It's Harder This Way

by Travis Hill

  “I can see how that might be a problem,” I said, rubbing my chin in thought.

  “It’s not going to be a problem forever. The patrols will eventually carry our newest weapon, a sort of hybrid rocket launcher with enough range to knock out a Bull tower before wandering into its kill zone.”

  “Pretty big red flag for the Bulls when one of their towers goes offline or sounds an alarm. Or sounds an alarm then goes offline, which will probably make the Bulls send even more ships or ground units.”

  “We expect that. If the squads see limited reaction, say only a single shuttle arrives to survey the damage, they’ll take it out.” He held up his hand when I tried to protest that was like throwing kerosene on a gasoline fire. “Don’t worry, Lieutenant. Our people won’t be ordered to stand against enemy soldiers and air support. The goal is to see what the Bulls send out to recon the area. A single shuttle as a first response is light, so knocking it out as soon as it arrives most definitely should elicit a much more severe response.”

  “Okay, sir,” I said, still puzzled about the plan. “What’s the goal beyond that? Am I just missing the big picture?”

  “Of course,” he said with a laugh. “But that’s what I’m explaining. If I may?”

  He raised his bushy white eyebrows. I waved him on as if he were a maestro and I was his stage manager. I hoped whatever he was going to say wasn’t as insane as what he’d already told me. That tenuous feeling I had about the army actually doing something effective was growing weaker.

  “We’re not ready for any kind of head-on assault with the Bulls,” Pryor said. “We’re more than capable of meeting them head-on in some circumstances, but they would definitely retaliate with overwhelming numbers of both ground troops and air units. Which would eventually lead to them using their orbital weapons once they found out what we’re up to here. Until we’re ready for a serious confrontation in say… twenty more years, if not longer, we’re going to probe them continuously to learn what makes them tick. To see what patterns, if any, they use in their tactics. To see if they even have strategy. They might be so used to showing up, setting off some EMP weapons, then taking what they want without resistance that they haven’t had to develop a strategy.”

  “You think the Bulls are overconfident and won’t know how to fight back?” I asked. I hoped my voice wasn’t as incredulous as it sounded to my ears.

  Pryor laughed again. “No, Lieutenant. Stop looking at me like I’m a crazy old man with supervillain plans. Like I said, maybe in twenty years, maybe fifty, maybe never, we’ll have enough of us around with the right training and armaments to strike a killing blow. Or at least a crippling blow and have some momentum. But if you think we’re not capable of doing much more than annoying a single Bull outpost, you’re right.”

  I hid my surprise at his admission that his plan was too crazy to work for at least two decades—if ever. Part of my surprise was his use of the word “supervillain.” My mind drifted back to the old days when comics, superhero movies, and video games dominated my personal bubble. It was a term I hadn’t thought of in twenty-three years. It was an accurate description of how I’d begun to feel about the general’s plans. I remained silent, knowing there was more to the mission.

  “You seem like an extremely intelligent person,” Pryor continued. “And I can still see you’re worried that I am a crazy old man. But think about it. With your help we can expand Base Charlie, keeping it almost entirely underground so it never looks like more than a small community at the most from the outside. Or the air. Or from space where the Bull mothership is still parked.

  “Expanding the base means expanding our borders, which means pulling in new recruits. Most people outside of places like Base Charlie and The Farm are living hard. Some are barely living at all. You’ve seen the amenities we have here. Tomorrow you’ll visit C2 where the civilians are. C2 is just as important for the fact that it’s a feeder program for us. None of those kids growing up with hot showers, hot meals, and warm beds are going to run off into the wilderness and join a gang of brigands. Whoever doesn’t want to be a soldier can move into C2 as long as they follow the rules.

  “Now that we’ve established contact with one of the largest communities in the Northwest, we’re hopeful that word will get back to The Farm and others will feed into us as well. We’re not looking to drain your community and weaken it. Our borders will eventually expand beyond The Farm—”

  “No offense, General,” I said, raising a hand to break into his speech. “But The Farm isn’t going to go along with that. At all. You might think you can convince me or someone else of that, but I can assure you right now they’ll never go for it. Recruiting at The Farm on a regular basis? I don’t see anyone having a problem with that once we tell them it’s a legit operation down here. It might even go easier if we get some kind of trade network going and there’s goodwill and diplomacy on all sides. But I’d be hesitant to give them such a recommendation if your plans are to swallow up The Farm and any other communities who are between you and whatever your border goals are.”

  He stared at me for a long time. His face was neutral and his eyes were hard, but he didn’t seem angry. More like a thoughtful annoyance. He pursed his lips and leaned forward in his chair.

  “I hear you, Greggs,” he said. “Loud and clear. To be honest, I truly did think it would be easy to convince everyone along the way. There aren’t any outposts of humanity anywhere near the size of The Farm within three hundred miles. Portland might have one hundred thousand humans left in it, but it’s a chaotic war zone where boundaries constantly change—sometimes hourly—based on who took territory from whom on any given day. Redding is completely gone, nothing but a blackened landscape of rubble. The Bay Area is much like Portland other than the twenty-mile perimeter around Base Echo.

  “My point is, most small hamlets or villages we’ve run across in the past were more than happy to throw their lot in with us because we have far more to offer than they’d get by going it alone. The Farm… from what I understand, you’re the law up there and for a pretty large area around you. You’ve got what? A couple thousand people?”

  I nodded in agreement, not wanting to reveal our true size but letting him know we definitely numbered at least a couple thousand.

  “It’s not a stretch to think they’d be opposed to giving up control of all they built over the years. And even though that’s not what we want, it’s how they would see it, right?”

  I nodded again.

  “But if we worked out an agreement that our soldiers stay out of their territory but arrive when there’s a call to arms to defend it, and The Farm would help us defend our northern borders around their own borders…?”

  I shrugged. It sounded like a good plan, but I couldn’t speak for The Farm. I could do my best to convince Tony, who could help me convince Jenna, the council, then the rest of the citizens. I worried once again that I was being drawn into the army’s plans instead of focusing on how to eliminate them.

  “The Farm can produce a lot of things you can’t here at Base Charlie,” I said. “Base Charlie can produce the tech we can’t at The Farm. Asking them to help you defend your territory is likely going to be a tough sell, and especially if you plan on gobbling up everything and leaving The Farm as an island within your borders.”

  “They aren’t interested in expanding their own sphere of influence?” Pryor asked. He seemed surprised we’d grown to our present size without designs on dominating the former state of Oregon.

  “No. Just as you said, it takes more bodies to push boundaries out further from the base. By choice, The Farm grew only as big as it needed to. We left individuals and the other small towns alone for the most part, not asking them to pledge allegiance to us. We do make it clear if they want to trade with us and want protection they have to follow some rules. Nothing too serious. Give us information about the goings-ons in their area. Not attack our patrols or our traders or any traders. Don’t let us find out they kee
p slaves. That sort of thing.”

  “I see,” Pryor said, leaning back and scratching his cheek. “Peace-loving hippies?” he asked.

  “Something like that,” I replied with a grin. “We do grow some pretty potent marijuana. But we also have surplus crop yields most years because we’re damn good at growing things. The Farm is a great place to trade with, but they don’t want any part of your fight with the Bulls. If you don’t turn this into a pissing contest or power struggle or a war of threats, you’ll attract more of us. Maybe down the road your civilians can migrate farther north to keep them away from the danger this base presents.”

  General Pryor nodded and scratched his chin again. He seemed in deep thought. I chastised myself for vocally suggesting Base Charlie’s civilian population move north. On one hand, in a perfect world, it was a great idea. A few hundred extra citizens with ties to the army meant plenty of trading opportunities. It also meant the meshing of two communities would force both to protect each other without one becoming parasitic. But we didn’t live in a perfect world. We lived in a shattered world of warlords, hippie communes, and crippled armies trying to regain their former glory.

  “I think that’s a bit far in the future, though,” I said, ready to change the subject back to the Bulls. “What about right now? You can’t recruit and expand if you get everyone killed by annoying the Bulls to the point they decide to roll in with an army of their own.”

  “Again, our plan is only to probe the Bulls for a number of years to see how they react. We’re smart enough to make sure we do it far away from Charlie or any of the other populated areas near their towers. They caught us by surprise twenty-three years ago. We’ll never be able to catch them by surprise like that, but if we stick with it long enough, we’re hopeful we’ll see a pattern emerge, a weakness present itself, or an opening for us to do something other than live on our knees as they rape what’s left of the planet while we kill each other for them.”

  “What happens if you blow up a tower and they send a heavy response and the squad is eliminated?” I asked.

  “Then we’ll know to not do that again.” I watched his face to see if he was making a joke, but he looked more than serious.

  “And in the meantime, we send out more patrols, recruit more people, chop more wood, build more beds, make more babies…?”

  “Essentially.”

  I shook my head. “I’m not sure that’s the best idea I’ve ever heard.”

  “I’m not sure either,” he said, surprising me again. “But if you have a better plan, then I’m all ears, Lieutenant.”

  I couldn’t say anything to that. I had zero plans other than our original plan to destroy Base Charlie. That plan was now more of a bad idea and was about to be shelved. I’d spent the last three weeks thinking about what General Pryor and I just discussed, minus the knowledge of even more advanced weapons than assault rifles and scopes. I shrugged my shoulders.

  ***

  “So what’s the plan?” Dru asked as we sat with our backs against the waterfall’s rocky cliff.

  “Jesus, what’s with you and your need to know the plan?” I asked with more annoyance than I intended.

  “Oh, I don’t know, Evan,” she said with heavy sarcasm. “Maybe the fact we’ve been here three weeks and you still haven’t told us what we’re supposed to do other than go along with whatever the army tells us to? Didn’t you hear me when I told you Larry and Jackie are running out of food? What the hell did you talk to Pryor about? Or did you just sit around and smoke weed and talk about the old days?”

  “Druscilla, that’s enough,” Tony said, his tone edging into danger.

  “No, it’s not enough,” she said, turning her venom on him. “I get it that murdering everyone here is no longer the plan. But I don’t get why we’re still here. Half of us want to stay, the other half want to go home since we’re not going to go through with the mission. I’m starting to suspect you two have been brainwashed by these assholes to believe you really can take on the Bulls.”

  I held up a hand. “Look, Dru—”

  “Don’t fucking patronize me, Evan,” she said. Hissed would have been a better description. “I just want an answer.”

  “If you want to go home, go home,” Tony said. “No one will force you to stay.”

  “I want to go home,” she said. “I’m staying until we make a decision just in case things go bad. If you and Evan and the others want to stick around and play soldier and go fight the aliens, just tell me. Tell us. This limbo shit isn’t a good way to live.”

  I spent the next thirty minutes repeating what General Pryor and I talked about the day before. Dru looked ready to both punch me in the face and bolt back to The Farm. Tony said nothing, his expression unreadable. I admitted that Pryor’s plan sounded like a foolish fantasy I might have dreamed up when I was a teenager, but I also felt strongly about some parts of it.

  The Farm truly could benefit from some kind of agreement or even just a regular caravan. Base Charlie and Base C2 could benefit from new bodies and regular trade. Dru argued neither the council nor the majority of citizens would go along with anything involving the army after the almost unanimous vote to form a small army of our own to infiltrate and destroy Base Charlie. Tony agreed with Dru on half of the issues and me on the other half. It was a classic three-way argument that couldn’t get a majority decision about the best way forward.

  We broke up our meeting soon after. Dru’s feelings were hurt and she refused to even look at me. I caught up to her near the underground entrance to try and apologize but she wanted nothing to do with me. I tried again once we were inside but she seemed more upset at the way I gravitated toward Colonel Collins after seeing her in the hallway.

  I couldn’t help myself. After being brushed off by Dru a second time, I immediately beelined toward the colonel. I didn’t want both women pissed at me at the same time and felt like I had a better chance at making friends with Rebecca Collins than I did in salvaging my friendship with Druscilla.

  6. Decisions of the Heart

  “What do you want?” Collins asked, her eyes hard and tone frigid.

  “You know what I want,” I said, going for broke since she’d hinted to me on the first day she was interested. Even if every moment with her after that had been torture.

  “I wondered when you would grow some balls, Greggs,” she said gruffly as she grabbed my hand and led me toward the stairs.

  “Just like that, eh?” I asked while trying to keep pace with her.

  She stopped and turned to me. “Do you want to fuck or do you want to be a smartass who spends the night playing with himself?”

  “Okay, okay,” I grunted. “Lead on. I’m sorry.”

  She had only taken a step with me in tow before stopping again.

  “Stop apologizing for everything.”

  “Okay.”

  I decided to leave it at that. She took us down the stairs and past the barracks, which was a relief. The short cubicles gave their denizens a tiny slice of privacy, which was enough to engage in sexual activity without feeling shameful and guilty but not enough to do anything more than breathe without ten soldiers hearing it. Collins led me down another set of stairs to a narrow hallway with a number of closed doors on each side. We walked until we came to an open door.

  “In you go, Lieutenant,” she said and gave me a shove that made me stumble.

  Before I could turn around, she stepped in, kicked the door closed, then reached around and began to unbutton my pants. The urge to once again ask just like that, eh? almost gained control of my brain but my instant reaction to her hand sliding up and down my shaft destroyed any attempts at rational thought. I thought I might explode until she spun me around and shoved me down onto the cot.

  When she stepped forward, a hungry look in her eyes, I unbuttoned her shirt without a word. I kept my face turned up to hers, never breaking eye contact as I unbuckled her belt and unzipped her fatigues. The second they slid to the floor she stepped
out of them while pushing me onto my back. The way she looked down at me after straddling my face both frightened me and turned me on to the point my extremities felt like burning torches.

  Rebecca Collins was a woman who knew what she wanted and had likely spent her life taking it whenever she could. She was rough with me for the first few minutes until she settled into a gentle rocking motion, my hands locked onto her buttocks to occasionally position her so I could breathe. I closed my eyes and visualized our actions as if I were outside of my body. I opened them again when she locked her fingers into my hair and pressed down hard enough to make my jaw ache. I held on while she spasmed, gently letting her slide off and lay next to me when her body was fully spent.

  We stared at each other for a while until our breathing returned to normal. Her hand wrapped around me and she grinned, her white teeth and bright eyes standing out in the dim light, the rest of her smooth, dark skin blending in with the shadows. Or maybe it was the fluttering of my eyelids while she gently stroked me. My world tilted sideways when I felt her tongue flick across my stomach. I nearly jerked myself out of her grasp but she held on and took me in her mouth, one hand still stroking while increasing the suction. I held on as long as I could but felt the train arrive then blow past the station as I bucked and shivered, my hand now gripping her head since her hair was braided tightly against her scalp.

  I couldn’t help the laughter that escaped me even though I knew it would ruin the moment and bring back Colonel Collins—who didn’t seem to care for me too much. She looked back to me, a grin on her lips, then began to laugh either with me or at me.

  “I’m sorry,” I said after getting my giggles under control.