Invasion (The Alien Wars #1) (7 page)

The moon was high in the sky as the bullet-ridden Land Rover sped down the road with its headlights blazing. Kenneth drove while Xavier sat shotgun. Logan and Derek sat in the back, talking.

“Do you know if the bridges linking
San Francisco
are still standing?”
Logan
asked.

“The two south of the city were completely destroyed, I think. I didn’t see the others though.”

Xavier called over his shoulder. “At this rate, we’ll be at the
San Francisco
International
Airport
in an hour.”

“I wonder if she’ll be there,” Derek muttered.

“How long did you tell her to wait there?” Kenneth asked.

“We didn’t have any firm agreement,” Derek stated. “It was more just a basic meeting place if we got split up.”

“Well, if she’s not there, we can head closer to
San Francisco
,” Xavier said. “Where did you say your grandmother’s place was?”

“In
Daly City
, but I doubt that we’d be able to get there. That is, if the fighting’s still going on.”

Logan
glanced behind his shoulder and gave their oddball arsenal a quick inventory. One AR-15 with fancy optics, three shotguns, some hand grenades, a few semi-automatic handguns, and a bolt-action sniper rifle decked out in stylish camouflage. “Well, I’d say that we have more than enough firepower to suit our needs.” He glanced at Xavier. “Where did you say you got all this?”

“I have my contacts,” Xavier replied. “The important thing is to not waste ammunition. It’s limited, so we can’t fight for too long. Stealth will be
key
.”

“I don’t think we should just barge in and start shooting,” Kenneth argued. “Derek said there’s more than one gang battling for control of the city.”

“Suit yourself, but if someone shoots at us, I’m going to take them out.” Xavier grunted. “These are dangerous times, and although I’m not a violent man, I’m not going to give anyone the opportunity to kill me. If someone is willing to talk, then I’ll talk, but they better be damned polite about it.”

Silence descended upon the group.
Logan
gazed out at the darkened scenery as the minutes passed. They could hardly see a single light as they
traveled
north along the
Bayshore
Freeway. It seemed so unreal. They hadn’t passed a single moving vehicle the whole time that they’d been driving, but three weeks ago, the freeway would have been packed, even at this time of night.

“There’s a bunch of lights up ahead,” Xavier said. “I think they’re at the airport.”

“The
San Francisco
International
Airport
?”
Logan
asked.

Xavier nodded. “They must have a bunch of generators and …” He paused as he glanced in his
rearview
mirror. A light appeared out of the darkness, growing bigger by the second. It was heading straight for them. “We’ve got company.”

Logan
peered over of his shoulder and frowned. “I wonder who they are.”

“They might be able to help us,” Derek said. “Maybe we should pull over.”

“No,”
Logan
muttered. “If we—” He paused as a bullet smashed through the back window, showering his neck in stinging glass shards.

Kenneth pumped down on the gas and swerved the wheel to the left, switching lanes. More rounds cracked by and shattered the rest of the windows, but no one shouted out in pain. The Land Rover roared down the road, heading toward the airport, pursued by the unseen vehicle.

“What are we going to do?” Kenneth asked.

“If men are occupying the airport, Molly is probably not going to be there,” Derek said.

As the turn off to the airport approached, a decision had to be made. Kenneth was still struggling to make a call, but a moment later, the decision was made for him.

Bright lights suddenly appeared in front of him just beyond the turn. Kenneth couldn’t see anything due to the glare of the lights. Not wanting to head where he couldn’t see, he took the turn.

Logan
grabbed the AR-15 from the back and fired off controlled pairs through the broken windshield. Their pursuer swerved to the side and he heard the crunch of metal moments later. “We’ve got some distance between us now.”

“But what are we going to do?” Kenneth asked as he drove closer and closer to the entrance of the airport. “There’s definitely something going on here, so I doubt Molly will be here.”

“We’d better make sure before we leave.”
Logan
turned to Derek. “Where did you say the meeting place was?”

“At the end of the main runway,” Derek replied. “I didn’t know what buildings would still be standing, so that’s why I thought the runway was best.”

Logan
glanced behind him. No lights were in view, but he knew it would only be a matter of time before their pursuers contacted their friends.

The Land Rover screeched to a stop as Kenneth slammed on the brakes. “We can’t go through there.” He quickly switched off the car’s headlights.

Logan
stared ahead and saw that his brother was right. It looked as though some sort of roadblock had been set up in front of the airport entrance.

Two vehicles sat side by side, while a number of militia folk, all holding military-style weapons, talked to one another. A bright light, powered by a generator, lit up the whole scene.

“There must be something really important here to have that many men guarding the entrance,” Xavier said.

“We need to find out what it is,”
Logan
stated. “There might be a place where the fence is down, so let’s head right and go along the perimeter.”

Kenneth put the vehicle in reverse, but while he was doing so, he accidentally switched on the high beams.

The men looked up, shouted, and
leveled
their weapons at them.

“Damn!”
Logan
muttered.

“Gun it!” Xavier took hold of a rifle and pointed it at the light. He pressed the trigger. The glass broke and the light went out.

Shouting and rapid fire pierced the night as the Land Rover roared off the road and headed across the grass.

Kenneth left the high beams on. They needed to find a hole in the fence, and they needed to find it quickly before they were caught. The vehicle bounced over the rough ground. It took a good minute to find a hole large enough for the vehicle to fit through.

Kenneth swung the wheel to the left and went through. Glancing back, he saw headlights approaching. After spotting a nearby building, he switched off the lights and drove around to the other side before turning off the engine. They were now invisible to the naked eye.

Everyone listened as they heard the roar of vehicles approach. Luckily, the roar passed as the vehicles continued on driving past the hole in the fence. They couldn’t actually see this, but given the fading engine noise, it was a safe bet.

Kenneth breathed a sigh of relief. “Phew, that was close.”

“Now we just need to get to the runway,” Derek said.

“That’s easier said than done,” Xavier said. “We can’t afford to cruise around in this vehicle as they’ll be on the lookout for anything like it, so we’ll have to go on foot. Speed is the key. We’ll leave the wheels and hope that it’s still here when we get back.”

“Why don’t we hide it in one of the hangars?”
Logan
asked.

“Too risky turning on the engine now.
Best to leave it the way it is and
hope
for the best.” Xavier climbed out of the vehicle and opened the trunk. “Grab a weapon. If we get spotted, head back here. Oh, and if we get split up, meet back here in fifteen. Got that?”

Logan
looked at his watch. “Okay.”

After they each grabbed a weapon, they checked for ammo before heading toward the runways. As they walked, Kenneth
marveled
at the size of the airport. He and Logan had flown out of San Francisco International many times over the past couple of years, but it had never felt as big while sitting inside an airliner as it did now, walking along the tarmac that stretched for miles. This was an entirely different experience. Another reason it felt and looked so much different was that many of the hangars had been burnt out, and destroyed planes littered the taxiways and terminal areas.

It may have been dark, but the moon did a good job of illuminating the place. Although it wasn’t the same as walking in daylight, it was still a surreal experience.

The group had managed to cover just over half the distance when they rounded a hangar and paused. Up ahead, three buildings down, a blaze of lights lit up the area.

“What the …” Kenneth shook his head in wonder. “This must be why they’ve got those guys guarding the entrance.”

Xavier, who was now wearing his night-vision goggles, nodded. “I don’t know what you can see, but there’s plenty of firepower up there. We’ll have to take a wide detour. It’ll be longer, but if any of those men have night-vision goggles, we’ll be toast.”

“I can’t see Molly being here with all these people about,” Derek muttered.

“We’ll soon see,” Kenneth said. “Let’s go before we’re spotted.”

To get to the other set of hangars, they had to cross a large expanse of tarmac. As Xavier had the goggles, he was chosen to keep watch. So while he kept an eye on the men, the others hurried across the gap.

They managed to do so without any trouble. Now it was Xavier’s turn. He waited until the men by the hangar door seemed engaged in conversation and hurried across to join the others. Before he made it to the cover of the building, a yell went out. Looking back, he spotted two figures racing toward them.

“Do we make a run for it or make a stand?”
Logan
said as Xavier reached the hangar.

“We don’t have enough firepower to make a stand,” Xavier said. “We’ll have to split up and make for the runway. Derek and I can go straight there while you lead them astray for a bit. As for these guys …” Xavier fired his shotgun and stopped the two men in their tracks. As soon as the shots rang out, more yells were heard and two Humvees, their headlights blazing, tore toward them.

“Meet back at the car in twenty minutes.” Xavier turned and disappeared into the darkness without another word, quickly followed by Derek.

Taking aim with his trusty AR-15,
Logan
emptied the 30-round magazine in seconds. Grinning, he saw the Humvees swerve to one side and the men dive for cover.

His grin quickly faded as the men replied with their own measures. As the zings overhead grew into louder cracks, he grimaced. “We should get going.”

After firing off one more round,
Logan
followed his brother. Unfortunately, Kenneth did not have the night-vision goggles that Xavier sported, so when he came to a corner, he had to guess which way to go. He headed right, but no sooner than he did, two sets of headlights lit up the area.

Kenneth and Logan raised their weapons to fire, but dropped them and put their hands up as ten men appeared from within the darkness. As the men walked closer,
Logan
saw that even though the men were carrying military-grade weapons, they were not dressed in army uniforms.

“Let me do the talking,”
Logan
whispered to Kenneth. A tall guy broke off from the group and approached them. By the way he strutted over and the way two men followed his every move, he guessed that he had some authority over the group.