End Days Series Box Set [Books 1-4] Read online

  “Ha! I make it to the top only to be attacked by a feral dog.”

  No self-respecting Aussie outdoorswoman traveled alone in the woods without a knife, so she reached for hers.

  “Oh, fuck.” Her knife was in her pack, which was probably burning bright somewhere below. Destiny slapped herself across the cheek to force herself to focus. “Pour yourself a glass of concrete, girl. Toughen up.”

  The dingo-like creature stalked a few paces forward, where she got a good look at the whole body. It had weird stripes on its hindquarters, as if someone had thought it would be funny to draw black tiger stripes on that part of its body.

  It growled and squared its shoulders as if getting ready to pounce.

  “Good doggie!” The fire had stressed every animal in the vicinity. The clinical researcher part of her brain didn’t hold it against the visitor for being scared. At the same time, she tried to subdue the growing spiral of fear swirling through her gut.

  Should she puff out her chest to make herself larger? Play dead? In the heat of the fire, she couldn’t say for sure. She was pretty certain she wasn’t supposed to turn and run away, lest it give chase, but she wasn’t going to stand there and do nothing, either.

  Her body poured out the adrenaline as she realized the animal was going to strike.

  When the beast lunged, she was already moving. She side-stepped as best she could and tried to get one of her boots to land on the dog’s face, but all she managed to do was knock herself off balance.

  “Shit!”

  The dog wasn’t fooled. It skidded on its front paws and twisted its body toward her. It let out a strange bark-yap that sounded more wolf than dog.

  There was no way to outrun the four-legged beast on the narrow ridge, so she swung herself toward the edge of the rocks and tried to flop on her bottom. Her intention was to slide off the side but catch herself at the last second, like sliding down the pitch of a roof and hooking yourself on the gutter.

  The dog got its teeth into her long, curly hair, which yanked at her already-sore scalp.

  She screamed as she went over the side, desperately searching for something to grip.

  The dog breathed in her ear the whole way.

  10 miles north of Modesto, CA

  Part of Buck’s duty as a truck driver was to call into the headquarters of his trucking company each time he dropped or picked up cargo. That allowed the bean counters to keep track of their fleet. It was usually a time-waster for him, but Buck was glad to make the call once he settled into his drive. At least they hadn’t installed the auto-tracking GPS like the newest rigs were getting. He only tolerated so much of big brother’s oversight, even if it was his employer.

  They picked up on the first ring. “Hey, Blake, how are you doing?”

  The owner of the company refused to use his nickname like everyone else. It was one of those details that got under his skin, but it was a minor act compared to some of the weapons’ grade assholes he’d worked for throughout his career.

  “Hey, Mr. Williams. I’m fine. I’m carrying enough pallets of chili to stink up the entire East Coast. Heading for the Vickers hub in West Plains. I wiped up all the paper about fifteen minutes ago.”

  “Great,” the owner replied in a friendly but concerned voice. “You planning on going the distance for me?”

  “Sure. Why wouldn’t I?”

  “I’ve had two good drivers call in the last half-hour to tell me they were dumping their loads and bobtailing it home. Can you believe that shit? Dumping! Anyway, I was beginning to think this was some kind of stealth walkout or something.”

  Mr. Williams was middle-of-the-road as bosses went. On the one hand, he didn’t stop his business for any holiday on the calendar. On the other, he threw as much work at Buck as he could stand.

  Buck had big plans for his life and wanted to do right by his son. He already owned his own truck, so all he needed to do was work for a good shipping company and drive off with the dollars.

  “Uh, sir, can you tell me if you’ve heard anything about a crash in La Guardia? My son was in the area, and I want to make sure he’s okay.”

  The other guy had several kids, too, so he hoped that would work in his favor.

  “Yes, I’m watching the news right now, in fact. I wanted to know if something was going on to make these guys cut and run. I still don’t see anything big, but one of the channels has been broadcasting about that plane crash. There is a helicopter getting shots from the air, but the transit police are keeping them far away.”

  That was only part of what he wanted to know. “Can you see if the crash happened in the airport itself? Do you think anyone on the inside could get hurt?” His heart leaned up against his ribs with a plastic cup to listen for the answer.

  “Let me see…”

  Buck imagined his Peterbilt was on self-drive while on the straight stretch of highway. The number of cars and trucks had been growing, but that wasn’t unusual for California’s Central Valley, even around midday.

  Buck couldn’t stand it anymore. “Well?”

  “Hmm. It looks like the fire trucks and police are all out on the runway. I do see some other flashing lights at the entrance to the airport, but I’d bet those are to evacuate people. Lots of passengers are walking out the front doors.”

  That sounded like good news.

  “Anything else you can see? Does it say anything about survivors inside the airport?”

  Mr. Williams’ laugh was a bit on the condescending side. “Just because they were there when it happened doesn’t make them survivors. Based on what I see on the TV, there were no survivors on the plane. It is just a black pile of debris.”

  “All right, thanks, Mr. Williams. I really needed to hear that.”

  “Yeah, anytime. I know your boy is in that area. I’ll watch the news and make sure nothing changes at the airport. I’ll give you a call if it does.”

  “Thanks. I really—”

  “Hold on. Another driver is calling in. If I get another one quitting on me, I’m going to be very upset.” He paused for a second. “Just to confirm, you aren’t quitting on me, are you, Blake?”

  “No, sir. I’m in it to win it. I’m going to New York if it kills me.”

  “Good. I mean, I hope it doesn’t.” He laughed it off. “But I’m glad you’re still with me.”

  Buck hung up the phone.

  “Hey, Mac, the boss wishes us well.” He laughed to unload some of his stress. “Garth is just fine, too. I’m sure of it.”

  He said the words aloud to make them more solid, more believable. Why wasn’t Garth calling back?

  NORAD, Cheyenne Mountain, Colorado

  “General!” a lieutenant called from among the dozen workstations in the secure room. “We have a video.”

  After all of General Smith’s bluster about wanting an answer to the mysterious power outage, demanding an answer in under a minute, they were fifteen minutes in and still in the proverbial dark. During that time, he briefly talked to the president and read five seismic reports confirming there were no ground impacts near his bunker. But he’d also been advised about a wave of blue energy that had passed around the globe. It was his job to assess its threat to the heartland of the United States.

  The general hurried over to the lieutenant’s computer display.

  “What am I looking at?”

  “DARPA and Boeing have a joint project called Sun Diver. It’s a solar-powered aircraft that can stay fifty-five thousand feet in the air for years at a time.”

  “Yes, and?” the general replied impatiently.

  “They have an onboard reconnaissance package that records around the clock. It’s nighttime there, but it caught the blue rip as it went by.” The junior officer pushed a button to start a video. The perspective was from high in the atmosphere, and even though it was dark below, the bright curvature of the Earth made him feel like the camera was close to outer space.

  “Here it comes,” the lieutenant said dramatica
lly.

  On cue, a long line of blue appeared from over the round bulge of the horizon and approached the camera like a wave at the beach.

  “How fast is it moving?” the general asked.

  “Based on how fast it reached the camera after our power went out, the back of the napkin math is about a hundred and fifteen thousand kilometers per hour.”

  “Damn. And where is this camera?”

  “It is currently parked over the border between Pakistan and Afghanistan.”

  “And how long after our power went out did this light show up over there?”

  “About eight minutes.”

  What could cause this thing to go around the whole planet?

  Six

  Search for Nuclear, Astrophysics, and Kronometric Extremes (SNAKE). Red Mesa, Colorado

  Dr. Faith Sinclair had the room to herself. Her assistant cleared out the others so she could gather her thoughts in relative silence. After the disaster she’d just witnessed, that calm reflection time quickly devolved into silent head-banging on the solid wooden table.

  “That sucked,” she groaned.

  As managing director of the University of Colorado’s SNAKE lab, it was her job to ensure the corporate partners got enough time to run their scenarios through the mainframe. For the better part of the past week, their largest donor had been running a test, but moments before its scheduled end, an apparent hardware glitch forced an early termination. Her final moment of silence was appropriate, considering her career was about to be terminated, too.

  Azurasia Heavy Industries was not known for their patience. Their Izanagi Project was a huge investment in research and development for the foreign firm.

  After a minute of indulging in self-pity, she raised her head to see what could be done to salvage the worst day of her life. With arms outstretched, her chin rested on the table while she built up her usual confidence. Things were bad, sure, but she’d seen failure before. The only way to overcome a setback was to get back in the game.

  Faith was going to stand up and take her own advice, but she caught sight of some words etched into the tabletop near her fingertips.

  ‘Prof Sinclair’s bosons will supercharge your neutrinos!’

  She huffed. “Oh, come on. Neutrinos don’t even have a charge.”

  Is that really the point here?

  “Dammit,” she said under her breath before checking the door behind her. It was still closed, so she took one of her car keys and scratched at the uneven words etched in the wood.

  Admitting it was a pointless task, she nonetheless went at it with fervor. Cleaning that one little mocking phrase was something she could control. Once she got up from the table and walked back to her collapsing world, it would be dog-eat-dog. As director, she hated the feeling of helplessness.

  Faith sawed into the table like it was a thick steak, but before she could do more than blot out her name, someone knocked on the door.

  She shuffled a few papers over the imperfection. “Yeah, come in.”

  Mindy Paulus appeared in the opening. Faith’s assistant, and friend, the woman was fifteen years her junior and twenty pounds heavier, but she reminded the professor of her best friend back home, so they got along well. “Dr. Sinclair. You aren’t going to believe this.”

  “What is it? My reassignment to research snowdrifts in Fairbanks?”

  “No, just the opposite!” She held out a fax sheet. “Look.”

  Faith stood up and snatched the printout. “This is from the president’s National Science Advisor.”

  Mindy flashed a conspiratorial grin.

  She started to read the words aloud but stopped after a few sentences. The first part was nothing more than a bunch of glad-handing and thanking various departments and scientists in the government. However, when she got to the third paragraph, she had to read it to her friend.

  “At 2:01 pm Eastern Standard Time today, we believe a heretofore unknown meteor made contact with the Earth’s upper atmosphere. An electromagnetic wave was created during this event, and it continues to interfere with commercial and private power consumption throughout North America. We are still trying to ascertain—”

  Faith looked up like she’d been commuted from a death sentence. “It wasn’t my fault!”

  “No, it wasn’t,” Mindy agreed.

  Dr. Sinclair took a deep breath and finally allowed herself a smile. The fine print of the two-story-tall stack of legal documents she signed prior to the experiment probably had something to protect Azurasia from an Act of God, but at least they couldn’t blame her, personally. “Still, it’s a good thing we didn’t allow that reporter to watch the conclusion of this experiment. A failure is still a failure, even if it was no one’s fault.”

  “Should I give this sheet to Mr. Shinano?” Mindy pointed to the fax.

  “No. I want to give it to him myself.”

  She walked out the door, confident her career had been saved.

  I-5 North of Modesto, CA

  Buck drove for several miles half-listening to the radio. He was concerned for Garth, but that was the same as any other day. His boy lived in a city of six million residents, and minor disasters happened all the time. A lone plane crash at a busy airport wasn’t something that could get him to abandon his wagon, like the guys Mr. Williams mentioned.

  I could fly home if I dropped out.

  That was something new. He’d not considered flying home, but that would be the fastest way to get back to Garth if he was sure the world was coming to an end.

  He guffawed. “Yeah, right! Like that’s going to happen.”

  His time listening to books gave him some insight on what to expect if the world ended. They were filled with clueless characters who never saw the obvious signs. He used those lessons to run his own mental checklist.

  “Mac, do you see any medical labs with zombies running out of them?”

  He looked back to the monster in the cage.

  “No, me neither.” He tapped the steering wheel. “And the Peterbilt is still running as smooth as the day I bought her. No EMP blast knocked her out, right?”

  Buck wasn’t certain Mac was awake, but he continued.

  “I study this shit for a living. That blue light might have been military testing or solar interference, but it wasn’t a nuke EMP. If it was, the story would be all over the news, or there’d be no stations left on the air, like in the books we listen to.”

  As if to prove the point to himself, he switched the station again. The sports guys still talked about sports. The preacher on the religious channel still yakked about church. Even the talk radio guys babbled on about politics, same as any other day.

  “See, Mac-daddy, we’re good to go. And, if anyone uses a blue light as an excuse to make trouble with us, well, I’ve got a nice surprise for them. It’s chambered in nine-millimeter.” He eyed the vinyl wall panel where he kept a few of his supplies stowed away.

  He gripped the wheel as his attention returned to the road where it belonged. Brake lights in the sea of cars and trucks ahead signaled a slowdown.

  “There’s our real enemy, right? It ain’t EMPs or viruses or any of that end-days crap. It’s G-D traffic!”

  He engaged the Jake brakes and slowed down with everyone else.

  “What now?”

  La Guardia Airport, New York City, NY

  Garth and Sam ran away from the policeman and joined the rest of the herd waiting at the far side of the terminal. They took a few minutes to catch their breath and shake off their misgivings about sticking around, but Garth couldn’t stay quiet for long.

  “Thanks for pulling me away from that window, dude. I don’t know why I didn’t run.”

  Sam laughed. “That’s what friends are for. I saw you standing there with your jaw on the ground and figured you weren’t going anywhere.”

  Garth laughed it off because he hated losing control like that. “I thought you were nuts for going to that board, but I’m glad you got the info on your parent
s. Did you see if the plane landed before all those lines changed out?”

  “No, but good point. If they weren’t already on the ground, then it could still be their plane that blew up out there.”

  He noticed his friend nervously tapping his pant leg. “Come on, Sammy, I know exactly how we can figure it out.”

  Now Garth pulled at Sam to get him to come along. His friend willingly walked with him once it was clear where they were headed.

  “Let me see that slip of paper,” Garth demanded.

  Sam handed it to him and he noted the airline. He then looked around the giant terminal for the ticket counter to match. He found it right away, but when he realized it was on the cleared-out side of the building, he slowed and then stopped.

  Sam saw the empty service counters as well. “Shit. Good thought, but what do we do now?”

  Garth understood what his friend needed. In those first few minutes since the accident, many of the passengers took the escalators down, but most of the airport workers still milled about near the ticket counters. His parents flew on one of the biggest airlines, so all he had to do was find the biggest group of employees loitering nearby.

  “These folks will know. Come on.” Garth led him to a gathering of twenty or thirty men and women in dark blue uniforms. Once they got close, he confirmed the airline logo on their nametags.

  “Excuse me. Can anyone tell me if that airplane was one of yours?”

  Garth expected it would be a straightforward question with a simple answer. If it wasn’t theirs, they’d be ready to disown it. However, when none of them gave the response he sought, he prepared himself to keep digging.

  “My parents are on an AirBlue flight. It would really help to know the burning plane isn’t yours.” He let himself sound vulnerable and pointed outside at the wreck. “I want to make sure my parents aren’t out there.”

  A young redhead with a smart-looking pair of glasses stepped near him. “We are all trying to find that out. I promise.”