The Gates of Byzantium (Purge of Babylon, Book 2) (15 page)

“Forgive the blood,” Lara said. “Some guy was bleeding all over it yesterday.”

He grinned. “That dickhead, he left a real mess.”

Will drove, with Lara in the front passenger seat. Danny followed in the blue Ranger with Carly and the girls. They drove down the driveway and turned south back onto US 287/Route 69.

As they headed up the road, Blaine fought the urge to tell Will to drive faster. They were cruising between thirty-five and forty, and Blaine didn’t notice his right foot was pressed down hard against the floor, as if there were an imaginary gas pedal there, until it started to throb. He slowly relaxed his leg with some effort.

“What did they look like?” Will asked. “The men that attacked you.”

“I only saw one of them up close,” Blaine said. He conjured up Folger’s face in his mind’s eye. The thick white hair. The slimy smile. The low-tied gun holster. “I heard someone call him Folger. He had white hair.”

“White hair?” Lara said. “So he’s old?”

“No, not too old. Fifties, maybe. He just had a lot of white hair.”

“Four vehicles?” Will said.

“They took our newer Jeep. The one you saw on the road was theirs. They also had two trucks. A GMC and a Ford F-150. And a big rig pulling a semitrailer.”

“I don’t think I’ve seen a big rig moving around since all of this began. You can still find gas in cars, but diesel power is a pain in the ass.”

“I was surprised to see it, too.”

Outside the window, Blaine saw a sign flash by, reading: “Lancing 10 Miles.”

“Have you heard of Song Island?” Lara asked him.

“No,” Blaine said.

Lara picked up a ham radio from the floor and put it in her lap. She turned it on and played with the dial for a moment. “The girls were playing with it one day and they found this. It’s been broadcasting on the FEMA frequency every day, in a constant loop, since we found it.”

She placed the radio between the front seats and turned up the volume.

Blaine heard a female voice, soft and soothing through the speakers:

“…want you to know there is hope. There are survivors on Song Island. We have food, supplies, electricity, and protection against the darkness. If you are receiving this recorded message, we encourage you to make your way to us. I repeat: we have food, supplies, electricity, and protection against the darkness. Hello. If anyone can hear me out there…”

“FEMA?” Blaine said.

“Federal Emergency Management Agency,” Will said. “The people who show up when hurricanes make land or a tornado wipes out a town. The message doesn’t say specifically that it’s FEMA. We’re guessing it could be some ex-military types or maybe an ex-Fed who managed to establish a base on Song Island after The Purge.”

“Do you think it’s true? That the island is secure?”

“We’ll find out soon enough.”

“But is that possible?” Blaine insisted. The idea sounded absurd to him somehow. “I didn’t know the monsters—the ghouls—didn’t like water.”

“Neither did we,” Lara said. “Do you know about silver?”

“What about silver?”

“Have you tried shooting them?” Will asked.

“It just pisses them off.”

“Silver is their Kryptonite. It kills them on the spot. It’s the second-best weapon against them other than the sun, so half of our ammo has silver in it.”

“I’ve never heard about that. How does it work?”

“We don’t know, exactly,” Lara said. “But it’s fatal to them.”

“Look in your ammo pouch,” Will said.

Blaine picked up the pouch from the floor between his feet. He opened it and saw shotgun shells inside.

“See the ones with the white ‘X’ on them?” Will said.

Blaine sifted through the shells. For every regular shell inside the pouch, he found one with an “X” written in white marker on the side. “I see them.”

“The ones with the ‘X’ have silver-loaded buckshot. If we get separated, or you have to go your own way, load your weapon with the silver ammo at night. You can make your own silver bullets after that.”

Make my own bullets? How the hell do I do that?

“As for this Folger,” Will said, “any old shell will do.”

“Once we help you find Sandra, we’re continuing on to Song Island,” Lara said. “You’re welcome to come with us. You and Sandra both.”

“It sounds too good to be true,” Blaine said.

“That’s what we said. But what else is there?”

“That’s why there’s no hurry,” Will said. “If it’s as safe as they claim, it should still be there regardless of how fast we get there. If not…”

He nodded, understanding. “Sandra would love a place like that.”

Sandra, wait for me, baby, I’m coming as fast as I can…

Outside the window, they drove past another sign that read, “Lancing 8 Miles.”

WILL

The sign read:
“Welcome to Lancing, Texas. Pop. 12,077.”

Will had been hoping Lancing would be a smaller city and wasn’t prepared for one with over 12,000 people in it. A city built for that kind of population meant a sprawling residential base and businesses spread out into multiple main areas.

They entered Lancing from the north end along US 287. At first there was just massive farmland to one side and sprinkles of old homes on the other. Soon, businesses appeared, then huge residential subdivisions with hundreds of newly built homes. Lancing was a growing community, and getting bigger every year.

Or it used to be, anyway.

Will’s radio squawked and he heard Danny’s voice: “It’s not going to be easy finding someone in this place.”

“Like a needle in a haystack?” Will said.

“Sure, if you wanna get cliché about it.”

“Well, we wouldn’t want that.”

Blaine was moving around in the back seat, a bundle of energy despite his wounds. He didn’t blame the big man. If it were Lara out there…

“Where’s the main business district?” Will asked Lara.

She scanned the map in her lap. After a moment, she pointed up ahead. “Main Street runs parallel to the road we’re on now. There should be another road coming up—West Chance Road. Turn left onto it and it should take us to Main Street.”

Will slowed down, then turned left onto West Chance Road. Danny followed closely behind in the blue Ranger, his turn signal blinking. Will smiled.

“Anyone looking for supplies will make the business district their base of operations and work from there,” Will said. “If these guys aren’t complete idiots, that’s probably where they’ll be.”

It was about three kilometers to Main Street. During the ride, Will could hear Blaine moving around in the back seat, peering out at every vehicle parked in the road, on the sidewalk and in driveways on both sides of the street.

Chance Road was mostly residential until they neared Main Street, so they drove past a slew of quiet homes with grass that had risen as tall as windows in some spots and gardens overgrown with weeds. Finally, small businesses began popping up around them, unmowed lawns giving way to debris-strewn concrete and sun-baked parking lots that were slowly changing color.

Will slowed down before coming to a complete stop at a big four-lane intersection, with Main Street running across West Chance Road. There was a Chevron gas station on the corner to their right, with competition in the form of a Shell to their left. The road itself was relatively clear of obstructions, with only a couple of vehicles parked haphazardly in the middle of the streets. A blue Honda had nosedived into a Wallbys Pharmacy store sign on the other side of Main Street. The sign remained standing, but the Honda no longer had much of a front end.

There was some kind of official city building across the street, with three flagpoles—one with the American flag and the other two hoisting the Texas state flag. The flags were moving with the wind, the metal latches banging loudly against steel poles. Farther up the road, he could make out more city buildings, including a courthouse and what looked like a public library.

His radio squawked and Danny’s voice came through: “What’s the plan, Kemosabe? We just going to sit here with our thumbs up our butts?”

“There are a couple of options,” Will said. “We could drive around, make a lot of noise, and hope someone hears us. Maybe it’ll even be Folger, in which case, well, we’d need to get his attention anyway.”

“What’s the second option?” Lara asked.

“Find a base of operations and do what we usually do. Look for supplies, survivors, and hope we find some clue to where Folger and the rest went. Chances are they came through here, but how long they stayed is the question. Or maybe they left earlier this morning, but I don’t think so. Lancing looks like it could be a decent haul in terms of supplies. I don’t think anyone moving between towns will be in too much of a hurry to abandon it.”

“There’s a Dairy Queen to our right,” Danny said through the radio. “I could go for some ice cream Blizzards about now. How about you guys?”

“You’re assuming anything you find will still be edible.”

“As the designated Captain Optimism, it’s my job to think positively.”

“I assumed as much.”

Will hadn’t gotten “much” out when he heard the very distinctive
crack!
of a rifle splitting the air. He twisted in his seat and looked back, past Blaine and out the rear windshield at the blue Ranger parked about two meters behind him. Danny was opening his door and hopping out with his M4A1.

He heard Danny’s voice, calm, through the radio: “Rifle just took out my rear windshield. Girls are on the floor.”

Another shot rang out and Will saw one of the back windows on Danny’s Ranger shatter. He might have also heard screams, but he couldn’t be sure because at the very same moment a third shot pierced the air and Will heard the
ping!
of the bullet punching through the blue Ranger’s passenger side.

Danny’s voice, through the radio: “Water tower at ten o’clock. About 150 meters.”

They heard the M4A1 firing back. Three shots. Will knew Danny wasn’t trying to hit anything. He couldn’t have hit anything over that distance, anyway. The three shots were to let the shooter know his location had been compromised. A sniper who was taking fire didn’t feel quite as free to linger with his aim.

Will grabbed his M4A1 and was reaching for his door when he heard gunfire—not from behind him this time, but from
in front of him.

He threw himself into the door and dived out just as his Ranger’s windshield spiderwebbed and three bullets pierced the glass. One bullet punched through the middle of the driver’s seat and the other two went astray, but by then the second shooter was firing again, more bullets ricocheting off the hood of the Ranger, one taking out a headlight.

Will was already outside and positioned behind the open door. He looked across the street, following the trajectory of the shots, and caught sunlight reflecting off metal from the rooftop of the Wallbys, about seventy meters away and slightly to his left. He instantly fired three shots in that direction, knowing he wasn’t going to hit anything, but the shots served their purpose by sending the shooter scrambling for cover.

He glanced back into the Ranger at Lara, on the floor of the front passenger seat, looking back at him. She looked scared, but fine. Will looked into the back at Blaine with his sawed-off shotgun, crouched behind the front seat, looking back at him.

“You’re safer in there,” Will said to them.

“What if they shoot the gas tank?” Blaine asked.

“Then we’ll need to find a new car.”

Shooting a car’s gas tank put a hole in it and the gas leaked out. That was it. The car didn’t explode or catch fire like in the movies unless the bullets were incendiary rounds, which were rare—or if the shooters were using tracers, which was pointless in daylight.

He heard the sniper at the water tower fire at Danny’s Ranger again. Will didn’t have to look back to know Danny was in a good position not to get shot. At the same time, the shooter on the Wallbys rooftop found renewed courage and began pelting the street around Will, sometimes hitting the Ranger’s open door with a lucky shot. Will hadn’t fired back since those first three rounds, and neither had Danny.

Will keyed his radio: “How are the girls?”

“Girls are safe,” Danny said.

“Can you get the guy in the water tower?”

“I can’t even see him. What about your guy?”

“Wallbys rooftop across the street. I’ll need a M79 grenade launcher to hit this guy. Maybe a nuke might work, too.”

“How about a distraction?”

“You game?”

“I’ll do it,” Blaine said.

Will looked back at the big man, saw his eyes, the clenched teeth, and knew right away that an argument wasn’t going to get them anywhere. Will said instead, “You have to be fast.”

“I’ll be fast.”

“All right. Call it.”

Blaine nodded and positioned himself against his door. He gripped the handle and waited, then counted down silently before he said, “Now!” and opened the door and lunged out, racing across the road toward the Shell on the other side.

Almost instantly, bullets started flying around Blaine, peppering the street and kicking up asphalt around him. Blaine kept his head low, arms thrown over his head, the sawed-off shotgun in one hand. He was running so fast Will didn’t know if that was pure natural speed or if it was adrenaline, or maybe it was the very real fear that if he slowed down even for a split second he would die. Probably all three.

Will saw the shooter on the Wallbys make his first mistake. The man stood up on the rooftop to get a better shot at Blaine. Will peered through the red dot sight mounted on his rifle. At seventy meters, the sniper was more of a lump of black twig than an actual figure, but at least he could
see
the guy this time.

The shooter was concentrating on Blaine, firing round after round after him.

Will fired. He knew he had missed as soon as he squeezed the trigger. The bullet went low and struck the wall about a meter from the edge of the rooftop, directly below the shooter. The man reacted, taking his focus completely off Blaine and turning slightly, lifting his rifle to shoot in Will’s direction.

Will pushed the red dot higher, compensated for the distance, and fired again.