Part 31 (2/2)

He went to the next one down the line and got in. There was a click, then the engine started. Hardened military electronics were not so quick to fry, fortunately, but there was going to be more than one vehicle in this convoy that wasn't gonna move. ”Got forty miles left in this,” Del said.

Without speaking-they didn't need to bother, the three of them always understood one another's thinking-Mike picked up the portal and slid it into the back of the Humvee, where it fit nicely ... or had it gotten smaller when Mike tried to put it in?

Everybody knew the way the image in it changed as you moved it, and Mike didn't want to lose the spot where Timmy had gone in.

”We get this thing working right, we need to bring it back right here,” he said.

”It's a countryside over there. If we get through safely, we're gonna find him sooner or later. Looks like southern Ohio, matter of fact.”

”Southern Ohio is G.o.d's country.”

”So is the rest of the world.”

They were silent for a moment, each contemplating in his own way the enormity of what was happening.

”Why don't we just go in now?”

”You think we should?”

They both looked at it, then at each other. At last Mike said, ”I think we need to find out more about it.”

”I hear you,” Del said. He pulled the Humvee out of the line and proceeded toward the town square. Plasmas so intense that they outshone the dismal sun now flashed across the sky without ceasing. Instead of the empty streets that had followed the pa.s.sage of the penitents, they soon found that Raleigh was crowded with people who were pus.h.i.+ng and pulling anything they could that was on wheels, trying to take supplies with them as they headed west toward the interstate. It looked like something out of a World War II movie.

People stared hard at the Humvee as it trundled east. They'd been shot at one too many times when trying to approach the convoy. They gave the soldiers their distance.

Up and down the street, buildings were burning. Molten insulation was dripping off overhead wires. ”Spontaneous electrical fires,” Del said. ”Must be a whole lot of solar juice in the air to cause this.”

Mike knew that the sun's energy would concentrate in wires if it became intense enough. There were weapons that could do that, too.

Up and down Main Street, the same street lamps from which the victims of the penitents were hanging were now exploding, sending sparks down into panicky crowds of refugees. Sheets of fire flared along electric lines, and columns of smoke rushed up from the roofs of buildings.

”It's everywhere,” Mike said. ”The whole world is burning.”

When Del was forced to slow down, people began coming up to the Humvee. ”This could get ugly,” he said, and jammed the gas to the floor.

”Easy on the clutch, man.”

”I know it, but I gotta not hit these folks.”

In the sky, a huge plasma danced, a long electrical body writhing, its appendages sweeping the horizons like great snakes.

Soon, they were through the town and onto the highway that led to what had been the convoy's original destination. Like the town, the road was filling with refugees, a few on horseback, more on bikes, most on foot. Mike held a weapon in sight, making sure it was visible to the angry eyes and the mad eyes that watched them pa.s.s.

These poor d.a.m.n people-somebody had to save them. If this darn portal would work, they could go through. Given enough time, maybe the whole darned country could go through.

What a d.a.m.n miracle it was, but probably not for ordinary folks. Only people like the ones in the Blue Ridge would be allowed to use a thing like this, you could bet on it.

His heart just literally felt like it was tearing in two. He could feel his twin wanting to be with him. He could feel Tim being scared and being alone, and maybe knowing that the portal was in motion, that it was disappearing like a summer cloud or whatever it looked like on that side.

The farther they got from town, the fewer people there were on the road, and Del began to run the Humvee harder-until he saw someone ahead of them.

”d.a.m.n,” he said as they drew near the person standing in the middle of the road. It was a woman with a baby stroller filled with fis.h.i.+ng equipment, rods, reels, poles, hooks and lines in packets. She wasn't going anywhere, either. She held her ground right in the middle of the two-lane blacktop.

Del stopped, leaving the Humvee idling.

She came around to the window. ”We're moving our stock,” she said, ”and I'd be willing to pay you twenty dollars for an hour of the truck.” She glanced around. ”There's looting. The cops are gone.”

”Lady, we'll all be dead in a few days.”

”What in the world is the matter with you? How dare you say such a thing.”

”This is the Last Judgment, lady,” Del said. The Twines were Church of Christ, big-time. Not the Peltons. Their dad had steered clear of religion altogether. But Mike knew about the Last Judgment, of course, and from where he sat, Del could d.a.m.n well be right. What if that black stuff on people was sin showing up right through their skin?

”I need to move my stock. We're in hard times and we're planning a sale next week. We need inventory.”

Mike leaned over to Del. ”She's blown,” he said. ”Totaled.”

”Christians can't just leave people,” Del snapped.

”So let me drive. I ain't one. Anyway, you left all those people back there.”

”Yeah, they weren't askin' for help.”

Mike had to get this portal working. He had to get over into wherever the h.e.l.l it was and find Tim. Mom and Dad were gone now, but this is what they would've wanted him to do, and it was what his blood wanted him to do. You lose your twin, you lose half your soul. But how to convince Del?

”Lady,” Mike said, ”we need to get on. We got a mission.”

”There's no mission, Mike!”

”My brother is my mission!”

”Fellas, if you need to go-”

”We need to go!”

Del did not move, and it shocked Mike to realize just how strongly he felt about this. He was going to push Del out of that seat and drive away without him if he didn't get this vehicle moving again.

But, in the end, Mike had to admit that he couldn't bust up with Del, let alone make him eat a fist or something. So the next thing he knew, he was loading fis.h.i.+ng tackle into the Humvee.

They did six miles to a just plain pitiful little house, sad and tired and full of kids. An older boy and his dad came out and quickly unloaded the Humvee. Helping them and seeing the way they treasured this stuff that n.o.body would ever buy, Mike was almost moved to tears. It reminded him of being in Afghanistan and having cold families come up to camp in the night, to huddle against the warm sides of tents and fill them with their ripe stink and the reek of 'Stan food.

Guys would kick the s.h.i.+t out of them through the canvas, but Mike and Tim didn't, and Del would go out and feed them, which would draw more, and he'd feed them until he ran out of d.a.m.n loaves and fishes or whatever.

These were Americans, though, but it no longer felt much different.

They finished, then Del went out and got their well going by osmosis using garden hoses, which is the kind of thing he always knew how to do.

<script>