Exodus (10 page)

“Fantastic,” replied Simon as he released both kids from his grasp. “Now we have to go home, okay?”

As the kids raced ahead, Emily placed a restraining hand on Simon’s arm, holding him back until they were just out of earshot, but not so far that she lost sight of them—she would be keeping them all close from this point on.

“We have a problem,” she said.

“You aren’t kidding. Did you see that? It’s just so…so…alien.”

“Okay, let me rephrase that. We have a bigger problem. Did you see the weird-looking trees down by the lake?”

“Of course,” said Simon. “How could you miss them? Those things must be eighty feet if they’re an inch.”

She quickly reminded him of her disconcerting encounter with the lone tree and its white pods when she was traveling through the forest outside Valhalla. “Oh, shit,” said Simon. “That’s what those things were down there? I thought it was just some kind of trick of the light.”

Emily shook her head. “Don’t ask me to explain, or how I know, because I won’t ever be able to give you an adequate explanation, but whatever was growing inside those sacks it’s…it’s evil.”

She realized how ridiculous that must sound, but it was the truth. She didn’t mean “evil” in the religious sense, though. Her encounter in the clearing was simply the most incredible sense of concentrated malevolence Emily had ever experienced. It had been like the frozen blade of a knife had been laid against her soul, and it had left an indelible scar. Even now, as she thought back to her first brush with the globes, she shuddered. More than anything in the world, she did not want to know what was inside those milky-white sacks.

“Lock the doors and keep the children inside,” Emily warned as Simon ushered Rhia and Ben back inside the house.

“Where are you going?” he asked as she and Thor turned and began to head back toward the path that led down into the woods.

“I won’t be long,” she called back over her shoulder. She heard the door slam shut.

She had left her backpack, bike, and, most importantly, her satellite phone at the house on the opposite side of the ridge when she had left yesterday morning.

Emily followed the path back down the hill toward the Jefferson house, Thor trotting beside her. She had learned the home owners’ name from Simon. Mr. and Mrs. Jefferson had, apparently, left the day of the red rain, heading off to be with their parents in DC. They were probably dead now.

The trail dropped down, then leveled out as she headed back past the pond. The ducks she had seen earlier were back, but
Thor seemed uninterested in harassing them this time, preferring instead to stay close to her.

At least one of those sacks they had seen growing on the tree had disgorged its contents. She thought back to the similar tree she had seen in the forest outside Valhalla and the slowly rotating shadow she had seen hidden within the orb’s pink-liquid-filled interior. Whatever had been inside, it was now out and roaming the area. The knowledge that she might not be alone had turned the surrounding woods and deep shadows from a pleasant distraction to a potential ambush, and she found herself jogging along the path, the shotgun off her shoulder and held tightly in both hands.

If she had brought the phone with her, she would not have risked coming back to the house and would have abandoned her supplies, but it was her only means of contact with Jacob and his team, and she would be damned if she was going to leave it behind.

The muffled electronic call of the sat-phone greeted Emily like a long-lost friend as she pushed open the door to the Jeffersons’ home and stepped inside.

She raced upstairs and jogged into the living room. Pulling the case holding the phone from the backpack, she quickly opened it, pulled out the phone, and flipped up the antenna, simultaneously hitting the Talk button.

“Hello,” she said, breathless. “Jacob?”

“Emily. Thank God. I’ve been trying for hours to get in touch with you. Are you okay?” Jacob’s concern was obvious, but Emily had no idea why he would be worried in the first place.

“Yes. Of course. Why?” she finally answered.

“Listen, I have some news that I need—”

Emily cut him off. “I have better news, so I get to go first. I found more survivors.”

Emily heard Jacob’s sharp intake of breath. “What? Where? How many?”

“They’re a family, a father, son, so damn cute, and a daughter. I found them yesterday.”

“That’s astonishing. Amazing,” Jacob stuttered. “Wait? Are they immune to the effects of the red rain, too?”

Emily realized that she hadn’t actually given any thought to the possibility that Simon and his little family might not be immune to the red rain. She had simply made the assumption that they were, for whatever reason, resistant like her. They’d had zero exposure to the event thanks to the quirky weather system of their little valley. But what if they were not immune? What if once they stepped outside of the hill’s border the virus—or whatever the rain actually was—was still active, and what if it killed them?

No! She was convinced that once the original red rain had turned to dust, its ability to infect human life had become negated, but there was no way to find out if her theory was correct without risking the lives of Simon and the kids.

“I don’t know,” she answered Jacob eventually. “Maybe they are immune, but I think they were probably just lucky.” She took a couple of minutes to explain what Simon had told her about the valley’s microclimate and how it had shielded them from the red rain. “There are even ducks here, too,” she blurted out excitedly, resisting the urge to add a comic quack to emphasize the point.

“Fascinating. Just fascinating. This makes my news even more important.” She heard Jacob’s voice grow fainter as if he was holding the phone at arm’s length. “I’m going to send you some images that you need to look at,” he continued, raising his voice to ensure he was heard while he apparently fiddled with some controls on his sat-phone. “You’ll need to share them with your new friends
as quickly as possible. You’ll need to convince them to get out of there.”

The sat-phone gave a beep, and Emily glanced at the little LCD screen; it read, “Downloading Files…1 of 4.”

Emily waited for all of the files to download. The resolution on the screen was not optimal for viewing the kind of detail she was looking at, but as she scanned through each of the images while Jacob explained what she was looking at, she felt a growing discomfort in the pit of her stomach.

“You can see what you’re facing, Emily. It’s imperative that you get yourself and the family out of there as soon as possible. If you don’t there’s no way—”

Emily stopped him midsentence. “I need to get back to the other house. You’ll need to explain this to Simon, or I don’t think there’s any way he’s going to believe me. He’s already skeptical of what I’ve told him. Without proof from you, he’ll think I’m out of my mind. Can you give me half an hour to get to them and then I’ll call you back?”

“Make it fast, Em.,” Jacob said. “I’ll be waiting by the phone.” Emily heard the click of Jacob hanging up and immediately began to collect the remainder of her belongings. She shoved them into the backpack and swung it over her shoulder and called for Thor to come with her.

Making her way through the house to the garage, she found her bike on the side of the house and walked it around to the back path. Once she was down the steps and back on the dirt trail, she began pedaling toward the house on the opposite side of the valley.

She barely felt any of the bumps of the rough trail as she and Thor raced back to Simon and the kids. The implications of what Jacob had shown her flooded her mind with questions, and it was
all she could do to keep her pounding heart from exploding out of her chest.

“What exactly is going on?” Simon asked as he followed Emily into her room.

“Do you have a computer? One that’s charged,” she asked.

“What? Why do you need a computer?”

Emily dropped the backpack onto the bed and turned to face Simon. “Please, Simon,” she said. “Do you have a computer?”

Simon stared at her for a moment, then disappeared. When he came back, he was carrying a laptop computer under one arm. Emily pulled the sat-phone from the backpack, pulled the computer from under Simon’s arm, and walked into the living room.

“Jesus, Emily. Are you going to tell me what the hell is going on?”

“I don’t know what’s going on,” she replied as she set the equipment down on the coffee table and attached a USB cable from the laptop to the phone. She pressed the On button of both machines and, once a connection had been established, hit Redial on the phone. “But I think I know someone who might be able to explain it to both of us.”

She pressed the Speakerphone button and listened to the ringing phone. It chirruped a couple of times before Jacob answered. “Emily. Are your new friends there?”

“It’s just me and Simon,” she answered, keeping her voice as low as possible in case the kids overheard her. “I didn’t think this was something we should discuss with the children around.” Emily glanced up from the phone at Simon, and she realized by the surprised look on his face that he hadn’t believed a word she
had told him when she had tried to explain about Jacob and his crew of scientists. “Simon, meet Jacob. Jacob…Simon.” The two men exchanged greetings before Jacob took control of the conversation again.

“I don’t know how much Emily has explained to you about what we think is actually going on here, Simon, but I have someone else that I want to introduce to the both of you who I think will be able to clear up any doubts you might have about the threat you are all facing. Hold on a second while I bring them in…” There was a sharp beep followed by a short burst of electronic tones. A few seconds later, a woman’s voice filled the room.

“Hello all, can you hear me okay?” There was a slight static buzz behind the transmission, as though the stranger was speaking from a great distance. The woman’s voice was accented, certainly not American. British maybe?

“We hear you,” said Emily and Jacob almost simultaneously.

Jacob’s voice broke in to the conversation. “Everyone, this is Fiona Mulligan. She’s the commander of the International Space Station.”

“My God,” said Simon, his voice a stunned whisper.

Huddled around the computer screen, Emily could see exactly what Simon saw: a panoramic view of what looked like Venezuela, Colombia, and Mexico. Of course, she could only assume it was the uppermost part of South America because the majority of the image she was looking at was obscured by a red haze. The only way she could be sure of what she was seeing was because she could still make out the rough outline of the Gulf of Mexico on the right side of the image. The east coast town of Veracruz was just vaguely visible, but everything else was covered by the same cloud.

“Are you looking at the first image?” Commander Mulligan’s voice crackled over the speaker.

“Yes,” replied Emily.

“Jump to the second image, if you would.” Again Commander Mulligan caught a gasp of astonishment from the two civilians;
this time it was followed by an expletive from Simon and a quick apology.

“That image was taken twenty-four hours later. It’s the same location as the first image. I’m sure you can see now why I thought it was so important for Jacob to let you see these pictures as quickly as possible.”