The Gates of Byzantium (Purge of Babylon, Book 2) (28 page)

That wasn’t the case this morning as he opened his eyes and stared up at the LED lamps hanging from the ceiling, set to low so they didn’t blaze a hole through his eyeballs like they usually did. The basement was closed off from the rest of the universe, the better to keep it beyond the reach of the bloodsuckers. Or ghouls, as the others called them.

Josh sat up on his bedroll and looked over to his right, expecting to see Gaby, but she wasn’t there. Instead, he heard voices and saw the doors at the top of the stairs were open, the thick slabs of wood used to reinforce them leaning nearby. He was the only one still in the basement, a realization that made Josh panic momentarily until he remembered the voices from above him.

He wiped sleep from his eyes and glanced down at his watch: 8:16 
a.m.

Jesus, he had slept for more than twelve hours? Was that even possible? He didn’t remember the last time he had slept for more than four or five hours at a time. All that waking up in the middle of the night, the nightmares, the fear, was not conducive to naps.

Josh stumbled up from his bedroll and looked for his tennis shoes. He found them nearby and pulled them on. He heard the voices traveling down from beyond the stairs again. Just the women.

Nice going, chump. Way to make a first impression.

He climbed up the stairs and slipped out through the basement doors and looked sheepishly around. Gaby sat on one of the pews playing some kind of clapping game with Elise and Vera. Carly was nearby watching them, one of those pump-action shotguns hanging off her shoulder from a strap. Lara walked back from the front of the church, also with a shotgun hanging off her shoulder.
They looked like road-weary warriors
, he thought, feeling a touch unmanly with just the Glock handgun stuffed in his front waistband.

Gaby looked over at him and smiled. “Look who’s finally awake. We thought you were going to sleep forever.”

“Why didn’t anyone wake me?” he asked, slightly indignant.

“You looked like you needed all the sleep you could get,” Carly said. “Besides, there’s nothing pressing to do. Breakfast is over there,” she added, pointing at some food laid out on a long bench nearby.

Josh was about to tell them he wasn’t hungry when his stomach growled involuntarily, just low enough that only he could hear. Which was good, because he didn’t really need the added embarrassment of a rumbling, empty stomach, too.

He walked over to the table and grabbed some Vienna sausages and was surprised to see fresh bread on a plate. Well, half a loaf, anyway. He nibbled on it and was shocked by how good it tasted. Of course, that could just have been the fact that it was the first piece of fresh bread he had eaten in months.

“Enjoy it,” Carly said, “it’s pretty much the last loaf we’ll be making for a while.”

“How did you make this?”

“It’s bread, Josh, not gold from wine,” Carly said, amused. “All you need is dough and fire. We have both. Well, we had both. Kind of short on the dough part at the moment.”

“Eat up,” Lara said. “We already ate most of it—it’s only fair you get the final piece.”

He discovered he was actually starving. Josh grabbed some bottled water, and even warm as always, it tasted almost as good as the bread going down.

“Where’s Will and Danny?” he asked.

“They went out to do some scouting,” Lara said. “They’ll be back soon.”

“Any word on Blaine or Sandra?”

“No, unfortunately.” Lara looked at him for a moment, then asked, “Is that comfortable?”

She was looking at the gun in his waistband.

“Not really,” he said, slightly embarrassed again.

“Come with me.”

He grabbed the remaining piece of Vienna sausage and followed her back down to the basement. “These sausages are really good,” he said, taking the final bite and wiping his fingers on his cargo pants.

“Those are the last ones, too. We’re reaching lots of ‘last ones’ these days.”

“Maybe Song Island has more.”

“Hope springs eternal.”

“And fish. They’d have fish, don’t you think? Being on an island? I could go for some fish.”

“What about lobsters while we’re at it?”

“Yeah, those too. Why not?”

Lara led him to their stack of plastic moving crates. She opened one and pulled out a gun belt with a holster, which she handed to him. “It beats walking around with a gun stuffed down your front waistband.”

Josh put it on. It was one size fits all. He cinched it, then tried holstering the Glock. The belt fit just fine, and it even had a flap to flick over the gun so it didn’t fall out of the holster. There were also small pouches in the back and sides.

“Ammo,” Lara said, and handed him four magazines. “The ones with ‘X’ on the side are silver bullets. The ones without are plain bullets.”

“The silver bullets actually work?”

She nodded. “They really, really work.”

He slipped the magazines into the pouches and instantly noticed the difference in weight.

Lara smiled at him. “Look at you. Bad-ass Josh.”

He grinned back at her. “If only I had this in high school.”

“If you did, I’d be reading about you in the news, Josh.”

He laughed. “Oh, right.”

*

He went out
into the parking lot with Lara when Will and Danny were half a mile from the church. Josh blinked in the sun, the heat already doing its job making his pants and shirt stick to him, and it was just morning. It would get much, much hotter in a few more hours.

They watched the black Ford Ranger, with its missing windows and duct-tape-covered windshield, turn into the parking lot and stop in front of them. Danny was driving, Will in the passenger seat.

Lara walked over to Will as he climbed out with his rifle.

Danny walked around the hood of the truck, grinning at Josh. “Look at you, all grown up and holstered. I definitely don’t want to mess with you now.”

Josh felt his cheeks flushing a bit. “Thanks, I guess.”

“We’re doing some shopping later. You should tag along.”

“I will,” Josh nodded.

“Good,” Danny said, and smacked him on the shoulder, so hard that Josh flinched a little.

*

They gathered back
in the parking lot an hour later, after Will and Danny had eaten. Josh felt a little underdressed next to the two men, who were both wearing some kind of slimmed-down version of an assault vest. They had radios connected to throat mics, and they carried rifles and shotguns. He only had the Glock in a hip holster.

Danny, as if reading his mind, grinned. “Don’t worry, kid, one of these days you’ll get a cool assault vest just like us. And a shotgun, too, if you’re a really good boy.”

“Gee thanks, Dad,” Josh said, playing along.

Danny laughed and said to Will, “I like the kid, he’s got spunk.”

“Is that what he has? Spunk?” Will asked.

“Either that, or Cheetos.” Danny glanced back at Josh. “You got spunk or Cheetos, kid?”

“I’ll go with spunk,” Josh said.

“Spunk it is.”

Danny climbed in behind the wheel and Will took the front passenger seat. Josh slipped into the back, feeling like he was about to travel somewhere with mom and dad all over again. Except his new mom and dad were heavily armed and had probably killed a lot of people before the end of the world, which made their
“Don’t make me stop this car”
a hell of a lot more menacing.

Josh saw Will press a Push-to-Talk switch connected to his radio and say into the throat mic, “We’re good to go.” He listened, then responded, “See you in a few.”

“Got any more of those?” Josh asked.

“What’s that?” Will said, looking over his shoulder.

“Throat mics. They look cool.”

“That’s because they
are
cool,” Danny said.

“Sorry, kid,” Will said. “We had two other pairs but lost them a while back. If we pick up some more, we’ll let you know.”

“Besides,” Danny said, “they wouldn’t look nearly as cool if everyone had one.”

“Yeah, that, too.” Will nodded.

“You guys are messing with me, aren’t you?” Josh asked.

“Not at all,” Will said.

“Of course we are,” Danny said, backing them out of the parking lot and turning onto the empty road.

*

Danny drove south,
back in the direction they had come last night. Josh caught sight of an RV park to their right, then a chicken fast food joint to their left with two cars forever frozen in the drive-through lane. He wondered how that had gone down, with the car’s occupants pulling up to the drive-through speaker box only to get something they weren’t expecting.

Must have been one hell of a surprise
.
I went out for chicken and all I got was dead.

They drove for another couple of minutes, passing a McDonald’s, a Burger King, and a pair of Valero gas stations on opposite ends of the same block, which had to be a first. There was a hardware store with a truck buried in the side wall and a battered motorcycle along the shoulder, missing its front tire.

Finally, Danny slowed down, passing a car wash to their left. He maneuvered around an overturned white Volkswagen Josh hadn’t seen yesterday. Danny kept going for about twenty more yards, then turned into a parking lot. Josh glanced up at the big sign as they drove under it: “Lancing Veterinary Clinic.”

“Someone has a sick dog?” he asked.

“Vets keep a lot of drugs inside,” Will said. “Small clinics like this one are always preferable to the hospitals. They’re too big, too many dark rooms. A place like this carries less risk.”

“Yeah, but animal drugs?”

“It’s just labels, and what can and can’t be sold to humans without a prescription. Antibiotics, for instance. Think about it this way: what do they test most drugs on first, before they sell them to you and me?”

“Animals,” Josh said.

“Exactly.”

“With just mild chances of barking side effects,” Danny said. “
Woof
. Excuse me, ahem.”

There were two vehicles in front of the brownstone building, a blue Honda with its front windows rolled down and a slightly beat-up moped with the key still in the ignition. Danny parked next to the moped and they climbed out, Will and Danny slipping their rifles behind them and unslinging the shotguns. Danny grabbed one of the portable LED lamps and clipped it behind his gun belt, which looked much heavier than the one Josh was wearing.

“Close-quarter action calls for shotguns,” Danny said. “Better maneuverability and spreading power.”

“Josh,” Will said, handing him an empty gym bag. “Stick with us for now.”

Josh took the gym bag and nodded. He opened it and saw a second bag inside.

Will tugged open the glass door of the clinic. It pulled free without a fight for a brief second before the spring pulled it close again. They looked through the glass and the layer of dirt smeared on it at the empty front lobby. There was enough sunlight to make out chairs against the front wall, a receptionist desk across from them, and a hallway on the left side.

Will took hold of the door handle again and waited for a beat while Danny got into position. When Will pulled the door open this time, Danny slipped smoothly inside, raising his shotgun. Will nodded at Josh, who darted in after Danny. Will was right behind him as a brief wind twisted inside the room just before the door softly slid shut after them.