Break Free The Night (Book 1) (33 page)

Chapter Fifteen

             
The rain had stopped, leaving the sky remarkably clear. The stars were brilliant, not so much pinpoints of light but whole sprays of them, scattering haphazardly across the inky sky. Now, it was
n’
t hard too understand why they had once been seen as gods, as miraculous bursts of light that shone from the very heavens above. Kaylee felt a small smile tug at her lips when she picked out the ordinary patch of sky in which Jack had once traced a kite. That night felt like so long ago. The stars bathed the street in silver now, making the three girl
s’
skin shine white as marble. Even Anna appeared statuesque and she laughs lightly when Emma points it out. But the laughter was short lived and her attention was soon called back to the city.

              The keys sat idly in the ignitions. All lights, save the headlights, had been disabled. They were ready to go. But first, they had to make sure none of the infected could follow.

              They were lucky, in a way, because the northernmost border to the city was lined with water. No one had yet to see any infected swimming and it seemed unlikely that they would start. So, it was only three borders that would have to be destroyed. Highways defined two of them. In large cities that would have made it easy, lonely tangles of concrete and steel that wove over trenches and embankments. But here, the highways were just flat stretches of impossibly reaching pavement. Jack and Andrew had walked the whole perimeter in the days proceeding, Andrew pointing out landmarks that could be sabotaged to block any exit for Jac
k’
s approval. Multiple high rises were rigged with explosives, the mall, a police station, one bridge, and the only tunnel leading out were ready to collapse. Tonight the men were poised on motorcycles on the edge of the city. Waiting, just as Kaylee and Emma waited, listening for that first signal that would precede that first blast, the destruction of their world.

             
“
Fire in the hole
!
”

              It was Jac
k’
s voice, made soft by the distance but clear in the silent night. The ground trembled underneath her as the first explosion went off and Kaylee had a moment of surprise and confusion when she did
n’
t hear the terrible blast only felt the quiver in her feet and saw the building wobble. But then the boom of noise rushed at her like a gale and echoed in cracking precision. The concrete wavered and fell and orange flames sprung up to lick the crumbling sides.

             
“
Holy shit
,”
Emma murmured, her voice low.

             
“
Watch your mouth
,”
Kaylee corrected more out of reflex than actually caring. But she did
n’
t think Emma heard her anyway. A second building was falling and loud, thundering booms were sounding as the explosion rent the sky.

             
“
Whose was that
?”
Emma asked, looking from the billowing column of grey ash and smoke that was rising from the newest pile of rubble. A cloud of dust mingled with the smoke, settling in a dense, lingering fog.

             
“
Quinton, I think
.”
But Kaylee was pretty sure. It was Jack first, then Quinton, followed by Andrew, Bill, and then their Dad. If they stuck to the plan they each had two explosions to set off.

              Two explosions sounded in close time, opposite ends of the city now smoking. They were working their way around, closing off each exit systematically until they got to the girls. The last target was their old high rise. Nick was supposed to do that one. If it fell right, which it should, it would block the last of the roads out. All the infected would be trapped. They would be free.

              The fires now darted through crumbling cement in a loose half-circle around the city, the crumbling brick and stone cracking and crashing, and a new noise rose, softly at first and then horrible in i
t’
s intensity: shrieks and moans and guttural cries of hunger. Kaylee saw Emm
a’
s fingers twitch and straighten and Kaylee grabbed them to steady them both. Stubborn as she was, Emma gripped her siste
r’
s hand with everything she had.

             
“
Bill and Andre
w’
s
?”
she asked, but Kaylee knew she knew.

             
“
Dad next, then Jack and Quinton again
,”
Kaylee murmured back. The engine of the motor home spurred to life behind her and Anna jumped from the cab to go start the tanker.

             
“
How long
?”
Emma asked, her voice tinny from nerves, her eyes scanning the wreckage of their city.

             
“
Should
n’
t be too long now
,”
Kaylee answered, eyes also trained on the jumble of roads and dead streetlights and homes and stores laid out in front of her. In moments it would be gone, all of it, closed off to them and to everyone else, all she ever knew as a home, gone.

              The fifth, and closest, of the explosions sounded followed by a swelling silence. Amidst the moans and shrieks was the sound of bare, rotting feet hitting the pavement, staccato beats that clicked as bones clacked into the concrete and thumped as flesh followed. But, the sounds were soon swallowed by the roar of fire and crumbling of mortar as the sixth, seventh, and eighth explosions blew buildings into the sky.

             
“
Andrew again
,”
Emma whispered, her eyes darting nervously to the mouth of the tunnel. Its location was out of the circle that the fire had sprung up to create and Kaylee too watched there for any sign of movement.

              It was different from the other explosions. The tunnel seemed fine at first, just the noise and the dirt lifting above it giving the bomb away. All the earth around the perfectly round circle rose suddenly into the air, lifting away from it with three times it
s’
normal width, and just as suddenly, it all fell back again, only now there was no tunnel to support it all. The dirt fell in massive heaps, a steep and rocky precipice now standing where a tunnel once had.

             
“
Just Dad left now
,”
Kaylee murmured, her eyes following a slow circle around the destructive ring. The barrier could be plainly seen: rubble, stone, concrete, flame, all of it enclosing the infected within the city. Even with functioning limbs and fingers that were
n’
t brittle and broken, Kaylee would have had a hard time finding a way out. The once smooth, glassy surface of the buildings lay in dangerous ruin, sheer drops and twisted wires and glass to cushion on
e’
s fall.

              The slap of boot against the pavement alerted the girls to Ann
a’
s presence
.“
I
t’
s too long
,”
she said, stepping out past the girls. The groans of the infected were getting louder in the unexpected silence; it felt as though they were coming closer.

              No, Kaylee, stop it.

              She knew that was
n’
t it, they would be drawn to the flames, to the light, not to the darkened corner of the earth that Anna and Emma and she inhabited. That was why Jack and Quinton had planned it this way.

             
“
Draw them to us only ever in the end, leave the supplies and the vehicles at the last target
,”
Jack had said, listing it off-handily, like he was copying a school assignment he had completed already before.

             
“
Behind the last target
,”
Quinton had corrected Jack. Kaylee remembered the conversation clearly, remembered how afterwards Jack had warned her that it might sound like the infected were getting closer.

             
“
But the
y’
re not
,”
he had said
.“
They just get really loud. It feels that way, but yo
u’
ll be safe
.
”

              Kaylee believed him. And she trusted him. But still, the shrieks were terrifyingly loud.

             
“
Why is
n’
t the next one going off
?”
Emma asked and it was only because she was her sister that Kaylee could detect the trace of fear in her voice.

             
“
Soon
,”
Kaylee reassured, squeezing her fingers.

             
“
No, i
t’
s been too long. Somethin
g’
s wrong
,”
Anna murmured, slipping the pair of night vision goggles Quinton had produced over her curls and unto her face. Anna cursed softly.

              Kaylee did
n’
t have the time to ask for clarification before she heard the whine of a motorcycle. The engine revved as it climbed the hill to the empty stretch of highway where they were positioned. Backlit by fire, two men struggled to keep a third on the bike between them.

             
“
Dad
!”
Emma cried, running forward as Quinton and Bill let the bike fall away from them and dragged Nick over to the motor home.

             
“I’
m fine
,”
Nick replied gruffly, hissing when Anna reached for the hem of his jeans.

             
“
He dropped a blasting cap
,”
Quinton informed.

             
“
Two of them
,”
Nick corrected
.“
I did
n’
t exactly drop them
,”
he hissed again and swore when Anna pulled the material to cut it away
,“
I got knocked back and fell on one, the other landed on my foot
.
”

             
“
Quinton, Bill, get him inside
,”
Anna instructed, tossing her goggles to Kaylee and yanking open a side compartment of the motor home. She dragged a large bag out before she slammed the hatch shut, the shiny reflectors sewn into the straps shining in the limited moonlight.

             
“
Watch out for the boys
,”
Quinton told Kaylee as he took hold underneath Nic
k’
s arms
.“
The
y’
ll finish up and be right along. Bill, Em, grab that other leg
.
”

              Emma and Bill each took a leg, Bill careful of Nic
k’
s injury. Emma spared a glance past Kaylee and into the night before Anna shouted down at her
.“
Move it along! Emma, I need your help here
.
”

              The smoke billowed upwards, smudging the inky darkness a dusky charcoal. The stars and the sliver of moon were blotted out. An orange glow that almost mimicked a sunrise stained the earth. And the trembling of concrete, the crack of stone, the shrieks of the infected all mingled, rising in pitch and dropping like waves crashing the shore. Her father was groaning from inside the motorhome.

              Kaylee jammed the goggles unto her face, feeling a near sickening desperation to do something, anything, helpful. She scanned the horizon, her head jerking back and forth so quickly that all she caught were greenish-gray blobs of rotting flesh moving quickly through her view. They lit up the lens and confirmed that they must have had some human warmth left to them.