He spent the rest of the morning and the whole afternoon driving around the base, checking every building and road. He had been right in one respect. There had been an attempt to consolidate survivors. It had occurred at the airfield in the isolated northern portion of the base.
A series of roadblocks flanked by fortified gun stands had been erected along what appeared to be the only route to the isolated section. None were occupied, though. Because of this, Ben knew what he would probably find, but he had to check anyway so he weaved around the concrete barriers and didn’t stop until he reached the airfield.
Hundreds of people had camped out in the hangars — men and women, some in uniform and some not. And children, lots of children.
And every single person dead.
Ben stood frozen outside the main hangar for twenty minutes before he forced himself to grab a hoodie from his bag. Using the arms, he tied the pullover around his mouth and nose and headed into the hangars. He didn’t want to walk among the bodies, but he had to know if Martina’s family was there.
If she was there.
It wasn’t long before he lost the small breakfast he had eaten, and by the time he’d confirmed that the Gable family wasn’t among the dead, his stomach had revolted twice more.
Weak and in a daze, he had gone back to his girlfriend’s house and fallen asleep on her bed before the sun had even set.
When he woke up that morning, he drove up and down the streets of Ridgecrest, honking his horn every once in a while, but the town was as devoid of the living as the navy base had been.
With all options in town exhausted, he didn’t know what to do. Martina was still alive. He wouldn’t allow himself to believe anything else. But where was she?
A million possibilities raced through his mind before one finally pushed its way to the front.
A survival station.
Would she have gone to one?
Of course. That had to be it. He had assumed that if she was immune like he was, she wouldn’t have seen the need of going to one of the stations to get vaccinated, but her family wouldn’t be immune so she would stay with them.
Where was the closest one?
He hadn’t watched TV in nearly a week, right after the UN secretary general had first come on the air. Survival station locations hadn’t been broadcast at that point, and even if they had been, he would have only heard about the ones in the Bay area.
He looked around. He needed to watch the message again.
He ran over to a house half a block away, heaved a potted plant through the window in the door, and let himself in.
He grabbed the remote for the TV in the living room and hit the power button.
The screen remained dark.
He closed his eyes and groaned. In his excitement and hurry, he had forgotten the town was without power.
He closed his eyes and breathed deeply to stem his frustration.
Los Angeles, he thought as he opened his eyes again. There had to be a survival station there.
If the Gables had gone anywhere, that would be it.
With renewed purpose, he headed back outside.
6
After finding nothing he could use at the port, Robert hopped into the fuel truck and drove through town toward Puerto Moin, the smaller auxiliary port west of the city.
His route afforded him a view of the sea, and it wasn’t long before he spotted the ferry meandering along just offshore, heading in generally the same direction he was. He increased his speed and quickly outdistanced the boat.
Puerto Moin was built along a small offshoot of the Caribbean that dead-ended several hundred yards from the sea. The dock took up the entire eastern edge of the miniature bay, allowing ships to pull right up next to the shore.
Currently, two freighters were moored at the southern edge, each looking as though it had been unloading when work was abandoned. The northern end of the port was empty. Robert raced to that end and stopped very close to the edge before hopping out.
Dammit, he thought. On at least two occasions in the past, he’d seen a speedboat tied up to the dock, but it wasn’t there now. He looked over at the freighters, thinking one of them might have a smaller vessel on board he could use.
There, mounted on the wall of the pilothouse of the nearest ship, was a Zodiac. The small rubber craft wasn’t the perfect solution but it appeared to be his only choice.
He ran over to the ship and up the gangway. As he made his way to the pilothouse, he caught sight of a much smaller dock on the other side of the channel. Lashed to it were three tugboats. He thought they would be too complicated to pilot, but the coast guard skiff moored next to them should be a cinch.
He raced back to the truck and drove around to the other dock, a plan beginning to form in his mind. It would take more time to execute than he’d have liked, but it would give him the best chance of success. Climbing out of the truck, he looked out toward the open water and saw the ferry continuing its trek up the coast.
Good, he thought. He had worried the ship had turned out to sea, that he had lost it.
He hustled down to the skiff and checked the gas tank. It was almost full, but given what he had in mind, he knew it would likely not be enough. He located several spare gas cans in a shed on shore and filled them from the tank on the pickup. Once he’d secured them in the skiff, he checked the craft’s built-in storage containers, looking for something he could use as a weapon. He found bottled water, diving gear, a blanket, and a first-aid kit, but no knife or gun.
Another check of the sea showed him that the ferry had moved past the point straight out from the port. In a few more minutes, the trees along the western edge of the channel would block it from view.
He jumped out of the skiff and hurried over to the first tug, where a quick search produced only a long metal pole with a hook on the end. He tossed it into the skiff and moved on to the second tug. Here he had much better luck. First he found a plastic case holding a flare gun and nine ready-to-use flares, and then he hit the mother lode — three identical handguns and two boxes of 9mm ammunition. One of the boxes was half empty, but the other was full.
He knew he should check to make sure the bullets fit the guns, but he couldn’t afford to waste any more time. He could check once he was underway. He located a canvas bag and stuffed everything inside before hurrying back to the skiff.
The ferry was out of sight now, but that was okay. They couldn’t have gone far, and he was sure his little boat would travel a lot faster than the big ship could.
He untied the skiff from the pier and started the engine. The boat was indeed fast, and he was able to zip to the end of the channel in no time and enter the sea.
He spotted the ferry immediately. It was a white blob not much larger than a quarter, off to the left. Once he felt he was far enough from shore, he turned so that he was paralleling the coast on the same line the ferry was traveling.
After that, the hard part was trying not to catch up, his boat wanting to jump across the surface like a skipped rock while the ferry plodded through the water like a blunt instrument. When night fell, that’s when he would move in. Until then, he kept a soft hand on the throttle and his prize in sight.
“This stuff is useless,” Chloe said, tossing the journal she’d been reading onto her bed.