Stryker: A Post-Apocalyptic Tale (8 page)

His earbud came to
life again. “Erin’s on the hill with the M-40.”

“Does she have
comms?”

“Affirmative.”

“Then dial her up
right after my first LAW. Tell her not to kill Brody. Shoot to wound if need
be.”

“Roger that.”
Stryker was furious about involving Erin in the fight, but accepted it. They
would need all the help they could get under the new circumstances.

 The first
truck came into Stryker’s view, moving down the road directly toward where he
sat. Sarge was right; the second truck was obscured by the first. As the truck
lumbered toward him, Sarge gave the command to fire after the vehicle stopped
and the men stood up. Stryker removed the safety pin located at the rear of the
tube. Then he moved the front and rear sight covers, allowing the sights to pop
up into their firing positions. He removed the first of two safeties, held down
the red safety lever located in front of the cocking lever, and then fired by
pressing forward the red firing button with his thumb. An enormous whooshing
sound cracked the air as the projective left the tube, and the back blast
emitted a four-foot tail of flame. The missile impacted the radiator of the
truck. It reared up like a horse, throwing men to all sides of the vehicle and
separating them from their weapons. Stryker quickly prepared the second LAW,
hoisted it on his shoulder, and waited for the command. Sarge was already
raking the unarmed downed men with continuous fire from the SAW, and Stryker
fought to not look at the damage.

The sight remained
steady on the now-visible second truck. The passenger saw Stryker aiming the
LAW at the truck. He pointed to where Stryker stood and the two men left the
cab and moved toward the back of the building, the larger man dragging the girl
behind him. Stryker carefully laid the LAW on the ground and brought up his M-4
as the men moved closer. He was sure the larger man was Brody. He sighted
carefully, squeezed off a round, and the man went down, releasing the girl, who
stood rock still, looking confused. The second man pirouetted to the ground
after the boom of the M-40. Stryker looked around and didn’t see any bad guys
moving. He ran over to where the girl stood and she cringed away. His ear bud
crackled to life. “Clear,” Sarge said. “Erin’s on her way in and I’m policing
up.”

“Roger.” Stryker kept
the M-4 leveled at the man he assumed was Brody; a minute later, Erin
approached at a dead run.

“You got her?”

“Yes.”

“Good. Get her back
to where you parked and guard her until we can meet you there.” Stryker heard
two pistol shots and presumed Sarge was finishing the job. “That’s me,” Sarge
said. Stryker nodded and moved to the downed man, who had gained a seated
position and was staring at the hole in his stomach.

“You shot me.”

“You should be
grateful, Brody.” The man started at the sound of his name being spoken by a
stranger. “I really wanted to kill you very slowly with my bare hands.”

“Go ahead and
finish it.” He grimaced in pain. “I’m going to die anyway.”

“I will if you
answer one question honestly. If you don’t, I’m going to make it much more
painful. I might even patch you up so I can have fun for a longer period of
time.”

“What’s the
question?”

“Where are the
other girls? We have the ones that were here, but we also know there were more
before them. Do you know the men who bought them?”

“No,” he replied
softly.

“You sure?”

He weakly nodded
his head. “We didn’t care who they were; if we asked, they would have lied
anyway.”

Stryker stared at
the man until Sarge stood next to him. “He’s telling the truth,” Sarge said.

“Are there any more
of you?” Stryker asked

“No.”

“You want to make
that your final answer?”

“Come on, Regis.
Let’s get this over with,” Sarge said. “Only a couple of fools would stand out
here in the open.” Sarge carefully placed a pistol shot in the man’s left
kneecap. “That’s for Erin,” he whispered, as Brody writhed around in the dirt.
He fired again, and the other kneecap seeped blood. “That’s for Haley.”

“And this is for
making me want to puke, you sick bastard.” Stryker killed Brody with a single
shot to the forehead, then shot him twice in the chest. “That should do it,” he
muttered, then walked over and picked up the LAW. Stryker and Sarge walked
about fifty yards. Stryker turned and sighted the weapon at the building and
released the rocket. There was a loud explosion. The front of the building
collapsed into the structure, but it still stood.

Both men looked at
the rocket launcher. Sarge looked up and said, “Probably made in China.” Both
men chuckled and walked back to where Erin had parked the truck.

“How do you suppose
they all survived the plague?” Sarge asked as they walked.

“No idea. Maybe
they were all from the same family. Brothers, or cousins, or something.” Sarge
looked doubtful.

“I’ve not seen more
than two survivors together since this thing started.”

“Me either. Except
for us. I’m guessing that they knew each other before the plague started, and
maybe went into hiding somewhere in the country and waited for things to pass,”
Stryker answered. The men stopped by the pickup and both looked back at the
battlefield.

“Sarge, we better
police up the weapons.”

“Most of it is
junk.”

“I know. But some
kid could stumble on them and start playing with them or something. Besides,
there’re two ARs and some pistols we could probably use.” Sarge shrugged and
the two men policed the battlefield, dumped the weapons in the pickup bed, and
took a last look around.

“Job’s not done
until the tools are put away,” Sarge noted.

Haley was
comforting the small girl who they just freed from Brody’s men. She was crying
and seemed beyond consolation.

“I presume you
killed him?” she asked when the men stopped in front of her. She looked a
little shaky and pale.

“Of course,” Sarge
replied

“He took a lot of
killing. I counted five shots.”

“We had to be
sure.”

“I know.”

“That was a nice
shot, Erin,” Stryker said.

“I couldn’t let
them get to the building and I knew you wanted Brody alive, so that’s the shot
I took. It’s pretty hard to wound someone with this thing, so I picked the
other guy.” She paused, looked away and asked, “You’re not angry with me for
coming back?”

“I wasn’t crazy
about the idea, but it turned out you were right. Without that shot, things
could have ended very badly for all of us.”

“I’m glad I was
there.”

“Me too.”

Sarge joined them.
“Hey Sarge,” Stryker said.

“Yeah?”

“Regis Philbin
hasn’t hosted that quiz show in years.”

“Guess I gotta get
out more.”

“Let’s go meet the
women. But first, is she okay?” Stryker asked, nodding his head toward the
little girl who was still sobbing.

“I don’t know,”
Haley answered.

“We can do
introductions later. Erin, get them in the back of the truck and we can do the
formalities in the house,” Sarge said. “We’ll sort out the girl later.”

They rode back in
silence, disappointed to have not been able to free the rest of the women, but
content with what they had accomplished. Stryker snuck a glance at Sarge
sitting in the passenger seat. He saw the old man was exhausted, but Stryker
knew better than to comment.

They parked the
pickup in the barn next to the Jeep that Erin had stolen from her captor, and
they all walked to the house, Haley holding the little girl’s hand. After
passing through the door, Stryker went to the basement, cleared the two rooms,
and reappeared with an armload of water bottles. He nodded at the young women
when he returned and then passed out the bottles. Everyone drank the water and
they introduced themselves.

Haley was a smaller
version of Erin. She was lean with an athlete’s build, with the same green eyes
and auburn hair. She was studying to become a dentist and had lost her
boyfriend to the plague. She seemed a bit shy, and that was understandable; but
there was melancholy look to her that puzzled Stryker. The little girl clung to
her like a limpet on a ship’s hull and remained silent.

Mia was the polar
opposite. She had short, dark hair, a little pixie of a woman and probably the
most outgoing. Mia wanted to be a college professor of literature, and her
voice seemed to grow quiet as she discussed how that had no possibility of
happening. Her boyfriend had called her cell phone on the fourth day of the
plague, telling her he was infected and saying goodbye. He went to college in
Florida. She sniffed a few times as she talked about him, but gave the impression
of being a strong, young woman.

Jenna was redheaded
and had a normal build. Taller than Mia but shorter than Haley, she had a
tomboyish look to her. Jenna was studying art and wanted to be a museum
curator. Her eyes looked at the floor every time she spoke and she only looked
up when someone else spoke. She finished her introduction by saying that she
missed her parents. She was from San Antonio. The family had lived in San Diego
until a few months before the plague, but had moved back to the family ranch in
Texas.

“I was stationed at
Pendleton when it happened,” Stryker said.

“Do you think
anybody in San Diego is alive?”

Stryker tried to
think of a way to soften the blow, found none, and looked into her hopeful
eyes. “I very much doubt it. I stayed there for quite a while after and didn’t
see anybody for the last few weeks. I don’t know that San Antonio would be any
different.”

“Why are you still
alive?”

“I think Sarge’s
family and I are immune. I can’t prove it, but I had all sorts of contact with
the sick and never got the disease.”

“Maybe my parents
are immune, too.”

“I hope so.” His
reply was gentle.

Elle was truly
striking. Even without makeup and after what she had been through, she looked
like she belonged on a catwalk somewhere. She had long, glossy black hair,
startling blue eyes, and an air of confidence that was not present in the other
women. She was studying fashion design and had wanted to be a clothing buyer
for a department store. She shrugged as she dismissed the idea of it ever
happening now. She claimed to have been between boyfriends, but her confidence
made that seemed unlikely.

Throughout the
conversation, Stryker watched the women’s reaction to him when he spoke. With
the exception of Elle, they all avoided eye contact, and he wondered if he
reminded them of Brody because of his size. He also realized that all they knew
was that they were in cages one minute and the next Erin was unlocking the
doors and leading them out of the building past two dead bodies.

“Erin, have you
explained to the ladies what happened back there? How we got here?”

“I’ve been a little
short of time.”

“Why don’t you do
that now? They’re probably curious about it.” Erin launched into a monologue
describing her own ordeal, the phone call to Sarge, how he picked up Stryker on
the way to Baton Rouge, and then the rescue itself. When she finished, each of
the young women hugged Sarge and Stryker in turn, whispering their thanks. The
mood seemed to improve, although the little girl continued to remain mute and
clutching Haley’s leg.

They spent the
better part of an hour chatting, and then Sarge got down to business.

 “Any of you
women shoot?”

“Well, Erin and I
do, but you know that,” Haley said.

“I have a carry
permit,” Mia offered.

“What pistol?”

“.380 Ruger Compact.”
Sarge nodded and turned to Stryker. “We need both vehicles to get back to the
ranch. How do you want to do this, Stryker?”

“We need rest. I
say we overnight here and head back first thing in the morning. You take Haley
and Erin in the truck, and I’ll follow with the rest in the Jeep.”

“What are we eating
tonight?” Sarge asked.

“I got that,” Erin
replied. “There’s a lot of dry and canned food in the basement, and tons of
water and soda, too. We can make dinner.”

“Does the stove
work?”

“Yes. It’s gas.”

“Okay, why don’t
the three of us get some sleep? The rest of you can take guard duty until
dinner.” Sarge handed his XD to Haley, kissed her cheek, and Erin came over and
the three hugged. Sarge left the room and made his way to one of the three
bedrooms.

“If something comes
up, come get me before you try to deal with it, unless you have no choice,”
Stryker said.

“Okay.”

Erin and Stryker
also went into separate bedrooms, still carrying their weapons. Stryker left
his door open.

“Dinner’s on you,
Haley,” Erin said before she closed her door.