Boom. The explosion is huge. The shockwave throws Judd to the bitumen. His eyes flutter open and he staggers to his feet, shields his face from the wall of fire that dissects the road, and searches for the school bus.
It punches through the flames just thirty metres away. Judd sprints towards it. Its engine sound changes and his eyes flick to the exhaust. It’s pitch black. He yells at the top of his lungs: ‘Stop the bus!’
Ka-boom. It explodes and the fireball is enormous. The blast catapults Judd back over the cement divider and into a pylon. He crumples to the ground, his ears ringing, his face numb.
He failed, and all he can think about are those three children, staring out the back window, too scared to cry.
A distant voice floats to him:’ —andy—’
Andy? Who’s Andy?
‘Mandy!’
Oh! Mandy. That’s right, it’s my nickname.
Judd’s eyes blink open as Corey kneels in front of him. ‘You okay?’
Judd takes a deep breath, nods dully.
‘Mate, when you hit that pylon I thought it was curtains. It looked really painful.’
‘I didn’t get to the bus in time —’
‘No, you didn’t.’ Corey jabs a thumb to the left. Judd follows it to the unharmed group of schoolchildren and their elderly bus driver, who climb an emergency stairwell beneath the overpass. ‘But I did.’
A profound sense of relief sweeps over Judd. ‘Well done, son.’
Corey grins his crooked grin. ‘I only told them to get off. You did the hard bit.’
That’s true, and Judd couldn’t be happier the children are safe, but still, he can’t help thinking that, once again, at the critical moment, he didn’t rise to the occasion, he didn’t save them, he wasn’t the man the world thought him to be.
A siren blares and an engine strains. Judd and Corey turn to the sound, see an ambulance speed along the freeway’s far lane. It’s the first emergency vehicle they’ve seen since the explosions began. Their eyes flick to its exhaust.
It’s pitch black.
Corey shoots Judd a concerned look. ‘That’s never good —’
Boom. The explosion flips the ambulance onto its side and it skids along the freeway for fifty metres. Golden sparks spray as fast steel meets stationary bitumen, then it clips the cement retaining wall, flips over it and disappears into the brush on the other side.
17
Alvy Blash comes to with a gasp.
He lies on the ceiling of the ambulance, the vehicle upside down and tilted at a steep angle. He can see thick brush out the shattered front windscreen. From the panicked comments of the paramedics as they raced him to hospital, he knows the Swarm is to blame for his current predicament. Bunsen sure didn’t waste any time with his ‘urban deployment’.
Alvy feels woozy, not from the accident so much as his twin gunshot wounds, which the paramedics tried to patch as best as they could. Alvy turns, looks at the medic who was in the back with him. Blood trickles from his ears and nose, evidence of a traumatic head injury. The guy is dead, no doubt about it. Alvy shifts his eyes and takes in the driver. The poor schmuck’s been impaled by the branch that shattered the windscreen.
Alvy is horrified. This is his fault. He created the Swarm. Even if he never intended it to be used this way it is still his responsibility to put right. He must tell the authorities what is going on and give them a sample of the counteragent. He’s the only one who can do it. But first he must get out of this ambulance before Kilroy finds him. The old man is nothing if not thorough and will not stop until he knows Alvy is dead.
Alvy turns towards the rear doors and the ambulance shudders, slides down the incline, then stops. Alvy looks out the shattered front windscreen. What’s left of the vehicle’s nose pokes through the brush that blocked his view a moment ago.
Directly in front of the vehicle is a bracingly steep twenty-metre incline to a wall, then a sheer drop to a car park that is, at best guess, ten metres below that, a fall that would either be fatal or never-walk-again-bad if he were to make it in this upside-down ambulance.
He turns to the rear doors again and the ambulance slides towards the drop once more — then stops.
A noise in the distance. Someone crunches through the brush towards the ambulance.
Kilroy.
Damn it.
The sound grows louder, draws closer quickly, then stops. Alvy waits, heart in mouth, for a volley of bullets to strafe the vehicle, or for it to be simply kicked down the incline and over the edge.
‘Anyone in there?’
That’s not Kilroy’s voice. It doesn’t have the ponytailed bastard’s flat southern twang.
‘Yes — yeah! I’m okay, but the paramedics are dead.’
‘Need some help, mate?’
That’s a second voice. He’s pretty sure the accent is Australian.
‘Yes! Every time I move, it slides down —’
The ambulance slides down the incline.
‘Grab it!’
Alvy hears bushes thrash, then thumps on the side of the vehicle — then the ambulance stops.
‘I didn’t even move that time!’
‘Christ!’ The American voice is strained.
‘Jeez Louise!’ The Australian voice is little more than a grunt. ‘Okay, mate, get out.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘She’ll be right.’
‘I don’t know what that means!’
‘It means get moving ‘cause we can’t hold this bloody thing all day!’
‘Oh. Okay!’ Alvy starts towards the rear hatch and the ambulance slides again.
The Australian voice rings out. ‘Crikey! You got it?’
The American answers. ‘Yeah, but the ground — it’s collapsing under my feet! I can’t get a foothold.’
A dog barks.
‘Unless you just grew a pair of hands, no, you can’t help! Now get out of the bloody way!’
What’s a dog doing there? Alvy pushes the thought from his mind and continues towards the rear doors. It’s slow going. His head swims and the gunshot wounds throb but he ignores it all because he can feel the ambulance pick up speed.
He pushes the rear doors open and sees two men trying their best to slow the ambulance as it skis down the incline. Alvy is momentarily stunned to realise they look just like the astronaut and chopper pilot from the Atlantis 4.
The Australian barks at him: ‘You waiting on an invitation, mate?!’
And the American doubles down: ‘Get out now!’
Alvy leaps out — and the men let go of the ambulance. Sprawled on the ground, the scientist watches the vehicle slide noiselessly down the incline, reach the bottom, flip over the edge and crash into the parking lot below. He lets out a deep sigh of relief — then everything fades to black.
Corey and Judd carry the unconscious bloke to the freeway’s cement retaining wall, not far from where the ambulance flipped into the brush, and lay him down. Corey studies his blanched face. ‘He doesn’t look so hot.’
Judd feels his pulse. ‘He’s alive but he needs a doc.’
The man’s eyes flutter open and he takes in Judd and Corey. ‘It is you.’ He grins weakly.
Corey knows that smile, has seen it many times before. The guy is a fan of the Atlantis 4 and, in spite of everything that’s happened to him, is excited to be in their presence.
‘You saved me — that is so cool. You’re my biggest fan — I mean I’m your biggest — you know what I mean.’ He forces another smile then realises he doesn’t have the energy for that. ‘Oh boy, I’m not feeling so great.’
‘I’m gonna call for help.’ Corey instinctively pulls out Bowen’s iPhone and dials 911, then immediately realises that it’s a useless gesture. Even if he managed to have an ambulance sent here, wouldn’t it just explode on the way? It’s a moot point anyway as the line is engaged. ‘It’s busy.’