Every eye in the room was on her when she hung up. Mentally she shook herself. “Heinie,” she said, “call FEMA and get me in touch with Colonel Cosetta. I want to know the major features of their evacuation plans as soon as she can fax them, complete with time tables. I’m no geophysicist, but there’s going to be a tidal wave like nothing ever seen by human eyes.”
68
Wrap-Up
A team from the sheriff’s department arrived at the equipment yard just before the ambulances from the county hospital. Two highway patrolmen and six terrorists were dead. Four patrolmen and seven terrorists were wounded, all seriously or critically except the driver of the truck. The bystanders had hit the ditches at the first sign of armed intruders; only one had been killed and one wounded. Two apparently unwounded gunmen had fled across a field. The healers helped the wounded—police, bystanders, and gunmen. (Later, identification of Shaughnessy’s and Masterson’s corpses would give a new starting place and direction to the investigation.) The unwounded bystanders who hadn’t already left were held as material witnesses.
No tour people had been hurt. They were, however, emotionally drained. The only one of the tour group whose aura was still visible to Lee was Lor Lu, and even his was not as large or strong as it had been.
Sergeant Lavender had been in the bus when he’d first heard the chopper, and had just gotten out when the shooting started. By the time he’d run around the end of the machine shed, pistol in hand, most of it was over. Now he sat in a patrol car, its police radio on.
Another Highway Patrol car pulled in. Lavender was told by radio to work with a team from the Arkansas Bureau of Investigation, who were on their way by helicopter. The newly arrived Sergeant Hood would take charge of the Millennium people.
While they waited for the ABI, Lavender briefed Hood on the Millennium group and their situation, as he saw it. Lor Lu sat in. Shortly after the ABI arrived, the acting governor called via Highway Patrol radio, asking for whoever was in charge.
“This is Sergeant Elrod Hood. . . . Yes, sir, I just took command from Sergeant Lavender. He’s been with these Millennium people since they were taken into custody, but he’s working with the ABI folks now. The Millennium folks would like to leave, head back home to Colorado. . . . No, sir, they don’t appear to. According to Sergeant Lavender, didn’t any of them actually see the firefight. They were in their bus, watching the news on television, about the meteor . . . No, sir. The bus was parked behind a big old Butler shed . . . That’s a big metal machine shed, sir. All the shooting was on the other side of it . . . Yes, sir. I’ll send for him right now.”
A week earlier, Sergeant Hood had been hostile toward Millennium, and the healings hadn’t conspicuously changed that. They had, however, undermined it at a subliminal level. What had made the crucial difference was what he’d seen and heard on TV at the substation: the guru’s enumeration of the governor’s felonies, Marius Cook’s deadly psychotic break, and finally the asteroid. Now he sent a patrolman to bring the ABI lieutenant over.
The governor spoke briefly with the lieutenant, then asked for Hood again. “Sergeant,” he said, “is Mr. Lu with you?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Good. Mr. Lu, as soon as the medical examiner releases it, the State will turn Mr. Aran’s remains over to whomever you designate.
“Meanwhile I’m going to let you folks go, with your own driver. Sergeant Hood and one of his officers will ride with you, and two patrol cars will escort you. The only direction I want you to go is west on I-40. Stop and fuel up at the next truck stop. The sergeant will know where it is. You’ll stay there till National Guard helicopters meet you. They’ll escort you on west, on the interstate.
“Now I-40 passes through North Little Rock. Do not stop there. Drive right on through. This city has gone totally bonkers. We’ve got riots, shooting, arson fires . . . Just now it’s the insanity capital of the known universe, and it’s not a whole lot better in any other large town in the state. I suppose because Arkansas is where Mr. Aran got shot. Anyway, I want you to keep on rolling till you hit Oklahoma. I’ll see if I can’t arrange with Governor Eagle to provide you with another escort at the state line.