The day after: An apocalyptic morning (98 page)

              Now, Jack could see that what he'd assumed was a dangerously mad mission had been worthwhile after all. On the screen before him, as he panned the FLIR back and forth, he could clearly see nearly sixty houses that were lit up with the white glow that betrayed a heat source within them. In addition, he could plainly see the white figures of twenty to thirty people walking here and there on the streets.

              "What do you see?" asked Skip, who, when he dared to avert his eyes from the instruments, could see nothing but the faintest of glows before him.

              Jack gave him a quick summary of the overview and then began to go into more detail. "There's a group of buildings that looks like an elementary school near the south side," he said. "That's where most of the activity seems to be. Most of the occupied houses are surrounding it. I have brightness coming from the biggest building in the school."

              "The cafeteria?" Skip asked.

              "I think so," he agreed. "And there's also a glow coming from the smaller building next to it. There are two guards standing in front of that building. They both have rifles - looks like assault weapons of some sort."

              "What's the sex of the guards?" Skip asked. "Can you tell?"

              "One male and one female it looks like," he said. "They're talking to each other but they seem to be paying fairly good attention to what they're doing."

              "Coed guard teams," Skip said with a smile. For some reason this idea comforted him. "Any other people with guns about?"

              "Not that I can see," Jack said, panning back and forth. He directed Skip to turn to the left so he could get a better view of the north side of town. He took shots of all there was to see there and then began looking at the hills surrounding the town for guard positions. It took a while but eventually he found two different sets. "I got two people in the treeline near the top the hill on the east side of town," he said when he spotted the first one. "I can only get a glimpse of them between two of the trees, and only from the shoulders up. It looks like they're pretty well hidden in there."

              "They must've seen us coming the other day when we did the first fly-by," Skip said reflectively. "They probably have radio communications in place down there and warned everyone in town to take cover somehow. That must be their defense; to hide and pretend they're an abandoned town if an unknown force probes them."

              Skip hovered for the next ten minutes, turning this way and that and allowing Jack to film a complete infrared view of El Dorado Hills.

              "All right," Skip said when they were done. "Let's get ourselves home. They're probably worried about us." He increased the lift of the rotor blades, bringing them up to an altitude of 6200 feet above sea level, a height that put them well above any peaks between the valley and Garden Hill. It was also high enough that the El Dorado Hills residents would not be able to hear their engine as they passed over.

              "Are we gonna go back to Auburn and backtrack?" Jack asked.

              "Negative," Skip replied. "Keep the FLIR on Highway 50 and we'll follow along it until we get to Cameron Park. Once we get to the airport I literally can fly us blind back home. Those sixteen flights I did back and forth from there let me lock in the exact course."

              "The exact course?"

              "From the airport, if I fly straight on a heading of 54 degrees, I will pass right over the Garden Hill bridge. Of course the wind would have to be factored into the equation if there was any, but we seem to be a little short on that lately." Since about impact+45 days, there had been almost a complete cessation of air movement in the atmosphere as temperatures became relatively equalized around the globe under the thick cloud cover. Strangely enough, Maggie, Christine's newest friend, had provided this information to Skip and the others. Maggie had minored in meteorology back in college while she had been waiting to meet her Prince Charming.

              "I see," Jack said, filing this fact away in his rapidly growing lexicon of aircraft knowledge.

              Once they were underway, Skip asked him if he had been studying the materials he had prepared for him.

              "Yep," Jack assured him. "I've got them memorized. Coming up on a curve, bank five degrees left."

              "Banking," Skip answered, making the turn. "How we looking?"

              "A little too much," he said. "Go back right about a degree. There you go. On course."

              "So tell me about the collective," Skip said.

              "The collective?" Jack asked.

              "That's right. What does the collective control on this aircraft do? If you've memorized the materials, you should know this."

              Jack smiled confidently. "The collective," he said. "It is..."

              "Do you want to put a nightgown on?" Janet asked as she and Sherrie entered the spare bedroom where she would be staying.

              Sherrie had a towel wrapped around her body and one wrapped up in her wet hair. She was leaning heavily against Janet to avoid putting weight upon her injured leg, which was still free of the improvised cast and would remain so for the duration of the sleeping hours. The process of movement from one room to the other was made more difficult by the fact that both women had consumed four glasses of wine in the past hour. "No," Sherrie replied. "I'm gonna sleep naked tonight in honor of my new freedom. I've had those damn nightgowns on for too long."

              Janet giggled. "You're the boss," she said, guiding her over to the side of the neatly made twin bed "But don't be surprised if Paul finds some reason to come in here and check on you half a dozen times tonight."

              This made Sherrie blush in embarrassment. She had of course noticed Paul's recent attention to her body whenever he examined her. His eyes always seemed to be focused on her braless breasts or between her legs. Truth be told, she actually encouraged his eyeball explorations, finding them exciting in their forbiddeness. She often kept her gown just a little higher than necessary and her legs just a little wider than necessary during such times. She had not been aware that Janet had noticed this as well. At least not until now. She went with her instincts in response, which was to deny. "I don't think Paul would do anything like that," she said with a tone of dismissiveness that didn't come across very well. "Besides, who would want to look at this broke up body anyway."

              Janet smiled knowingly. "Give me a little credit, Sherrie," she said. "He's been looking at your pussy every chance he gets. And do you really think he needs to feel up your leg twice a day?"

              Sherrie honestly didn't know what to say. In the olden days such words would have meant a war was being declared and would have been spoken in a threatening tone. That was not the case here though. Janet was speaking lightly of these things, as if they were cutely amusing traits.

              "Here, let me pull the covers back for you," Janet said, bending down and doing so. "In with you now."

              Slowly Sherrie was lowered to the bed, keeping her injured leg as straight as possible. Janet then reached down and lifted up on her feet, helping her swing them up onto the Mickress. This served to open her crotch up almost obscenely for a moment, giving Janet a premium view right up under her towel. She did not avert her eyes as a woman typically would under such circumstances. Instead, she took a good hard look at what was revealed.

              "I can see why Paul likes to look at it," she said with a smile. "You really do have a nice little slit there."

              "Uhhh... well... thanks. I mean... uh..." Sherrie stammered, unsure just how to handle such a situation. Janet had seen her vagina a hundred times when she'd bathed her and helped her with the bedpan. Why was she making comment on it now? And why was she talking about it in such a decadent manner?

              "Here," Janet said, reaching down and tugging on the towel. "Give me that thing so I can put it in with the laundry for tomorrow."

              Sherrie raised up a bit to let the towel come free of her, leaving her completely naked atop the sheet. She quickly reached down and grabbed the covers, concealing herself. Janet did not try to stop her, although she feared that she might.

              "I got a lot of your personal stuff out of your house, just like you asked," Janet told her, sitting on the edge of the bed.

              "Thanks."

              "I got your make-up supplies, your razor, your deodorant, some of your clothes and underwear." She paused, giving a wicked look. "I also got your toy out of your nightstand and brought it over."

              "My... toy?" she said slowly, hoping that Janet wasn't referring to what she thought she was.

              It was a hope that turned out to be a vain one. "Your toy," she said, reaching over and opening up a drawer on the nightstand. She reached in and pulled out a nine inch vibrating dildo. "It's a nice one. Top of the line."

              Sherrie was familiar with this particular dildo since she had purchased it herself at an adult store in Citrus Heights about a year before the comet. It was the only thing that had given her any orgasms throughout her married life. "Oh my God," she said, appalled at seeing her most personal possession in Janet's hand.

              Janet smiled. "Nothing to be embarrassed about," she said lightly, making no move to put it away. "These things are the staple of trophy wife syndrome, aren't they? Remember when we went through the empty houses looking for supplies? We found dildos of various shapes, sizes, and colors in almost every master bedroom. And in those houses that we didn't find them, it was probably only because they'd hidden them too well. Hell, I got one myself."

              "You... you do?"

              "Of course I do," she said. "I was a trophy wife of sorts wasn't I? I used to bust that thing out whenever Frank went to sleep before me and fire it up. I went through at least a set of batteries a week. How else is a girl gonna get a good come?"

              Sherrie started laughing. She was still acutely embarrassed and more than a little uncomfortable with the direction the conversation was going, but she couldn't help herself. "I thought I was a pervert," she giggled. "I used to hide that thing in the bottom of my sewing cart so my husband wouldn't find it. I would've died if I'd thought the other women knew I had one. I mean, we used to joke about it sometimes, but no one ever admitted to having one."

              "The suburban housewife's best friend," Janet said, still holding the object in question in her hand. "Mine's just a standard ten dollar model. This one looks like it must've run you fifty bucks at least."

              "Sixty-five," Sherrie said, making both of them laugh. "That's genuine lamb skin it's lined with. It even has a warmer in it to make it... you know... warm."

              "Oooh," Janet said, giving it a few strokes with her hand. "I thought it felt awfully nice. You must've missed it during your convalescent period, huh?"

              "Well..." she said, her face flushing brightly again.

              "You should've asked for it. I would've got it for you. I mean, the hand is okay in a pinch, but nothing beats the old latex friend when it comes to relieving the pressure. Or at least nothing but a good, real one that's attached to someone that knows how to use it."

              "I wouldn't know," Sherrie said. "I've never come from the real thing before."

              "Never?"

              She shook her head. "Never," she said. "I've only slept with four guys in my life and none of them were all that good at it."

              "That's a shame," Janet said sympathetically.

              "Isn't it though? And you're right. I really did miss my friend while I was in the community center. It seems that this last week I've really been wanting him."

              "So I did good bringing it over," she said brightly. She let her hand drop down to Sherrie's leg and began rubbing the head of the dildo back and forth across it over the covers. "I bet you want to use him now, don't you? After the bath and the wine and all. I always found that that's when I was the horniest."

              Sherrie looked at her friend's hand nervously, watching as the lambskin dildo pushed against her thigh. What was going on here? Surely Janet wasn't coming on to her, was she? "Well..." she said carefully, "maybe a little later."

              "Oh come on, Sherrie," Janet said, using her other hand to tug on the covers. Before Sherrie had a chance to realize what was happening, they were down below her waist, revealing her nakedness. "Why don't you play a little? You deserve it after all you've been through." She began to slide the dildo over her breasts, making the nipples hard.

              "Janet," she said, almost paralyzed from the turn things had taken. "I don't really... I mean I'm not a..."

              "Shhh," Janet said, sliding the dildo between her breasts and trailing it slowly down her stomach. "Just relax a little. I'm here to help you, just like I always was."