Chapter 45 - Lot To Ask

Their lair was a true mess. They had an excuse; they’d fled the police station in the middle of the night and holed up in this place, huddled and fearful. Then they’d spent the morning setting it up to be defensible, what with filling the stairwells. I still wasn’t convinced that was a smart plan.

What they hadn’t spent time on was making the interior more livable.

Blankets were draped over tables to form partitions in the rooms, allowing for some semblance of privacy, but the whole setup looked like a scene from a war movie—the part where the residents of the bombed-out city were huddled in the dark trying to stay alive. It wasn’t a pretty sight.

Alfred hadn’t been kidding when he said they’d picked up more people, though. He had dozens of refugees living in those rooms. I saw one woman trying to wrangle a pair of kids while she breastfed a baby. Right next to her was an older man, just sitting on the dirty concrete floor, staring at his hands. Some folks were handling the changes and adapting, while others…just weren’t. Was there a way to help people like that man? I didn’t know.

“Alfred, this is a lot more people than you had before,” I told him in a soft voice.

“Yeah. I’ve been taking a team out on scouting runs, and we’ve been bringing back more refugees to the camp as we searched.”

I nodded. That explained why he had so many crystals, too. He’d been out there, facing down danger. “We need to get these people somewhere safer. If the goblins attack, it’s not going to end well.”

“I know. But where do I take them? You said something about the Air Guard base?”

“I haven’t been to see it yet, but a lot of houses nearby the airport have been carefully abandoned,” I said. “Like, the people are gone, but there’s no sign of violence or struggle, and they packed up before leaving. Took a lot of food and clothes, stuff they might need. They had to have gone somewhere, and it looks like they went as a group.”

“Probably were picked up by someone’s patrol,” Alfred said, nodding. “We did that, basically. Swept buildings on campus and rows of houses, looking for survivors. When we found them, we invited them to pack up and join us at the station. But how do you know they’re gathering at the Guard base?”

“I don’t. It’s just a guess because it’s nearby.”

He led us into a room, inviting George, Samson, and two people I didn’t know in with us, then shutting the door. It had been a classroom space before. Now, he’d rearranged a few chairs into a circle, for meetings I presumed.

“Have a seat, folks. For those who don’t know her, this is Selena. She’s a classmate of mine. Selena, you know George and Samson. This is Kara, and Joe. They were fighting alongside me that day Brad attacked you, and they’ve come with me on my patrols ever since,” Alfred said.

I checked them out. Both of them were tier two, as were George and Samson. Was Alfred the only tier three person in this entire group? No wonder they’d made him leader. But that was not good at all. It meant that most of these people hadn’t been out there fighting. They’d been holed up, hiding, instead. Good short-term strategy with terrible long-term results.

George still looked pissed. Samson looked cool and reserved. Kara eyed me skeptically. I recognized her, now, from the fighting that morning, before everything went to shit. Joe just had his eyes on Alfred and no one else. I wasn’t sure if that was hero worship or something more, but there was some intense emotion going on there.

“We need to figure out what we’re doing next,” Alfred said. “You’ve all been leaders in this group, so I brought you in to hash it out. Selena thinks she knows where there’s a gathering point. But…she’s not sure.”

He looked toward me, so I guessed that was my signal to explain. “I found a bunch of abandoned houses near the airport. People had packed up and left, and it looked like they’d gone together, as a group. My hunch is that the Air Guard base might be out doing patrols, bringing people together.”

“Did you see the base?” George asked. “Go there, I mean?”

I shook my head. “Not yet, no. It was where I’d planned to head next, but then I saw the smoke rising from the station and headed west instead to make sure you were all okay.”

“We could have used the assist last night, but we’re okay now,” Kara said. “You’re not sure that Guard base is even still there then, are you?”

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“Airplanes,” Kara replied, like that explained everything. When we all still stared at her with a blank look, she sighed and went on. “When the power died and the car engines went out, what do you think happened to any airplane still in the air? Anything taking off or landing at the airport just dropped out of the sky. It’s got to have been a mess over there.”

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Shit, she wasn’t wrong. I hadn’t even really considered the fallout from everything that happened. How many airplanes were in the air at any given time? I didn’t know the answer, but it had to be thousands, right? Now everyone aboard all of those planes was probably dead.

I’d come to assume the Event was global; it was the only thing that really made sense. If it hadn’t been, I was sure someone would’ve figured out a way to get aid into the affected area by now. They could have set people up on bicycles, maybe towed trailers of supplies with some bikes, or something. No aid had appeared, no outside backup at all. To me, that shouted volumes about how large scale this catastrophe had been.

Everyone who’d been relying on power to survive was dead. Every ICU patient, everyone who needed oxygen supplementation. Every person aboard a plane. People on boats out in the ocean were likely dead as well, or would be eventually when their food and water ran out. I shivered, thinking about anyone on the train that passed under the English Channel. They’d be utterly in the dark with miles of tunnel between themselves and freedom, probably surrounded by monsters, too.

“Yeah, that’s a good point,” I said, after a pause. “But the Air Guard side of the field is separated from the civilian. They’ve got runways between them which ought to work as firebreaks, right?”

Kara nodded. “It’s possible, for sure. I just think we need to make sure there’s actually someone there before hauling all of these people someplace miles away, across dangerous terrain, to somewhere that may or may not have help. We get people all the way there on a hope, and they’re going to be pissed if we’re wrong. Hope isn’t a strategy.”

I chuckled. “You talk like you’re in the military yourself.”

“Kinda am. Army ROTC, so I’m technically a ‘cadet’ rank,” Kara replied with an easy smile. “I don’t have a ton of training, but even the bit I’ve gotten has helped some. More in terms of attitude than anything else.”

“I bet!” I replied. “Could have used you for some small unit tactics the other day.”

“I’ll be glad to help,” Kara replied. “But for now, I think we need to keep the civilians here, at least until we’re sure there’s a good option elsewhere.”

It made sense, what she was saying. I hated it, because it meant that mom and her kids were going to remain in this deathtrap for another day or two while someone checked out the base. If that goblin with the fireballs hit this place, there was no way they could defend it. Would the handheld fire extinguishers work, still? I thought they might, since they ran on pressurized gas. That should still function. Probably.

But would it be enough to keep the building from burning down after the goblins lobbed half a dozen fireballs into the lower levels? I doubted it. They’d designed themselves a fortress, but it was one they couldn’t easily escape.

“Do you think you can keep them from burning down the building if they attack?” I asked.

“Maybe,” Alfred replied. “We do have an escape route, though. There’s an elevator shaft cleared. We can get people down the ladder, through the roof of the elevator—it’s stuck at the basement level. Then out the doors, down a hall, and there’s a tunnel connecting to one of the neighboring buildings. We’ve got a way out if things get bad, Selena.”

“Well, that’s a relief,” I said. It still wouldn’t be easy. Was Kat going to be able to climb down a ladder, missing a foot? Would that mom be able to get her kids and baby down safely? “You want someone to go check out the Air Guard base. I’m sort of assuming you want me to go check it out, right?”

There was a brief pause as the rest of them looked at one another, then finally back at me. Alfred spoke first. “If you’d be willing, that would be terrific. You’ve got your undead. They’ll keep you safe, so you don’t need to take a whole team with you. Find out if there are people there and if they’re taking on more refugees, then come back and let us know?”

I hesitated a moment before answering, so he went on.

“I know it’s a lot to ask. But I can’t go—they need me here. I can send a team, but I’ve only got about a dozen people who are even vaguely combat effective. I’d need to send half our fighters to even have a chance of them making it safely, and that would put everyone else in danger.”

“Yeah, I can do it,” I told him at last. I kept seeing that mom and her baby. There was no way she’d survive without some sort of secure location. Her kids, too. “I’ll go check the place out.”

“We should send someone trustworthy with her,” George snapped. “I can’t believe we’re planning to trust a known murderer with something this important, but I understand the need. Even so, we should send one of our own along, just to be sure she does what she says.”

My temper washed over me like a wave. “Really? Murderer? Listen, asshole. Your friend tried to kill me. I’m sorry I had to kill him. More sorry than you can know. But I’m not sorry that I’m alive and he’s not.

“You want to send someone with me? Sure. But if you think that will somehow control me, or shape what I do, think again. Do you really think any one, or hell any ten of you could stop me, if I didn’t want to be stopped? Send someone with me if you’d like, but if they turn out to be another Brad, they’ll be another dead asshole.”

George looked like he was going to get out of his chair and launch himself at me, but Alfred put a restraining hand on his shoulder, and I got to see what tier three Strength looked like when applied. George didn’t move at all.

Kara spoke up, then. “I’ll go.”

Everyone stopped and looked at her.

“It makes sense to have a rep from our group there, and no offense meant Selena, but you’re not from our group at this point,” Kara said. “I’ve got skills that might be useful in the field, and I know how to talk to military folks, which might also help. I won’t get in your way or slow you down, and I’m also not a testosterone-fueled reject from an apocalyptic film like the guy who came after you, so I’m not worried about that.”

Everyone in the room turned from her to look at me.

I considered it for a moment and then smiled. “Sure, I’m good with that. I’m in charge?”

“You’re the one with the undead legion,” Kara replied, deadpan. “You’re in charge.”

“We have a plan,” Alfred said, standing to close out the meeting. “Let’s make it happen. The sooner we get these people somewhere safe, the better.”