Lost: Deluge Book 5: (A Thrilling Post-Apocalyptic Survival Story) Read online

  LOST

  Deluge Series

  Book 5

  By

  Kevin Partner

  Mike Kraus

  © 2020 Muonic Press Inc

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  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form, or by any electronic, mechanical or other means, without the permission in writing from the author.

  Table of Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

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  Special Thanks

  Special thanks to my awesome beta team, without whom this book wouldn’t be nearly as great.

  Thank you!

  DELUGE Book 6

  Available Here!

  Chapter 1

  Devon

  Bobby felt the truck’s tires slide as he eased it up a gentle incline. They’d gone, maybe, a couple of miles since waking up and the snow was still falling, piling up on the highway in a deep, unbroken layer.

  “Six hundred miles? No chance,” Yuri said, gesturing in frustration at the scene outside. There was no sign of any other vehicles moving, though they could see lights behind the drapes of the ranch houses they passed by.

  “What is place called? Hope? Pah!”

  Bobby brought the truck back under control, dropped the selector into sports mode and nudged up to third.

  “You Americans!” Yuri continued. “You have automatic this, automatic that. Never trust anything if you can’t see where it keeps its brain. Automatic very good on shiny American highways, but in a Siberian winter, give me stick shift any day.”

  “Well, next time we’re shopping for a car I’ll bear that in mind.”

  Yuri laughed. “Just do not ask me to get out and push. My legs are still not strong.”

  “I’m going to pull over when we find somewhere. We can’t go much farther today.”

  “Maybe storm will pass?”

  Bobby nodded. “I hope so. Either that, or we’ll be snowed in and stuck here. But there’s no point trying to keep going in this.”

  “And what of mission?”

  Bobby didn’t answer. They still had their task before them. Yuri had an SD card with vital intelligence around his neck and they had a duty to get it to the president who, as far as they knew, was in Denver. But it seemed a long way away when every mile was a struggle against a snowstorm.

  Whatever was to come, it would be insane to carry on today—that much was obvious. Yuri was still weak from spending six months on the ISS and the struggles they’d gone through since then. And Bobby was exhausted. He finally knew what he wanted—to go back to Ragtown and be with his lover and his daughter—but his duty took him in the opposite direction.

  “Look, there is gas station.”

  Sure enough, as they crawled across an intersection, they saw a single pump, half buried in the snow. Bobby glanced down at the fuel gauge. They were three-fourths full, but his eye was then caught by movement just a little along the road.

  “Who is crazy person?”

  Yuri gestured to a figure who was clearing the snow from a car beside the road, red paint appearing behind the gray sheet of falling flakes. As they got closer, they saw that there was a small block of apartments behind him: a squat flat-roofed building, columns of smoke or steam rising up from multiple flues.

  The figure only saw them when they were a few yards away, but immediately waved at them to stop.

  Bobby nodded at Yuri, who pulled a pistol from the glove box and hid it under his coat as Bobby rolled down the window.

  “You don’t wanna go that way.” The man was Black and had a close-cropped beard. He spoke in a strangely transatlantic accent. “The road’s blocked maybe a quarter of a mile ahead.”

  Bobby cursed.

  “Yeah, two cars collided with a van. Won’t be hard to shift once the snow stops.”

  “Thanks for the warning. We were looking for somewhere to stop, so at least we know not to go on along the highway.”

  The man looked at Bobby and then across at Yuri. “Who are you guys? Oh, and you can pull the piece out from under your jumper. I’m not armed.”

  After a moment, Yuri slipped it out like a boy trying to sneak candy past his parents.

  “Name’s Devon. Why don’t you park up here and I’ll make you a hot drink? I live there.” He pointed at the apartment block.

  “Da. That would be nice,” Yuri said.

  The man at the window looked at Bobby, who nodded. “I’ll park the car.”

  He rolled up the window as the man went to stand on the sidewalk, indicating where the edge was so Bobby didn’t end up in the middle of the road when the snow melted. If it melted.

  “I’m not sure this is clever,” Bobby said as he wrestled with the steering wheel.

  “What choice do we have? Besides, he is just man clearing car of snow.”

  Bobby had no argument and, given that the man had seen them, their only option was to go with him or make the slowest, slipperiest getaway in history.

  They followed the man up three steps and into the main entrance. The place had the feel of a former factory turned into accommodations, with some of the fittings retained for authenticity. But the conversion had been done some time ago and it was now shabby and unloved.

  “Yeah, it’s not exactly a classy establishment,” Devon said, noticing their expressions. “But I’m a single man, and not exactly rolling in it.”

  “Are you from England?”

  Devon smiled as he led them up a metal staircase to the first floor. “Military brat. Born here but brought up in the UK. Only been back a year or two. Here we go. Excuse the mess. Bachelor, you know?”

  He pushed open the door to reveal a small open-plan living room and kitchen with a window looking out on the highway. As he’d warned, it was a wreck inside. He swept clothes from the sofa so they could sit down, gathering them into his arms, then opening the door to the bedroom and throwing them inside.

  A pile of magazines and newspapers—mostly very old—had spread to the floor and Bobby could see cups, plates and bowls piled on all the surfaces of the kitchen.

  “I promise I’ve got some clean crockery, but I didn’t figure on having
guests.”

  “Is okay,” Yuri said, having cleared himself a space on the sofa and settled down. “My flat in Moscow was like this. Good times.”

  Devon filled the electric kettle from the faucet and put it on to boil as he began to gather the dirty plates and bowls into piles.

  “So, tell me,” he called over to them, “why have you got a bounty on your heads?”

  Bobby leaped up and drew his weapon, but Devon smiled, his hands apart. “It’s okay, Bobby. That’s your name isn’t it? I know you’re being looked for, but I don’t know why. And I’ve got my own reasons for not trusting the powers that be. You got me?”

  Yuri put his hand on Bobby’s arm and nodded. “Is okay. Let’s give our new friend a chance to explain. He is not police, I think.”

  Bobby lowered his weapon but didn’t holster it.

  “Not anymore. I was in the Met back in London, but that doesn’t seem to mean much when you’re looking for a police job back home. But I keep my hand in, and I’ve got a contact at the sheriff’s office, so I knew about you. Had a hunch you might come this way, so I kept an eye out. Now, coffee or tea?”

  “You have British tea?” Yuri asked.

  “Tea bags. PG Tips.”

  Yuri shrugged. “Better than nothing.”

  “It should be, it costs a fortune over here.”

  Bobby felt simultaneously foolish, yet still on his guard.

  “Bob? Look, if I’d wanted to report you, I’d have done it already. So, why not sit down and have a nice cup of tea or coffee?”

  Reluctantly, Bobby nodded and settled into the sofa which creaked under him. “Coffee, please.”

  He watched as Devon moved back into the little kitchen, preparing their drinks.

  “So, is the road really blocked up ahead?” Bobby asked, as Devon returned with steaming mugs.

  “Yeah. Just as I said. But even if it hadn’t it’d be worth you lying low until this…” he gestured to the window and the snow beyond, “eases up.”

  Yuri sipped on his tea. “We have mission. Is urgent.”

  “Better to get there late than never.”

  Bobby’s eyes narrowed. “Why are you so keen to keep us here?”

  Devon dropped in the armchair and sighed. “Look, Bob, you’re free to go if you like. I’m just trying to be helpful. Sometimes you’ve just gotta accept help when it’s offered.”

  “What do you know of us? Our mission?” Yuri asked.

  “Not that much. I know that Schultz is after you, and that would be enough to make me want to help keep you safe. He’s set himself up as a kind of president while POTUS is in Denver with him, and that Booker’s set up another federation along the West Coast. Feels like a petrol can just waiting for a match.”

  “And we are match?”

  Devon shrugged. “Maybe. Seems to me what this country needs is unity, and that can only come from the true president.”

  “Trouble is, she’s only got control of the east, and most of that is underwater,” Bobby said.

  Devon got up and went to stand at the window, looking down on the road. “Your car’s almost buried. How long was that? Twenty minutes? We’re on the edge as a species and I’ve got to hope that whatever you two represent, it’s some kind of hope out of this disaster.”

  “I do not know,” Yuri said. “But come, and I will tell you what I can.”

  “Yuri!” Bobby snapped.

  “Oh, come on! Devon here, he is right. I am good judge of character and we can trust him.”

  Devon returned to the armchair and sat, cradling his drink, all ears as Yuri told him everything. Almost everything.

  #

  Bobby felt it before he heard it. A vibration that grew into a rumble as he came around in the early morning. He’d spent an uncomfortable night on Devon’s sofa while Yuri slept in the armchair. As he became sure he really was hearing something and not still half-asleep, he threw off the blanket and breathed out a fog into the frigid air. Devon had explained that electricity was being rationed in Hope as the town relied on a single electrical line coming in from a power station not designed for extreme weather like this.

  “What?” Yuri mumbled as Bobby made his way to the window and pushed the blinds apart a little so he could peer out.

  He screwed his eyes up against the blinding white and, at first, struggled to make out anything on the road until he spotted the hump that covered their truck.

  He turned to see Devon standing beside him, rubbing his eyes. “What’s going on?”

  “There’s something coming.”

  “Move back from the window.”

  As they watched, a vehicle came into view, moving from the south toward the intersection and, finally, passing the apartment block where they stood.

  “Humvee, like the one you stole,” Yuri said.

  Bobby nodded. The only difference was that this one had a snowplow fitted to the front. “Maybe they’re going to clear the crashed cars ahead.”

  “No, I reckon they’re looking for you,” Devon said.

  “You’re a breath of fresh air, aren’t you?”

  “Just being realistic. We haven't seen any official vehicles since the snow started, then you appear and the next day a Humvee goes past. Why not just wait for it to pass?”

  “Because we don’t think it will pass?”

  “Now who’s the doom monger?”

  Bobby watched the Humvee make its slow way along the highway then closed the blinds. “It doesn’t make much difference. If we know they’re ahead of us, we can’t go that way.”

  “Trouble is, this is the only major road,” Devon said. Then he paused for a moment. “How quickly can you get ready?”

  “I guess if we have to, we could be out of here in a few minutes,” Bobby said, reluctantly. He’d been hoping for something hot to eat and maybe even a shower.

  “Vsegda Gotov,” Yuri said. “Always prepared. I was a Young Pioneer. Come, what is plan?”

  “While you’re getting yourselves ready, I’ll go down and start digging your truck out. There’s a small road that runs parallel to the highway and joins up with it beyond the crash. If you’re quick, you can get ahead of the Humvee.”

  “That’s your plan?” Bobby said as he pulled on his pants. “What if we get stuck in the snow?”

  Devon shrugged. “There shouldn’t be as much snow the farther north you go. Hope’s surrounded by mountains that hem in the weather, but the highway is on a wide, flat plain. With any luck you’ll be able to move fast enough to keep ahead of them.”

  “With any luck? Seriously?”

  “What is choice, Bobby?” Yuri said. “But tell me, Devon, you have computer?”

  Devon nodded.

  Yuri smiled and pulled the SD card from around his neck. “Then we copy this. For insurance.”

  #

  Bobby reversed the truck out onto the disturbed snow left by the Humvee, then headed fifty yards back the way they’d come to reach the gas station. He saw Devon in the rearview mirror. They’d barely spoken once they’d gotten outside as he didn’t want to attract attention, but he’d given them directions and then wished them luck.

  They turned left at the intersection, passing the grocery store to their right and finding the parallel road just past the community center. Devon had told them that this was where the local council had their offices and if they were going to be stopped, it would be here. But nothing else moved as they crawled along the narrow road. The part-time police office was on the highway so, with any luck, they’d avoid any official attention.

  They almost missed their target road, as the sidewalk was practically invisible under its blanket of snow, but Bobby made it, the truck slip-sliding its way along the road as the houses thinned out.

  “I do not like this,” Yuri said as snow began to fall again, whipped up into flurries by the wind. “If we get stuck on highway, we are finished.”

  Bobby grunted acknowledgment. But they both knew they had little choice other than to
press on in the hope that the weather would improve and the truck could cope.

  The houses had now disappeared, and the land to left and right was coated in a deep blanket of snow that was only interrupted by the occasional barn that poked out of the pristine white.

  Bobby felt the acid edges of desperation gnawing away at him as they struggled on, foot by foot. The truck was slipping so often, and the road so indistinct, that it felt as though they were a lifeboat adrift on a frozen ocean, hopelessly lost.

  Then he saw something that gave him hope. “Look! A tractor!” The ground had risen a little, and they could see a barn that seemed to have been built on a small rise that kept it clear of most of the snow.

  “You want to go to Denver on tractor?”

  “No! We’d freeze to death. But we can pull the truck through the snow in it.”

  Yuri roared with laughter. “You are genius, Bobby! Have you ever driven tractor?”

  “No, but I mean, how hard could it be?”

  “Hard,” Bobby muttered to himself. “That’s how hard it could be.”

  He sat on the tractor seat, exposed to the wind and snow on all sides, with Yuri’s coat wrapped around his own and his baseball hat pulled down as far as it would go.

  To his surprise, the tractor had turned over almost instantly, which suggested it had been used recently. To his greater surprise, he was able to drive it out of the barn and down to where the truck waited without a gun-wielding farmer chasing him. It seemed everyone else was waiting out the weather from behind locked doors. Lucky devils.

  He’d found a length of rope beside the tractor in the barn and wrapped it around the tow hook at the front of the truck. Yuri sat behind the steering wheel and gently guided it along the tracks made by the tractor.

  Bobby had lost all feeling in his limbs and face by the time they reached the intersection with the highway. The snow was falling less heavily, but a bitter wind was whipping along the road as he dragged the truck onto it and turned north.