Dust blinked in surprise. “Okay,” he responded, unsure of what else to say.
“I’m not. I hate being underground,” Josie announced.
He nodded and turned a questioning look at Sammy. His stomach clenched when he saw her hesitation. The feel of a pair of arms around his waist drew his attention. Pulling his hands out of his pockets, he wrapped an arm around Todd’s shoulders.
“We’re going with you, Dust, aren’t we, Sammy?” Todd stated.
“Yes, we are,” Sammy said. “I’m like Josie. I don’t really care for being underground.”
He released the breath he didn’t realize he was holding. A smile grew on his lips and he nodded. He turned and looked at Raymond.
“Thank you for everything you’ve done. It… I’m glad we met,” he said in an awkward tone.
“The pleasure is mine, Dust. You are an exceptional young man. I hope we meet again someday,” Raymond replied, holding out his hand.
Dust released Todd, stepped forward, and shook the older man’s hand. He turned to Martha when she sniffed and held out her arms. Slightly embarrassed, he stepped into her embrace. He awkwardly patted her on the back.
“Thank you so much for saving us, Dust. Protect Josie, Sammy, and Todd,” Martha instructed in a voice that quivered a bit.
“I will, ma’am,” he promised.
He turned and looked at Randolph again. He was standing next to Denise and holding her hand. Josie’s brother held out his hand. He grabbed it and shook it. Dust gave Randolph a smile when he saw the guilty expression on Josie’s brother’s face.
“It is safer for Denise here. Raymond and Martha are the only family she has now, and well, the General said that Portland wasn’t exactly friendly for people like us,” Randolph awkwardly defended.
“Yeah, things might get a little difficult. I need to at least try…,” Dust said. “I’ll watch out for Josie.”
Randolph released a strained laugh. It was obvious that Randolph was having a hard time with his decision. Over the last few months, Randolph and Josie had not only grown closer, but had grown to respect each other.
“Thank you,” Denise murmured.
Dust nodded, surprised when the other woman released Randolph’s hand and threw her arms around his neck and gave him a brief, hard hug before releasing him with a self-conscious sniff. Randolph immediately wrapped his arm around her waist and drew her protectively close to his side.
“Those that are going to Portland need to get loaded. We lift off in five,” one of the helicopter pilots said behind them.
Todd grabbed Dust’s hand. He squeezed it reassuringly when Todd clung to him. Sammy took a step toward Josie to help her up. Josie shook her head and grinned.
“I’m good. That stuff may taste like shit, but it packs a punch,” Josie commented, sitting up and swinging her legs over the side of the cot. “I’m ready to leave this place.”
Dust saw a pained expression cross Randolph’s face at Josie’s callous statement. Josie had the grace to look remorseful. She paused in front of her brother and playfully punched him on the shoulder.
“Make sure they don’t assign you to anything mechanical,” she teased.
“With my luck, it will either be kitchen or latrine duty,” Randolph softly retorted. He looked at Josie silently before he pulled her into his arms. “I’m sorry for hurting you, Josie.”
Dust could see the shimmer of tears in Josie’s eyes. She wasn’t quite as composed as she was pretending to be. Several loud sniffs told him that Josie wasn’t the only one getting emotional.
“I love you, bro. Be safe,” she whispered before pulling away and wiping her eyes.
“The human said it was time to leave. Are you coming or not?” Daciana impatiently demanded.
Dust nodded and turned. Sammy and Josie followed behind him. Daciana frowned when she saw the others gathered in a group watching them leave. Dust motioned for her to follow them.
“Are they not coming?” Daciana asked.
“No,” Dust replied.
“I’m surprised the boy and the girl you like are coming,” she replied.
Todd looked around Dust and shot Daciana a glare. “We go where Dust goes,” he stated.
Daciana raised an eyebrow. “I see you’re still as hostile as you were before,” she commented.
“Yep,” Todd replied with a sharp nod.
“Todd, come stand by me,” Sammy ordered, shooting Daciana a heated look of her own.
Daciana tilted her head. “I believe my life was easier when I only wanted to kill everyone,” she reflected.
“I’m beginning to like her,” Josie chuckled as she passed by them.
Dust stopped and looked at Josie before he focused on Daciana. The She-Devil wore an innocent expression that didn’t fool him one bit. He finally shook his head and walked over to the helicopter pad.
“We need you two on this one,” the pilot ordered, pointing to the second helicopter.
Dust wanted to protest, but Daciana, Sammy, and Todd had already boarded the first helicopter. He reluctantly followed the pilot. He waited for Josie to climb on board before he stepped on the skid and pulled himself into the large, dark green aircraft.
He nodded when one of the crewmen yelled instructions. He pulled on the black helmet, blinking when he heard a voice in his ear instructing him to pull his straps on. Glancing over at the other helicopter, he was surprised when he saw Sammy helping Daciana. She looked up and caught his surprised stare. A crooked grin curved her lips before she shrugged and sat back down in her seat.
I really don’t understand girls, he tiredly thought before a new realization struck him. He was now stuck with three of them!
Chapter Fourteen
The Wrath of Mother Nature:
A sense of melancholy swept through Dust. He watched in silence as Raymond and the others wave them off. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw see Josie start to lift her hand. He turned, lifted his hand, and wiped his fingertips gently across her cheek.
“You okay?” he quietly asked into the microphone attached to his helmet.
She nodded, but he could see the trembling of her fingers. Unsure of what to do, he reached over and cupped her hand in his. She threaded her fingers through his and held on. Returning his gaze to the window of the closed door, he saw that the snow had fallen on the higher elevations in the distance.
A shiver ran through him as the frigid air inside the helicopter swept over him. He blinked when he felt a wave of warmth glide up his arm and over his body. He turned and looked at Josie again. She was resting her head against the backrest of the seat, and a small smile was on her lips. He squeezed her fingers in gratitude. Looking out the window again, he watched as they swept over the tall mountains of the Rockies, heading northwest.
An hour into the flight, Dust was jolted awake when the helicopter violently dropped. He grabbed onto a bar next to the door. Josie loudly cursed when the helicopter tilted.
“Make sure you’re strapped in tight. We are in for a rough ride,” the pilot stated in their headset.
“Where are the parachutes?” Josie muttered, frantically looking around.
“I don’t think it would help if we had one,” he replied, desperately looking out the window at the storm. “Where is the other helicopter?”
“They’re behind us. They’ll see the storm and go around,” the co-pilot answered.
The soldier sitting next to them looked grimly down at the ground. Dust’s dark eyes focused on the storm. There was something wrong. He could feel it. Josie squeezed his hand to get his attention.
“What’s going on?” Josie mouthed, nodding toward the soldier.
Dust shook his head. She sensed it as well. Looking back at the soldier, he leaned forward.
“Does this happen often?” Dust demanded.
The soldier glanced at him and nodded before returning his attention to the storm. Dust was about to ask why they came this way if it did when the sound of alarms began
to blare. He immediately looked toward the front of the helicopter and saw multiple lights flashing on the console.
He winced and closed his eyes when a brilliant flash of green light blinded him. A fraction of a second later, he heard a loud snap and the helicopter began to spiral at a dizzying speed. The alarms became louder before the movement slowed. Dust heard the pilot yelling at them to brace for a hard landing. Frigid air blasted them when one of the doors of the helicopter was ripped loose. The sound of metal-on-metal above the roar of the wind resonated through his head before everything went dark as they impacted with the ground.
“Pull the clip out. Do you know how to use a firearm?”
Dust could hear the urgency in the man’s voice, and it pulled him back to consciousness.
The world looked funny. There was a hazy green hue to it. He turned his head and realized that he was lying on the ground several yards away from the remains of the helicopter. The three soldiers were unloading it. One was inside handing equipment to the second one who was standing at the door tossing the items down to the third. Josie stood over him.
“I use my own brand of firepower,” she said, wrapping her arms around her waist.
Dust groaned as he pushed himself into a sitting position. Josie immediately knelt next to him. She was looking at him with a worried expression mixed with awe.
“What… What happened?” he asked in a thick voice.
Josie ran a warm hand along his cheek. “You saved us,” she informed him. “Again.”
He blinked and looked at the helicopter. It was lying on its side, the rotor was shattered and some of the blades were missing or twisted at a grotesque angle. One skid was still intact while half of the other was gone. The canopy of the cockpit was torn open and at least half of it was buried in the rocky surface of the mountain.
He looked up at the trees. Most were dead and several nearby had parts of the helicopter embedded in their broken limbs and trunks. A light snow had begun to fall. He frowned when he saw that it had a green tint.
“Why is the snow green?” he mumbled.
Josie released a shaky laugh. “I have no idea. Maybe the Jolly Green Giant took a piss,” she answered with a shake of her head.
“I think it would still be yellow,” Dust replied, still feeling dazed.
“You might want to put this on,” suggested one soldier, whose name tag read B. Daniels.
Dust looked at the heavy clothing the man was holding out. Rising unsteadily to his feet, he took the outfit. There was a pair of weather-resistant dark thermal lined beige pants, a matching jacket, gloves, sock cap, thick socks, and to his surprise, a pair of boots.
“Major Mendoza thought of everything,” Josie replied.
He blinked and looked at Josie again, realizing for the first time that she was dressed in a similar type of clothing. She grinned and shrugged. He saw her look down at herself.
“I don’t really need it, but it was nice of her to think of me. I decided it might help conserve some of my energy,” she said.
Dust nodded and looked around again. He pulled on the jacket before kicking off his left shoe and sliding his foot into the pants. Josie helped to steady him when he wobbled. He pulled on a sock over the pair he was wearing and slid his foot into the boot before repeating the procedure with his other leg. Once he had fastened the pants, he bent over and laced up the boots. They were a pretty good fit with the thick socks on.
“What happened? Where are we? And where is the other helicopter?” he demanded.
“Right before we hit the ground, you made some kind of shield. You literally pulled the pilot and co-pilot out of their seats and encased us all in this bubble, then pulled us out of the helicopter,” Josie explained.
Dust paused as he pulled on the sock cap. He looked at Josie with a confused expression before looking at the helicopter again. He didn’t remember any of that.
“We’re on the edge of the dead zone,” the pilot stated.
“The dead zone?” Dust repeated.
“My name is Captain Eric Bowling. He’s Captain Dave Matthews. You’ve met Sergeant Brian Daniels. This area is part of the dead zone. The storms don’t normally move this far north. The zone is spreading north and south. The scientists studying it believe it will cut off the west coast within a year at the rate it is spreading,” Bowling explained.
“Not that there is a lot left of the west coast,” Matthews replied, dropping two packs next to him and Josie. “One is for you, the other is for you.”
“We need to get out of here. This site will be a magnet,” Bowling continued.
“A magnet for what?” Dust asked.
He wondered if he hit his head during the crash. Everything felt strange, disconnected, and he was having a hell of a job focusing on everything that was said and done. The other men must have sensed his confusion.
“Bad things,” Daniels stated as he was loading another pack.
“Let’s move out,” Bowling ordered.
Dust was about to protest when Josie touched his arm. She shook her head and gave the men a wary look. Understanding that she was trying to warn him about something, he kept quiet.
He bent over, picked up Josie’s pack, and held it out for her to slide her arms into it. After her pack was securely strapped on, he strapped his on as well. He widened his eyes when she held out an energy bar that she had pulled from his pocket. Taking it, he sent her a grateful smile before ripping it open and devouring it.
“Don’t let your energy get low,” she murmured under her breath. “We need to watch our backs with these guys and with whatever else is out here.”
He glanced out under his lashes at the three soldiers. They were huddled together a short distance away, waiting for him and Josie. He saw Bowling look in their direction with a sharp, suspicious expression on his face.
“What happened?” he demanded.
“The crash itself is sort of hazy. You probably remember about as much of it as I do. After the door took out the rear rotor, lightning hit it on the top, and we went into a tilt-a-whirl on steroids ride to the ground,” she shared.
“I remember all of that,” he said, walking slightly behind her as they followed the three men.
“Do you remember creating the bubble wrap around us and flinging us out of the door?” she asked, looking at him with a raised eyebrow.
“Maybe—a little,” he grudgingly admitted.
He did remember—and it scared the crap out of him. He had never physically transported anyone before, including himself. Sure, he had basically become invisible and passed through walls, but he had never been able to do it with someone else.
There had been more than that, though. The green mist that swept inside the helicopter had supercharged him. He’d felt like someone had plugged him into an electrical outlet. Then there had been the lightning strike. The hair on the back of his neck and along his arms had stood straight up. He had literally looked at the world around him through a green haze, the same one that still clung to him when he woke up.
He had realized they were going down and that there was a high probability they wouldn’t survive. Less than a hundred feet from the ground, he had reached out with his mind, pulled everyone close to himself, and created a shield similar to the one that he had created back in the complex against the bugs. The only difference was that he swept them out of the open door and into thin air. The green cloud had wrapped around the bubble, and they floated to the ground where they landed a short distance from the crashed helicopter.
“Are you okay? You look a little, um,—green,” she said, looking at him again.
“I’m good. Do you—feel anything different?” he asked.
Josie shook her head. She climbed over a fallen tree. He followed her.
“Not really. I feel a little tingly. You don’t think this green stuff is radiation, do you?” she suddenly wondered.
“I don’t know. I hope not,” he replied, remembering the episode of the Simpsons where Hom
er was exposed.
He instinctively raised his hand and moved it to cover his groin. Boy, I really hope it isn’t radiation, he thought with a shudder.
Chapter Fifteen
Asylum:
Sammy sat back against the seat and stared blindly out of the window. She felt numb. They had all heard the distorted mayday that came from the other helicopter, before watching in horror as parts of the other aircraft were ripped off and the remains tumbled to the ground below.
Sammy wiped at the tears that coursed down her cheeks. Todd was blissfully unaware of what had happened. He had fallen into an exhausted sleep shortly after they had taken off and he was still out.
Storms had formed out of the thick green fog, rising up from the ground instead of down from the sky. Rolling waves of gas, bizarre funnel clouds, and lightning shot upward like greedy hands reaching for them. They had been behind the other helicopter and had seen the storm suddenly appear. Their pilot had veered to the left, moving away from the storm.
“We’ll be landing in a half hour,” the pilot instructed.
Sammy was startled when Daciana touched her arm. An expression of frustration etched the other woman’s face. Sammy brushed another tear away.
“What is it?” Sammy murmured.
Daciana shook her head and looked at the man sitting across from them. He had turned away and was talking to the copilot. She lifted her finger to her lips.
Sammy shook her head in confusion. Why should they not talk freely in front of the soldiers? Sammy looked at the soldier across from them when he turned around. He caught her look and narrowed his eyes. To cover her unease, she wiped at a fresh tear.
“Will they send a search team to find them?” she asked in a trembling voice.
The soldier didn’t answer her. At first, she thought he hadn’t heard her through the headset, but then he shot a quick look at the pilot, and she thought he just wasn’t allowed to answer her.
“Who’s missing, Sammy?” Todd asked, sitting up straight and rubbing his eyes.