Homecoming, page 40
Because he didn't have full control over the snowplough, there was no way he could avoid any of them. There was also no way that now he finally had the machine lined up to head to where he wanted it to that he was going to change course.
The three wannabe heroes all dived for cover and out of his way as he bore down on the group. But Tara was merely caught in the bright lights and confused by them, so much so that she merely stared up at him and by then it was too late.
The apex scoop on the front was raised enough for him to drive forwards. The sharp metal edges collided with fragile human flesh and it was no contest. Blood immediately splattered up as far as the windscreen, and he had to find the wipers to clear it as Tara’s body first struck the blade and then disappeared under his wheels. A soft bump of her body underneath told him that she'd been crushed, but it took him several moments to find the reverse gear before he backed up over her as the warning beeps sounded out.
Dimly, he heard the others yelling something at him from outside, but he didn't have time to listen. Instead, he slammed the plough back into first and carried on forwards towards his target, allowing the vehicle to pick up as much speed as possible.
Having done the calculations in his head, he was now heading for what he estimated was a direct line from the forest to Nathan’s house. He intended to use his battering ram to smash through everything and bury it all.
The engine was whining now at a high-pitched scream, but he kept his foot to the floor before jamming down a snow shovel that he'd found in the cab through the steering wheel and wedging the accelerator pedal down to the floor. As the plough continued forwards gathering pace, he opened the driver’s door, and only when he was certain that his aim was true did he leap out and throw himself to the side.
The vehicle struck the house full on, and the outer walls, although made of brick and stone, offered little in the way of resistance as the snowplough smashed its way through.
Almost the second the mighty machine was through the front of the house, the building’s floor gave way, and it plummeted downwards into the basement level crushing everything in its path.
Vanek climbed back to his feet having dug himself out of the snow; for once, he was actually glad of the weather as the heavy drift softened his fall.
Back at the station, he'd smashed the vehicle’s petrol cap off and then taken out the plunger stop. As a result, the machine had been leaking diesel the whole drive over, and he stood over the wet trail before taking a lighter out of his pocket.
“I never thought I’d be glad to see you,” a voice said from off to the side.
He turned to see Belle and her skeletal father limping their way over towards him. A quick look behind them showed him a boot print trail in the snow leading from the house.
“Cutting it a bit fine there, weren’t you?” she asked. “I mean, how did you know we’d get out in time?”
He favoured her with a look without speaking.
“Oh, I see,” she responded. “You really are a son of a bitch, aren't you?”
“I never said I wasn't,” he replied as he dropped the lighter.
A flame instantly rose from the ground and shot its way towards the wreckage of the house, following the path of the snowplough. A split second later, there was an almighty explosion that rocked the heavens as the vehicle, and whatever dangerously flammable material was down in Nathan's secret lab, went up in a fireball that even God himself must have noticed, and probably approved of.
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It was the following afternoon before the storm broke enough for the military helicopters to be the first to breach Wellspring. Then, for several days after that, large military machinery pushed and cleared the road into the town, bringing with them enough manpower to pacify the locals.
With the town constable dead and a wounded deputy, the army placed Wellspring under military control until the police authorities could make their way in a few days later.
In the immediate aftermath, Marko, Lizzie, Wendell and Belle were rounded up and placed under a strict military quarantine for the first six hours or so. Her father was taken away and placed under the care of the army medics.
The quarantine, however, had only lasted as long as it took for them to realise the level of her media profile, and then her jailers quickly became far more cooperative.
Of course, her anger had gone through the roof when she'd gone to retrieve the stolen files from the Marko family safe to discover they had in turn been stolen a second time. Her frustration levels only increased during her separation from the others when she learned that one person was missing from their band of survivors.
Unsurprisingly, Vanek had vanished like a ghost, no doubt taking their leverage with him. No one remembered seeing when or how the man had slipped away, but given the man's profession and the aptitude that she had witnessed first-hand, she had guessed it was inevitable.
Fortunately for her, even without the files, the job she'd dedicated her life to brought with it a large enough spotlight to prevent them all from being snaffled away to be debriefed at the military's leisure somewhere far from here and with little in the way of rights.
She had wondered if the others would play down what had happened or even deny it completely. She couldn't have blamed them if they had; the truth in a situation like this wasn’t always your friend. But to their credit, there had been an agreement between them before the cavalry arrived, and they had all stuck to it and told the authorities what they knew and all they knew.
Of course, most of what they claimed was met with either scepticism or else outright derision. But once the bodies started rolling in, especially in numbers, the drive to find answers, any answers, became too strong to ignore.
Wendell played a blinder and used a friend to find her a military grade network connection, and she had quickly uploaded pieces to an editor in London to be shared with colleagues across the world. But this wasn’t about her career, this was about survival, both of the truth and of them, and she felt better having the safety net of the story being out there before it could be contained.
The same friend had also been crucial in them finding out nuggets of information from the military side of things, one of which was that the army truck that had come thundering through town sparking many a false theory had simply been a young corporal with his foot to the floor because he'd been running late and already had several black marks against his name. The kid simply couldn’t afford the promised demotion for being tardy again.
Dan Marko had gone from a small-town officer to a major player in what had happened and what was happening to Wellspring. The man had grown exponentially since the sky had fallen in, and she could see that the town was going to be in good hands once the circus finally left.
She had deliberately kept Wendell front and centre of her reporting, fearing that the one person amongst them that the military owned was the most vulnerable. While the army had little authority over the civilians, Wendell was one of their own and he could very easily be disappeared if they weren't careful.
So that left Dan Marko as the town’s one remaining lawman and local hero. Along with the town doctor, they were the new power couple in Wellspring. Belle thought that her profile of the couple in several of the national Sunday magazines gave them protection.
Several serious pieces on Wendell Norrie and Dr Ngo’s help brought them into the conversation with the scientists that the government had sent to the town; this meant that they were covered with at least as much protection as she could give them.
She knew that the military would be able to go back and monitor recordings of any of the correspondences she'd been having with London, so she used their eager ears against them and laid it on as thickly as possible. The more information they thought was out there, the safer she felt. It was hard to make high-profile people disappear and certainly more difficult to make a few disappear all at once.
By the time that the circus had started to die down, the spring thaw was well underway.
The details she'd leaked had kept them all safe, but it had also sent the military disinformation service into full effect, and by the time that the roads were passable, the story of Wellspring had become a dwindling urban legend.
Whatever had been recovered from Nathan’s basement was being kept under strict lock and key although given the widespread damage, she doubted that much had survived.
The fire had been a raging inferno that had burned for much of the night and devoured most of the proof. Her biggest concern, however, was that Nathan’s research may have fallen into the military’s hands. God alone knew what they'd do with it, given what a man like Sutherland had done with his canine friends according to the doctor’s files that they'd stolen.
Speaking of the good doctor, it appeared that karma was finally making an appearance as stories about the death toll up at the Institute started to leak out around town. Sutherland was not seen again, and word was that he was among the victims.
After her first round of leaks, it had been pressed upon her in no uncertain terms that there would be no further unauthorised reporting.
Soon after, stories ranging from gas explosions to chemical spills were popping up in the broadsheet press, while the tabloids seemed to carry more along the lines of alien invasions and zombie attacks. Not long after that, any attempt to discuss Nathan’s experiments in reanimation quickly became laughable.
She didn't blame the military or the government. The public weren't ready for the truth here, no matter how strongly she felt about revealing it; the panic over their planted stories showed her that.
The town began to settle back into its usual way of life, and stories from inside Wellspring began to dwindle as the appetite fell for juicy gossip. The remains of Nathan’s house were cleared and a memorial garden was built on the site.
Most of the residents were as in the dark as the outsiders, but once the military started to rebuild and reopen the Institute, with added town funding to buy off any lingering doubts, minds were set at ease. She supposed that the threat of the only industry in town pulling up sticks and leaving Wellspring bankrupt was enough to quieten any questions.
Now, as she sat outside the medical building, waiting for her father, it was hard to believe that most of what she'd seen with her own eyes had even happened.
“Penny for them.” A voice startled her.
She turned to see Dan Marko standing there, complete with a brand spanking newly designed uniform.
“I see the Wellspring Police are sponsored these days,” she said and immediately regretted the remark.
Her own offers of work had quickly dried up after the white-hot feeding frenzy had died down, and her name was increasingly being linked with a wild hoax that had gotten out of control.
She had known that there would be blowback from her early efforts to safeguard herself and the others, but the true cost was only just becoming clear to her. Even though she'd do it all again, it was a little hard not to feel bitter about the price she'd paid. The files were supposed to have been their insurance, and yet Vanek had screwed them all over again in order to protect himself.
“Sorry,” she said at his uncomfortable expression.
She couldn't blame him for going along to get along.
“Ignore me. I'm just feeling sorry for myself,” she added as he sat down on the wall next to her.
“I do feel guilty,” he admitted. “I mean, the station has been rebuilt and we’ve got all kinds of new facilities now: new cars, new equipment, staff… not to mention my promotion.”
“You shouldn't feel guilty about anything,” she said honestly. “Wellspring is your home, and someone has to man the lighthouse. In fact, I'm very grateful that it’s you, Dan. I mean it.”
He blushed a little at that but seemed to relax and she glad. He was a good man and the town was lucky to have him.
“So when’s the big day?” she asked lightly.
“July 12th. It's just going to be a small ceremony, but personally, I think that Lizzie would be happy without a fuss.”
“You spoil her rotten, you hear me? She deserves it. You both do. How’s the new place shaping up?” she asked, nodding towards the medical centre.
“Great. Lizzie says that most of the equipment in there will never get used, but she says better to have it and not need it than the alternative, you know?”
“She's right. After what we went through, I wouldn't object to any amount of unnecessary preparedness.”
“You're not kidding. I've got an arsenal in a vault in the station,” he whispered to her. “And another one at home.”
“Did you guys not think of leaving?”
“It's my home… our home now.” He shrugged. “Like you said, someone's got to man the lighthouse. How’s your dad doing?”
“Better. He gets out today, but... well, it's a whole lot to take in. Everything that happened recently, and before that… hell, my whole adult life was shaped by lies, Dan. It's going to take a long time to work through that, if that’s even possible.”
She hadn't told anyone about what Nathan had told her in his basement, that she was a biology experiment created by a crazed, wannabe Shelley character. She didn't know if any of that was true or not, and for now she wasn’t sure that she wanted to know. Only Nathan, her father and Vanek knew about the claim, and while Nathan was dead and Vanek had vanished, that only left her and her father to have the first of many difficult conversations.
“You know, something’s been bothering me about... well, about your dad, that is.”
“There are a lot of things bothering me, I don't mind telling you. What's on your mind?”
“It's just that everyone thought he was dead, your dad I mean, but that would mean that... well that...”
“That there were others involved? Yes, that has occurred to me too,” she replied, looking around the view of Wellspring’s downtown area and its many bustling residents.
“You think that there are others in town like... well, like Tara was?”
“Honest answer is that I don't know. To be honest, it’s one of the reasons I'm very glad that you and Lizzie are staying.”
“You know that Huffman told me she could see them? I mean, she thought that they were some kind of demon, but she said that she saw Tara was evil and that Lizzie and me weren’t. Crazy, huh?”
“Yes, she was.”
“I guess so,” Marko said, somewhat unconvinced.
“Look, Lizzie can keep an eye out for... well, anything abnormal, and you know what to do if you find them?”
“Yes, but I pray it never comes to that.”
“You and me both,” she said, staring pointedly straight ahead at the medical centre.
“Lizzie says your father’s fine. She’s run every test she knows how to run, and she says that she hasn't found anything. You know that?”
“I know, but it’s still a thought that keeps me up at night. All these years hating the man I thought sent me away. Living a childhood with a mother terrified of a man finding us, only to find out that she wasn't scared of my father – she was scared of Edgar Schaefer.”
“But you have a second chance.”
“Ever the optimist.”
“Of course. Hell, if someone like Lizzie agreed to date and then marry me, anything’s possible, Belle. Anything.”
They shared a laugh, and it was warm and homely with a faint promise of a future yet unwritten, one that she was about to write as the medical centre doors opened and Lizzie walked her father out.
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EPILOGUE
Derek Roberts exited the elevator as it opened with a ping onto the penthouse floor of the luxury five-star hotel he was currently staying in.
The place was filled with tourists from all over the world. It was a huge building with top-notch facilities on every floor and a plethora of rooms. Such a place was easy to get lost in, which suited Derek just fine.
He used the electronic keycard to open his door and stepped inside, glad for the island breeze that brushed him on entry through the wide balcony windows.
Crossing to the safe, he opened it and placed the thick envelope inside so that it sat on top of a pile of others. Along with the bankbooks from multiple countries he’d collected on his financial reclamation tour were several passports all with different identities but the same photograph. In fact, the only one he'd left behind was the one with his real name. As far as the world was concerned, Josef Vanek was gone – if he'd ever existed at all, that was.
There was also a thick file that he'd had copied and placed in several emergency boltholes: Sutherland’s file. With it, he knew that he'd have a safety blanket if anyone came looking for him from the government. It was a backup card and one that he didn't want to play just yet; it was one that he preferred to keep for a rainy day.
Once the safe was locked again, he crossed to the bar area and made himself a dry cocktail.
He'd never been a man of expensive tastes, but it was something that he could get used to, he thought, looking around at the plush surroundings. He certainly had the money now. Years of squirreling away his own money and a whole bunch of Kline’s had been hard work. Maybe it was time to enjoy the fruits of his labour; he'd certainly earned it.
It had been a little over six months now since Wellspring, and he hadn't stopped moving. It wasn't just the British authorities he had to stay ahead of as he was in no doubt that the others would have dropped his name the second they discovered that he'd fled the town. No, a small article about a car crash that had left a woman and her three grandchildren dead had caught his attention. There hadn’t been anything apparently suspicious about the accident; it was just the woman's surname that had caught his eye: Kline.
Of course, it was entirely possible that the deaths had been just as the reports suggested: a simple accident. However, there was one small detail that might have seemed incidental to the investigation.
Mrs Edna Stone, the once carefully hidden Mrs Edna Kline, had suffered several injuries in the accident when her car left the road and plunged off a hilltop road. But some bribery money had passed hands to a local doctor for the autopsy report. When she was examined, even though the body was severely broken and burned in the crash, she was missing three fingers. Vanek knew that finger amputation was a favourite torture technique of the Colombians. They had come for their money, and when the widow didn't have it, they had tortured and killed her along with her grandkids. Such men wouldn't give up easily on several million pounds. It was one of the reasons that he felt it safer to convert all of his rainy-day money to something tangible and not electronically traceable, just in case.
