The Collapse Box Set Read online

  The Collapse Boxset

  J.S Donovan

  Contents

  1. Heist

  2. Plan B

  3. Death Squad

  4. Fire Run

  5. Homecoming

  6. Unexpected Arrival

  7. Runaways

  8. Bridge

  9. Getaway

  10. The Trip

  11. Road Weary

  12. Forty-Seven Miles

  13. To Start Again

  14. Hallowed Days

  15. Dissenters

  16. Outskirts

  17. Wolves and Sheep

  18. Crimes and Punishment

  19. Traitor

  20. Cold Front

  21. Reunion

  22. Last Retreat

  23. Crumbling

  24. Rampage

  25. Uninvited Guests

  26. Rebellion

  27. The Ditch

  28. Jackpot

  Aftermath

  29. 8:36 A.M

  30. 9:11 A.M

  31. 11:57 A.M

  32. 2:01 P.M

  33. 4:17 P.M

  34. 7:12 P.M

  35. 9:45 P.M

  36. 11:00 P.M

  37. One Hundred and Fifty Miles

  38. Icy Tombs

  39. The Trade

  40. Gatekeeper

  41. Assignment

  42. Runner

  43. Down Under

  44. Pyre

  45. Tracker

  46. The Bell’s Toll

  47. The Stand

  48. Bound

  49. Dawn

  50. Walk

  51. Return

  52. Departure

  53. Homestead

  54. Community

  55. Route 29

  56. Ink

  57. Alone

  58. Mighty

  59. Blackout

  About the Author

  Copyright 2019 All rights reserved worldwide. No part of this document may be reproduced or transmitted in any form, by any means without prior written permission, except for brief excerpts in reviews or analysis

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  1

  Heist

  Like the eye of God, the late-afternoon sun watched New York City. Tall towers reached to the heavens. Below their long shadows, the city lived, breathed, and groaned with the sounds of over eight and a half million people. Police sirens screamed. Car horns filled the streets. Completely absorbed by their handheld devices, hundreds of thousands of locals strained their necks as they navigated the cluttered sidewalks. It was September 11, 2019.

  The windowless 2005 GMC Safari van sat in the Diamond District - a block of pricey jewelry stores east of Times Square. Haley Stone sat in the back of the van. She wore a men's business suit fitted to her size, a bald cap, and a short black wig matching Bruce Lee’s hairdo. Sunglasses hid her ocean blue eyes. She’d transformed herself into a man for the day. It was the best way to keep the cops off her trail. Leather gloves warmed her hands. The empty duffel bag rested on her lap.

  Her husband Dan sat across from her. A women’s trench coat cloaked his barrel chest. Trousers and pantyhose concealed his hairy legs, while a scarf and bug-like sunglasses masked his clean-shaven face. A blonde wig rolled down his broad shoulders. Caked with white make-up, Dan was disguised as a woman with porcelain skin. He was surprisingly convincing for a six foot, two inches tall bodybuilder with hands big enough to crush someone’s head.

  Haley flashed a nervous smile Dan’s way. Her heart raced like a virgin on prom night.

  Dan squirmed as he fixed his wedgie. “I hate this.” His voice was deep, slow, and manly.

  “What part?” Haley asked, her natural Texas twang lacing her accent.

  “The make-up, the bra, everything. It’s stupid. I look stupid.” Dan grumbled.

  Lawrence glanced at them from the driver seat. “Don’t be so hard on yourself. You’re a beautiful woman.”

  Dan grunted.

  Lawrence was also dressed like a woman. At five foot, seven inches tall, having high cheekbones and a lean frame, the disguise wasn't much of a stretch. Like Dan, bug-eye sunglasses covered a third of his face. He wore a double-breasted coat, women's business pants, and a brooch. White gloves covered his hand, hiding scars on his knuckles and misshapen digits from his many past fights. The little black purse leaning beside his seat was heavy.

  “Let’s just get this over with,” Dan complained.

  Haley calmed Dan with a kiss.

  She turned to Lawrence. “Ready?”

  A cop car cruised by them. The moment it left their sight, Lawrence said, “It's now or never.”

  Haley buried her fear and focused on the mission. They had one shot to pull this off. If they blew it, they lost everything. At forty-four years old, Haley had never felt more alive.

  Dan opened the van's sliding door and exited. Haley followed, stepping onto the sidewalk. The wind brushed her fake bangs against her forehead. She kept the bag at her side and walked to Jesse’s, an upscale jewelry store. Dan flanked her right side, and Lawrence flanked her left. Walking with style, they entered the front door.

  Half a dozen people browsed through the display cases. Most of them were wealthy old women burning holes in their husbands’ checking accounts. The cashier, a gentle little man wearing a turtleneck, stood by the counter with his hands folded behind his back. He smiled kindly at Haley and her crew.

  Dan stopped by the door, casually blocking it, while Haley and Lawrence stepped into the center of the store.

  Haley reached into the side pocket of her bag and pulled out a hammer.

  The cashier’s eyes widened. He opened his mouth to shout when Lawrence interrupted.

  “Everyone in the corner! Now!” Lawrence commanded, drawing a chrome .375 Magnum revolver and a frag grenade from his black purse.

  The people gasped and screamed. A few turned to the front door, only to see Dan guarding it.

  “Now! Now! Now!” Lawrence shouted. “Or people start dying!”

  Like a sheepdog, he herded the cashier and the patrons into the farthest corner of the store.

  All the while, Haley’s hammer smashed glass display cases. The duffel bag's strap ran diagonally across her chest and hung open at her belly. Moving quickly, she shoved handfuls of necklaces, earrings, and rings into the bag.

  Lawrence aimed the gun at various people and kept the grenade in plain view. “You touch your phone, and we all go boom.”

  Dan glanced over his shoulder. Outside, pedestrians strolled by, completely unaware of the robbery occurring on the other side of the tinted windows.

  Haley rushed to the display cases on the other side of the store. She focused on her surroundings. Her hands moved independently of her, grabbing fists full of priceless diamond jewelry. Before she knew it, the store was clean. No one was playing the hero.

  She signaled Dan. He opened the front door for her.

  “Stay put,” Lawrence told the terrified people as he jogged backward through the store. He stuffed the revolver and grenade into his purse and went out the door. Dan exited last.

  Haley checked her watch. One minute and twenty-eight seconds. Two seconds to spare. Nice, she thought as an overdose of adrenaline pumped through her. Eight months of planning for less than two minutes of work. She couldn’t complain. People on the street gave her funny looks. She reached the van with the fake license plate and twisted around, seeing Lawrence and Dan just a few yards behind.

  The traffic was busy, but that was to their advantage. The route to the safe house was prepped. The plan was going splendidly. Haley wasn’t going to count the hens before the roost, but she felt her confidence rising.

  Suddenly, a truck slammed into the back of her van, pushing it five feet forward and smashing its nose before the back fender of a parked car. Before a curse could depart from Haley’s lips, every car on the road hit each other as their engines died all at once. A car swerved to the side, bumping up on the sidewalk to avoid hitting other vehicles but almost running over a couple of pedestrians.

  Haley's jaw dropped.

  Within three seconds, she saw a car get wrapped around a light post, a person fly through a truck’s windshield, and an older man collapsed the sidewalk, having a heart attack. Every light and every billboard shut off.

  2

  Plan B

  Haley froze, looking at the carnage. Dan rushed to her, locked elbows, and escorted her away. She kept staring over her shoulder as Dan moved into an alley. Lawrence followed, hiding in the shade of the tall buildings.

  Screams and curses echoed through the street. People exited their cars and wobbled like drunks.

  Lawrence took off his sunglasses. “What the hell just happened?”

  Dan asked Haley. “You okay?”

  Haley shook her head.

  Dan gave her a quick hug. He relieved her of the duffel bag and slung it over his shoulder. “We’ve got to move.”

  “Dressed like this?” Lawrence exclaimed, gesturing to his women’s clothing.

  “Who’s complaining now?” Dan replied.

  “Our only means of escape is sandwiched, and we are dressed in drag with three million dollars’ worth of glass. I’d say it's a good time to complain,” Lawrence replied. “Why did the cars stop like that?”

  “EMP,” Haley mumbled.

  The men turned to her.

  “What?” Lawrence asked, both annoyed and scared.

  Haley glanced at him from behind her sunglasses. “Electromagnetic pulse. My fa
ther talked about this. It's made to disable every electronic device. Cars, cellphones, everything. Electronics in a Faraday cage and some older vehicles may still function, but we’ve got neither… I thought it would never happen.”

  Dan absorbed the information, his make-up covered face becoming stern. “How big is the blast radius?”

  “It could be the block. It could be the whole country,” Haley answered. “I don’t know. It depends on the bomb.”

  “EMP or not, we need to start thinking of a new plan. We’ve got one hundred miles between here and the safe house. I’m not doing that on foot,” Lawrence complained.

  Dan walked to the corner of the alley and peeked out.

  Bleeding and concussed, people helped one another to the sidewalk. The patrons from the jewelry store exited. A single cop helped a toddler out of a truck’s backseat. A woman screamed. A bone poked out of the side of her arm. Her husband shouted for a doctor, but no one responded. People tried their cell phones. Getting no response, they were forced to stop looking at their screens and start helping each other. Unintentionally, people gathered around Haley’s getaway vehicle, checking themselves for wounds.

  Dan dipped back into the alley. “There’s no way we’ll make it to the van.”

  Haley took deep breaths. She dealt with high-risk situations constantly. She told herself that she could overcome this too.

  Lawrence stopped pacing. “Wait. Does this EMP thing mess with the police too?”

  “If it’s as bad as I was told, no one escapes it,” Haley said dreadfully.

  She thought of her father. He was a good man with wholesome values, a nice farm, and a healthy dose of paranoia. One night, while he and Haley walked the muddy paths of his vast cattle ranch, he told Haley that society was built on a gentle fabric and as the years waned, it grew weaker. One day, it would tear, and only those prepared would make it out. Like thousands of others, her father was a prepper. From his buried box of automatic rifles to his twelve-by-fifteen underground bunker, he prepared for all sorts of attacks. All except the lung cancer that stripped him of his strength before shipping him to an early grave.

  In College Station, Texas, he taught Haley all that he knew about farming, animal husbandry, and survival. She ditched his advice to become a career criminal. If her father was correct about EMPs, she’d have months, maybe years without power.

  A dark smile grew on Lawrence's handsome face. “No cops. No communication. I say that we go on a little shopping spree.”

  “We stick to the original plan,” Dan said gruffly.

  “This is a one in a million chance to rob this city blind, and you want to settle for a single duffel bag?” Lawrence exclaimed. “Let's take a bite out of this Big Apple.”

  “What about the kids?” Haley asked.

  “Dang, Haley. I never said anything about robbing children,” Lawrence replied.

  She locked eyes on Dan. “Our children,”

  Dan replied, “If they stay inside, they’ll be fine.”

  “We need to get them,” Haley said.

  “It will destroy them to see us like this or with this,” Dan replied, gesturing to the bag full of ill-gotten gains.

  “Are you both this stupid?” Lawrence asked.

  The bickering couple channeled their anger his way.

  Lawrence opened his arms in a wide gesture. “Everything here can be ours.”

  “People are panicking,” Haley said. “They make dumb decisions when they’re desperate.”

  “Like leave their shops unattended,” Lawrence said.

  “Like attack us outright.” Haley said, “We’ve got enough, Lawrence.”

  “It’s nothing compared to what we could have,” Lawrence said.

  Dan replied, “Haley’s right. If we push the envelope, we could lose everything.”

  Lawrence was astonished. “I can’t believe you guys.”

  Haley said. “Right now, we need to leave before this entire city goes to hell, and it will, quicker than we like. If we get trapped in here when that happens, we won’t be getting out.”

  “You’re suggesting to take to the kids to the safe house?” Dan asked.

  Haley nodded soberly. “Once we have them, we’ll head to Greenhill.”

  Lawrence argued. “You’re wasting a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.”

  “Priorities, Lawrence,” Haley answered.

  It was roughly four and a half miles to Haley’s home. Keeping to the shadows, the three of them slipped between tall buildings and stepped out onto the opposite sidewalk. Crashed cars clogged streets in every direction. Store owners closed shop to help those on the street. A few scattered policemen directed people to the nearest hospital.

  Haley, Dan, and Lawrence moved at a brisk pace. Haley longed to get out of the cumbersome suit. She imagined the men were miserable in their disguises, too. If not for the gravity of the situation, their get-up would be quite funny.

  They crossed onto 5th Avenue, seeing the Trump Tower and other famous skyscrapers. People crammed on the streets. Many of them were running home. A group of businessmen waited outside of their office, chatting.

  Haley slipped through the crowd, knocking shoulders with various people as she tried to find her way off the busy road. Sweaty bodies pushed against her. People shouted into her ear. She glanced back, realizing that she had lost Dan and Lawrence in the crowd. She stopped walking and yelled their names. Her shouts were lost in the noise. Chewing on her lower lip, she hesitantly pressed forward against the sea of bodies. A small group of men in black paramilitary garb dashed into an alley across the street.

  A fat man in a business suit ran out of a nearby building, shouting. “...omb. Bomb!”

  Some of the people in the crowd twisted back to him while others shouldered their way forward. One such woman slammed into Haley, causing her to stumble.

  The fat man ran to the center of the road. “Bomb!”

  The crowd panicked and pushed into each other.

  The people swarmed around Haley, unintentionally touching her all over. She tried to stand against them, but she was fighting a tsunami.

  In the midst of pushing and shoving, Haley lost her wig. She reached for it --

  Ka-boom!

  Instant darkness.

  A sharp ringing noise penetrated Haley’s ears.

  She opened her eyes.

  A hazy grey mist masked the sky above and shrouded the world in a dense fog. Like snowflakes, paper debris drifted through the air. Haley coughed a lung full of chalky dust. She realized she was on her back. Ashy powder coated her clothes, face, and tight bald cap. She sat up. Her sunglasses were gone, leaving behind an undusted imprint on her face. Like discarded trash, a dozen bodies spotted the street and sidewalk. Most of the crowd was gone. God only knew how long she had been unconscious.

  Somewhere in the mist, the metal building groaned.

  Haley stood. Her legs felt like jelly. She stumbled a few steps, resting on a newspaper box. The sharp ringing sound persisted in her ears and caused her head to hurt. A nearby dead body was in two pieces. Haley tried not to look at it, but couldn’t draw her eyes away. Outside a funeral, she’d never seen a dead person.

  Boom!

  A nearby car exploded. Flames danced on its blackened frame. Oil leaked from other vehicles and puddled on the street. They took light as well, spreading a wall of fire to another vehicle.

  Haley stumbled down the sidewalk and coughed violently.

  A burned man suddenly appeared in front of her, holding his detached left arm in his right hand. “H-help me…”