Skull's Shadows (Plague Wars Series) Read online

  Besides, complacency made for bad habits, and bad habits got you dead. Skull had killed enough of those who had them to know.

  Once at his selected position, Skull unfolded a bipod and pulled his go-bag up to serve as a support for his upper body. He laid a small tarp on the ground under the end of the rifle’s muzzle. Skull didn’t want them to be able to identify his location from the dust stirred up by the muzzle blast.

  Then, he waited. Right now the sun was in his face and a glint off his scope might give away his position despite all his precautions.

  Patience, Skull told himself. Their time will come soon enough.

  Heat radiated from the ground in waves by the time the sun ranged high in the sky. Skull took the lens caps off his scope and peered through the crosshairs again. Seeing fewer men than before, Skull thought that maybe some were sleeping off their alcohol or their lunches in the heat of the day.

  No matter. They would emerge when the action began. Curiosity would bring them forth, no matter how suicidal. It was simple human nature, and many of them, especially those not seasoned veterans, wouldn’t believe what was happening. Not deep down. A proper sniper ambush often seemed to defy possibility for those on the receiving end.

  Skull checked the ammunition again to make sure it was the proper lot number. With two different kinds of match grade ammunition, sight adjustments were slightly different for each. Skull wanted every shot to count. The sniper’s mantra, the oldest one anyway, ran through his head.

  One shot, one kill.

  Lee Harvey Oswald had been an amateur. Three shots to kill Kennedy at a hundred yards in a slow-moving car was child’s play.

  James Earl Ray – or whoever really fired the shot that killed Martin Luther King – had done it more professionally. One .30-06 round to the head.

  Skull didn’t judge the morality of these acts, of course. In fact, in his own thoughts he deplored them. The men who performed them were criminals, rebelling against lawfully constituted authority. But if you’re going to take a life, he thought, best you do it right.

  Skull thought once more about the two cops he’d killed. He hoped those would be the last unjust killings he’d be forced into. Much better to find those guilty of great evil, and then kill them.

  Much easier to live with.

  Checking the rangefinder once more, Skull saw the temperature had climbed a good ten degrees and the barometric reading had fallen. He made corresponding, minute adjustments to the sights.

  Looking through the scope, Skull laid the crosshairs on a man sitting atop the hood of a truck at the far edge of town, the farthest target. He had a straw hat on his head and a shotgun across his lap.

  The time had come.

  Aiming at the center of the man’s chest, Skull let the air partway out of his lungs, stopped his breath and slowly, gently squeezed the trigger. The rifle jumped against his shoulder and the man fell to lie flat on the hood, blood pouring from a hole in his chest and back. The windshield of the truck shattered as the bullet continued on through.

  Excellent, Skull thought, adrenaline and cortisol flooding through him. Time slowed and took on that crystal clarity of performance perfection, the “zone” of athletes and martial artists. Without conscious thought he moved to his second target while deepening his breathing to slow his heart rate, countering the ill effects of stress hormones on his nervous system while retaining their benefits.

  The tall man closest to Skull stood at the west edge of town, looking east toward the first target. He’d just begun to say something to the fat man beside him when Skull’s second bullet took the top of his head off.

  Skull didn’t smile, but stored up the memories and the pleasure of these moments for later recall. Instead, he shifted to the next target, and then the next.

  By the time the sun had set he’d picked off a total of fifteen men and one woman. He continued to seek more targets, until eventually even the stupidest concluded that deep cover was the only way to survive.

  Doesn’t matter, Skull thought. It’s enough. If the downtrodden civilians in that town have any stones at all, they’ll kill the rest of the thugs. If they don’t, they deserve slavery.

  Taking out his knife, Skull etched fifteen more notches in his rifle stock alongside the hundred-odd that were already there.

  Fifteen more notches. Fifteen more lives. Fifteen wrongs wiped clean, if not entirely made right.

  “Not a bad day’s work if I do say so myself,” Skull said aloud.

  Packing up his belongs and collecting fifteen spent shell casings, Skull slipped back behind the ridgeline and walked east, careful to stay out of sight of the town. They wouldn’t come looking for a ghost, but if they spotted him, some might convince themselves that revenge was a possibility.

  Better to be the ghost.

  Sometimes, fear was a more effective weapon than bullets.

  After nearly an hour of walking, Skull found a bowl in the rocks that would serve nicely to bank a fire from the evening wind and prevent anyone from seeing the light. He felt the need for flame tonight, even though the night wouldn’t be cold.

  A few of the simple snares the Hopi had taught him resulted in the capture of one large jackrabbit. After gutting and skinning the animal, Skull spitted it on a stick and propped it over the fire using rocks. He ate the rabbit while gazing at the bright edge of the Milky Way. Afterward, he threw the carcass downwind as far as he could. Better that the early, lucky scavengers found something at a distance, and the flames should deter the rest.

  Lying down in his sleeping bag he thought of the family, and the little girl he’d buried. If there was a heaven, was she looking down on him now? Was she angry he couldn’t help her? Was she pleased he’d avenged her family?

  What a screwed-up world you’ve brought on, Markis, he thought. I wonder if you’d be as smugly self-righteous if you’d seen what I have lately. It’s all very well to calculate your germs would save more than they killed, but how do you apologize to the dead?

  Staring at the stars, he drifted off to dreamless slumber.

  Chapter 7

  With plentiful game, clear weather and few people or settlements to avoid, Skull made good time across New Mexico, walking generally northeast. As he approached the Texas border he saw a long line of cars along I-40. The queue seemed to be nearly at a standstill, and most people had their engines off, sitting outside their vehicles in the grass. In some places stood arrangements of tents and lawn chairs.

  Watching for more than an hour from a low hill, Skull noticed only rarely did anyone have to move a car forward, and even then only a few yards. The people attached to each vehicle usually didn’t bother to break camp.

  I need information, Skull thought. This is a good place to blend in and get it.

  Waiting until the hottest part of the day, when most people were napping beneath tent flaps or inside their cars, he wandered casually down the hill and drifted into the thin, populated swath alongside the freeway. Picking his way quietly along, he lifted his hand in greeting whenever anyone seemed to notice him, but continued until he found what he was looking for: a relatively relaxed group of four people sitting outside a large but old recreational vehicle, all on the downhill side of middle age.

  “Hello,” Skull said in his mildest voice. “Might I trouble you for a drink of water? It’s as hot as the devil out here.” He’d made his face as smooth and unthreatening as possible, aware that his mien wasn’t one to make children leap into his arms.

  “You can say that again,” said a tough-looking woman with narrow eyes. “Hold on just a second,” she said as she went inside the RV.”

  “What’s up with the line?” Skull asked the two men and remaining woman sitting in the shade of the RV’s attached awning.

  “Haven’t you heard about Texas?” the older of the two men asked.

  “That it’s too damn hot? I heard that.” Skull hoped a little levity would ease the conversation.

  The two men laughed. “That to
o. No, I mean the New Republic.”

  Skull shook his head. “Been out hiking. Living off the land. Haven’t heard much of anything in awhile.”

  “Well, I’m afraid you’re going to find lots of things have changed,” said the other man. “Texas has closed her borders.”

  “To keep out the Edens?” Skull asked.

  “No,” answered the woman. “They’ve decided to go against the executive order for universal testing. Federal troops are threatening to come in to enforce it and the governor has closed the border in response. He’s also put an end to martial law within Texas. Some are talking about the New Republic of Texas. You know, saying they’re the only ones who can legally secede because they were once an independent nation.”

  “You said ‘they,’ so you folks aren’t from Texas,” Skull stated.

  The woman shook her head. “Colorado, but things are going all to shit there. Bunch of jackboot thugs all up in your business. Figure we’ll try Texas for awhile.”

  “I thought Colorado was pretty liberal. Legalized pot and all that.”

  The woman spat deliberately and her narrow eyes squeezed further together. “Liberal and libertarian ain’t the same thing, bub. We just figure the government shouldn’t tell you what you can’t buy – guns, dope, whatever. Long as you ain’t hurting anyone else. But the feds are pushing law enforcement hard to crack down, so most of ’em forgot about little details like warrants, probable cause and innocent until proven guilty a while back.” Her voice turned bitter. “So much easier to catch bad guys when you ain’t gotta actually prove they done nothing wrong.”

  Skull glanced around and decided getting into a political discussion was a stupid move, like always. Still, he needed to test the prevailing wind on the most divisive hot-button issue of them all. “Aren’t you worried you might get the Eden Plague?”

  “Doesn’t sound much like a plague to me,” said the first man. “I could use a little relief from my hemorrhoids.”

  “Not if it turns your brain to mush,” countered the other man. “Dopers are bad enough.”

  “I bet if you got cancer you’d smoke a little dope yourself, Harry,” the first one said without heat. The two couples seemed like old friends, the kind who could argue without ever settling anything or getting upset with each other.

  The first woman returned with a plastic cup filled with water, handing it to Skull.

  “Thank you kindly, ma’am,” he said and took a deep drink.

  “You’re welcome,” she answered. “Looks like you’ve traveled far.”

  “I have at that,” Skull said, his eyes drifting to the lines of vehicles that extended eastward as far as he could see. “All this because of the closed border?”

  “Yeah,” answered the second man. “The internet says they’re worried about fed spies and undesirables entering. You gotta surrender all weapons until you can be processed at the welcome center.”

  “Welcome center,” Skull said. “Sounds Orwellian.”

  They peered at him with blank stares.

  “You know. Big brother is watching?”

  “Oh, yeah,” said one man knowingly, though Skull doubted he really understood.

  “Anyway,” said Skull after drinking down the last of his water and handing the empty cup back, “thank you for the water and the information.”

  “Our pleasure,” she responded. “Watch out for the feds on this side of the border. Hear they’re harassing the hell out of people up near the line.”

  “And you’re not worried?” Skull asked.

  The woman shrugged. “I’ll worry when we get closer than ten miles. At the rate we’re moving, we might be there in a month.”

  Skull put on a bemused smile and waved goodbye. He walked east on the pavement between the lines of vehicles. A near-carnival atmosphere prevailed, with music playing and kids tossing Frisbees and balls in the grassy median. Small clumps of people sat in chairs drinking beer beneath awnings while dogs lay at their feet panting in the shade.

  Yet some groups looked nervous and hunted. Skull studied them out of the corner of his eyes and saw all the adults appeared exceptionally young and healthy, though many were thin as proverbial rails.

  Edens with nowhere to go, he thought. They’re being chased down nearly everywhere.

  By evening he could see the border and several hundred police and Texas National Guard troops, faced by what looked like half that many U.S. Army soldiers on the New Mexico side.

  Vehicles moving forward in the line were directed through several stations. Cars were being searched, occupants fingerprinted and photographed. Working dogs sniffed everything. It all moved in slow motion on the near side of the border. Once across the Texas state line the processing seemed swifter.

  A cyclone fence topped by rolls of concertina wire held several forlorn-looking people, guarded by what seemed to Skull an inordinate number of soldiers. He wondered if they were Edens, people with warrants out, or some other sort of undesirable entirely.

  Cop killers, for example?

  Guess I could go north around the panhandle of Texas, Skull mused, looking at the newly erected fence along the border. It stretched as far as he could see, at least several miles in either direction. He didn’t relish the time it might take to bypass. He’d been content to rest at the Third Mesa when he needed to heal, but now that he was moving again he felt as if he was behind schedule.

  For exactly what, he didn’t know for sure. INS Inc. seemed a slippery fish in the pond of his intentions.

  Behind him lay a large rest stop, the last place to relax before getting in the snail’s-paced line to cross. The entire area was jammed full of cars, vans, RVs, semis, and every other mode of transportation that a very creative person could imagine. Skull saw tractors, motorcycles, dune buggies, ATVs, even a riding mower pulling a yard trailer full of camping gear.

  Making his way back up the exit ramp, Skull passed waiting vehicles adding to the jam as they tried to squeeze onto the freeway. Continuing backward, he saw a large truckers’ rest stop, a gas station with at least thirty pumps, a hotel that might have rooms for twenty, and fast food restaurant so filled with people that it looked like they had been crammed in there at gunpoint. He was amazed people hadn’t started shooting each other over toilet privileges, but for now, things seemed more or less peaceable.

  As night fell, Skull resolved to get across the border somehow. He wasn’t willing to give up his weapons or other gear, though he had a feeling any search would spotlight him in a very unfortunate way even if they didn’t connect him to the cop killings.

  Semis and other big trucks abounded, some of them even unlocked, but they appeared to get more scrutiny at the border. The same seemed true of RVs. He needed something that looked clean, innocuous and not inviting of further examination.

  Walking around the back of the hotel, he spotted something that might work and made a mental note for later.

  Returning to the truck stop, Skull paid for a shower token, standing in line for over an hour to use it. Soldiers were everywhere looking alert, but for the most part didn’t appear interested in doing anything. In fact, several of them seemed to be trying to hit on the prettier women in line. Most looked to be privates barely out of boot camp. Skull had heard the draft had been reinstituted. He felt better, seeing the situation. Draftees had to be motivated and experienced to be effective. Skull doubted these were either.

  After the shower and a tepid meal that he had to pay double the listed price for to eat standing, Skull made his way back around to the rear of the hotel. Fully dark now, he sought out the station wagon with the hard-sided cargo carrier on top, the one he’d marked before. A bike rack on the back held two mountain bikes locked to it.

  Skull watched the area for nearly an hour until he was sure there was no one nearby or guarding the car. He then walked over casually and examined the padlock on the car-top carrier using a tiny single-LED light. The case was sturdy, but he knew his way around such devices from a loc
ksmithing job he’d had after leaving the Corps.

  Skull saw that it was a three-pin and, after digging through his bag for the tools, pulled out an appropriate rake and torsion bar. Fading into the shadows and tuning out the world around him, he focused on the task at hand.

  You never knew what you were going to get with a lock. Any one of them might take ten seconds or three hours. Picking was never predictable. If it ended up too difficult, he knew he might have to use force.

  This time, he got lucky. The lock popped after a minute. Skull put the tools away, and then snapped it shut again only on one side so that to a casual observer it might still appear secure. He looked inside and pulled out two suitcases and a duffle bag after a quick calculation. Closing the carrier again, he walked around the corner of the hotel where it was darkest and leaned the bags against the wall before returning to the car.

  Now for the most dangerous part. Anything Skull had done up to that point he might explain away if caught, but there was no talking his way out of what he was about to do. After slipping on his hooded ghillie jacket and pants, he glanced around as casually as he could before climbing up into the carrier, pulling his own ruck and go-bag after him. He pushed the owner’s luggage closest to the opening. It and the ragged cloth strips might give him concealment if it were opened.

  Then he pulled the lid shut.

  Taking out his pistol, Skull attached a silencer and listened. Nothing. He’d been lucky so far, and hoped the owners wouldn’t check or open the carrier in the morning. If they did, he’d try to talk his way out of it as a vagabond with nowhere to sleep, and then flee.

  If that didn’t work, there was always the gun.

  ***

  Skull awoke to the station wagon’s engine starting. The light leaking in through the seams and the heat of the fiberglass above his head told him morning had come.

  Good thing no one opened the carrier, he thought. I was sleeping hard. Would have been dead meat. Must have gotten soft around all those Hopi pacifists.