The Seventh Seal (16 page)

The house sat in a coma.  Chunks of plaster peeled back from
the area between the two windows.  Two feisty squirrels chased each other
across the gutter that hung from the edge of the roof.  Spiderwebbed panes of
glass on the first floor stood like alarming line graphs, diving down in a
steep decline.  The pentagram, circled in red, remained exactly as it had been
painted.  The Sign stood out like an open sore, festering on the face of the
community.

The soldiers arrived on foot and left tracks in the wet
snow, but did so without a sound.  Two men ran down the driveway, securing the
side door.  Two more ran past them and pointed rifle-mounted flashlights into
the garage.  White power from LED lights performed a macabre waltz with the red
points of the laser scopes, as a third pair of soldiers secured the back door.

When the synchronized timer beeped on the men’s wrists, all
teams sprang into action.  The front, side, and kitchen doors imploded with one
ragged gasp.  The wind current created by the open doors blew draperies around
the room like frightened poltergeists.  Papers, bags, and other pieces of
debris lifted into orbit and then drifted back down under the force of gravity.

“Clear!” rang out from every corner of the wood and brick
corpse.  Soldiers penetrated and explored every habitable space, securing the
premises and defiling family memories.  One rifle cracked the protest of the
wind. 

Finally, the invaders retreated through the house, weapons
holstered.  They met around back in the detached garage.  The sergeant in
charge brought his team up to speed.

“The place is secure.  Our orders are to maintain covert surveillance. 
Under no circumstances are we to engage anyone, friend or foe, without a direct
order.  That means you take a bullet in the head before you fire upon an
enemy.”

The young servicemen looked up at each other and then back
down at their muddied boots as he continued.

“We are looking for a John or Jana Burgoyne, owners of the
house.  Here is a picture of John.”  The sergeant held up a pixilated image,
taken and then enlarged from the original in the department of motor vehicles. 
“We’ve got no visual for Jana yet, but they’re working on it.  The Covenant
believes that these two might be searching for each other, and this is the
first place they’ll probably try to check.  Keep an invisible profile.  We
might have to let them remain in the place for up to thirty-six hours before we
raid it.  In addition, any other hostile forces that might arrive are
not
to be engaged.”

The men shuffled their boots in the wet snow.  Some clicked
the safety on their automatic weapons.  The sergeant sensed their deep unease.

“Okay.  Listen guys.  If someone opens fire on us, let ’em
have it.  I don’t care what the ‘official’ order is; we’re not going to stand
there and let the enemy fill us with holes.  I got your back on that.  But if
civilians make their way here, we gotta do everything we can to keep ourselves
hidden and keep them contained.”

Men nodded and caressed the triggers of their assault
rifles.

“Let’s fall back into position and get the hell away from
this house.  Hopefully we didn’t kick up the dust while they were watching. 
Radio silence.  Stay within eyeshot of each other, communicate with hand
signals.  Get comfy boys, we could be here a while.”

The intruders faded into the surrounding environment,
leaving the house to shed silent tears.

“How many?”

“Don’t know.  At least ten, maybe fifteen.  But they’re
raining bullets by the thousands.”

The burly man nodded, pulled his scope up, and placed the
cross hairs on a distant, helmeted head.  He yanked the trigger back.  The
machine gun howled in protest and let loose a shower of deadly missiles.  A
bright-red burst exploded, and the far off man fell face-first into a freshly
dug grave.

“Now there’s nine.”

***

John pulled Alex down an embankment while shouts and screams
resonated off the grave markers.  His ears rang, though the explosions were
subsiding for the moment.  Alex moaned and his eyes fluttered open for a
second.  A maroon patch bloomed on his shoulder, and a piece of torn material
from his pants exposed an additional flesh wound on the calf.

John grabbed a water bottle from his bag and poured it on
his friend’s face.  Alex continued to moan, and raised an arm, shielding his
face from a violent memory.  John scrambled around him, checking for more
wounds.

He looked up into the somber sky through bare tree limbs. 
Outbursts of snowflakes doused a clear vision of the moon.  John and Alex
remained hidden behind faded headstones.  Their attackers held the top of the
ridge, firing down into the gulley.  Bullets continued to sizzle the cold air
and dance from headstone to tree.

John felt a sting on his cheek.  He reached up to swat away
the annoyance and felt warm blood on his face.  The close call woke him from
his momentary daze.  Alex lay on the ground, coughing, but alive and conscious.

“What the fuck?” he asked.

Alex burrowed his face into the frozen grass as another
barrage of machine-gun fire responded to his question.

“Keep your head down.  They’ve got the top of the hill and
are firing on us.  As long as we stay cool and hold our position, maybe they
can’t do much more damage.”

As if on cue, another deafening explosion fell from the
sky.  The mortar round landed near the men, blowing dirt and stone across a
wide path of the cemetery. 

“Right.  I’m sure they won’t be firing any more of those,” said
Alex.

He winced and tore a strip of cloth from the bottom of his
shirt.  Alex took the strip and held it against the wound on his shoulder in
hopes of slowing the loss of blood from his gunshot wound.

“Is that gonna work?” John asked.

“If I don’t pass out, you’ll know.”

The attacking force suddenly stopped firing.  They heard
shouts and commands coming from the top of the hill.  John and Alex looked at
each other and scrambled to reload their weapons.

“How many clips you got left?” Alex asked.

“Two.  You?”

“One.  If they come down this hill, we’re not going to be
able to hold them off for very long.”

John shoved the clip into his gun.  He swung the barrel of
it over the top of the headstone that protected him from the majority of the
rounds being fired in their direction.  John squeezed the trigger, letting the
recoil of the gun drive his aim upward and over the heads of the enemy.

Random bursts answered John’s fire.

“Stop!  Man, we don’t got much left,” Alex said.

“I’m trying to buy us time.  Do you think you can walk?”

“My leg has been hit, but not enough to keep me down.  It’s
my shoulder that hurts like hell.”

John shrugged and grabbed his bag.

“Guess I’ll leave you here.”

“Don’t be such a smart-ass.  What do you have in mind?”

“If we can get to those trees over there, we might have
enough cover to sneak our way through the cemetery and get to the Heights.”

Alex sat up and pain raced from his shoulder to his brain. 
His squinted his eyes and his mouth held a breath captive in a tight grimace.

“Do or die, right?” Alex said.  He got into a crouch like a
runner anticipating the starter pistol.  “You’re gonna have to provide cover
fire for me.  I’ve got to use my one arm to hold my shoulder tight.  Fire high
rather than low; it’s more effective in keeping them in place.”

“Okay.  On the count of three, we run for the trees.”

Alex threw his bag around his waist, and left his gun on top
of the grave.

“Won’t be able to carry that and run.”

John pulled the lever back on his gun and removed the
safety.  With his fingers accompanied by a whisper, he began the countdown. 
“One, two—”

Before John could get to three, dozens of guns fired and
rolled through the valley like deadly thunder.  Both men spun around, searching
for the source of the new volley.  Rapid gunfire and exploding grenades
followed the initial blasts, all directed back toward the top the ridge.

Alex looked at John and fell on his back.

“What can you see?”

“Looks like the Warriors of Christ may have found targets
more evil than us.”

***

“Get some, get some!” yelled Sully, doing his best
Full
Metal Jacket
.

He stood behind the opened door of a 1987 Dodge pickup.  The
broken window allowed the bulk of Sully’s frame to fill it while he fired his semiautomatic
twelve gauge at the troops facing down the hill.  The rest of the biker clan
fanned out in a rough line, zigzagging across the top of the ridge.  They used
the advantage of surprise to fire lethal doses of buckshot at the Warriors of
Christ.  Soldiers flew through the air, flung many feet by the force of the
close-range gunshot blasts.  Several men managed to find cover, but Sully and
the Keepers of the Wormwood killed six in the first ten seconds of the
engagement.  A second round of firing by the bikers obliterated another three
soldiers.  The remaining men hid behind overgrown trees and slanted
headstones.  One grenade sailed through the air and landed near the Dodge, but
upon exploding it merely lodged shrapnel into inanimate objects.

***

John stood, no longer fearful of getting a round to the
chest.

“Wait here,” he said to Alex before breaking into a full
sprint.

He ducked back and forth between headstones, climbing up the
slope toward the summit as the firefight died.  He heard two distinct
explosions echo up and away from the fight, and then, relative silence.  His
ears rang and the smell of spent gunpowder forced a moment of nausea.  John
moved three feet toward the summit when a blow struck him on the left ear.  He
fell to the ground, but pointed his weapon toward the attacker.  A tattooed
forearm knocked the barrel off to the side.

“You don’t wanna do that, son,” Sully said.

His big man’s chest heaved and his hair tangled in his
beard, from the adrenaline of the fight.  The men recognized each other at the
same time.

“Sully. Jesus Christ.” John let go his weapon. “I hope you
have a cold beer I can use to keep my face from swelling.”

“Be glad I didn’t open your chest when I saw you climbing
the hill.”

John smiled and accepted Sully’s hand.  The President of the
Keepers of the Wormwood pulled John to his feet.

“What the hell are you guys doing all the way over here?”

“Long story.  We’re not about to pass up an opportunity to
fight these bastards.  Maybe even patch them over.”

“Thanks,” said John.

“For what?  We didn’t come here to save your hide.  Is that
your buddy down there trying to crawl up the hill?”

John turned and saw Alex moving toward them, his face turned
pure white, hair plastered to his forehead.

“Yeah.”

“You’d better get down there and help him out.  Dude looks
like he’s about to collapse.”

Sully’s men maneuvered through the cemetery, certain that
they had found all the bodies.  Together they loaded Alex into the back of the
truck, where one of the biker chicks began working on his shoulder.  Sully
drove through the cemetery and back onto Mayfield Road.  He headed away from
town, toward Cleveland Heights.  John sat next to him in the truck, looking at
the caravan of three as they moved around abandoned cars and buildings marked
with The Sign.

“This shit doesn’t bother you, does it?” asked John.

“Not really.  This is how we live.  When you’re not part of
society, you don’t miss it when it goes to hell.”

“Where are we headed?”

“Your buddy is in bad shape.  You’d better hope Crystal can
fix him up.”

“Where are we headed?” John repeated.

“Chill, man.  Nobody is going to fuck with you when you’re
with us.”

“I appreciate that, Sully, but that’s not what I’m concerned
about.  I need to get back to my place and see if I can figure out where my
wife is.  I need to know if she’s alive, and if she is, I need to find her.”

Sully turned the truck onto another street, grimacing before
speaking again.

“Maybe we can help you.  There ain’t much the Keepers hold
sacred, but family is definitely up there.”

The truck rolled to a stop in front of an abandoned warehouse
on the East Side.  Sully killed the engine and tapped the bed of the truck. 
Crystal and two men helped Alex out and carried him inside.  Barely conscious,
the veterinarian was clearly in trouble.  His skin had turned gray, and his
eyes seemed to roll around in the sockets.

“Your pal has lost a lot of blood,” one of the men said to
John.

“We’ve all lost a lot,” replied John.

Sully led John through a maze of corridors until they
arrived in what used to be an auditorium.  The place stunk of cigarette smoke
and rotten paper.  On the stage, a bunch of milk crates and old lawn chairs sat
around a fire ring.

“Home sweet home,” said Sully.

John sat down and rubbed his burning eyes.

The sun crawled through the heavy curtain of the storm
front.  Renegade geese flew over the frozen land in a fighting formation.  Cold
moisture glistened off the pitch-black surface of the asphalt.  The final
survivors of summer leaves clung to the branches, while many fell to the
snow-covered ground.

Commander Byron fumbled through the multiple layers of his
clothing until he found the zipper.  The frigid air blasted his exposed
midsection.  He straightened his back and shook off a shiver, thinking hard
about flowing waters.  After a couple of moments of indecision, his bladder
sent the command to release its contents.  White steam lifted off the stream
and took the pressure from his abdomen.

He yanked the zipper closed, and, returning to his version
of domesticity, he poured a hot cup of coffee from one of the pots set up in
the auto shop.  The soldiers had rigged an outlet to a car battery, which gave
them plenty enough power to brew the inviting beverage.  Byron placed the end
of his knife in the cup and mixed a packet of sugar into the black coffee.  The
first sip stung his tongue and paralyzed his taste buds before allowing the
pleasant, bitter bite of the coffee to take hold.

Sometimes, life is about simple pleasures
, he
thought.

The two soldiers from across the street now stood guard at
the front of the shop, arriving with the morning light.  Byron debriefed the
men, who saw nothing during the course of the night save for stray animals. 
The three men drank coffee and smoked, none of them eager to wake the woman and
start the trek to her house.

Byron dug in his pockets for the satellite phone.  The black
plastic shone in the winter glaze, the display temporarily cold and dead.  He
made the call and finalized the plan.  For security’s sake, Byron considered
smashing the phone to pieces on the hard sidewalk, but hesitated.  He shoved it
back into his pocket and hoped he would not need it again.

***

“That smells great,” said Jana.

One of the guards had unlocked her door earlier in the
morning, and she’d wandered from the room.  The commander stared at her. 
Jana’s hair fell down upon her shoulders.  She wore a tight T-shirt, holding
her breasts high.  Her jeans rode low on ample, curvy hips.  Byron snickered as
the other soldiers stole glances.

“Come, join us,” said Byron, ever the faux-gentleman.

He surveyed the damage he had done to her delicate face the
night before.  When the swelling went down and the purple bruises subsided, she
would heal, except for the missing teeth.

“I’m sore, you son of a bitch.”

“I am truly sorry you brought that pain upon yourself.  I am
not enjoying much of the torturing of women, I hope you see this.”

Jana drew her finger across a swollen lip and winced.

“I’m not convinced of that.”

Byron handed her a cup of hot coffee.  Jana held it to the
corner of her mouth with care, and attempted to pour it into her throat.  The
liquid struck the open, raw wounds of her mouth and she dropped the cup to the
floor.  She glared at Byron through tears of pain.

“It will heal faster than you think.”

“Don’t talk down to me.  I’m a nurse.  I know what it will
take.  And I know that teeth don’t grow back.”

“Can we move past the hostility and work together?”

“As long as I’m your prisoner, there is no such thing as
‘working together’.  You’d better remember that if you let your guard down for
one second, I’ll do my best to cut your throat.”

Commander Byron smiled.  The grizzled warrior relished the threat
and became excited by it.  He motioned to the guards.  They appeared on each
side of Jana, and one of them grabbed her by the shoulder.

“There is no need to spill any more blood, or
coffee.  Both are valuable liquids, are they not?”

Jana got the message and let her body go limp, sliding back
into the chair.  The guards stepped back but stayed within arm’s reach of her.

“Beautiful and wise, a nice combination.”

Jana rolled her eyes.

“Today we are marching back towards your house.  We must
find John and then report to Father.  If you do not incite a fight, you will
not find one.  My men are expert marksmen.  They will eliminate any threats to
our movement on my command.  Gather your things together.  We leave in twenty
minutes.”

“I thought we were going to Reggie’s house,” protested Jana.

“Sometimes plans change, my dear.”

“Christ.  Why can’t you let us be?”

“I have my orders, and I will follow them.  When man
discards orders, society breaks down.  Go pack your things.”

Jana turned and stomped into the storeroom.  She packed a
bag of loose clothes, given to her by Sally.  Jana thought about her and Jay,
and then decided that it would not do any good to speculate or worry.  She
tossed pieces of beef jerky, her battered cell phone, and a bottle of water
into the bag.  Then the commander searched and removed any potential weapons
from her possession.  However, with the modern world brought to its knees, he
found no reason to keep her phone.

Commander Byron and his two guards had their backs to Jana
when she exited the storeroom.  The one on the left looked over his shoulder to
let her know they monitored her location.  Jana sighed and lamented the slim
possibility of her escape from their hands.

The group set off at a fair pace and, for a man with a cane
and limp, Commander Byron made good time.  The foursome stuck to the main
avenues and traveled east, away from downtown Cleveland.  The guards kept their
rifles angled toward the side of the road, and the Commander walked directly
behind Jana. 

They covered nearly seven miles during the daylight.  As
five o’clock neared, the early arrival of the November night swallowed the
day.  The group stopped at a crossroads.  A bank stood on one corner, with a
service station across from it.  On the other side of the street, a Phoenix
Coffee sat next door to a Chinese restaurant.  All of the businesses contained
gaping windows and no movement.

“The Phoenix.  I like the name of that place.  Maybe they
will have more coffee,” said Byron, nodding toward the guards.

The two soldiers held up a hand, signifying that Jana and
Byron were to wait outside until they could secure the building.  The LED bulbs
of the searchlights clicked on, followed by the deadly red dot from the laser
scopes.

Byron removed a silver cigarette case from his pocket.  He
opened it and drew out a hand-rolled smoke.  He offered one to Jana, but she
refused it.

“I pulled this from a dead Russian soldier in the hills of
Kabul.  The bullet that killed him entered his heart inches from the pocket
that held this.  I cannot read the inscription on it, so I often look at it and
try to imagine what it says.  Some days it is a message of hope, and other days
it is one of vengeance.”

“I’m cold,” said Jana.

“I didn’t think I would make it out of that godforsaken
country alive,” he continued.  “Afghanistan is the most wretched place on earth. 
In the summer, it is dusty, hot, and filthy.  In the winter, the cold will burn
your fingers and toes right off.  And the women, they cover themselves from
head to foot.  There is no, shall we say, recreation for a soldier in that
place.  The tobacco, in this case, kept me sane.”

Jana sat on the curb, staring at the remnants of a styrofoam
cup while the commander spoke.  She thought about the person that purchased the
cup, in another lifetime.  He was on his way to work perhaps, stopping in for a
quick shot of caffeine and a buzz to start his day.  Jana pictured an older man
dropping the cup into the overflowing garbage can, where it perched until the
wind knocked it to the ground, and somersaulted it into the busy parking lot. 
Before the rest of her daydream could unfold, the two soldiers came back out of
the coffee shop.

“All clear,” drone number one said to Commander Byron.

The foursome spent an uneventful night in the Phoenix.  In
the morning, the commander managed to find undamaged beans.  They’d brought the
car-battery power with them and were able to get a drip machine running.  Most
of the shop sat in shambles, as an explosion had taken place in the main
sitting area, leaving a substantial gap in the roof.  Wind blew snow and rain
through it, which ruined most of the product in the store.

They headed east again.  Jana recognized the streets
themselves, but struggled to recognize the places.  The buildings sat void of
all life.  She never realized how much humans influenced the mosaic of the
neighborhood.  In the afternoon, they picked up Mayfield Road.  She felt the
closeness of Plainfield Road, their final destination.  However, the
Commander’s pace slowed.  The toll of the hike had robbed him of his energy. 
They took longer and more frequent breaks.  His limp became more pronounced,
and they covered half as much distance as they had the day before.

A “For Lease” sign hung by one corner in the front window of
a deserted flower shop.  The door slanted off its hinges, sticking in the
sidewalk out front.  Shattered glass spread out from the epicenter of the front
door.

Inside, most of the cooler units and display cases stood
empty.  The lingering smell of roses lifted Jana’s spirits.  She found a
handful of dried flowers in one corner and scooped them into her bag.  Unlike
the previous night’s stops, the back room of the flower shop sat in disarray. 
The floor held two inches of water that poured in from an open back door and
hole in the roof.

“Looks like we’ll all be sharing this room tonight,” said
Byron.

Jana sat in a corner and pulled her knees up to her chest.

“We are a mile or two from your home.  Tomorrow we will
arrive.  I must remind you that if you try anything, anything at all, I will
have these men fill you with holes.  I have an order, but I will not jeopardize
us for you.”

Jana ignored him.  She rolled her eyes and kicked the
remains of a vase across the littered floor.

“I have to go,” Jana said.

“Escort her,” Byron said to the soldier nearest him.

“Can you show some decency?  Where am I going to go?”

“Nowhere, because you will be escorted.  Go with her.”

The man followed Jana through the store and out the back door. 
She found a half wall separating one parking lot from the next.  Jana stepped
over it and squatted.  The soldier could see her from the shoulders up.  Jana
stared right through his cold eyes while relieving herself.  She stood and
pulled her pants up at the same time, providing a glimpse of her ivory flesh. 
The soldier’s eyes never left hers.

Each man took a corner of the store for their personal
sleeping space.  The soldier that escorted Jana outside sat across from her
while the other one stood guard at the front door.  The commander fell asleep. 
His snores rattled the existing glass inside the shop.

“If you come near me, I will slit your throat,” said Jana,
who possessed no weapon except her own rage.

With a burning stare, the soldier grinned through yellowed
teeth.

***

“Sir, there is movement on Mayfield.”

“Where?”

“A mile or so out.  The flower shop.”

The sergeant overseeing the house on Plainfield Road
stiffened.

“Radios off.  Get a patrol to recon.  Do not engage and do
not reveal yourselves.  Get back here in one-hundred-twenty minutes with an
update.”

The soldier trotted away.  Another joined him as they moved
south on Plainfield toward Mayfield Road.