Eliza collapsed into Krantz’s arms. The baby slipped out, but he caught its clothing in his fist and set the child on the ground.
“Air,” she managed.
“No,” he said. “Not here. Smell it.”
And then she noticed that, curiously, he wasn’t wearing his mask. She took a deep lungful. It was dry and sweet, the air of the desert. A breeze whistled over the ridge, coming from the north. Anne and her daughter lay on their backs away from the doorway, breathing deeply. For several seconds they did nothing but gasp. The baby cried out where Krantz had set it. Miriam’s let out a long, desperate-sounding whine. The crying children sounded beautiful to Eliza’s ears.
“The wind shifted a few minutes ago,” he said. “I took a chance and saved the oxygen.” He turned to Miriam. “Open that door wider. It can only help.”
Miriam set down her child and did as Krantz said. She loaded more bullets into her gun. “We have to go back. The air is dead down there, and we can’t wait until it clears out.”
Eliza lifted herself to a sitting position. Her head pounded. “And the wind might shift again. Lillian’s oxygen will be gone by now.”
They swapped out their empty air tanks for the spares, and then Eliza and Miriam descended once more into the underground compound along with Krantz, who put on his own SCBA gear and carried the half tank from earlier. This time there were no surprises. They paused at the bottom, where Niels Griggs lay
sprawled, broken and bloody. Krantz stopped long enough to strip him of his mask and air tank.
When they reached the far lounge, Lillian was slumped in the corner, staring at the door with a glazed expression, but still awake. Some of the others had regained consciousness too, as she’d shared the air from her tank and what she could give them from the dead woman’s hazmat suit. Some could walk, and a couple of older children—who seemed to recover more quickly than the adults—even helped the younger ones. Krantz carried three children at a time, one on his back with arms around his neck, and one tucked under each arm. He even managed this while climbing the metal ladder. They made a second pass, but then Krantz’s air gave out, and Eliza went back alone for the last child.
By the time Eliza brought him out of the compound, her tank pressure had fallen to zero. She stripped it off and tossed it to one side, handed off the boy, and collapsed in Krantz’s arms a second time. She came to a few seconds later, lying in his arms, her face buried in his neck.
She lifted her head and found she was looking east. Venus sat just above the mountains on the horizon, where the first light of dawn promised an end to this infernal night. The air smelled of sage and sand, not sulfur, and she took deep gulps. All around her lay gasping people, crying children, and others, who’d been outside for longer, groaning or gulping at water bottles. Twenty people, all of them alive.
Krantz sat with her on the ground. He stroked a thumb along her cheek, his hand so big it cradled Eliza’s entire face. She wished he would hold her closer, but he seemed reluctant, as if the lack of oxygen had made her bones brittle.
“I’m okay,” she said, too feeble to tell him what she wanted.
“Promise?”
“I’m sure. Thank you.”
He leaned over and kissed her forehead. “You done good, kid.”
“You too. And Miriam. She killed two people.”
“I heard. Thank God she’s on our side, right?”
“Yes, thank God.”
For once
, she thought.
For once we got lucky. One woman dead, one old man. Too brainwashed to get out when they could. But we saved the rest. All of them.
Or maybe it wasn’t luck. Maybe thanking God was exactly the right thing. Maybe He had offered His help to destroy Taylor Junior once and for all. Maybe He’d sent not just Miriam but Krantz too. Eliza never could have left people behind—no doubt she’d have died down there, suffocating, as she tried to help the last few climb up. But there was Krantz and his superhuman strength, hauling three people at a time, never seeming to tire, not even when climbing a hundred feet to the surface.
Krantz squeezed Eliza’s hand, then stood and tried to raise Blister Creek on the satellite phone. Nobody answered. She thought about Jacob, David, Fernie, her nephews. All the other people of Blister Creek. And that Humvee rolling into town, its heavy machine gun hacking people down.
Please, Heavenly Father
, Eliza prayed.
If you helped me, help my family too.
The machine gunner spotted David as he ran desperately down the road. The moment he stumbled through one of the splotches of light thrown up by the flares that dotted the road, tracers from the .50-cal swung toward him like a glowing, white-hot knife cutting an arc through the darkness. The bullets splintered rocks and chewed up trees in the darkness behind him. That knife would intersect his position on the road within the next three seconds.
And then he would die.
Time seemed to slow as David reached this conclusion. There was nothing to stop the gun now. He was too far from the shoulder of the road to return to safety, and too far from the Humvee to reach it in time. He had his Beretta in hand, ready to fire with the desperate hope of distracting the enemy, but the gunner stood
cocooned in a metal shield. If all those rifles couldn’t penetrate from their various angles, neither could David.
Meanwhile, it might not matter. Bullets from his own side whizzed past his head or ricocheted off the pavement at his feet. They pinged off the Humvee and the machine gun shield. They may not be ineffective against the enemy vehicle, but David had no protection, caught as he was in the crossfire. Yet somehow his legs kept pumping and the gunfire missed him.
And then the machine gun was on him. He flung himself to the ground, rolled as he hit. He waited for a sharp, lancing pain as the four-inch-long bullets cut his body in half. The machine gun roared, and bullets poured overhead.
But then the glowing arc of tracer bullets continued past his position and doubled back in the other direction. The gunner hadn’t spotted him after all, but was simply firing into the darkness as fast and furiously as he could manage to combat all those rifles and handguns blasting away at his position.
The relief lasted an instant, and then the paralyzing terror returned. David lay flat on the ground, unable to move. He was close enough now to hear brass shell casings clinking onto the Humvee, high and tinny above the gunfire, like a rain of BBs on a corrugated metal roof. The gun fell silent briefly as the operator ran out of ammo, but the instant it did, the other occupants of the Humvee ripped off volleys from their assault rifles on full auto to suppress fire from the surrounding forces. Moments later, the machine gun started in again. This time it faced forward, all firepower concentrated on the rifle fire from the south. Stephen Paul was giving him a chance by keeping the enemy guns focused in the other direction.
David had to force his limbs into action. They wanted to stay limp, as if his body thought that if the bullets couldn’t see him move, they couldn’t hit him.
Go! Move!
David crawled across the cool pavement. The Humvee glowed red from the flares and strobed from the tracer bullets that flared away from the gun nozzle. He came forward until he crouched against the deflated back tire. He held the pistol in his right hand, steadying himself, thinking about those times on the shooting range, or when Miriam dragged him into the desert to shoot tin cans off fence posts. He popped loose the strap on the knife sheath on his leg and steadied himself for the charge.
And then his moment came. The machine gun fell silent. The men in the front seat fired their assault rifles while the man at the gun clanked around with what David assumed was a fresh can of ammunition.
David lurched to his feet. His head felt light with terror and he thought he’d fall, but somehow he found his balance. He grabbed the back-facing shield with his left hand and swung himself onto the fender of the Humvee. The man at the machine gun was kneeling on a huge metal box of ammunition. He wore black, a heavy vest that came up around his neck, and a helmet. His pants were some sort of plastic-looking Kevlar-type material. He popped open a can of ammo and fed the belt into the gun with shaking hands while cursing, and David realized the man was just as terrified as he was. That strengthened him.
The man turned with a cry as David got in behind the shield. He thrust out with one forearm, but David fired his gun even as the man caught him in the throat. The man fell backward. David
recovered from the elbow and then turned to shoot at the man’s back. He fired from point-blank range, and the man shuddered. David fired again and again, even as the man flailed, flopped from the Humvee, and fell to the ground. David stood above him, shooting until the clip was spent.
“Help!” the man screamed, now on the pavement, lying on his back and clawing at his helmet, even as he squirmed to take refuge next to the vehicle. He got the helmet off and screamed again for help. He looked up at David with bulging eyes, his face illuminated in red from a flare inches from his face. It was Elmo Griggs, David’s first cousin.
David hadn’t seen the man in years, but he remembered Elmo as a chubby, sullen boy who hung around with Taylor Junior and Gideon Kimball. Not exactly a bully, like the Kimballs, but happy enough to tag along and watch whatever nasty thing the other two came up with, much like Eric Froud, Israel and Aaron Young, and several others. David had been young enough to mostly escape their attentions. Mostly, but not entirely. That entire crowd had ended up as Lost Boys.
David dropped the empty pistol and drew the KA-BAR knife. He slid from the machine gun to the pavement. Dimly he heard gunfire, saw flashes of light. Something had taken control of his limbs, and he no longer felt fear or any other emotion but a sense of urgency. Already Elmo seemed to be recovering from the gunshots. A dozen hits, all at point-blank range, and they hadn’t finished him.
David fell on top of Elmo, knee at his enemy’s chest, and raised the knife overhead. Elmo tried to break free. David slammed the knife down. The man grunted in pain, but the knife didn’t go in, blunted by the same body armor that had stopped the gunfire.
Elmo swung his elbow around and crushed it into David’s jaw. David’s head flew backward, and Elmo got free. He wrestled for the knife with one hand and clutched at David’s windpipe with the other. The two men rolled over on the pavement.
“You’re nobody, Christianson,” Elmo said with a grunt. “Weak. You’re nothing.” Another grunt. “Not a prophet.” He almost had the knife free now and was on top of David, clawing, digging, and punching.
He thinks I’m Jacob
, David realized.
Why? The two men looked a little bit alike, of course, more like full brothers than the half brothers they were. Jacob was a couple of inches taller, but that wouldn’t be noticeable in the darkness. Beyond that, they shared roughly the same build, had the same sandy hair. But that look was hardly rare in Blister Creek. It could have been almost anyone. Why would Eric make that mistake?
Because he’s expecting my brother.
Only a man with courage and confidence would have charged. A man like Jacob, or their father, or even Taylor Junior.
But not me. I’m an idiot, and now I’m going to die.
But Elmo Griggs was no hero either. David couldn’t get the knife free, but Elmo wasn’t strong enough to wrench it away. And their struggles had twisted the bulletproof vest around to where it rode up around Elmo’s neck and constrained his movement. When Elmo let go with one hand to wrestle with his vest, David groped with his own left hand for the Beretta, thinking he could pistol-whip Elmo across the face.
His fingers closed on a pair of brass casings, each roughly three inches long and still warm to the touch. He seized them in his fist and let them protrude between his fingers. He swung his arm with
all his strength. The fist with the brass shells exploded into Elmo’s face, and the man fell backward and let go.
David dropped the casings and got a better grip on the knife handle. He threw himself on top of Elmo.
“No, please!” Terror filled Elmo’s voice. “I didn’t have any choice. It was Taylor Junior. Jacob!”
But David couldn’t let up, not now. There were still two men above him with assault rifles. He had to take this man out—he had no choice. He found the spot where Elmo’s jacket was riding up and got the knife underneath, where there was a gap, just above the hip. He leaned down. Elmo screamed.
The man bucked and squirmed, even as David pushed and leaned and pushed. First the man clawed at him, then his hands and feet beat a horrible drumbeat on the pavement, and then blood came out of his mouth. David felt sick, like he would pass out, horrified and disgusted, but too terrified to let up. He jerked the serrated edge back and forth and pushed and pulled.
At last it was over. Elmo Griggs lay motionless beneath him. David withdrew his hand and threw himself backward, toward the relative safety of the Humvee, even as he knew he had to get out of there somehow. He stumbled over his gun and picked it up.
He fumbled for the shells in his pocket, and then fumbled again as he tried to load the gun. Three straight bullets fell and rolled away, but he finally got one in, and then the rest of the clip loaded. His hand steadied as he popped the clip into the gun.
David didn’t know what to do. He didn’t dare stay there, but he was even more afraid of another sprint across the pavement. With no machine gun to silence them, the rifle and handgun fire continued its unrelenting attack on the front of the Humvee,
more ferocious than ever. But then the side door swung open on the Humvee and a man staggered out of the driver’s side with an assault rifle. He fired into the darkness as he came around to man the machine gun.
The man wore the same body armor as had Elmo Griggs, but no helmet. David had to keep him from getting up to the .50-caliber machine gun or the whole awful mess would begin again.
David stayed motionless in the shadow of the Humvee while the man hoisted himself up, and then he rose to his feet, swung around the shielded gun, and aimed at the man’s head. Fired. The man slumped over the gun. David crouched back down and waited.