Omega Days (An Omega Days Novel) (30 page)

Mission Bay

It was only three blocks, but Father Xavier’s journey from the building where he’d left Alden to the waterfront was the longest and loneliest time of his life. He moved down the center of a street that was like a canyon, the high walls of condominiums rising on the left and right. Cars sat parked in silent rows along the curbs, many of their owners banging rhythmically at windows high above, dead and trapped within their homes.

A rat that appeared as big as a housecat strutted insolently across the street in front of him, its gray-black hair slicked flat by the rain. A solitary corpse, a woman in tight jeans and a torn blouse, one hand so chewed it looked as if she had stuck it in a lawn mower, hobbled after it, not seeing the man in the street. They quickly disappeared between a pair of buildings on the left.

The rain drummed on the hoods and roofs of cars, creating puddles on the asphalt and plastering the priest’s clothes against his chest. It was a cold rain.

I saved no one,
Xavier thought.
I protected no one.

He suddenly wondered why he was going on at all. To what purpose? To stay alive in a world where only he existed? To perhaps encounter another handful of desperate, frightened people, only to fail them as well?

It was then he knew Tricia had been right. He was already in hell, and this was God’s punishment for his unforgivable sins. Did he deserve less? If this were a movie, he would cry to the heavens, “God, why have You forsaken me?” But he already knew why. God had turned his back because Xavier Church was a killer, and one who masqueraded as a man of faith, perhaps an even greater sin. He had taken lives and, in doing so, broken his covenant with God. Now he was condemned to walk among the dead, a man without hope.

And yet he kept moving toward the bay.

Eventually he came to a final cross street, Terry A. Francois Boulevard. Beyond was a large park that led to the water. Xavier turned left and kept going, staying close to the park side of the street, watching for movement in the rain and still wondering why he bothered. Near Mission Bay Boulevard South, the park ended at another industrial area on the right: small garages, fenced yards where boats rested elevated on metal racks, repair facilities, and a few shops specializing in sport fishing equipment. Xavier moved into this area, still heading for the water, and soon found himself at the edge of a long wharf. Off to his left was a large building with many windows and umbrella tables outside. To the right was a commercial fishing pier and docks, where small cranes sat waterside near ice houses, ready to receive the day’s catch. The air reeked of oil and salt and fish, but there were no boats in the water. A dirty gull stood on a piling not far away, watching him with small black eyes.

The priest stared out at the gray day, at the storm clouds passing slowly across the sky, at the water, choppy and cold. He knew its temperature could get down into the forties, even in September. It wouldn’t take long before the water sapped him of heat and strength, pulling him under and quickly silencing him.

Suicide meant immediate damnation.

But he was already in hell, wasn’t he?

It took a moment before he realized he had been watching the small shape of a helicopter far out across the bay, moving slowly along Alameda Island. He blinked. Helicopter. That processed for a moment, and then he began to wave his arms and shout, demanding it see him, demanding it come. And then he dropped his arms and shook his head, feeling foolish for the unthinking reaction. Did he really think he could be seen or heard at this distance?

But he did get a response. A chorus of moans called out behind him.

Xavier turned to see a hundred or more of the dead coming at him in a crowd. They had approached steadily, quietly, while he stared out at the water. Now they were less than ten yards away.

The priest ran, heading into the commercial fishing area. The crowd followed, and he didn’t get far before more corpses staggered out onto the wharf in front of him. He cut left, running down a floating wooden dock that bobbed beneath him, threatening to throw him off balance and into the water. It was a short dock, and he reached the end in less than a minute, angry with himself for coming this way, not thinking, knowing he had obeyed a primitive instinct to run, run, run. He turned and saw the dead streaming off the wharf and onto the wooden planking, bumping against one another as they came on in a wave.

Xavier looked at the crowbar in his hand, looked at the water. A few of the dead lost their balance on the bobbing dock and fell off the sides, but the rest kept coming, their moans rising. Fifty feet. Twenty-five. Mouths dropped open and the creatures in the lead began lurching faster.

The priest planted his feet and raised the crowbar, the beginnings of an Our Father coming out in a whisper without him realizing. He tensed to swing.

A spotlight framed him from behind, and he heard the sound of an idling motor. He turned to see a San Francisco Police Harbor Patrol boat drifting fifty feet away, silhouettes of people moving behind the light.

“Swim!” someone shouted.

Xavier dropped the heavy tool and dove. The water took him in a frigid grip, and when he broke the surface he gasped, trying to breathe. Dozens of splashes came from behind him, and he forced his arms and legs to move. The boat seemed miles away.

“Faster!” the voice yelled, and then there was the boom of a shotgun. Xavier pulled himself through the water, forcing himself to take even breaths, not to give in to the stabbing cold. Another shotgun blast went off just overhead, and then one of his hands rapped hard against the fiberglass hull. He pawed his way down the side, finding a narrow metal platform half submerged at the stern. Xavier hauled himself out of the water and tumbled into the rear of the boat.

A man and a woman sat on a bench seat, keeping close together and huddling under rain ponchos. The woman was pregnant. Another woman in blue camouflage and a ball cap stood at the helm, gripping the wheel and already throttling the patrol boat away from the dock. Xavier slumped to the deck, shivering as a man stood over him. He wore sneakers, khaki jeans, and an expensive caramel-colored raincoat. His skin was a light mocha, and he wore his hair in tight, neck-length braids with a few shells and colored beads woven into them.

He was pointing a shotgun at Xavier. The priest thought he looked terrified.

“Helicopter,” Xavier said, his teeth chattering.

The man with the braids ignored him. “He’s shaking,” he called to the woman at the helm. “I think he’s got the virus.”

She didn’t look back. “Then kill him.”

Xavier raised a hand and shook his head as the man pointed the muzzle of the shotgun and pulled the trigger.

Naval Air Station Alameda

On the deck of the barge, the hippies sheltered their children as best they could, pulling on hoods and hats, staying close together. There was sadness over the few they had lost on the pier, but a quiet joy that Calvin had safely returned to them.

Inside the tiny wheelhouse, with Maya tucked close against him, Evan guided the barge out of Oakland Middle Harbor and across the western tip of what someone had shouted was Alameda, the old Navy base. From the water they could see only a rocky shoreline with a high fence fifty feet in, tall weeds growing along the chain link as it stretched away in both directions. Beyond the fence stood a line of tall metal-frame towers with airfield landing lights mounted atop them, and a high red-and-white radio antenna, but from this angle the actual field could not be seen, and thus there was no sign of the helicopter. The shore was jagged stone and uninviting to boats, so he stayed well off, following the land and looking for a soft place to beach.

The surface was choppy, and the barge, designed for flat harbors and never intended to withstand even the relatively calm waters of the bay, swayed dangerously, forcing people to widen their stances and hold on to whatever they could. Maya kept one arm locked around Evan’s waist and braced a palm against the plywood wall of the wheelhouse. The young writer had too much imagination for this as he envisioned the barge rolling over to the left, dumping screaming people into the cold water, and the armored truck over on top of them. It made him tighten his grip on the wheel.

•   •   •

O
ut on the open deck, once he was certain his wife and children were accounted for and after he checked with the others to see who was missing, Calvin headed for the cab of the armored truck parked at one end of the barge. Carrying the small cooler of insulin in both hands, he nodded in satisfaction when he saw that the vehicle’s engine was still running. Using an elbow, he opened the passenger door.

“You’re so beautiful, baby,” someone crooned from within.

Calvin hesitated, then stepped up onto the metal running board and leaned into the cab. There was sudden movement in the back, and then a face was looking at him through the opening between the cab and the rear compartment. It was a muscular man in his early thirties with long blond hair and tattoos, wearing black, military-style clothing. His face was flushed, and he glared at Calvin, quickly buckling his pants.

“I just need a place to plug this in,” Calvin said, waving the adapter cord for the small cooler. He looked at the dashboard, then unplugged a portable DVD player from the cigarette lighter, switching it for the cooler cord. He didn’t see the man behind him bare his teeth when he did it.

A groan came from the back and Calvin turned to see that, among the stacks of supplies and piles of weapons and body armor, the younger man was crouched over a girl. She was gagged and bound tightly, lying on the floor partially undressed. Her eyes were closed and she was breathing rapidly, her body slick with sweat. Calvin recognized the fever at once.

“What are you doing?” Calvin whispered, redness creeping up his whiskered neck. The girl was Maya’s age.

TC’s lip curled as he bared his teeth. “None of your fucking business, old man.”

Calvin stepped between the seats and removed his hat, bending slightly at the knees as he smoothly drew a large, bone-handled knife from a sheath at the small of his back. He held the knife low and looked TC in the eyes. “It’s my business now,” he said, his voice little more than a growl.

TC sized him up. No stranger to close-quarters prison combat, he recognized an experienced knife fighter when he saw one and wasn’t fooled for a moment by the man’s age. He was hard, and the inmate could tell that the man was ready to go all the way.

“You sure you want this, old man?” TC asked, giving him a smile that didn’t reach his eyes.

Calvin simply said, “Get out.” There was no bluster, no threats, only the tiniest, snakelike wave to the tip of the big blade and the man’s steady gaze.

TC nodded, smiled more broadly, and slipped out onto the deck through the Bearcat’s rear double doors, then slammed them closed behind him. Calvin sheathed his knife and crouched beside the girl, pulling her clothing back into place.
What kind of sick bastard . . . ?

The truck rocked as someone climbed into the cab. “What are you doing?” said a voice.

The hippie turned to see the man with the crew cut and black body armor, the one whose rifle had saved his life earlier on the pier. He was dressed just like the man Calvin had chased off, and he immediately made the connection; they were together. Calvin’s hands shook. “Your buddy was about to . . . if I hadn’t come in . . . She’s sick, for God’s sake.” Calvin finished covering her and put the back of his palm on her forehead. “She’s burning up. Is it the virus?”

Carney put it together quickly. “I don’t know. Probably. She got a face full of fluid. Where did the other man go?”

“Out the back.” Calvin was still crouched over Skye, as if this new arrival might also attempt to defile her. He eased his hand back toward the big knife.

Carney shook his head slowly. “You need to relax. Come on out of there.”

Calvin looked at him, seeing they were both about the same age, each toughened in his own way by different lives. This man’s eyes were different than the younger man’s, though. They lacked the crazy he had seen in the would-be rapist. Calvin climbed out and stood beside Carney in the rain. After a moment, they gave their first names and shook hands, never taking their eyes off one another. Both had solid grips.

“Who is she?” Calvin asked.

“I still don’t know her name. She’s someone who needed help out of a tight spot, and you can see what good that did her.”

Both men looked forward, picking out the mass of TC Cochoran walking slowly through the crowd to the front of the barge. He stripped off his armor and shirts until he was bare-chested, revealing his broad, deeply chiseled upper body and canvas of ferocious tattoos. He sat and dangled his legs over the water, the auto shotgun resting beside him.

Calvin faced his new acquaintance. “If he goes near that girl again . . .”

Carney didn’t like threats, and his eyes narrowed just a bit, but he had warned TC about the girl and he would have to deal with the situation. Now was not the time, however. “You want to stay clear of him, man.”

“He doesn’t scare me,” said Calvin.

“He should,” Carney said.

Up on the bow, TC threw his head back into the wind and rain and let out a long howl. The gathered hippies and their children jumped at the primal noise.

“Is he going to be a problem?” asked Calvin.

The con stared out at his cellmate. “If he is, then he’s my problem.”

The two men looked at each other for a long moment, coming to an unspoken understanding of the situation, and each other. Then Calvin extended a hand, Carney shook it firmly, and the hippie made his way back to his family.

•   •   •

E
van continued to pilot the barge along the shore and fence line, coming to a literal corner of land so squared-off it had to be manmade. Just beyond the fence, rising out of tall grass, was a cement airfield tower that looked as though it had been unused for half a century. In front of the tower, standing with rotting fingers curled through the chain link, was the corpse of an old man in baggy khakis and a dark blue jacket covered in military patches, one of those elderly vets who donated their time at military museums, sharing their stories with those who would listen. Strands of thin hair were matted to his head, and his skin had a greenish hue. He rattled the fence and peeled back his lips as the barge chugged past.

The writer brought the vessel around the corner to the left where the shore and fence continued on as far as he could see, still rocky and unfit for landing. The expanse of the bay spread out to the right, San Francisco in the distance, a gray shadow behind a curtain of rain. The corpse turned its head to watch them go by, and then it disengaged its fingers from the fence and began to trudge through the high weeds, unable to keep pace, but keeping steadily on.

Evan knew that if he stayed on his course, eventually he would find a way into the base, and from there they would seek out the helicopter. After that? He had no answers, but at least they were together and safe for the moment.

Behind him, the old man’s corpse followed, as relentless as time.