Interrupt (50 page)

Three of the Neanderthals were bleeding. One man was wounded seriously in the abdomen. Another looked like he’d lost his teeth. They moved at the front of P.J.’s skirmish line like expendables. They would soak up as many bullets as possible to bring P.J. and the other men to Drew.

“Steady,” he told Emily. He pressed his clumsy right arm against his M4, using the shoulder sling and his forearm to pin the weapon. Firing left-handed from the hip wasn’t ideal, but he needed the carbine’s power and thirty-round magazine.

Beside him, Emily gasped. She dropped her walkie-talkie to embrace her M249.

The first hunters emerged from the trees.

“Fire,” Drew said as she screamed, “Marcus!”

Drew couldn’t look. P.J.’s expendables sloshed through the muck, closing fast. Drew knocked down one man but missed the next two. “Shit, I can’t—”

Emily’s M249 chattered.

Recoil pushed her into Drew’s swollen elbow. Twisting in pain, he let his M4 swing free and pulled his Glock. Four shots stopped the two men.

Then he thrust his Glock at P.J.

P.J. was within thirty feet, running from the water onto the asphalt. It was unlike Drew to think twice, yet he glanced at Emily to see if she needed support. He intended to turn back. Maybe he could wing P.J. or disarm him.

Another hunter crashed into Drew. The man had thrown himself beneath Emily’s M249. His weight cut Drew’s legs out beneath him and they tumbled onto the road, the M4 smacking against Drew’s neck. Somehow he kept his pistol.

Drew slammed his knee into the man’s groin, once, twice. Then he cleared his arm and fired three quick rounds at the man’s feet. One connected. The man howled.

It was Marcus.

He clawed at Drew’s eyes until Drew rammed his pistol grip into Marcus’s neck. Marcus tottered. When Drew shoved him aside, he saw Emily screaming at P.J. as the boy ran at her with his club. She’d lowered her weapon.

“P.J., please!” she cried.

Drew’s mind slowed to a single thought of protest.
No.

Beyond her, four more hunters littered the roadside. One man was on his hands and knees. Another sat on his bottom like a child, cupping the bloody mess of his intestines. She’d blunted the second prong of Marcus’s assault. She’d done it by herself. But shooting P.J. was too much for her.

Drew couldn’t raise his pistol fast enough. He could only stare.

Emily stepped toward P.J., impeding his stride by kicking her foot at his shin. She redirected his club with her left arm. Her right hand lifted from her side. She held a Taser.

She jammed the stun gun into his ribs and discharged it. P.J. jerked. He collapsed, whacking his skull on the road.

Marcus was half-conscious, groaning, but Drew refused to take any chances. He put his own Taser against Marcus and jolted him, too. Then he hurried to Emily. She knelt over P.J., weeping. Amazement and relief swelled inside Drew, but there wasn’t time to compliment her.

“I need the ties in your pack,” he said.

“Yes.” She didn’t move to take it off.

“Help me reload and keep watch.” He shoved his Glock at her. “I can’t help their wounded unless you cover me.”

“Yes.”

He hugged her clumsily, turning his head to watch the swamp. After a moment, Emily shook herself as if waking up.

She’d slid a new clip into Drew’s pistol before Bugle’s squad filtered out of the trees. She could have handed the loaded pistol to Drew. Instead, she set the weapon down and called to them, “It’s over. You got us.”

The hunter sitting in the road died before the medic finished his cursory examinations of Emily and Drew. The other Neanderthal was
unconscious, so was P.J., and Marcus couldn’t stand on his own. Emily and Drew were barely able to move themselves.

Hiking back to the bunker was slow going. Emily shivered uncontrollably, too close to shock and hypothermia.

Her head was tangled with emotions. Hatred. Love. Dismay. Optimism. She’d been through too much with Marcus, P.J., and Drew. She would have given anything to walk alongside Drew and share their new closeness.

Bugle had separated them while arranging his column. Macaulay was on point with Orion. Emily came next, followed by two soldiers bearing the unconscious Neanderthal on a jacket they’d fashioned into a crude stretcher. Another man carried P.J. in his arms. Drew followed with his good hand secured to his belt with a plastic slip tie—the same ties they’d used to bind P.J. and Marcus. Three more soldiers hauled Marcus between them in another jacket.

Bugle marched alongside their column instead of being part of it, either waiting behind or pacing to the side, attempting to cover every direction at once. There was no one else left. Marcus’s ambush on the road had killed four guys in Bugle’s squad, and Bugle had yet to recover their M-string. First he’d run to help Drew because he’d intuited the trick Drew had played on the Neanderthals even if he wouldn’t admit to such a strong connection with his old friend.

By making themselves a target, Emily and Drew had lured the Neanderthals from the bunker. Otherwise the soldiers might still be trapped inside. The best they’d managed was a few potshots at the Neanderthals as Marcus pried at the rock above the tunnel, starting a landslide, trickling gravel and dirt across the shield. Then the soldiers had realized Marcus and his tribesmen were gone. The Neanderthals had outraced Bugle’s squad down the mountain, but in the end Drew had exploited the Neanderthals perfectly.

Their downfall was being predictable. They were so finely attuned to themselves and to any threat to their tribe that they couldn’t decide
not to attack. Yes, Marcus had used P.J. as a decoy exactly as P.J. had used his wounded men. They were clever. Nevertheless, they’d allowed Drew to bring them into the open swamp.

The memory of the gun shuddering in her hands wouldn’t leave her. Emily’s fingers fluttered and clenched as she trudged after Macaulay. She moved like a sleepwalker, utterly spent. Her thoughts felt as distant as the static on Bugle’s radio and the muffled sounds from the end of the column, where Marcus had been gagged as well as tied.

That P.J. had been spared was a godsend. She prayed his mind would clear once they were inside. Would he remember her? What if he’d been permanently altered?

Orion was growling. The noise reached Emily as Macaulay said, “Movement. Left.”

The soldiers dropped the unconscious Neanderthal to the ground, kneeling in the brush as they brought up their M4s. Bugle shoved past Emily. “Where?”

“Two wounded men eighty yards across the hill,” Macaulay said. “They’re hardly moving.”

“Okay, I see ’em.”

One of the human shadows crawled feebly on its stomach. The other lay on his back, either dying or dead.

Bugle dismissed them. “Let’s go.”

“Wait,” Emily said, rousing from her daze. “It’s Roell.”

“We’ll come back for him if we can.”

“Do you know who that is? Roell is Marcus’s son, and we need Marcus to cooperate with us!”

“I’d have to leave your nephew to bring anyone else.”

“I’ll carry P.J. myself. I can do it.” Emily turned to find P.J. and stumbled. Her legs felt wooden and she shook herself, desperate for more energy.

“All right, all right,” Bugle said. He chopped his hand sideways at the hill. “Heads up,” he told his men. “We’re gonna see if we can grab more of these fuckin’ cavemen.”

Orion and Macaulay led the short column of soldiers and prisoners through the brush.

Overhead, two birds darted through the rain.

Roell’s eyes were open. He bared his teeth when they approached. “Hnn!” he sang, biting as Bugle and Macaulay held him down, keeping their hands from his face.

“I can’t help this guy,” the medic said. “There’s too much damage. Lung. Ribs. Liver. Spleen.”

“He’s going to die?” Emily asked, looking at Bugle for empathy.

Marcus and Roell were only a few feet apart, and yet that space might have been wider than a thousand miles. It was as big as a lifetime.

“You have to let them talk,” she said.

Bugle shook his head. “You fuckin’ traitor. You really are crazy.”

“I’m not. Marcus was one of the top astronomers on the planet. He helped design the Hoffman array. If he’s ever going to work with us again—”

“Drew says he killed at least five of our guys!”

“You should give him this much. It might help us.”

“How?”

“We can afford to show a little mercy. We won this time. But there will be more fighting. If we want to stop the war, someone needs to go first. They need to see that we can forgive—that we can be good. We need to find a way to make peace, and you don’t know what we might learn here.”

Bugle studied Roell’s gray face. “Shit,” he said. “All right. But I’ll shoot them if I have to.”

“I know. Thank you.”

The soldiers carried Marcus to his son. At first, Marcus struggled even more. He calmed when they set him on the wet earth and removed his gag. He examined Roell, looking down at his son before sweeping his eyes toward Bugle and the rest.

“Nnnmh,” Marcus sang.

“Hnn,” Roell whispered.

“Nnnnnmh,” Marcus sang again. Then he stopped. It was as if he’d taken Roell’s measure and realized the teenager could not help him escape.

“Hnnnh,” Roell whispered as Marcus ignored him.

To Emily, the scene was unbearably tragic. She couldn’t say that Marcus didn’t recognize his son or that they hadn’t spoken of love or loyalty—but as Neanderthals, they seemed too limited to do more than study their enemies.

“This is stupid,” Bugle said. “Let’s go.”

“We have to try something else,” Emily said.

“It’s not safe. What if they sent runners for more men? We need to get M-string on more guys and regroup.”

“I have cargo sheets in my pack,” Emily said. “Let’s put M-string on them. Marcus needs to know what we’ve done for him.”

“We’ll tell the motherfucker inside.”

“Bugle, please.” Emily wasn’t sure it was the right thing to do, but she would have wanted to be in her right mind if she were in Marcus’s place.

It took three men to hold Marcus as Bugle belted a sheet of mesh fabric onto his head. Roell did not resist when Bugle repeated the procedure.

M-string was a trauma to them both. Roell went into seizure. He swiftly wilted, and his breathing grew shallow and erratic. Beside him, Marcus slumped over, unable to prop himself up with his hands tied behind his back.

Roell was in the pulse for weeks,
Emily thought.
What will happen to P.J. when we bring him inside?

“Dah,” Roell said. It wasn’t a Neanderthal sound. His eyes had brightened. Staring at the soldiers, he was obviously terrified and confused.

Marcus responded to his son’s voice. His first answer was incoherent, a humming noise like
Nnnnmh.

Roell’s gaze shifted to his father. “Dad,” he said.

“Cut his ties,” Emily hissed. “Bugle. Cut his ties.”

“I can’t.”

Marcus and Roell paid no attention to anything except each other. Marcus hunched closer, trying to embrace his son without falling onto his bloody chest. “Roell,” he said. “Roell.”

The boy might have smiled. “You were with us,” he said.

“I’m with you now,” Marcus sobbed. “Oh God, I’m with you now.”

They murmured together like a duet, exchanging soft, meaningful words. It didn’t last. Within seconds, Marcus was the only one speaking. Roell was gone.

Nobody moved.

Cold rain pummeled the hill.

“I’m sorry,” Emily said, reaching for Marcus, but he thrashed and screamed and tried to throw off his M-string.

NORTHERN CALIFORNIA

E
mily sat in a corner of her jail cell, pressing her forehead into the narrow slot between two bars. Her hunger felt like a rat inside her. It gnawed at her belly, pulling her midriff tight against her ribs. Even her face felt taut. She’d lost ten pounds she’d never had to spare. Her hair fell lank and unwashed against her shoulders.

The holding cells were in a sublevel of a California Highway Patrol station. Four lightbulbs lined the corridor ceiling. Everywhere else was in shadows. Their cells were dark and loud and disgusting, fogged with the stink of unwashed people, urine, and the ever-present ash and smoke smell of Sacramento.