LZR-1143: Redemption (7 page)

EIGHT

“I told you, I was hardly ever in any danger,” said Ky, trying in vain to convince us as we stared at her, the three of us sitting alone in the back of the large cabin. I held a half-full water bottle in my hand and absently swirled the contents as I gave her an unconvinced look.

Other than the electronics and some crates strapped to the metal floor, the interior of the cabin was stripped, and bare bones. Some jump seats and a cargo net in the back finished it out, and the mechanics for the weaponry were prominent in the small space, somehow out of place in the interior of a large plane. It was like a long, flying tank.

Somehow off-putting, but definitely secure.

“What the hell do you mean? You left the safest damn place in the world, snuck into a subway tunnel…”

“A safe subway tunnel…” she emphasized, trying to head off Kate’s rant.

“… and snuck or fought your way through a crowd of undead, on your way to possibly make a split-second rendezvous with an airplane that you might or might not get aboard, and that might or might not crash into an army of zombies. How on god’s green and rotten effing earth is that safe?”

She twirled a crossbow bolt in her hand absently.

“You make it sound worse than it was,” she replied in that infuriating teenage tone. Kate’s breath drew in and I checked her hand to make sure it wasn’t straying toward her pistol.

Clenched fist? Check.

Pistol? Negative.

Parenting win.

“Listen, I think we can all acknowledge how stupid this was…” I began, until fielding the look from both of them that made me want to sing soprano. Valiantly, I stopped talking.

“How did you survive even one foot outside the subway? For that matter, how did you get out of the subway? The Army had it locked down and welded shut past National.”

The plane shuddered once, and banked slightly, causing Ky to slide slowly toward me. I put my foot out and stopped the creeping crate upon which she was perched. Ky threw me a quick smile in thanks.

Kate did not.

“I told you. I just… snuck. I slipped into the tunnel right before those gas line explosions, and I lucked out big time on that count. I thought I was going to have to hoof it away from some Army goons after getting into the subway tunnel, but no problems there. I stole the access card from one of the corporals in the rec room while he was playing video games, and I packed my crap and waited. When the guards shifted out, I snuck through. Bingo bango.” She tossed her bolt into the air and caught it again, flashing Kate a fake smile.

“And where’d you get the fancy clothes?” I asked, having noticed quickly that she was wearing a smaller version of the tactical outfits we had been given. “You steal those too?”

“I’m borrowing them. If they all survive the apocalypse, and they can find a soldier that fits into their extra-small petite version, then they can have ‘em back.”

Kate’s face was a hardened steel mom-face.

A “smile all you want but I brought you into this world I can take you out” kind of look.

Despite the fact that, you know, Kate hadn’t brought her into the world. She had saved her life a few times, though, so I assumed that counted.

“That’s not the part I was asking about,” she said, gritting her teeth.

Shit was getting dangerous. I began slowly inching back, away from the approaching nuclear fallout.

“Oh,” said Ky, knowing full well what she was asking. “The last bit?” The nonchalance—the forced nonchalance—was oozing from the kid.

I had never liked her more than I did now.

But I was still backing up.

Something very interesting about this wall, right here. Yep, definitely needed to get closer to check it out.

“Well… You see, Romeo here, he’s not something they’re interested in. And he’s pretty fast. So he and I have this system.” She reached into her bag, and took out a hard rubber ball—the kind that bounce forever when they’re thrown, and that dogs can never destroy.

“I throw this as hard as I can, and he runs after it. Thing is, he knows not to bring it back to me. So when I throw it, he takes it and runs in the direction I threw it. He waits for me to get to a safe place, and finds his way back. He’s really pretty smart.”

I spared a glance for the dark red dog, so valiantly described, and he stared back, one eye dripping dog-goo, and a slow drip of spittle falling slowly from one fang.

Yeah, he’s got ‘Macarthur Genius Grant’ stenciled on his forehead, alright.

He shook his head and the spittle flew into the air. Then, he reached his head into his nether-regions, as if daring me to comment.

“So, we slipped under the chain link fence on the outer perimeter—just took some imaginative lock picking on the Metro doors to get out of the tunnels—and it was dark, and foggy, and we just made our way slowly. Every time they got close, he’d bolt off in the other direction, and I’d hide somewhere. Eventually, we got to the terminal. It was all locked up, did you know that? Only a few of those things inside. We grabbed a snack from the concessions and sat in one of the first class lounges. I got lucky though, since you guys weren’t supposed to leave until tonight. Romeo actually woke me up. We could see the landing lights on the plane.”

“And? How did you get from the lounge onto the tarmac without going through those things?” Kate was deceptively calm.

Wow. I wonder what purpose that bolt on the wall is serving? I definitely needed to check.

“Well… that actually took some doing,” she admitted grudgingly, twirling her crossbow bolt in her hand again. “The drones were doing their thing, and I figured we could probably flank them for a couple minutes more, until the plane was louder. So we made our way to a jet way and down the stairs. Did you know that all the doors inside the airport open if you push them? The locks only work from the outside.
That.
That was luck.”

“You’re telling me you didn’t see any of those things between the Metro and when we saw you? You’re full of crap.” Kate was incredulous.

I checked her pistol hand again, just to make sure.

We both knew she was lying. The kid was too much like me.

I was so proud.

“No, we saw a few. Inside the terminal, not many. I only used a couple bolts. We had to get through a bunch between the Metro and the terminal, but the way they have those access doors and tunnels and crap set up, all that security—not as many as you’d think. We saw a few more on the tarmac, but… all in all, piece of cake.” She leaned back and tossed her bolt into the air again.

This time, the turbulence was heavy, and we were all tossed from our seats to the floor. Her bolt landed on the floor and rolled away. I picked it up from where I stood, now safely ten feet away from the two women.

Rhodes stumbled back after several seconds, the cabin shaking up and down.

“T-storm,” he said. “No weather radar up, just ran into it. We’re having to go around, but we need to refuel soon, and the colonel says we might have some damage on the tail section from the take off. He’s trying to find an airport now.”

I nodded, looking at the airman who was shadowing Rhodes. Behind both of them, the surviving sailor sat staring at the wall.

“Sorry guys, what are your names? I hate to be rude, but this kid was a little bit of a surprise on take off.”

The airman looked shocked but then shook it off.

“Granger. Steve Granger, airman first class.” Then he got the look. Oh sweet Jesus the look. I thought we were past that.

“I have seen all your movies, Mr. McKnight. Huge fan. I never believed the stuff about you. Not once. I knew you were innocent.”

Rhodes guffawed once, whether at the sentiment or at the facts.

I smiled, despite myself.

“Yeah, thanks buddy. But… technically speaking, I wasn’t actually innocent. I did ultimately end it for my wife. I just wasn’t the one that killed her. This virus did that. I just helped her move on, even though I didn’t know that was what I was doing. But I appreciate your faith.”

He looked momentarily confused, then smiled quickly as the plane dropped suddenly in another spot of turbulence.

Behind him, the sailor hadn’t moved. He sat against the bulkhead, staring forward, rocking slightly.

“He’s a little shook up,” said Rhodes, understating the facts slightly as he leaned back against the outer wall. Taking out a flip knife from somewhere in his kit, he began to dig underneath his nails, not sparing another glance.

“Granger, what happened at your airbase? What made you guys bug out?”

He lost his smile and shook his head.

“I don’t rightly know. I was racking out in the plane—we were on long shifts, and you know, it was just easier. All of a sudden, the colonels were in the cabin, running to the flight deck. The doors shut up, and I was by myself back here. They said those things had come from nowhere.”

“Where did they come from? Didn’t the base have walls?”

He shook his head. “Not on the lake side. It was like back there, in D.C.,” he said softly. “They came out of the water, the lake next to our runway. We didn’t have a fence or a wall. Just some towers for visual watch, but it was night, and we didn’t like to burn spots unless we had to ‘cause it just excites ‘em, so we couldn’t see.”

“You had refugees at the camp, didn’t you?” asked Kate softly, switching into her doctor voice. “Women and children and older people?”

“Yes ma’am,” he replied. “We had a lot of those folks.”

He paused, as if fighting the memories.

“It didn’t go well for them. We couldn’t do anything. You know that, right?” He didn’t wait for an answer, just went quiet and turned to the sailor who was still rocking himself against the plane’s vibrating wall.

“I’m gonna go check on Mr. Watts—that’s his name, it’s on his uniform.”

“I’ll go with you, I might be able to help.” Kate said, her anger with Ky still affecting the tone in her voice.

I watched them move toward the young man, and turned to Ky.

“Seriously, what the hell?”

“You tried to leave me behind.”

“Of course we did, you idiot child. We were trying to keep you safe.”

“How’d that turn out for you?”

“Jesus, you’re infuriating.”

She screwed her face up and mimicked my voice in a childish, baby-voice.

There was no winning with her. Only escape.

Teenagers.

“I’m going forward,” I pointed at her abruptly. “Stay.”

She shot me her patented look and rubbed the sleeping dog’s head. He groaned and lifted a leg absently.

I grabbed the walls as the plane shook again, and moved forward, careful not to touch any of the controls or panels, and marveling at the massive gun barrels that protruded from the side of the machine. I never knew how impressive they were, although I had heard my brother talk about them for years.

A single 25mm Gatling style gun, which we had already used; a larger, 40mm Bofors cannon, and the mother of all aerial armaments—the 105mm cannon. The Gatling gun was like a shredder, tearing its victims to pieces. The 40mm cannon was a fiery rain, using incendiary rounds to make things go boom. And the 105mm—otherwise known on the ground as a Howitzer—could be fired at an average rate of 3-4 rounds per minute, delivering a massive payload for optimum disbursement. My brother had taught me well.

He had always wanted to fly one of these beasts.

It was the first time I had thought about him since New York, and I tried to push past it, but the airplane brought it all back. His love of flying, his rough divorce. The fact that he got motion sick but he loved flying too much to quit.

I harbored no illusions. I had little hope that he was alive. We were separated by more than just thousands of miles now.

We were separated by worlds.

The pilots had shut the door to the flight deck after we took off, and I looked through the small window before knocking. Lightning flashed in the distance, and a massive storm system boiled to our right. Rain slashed against the windshield in sporadic sheets, and heavy cloud cover obscured the landscape below.

I knocked lightly, and the co-pilot gestured curtly. I opened the door and found a seat in the flight engineer’s chair. The co-pilot turned to me and I saw the lieutenant colonel silver oak leafs on his uniform before I saw his name: Crawford.

“Colonel,” I nodded, extending my hand. He took it, and nodded once. “Thanks for the pick up.”

“Don’t mention it,” he said, and the pilot turned once, nodding quickly before turning back to wrestling the yoke.

“How are we doing?” I asked, looking out the window at the storm. “I heard we need a port in the storm.”

He gestured at one of a million dials and readouts. “We are at about twenty percent right now. Way too little to get to Seattle from here. We are aiming for Ellsworth in South Dakota, but it’s going to be a race. Our range is about twenty-five hundred miles, and we took off slightly over half full. But if we have to keep fighting this weather, it’s not going to happen.”

“Where are we now?”

He pointed at the GPS computer, which meant nothing to me, as it appeared to be only a green screen with numbers and lines.

“About a hundred miles past Chicago, give or take. But we don’t have weather information coming in, as all the sat links have been disabled. It’s old-school cross-country flight,” interjected the pilot, a full bird colonel who was still staring out the front windshield.

“Is Ellsworth secure?”

“It was the last time we checked. We’ve made a few of these runs, at least as far as San Diego. We’re doing cluster extermination, mopping up after the napalm and incendiary with some high yield explosive rounds. We stopped at Ellsworth a week ago for fuel. They’re remote enough that they haven’t been attacked in force yet. They’re pulling the same trick as the Western Army in Seattle, stacking old shipping containers to make a perimeter, and using drones for decoys.”

“Do we have an ETA?”

He shook his head. “No, largely because we don’t know what the weather is going to do. But one way or another, we’ll be on the ground in about three hours. Get some sack time. You’re going to need it.”