Age of Monsters by John Schneider (books to read for self improvement .TXT) 📗

“Don't ask if you don't really want to know.”

The group exchanged furtive glances, but Bud nodded for all of them.

Lucas shrugged.  “Well,” he said, “what you see is what you get.”  He tossed a thumb in the direction of the smashed-in ceiling and the devastated city beyond.

“This,” he said, “everywhere.”

There was a long, sober silence.

“Locally,” Lucas continued, “once things went south in L.A. and here in San Fran...  well, we kinda had a lot of bases clustered right around here – and damned if they pretty much didn't get taken completely out.”

Rosa took quiet note of the word 'completely'.

Again, Bud asked the question she didn't want to.

“What's left?”

Lucas shrugged.  “West Coast?  Militarily, pretty much the land bases are gone.  Fortunately, this was a big Navy area and we've managed to relocate off-shore.  The anchor-point is just off Fort Hunter – about a hundred miles south.

“Other than that,” he continued, tapping a rim-shot on a smashed car-bumper, “it's all gone.”

He waved his hand slowly, as if wiping it all away.

“Everything,” he said.

The little circle stared back, blinking in the dark.  Julie's eyes were wide and mollified.  Bud reflexively pulled Allison close.  Jamie squeezed herself tighter into her little ball.  Even Jeremy paused in his incessant pacing.

So,” Lucas said, slapping his hands with by-rote, gung-ho optimism, “that's the score as it stands.  Obviously, that's a number we're going to try and improve on.”

He hiked his wounded leg up on to the rubble like an easy chair and reclined, as if dismissing the subject altogether, and ready to simply settle down for a nap.

Rosa cleared her voice.

“Well, Lieutenant Walker,” she said, “what's the military's master-plan now?”

Now Lucas grinned.  “That's classified.  I could tell you, but then I'd have to kill you.”

Rosa felt her knuckles curling again.

“Okay,” she said patently, “what's YOUR master-plan?”

“Well,” he said, waggling his injured foot, “as soon I can get along a little better, I'm taking us all out of here, and we're gonna reconnect with my base just a hop south of here.”

“Define 'a hop'.”

“Fort Hunter.  Like I said.  A hundred miles or so.”  Lucas tapped his bum leg.  “That's why I want my foot working better.”

“And you expect us to just follow you through a hundred miles of monster-infested war-zone?”

Lucas shrugged, then nodded.

“Best not to linger,” he said.  He made as if to check his watch.  “My wife's probably already expecting me.  And she gets really testy when I'm late and don't call.”  He offered Rosa a confidential wink.  “You know how women are.”

“I do,” Rosa said.

Lucas reached for his wallet.  “Here,” he said.  “This is her.”

He pulled out a well-worn photograph and handed it over.

Suitably gorgeous, Rosa thought – a bombshell in a boob-shirt and a thong – a perfect complement to Lucas' own chiseled musculature.

The kind of woman that even Rosa – who could turn heads in her doctor's fatigues – reflexively hated.

“She won that wet t-shirt-contest, by the way,” Lucas informed her, as if baiting her with her own just-finished thought – while she sat there with two-weeks of hairy pits, furry legs, and no bath.

Lucas was briefly lost in his own moment – smiling to himself as he took back his photograph – holding it with the care of a fragile antique.

“This was the very first day we met,” he said, “We were just kids.  I was just out of boot.  Met her on the beach.”

When he looked back up, his eyes were, for the first time, unguarded, and just a little bit wistful.

“I like photographs,” he said.  “We always fight about that – my wife, she's gone one-hundred percent digital.”  Lucas held up his own cellphone.  “But this stupid thing hasn't worked once since all this shit started.”

He held up the worn Polaroid.  “I still got this.”

Then he paused, considering.  “You know, if I told her that, it'd piss her off, just for my being right.”

Rosa said nothing.  But she could see that happening.

Lucas very carefully folded the picture back into his wallet.

“And speaking of that,” he said, making another show of checking his watch, “all this shit going down and I haven't called?  I know she's already fixing to kill me.”

He held up his forehead to the light.  “I was out late on poker-night with the boys once.  Tried to sneak into bed after curfew.  She gave me this, with her ring finger.”

Just at his hairline, was the scar from a row of stitches – the kind of injury that might be caused by a knuckled-up diamond.

Despite herself, Rosa smiled – okay, now she was beginning to like her – maybe she could forgive the thong-bikini.

“What's her name?” Rosa asked.

“Naomi,” Lucas said.

And then, with just a slight puff of his chest, “MRS. Naomi Walker.”

Chapter 12

As it happened, Lieutenant Walker was right on both counts – at that very moment, Mrs. Naomi Walker was at once swearing violence and cursing his name.

After twelve days alone with her up in his cabin, Jonah was beginning to fear for the guy if she ever found him.

They hadn't been bothered by the beasts – not this high up – not this remote.  But the radio reports had not sounded good – and even those had not lasted for long.

Naomi had been marking each day off on the kitchen wall-calendar – it was a point of irritation for her that the days accumulated with no word from her husband – and she didn't care if it wasn't coming from her dead cell-phone, the defunct post-office, or singing goddamned telegram – all she knew was that he was very goddamn late and she was getting pretty goddamn mad.

“This sort of thing is just like him,” she said, glaring at