Storm Tide Rising: Blackout Volume 2 (27 page)

"People get pulled into the darkness between the tents and terrible things are done there," Maria said in a whisper, her eyes reflecting the horrors of what she’d seen and heard. "The guards never come inside the fence. Too much risk of being overrun, they say. We're just in here on our own."

"Did you?"  Alyssa whispered, a hand going to her mouth.

Maria shook her head. "Almost, but like I said before, Terrance saw me in the line and watched out for me when I first entered the camp. Two men grabbed me as I walked down the rows in the pitch dark a couple of nights ago. They pulled me in between two tents on the edge of the Rows. I don't know what they would have done."

Terrance gripped the club in his hand hard enough for the wood to creak, and Mike took a step back. The young man was large for his age, and he looked like he could crush bricks with his bare hands. "I got to her just in time to stop it. I didn't kill either one of them, but I wanted to. I broke a few bones, though."

Mike smiled at Terrance and shook his hand. "I think we're going to get along great," he said to the young man.

They made introductions all the way around, but intentionally kept them brief. Alyssa and Maria were sharing meaningful looks, and after a moment the younger of the two said, her voice thick with emotion, "If you'll excuse us, we've got some things to discuss."

They all knew what those things were. Mike could see them on their faces and in Terrance's eyes. Still, no one spoke of them. They'd all lost family or friends already and understood the need to talk about the loss and find comfort in shared pain. This reunion was more than just a blessing for Alyssa and Maria, but no one dared give voice to that. Hope was something to be held at a distance these days, locked away for safe keeping, if for no reason other than self preservation.

Mike caught Terrance's eye after a moment and nodded his head to the side. Terrance followed him and stood with a fresh tree stump behind him. His head never stopped turning, scanning the undergrowth and the surrounding hillside, the makeshift club in his hand.

"You said they always bring back FSS troops, right?"  Mike asked, and Terrance nodded. "About what time do they come?"

Terrance shrugged slightly. "I don't know, a couple of hours before sunset usually. They come to the main gate, drop off the new guys, pick up some old and leave. Sometimes the FSS guys that go out come back; sometimes it's mostly new guys."

Mike glanced up at the sun and held his closed fist level with the horizon. "Do you think we have time to get back to the gate before the van gets there?" he asked.

Terrance glanced at the sky, then looked at Mike. "Normally I'd say yeah, but you look pretty tired. You sure you're up to it?"

Mike smiled. "One way or another I've been walking through woods my whole life," he said with a chuckle. "I'll be okay."

Terrance flashed a skeptical grin and then walked over to his relatives. After a whispered conversation, he left the club with his cousin and came trotting back over to Mike. "You ready, old man?"  he asked playfully.

Mike shot him a frown. "I'm not old, Terrance," he growled. "I'm thirty three for Pete's sake."

Terrance let out a short belly laugh. "You remember when you were so young you thought thirty three was old, Mr. Mike?"

Mike nodded. "Of course I remember that," he replied. "It wasn't that long ago!"

Terrance grinned and chuckled. "Well, you're thirty three now, Mr. Mike," he said with a wink. "That means you're old."

Mike opened his mouth to reply but winced as his mind tried to unwind that logic. After a moment, his eyes narrowed, and his teeth clicked closed. "Shut up," he growled. "Let's get goin."

Terrance shrugged and started off at a brisk walk. "Anything you say, old man," he said over his shoulder.

Ch.41

Need to Know

Eric trotted slowly through the woods. He loved the sounds that surrounded him as he moved. Birds flew in the canopy over head and chirped to each other. There was an almost constant buzz of insects in the air, loud enough to be distracting at times. The cicadas were out in force this year, and they filled the woods with the undulating waves of their call. In the silences between roaring crescendos, small frogs called spring peepers chirped to each other now and then, or an angry squirrel chattered at him.

These were woods he had grown up in, woods he had run through before he was old enough to go to school. They were a part of him, an extension of his own imagination. But there was a cold intruder in that familiar world. It was sharp and metallic, and it was new. To Eric, the barbed wire they'd strung from tree trunk to tree trunk was about as unnatural a thing as could ever exist in those woods, and he hated it. The only thing he hated more was the fact that he knew it was necessary.

Suddenly, Eric froze. There in front of him, the fence had been neatly cut, evidently with a pair of wire snips.

In an instant, the woods around him had gone from familiar and comforting to foreign. Eric knelt and scanned the trees around him. He checked at ground level and up in the canopy for any potential threat or enemy. Most of the deer he'd taken were from a tree stand, and he didn't want to play the deer. Satisfied that he wasn't being watched or in imminent danger, Eric turned back to the barbed wire fence. He inched forward until he could reach the ends of all three strands where they lay in the leaf litter between two tree trunk fence posts.

Eric felt the small hairs on the back of his neck stand on end, and a cool thrill ran through his body to his fingertips. Adrenaline flooded his system as Eric scanned the woods around him again. He stood and started walking through the tree trunks, trying to keep a slow and even pace as he moved toward his grandparents' house.

Suddenly, every sound was a new terror. Every twig that broke under a squirrel sounded like a boot step, every rush of birds' wings seemed to be rounds whizzing by his head.

Before he'd gone fifty feet, Eric was running.

Ch.42

Eyes and Ears

Marcus could feel the blood pounding in his ears. His mouth was dry, and it was difficult to swallow. He glanced up and down the empty hallway one more time, then stuck the key into the door and turned the lock. He stepped inside and locked the door behind himself. The quarters were kept in pristine condition. The bed was made with surgical precision, and every surface gleamed in the light of a single lamp on the computer desk. The air smelled faintly of disinfectant.

Marcus looked around for good places to put the tiny devices in the case in his left hand. There were three things on the desk; a lamp, a computer screen, and a mouse. The keyboard was in a drawer and the computer terminal itself was in a secure alcove behind the wall. That didn't leave many inconspicuous places to put a listening device or a fiber optic camera. Marcus looked around for any clothes or books, anything at all that he could use as a point of concealment for the surveillance equipment.

The footlocker was secured with two padlocks on it, and there was nothing in the closet or the chest of drawers. Edwards had a single bunk, and his were the only belongings in the room. Marcus couldn’t risk cutting the locks on the foot locker. If he did, Edwards would know someone had been in the room, and that would likely be enough to push him into doing something dangerous.

Marcus carefully lifted the mouse from the computer desk and pried the battery well open with his master key. He slipped one of the wafer-thin listening devices into the side of the battery well and closed the lid again. He moved the mouse around on the mouse pad, but the small device in the battery well didn't rattle or make any noise at all. Satisfied, he walked across the room and used a small pad of adhesive gel to secure the second listening device to the back side of the bed frame.

The camera would be more difficult, though. Marcus looked around and settled on the edge of the light panel in the ceiling. It would be out of the way, and unless Mr. Edwards happened to look directly at the device, it would be difficult to spot. With the three devices in place, Marcus did a quick survey of the room to make sure everything was where Edwards had left it. He took a small pack of alcohol disinfectant swabs. He wiped ever surface he'd touched, and the smell of the alcohol blended with the heavy disinfectant odor already in the air.

With one last glance around the interior of the room, Marcus stepped out into the hall, closed the door, and locked it. He checked the knob once to make sure it was locked tight, and then he turned and started walking down the hallway. His hands were shaking slightly and his breath came in short, ragged gasps.

As he walked down the empty corridors, Marcus decided he simply was
not
cut out to be a spy.

Ch. 43

Strangers

Joe stepped out into the late August morning with his hair still wet from his shower. That wouldn't last in the warm wind that was blowing through the shaded back yard. From the height of the porch, he could see across the vineyard to the line of trees in the distance. And it was at that moment that Eric broke through the woods at a dead run for the house.

Joe reached inside and grabbed his M-4 carbine. He hopped to the ground and walked calmly to the edge of the vineyard and waited, his eyes scanning the horizon and his ears straining to hear any sounds of gunfire. Eric skidded to a halt, panting, with his rifle in his hand.

"The fence is cut," Eric said, gasping for air between each word. "I saw tracks, hard to tell how many. But it's a clean cut like someone did it with clippers."

Joe nodded, his pulse already racing. He turned to Beth as she stepped out on the back porch with a pan of peeled and quartered tomatoes in her hands. "Get everyone in the house," Joe called, "and grab a shotgun. Have Bill on the back porch keeping watch. Someone cut the fence."

Beth didn't ask questions; she nodded and began moving. Joe had already turned back to Eric, though, his focus stayed on the vineyard and the wood line beyond. "Did you see anyone or hear anyone?"  Joe asked, and Eric shook his head. "Chris is still out at the highway and Tom is at the pastures. It's up to you and me, okay?"

Eric swallowed hard before answering. "Yes, sir."

Joe started running through the vineyard back the way Eric had come. Eric ran right behind him, and as they approached the wood line, Joe slowed. He turned and made eye contact with Eric and pointed two fingers of his right hand at his eyes, then to the right. Eric understood and swung the barrel of his gun that way, looking for any signs of movement. Joe watched to the left, and they ducked into the woods.

Joe set the pace, moving carefully and quietly through the underbrush, but it was Eric’s hand signals that directed him right to the break in the fence. Joe looked at the ends of the barbed wire and saw that Eric was correct; they'd been cut cleanly. He looked at the tracks in the leaf litter and pine straw covering the floor. There had been three people that crossed through the break in the fence. They'd made a few circles in the leaves to confuse their tracks as much as possible, but from what Joe could see, two had circled along the inside of the fence to the right, and one had gone left.

Joe motioned for Eric to follow him, and he turned right inside the fence line. For about forty yards, he followed the two sets of tracks that led that direction until one set broke away from the fence and the other continued. Joe paused for a moment and then motioned down the trail that broke away from the fence. The tracks were dim and hard to follow at first. Then, after a few dozen meters, the tracks disappeared completely. Joe froze, and a chill ran straight through to his bones.

He looked at Eric and held up a hand, then pointed to his ears. They both strained as hard as they could, but finally both Eric and Joe shook their heads. "I don't hear a sound,” Joe said, "and that means whoever cut the fence probably isn't in the woods anymore. There's only one place they could be, and that's the house.

Eric's eyes went wide for a moment. "Maybe they just wanted to see what was on the other side of the fence. Maybe they left. There might not be anyone here in the woods or up at the house at all."

Joe's eyes hardened, and he shook his head firmly. "That piece of camo cloth you found on the fence line the other night," he said quietly, "that might have been someone just taking a look. Or maybe it was one of these three scouting ahead. Either way, there's only one good reason you lay down a false trail, and that's to buy yourself time. Whatever they're here to do, they ain't done it yet. And that means they're still here. I need to know you're ready for this, son? When we get back to the house, there are going to be people there, people we don't know. And I have to know that you will do exactly what I tell you, no hesitation."

Eric nodded his head, but Joe reached over and gripped his shoulder, forcing him to make eye contact. "When I tell you to move, son, you move. You've got to trust me. Whatever I tell you to do, you do it without hesitation. Do that and everything's going to be all right."

Eric swallowed past the sudden knot in his throat and held his father’s gaze. "Yes sir."

Joe nodded and looked down at Eric's rifle. "Go ahead and take your safety off. You see anyone you don't recognize before we get to the back yard, you shoot first and ask who they are after."

Before Eric could say anything, Joe was already moving at a fast jog through the woods back toward the house. He wasn't concerned about being quiet now, and instead he focused on moving as quickly as he could over the rough terrain. They broke out of the woods and continued across the lower field. In a few weeks the turnips Granddaddy had sown in the freshly plowed dirt would sprout, but for the moment the field was bare.

They ducked under the muscadine vines as thick as Joe's wrist that hung low and heavy with loose clusters of grapes that would soon ripen into a deep purple. A few rows back from the edge of the vineyard, Joe slowed, and turned to Eric one more time.