Flood Plains by Mark Wheaton (best ereader under 100 .TXT) 📕

submerged house through the downpour but didn’t want to take a chance.

So it was Muhammad who saw the two people on top of the gas station canopy, frantically waving to the truck. The convenience store and pumps were completely submerged but the roof over the pumps was still riding just above the water, hovering like a diving platform on its thin columns.

“Holy shit,” Scott said. “They’re alive.”

Big Time couldn’t believe his eyes. Of all the people in the city, that prick survives this shit?

“The water has to be crawling with sludge worms. How the hell are we going to get to them?”

Scott peered through the driving rain and noticed something about one of the two survivors.

“Big Time,” he said quietly. “Look at the one on the right.”

Big Time turned the windshield wipers down a little bit so they weren’t slinging water in every direction. Sure enough, there was the asshole that ran the station waving like a maniac, but alongside him was Tony, Big Time’s oldest son. Even if he couldn’t quite make out his face a hundred percent from this distance, he recognized the Houston Texans jersey. He’d given Tony such shit for so quickly abandoning the Saints for the Texans and even more after the Texans beat the Saints their first meeting after Katrina. Though he figured every other kid in the Ward had something similar, he knew his own son.

“Is that your son?” Muhammad asked.

“Yeah. Yeah, it is.”

“Alhamdulillah.”

“If we can get a little further up the bridge, we’ll be directly alongside,” Scott suggested.

Big Time nodded and slid the truck into gear. The engine protested, but Big Time wasn’t hearing anything about it. He accelerated up the bridge, threw on the parking brake, and swung open the door.

As he emerged, a cold wind hit him so hard he thought it might be the poltergeist force he’d encountered in the factory. He braced himself against the truck door as the equally frigid rain soaked him all over again. Over downtown to the south, a surprising patch of white clouds and light stood out from the rest of the hurricane.

“The eye isn’t that far away,” Big Time nodded to Scott as he followed him out.

“I don’t know if they can wait that long.”

He pointed to the pump canopy. It was quaking back and forth, and not just from the churning water. Something was clearly attacking it from below.

“They’re trying to knock it down!” cried Muhammad.

Big Time waved at Tony and the gas store manager. At first, it looked like his son couldn’t believe his eyes. But then he opened his mouth and, despite the words becoming lost in the din, Big Time could see him crying, “Dad!”

One of the sludge worms crested the murky-brown water between the bridge and the canopy. Big Time wondered how much higher the floodwaters would have to rise before the attendant ghost wind would be able to knock the two survivors into the drink.

“Do we have any kind of rope? Anything we could string across?”

Muhammad and Scott checked the trailer as Zakiyah went through the cab.

“Nothing but cords,” Scott yelled out. “I’m not banking your son’s life on our ability to build a rope out of them.”

Big Time’s mind raced. He had to do something. Tony might be all he had left. And there he was, just out of reach. It was maddening, as if God was punishing him even further. That’s when he got an idea.

“Scott!” Big Time said, banging on the trailer. “Come here!”

Scott hurried over to Big Time.

“How far do you think it is, bridge to canopy?”

“Twenty feet? Twenty-five? You’re not thinking they should swim it?”

“No, I’m thinking we build them a bridge. How fast can we get all those goddamn computers out of there and into the water?”

Scott stared at Big Time, realizing what he was proposing.

“You’re out of your damn mind.”

“Maybe, but it’s gotten us this far.”

Chapter 23

When Alan woke up, he found himself staring straight up at concrete. His head throbbed and his mouth was dry, as if he’d been under anesthesia. It took him a moment to recognize the odd, weightless feeling he was having as the result of the raft bobbing up and down on water.

Sineada and Mia had made it to an overpass. They’d docked the raft against a column, securing it as best they could by using Mia’s shoelaces to rope the makeshift boat to the rung of a service ladder. A good wave would probably be too much for the strings, but in the relatively calm water, they held fast.

Sineada was asleep, but Mia stared out over the water. Alan saw on his daughter’s face a look he’d often seen before but on her mother, not her. It was the stern, yet thoughtful gaze Zakiyah got when puzzling over a seemingly insurmountable problem. When something like that arose, everything but that problem got pushed aside until it was solved.

He’d only just seen the look the day before when he glanced over to her line as he was being marched away by the Deltech security guys. He knew in that instant that she was adjusting her mental landscape to see what her life would look like after she removed him from the picture.

“Mia…?” he asked weakly.

Mia was surprised to hear his voice, but her features softened as she smiled.

“Hey, Daddy.”

“Hey. Did you guys happen to come across any water?”

They had. Mia quickly crawled over and gave Alan a bottle.

“We found a truck up on a wall. They had a bunch of water bottles in the back.”

Alan tried to twist the cap off the bottle but found he didn’t have enough strength. Mia reached over, popped it off, and handed it back.

“Thanks,” Alan said, taking a lip. He nodded towards Sineada. “Is she okay?”

“I don’t know,” Mia sighed. “She got pretty hurt coming out of the attic, but she said she was fine. I don’t know if I believe her.”

That’s when Alan remembered hearing something as he came in and out of