Vacation

“You okay, Si?”

He nodded. Then to Kate, waiting her turn for the question.

“Kate?”

Another nod.

Then Kate said, in a voice that sounded as if it came from miles away, “Mom … are you okay?”

The question made Christie’s heart break. She was fighting so hard to hold back the tears, of fear, worry … she didn’t know what. The emotions all jumbled.

And Kate asks about her?

Christie gave her daughter’s hand a squeeze, then a smile. “I’m fine.”

Then, feeling that they both wanted more, “Dad will be back soon. They stopped the message. So, things must be okay now. Maybe … maybe it was a false alarm.”

As soon as she said that, her optimism sounded hollow. “Dad will be back. We’ll do what he says. He’s a police officer. He knows what he’s doing.”

The two kids nodded at that.

Because that was one thing they all agreed on.

Then all three of them went quiet again.

*   *   *

Jack grabbed the M-16 automatic rifle, loaded with hollow points.

He stuffed his pockets with boxes of shells. Then he grabbed one of the Glock 22s. Double the kick and killing power of the gun Christie had.

He wished she had it.

Too much kick for her, though she had shot it, before trying the bigger handgun out at the firing range. Laughing as it threw her backward.

“Got to plant your feet, kiddo.”

“I see that.”

“Plant your feet, lock your arm into position. Tense your muscles. Get ready for that kick. Then, eye on the target—”

“Squeeze slowly.”

“Exactly.”

Jack still had other weapons in the compartment, and the timed C4 explosives built for use in the narrow corridors and hallways of city apartment buildings. Blow in a door. Kick a hole in a wall.

No need for them now.

He took an extra flashlight he had there and stuck it in his back pocket.

He slammed the case shut, pulled down the trunk door, and started running back up to the main area of the camp.

The gunfire continued.

This thing wasn’t under control.

When he got to the top of the trail, near the left side of the lodge, he saw a guard there.

“Hey, you got weapons? They’re in the fucking woods. We can use all the help we can get.”

The guy radiated fear like woodstove heat.

“Getting back to my family,” Jack said, barely pausing his agonized limping run.

The guy reached out and grabbed Jack’s arm.

“You leave the Can Heads out here, and your family and all the families could be fucked. You get that?”

Jack shrugged off the arm. Started to run.

But the words were clear enough. And worse, Jack knew they were true.

Holing up in the cabin was just the wrong thing to do. Not with them still here, using the darkness, the trees, the shadows. Waiting.

“Okay. Where the hell are they?”

The guy pointed to the woods near the field. “Over there, and some have headed up to the service camp. Firing going on there. That’s where I’m headed. Other spots down by the main gate.”

“And the fence? Is it up, running, or can those things just keep coming?”

“I don’t know,” the guy said.

Jack looked at the path that led to the field and the thick woods past it. That was the area closest to his family’s cabin.

“Okay.”

Jack started running, this time in the new direction.

Jesus. Fucking. Christ.

I have to do this.

He moved as fast as he could.

The woods turned into a wall of darkness, a black gloom made by the thickness of the trees, the shadows.

Flashes of gunfire.

But not a lot of it.

Could the Can Heads be winning?

He tried to come up with a plan. Couldn’t just run in there. But all he had to draw on was working the city’s streets and their massive buildings.

Out of his element here.

He lowered the rifle’s muzzle so it pointed straight ahead. He looked at the flashes of gunfire and entered the woods.

Jack moved slowly.

When a Can Head attacked, it moved fast. Some crazy adrenaline-fueled burst of speed that helped them nail a body.

So, moving slowly might actually tip off any guards that he was human.

He walked steadily in the direction of a lone gun spitting out flashes.

Jack saw the guard.

One fucking guard, standing with a group of Can Heads circling him. They moved around the guard, taking steps, tightening the noose they had him in.

They could take a lot of bullets.

And that was another thing: how many bullets did Jack have? Should he have brought more? And when they were gone …

Jack saw a Can Head leap forward, taking shots from the guard and dropping to the ground. But the suicide move also allowed the others to accelerate their hunting circle. The guy began literally spinning on his feet, blasting, crazed.

Maybe, at this point, insane.

If Jack was going to help, it better be now.

He slowly tightened his trigger finger. The Can Heads’ crouching bodies caught the scant light, making them look like rocks and bushes … dark clumps moving.

Jack began firing.

Two of the Can Heads fell immediately.

The others, seeing their simple feral trap fall apart, turned to him.

Jack had planted his back against a tree. It gave him some protection from any rear attack.

The guard had stopped firing.

Stopped—or out of ammo?

Either way, the few Can Heads left surrounded him, ready to leap.

This would all play out in seconds. That’s all he had, Jack knew, from so many attacks and battles in the city.

He aimed at one Can Head to his left, firing, kicking it back, maybe not dead. But shifting to the right, and