Breakout (Final Dawn) (18 page)

     But it occurred to
Skully that if another camera was mounted on the top of that turbine it would offer a great view of the highway below. And it would take away the element of surprise.

     So this time, they were driving their quad runners through the woods.

     It was slow going. They had to slow to a crawl to drive through a seemingly endless number of arroyos, and repeatedly had to alter their path to go around thickets and stands of mesquite trees.

     But eventually they made it to the base of
Salt Mountain, where they dismounted and climbed on foot to the summit.

     By doing so, they accomplished two things. They’d given themselves a bird’s eye view of the compound and everything in it. And they’d managed to do so undetected.

     They brought two pairs of high powered binoculars with them. They’d come from the prison. In another time the binoculars had been used by prison guards in the towers above the exercise yard. The guards had used them to zoom in on convicts they suspected of passing drugs or other contraband.

     But they worked equally well to watch Hannah and Little Markie
as they walked hand in hand to the chicken coop to gather eggs.

    
Skully watched Hannah through the binoculars as she walked. The way the breeze tossed her hair around and rippled the skirt of her snow white sun dress awaked something inside him.

     “I just want it on record that that tasty treat is mine, before anybody else gets a shot at her.”

     But something else had caught Smitty’s eye.

     “To hell with that. Look inside the doorway to that second barn.
Skully, they’ve got cows too.”

    
Skully turned his binoculars away from Hannah and toward the west barn. The doors were open on each end to let the breeze come through. And, sure enough, Skully could make out several head of cattle in their pens.

     “Well, I’ll be damned.”

     Inside the compound, at the security console, Brad was diligently watching the monitors, completely unaware that his own group was being watched as well.
Skully and Smitty had managed to stumble across a flaw in the compound’s security system. A blind spot from which they could see without being seen. And it had the potential to mean disaster for the people in the compound.

     Smitty wanted to leave immediately. To return and tell the others, and to start formulating their plan to take over the compound.

     But Skully’s primal urges had been awakened. Hannah and Markie had been walking away from him before, on their way to gather eggs. He had seen her from behind, but hadn’t been able to see her face.

     He refused t
o leave until he knew what she looked like.

     The two made small talk while
Skully waited, wondering how this group had managed to keep livestock alive during the long freeze.

     And looking forward to the
day when they’d bite into a big juicy steak, with fresh mashed potatoes instead of that crap that came in a box.    

     Twenty minutes later, Hannah and Markie emerged from the chicken coop with a basket of eggs.

     Smitty said, “Those look like eggs. That means they have chickens too.”

     But
Skully didn’t notice the eggs. His attention was focused on Hannah’s pretty face. He was lost in his own thoughts, looking forward to the time when he’d be face to face with her, and the things he planned to do to her.

Chapter 3
4

     As it turned out, the bees weren’t an issue. They were slow to migrate to the higher elevation and cooler temperatures around Salt Mountain. But they were there in sufficient numbers to pollinate the crops.

     Karen had made a habit of leaving the east and west doors open to the greenhouse during the day, to allow the bees access to the greenhouse plants as well.

     Everything was growing quite nicely.

     And Karen was able to keep it a secret that her strawberries were starting to ripen, until the day she carried half a bushel into the kitchen. Helen used her grandmother’s old recipe to create a red sugar glaze, and they served a strawberry pie topped with Redi-Whip for dessert that night.

     It also happened to be Karen’s birthday. She’d tried to keep it a secret, but Helen managed to find out somehow. And Helen pulled her own surprise by producing a second dessert. A succulent three layer white birthday cake, beautifully iced with flowers and hearts.

     For a group that had survived on so little for so long, it was a joyous night.

     But they weren’t the only ones with something to celebrate.

     On
Buena Vista Drive, Tony and Frank were finishing up the watering of their crops when Tony’s wife Sally came running from her house, screaming incoherently.

     Tony thought something dreadful had happened, until she turned and he could see the smile on her face.

     He went running to her and said, “Honey, calm down! What’s the matter? What’s happened?”

     She could barely contain he
r excitement.

     “Lights! We have lights!”

     At that same moment, Jesse’s son Bobby came running out of his own house.

     “Hey everybody! The power’s back on!”

     To prove it, he ran back in and turned on the family’s stereo. Then he put on Santana’s
Supernatural
CD.

     Then he cranked up the volume, and out into the street came the chords of, appropriately enough,
the song
Put Your Lights On.

     Eva came outside as well, grinning ear to ear, grabbed her husband and began to dance in the middle of the street with him. It was possibly the only time ever that anyone tried to dance to that particular song. They were a spectacle, but they didn’t care.

     That night, Frank couldn’t sleep, but he couldn’t figure out why. Then it dawned on him that the light coming in the bedroom window from the streetlights outside were keeping him awake. Even when his eyes were closed, there was enough light penetrating his eyelids to keep him from falling asleep. For almost seven years, he’d been accustomed to falling asleep in total darkness. It would take him a few nights to adjust to the change.

     But for now, he needed his sleep. He closed the drapes and crawled back into bed, snuggling with a sleeping Eva. He was out within minutes.

     Two days later, a sound truck drove slowly down the neighborhood streets. Like Buena Vista Drive, many of the other streets were barricaded to keep out marauders, but the volume was turned up loud enough for everyone to hear.

    
May I have your attention, please. This is an announcement from the Mayor of San Antonio, Artie Cisneros. Now that power has been restored, the city water plant is expected to come on line within seventy two hours. When your water starts to run, it is important that you flush your pipes by running the water for at least five minutes. After that the water will be safe to drink. Please tune to AM Radio Station 950 for further details.

     Although San Antonio had begun to normalize, it would be a long time before it would recover from the meteorite. It had lost more than ninety percent of its population. There were still thousands of homes that had decaying human bodies inside. And the survivors would have to grow their own food for several more years, until factories and distribution systems could come back on line.

     But the lights and water would go a long way to make the survivors feel human again.

Chapter 35

     In
Eden, Skully and his crew were laying out their plans in the fire station’s old conference room.

    
Skully drew a rough diagram of the compound on a whiteboard, and a circle to depict Salt Mountain.

     “Before we start scaling the walls I want to put a sniper up here on the mountain. He can take out anybody who comes out of the building to return fire. Smitty, you claim to be a good shot. You can go up there early in the morning, just like we did before. From that vantage point, you can keep them inside the building, and tell us when it’s clear to come over the wall.

     Mark, whose real name was Albert, but who was called Marky Mark because he looked just like the rapper, asked “How in hell are we going to get over the wall?”

     “It looked to be about twelve feet. We’ll hit the local hardware store on our way out of town. They’ve got extension ladders that go to sixteen feet. We’ll climb up the ladders and drop down on the other side. Twelve feet’s not too far to drop
.”

     Smitty added, “I saw some ladders on the inside of the walls, leaning up against the wall, one ladder on each side. If we put our ladders up at the same place, we can climb down their ladders after we clear the wall.”

     Skully was surprised.

     “I didn’t see no ladders leaning against the walls.”

     “That’s because you were too busy watching that woman.”

    
Skully laughed.

     “Well, you got that right. She belongs to me until I get done with her. I’m gonna break her in right, and then you guys can have her too.”

     Mark said, “Screw trying to line up the ladders. Skully’s right. Twelve feet ain’t too far to drop. And it’ll be a lot faster getting in.”

     “Okay. We’ll need two vehicles. The warden’s Humvee should carry four or five of us. Mason, see i
f you can get one of the pickups running. We’ll put two guys in the front and the rest in the back.”

     “When are we going?”

     “Let’s try for tomorrow. If you can get the pickup running, go find three extension ladders and get them back here. If we can get everything ready tonight, we’ll send Smitty out first thing in the morning. Then we’ll follow him two hours later.”

    
Skully looked at Smitty.

     “Will that give you enough time to get up that mountain and into position?”

     “Yeah. No problem.”

Chapter 36

     “Damn it all to hell!”

     Skully wasn’t happy. He’d spent a good portion of the night dreaming about the woman he’d seen in the compound, and all the things he planned to do with her after they’d captured the place.

     He woke up ready and raring to go.

     Then he looked out the window and saw the heavy rains pouring down.

    
He went to the central dining room and found Smitty and Marky Mark cooking their usual breakfast of Ramen noodles.

    
Mark asked Smitty, “I can’t wait until we can eat some real eggs for breakfast. And some fresh bacon from those pigs too. Are you sure she was carrying eggs?”

     Smitty said, “That’s what they looked like. I don’t know what else they could be. And I know she got them out of that building, because the basket was empty when they went into it.”

     They looked up and saw Skully walk into the room. He didn’t look like he was in the mood to socialize.

     “So,
Skully, are we gonna go or not?”

     “Hell no, we can’t go. Those arroyos are gonna be full of rushing water coming off the mountains. You might get through them on your wheeler and you might not. And that field inside the wall will be hell to run across when it’s muddy.”