The Ashes of Pompeii (Purge of Babylon, Book 5) (14 page)

This wasn’t a charge, it was a victory march through occupied territory.

The gunfight had stopped almost at the same time Will and Michael slipped out of the back room and into what remained of the convenience store. They hid behind a couple of fallen shelves now, within sight of two bodies lying next to the gas pumps outside. The frag grenade had landed inside where it had left behind a crater in the middle and torn apart everything that wasn’t nailed down, including the poor soul whose shredded uniform they were looking at.

There were no rifles for Will to find, though he did see the remnants of an M4 stock among the debris. Which meant he had to make do with the Sig Sauer. At least Michael was smart enough to carry spare magazines, which Will had pocketed. The young man continued clutching his AR-15 (as if he knew how to use it, which Will doubted), eyes snapping from the remains of the uniform and out the shattered windows at the technical and its companions.

The sight of the attackers was intriguing. They were wearing civilian garb, including jeans, cargo pants, and long-sleeve shirts. The fact that they had come extremely well-armed and had acquired one of Josh’s technicals offered up more questions than answers.

Who are these guys?

“What now?” Michael whispered behind him.

“Do you know who took my rifle?” Will asked.

“Your rifle?”

“Yeah. I had an M4A1 with me when I was captured. It was in the truck.”

“I dunno. What’s an M4A1 look like?”

Will started to answer, but shook his head instead. “Never mind.” He looked back out the store at the figures moving slowly down the street. “We’ll let them pass us by. There’s no point in engaging. We’re outmanned and outgunned—”

He hadn’t finished “outgunned” when two of the attackers broke away from the technical and started angling—
right toward them.

Right. Because why would
luck be on my side now?

“Oh no,” Michael whispered a few seconds later.

Kinda late there, kid, don’t you think?

“What now?” Michael said in a hushed voice.

Will didn’t answer right away. He glanced back at the teenager’s terrified face, then looked past him at the back room. There was nothing in there that could help him escape. The window was too high to climb out of, and he wasn’t going to break down a wall with his bare hands. The only way out was through the front door of the Palermo. Or the broken windows would do just as well.

The technical had continued down the street and out of his view, but the two figures were stepping over dead bodies at the pumps after checking them for signs of life. One was a man, the other a woman. They both looked haggard, as if they had been fighting for days instead of ten, maybe fifteen minutes, tops. The woman looked in her mid-thirties and was wearing a Texas Rangers baseball cap that she pushed slightly up when she stopped in front of what remained of the windows so she could peer inside.

“Anything?” the man, who was older by at least ten years, asked behind her.

“I see a body,” the woman said.

“Dead?”

“I said a body, didn’t I?”

The man grunted. “So let’s go.”

“There’s a back room.”

“What about it?”

“It’s open and it looks undamaged.”

Shit. Should have closed the door… Too late for that now.

“Be careful,” the man said.

The woman didn’t answer him. She stepped through one of the broken windows,
crunching
glass under her boots.

Will’s mind turned. Spun. Then whirled.

He looked back at Michael again. The kid was trembling badly, causing the rifle in his hands to shake along with him. He looked like he was about to throw up.

Will back to the woman, the man in the background, and the technical out there, along with, from what he could see, at least four more heavily-armed men.

Then he glanced down at the Sig Sauer in his hand. It was a good weapon. He could probably kill the woman, take her weapon (it looked like an M4), and use it on the man outside. But then there was that damn truck and the M60 mounted on top of it. That thing could chew up what was left of the gas station in no time, and him right along with it.

Gotta get to Song Island. Can’t do that if I’m dead.

As long as I’m alive, there’s a chance…

“Shit,” Will said, before he realized he had said it out loud. Or whispered, anyway.

“What?” Michael said, alarmed. “What are we—”

Will grabbed Michael’s rifle and jerked it out of his hands. It came easily, as if the teenager was barely holding onto it. Before Michael could protest, Will tossed the rifle along with the Sig Sauer toward the woman. The two weapons skidded across the floor and stopped in front of her. She immediately snapped up her M4 and took aim at them, hiding behind one of the many toppled shelves, though he was certain she couldn’t actually see them.

“Don’t shoot!” Will shouted. “We’re unarmed!”

The woman didn’t answer right away. She looked confused. Then, “Step outside. Slowly!”

Will nodded at Michael, who stared back, horrified. “Slowly, like the woman said, okay, kid?”

Michael sighed, but didn’t respond. He did, though, stand up when Will did, and they moved slowly—ever so slowly—out from behind the shelves. The woman’s hands tightened around the rifle, and Will was almost certain she was going to shoot them down at any second. There was something in her eyes…

I’m a dead man. Any second now…

But she didn’t fire. Instead, she held her ground and glared at them over the iron sights of her weapon, even as the older man rushed into the store behind her. “Where’d these jokers come from?” he asked, slightly out of breath despite the relatively short distance.

“Dunno,” the woman said. “They tossed their weapons.”

“Step forward,” the man said, motioning at them with his rifle.

Will and Michael did as they were instructed, the kid still shaking so much it looked as if he was moving in a herky-jerky motion, desperately trying to make each leg move forward one at a time, one at a time.

The older man hurried forward and circled them before patting them down. He found Will’s pill bottle and pocketed it, then stepped back. “They’re clean.”

“Hear me out,” Will started to say.

“You don’t have a uniform,” the woman said, cutting him off.

“No. I’m not one of them.”

“So what are you doing here with them, then?”

“I was captured this morning.”

The man and woman exchanged a glance. Will was suddenly very thankful he looked like he had been through the blender, with his bruises and dried blood clinging to one side of his face. He really didn’t look anything like the clean-cut Michael in his spiffy uniform standing beside him.

“This morning?” the man said.

“Yeah,” Will nodded. “I’m not one of them,” he repeated, just in case they didn’t hear it the first time. You could never be too clear about your allegiances when someone was pointing a rifle at you.

“What about him?” the woman asked, moving her rifle to rest on Michael. “He’s one of them.”

“He’s surrendering,” Will said.

“I’m surrendering,” Michael said, nodding furiously while his voice trembled badly. “Please don’t shoot. I’m surrendering.”

“How old are you, kid?” the man asked.

“Seventeen,” Michael said. “Please don’t shoot,” he said again. “I’m surrendering, like he said.”

The woman stared at Michael.

Those eyes. Will had seen those eyes before.

Aw, shit,
he thought, just before the woman said, “Too bad. We’re not taking prisoners.”

Then she shot Michael in the head from ten feet away.

KEO

He was ready
to say good-bye to Song Island by noon. The fact that he hadn’t come to the place with very much, so had very little to pack on his way off it, helped. The short Texan, Maddie, was taking care of the boat while the other pretty blonde, Sarah, was packing his food for him in the kitchen.

With everything he needed being taken care of, all Keo had left to do was to grab some dry clothes from the hotel’s lost-and-found room, where there were piles of the stuff. He knew where they came from, even though Lara hadn’t mentioned it. Some of them probably belonged to Allie’s people, who had come here months ago seeking salvation, only to find death instead. He should have been a little queasy taking dead people’s things, but a shirt and cargo pants, along with socks and boots that fit, were hard to come by these days. Besides, it wasn’t as if he had ever actually met Allie’s people, or the poor saps who had found the island not quite as hospitable as they had expected.

He was surprised when Carrie knocked on the open door and leaned inside. In all the chaos of the last few days, he had forgotten about her and Lorelei.

“Busy?” she asked.

He gave her his best smile. “I got time if you got time.”

She walked over and sat on the edge of the bed and watched him stuff a couple of extra T-shirts and a few rolls of duct tape into the bag. The Rangers had really stocked up on the duct tape.

“What’s on your mind?” he asked.

“I just wanted to come see you off. We wouldn’t have gotten here if it wasn’t for you. Lorelei and me. I’m sorry to see you go.”

“I made a promise.”

“I know. And you always keep your promises.”

Not always,
he thought. “These days, yeah. I try.”

“It’s too bad we never got to talk.”

“What would we talk about?”

“I don’t know. What you were like before. What I was like. What could have been…”

“Ah. Trouble lies in that direction.”

She laughed. It was just a little bit forced. “I guess you’re right, so maybe we shouldn’t go there.”

“Probably a good idea.”

“It’s going to be lonely out there by yourself. The Gulf of Mexico is a big place.”

“So maybe you should come with me.”

Carrie looked surprised. She wasn’t the only one. It took Keo a second to realize what he had said and another second to know that he meant it. It wasn’t because he wanted the company. Well, that might have been a part of it, but it was also the undeniable fact that he had brought her and Lorelei here, a place that was about to come under attack. He felt, as difficult as it was to admit to himself, responsible for the two of them.

“It’s not safe here,” Keo said. “You must know that after everything we’ve been through the last few days. Especially after last night.”

“I know it’s dangerous…”

“Dangerous isn’t quite the word I’d use, Carrie.”

“What, then?”

“Endangered.”

“‘Endangered’?” She gave him a puzzled look. “I don’t understand.”

He hesitated and spent some time searching for the right words. What would make her understand? Did she really know what was coming tonight? How was he going to convince her without scaring her at the same time? Or maybe that was exactly what he needed to do right now. Terror might be what she needed.

“They want this place,” Keo said. “The soldiers working for the ghouls. And they’re going to take it. If not tonight, then the next, or the one after that. Eventually, it
will
happen. These people are fighting a losing battle.”

He paused. Was he using the right approach? Was the truth what she wanted to hear?
Needed
to hear?

“Sooner or later, the island’s going to fall,” he continued. “It’s not a matter of if, it’s a matter of when. And when that time comes, one of two things will happen to you and Lorelei along with everyone here. They’re either going to capture you and take you back to the towns, or they’re going to kill you. That’s it. There is no third option.”

Carrie didn’t say anything. Instead, she looked down at her hands. He didn’t have a clue what was going through her head at the moment. Keo had never been especially good at reading the opposite sex, and the end of the world hadn’t changed that.

“Come with me,” Keo said. “You and Lorelei. There’s plenty of room on the boat. Lara would probably be okay with giving me extra supplies.”

She finally looked up at him. Damn if he had no idea what she was about to say. He guessed picking up women in seedy bars across the world, as it turned out, hadn’t been very beneficial to understanding them.

“What’s out there?” Carrie said.

“It doesn’t matter. It’s better than what’s going to happen here when night falls. You saw the same things I did out there. The second time I was at the staging area, there were even more soldiers than before.”

Her face paled a bit. He had never asked her what had happened to her that forced her and Lorelei to go on the run in the first place. There was that whole thing about the women in the collaborator towns being impregnated, but he always suspected there was something else. He hadn’t pushed her about it because he didn’t think it was his business.

Now, looking at her, he wanted to ask but managed to bite his tongue. He said instead, “You’ll like Gillian. And I hear the Texas coast is nice this time of year.”

“We’re not going,” she said. She pursed her lips into a half-smile. “Lorelei doesn’t want to leave, either.”

“Carrie…”

“I know the risks, Keo. I also know there’s nothing out there for us.”

“There’s something in Texas.”

“You don’t know that. You just
hope
there’s something waiting for you.”

Crap. She’s got me there.

He hadn’t been in touch with Gillian or Jordan in months, ever since they split up back at Earl’s cabin. That was…how many months ago? Too long. So what were the chances Gillian was actually out there waiting for him, like he kept telling people? Or if she was even alive at all? For all he knew, Mark’s boat could have sunk on the way over. Or they might have met more of those soldiers, or…

I’m hoping for the best, just like a sucker. I’m no different from these people.

“Maybe she’s there, and maybe she’s not,” Carrie was saying. “You’re just like Lorelei and me before you met us, Keo. You’re looking for a place to belong, hoping something’s there when you finally arrive. Well, we found that. Here on Song Island. You could stay with us. With me.”