third instalment

Blackout

The first watch went over easy. Saunders spent most of the time on a broken, slopped roof across the way from the camp watching for any movement. He’d left the fire smoldering, the coals giving a supernatural red glow to the room that Hernandez and the survivors were sleeping in. The woman and child had fallen easily asleep after eating the MREs. Hernandez had stayed up tending the fire, making it burn to coals quickly, after it had fallen to embers and coals Saunders grabbed his M4 and moved to his previously set up concealed spot across the street that offered him a good view of the street and other houses. It was a clear night, and the lack of light pollution from the dead city made the stars stand out the most Saunders had ever seen them, they were only blocked in small columns near the horizon where black smoke still rose. He didn’t want to think about what was providing the fires with that much fuel. The night air was cool and dry, and a brisk wind swept through the street, blowing ash and bits of debris towards the gate house. It carried with it the acrid smell of death and things that weren’t supposed to burn. An hour or two passed and as 2200 approached, Saunders had the distinct feeling he was being watched. He wasn’t sure what it was exactly, but the hairs on the back of his neck stood on end. As his adrenaline rush made his heart beat faster, he became more aware of his surroundings. He hadn’t moved for a good hour, and that was just to reach his canteen that he had jammed in a nearby crevice, so if something was watching him now, it had either been there an hour or knew the now decimated area so well that his concealed form stood out like a red crayon on a white tile floor. If he moved now, he’d basically be telling whatever was watching him that he was on to something not being right, and if it wasn’t friendly, he’d have to fight it on ground it knew and would have already lost the element of surprise. If he waited for it to make a move, he could spring quickly and counter-act its move, surprising it and taking away its own element of surprise. He left his right hand on his M4 and slowly shifted his left hand to his Colt .45, waiting intently for the first sound of motion. It came a half hour later, just as Saunders was thinking that he had just been spooked by nothing. A small cocking noise from about 6 feet behind him, he waited a split second then exploded into motion, throwing himself left with a massive push from his right elbow, he rolled onto his back as he brought his Colt up with his left arm as a half dozen six inch nails thudded into the ground where his head had been. Saunders shot three rounds in the direction the noise and the nails had come from, he was rewarded with what sounded like a sharp intake of breath and a low clattering noise. He lunged for his M4 and flicked on the flashlight, the beam of light cut through the blackness and illuminated the empty house behind him. Two of his three bullets had missed their mark; the third was surrounded by a spray of crimson blood, and on the ground was a pneumatic nail gun covered with a smattering of blood. Hernandez hurried over with his M16 out and up as Saunders came down from the area the nails had come from with the nail gun. The room immediately off of where he had been had no working doors, and the only opening that could still be used was a second story window on the back of the house that opened up onto a 20 foot drop. At the bottom, there was a small patch of blood, but nothing else. No indication of where whoever it was had gone, or how they had survived a .45 round and a twenty foot fall well enough to sprint away from the area without leaving much of a trail.