Allison went with them, sharing the wet and tiredness. When a town or village was secured, he went in and presided over the executions. Then he met with the local people and appointed a government; by nightfall he was off again.
He had been so long at the ranch that the world beyond Monterey looked foreign. Roads were breaking up; farmlands had turned into weedy bogs. Whole neighbourhoods in Watsonville and Salinas had burned down. Mold spread across sodden carpeting in empty offices. Dogs had learned to hunt at night, in packs of fifteen and twenty; Allison often heard them bay in the dark, but they never challenged the soldiers. Rats were everywhere.
So were people. It seemed as if every building in the MLZ, intact or not, was jammed with people. Some were refugees from the coast, others from the towns and cities to the north — Santa Cruz, Los Gatos, San Jose — where food was scarce and gangs fought each other in the streets.
First out of curiosity, then out of necessity, Allison interrogated many of the refugees. The local councils in the Bay Area, he learned, had survived the attempted military takeover, but were desperately short of food and fuel. They were planning to salvage the Sitka Carrier.
When he heard that, Allison’s skin prickled. He gave orders that anyone recently arrived from the Bay Area was to be brought straight to him; the three or four people he then saw were able to give enough details to confirm the rumour.
Allison sent word to Ted to recruit a salvage team as quickly as possible. He did not intend to be ripped off.
It was a cold, misty day in early June when he drove back home. To the east the sun was baking the valleys beyond Salinas; air rose shivering with heat and the fog over the ocean swept in to replace it.
Allison sat in the rear of a Cadillac limousine. His chauffeur was black, as was his bodyguard. Ahead was a truck full of soldiers; behind was another. Two motorcyclists led the way. A waste of gas, Allison had thought. Mercer had disagreed.
“You are the main man now. A lot of people might like to take a shot at you. Then we’re all back in the shit.” Allison had reluctantly agreed.
He and Mercer made a good team: Mercer worried about internal betrayal, Allison about external threats. First it was Frank Burk, next the mutineers in Monterey, then the Bay Area locals. For now, no outside threat was really serious. The Carmel Valley Army was almost seven thousand strong; it controlled the whole coast from just south of Santa Cruz down to Big Sur, and inland to Highway 101 north of Watsonville. He had the support of the people; in Salinas, they’d even donated hidden food supplies without being asked. With Fort Ord’s armaments at his disposal, he could even consider taking over all of central California.
— Except that he had no gas. And the Sitka Carrier sat out there, slowly bleeding diesel.
The motorcade reached the ranch just before sundown. Most of the escort went back down the road to the now-permanent camp known as Fort Apache, half a mile away. Allison went into the kitchen and found Lupe giving Sarah some breakfast: tortillas smeared with butter. No one else was around. Lupe explained that the senora was still asleep, as were most of the others; Senor Bert was out patrolling the edges of the Brotherhood’s property. Allison nodded and let Lupe serve him a big meal of eggs, fried potatoes and ham. It no longer felt odd to eat breakfast at sundown, or supper at dawn.
“How ya doin’, squirt?”
“I’m fine,” Sarah beamed. “Did you bring me anything?”
“No, doggone it. I’m sorry, I forgot. Next time for sure.”
“Did you see Mommy?”
“No. We only went places around here. Salinas, Castroville. Your mom’s down in L.A.”
“How come she never phones?”
“Phones don’t work any more, love. When things get better, we’ll call her.”
“Shauna says they’ll never get better,” Sarah pouted.
“Oh, she’s just saying that. Things are better already. We’ve got lots of food, electricity and all these nice soldiers to look after us.”
“They scare me. Kenny says they kill people.”
Allison made a mental note to speak to Ted about his kid. Then again, Kenny was just relaying his father’s half-baked ideas. Better to have it all out. If Ted didn’t smarten up, he’d have to be dropped from the Leadership Committee. Or they could set up an Executive Group — sounded good — and leave him off it.
“Kenny’s just trying to scare you, silly. If we didn’t have the soldiers, all kinds of bad people would come and take everything away from us. Like Frank Burk.”
He saw fear, real fear in her eyes, and regretted his words. Burk was a bogyman for everyone these days: the lurker in the shadows, the avenger. The bastard’s corpse was probably rotting somewhere in the woods, but until it was found they would all jump at the thought of him.
“Daddy, can we go somewhere else? Can we go home?”
“Sarah, love, we are home.”
“I mean the old home. Before the Apartment.”
— The house in Topanga Canyon, in the long-ago days of two years ago.
“No, love, but listen: how about watching a movie on the TV? Popeye? Superman?”
“Only if you watch it with me.”
“Sure. I’d like that.”
They went into the den, where a big Hitachi projection screen dominated the room. Allison got out a videodisc and put it on; then he took a beer and a can of Pepsi out of the fridge behind the bar and settled down to watch Superman. They snuggled together, giggling; soon Sarah was lost in the movie, slurping her Pepsi. Allison put aside his beer after one sip. It was definitely past its shelf life.
When Krypton exploded, Sarah started screaming. Her body went rigid in Allison’s arms. Lupe hurried in, clucking in Spanish, and whisked her away. Sarah’s screaming went on for a long time.
Allison turned off the sound and watched the blinking, fuzzy images. Despite its foul taste, he drank the rest of his beer. As he put down the empty can, he saw’ that his hand was shaking.
— Oh, Sarah — it’s all for you, for you.
Chapter 12
It took less than an hour to prepare Squid and lower it off the rear of the barge. Morrie, more experienced with the sub, sat in the left-hand pilot’s seat. Don kept an eye on the gauges, set along the rim of the glass bubble.
“Jesus,” Morrie complained, “I put in this great viewport, and you give me solid mud.” They were barely submerged, and the water was an almost opaque caramel colour. Squid’s little electric motor hummed softly.
“You also put in a beautiful sonar system,” said Don, “and you must have shielded it perfectly. Look — there’s the cruiser.”
Morrie was silent for a moment. Then he said, “You sure you want to do this, Don? I mean, you didn’t even really ask the rest of us or anything.”
“They didn’t stop me. They know that if that cruiser keeps shooting, we’re finished.”
“That’s the United States Navy we’re going up against.”
“No, it’s a bunch of homicidal maniacs in a big ship.”
“You look kind of homicidal yourself.”
Don switched on the outside microphone. A dull thump came from the speaker. Another. The cruiser was launching missiles every two to three minutes.
“They seem to be manoeuvring in an oval pattern,” Morrie said. “Another few minutes and they’ll be back.”
“Cut across and we’ll wait for them.”
“What about their sonar?”