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Chapter 517
The floor of the store is much harder than the leaves and ground we’ve been sleeping on, but I don’t really mind. I’m tired enough to fall asleep anywhere, and it’s kind of nice to have a roof over our heads and solid walls around us for a change.
A moment after I lay down, Kai squats beside me.
“I’m going outside,” he tells me in a soft voice. “I’ll feel better keeping watch out there instead of in here. I’ve already told your father.”
“Okay,” I say, understanding his unease. I’m glad he let me know he was going out, though. “I’ll sleep better knowing you’ll be watching over us.”
Kai rests his hand lightly on my shoulder. “Sleep well, Leah. I won’t let anything in.”
With that, he vanishes into the darkness, moving as silently as a wraith.
I wake up with a shudder, opening my eyes to blackness. I know ex
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Leesa's Advent Chapter 518
After a quick breakfast inside the store, we’re on our way north again. The highway remains pretty much the same as the day before—flanked by lots of commercial buildings in various states of disrepair. Only a few show the distinctive destruction caused by a portal opening up. The rest appear to simply be victims of neglect. I find myself wondering what happened to all the people who lived in this area. It clearly had once been home to a fairly large population. Not city large, but large enough. There’s no trace of them now, though. Either they’re all dead or have long ago fled this place, or they avoid the main roadways and remain in hiding elsewhere in the area.It’s the middle of another beautiful sunny afternoon when Kai returns from one of his frequent scouting forays. He walks with a rapid, determined-looking stride directly up to my dad. Since I’m just a little bit behind, I hurry forward to see what Kai has to report.“
Leesa's Advent Chapter 519
Late the next day, we come to a literal fork in the road. We’ve pretty much left the developed area around Monterey and the surrounding towns behind. The landscape is once again more rustic, covered with long grasses, bushy shrubs and scattered trees. For a little while we were along the ocean again, before curving more inland.We’re on the outskirts of a small town a road sign tells us is called Castroville. Route 1, which we’ve followed for almost all our trip, heads to the left. Highway 156 veers off to the right.Dad and Lieutenant Gregerson are squatting over an old road map. I’m peering over Dad’s shoulder, curious as usual. Kai is apparently not interested in maps, because he’s standing off to the side. He’ll go along with whatever Dad decides.From Dad and the lieutenant’s discussion, I know the choice comes down to staying on Route 1, which will return to the coast and be somewhat winding as it follows the shore, or to head inland to Highway 101, which seems to be much more o
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I head back inside and join my friends for a quick meal of energy bars, nuts and dried fruit. It’s actually pretty tasty, though a bit boring. It beats going hungry, that’s for sure.Less than half an hour after I opened my eyes, we’re on our way north again. The powder blue sky is striped with high, wispy cirrus clouds and the temperature is cool but pleasant. It’s another fine day for a long walk.We’ve been walking for several uneventful hours when Radar suddenly stops. From the look on her face, I know what’s coming.“Anomaly!” she shouts, pointing to a spot just to the right of the road.There’s no need for her to wave her orange cap here. The Marines are well-trained for this. Dealing with Anomalies—and the things that come through them—is their primary responsibility back in San Diego. Two dozen of them quickly form a semi-circle in front of the spot Radar indicated. The two guys carrying flamethrowers take up stations at either end of the curved line of soldiers.The rest of t
Leesa's Advent Chapter 521
We reach the southern outskirts of Santa Cruz shortly before noon the following day. It’s a pretty big town—at least it was back before The Incident. Not San Diego or San Francisco big, but a decent sized place nonetheless. I know from our cram course about the California coast that Santa Cruz was home to a large university and was considered a very progressive city.Now, however, it looks deserted. A long section of the highway we’re following is elevated, allowing us to see a good distance in all directions. To our right, green hills covered with houses rise to a height of several hundred feet, while to our left the downtown section of the city stretches off to the ocean. From our raised vantage point, I can see a large number of destroyed buildings—far more than would be found in a similar-sized section of San Diego. I guess that comes from being so much closer to where The Incident occurred. Some of the destruction looks like it resulted from battles being fought, but a big propor
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Nothing unexpected happen, so the next morning we’re back on our way, same as every day. As Santa Cruz falls behind us, the highway starts to become much more like it was during the first part of our trip, though not so high above the ocean, which is frequently visible through gaps in the trees and hillocks to the west.We can also see a wall of heavy gray clouds looming on the horizon. The dark clouds look like the front edge of an approaching storm. The wind has freshened from the northwest as well, another sign that the good weather we’ve enjoyed so far may be about to change. Other than to make sure our plastic rain ponchos are near the top of our packs for quick availability, there’s nothing we can do about it, so we trudge resolutely northward.If we continue at our present pace, Dad says we’ll arrive in San Francisco in three more days. That will give us two days to spare, which is just about ideal. We’ll have time to scout the area
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The storm lasts for the better part of two days—two very wet, cold and miserable days. Walking twenty miles a day into a driving rainstorm is not something I’d recommend to anybody. They’re safe days, though, as Kai had predicted. We see no sign of any enemies—unlike us, the hunters seem to be smart enough to stay out of the rain. The closer we get to San Francisco, the more evidence we see of past Anomalies, until we’re passing a damaged area almost every hour or so. Radar tells us that most of them are pretty old, but a couple opened up in the past few weeks, and one occurred just two days before we come upon it. There’s no way to know what came through that most recent portal. The pounding rain has washed away all traces, and Radar’s Power doesn’t tell her what passed through, only if something entered our world when the Anomaly opened. Radar confirms that something did indeed come through. Even Kai can’t tell anything because of the storm. We keep an even sharper
Leesa's Advent Chapter 524
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My first view of our destination is nothing like I expected, nothing like the pictures I’d seen in all the books we studied prior to beginning our journey. The Rock itself, as it was often affectionately called, looks as solid as ever. But gone is the stark, solid block building made even more ominous-looking by the knowledge that it served as a maximum-security prison housing the worst of the worst. In its place stands nothing more than a skeleton of the old structure, pieces of exterior wall reaching up to varying heights before crumbling away. In some places the jagged concrete sections seem no more than eight or ten feet tall, while other parts rear up almost three times that. The various outbuildings that surrounded the main prison are now little more than piles of rubble, and the distinctive lighthouse tower has completely crumbled as well. Whether the destruction resulted simply from The Incident or occurred over the years there’s no way of telling. I study th
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