“So where the hell did everybody go?” Peter said.
The telegraph was in a small room in the rear of the building. Michael sat at the operator’s desk and examined the log, a large, leather-bound ledger.
“The last message from here was sent Friday, five-twenty
P.M
., to Bandera station. The intended recipient was Mrs. Nills Grath.”
“What was the message?”
“ ‘Happy birthday, Aunt Lottie.’ ” Michael looked up. “Nothing after that, at least that anybody bothered to record.”
Today was Sunday. Whatever had happened here, Peter thought, it had happened sometime in the last forty-eight hours.
“Send a message to Kerrville,” Peter instructed. “Let Apgar know we’re coming.”
“My Morse is a little rusty. I’ll probably tell him to make me a sandwich.”
Michael threw a switch on the panel and began tapping the key. A few seconds later, he stopped.
“What’s wrong?”
Michael pointed to the panel. “See this meter? The needle should move when the plates touch.”
“So?”
“So I’m talking to myself here. The circuit won’t close.”
Peter knew nothing about it. “Is that something you can fix?”
“Not a chance. There’s a break in the line, could be anywhere between here and Kerrville. The storm might have knocked down a pole. A lightning strike could do it, too. It doesn’t take much.”
They exited through the back door. An old gas generator was crouched like a monster in the weeds, beside a rusted pickup and a buckboard with a broken axle and tall grass poking through the floorboards. Trash of all kinds—construction debris, busted packing crates, barrels with their seams split open—littered the yard. The wreckage of the frontier, flung out the door the moment it had outlived its usefulness.
“Let’s check some of the other buildings,” Peter said.
They entered the nearest house. It was one story, with two rooms. Dirty dishes were stacked on a table; flies twisted above them in the air. In the back room was a washbasin on a stand, a wardrobe, and large feather bed covered by a quilt. The bed was sturdy and carefully made, with a tableau of interlocking flowers, quite detailed, carved into the headboard; somebody had taken their time with it. A marriage bed, thought Peter.
But where were the people? What had happened that the inhabitants should vanish before they had a chance to clear the dirty dishes from the table? Peter and Michael returned to the main room as Greer came through the door.
“What’s the holdup?”
“The telegraph’s not working,” Michael said.
“What’s wrong with it?”
“Break in the line someplace.”
Greer leveled his eyes at Peter. “We really have to get moving.”
What weren’t they seeing? What was this haunted place trying to tell him? Peter’s eyes fell upon something on the floor.
“Peter, did you hear me?” Greer pressed. “If we’re going to make it back before dark, we need to leave right now.”
Peter crouched to get a closer look, simultaneously gesturing toward the table. “Hand me that dishrag.”
Using a corner of the cloth, he took hold of the object. The virals’ teeth had a way of catching the light, almost prismatic, with a pearlescent, milky luster. The tip was so sharp it seemed to fade into invisibility, too small for the naked eye to discern
.
“I don’t think Zero’s sending an army,” Peter said.
“Then what’s he doing?” Michael asked.
Peter looked at Greer; the older man’s expression said he thought the same.
“I think he’s growing one.”
57
By the time the convoy reached Kerrville, it was nearly seven o’clock. The group disembarked into a state of siege. Along the top of the wall, soldiers were scurrying back and forth, handing out magazines and other gear. Fifty-caliber machine guns were positioned on either side of the gate. Apgar had exited the cab and was standing with Ford Chase, pointing at the one of the spotlights. As Chase moved away, Caleb stepped up.
“General, I’d like my commission back.”
Apgar frowned. “I have to say, that’s a first. Nobody ever asks to get back in the Army.”
“You can bust me to private—I don’t care.”
The general looked past Caleb’s shoulder toward Pim, who was standing with Sara and the children.
“You clear this with your CO?”
“I’d be lying if I said she was happy about it. But she gets it. She lost her sister last night.”
Apgar beckoned to a noncom manning the gates. “Sergeant, take this man to the armory and get him suited up. One brass bar.”
“Thank you, General,” said Caleb.
“You may rethink that later. And your old man’s going to have my ass for this.”
“Have we heard anything?”
Apgar shook his head. “Try not to worry, son. He’s been through worse than this. Report to Colonel Henneman on the platform. He’ll tell you where to go.”
Caleb went to Pim and hugged her. He placed his palm against the curve of her belly, then kissed Theo on the forehead.
Be careful,
she signed.
“We’re going to the hospital,” Sara said. “There’s a hardbox in the basement. We’re moving the patients down there.”
The sergeant shifted impatiently on his feet. “Sir, we’d better go.”
Caleb looked at his family a final time. He felt a gap widening, as if he were viewing them from the end of a lengthening tunnel.
I love you,
Pim signed.
I love you, too.
He jogged away.
From Boerne, Greer took the wheel. They were driving into the sun now. Michael was in the passenger seat, Peter in the back with Amy.
They saw no other vehicles, no signs of life at all. The world seemed dead, an alien landscape. The shadows of the hills were lengthening; evening was coming on. Greer, squinting into the harsh light, wore a look of great intensity—his arms and back rigid as wood, his fingers clenching the wheel. Peter saw the muscles of his jaw bunching; the man was grinding his teeth.
They passed through Comfort. The ruins of ancient buildings—restaurants, gas stations, hotels—lined the highway, sand-scoured and scavenged to the bones. They came to the settlement on the west side of the city, away from the wreckage of the old world. Like Boerne, the town was abandoned; they didn’t stop.
Fifteen miles to go.
Sara and the others met Jenny at the door to the hospital. The woman was on the verge of wild-eyed panic.
“What’s going on? There are soldiers everywhere. A Humvee just rolled by with a bullhorn, telling everybody to take shelter.”
“There’s an attack coming. We have to get these people to the basement. How many patients are on the wards?”
“What do you mean, an attack?”
“I mean
virals,
Jenny.”
The woman blanched but said nothing.
“Listen to me.” Sara took Jenny’s hands and made the woman look at her. “We don’t have a lot of time here. How many?”
Jenny gave her head a little shake, as if trying to focus her thoughts. “Fifteen?”
“Any children?”
“Just a couple. One boy has pneumonia, the other a broken wrist we just set. We’ve got one woman in labor, but she’s early.”
“Where’s Hannah?”
Hannah was Jenny’s daughter, a girl of thirteen; her son was grown and gone. Jenny and her husband had long since parted ways.
“Home, I think?”
“Run and get her. I can handle the situation until you’re back.”
“God, Sara.”
“Just be quick.”
Jenny darted from the building. Pim, holding Theo, was standing with the girls. Sara crouched before them. “I need you to go with your Auntie Pim now.”
Elle looked was fearful and lost; snot was running from her nose. Sara wiped it with the bottom edge of her shirt.
“Where are we going?” the girl asked woefully.
People were scurrying past—nurses, doctors, orderlies with stretchers. Sara glanced up at Pim, then looked at her granddaughter again. “Downstairs to the basement,” Sara answered. “You’ll be safe there.”
“I want to go home.”
“It’s just for a little while.”
She hugged Elle, then her sister; Pim led the girls to the stairs. As they descended, Sara turned to her husband. She recognized the look on his face. It was the same one he’d worn the night after Bill had been killed, when he’d shown her the note.
“It’s okay,” she said.
“You’re sure?”
“I’ve got things in hand here. Go before I change my mind.”
No more words were necessary. Hollis kissed her and strode out the door.
They turned off Highway 10. From here, it was a straight shot south on a gravel road to the city. The truck shook fiercely as they pounded through the potholes. Wind whipped through the open windows; the sun, coming across their right shoulders, was low and bright.
“Michael, take the wheel and keep it steady.” Greer reached below his seat. “Peter, give her this.”
Peter leaned forward to receive the pistol. A round was already chambered.
“You won’t have time to aim,” he said to Amy. “Just point and shoot, like you’re pointing your finger.”
She took the gun from him. Her expression was uncertain, yet her grip seemed firm.
“You have fifteen rounds. You’ll have to be close—don’t try to shoot them from a distance.”
“Unlock the shotgun,” Greer said.
Michael freed the weapon. An extended magazine tube ran below the barrel, holding eight shells. “What’s in here?” he asked Greer.
“Slugs, big ones. No room for slop, but it’ll put one down fast.”
The shape of the city emerged in the distance. Standing on the hill, it looked as small as a toy.
“This is going to be tight,” Greer said.
The last patients were being brought down from the main floor. Jenny stood at the door of the hardbox with a clipboard, checking names off a list, while Sara and the nursing staff moved among the cots, doing their best to make sure everyone was comfortable.
Sara came to the cot that held the pregnant woman Jenny had spoken of. She was young, with thick, dark hair. While Sara took her pulse, she looked quickly at the girl’s chart. A nurse had checked her an hour ago; her cervix had been barely dilated. Her name was Grace Alvado.
“Grace, I’m Dr. Wilson. Is this your first baby?”
“I was pregnant one other time, but it didn’t take.”
“And how old are you?”
“Twenty-one.”
Sara stopped; the age was right. If this was the same Grace, Sara had last seen her when she was just a day old.
“Are your parents Carlos and Sally Jiménez ?”
“You knew my folks?”
Sara almost smiled; she might have, on a different day. “This might surprise you, Grace, but I was there the day you were born.” She looked toward the girl’s companion, who was sitting on a packing crate on the other side of the cot. He was older, maybe forty, with a rough look to him, though like many new fathers he seemed a little overwhelmed by the sudden urgency of events after months of waiting.
“Are you Mr. Alvado?”
“Call me Jock. Everybody does.”
“I need you to keep her relaxed, Jock. Deep breaths, and no pushing for now. Can you do that for me?”
“I’ll try.”
Jenny came up behind Sara. “Everybody’s in,” she said.
Sara put her hand on Grace’s arm. “Just focus on having your baby, okay?”
The basement door was made of heavy steel, set into walls of thick concrete. Sara was about to close it when the room plunged into darkness. An anxious murmuring, and then people began to shout.
“Everybody, settle down, please!” Sara said.
“What happened to the lights?” a voice cried from the darkness.
“The Army’s just diverting current to the spots, that’s all.”
“That means the virals are coming!”
“We don’t know that. Everyone, just try to keep calm.”
Jenny was standing beside her. “Is that really what they’re doing?” she asked quietly.
“Do I know? Go check the storage room for lanterns and candles.”
The woman returned a couple of minutes later. Lamps were lit and distributed around the space. The yells had fallen to whispers and, then, in the gloom, a tense silence.
“Jenny, give me a hand.”
The door weighed four hundred pounds. Sara and Jenny pulled it closed and turned the wheel to engage the bolts.
A quarter of Apgar’s men had taken up positions within five hundred yards of the gate; the rest were spread at regular intervals along the walls and connected by radio. Caleb was in charge of a squad of twelve men. Six of them had been stationed at Luckenbach—part of a small contingent who’d made it to a hardbox as the garrison was overrun. No officers had survived, orphaning them in the chain of command. Now they were Caleb’s.
A man came banging down the catwalk toward him. Hollis wore no uniform, but a standard-issue chest pack was cinched to his frame, holding half a dozen spare magazines and a long, sheathed knife. An M4 dangled from its sling across his broad frame, the muzzle pointed downward; a pistol was holstered to his thigh.
He gave a crisp salute. “Private Wilson, sir.”
It was absurd, Hollis speaking to him this way. He almost seemed like he was play-acting. “You’re kidding me.”
“The women and children are secure. I was told to report to you.”
His face was set in a way that Caleb had never seen before. This large, gentle man, collector of books and reader to children, had become a warrior.
“I made a promise, Lieutenant,” Hollis reminded him. “I believe you were there at the time.”
The spots came on, spilling a defensive perimeter of stark white light at the base of the wall. Radios began to crackle; a tremor of energy moved up and down the catwalk.
A call went out: “Eyes up!”
The
clack
of chambering rounds. Caleb pointed his rifle over the wall and flicked off the safety. He glanced to his right, where Hollis stood at the ready: feet wide, stock set, eyes trained down the barrel in perfect alignment. His body was somehow both tense and relaxed, purposeful and at ease with itself. It had the look of an old feeling stitched to the bones, summoned effortlessly to the surface when called upon.
Where would the virals come from? How many would there be? His chest was opening and closing arrhythmically; his vision seemed unnaturally confined. He forced himself to take a long, deep breath.
Don’t think,
he told himself.
There are times for thinking, but this isn’t one of them.