Crossbones (20 page)

Her sock feet whispered over the steel decking as she continued toward sick bay, feeling as if her entire body were trembling. She
kept her finger off the shotgun's trigger for fear that she might pull it by accident. At another intersection she turned left—checking first to be sure it was empty—and hurried up this new passage.

Had she been wearing shoes, her footsteps might have masked the faint sound on her right. Instead she slid to a halt and listened. It came again, a soft whimper from inside an enlisted berthing space on her right. Sophia entered slowly, the shotgun ready and her finger now curled around the trigger, advancing between triple stacks of racks, peering around banks of lockers.

“Denny,” she called in a stage whisper. “Is that you?”

There was a cry and a blur of movement as something shot out from under a bottom rack. Sophia spun, nearly firing. Denny sobbed and ran to her, and Sophia dropped to her knees and took the boy in her arms. “Shh, it's okay, you're safe,” she whispered. The boy shuddered, his tears soaking into her sweater. “I've got you, Denny, you're safe.”
Needle one, haystack zero.

“M-M-Michael . . .” he started.

Sophia stroked his hair. “I know, sweetie, I know. Wind told us.”

“I'm s-s-sorry,” he cried.

She hugged him tight. “You didn't do anything wrong.” Then she held him at arm's length. “We have to hurry back to the school, okay? And I need you to be as quiet as a ninja. Can you do that?”

Denny nodded, wiping at his eyes.

“Okay, kick off your shoes. Grab my pocket and don't let go.” She stood and took the weapon in two hands again. Denny slipped out of his sneakers and clung to her, his other hand clamped over his mouth, body trembling.

Sophia paused at the entrance to the berthing space, got her bearings, and headed down the passageway, turning left at the next available intersection. She thought they were now in the corridor everyone called Broadway, a main route that ran from bow to stern and traveled almost the length of the ship, passing through wider-than-normal knee knockers every so often. They padded along
quickly as Sophia calculated how long it would take to get back to the classroom. Minutes only on a direct route. Denny had made more progress down through the ship than she had a right to expect, and for that she was grateful.

Another turn and she was headed starboard again, picking up the pace. Denny kept up without protest. Thirty feet to go.

“Hey!” a voice shouted behind her, and Sophia started to run, grabbing Denny by one hand and pulling him after her. A rifle fired and both woman and child let out a scream, the bullet whining off a nearby bulkhead. The sound of more than one pair of running feet pounded down the passageway behind them, followed by the crack of a pistol. Another bullet
pinged
off a pipe three feet from Denny's head, kicking up sparks.

Sophia reached the hatch to the classroom and started pounding on it with her fist. “Kay! It's Sophia, open up, hurry!” A glance to the right showed her the two bearded men she had seen before, both running at her.

“Kay, hurry!” she yelled, as Denny began to cry.

The man with the pistol stopped and aimed. The weapon barked, and a second later a bullet whispered past Sophia's head close enough to make her hair move. A metallic rattle from inside then, and the hatch opened, Kay standing there looking afraid and holding her own shotgun. Sophia shoved Denny through and leaped over the knee knocker behind him as another bullet sparked off the hatch frame.

The two women slammed the steel oval closed, and Sophia held the handle down while Kay jammed a chair leg against it. Most of the kids in the classroom behind them were crying now, huddling together at the far side of the room.

Fists began banging on the outside of the hatch, accompanied by muffled curses.

•   •   •

U
p on
Nimitz
's flight deck, Maya walked alone on the port side edge, staring into the misting rain to the north, night falling rapidly. She wore a gray hooded rain poncho and wrapped her arms across her chest for warmth. The earthquake had forced her to crouch and plant both hands on the deck to keep from falling, but it passed quickly. Now, especially since her life was one of sensation, she could feel the carrier moving. It wasn't much, but it was no longer stationary, and in the mist and gloom she couldn't
really
tell how fast the ship was traveling.

She wanted the diversion, wanted to think about what that would mean, their sanctuary no longer safely rooted to one spot, but she couldn't focus. All she could think about was that Evan was out there somewhere. Before the shaking started, Banks, the Navy operations specialist, had found her walking the deck. Using a notepad, he told her they'd lost contact with Evan and were trying to find him. He said he was sorry and went back into the superstructure.

Maya's face was wet from rain and tears. She wiped at it, then slid her hands to her stomach.
Be okay, Evan. We need you to be okay.

It hadn't occurred to anyone that Maya would be unable to hear Father Xavier's warning over the PA.

“That was intense,” Charlie said, grinning and climbing to his feet. He and the six others with him had been moving down a passageway when the tremor struck, and it threw them to the deck.

Of the nine people in his boarding party, Charlie had sent two of the men off on their own to wreak havoc, keeping the ship's defenders moving in different directions without time to organize. At the right moment he would break off another two, who would try to find weapons before starting trouble of their own. The remaining four would stay with him as an assault group, and this smaller team was already armed. The woman whose throat Ava slit provided them with a rifle and handgun, and they'd found their own weapons in a compartment not far from the mess hall.
Should have secured those in the armory, Chief,
Charlie thought. And of course Ava had her straight razor.

The woman had no reservations about first using the toddler and then leaving him behind. He wasn't hers, and she'd confessed to Charlie weeks after he'd found them all hiding in that cannery that she and the big man with the beard
had
been planning to eat him if supplies ran short.

Charlie didn't like that, but he liked the attitude behind it. He could use someone like this, and they'd been sexual as well for some time now. Ava seemed to enjoy their time together.

“Keep moving,” he ordered once everyone was on their feet, and the group set out once more.

Walking point and carrying an M4 was the young auxiliary deputy they had picked up in Oregon. He was eager to prove himself, and Charlie liked that. It would make it easier to use
him
too. The other two were civilians as well, as the decision had been made that trained crew were too valuable to risk on the first assault. Chick was the only coastie in the entire boarding party, as he had to lead the team. The next one would be different.

Charlie didn't mind. He'd personally selected his team not only for their potential as boarders, but for their personalities. All were well on their way to disentangling themselves from the morality and restrictions of living in a civilized society, and they were desperate to survive at any cost. Charlie had found that promising to alleviate that desperation was a powerful leadership tool. It hadn't taken much for Chick to transform these ragged refugees into killers, convincing them that seizing this ship was their only chance at salvation.

Good pirates, all,
he thought.

They came to a place where corridors intersected near a set of ladderways that climbed up to the Hangar Deck and descended to Third Deck, according to the stenciling on the wall. Chick motioned to two of the women on his team, who moved down the left passageway. They would make their way through the unfamiliar passageways in an attempt to circle back to flank and ambush the pursuers who would surely come after Charlie and his band.

“Up,” Chick said, and the young deputy started up the ladderway, Ava and the others following, Charlie coming up last. For now only he and the deputy carried rifles, but he was confident that
would change soon. The people aboard this ship had grown lazy and careless, confident in the knowledge that they were safe out here on their island, with no reason to secure weapons.

They emerged in a passage that looked like every other one Chick had seen since coming aboard. He had no schematic, had never been on a carrier in his life, and had seen them only at a distance, moored in various ports he'd visited.
The mighty carrier,
he thought.
The most powerful ship in the fleet, and the most vulnerable.

Chick didn't need a map. His mission was one of mayhem, the destruction of every soul he encountered. If they came across a prize like the armory, all the better, but their mission was death. For Chick, that meant one person in particular.
And oh, they had been so close!
The time hadn't been right, though. It would be soon.

They followed the corridor until it led them to an open hatch, and stepped through into the drafty openness of the main hangar.

•   •   •

A
nother thump on the hatch, and a muffled voice on the other side called, “Open up, we won't hurt you.”

Kay stood at the hatch with her shotgun. “You shot at us!”

“I promise we won't hurt you,” the voice said.

Behind Kay, Sophia was moving the children out the hatch at the other side of the room, taking a head count as they passed and whispering to each to take off their shoes. Calvin's older girl, age thirteen, led them.

“How do I know you're telling the truth?” Kay shouted, glancing back. Only a few kids left. There was no answer from the other side, and she looked at Sophia, shaking her head. Sophia motioned for Kay to join them, and the woman ran across the classroom.

“Go to the head of the line,” Sophia whispered. “We need to get
to a berthing space. One way in and out, and there'll be water and a bathroom.”

Kay nodded and ducked through the hatch, running past the line of frightened children, holding a finger to her lips as she passed. She reached Calvin's older girl. “Have everyone hold hands,” she whispered, then led off with the shotgun pointed ahead of her. One by one the children linked hands, hurrying after her. At the rear, Sophia closed the classroom hatch and put the shotgun's stock to her shoulder, aiming it down the passageway as she started walking backward.

The boarders would find a way around from the other locked hatch, she knew, and were probably already on the move. Even during all that time at the firehouse, Sophia had never gone on a supply run, had never fired a weapon at anyone, living or dead. Chief Liebs taught them all how to shoot during their time aboard
Nimitz
, but that was target practice. Could she shoot another person?

The whimpering shapes scurrying behind her were helpless, harmless children who had done nothing wrong. Little Ben was among them. Sophia knew the answer was yes.

Try me, you bastards.

•   •   •

T
he two women moved along the passageway, one carrying a shotgun, the other a pistol. They wore dirty flannel, jeans, and hiking boots. The woman with the handgun was more of a girl, a high school dropout who'd been working as a part-time cashier in a Brookings supermarket. The older woman was stout, her hair worn in a short brush cut, a former logging truck driver who preferred football and drinking with the boys to book clubs and cooking shows. She liked the cashier, and not just for her looks. A short while ago the girl had slit a man's throat with a kitchen knife, allowing the two of them to pick up these weapons from the sleeping area he'd been exiting.

As they came to a choice of corridors, left or straight ahead, the truck driver motioned for the girl to keep moving past hatch after hatch. The closeness of the low ceiling covered in pipes and cables made the older woman a bit claustrophobic. At the next intersection the trucker put a hand on the girl's shoulder to stop her, and they both listened.

Footsteps, down to the left.

The truck driver patted the girl's back and pointed to the left, then continued ahead on her own.

The cashier crept down the left corridor, raising her pistol.

•   •   •

X
avier and Calvin moved one ahead of the other, Calvin leading with his assault rifle to his shoulder, Xavier with the shotgun up and ready, turning frequently to watch their backs. Both tried to step carefully and quietly, and Xavier clenched his teeth as the grenade fragment deep in his thigh tissue shifted, touching a nerve. For the priest, the hunt brought back bloody memories of patrols as a young Marine in Mogadishu. For Calvin, there was only the area in front of his rifle muzzle, and a seething rage.

They were moving aft, just to starboard of the center line of the ship. The passageway seemed to have more cross corridors and hatches than ever before, so many places for a threat to hide. They would approach a hatch, Xavier would turn the handle and push, and Calvin would go in with the rifle. Each compartment got only a cursory inspection before they moved on. It was a slow process, but they didn't dare leave an unexplored space behind them, just as they hadn't while hunting zombies in this maze.

As they came to a point where yet another passageway crossed, Calvin pointed to himself and then the right, then at Xavier and to the left. The priest nodded, and both men moved.

She was only ten feet away, Xavier saw, startled at her presence, a
girl with greasy hair tied back in a ponytail, wearing layers of thermal and flannel. She was crouched against the wall and might have been cowering and hiding except for the pistol she was aiming, and Xavier's finger touched the shotgun's trigger.

The supermarket cashier fired twice, and the priest felt a pair of hammer blows to the chest that knocked him flat and stole his breath. Before he went down he saw the girl pause in surprise and, through his pain, Xavier had the thought that the girl had never shot anyone before.

Calvin triggered a full-auto burst, the heavy 7.62-millimeter rounds shredding the girl from chest to hairline in a haze of pink and gray. The hippie pivoted in the intersection, checking each hallway as he stood over his friend, rifle muzzle searching. The priest was gasping for air, and Calvin grabbed the man's ammo vest and hauled him into the hallway opposite the dead girl.

Xavier wheezed as Calvin helped him to sit, propping him against a wall.

“Hurts, doesn't it?” Calvin asked.

It was close to a minute before the other man regained enough breath to whisper, “Yes.” His hands slid across his armor, fingertips finding two flattened slugs lodged in the Kevlar.

“Lucky she didn't have a rifle,” said Calvin, peering back into the intersection to see if any of her companions had been drawn by the gunfire. “At that range it would have punched through your armor, and you'd be talking to God now.”

Xavier was still drawing tight, shaky breaths. “Left him . . . behind . . . remember?”

Calvin nodded. “Good. Then it's up to
you
to be faster on the trigger next time.” The hippie collected the dead girl's handgun and handed it to the priest, helping him stand. “You okay?”

Xavier nodded.

“One down,” said Calvin, leading them back into the corridor.

•   •   •

K
ay took the line of sock-footed children down a hallway, paused when it came to a T, looked both ways, and led them left. Aside from the whimpering of the younger ones, the kids were wide-eyed and quiet. The older children whispered encouragement to the most frightened among them. Near the middle of the line, three-year-old Ben kept whispering, “Papa.”

Sophia kept her eyes to their rear, still moving backward, glancing behind her to see the linked chain of children making a turn into another passageway.
We're so exposed out here,
she thought,
and moving so slowly.
She looked back in time to see a bearded man with an axe and a pistol walk out into the same passageway she was watching. He saw her and stopped, startled.

Making a noise that was half scream and half snarl, Sophia fired, the shotgun kicking hard into her shoulder. The bearded man let out a howl and fell on his ass, then scrambled back out of sight.

“Bitch!” came a cry from down the hallway.

Behind her, the children reacted to the shotgun blast with cries of their own, moving faster. Sophia racked another shell and stayed at the corner, aiming at the place where the bearded man had retreated.

Your life is precious, my love,
she heard Vladimir say in her head.
Sell it dearly.

A second bearded face poked out from the distant corner, and Sophia fired again, the stock slipping out of position a bit, the kick making her cry out as the weapon nearly dislocated her shoulder. Down at the corner, buckshot sparked off the bulkhead just above the man's head, and the face disappeared behind a scream. Then Sophia moved, pumping the weapon with some difficulty—her right arm felt numb and it hurt to move it. She ran after the fleeing children.

Kay made one more turn, and then she was hurrying the children through a hatch, telling them to find a place to hide and stay quiet. Sophia joined her a moment later, both women happy to see one another. They followed the kids inside and slammed the hatch, Kay holding the handle down while Sophia did a quick search and returned with a power cord ripped from the back of a TV. They wound it between the handle and a large hinge, pulling it snug, then used a bedsheet as a rope to tighten it further.

Calvin's girl and Kay got the kids settled into racks out of sight at the back of the compartment, sending them to the toilet in groups. Sophia picked up the handset of a wall-mounted phone and looked at it. The device had no PA features, and right now she couldn't remember a single extension to where anyone might be. Frustrated, she slammed the receiver back into its cradle, then pressed an ear to the hatch.

Nothing.

She tested the handle once more, then pulled a folding chair up to sit in front of the hatch. Sophia pointed her weapon at the only way into the compartment and waited.

•   •   •

I
t was almost dark, and the temperature was dropping as the rain fell harder. Maya remained on the flight deck, hoping Banks had somehow been wrong, searching the sky for blinking red-and-white lights. Rain plastered strands of hair against her face, and she shivered. Was Evan cold too? Was he hurt? She couldn't let herself think about the alternative.

Maya saw that the drifting aircraft carrier was gliding toward the Bay Bridge at an oblique angle, something unnatural for a ship. It looked as if it would pass directly under the span without coming near the supports. What would happen then?

The wind drove wet, gray curtains across the flight deck, and Maya hunched into her poncho, unable to endure it any longer.
She headed back toward the superstructure. Pat Katcher ran communications, and he would be able to tell her more about Evan. Maya went through the wide hatch and started the climb up the tower.