He was surprised at the number of people that had made it there. Once the initial confrontation subsided and Henry agreed not to hang Parker for bringing out his GTO, they all retreated to the great room in the house. Parker counted twenty people, and most of them were family somehow. Those who didn’t live on the island had arrived the weekend before the outbreak. The group originally was scattered around the three rentals and the farm. They all pitched in and fortified this house because of its size and location. A large cistern on the hill provided the house with a gravity-fed water system, meaning the toilets would function as long as the sewers remained clear. Sheets of three-quarter-inch plywood covered the windows and all but one door. The great room, once a cheery and bright gathering place, became a cave, dimly lit with candles and LED camping lights. The lovely view of Penn Cove was now replaced by a bleak darkness, both of the heart and the sun.
Parker spent some time answering questions about what he’d seen as he made his way to the island. They all talked about the people that had turned into rabid animals, and the attacks they had fended off since it all began. Molly and Kathleen, Merle’s wife, cooked a lunch of fresh vegetables, squash soup, and bread. Parker ate for the first time since the day before. Henry showed him around the place and pointed out the tree house where they stood watch. It was about fifteen feet off the ground, attached to several large pine trees. A ladder made of two-by-fours reached all the way to a hole in the bottom of the structure, the top eight feet covered with plywood.
“How do you get up there with that plywood on the ladder?” Parker asked.
“I fixed that up. There are hinges on the plywood like shutters, and a lock. You unlock it on the way up and then, once inside, you close it and relock it from the top,” Henry said. “Come on, I’ll show ya.”
The tree house was ten feet by ten feet with windows running around each side at seated eye level. There was a cot, a kerosene heater, two chairs, and a footlocker. Henry flipped open the top on the footlocker and retrieved one of two rifles from it. It was an M1 Garand. Originally used in the Second World War, it was a staple of the military for many years.
“Springfield thirty-aught-six,” Henry said. “No fancy sights on it or nothing, but it’s my favorite.”
Parker looked into the footlocker. There was also an AR15 with a red-dot scope in it, as well as enough ammo to supply a platoon.
“You can use the sissy gun in there if you want, but me, I like my rifle like I like my women,” Henry said.
“Okay, Henry, I’ll bite. How do you like your women?”
“Reliable,” he said with a smile.
Henry went on to explain to Parker that the house had solar panels and a bank of batteries, which he’d disconnected from the house. They used the system mainly for perimeter lights, which triggered with motion detectors.
“We wired a bunch of them up around the property, in the trees, and around the house,” Henry said, pointing them out. “When the vectors show up, we sit up here and pick them off. The only blind spot is the far side of the house, which is guarded by somebody in the attic.”
Parker nodded. “Why do you call them vectors?”
Henry shrugged. “It’s what doctors call anyone who’s been infected with rabies. I know that isn’t one hundred percent accurate, but it was the best we could figure when it all started.”
“Huh, Ryan called them freaks in the note I found at Sarah’s in Woodinville. I guess one name is as good as another,” Parker replied.
Parker had already decided to spend the night on the island. He’d missed the turn of the tide, and he wasn’t planning on being out and about when darkness fell. Henry asked if he would take the overnight watch with him in the tree house. Parker agreed, and they settled in around eight o’clock, just as the sun was setting. It wouldn’t be fully dark until close to nine, but in this case, better safe than sorry.
Henry lay down on the cot and Parker took the first watch. A Navy sound-powered phone sat in the corner connected to the house. It was old tech, but it worked. Henry’s instructions to Parker were simple. If the vectors showed up, call the house and warn whoever was on watch there, and wake them up, too.
Parker spent many hours staking out owl nests in his life prior to the outbreak, so he was used to staying awake for long periods. He sat facing the woods toward town. Henry had told him that they didn’t show up every night, and when they did, it was usually only a small group.
Whidbey Island’s population fluctuated from between sixty and seventy thousand; this being the height of tourist season, it would be closer to seventy. While Coupeville was the county seat, its population was only eighteen hundred, give or take.
Parker sat there doing the math in his head.
The South African Flu’s morbidity rate was high, and the average age of people in the area was fifty-something. Older folks tended to be more likely to have received the vaccination, as they visited the doctor more often than young people did. He figured that if half the population died of the flu, and three out of four that survived had gotten the vaccination, then… still a shitload of vectors!
He wondered how so many of his family had survived both the flu and the vaccination. Immunity or resistance to both must be hereditary, something to do with genetics.
A light popped on in the trees, pulling him from his thoughts. He searched the area for whatever had triggered the motion detector. It wouldn’t do to wake Henry up only to find that a raccoon was poking around. Before he could locate the source, several more of the perimeter lights came on. He reached over and shook Henry.
“Henry, we’ve got company.”
“How many do you see?” he asked quietly as he sat up on the cot, rubbing his face.
Parker was about to tell him none, but as he formed that thought, several of them ran into the clearing.
“Small group, probably six or seven, yeah, seven,” Parker whispered. “Over in the clearing to the south.”
Henry focused on the lit area. “Let’s see what they do. If we start shooting, it will draw any others close by. They may just keep moving.”
Henry called the house. “We have a group of seven to the south; don’t start shooting unless we do.”
The small pack of vectors were all lifting their noses to the air, trying to get a scent. One let out a shriek that sent the others scurrying. Parker heard another shriek off in the distance to the east.
“Sounds like we may get more regardless; those things communicate with all that damn shrieking,” Henry said. He moved to the window, swung it up, and hooked it.
“Do you think you can take out the one making all the racket?” he asked Parker.
“I don’t know, Henry, I’m not much of one for killing unless we have to,” Parker answered.
“There is something you need to realize, Parker: It’s us or them. We are going to have to kill, and keep killing, until either these things are all gone, or we are.”
Parker had killed things when necessary throughout his life. He fed himself and Rhonda with the kills his falcons made. He killed birds to feed to his falcons, and now he faced having to kill people to survive. He killed Wilson, and the little girl next door, and it made him feel like shit, but there was no arguing that these things were trying to kill them.
“Okay, I’ll do it.” He picked up the AR15 and braced it against the windowsill. He located the vector that was obviously the leader. He breathed slowly, remembering the lessons his dad taught him all those years ago with the twenty-two. He lined up the dot on the center of his target and began to ease pressure onto the trigger.
The trigger pushed the sear up, releasing the firing pin that ignited the primer in the .223 round. The primer’s ignition set off an explosion in the 25 grains of gunpowder. This, in turn, expanded the shell casing, sealing off the barrel, forcing the 62-grain jacketed hollow-point bullet to begin its journey. The twisted grooves inside the barrel began to spin the projectile as it exited the rifle. Traveling at 3,050 feet per second, the bullet tore into the chest cavity and created a path of destruction through the vector’s heart. This all happened before it heard the report of the rifle.
As the vector crumpled to the ground, Parker heard Henry begin to fire on the others. Parker located another vector as it turned and looked in their direction. Through the lens of his scope, Parker saw no recognition in the thing’s face that it was about to die. He watched his shot hit it above the right eye; its head snapped back and it fell in a heap. Unlike any movie he’d ever seen, each vector that he shot simply dropped to the ground. None of them flew through the air or did a back flip, they simply dropped.
After what seemed like both an eternity and an instant, the gunfire ceased.
“Be ready, the second group will be here any minute,” Henry said.
Parker could barely hear him over the ringing in his ears. “What the hell, don’t they realize that the noise means death?” Parker shouted back.
Henry looked at him quizzically, and then remembered that it was Parker’s first battle with a pack of vectors.
“No, I guess they haven’t put two and two together where that is concerned.” Parker just shook his head and looked out over the scene of death he’d helped bring.
“What if they find a cure for this? We are killing these people, your neighbors, possibly even relatives, without a second thought,” Parker complained.
“You obviously haven’t seen someone who has been torn to pieces by one of these things yet, have you?” Henry asked, all the while keeping an eye out for more of them. He continued, “They have no mind, Parker, just an unstoppable desire to feed. If someone comes up with a cure I will be alive to feel regret that I had to kill so many, but I’m not going to let them eat me, or you for that matter.”
They waited and watched. After several minutes, Henry spoke.
“Well, maybe they are learning. That ain’t good.”
The rest of the night passed without incident. In the morning, they climbed down from the tree house, and with the help of the group, cleaned up the mess. After they took the bodies to the farm and burned them, Henry and Merle dropped Parker and the dogs at the pier.
“I’ll be back soon,” Parker said as he leaned against the door. He ducked his head and looked across the truck at Merle and gave him a nod.
Henry smiled at him.
“You take care out there, Parker. Remember what we talked about up in the tree house. Those things won’t feel bad about killing you.” With that, Henry fired up the truck and headed back up the road.
They sat around the table having just finished a wonderful meal. Harry and Maddie made a canned ham with macaroni salad and candied yams. Conner ate the last piece and was in the process of communicating his undying love for his newly found cousins.
“I haven’t eaten anything that good, ever,” he said, as he rubbed his full belly.
“Well, I hope you liked the macaroni salad; I made enough to feed an army,” Maddie said.
“Liked it? I loved it! But I couldn’t eat another bite; I’m stuffed.” He leaned his head back against the plush headrest of his seat in front of the desk next to the dining table. The chair could turn toward the table and lock, or turn toward the desk. The coach was all about efficient use of space.
Once everything was cleaned up and put away, Thomas gave the newcomers a tour.
“The couch on the left, as you enter, is a queen-size pull-out bed that will only deploy when the slide is out. The sink and storage cabinets begin the galley area, below is the dishwasher drawer. Next to the sink is the two-burner stove, with the speed oven and microwave above it.”
He got up from the table and motioned for everyone to follow. They moved to the center of the salon and watched as he manipulated the Crestron remote, which could run every feature on the coach. The table they had been sitting at slowly descended into the floor, the slide-out retracted into the coach, and the bench seat they had been sitting on came toward them.
“With the slide-out and the table retracted, the seating area can be converted into another sleeping area. Across from the galley is more storage space and a subzero refrigerator with a two-drawer freezer.” He didn’t point out the secret gun locker next to the fridge, because he wasn’t sure Maddie wanted them to know about it.
“Go ahead and show them the weapons bay, Thomas,” Maddie prompted.
The front of the fridge had the same high-quality walnut veneer as all the cabinets, and next to it was what looked like a six-inch wall, again with the same wood trim.
“If you push here,” Thomas pointed to the bottom kick plate as he pushed against it with his toe, “you will activate the lock that holds this floor-to-ceiling storage area.” He pulled it out.
“Nice,” Conner said under his breath.
The storage bay held two tactical shotguns and two AR15s, as well as two nine-millimeter MP5s.
“These are all from my personal collection; they did not come included with the coach, and I will train you on their use as we travel. Don’t get in here without asking, unless the situation is grave. The ammunition is stored in these drawers, and as you can see, we have a lot, but we will never have enough,” Maddie said, closing the drawers under the freezer.
“Continue, Thomas,” Maddie said, giving the floor back to the engineer.
“Okay, these two bunks can be converted into a wardrobe closet, but with there being six of us, I won’t even bother to show you that feature. If you look on the ceiling above the bunk, you will see a docking station for your phone, as well as a tablet that you can use to view all of the same things that you can on any of the onboard TVs or the computer. Across the hall from the bunks is the restroom.”
The shower, toilet, and small sink, beautifully crafted, pulled a “sweet” from Carla. They moved through the air pocket doors into the master suite/office.
“This room was completely customized from our normal floor plan. Normally, this area is a luxurious bedroom or a high-end office, not both. On this wall is a motorized queen-sized Murphy bed, which when in the up position as it is now, has a table attached that unfolds as you see here. The chairs are stored in this cabinet,” Thomas said, pointing to another closet.
“On the opposite wall is a set of drawers that also has a 50-inch flat screen TV that can be raised and lowered. With the bed down and the TV in its stored position, you have two sets of windows. There is normally another restroom in the back, but we used that space for personal storage and the motorcycles.” Thomas finished the tour and told them that he would continue to teach them about all the features as it became necessary.
Maddie and Carla talked while Lauren took a nap and the boys worked on the catwalk.
“So, what are you planning on doing?” Carla asked.
“We talked about heading back to Texas, but with all the family heading to Whidbey, we thought we would go and find out if anyone made it,” Maddie said.
Carla looked down at her hands, trying to fight back the tears.
“We lost my husband to the flu, and my son-in-law to the vaccine, and well, I don’t know what to do. Go home to San Diego, go with you to Whidbey? I am so confused.”
Maddie reached out and took Carla’s hand.
“Listen, honey, you don’t have to decide right this minute. Do you know where any of your other family is?”
“No, I’m not sure; when this all started, I couldn’t reach any of them. Mom and Dad, my sister Hope and her family, and my brother Josh were supposed to leave the day after we did. I have no idea if they actually did,” Carla said.
“Well,” Maddie looked pensive, “I only know that the big cities are going to be teeming with these things, plus it can’t be coincidence that we found each other. I had a dream the other night. Your mom and I were in the kitchen of the old homestead in Langley just chatting, and then she looked out the window and told me to wake up, that something was outside. We got up, and an hour later, the creeps showed up. I don’t know if it was just because I planned on seeing her at the reunion that she was in my dream, or if she was reaching out to me. Either way, it convinced me to head to Whidbey.
“Let me talk to Thomas and ask him to give us a satellite shot of San Diego,” Maddie said. “Maybe we can we get an idea of what’s going on down there.”
Carla wanted to be able to give Conner a good reason not to head directly home.
“I would appreciate that,” she said.
Carla fell asleep on the couch in the salon and woke up several hours later. It was dark and no one else seemed to be up except for Thomas, who sat at the computer watching the camera feeds.
She lay there thinking.
What should I do, Jacob? I need your help, give me something.
She drifted back to sleep. Her dreams filled with horrible scenes from what looked like her home. An ethereal feeling encompassed her. A strange, hollow, echoing feeling; she was standing in her living room and Jake was standing next to her.
Don’t go back, baby;
there was a bright flash of light. The air was sucked from her lungs and the heat felt like every description of hell she’d ever imagined. She awoke with a gasp, knowing that the only thing to do was to head away from home. She wasn’t sure if Jacob had really come to her in a dream or if it was just her subconscious, but the dream seemed very real. She had to convince Conner that going home was not an option. She went back to sleep without the horrors of the dreams, just the knowledge that they must not go back.
The next morning, she woke with a purpose. She looked around to find Conner, who wasn’t in the coach. She finally found him sitting on the top of an old ’57 Chevy, a rusted-out hulk of a once-powerful muscle car. She groaned as she climbed up the bumper to the rear deck and then onto the roof. She sat down beside Conner, who looked like he was in deep meditation as the sun poked its head up over the mountains. She rested her hand on his shoulder.
“Conner?”
He didn’t move; his voice sounded resigned.
“I know, Mom, I know, we can’t go home… I saw Dad in a dream last night; he said we could never go back. God, I miss him. I know it sounds stupid, but the dream seemed so real. Do you think I’m losing it?”
Carla held him close and pressed her lips to his ear.
“No, you’re not losing it.” She didn’t tell him of her own dream; she didn’t know why, it just didn’t seem like she should. “Your dad lives inside us, he still loves you, he will always love you, Conner.”
“Hey y’all, want some breakfast?” Maddie called from the door of the coach.
Carla hooked her arm around Conner’s neck.
“What do you say, boy? You want some breakfast?”
“Yeah, Mom, let’s get some breakfast.”
They climbed down from the Chevy and made their way back to the coach. As they entered, Harry gave them both a smile.
“How do you like your eggs? Scrambled or scrambled? We’re down to the powdered stuff now.”
After breakfast and some discussion, they decided they would all travel in the coach. They could always pick up another vehicle down the road if they needed it. Leaving the Rover was hard—it was a part of the family, and it had been Jacob’s.
They rolled out at around eight in the morning, topping off the diesel from one of the many abandoned eighteen-wheelers at the truck stop.
Carla was worried about Lauren.
“We’re going to be okay, honey.”
Lauren looked up.
“Nothing is ever going to be okay.”