Into the Inferno by David Lucin

Author:David Lucin
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Highway 3 Publishing

12

Valeria dropped the shovel and ran for the Nissan.

Leaning against the passenger side door, Jenn was wedged between Sophie and Dylan. Above hovered two drones, four propellers on each. Both were small and likely contained only cameras, not machine guns like the weaponized models the military used.

Dylan’s head twisted and turned. So did Jenn’s, but only miles of sand surrounded them. Her pulse quickened anyway, and her hand reached for the gun, but Sophie touched her wrist to stop her. “Don’t,” she said. Then, to the group, “Everybody, weapons on the ground.”

“What?” Jenn asked. “You can’t be serious.”

Sophie plopped onto her rear and rested her elbows on her knees. Valeria led Carter to the truck, and they crouched beside it. After a long second, Sophie pulled out a cigarette—her last one—and lit it. “In a few minutes, I’m expecting to be greeted by a branch of the U.S. military.”

“The military?” Jenn asked. Both drones hovered, motionless. “How do you know?”

“She’s right,” Dylan said. He laid his rifle on the ground and rose to his feet. “Recon drones. I can tell you what model they are, if you’re curious.”

The possibility that soldiers had killed José and Tess and stolen Ed’s truck crossed Jenn’s mind. But why would they do that? For supplies? For transport?

For fun?

She gripped her gun tighter. “They could have done it. Attacked Ed.”

Sophie pulled on her cigarette and blew smoke. “Why?”

“Why not?” Jenn said. “Camp Verde. Prescott. Maybe they’re starving out here and went AWOL or something. You really want to wait around and find out?”

Sophie tucked a rogue strand of hair into her cap. “I appreciate your concern, but I can’t agree with you this time. If the plan was to kill us, why show their hand first? Why fly in these drones? I’d think the United States Armed Forces, the greatest military in history, would be better at ambushing people.”

Dylan shrugged in apparent agreement. “She’s got a point. If they wanted to take us out, they would’ve done it by now. We wouldn’t have known it was coming.”

Jenn snorted. “Yeah, and you’d know.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

Her blood was running hot. The buzz of the drones burrowed into her skull. Her hindbrain commanded her to run and hide, but she breathed in and wrestled it into submission.

Dylan and Sophie were right; the military didn’t do this.

“Nothing.” She laid her gun in the dirt. “Sorry.”

Still seated casually, Sophie turned to Carter. “You good, Vladdy? Soldiers are coming. Stick close, no sudden movements. You got it?”

“Got it,” the big man said. His face had gone pink.

The next ten minutes felt like an hour. The group remained quiet while the drones observed from high in the sky. Jenn could feel the cameras scanning her face and running her features through a database somewhere. But there was no Internet, so that wasn’t possible, was it?

She hoped Sophie and Dylan were right and this really was the military. They based that conclusion solely on the model of the drones. What if

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