okay?”
She blinked. Realized that they were passing the spot where the remains of Rebecca Rule lay. She considered stopping once more for her friend and mentor’s remains, but they’d been out of touch with the town for too long.
Refuge comes first
, she told herself, glancing at Griffin.
Everything else is secondary.
Shaking her head to clear it, she said, “I’m fine,” and she pressed her foot back down on the gas pedal.
They didn’t speak for the next several minutes. Not when she made the turn at the intersection. Not as they climbed the road leading back into town. At some point, she knew one of them would speak, and that would start up a whole conversation, but she wasn’t sure what she could add to it. Not yet at least. Not until she had time to sit down and process everything.
Then, behind her, Winslow said, “It’s happening again.”
She eyed him in the rearview mirror and saw him staring out the window. She looked out the windshield again, not at the road but toward the sky. He was right. She slowed the Humvee to a stop and cut the engine. Off in the distance, the church bell was ringing frantically.
They waited and watched the green world behind them shimmer and fade. In its place was a wasteland. Brown dust blew across the landscape, shifting past fields of boulders, craggy stone outcroppings and a few scattered, burnt trees that rose up like blackened, one-hundred-foot tall flagpoles.
Dodge’s voice was a reverent whisper. “What—what is this?”
“Did you ever see pictures of Hiroshima after the bomb?” Winslow asked. “Looked a lot like this.”
Frost started the engine, placed the Humvee in gear, and they moved forward again.
They reached the outskirts of town two minutes later. Some people were out with guns and rifles. They even heard gunfire off in the distance.
“What’s happened now?” Dodge asked.
Someone spotted them and hurried over.
Frost rolled down her window. “What’s going on?”
“Bugs. Big, giant bugs. Like bees or wasps or something.”
“How many?”
A shrug. “Not sure, but we managed to kill most of ’em. A few others flew away. Sheriff, where do you think we are now?”
Frost decided to ignore the question for the moment. “Is anybody hurt?”
“A few people. Think they got stung. I’m not too sure, though. Hey, where’d you get the Humvee?”
Another question Frost decided to ignore for the time being. “I’m sorry, we need to go. Be safe.”
They continued into the center of town. More people were around, most of them carrying weapons of some kind. Not all of them were guns. Some of them were makeshift—baseball bats, rakes, hoes—a mob fit for Dr. Frankenstein’s castle.
Frost stopped the Humvee in the middle of the street. She glanced back at Charley. “How are you holding up?”
He grimaced. “Could use a drink.”
Frost raised a single eyebrow . “We’ll get Kyle to look at your hand.”
The sense of confidence she tried to convey rang hollow even to her own ears.
“Now we just need to find him,” Winslow said.
“Here comes Cash,” Griffin said. He opened his door and stepped out as the electrician hurried over.
Cash took in the Humvee. “Guess the depot wasn’t completely deserted after all, huh?”
“It’s a long story,” Griffin said. “Charley’s hurt pretty bad. Do you know where we can find Kyle?”
“Actually, that’s what I wanted to talk to you about.” He ran a hand through his hair, then replaced his Sox cap. He was clearly nervous.
Everyone else was getting out of the Humvee now. Frost asked, “What’s wrong?”
“Well, um—” Cash shook his head. “Kyle’s up at Mr. Herman’s place.” He glanced at Winslow and then back to Griffin. “It’s best you head up there as quickly as possible.”
Griffin stepped forward, clutching Cash’s arm. “Is it Avalon?”
“Lony’s fine,” Cash said. “It’s—” His eyes shifted toward Winslow again, and at once the old man’s face paled.
“Carol?” he whispered.
Cash repeated, “You best hurry.”
Frost touched Winslow’s arm, tried to direct him back to the Humvee. “Get in. I’ll drive.”
“What’s happened to Carol?” Winslow asked.
But Cash only shook his head.
Griffin helped Charley out of the car. “Can you find Charley some help?”
“What’s wrong with him?” Cash asked.
“His left hand is broken.”
“How’d that happen?”
By then Frost had managed to get Winslow back in the Humvee. She waited at the driver’s door. “Griffin?”
He nodded to her, then said to Cash, “Just make sure he gets some help, okay?”
“Definitely,” Cash said. “No problem.”
Griffin hurried back to the Humvee. Dodge was still in the passenger seat. He climbed in next to the pastor as Frost started up the engine and tore down Main Street, turning a quick right into the residential neighborhood.
Cash took Charley’s
arm and led him toward Soucey’s Market. “Hell, man, what happened to your hand?”
Charley said nothing. The pain still radiated up his arm, but the hand itself had become numb. He wondered if he would ever be able to use it like he had before. After all, this was his beer-drinking hand. The one he used to tip back countless bottles. The one he even used to choke the chicken on the occasions he had nowhere else to stick it.
Cash opened the door for him. Charley started to take a step inside, but something caught his eye down the street. Julie Barnes, now dressed in form-fitting jeans, a tight, pink flannel shirt and new-looking hiking boots, stood there outside the Brick House, watching him. He stared at her a moment, not sure what to say or do. Then he lifted his other hand, his good hand, and raised his middle finger.
Cash glanced down the street. No fan of Julie Barnes, he grinned. “What’s that about?”
“Nothing,” Charley grunted, turning back to him. “You think you can find me a beer? Because right about now, I could use a goddamn drink.”