Apocalypse Unleashed (10 page)

Guards held the checkpoint with the barriers in place. There were more of them present than Joey had ever seen. On other occasions, before the disappearances, the guards had often laughed and joked, though they’d always been professional. There was no laughing and joking now. In fact, two jeeps filled with armed men sat farther back. Their presence was obvious and powerful.

Other guards, these with sentry dogs, walked the perimeter. The dogs moved effortlessly and remained ever watchful.

As he watched them, Joey felt more safe than he had in days. The nightmares about the mall shooting, about Zero and the others, had left him wrecked. He knew that. Seeing the guards at work helped him relax. As long as he didn’t leave the camp, he was safe.

Unless Zero or one of the others got picked up and busted for the murder of the old man. Then they could blame everything on Joey.

As soon as those thoughts crept into his mind, Joey felt sick with dread and fear all over again. His hands shook on the bike handles, and he thought he was going to be sick.

“Hey, kid.”

Joey looked over at the K-9 soldier and the German shepherd at his side. “Yeah?”

“Do you feel okay?” The soldier was older, probably Goose’s age, and he wore sergeant’s chevrons on his sleeves.

“Yeah.”

“You don’t look so good.”

“Just kind of creepy thinking about it, you know?”

The sergeant hesitated a minute, then nodded. “Yeah. Really creepy. I keep thinking I’m going to wake up and find out this was all a bad dream.”

“But it’s not.”

“No, I guess not.” The sergeant looked at Joey again. “But don’t worry about it too much, kid. The brass will figure this out. They always do.”

“I hope so,” Joey said. “The sooner the better.”

“I’m keeping my fingers crossed. In the meantime, stay back from the fence, okay? It makes the snipers tense.”

Snipers?
Joey looked around at the nearby buildings.

“They’re there, kid. Always on watch.”

“Okay.” That made Joey feel even more safe. The camp was like one of those old medieval castles. The armed guards were the moat that cut it off from the rest of the world.

“I gotta get back to it,” the sergeant said. “Got a lot of miles to cover before my shift’s over.”

“Have a good day,” Joey said. After the sergeant and the dog had moved on, Joey sat astride the ten-speed and stared out where Columbus sat touched by the early dawn. He thought about the madness that was in the city.

Many metropolitan areas had tried to return to a semblance of order. That was what people did, he supposed. Just picked up the pieces and moved on. Like his mom had when his dad left them. And like what she’d done in the camp when so many kids needed somebody.

But that was just the surface. Looting and violence had broken out all over. People were scared and mad, and they were going to be that way until they knew for sure what had happened.

And that it wasn’t going to happen again.

St. Francis Hospital
Local Time 0656 Hours

Jenny luxuriated in the hot shower. The nurses had allowed her into their locker room weeks ago, once they’d discovered she was living at the hospital. Megan Gander had tried to get her to return to Fort Benning, but Jenny didn’t want to leave her father. Her whole life, every time he’d gotten bad, wherever they’d been living, whether in jail or in a psych ward, she’d always managed to be there for him. She lived with the fear that if she wasn’t there, something would happen to him.

Dark hair washed and dried with a community hair dryer, she quickly dressed in a pair of khaki cargo pants, a white blouse with three-quarter sleeves, and her tennis shoes. She used a separate plastic bag to put her dirty clothes in. She planned to wash them later.

Jenny looked in the mirror and noticed how hollow-eyed she was becoming. Red rimmed her green eyes.
No wonder the nurses are worried about you. They probably think you’re going to be their next patient.
A little makeup would have helped, but she didn’t have any.

Satisfied she’d done all she could do, she turned from the mirror.

9

United States of America
Columbus, Georgia
St. Francis Hospital
Local Time 0703 Hours

Having possessions was turning out to be a problem. Over the last few weeks, Jenny had pared everything she owned down to one backpack. The new clothes didn’t fit inside. She got frustrated thinking she was going to have to carry her bags around like a homeless person.

“Problem?” a voice asked.

Jenny turned to see a nurse putting on makeup two sinks down. “No.”

“You look like you don’t have enough arms.” The nurse was in her early thirties. She wore a charm bracelet that had pictures of a small girl on it. The woman didn’t look familiar, so Jenny assumed she was on loan from one of the other floors.

“Things were easier,” Jenny admitted, “when everything fit into one bag.”

The woman laughed. “I know that’s true. But that’s not really life, is it?”

Jenny silently thought that all the good things that had happened in her life could have fit into one bag with plenty of room left over. It was trouble that seemed to come in bushel baskets.

“No,” Jenny said.

“Tell you what,” the nurse said, “I’ve got an extra lock here somewhere.” She rummaged through a big purse. “Bought one and never used it.” She produced a Master Lock with two keys taped on one side. “You’re welcome to use it.”

“I can pay you back,” Jenny said.

The nurse laughed. “Well, I appreciate that. Just promise me you’ll help somebody in the future. With everything that’s going on in the world, I’m starting to think that’s the only thing that matters. So me helping you today? I’m already one good deed down the road.”

The nurse’s good humor and smile were infectious. Jenny couldn’t help smiling back. She took the lock and the keys.

“Help yourself to a locker.” The nurse pointed at the wall. “There appear to be quite a few of them these days.”

Jenny stashed her stuff while the nurse dashed out.

Local Time 0710 Hours

Jackson McGrath looked small and sickly lying in the hospital bed in the intensive care unit. He was at least twenty pounds under his best weight. Several days’ growth of beard stubble, all black and gray, covered his face. His hair was too long and uneven from bad haircuts he’d given himself. Yellow tinged his skin.

Jenny knew her father was that color because his liver was trying to fail. Once it did, death was right around the corner.

The doctors had already examined Jackson McGrath’s liver and said it was a miracle he’d lived as long as he had. Both legs and one arm were in casts from the single-car collision that had landed him here. He’d been drunk when he drove off the street and hit a tree. Bruises still showed on his pallid, too-thin chest where the seat belt had cut into him.

Seated in the chair beside her father’s bed, Jenny stared at him, recalling numerous memories of him drunk and sober. None of it was pleasant. Jackson McGrath had never been a happy man. For a long time, he’d blamed his unhappiness on Jenny, telling her that raising a daughter by himself was too hard. At least, too hard to do sober.

Truthfully, though, Jenny had been forced to learn how to raise her father. And he’d fought her at every turn.

“How are you doing this morning, kiddo?” Katie Lang, one of the morning ICU nurses, filled out the chart at the foot of Jackson McGrath’s bed. She was in her late thirties, a heavyset woman with a quick smile and an even quicker comeback. Patients learned early not to give any guff to Nurse Lang.

“Doing okay,” Jenny said.

“You look pretty this morning.”

“Thanks. Ester said the nurses got me the new outfits.”

“You deserve them.”

“I appreciate them, that’s for sure.”

“We were happy to get them for you.”

“Has there been any change with my father?”

Katie took in a deep breath and let it out. Then she shook her head. “Not yet. I’m sorry.”

Despair swallowed some of Jenny’s good mood. “The longer he stays in a coma, the less chance there is of him recovering.”

“Don’t give up on him,” Katie advised. “I’ve been a nurse for a long time, and I can tell you right now, I’ve seen some of the most audacious things happen that you wouldn’t believe.”

Jenny nodded, not because she believed what the woman was saying but because she knew it was expected. Everyone talked about miracles in the hospital like it was a requirement or something. But she knew that not many people believed.

“If you give up on him,” Katie whispered, “he might give up on himself. Just because they don’t respond to you doesn’t mean they’re not listening.”

That was something else Jenny had heard a lot about. She made it a point to talk to her father every day. Sometimes she read stories she thought he might like from the newspaper. Other times she created a make-believe horse race and reimagined it for her father. She embellished the race and the names of the horses and jockeys. In addition to alcohol, gambling was also a problem for her father. She felt bad about feeding that addiction, but she didn’t know what else to talk to him about that he would have found interesting.

“I know,” she said to Nurse Lang, and she felt guilty at once. Before coming to the hospital, when she first heard that her father was in bad shape, she’d resented him all over again for disrupting her life. She’d been happy with Megan Gander at Fort Benning. While there, Jenny had found purpose in helping teens who had been left behind.

Now she was here in the hospital. Waiting for the worst like she’d been doing for years.

“As long as he’s hanging in there,” the nurse said, “you’ve got to do it too.”

“I know.”

The woman patted Jenny on the shoulder as she passed. For a few minutes, Jenny sat there and looked at her father. Then she spoke. “Dad, I don’t know if you can hear me or not, but I hope you can. I’m here for you. I’ve been here for you every day. But I’m getting tired. And maybe I’m getting a little scared. You know how I hate being scared. This is the hardest thing I’ve ever done.”

The machines kept beeping and chirping. The ventilator pumped up and down, filling Jackson McGrath’s lungs with oxygen and emptying them again.

“What I need you to do,” Jenny said in a voice so thick with emotion she could barely get it out, “is come back to me. Everything you’ve done, we can fix it. Somehow. All you’ve got to do is come back.”

There was no response.

Gently, Jenny took her father’s free hand in both of hers. His flesh was cold and felt slightly stiff, but that might have been her imagination. She kissed the back of his hand and felt hot tears fill her eyes. She blinked them away with effort.

God, I know a lot of people don’t like my father, and I know he’s given them plenty of reasons not to, but he doesn’t deserve to die like this. And I don’t want to watch it happen.

Jackson McGrath’s thin chest rose and fell.

I’m not even sure what I’d say to him if he makes it back from this. We didn’t have a whole lot to talk about before. But he’s my father. I love him.