by David Wilson
The main gate to the compound was closed, and the guardhouse was empty. The wrought iron fence was made to preclude adult size people from squeezing between the fence rods. Talon grabbed the thick outdoor doormat lying in front of the door to the guard shack. Carrying it over to the six-foot-high fence, he lay the mat over the pointed spikes of the fence. Gesturing to Ben to hand him his rifle, Ben handed over the rifle. Talon stepped over close to the fence and knelt down with one knee on the ground, and the other leg bent at a 90-degree angle. Motioning Ben to go ahead, Ben stepped up on Talon’s thigh and, using the doormat, rolled over the top of the fence.
Talon passed Ben’s rifle through the bars and followed it with his. Ben then knelt down and extended his knee forward through the bars so Talon could use it as a step stool. Stepping up onto Ben’s knee, and using the welcome mat, Talon was easily able to cross over the top of the bars.
“Building five is what we are looking for, Jake said her apartment was on the interior overlooking the pool. Keep up tight on me and do NOT shoot me in the back, you watch high, and I’ll take the lead and low,” ordered Talon. Ben nodded and moved into position. Talon wished again that they had taken the body armor of the sniper team, but Talon had not wanted to give the DHS goons any more reason to follow them or try too hard to catch them then they had to. But also, he knew where there was a good cache of supplies, which included body armor, not more than two miles from where they stood right now. Talon was planning on hitting it on their way out after they found Diane and her kid.
Staying tight to the first building Talon and Ben moved to the inner corner of the building and stopped to watch and listen for any signs of life. Talon cursed when he saw the red X on the kicked-in door of the first building. Moving more rapidly, they crossed the small courtyard next to the pool to building five. Talon didn’t waste any time with attempting to be surreptitious, he mounted the stairs to the second floor of the apartment building and looked at the four doors of the second floor. All four doors were ajar, and each had a red spray-painted X on them. Talon moved to the doorway of Diane’s apartment, hesitated for only a second before he entered the apartment with Ben close on his heels.
The first thing they noticed was the apartment was not trashed. Upon entering the first bedroom, there were indications that someone had packed quickly, but again the place was not torn apart. The second bedroom was a child’s room, and again it looked like someone packed in a hurry, or they were attempting to make it look as if someone had. Hmmm, thought Talon, something was not right, he couldn’t quite put his finger on it, yet, but the whole apartment just seemed, staged. Checking the rest of the apartment only took a couple of minutes. Returning to the kitchen, Talon leaned against the island as he let his eyes roam around the room. Walking over to the cabinets, he began opening them and doing a mental estimate of the food and water supplies still neatly arranged in the kitchen cabinets.
Asking Ben to go watch the front door, Talon roamed the apartment. This wasn’t the run of the mill apartment complex. The apartments were individually owned but were part of the co-op. Talon paced up and down the main hallway several times before realizing the hallway was too long for the number of rooms on the inner wall. Walking back to the living room, he turned and studied the hallway, then it dawned on him. Going into the first hallway room on the right, the room was set up as a small home office, measuring about 12 x 12. Coming out of the room, Talon moved to the point where the office wall should be. Walking down to the second room, he found it was a half bath, maybe six feet wide. Stepping back into the hallway, he realized there were about eight feet unaccounted for. Stepping back to the bookshelf on the right-hand side of the hallway, Talon spoke in a low tone, “Diane, your In-Law’s sent us to get you. Jake didn’t know you had a safe room built into your apartment. We are not going to tear into the wall because if you don’t want to go with us, we don’t want to reveal the location of the safe room. Jake is sick, or he would have come himself, and they are going to the Armory in Winchester to ride this thing out. My name is Talon, and the guy with me is Ben. We have four horses less than a mile from here, and a plan to get you and your son out to Winchester to be with your in-laws. You can’t stay here, more than likely they are going to move either military or DHS personnel in these apartments. We have to move at night to avoid the sweeps the military is conducting. So you have until tonight to decide what you are going to do. I do not know if you know what is going on or not, but the country has been hit with at least one EMP, and power is out everywhere in the lower 48, and that includes all vehicles. The military has been placed under the DHS for the time being, and they are rounding up all civilians into FEMA camps. We are under martial law, and it is illegal for a civilian to process firearms. We are armed, and we are not going to give up our weapons. You will be safe with your In-laws in Winchester at the armory. You….,” Talon trailed off as he heard a clank of something mechanical in the wall and the bookcase began the swing out into the hallway. Stepping back, he did not raise his M-4. Instead, he raised both of his hands, keeping his palms up so she could see he didn’t have any weapons in his hands. Talon was shocked into silence when the voice of a child came from the dark, “They took my Mom.”
Chapter Sixteen
Talon stared in shock, as a boy of about seven stepped from the shadow of the darkened safe room. For once, Talon was utterly speechless. Shaking himself, Talon asked, “How long has your mom been gone?”
“Two days, I have watched for her to come back on my IPad, but no one has been back since they took her and all the other people away,” replied the kid.
“Your name is Billy, right,” asked Talon, and the boy nodded his head, “Have you had anything to eat or drink since the soldiers took your mother?”
“Yes sir, the room has a bunch of food and water and some stuff my mom won’t let me touch, but that stuff is locked up. If I had a gun I would have stopped those soldiers from taking her, but she made me promise,” Billy said as tears glistened in his eyes, “she made me promise and swear that I would not come out of this room for anyone other than her or Grandpa Jake. She made me come in here, and she told me to wait that she was going to go talk to the military men that had pounded on our door. I was hoping Grandpa was with you, but you said Grandpa Jake sent you to get Mom and me. ”
“Well, Billy, you did the right thing by staying in the room like she said. Ben, that’s that guy over by the door, and I will take care of getting your Mom back, so we can all go to your Grandpa Jake’s,” Talon told the boy, “is it ok if I take a look at your safe room?”
Billy brightened up with pride at Talon, asking his permission to see the room. “Oh, yes sir, come on in, and I will show you how to work the cameras and everything.”
Stepping back into the living room, Talon gestured to Ben to follow him. Ben’s eyes got wide when he saw the boy and the open bookcase. Talon just held his finger to his lips and then introduced Ben to Billy. Billy was really excited when he realized that Ben was much younger than Talon. Talon smiled as Billy began talking faster and faster, explaining everything to Ben as he dragged him from shelf to shelf. Talon pulled the bookshelf closed, then closed the safe room door and locked it. As he closed the inner door, the overhead automatic low voltage lights came on and lit up the room.
Talon was impressed with the safe room set up. The door was a real vault door set in a wide steel frame. Even if someone found the hidden door, no mortal man was going to breach that door without the assistance of some explosives. Additionally, Diane had spent a good bit of money on the accommodations inside the safe room. Tuning out Billy’s rambling, I walked around the small room, taking note of all of the equipment. In one corner was a small chemical toilet, complete with a nice shower curtain type screen for some privacy. On each opposing wall were two single beds that folded up flush to each wall. One side was down, the bottom one showing signs that Billy had been using that one. The opposite walls racks were folded up, and a small card table was set up
with two folding chairs. On the table was a laptop computer and a coffee cup that held about half a cup of what appeared to be old coffee. On either side of the safe room door were stacks of bottled water and dehydrated meals.
Billy was finished briefing Ben, and I could tell Ben was impressed with all the safe room gadgets. Talon pulled out one of the folding chairs and turned his attention to Billy. “Billy, you said it was soldiers that took away your mother and everyone else in the complex,” asked Talon, “does the camera system record everything.”
Billy went over to his bed and picked up his IPad. He messed with the IPad for a few seconds then handed Talon the device. Talon hit the play icon and watched the short recording of two soldiers in uniform talking to Diane. The audible wasn’t very good, but the picture was clear. The discussion on the film turned hostile, judging from the body language, and the young woman turned to head back to her apartment. One of the soldiers grabbed her by her wrist. Wow, thought Talon, remind me not to do that, as he watched her turn back and drive her fist straight into his nose. Blood gushed from the soldier’s nose, but before Diane could do any more damage, her body went rigid, and she fell to the ground. Behind her in the camera frame was the other soldier, and he had a Taser in his hand, more soldiers appeared and flex cuffed Diane. As Diane recovered from the Taser shock, she began to attempt to fight loose of the flex cuffs and the soldiers holding her. This got her another pull of the trigger by the soldier with the Taser and down she went again. After a few seconds, two of the soldiers picked her up under the armpits, and she was dragged from the camera’s angle of view.
Between Talon and Ben talking with Billy and the reviewing of the videos Diane had made with the cameras located in the apartment and inner courtyard, Talon and Ben had a pretty good idea of how the DHS controlled troops were going about their roundup efforts. After Billy was asleep, Talon and Ben watched the video clip of Diane’s arrest several more times. Listening carefully to what little audio they could make out, the two compared notes and discussed several courses of action. While not being able to come up with a perfect rescue for Diane’s situation, they did agree they needed more information to decide what their next step was.
The conversation became a little heated when Ben had suggested that he should give himself up to one of the military groups gathering up people, so then he could look for her on the inside of the FEMA camp. Talon argued that Ben would immediately be marked to be assigned to one of the militia groups or to a work gang. Ben came back with the argument that they could sit here for a week or longer and never catch a glimpse of Diane.
One of the more promising plans had Ben, acting as a dispatch rider from the Winchester armory with a personal letter for the local commander asking for assistance in locating a person of interest. Talon was still thinking about that one. If they were dealing with only an armory commander, then he would definably go for it, but with DHS in charge, it wasn’t at the top of his list. The local DHS might just see an opportunity to gain a few horses and some equipment and just shoot the messenger out of hand.
Right now, Talon needed more information about the camp. He was operating blind, and he didn’t like it. Time to go and see if he could find out more about the layout of the camp. But right now, he needed some rest, and this was about the safest place he was going to find to get some rest. Stripping off his gear, he nodded at Ben and suggested that he get some rest also. Diane had the cameras set up with motion detection, and the alarm would wake them if anyone began poking around the apartment complex. He surprised himself, he thought he was too amped up to sleep, but his eyes became too heavy to keep open after he had gone over his route a couple of times. Laying down his maps, he closed his eyes and fell asleep within a couple of minutes.
Waking, Talon checked his watch and saw it was about 0200. Swinging his legs off the bunk, Talon stood and moved over to Ben. Billy was curled up next to Ben, and Talon really didn’t want to wake him up. Reaching out, he touched Ben on the ear, catching him with his hand as he began to rise up. Putting his finger to his lips, Talon told Ben what he was planning and for him to stay with Billy. With that finished, Talon returned to the rack he was using and began to put on the gear he would need to do his little recon of the FEMA camp. After double-checking all of his gear, he made sure his water bladder was full and completed a quick wipe down of all his weapons. Slipping on his skull crusher rig, Talon got it adjusted the way he wanted it, then added the PVS-14 to the mount. He moved to the door of the hidden safe room and after glancing at the small monitor to make sure there was no movement within range of any of the cameras.
Slipping out the door, he carefully closed the vault door after himself, again realizing that Diana had been capable and prepared to take care of her and Billy, enough that is if the military had not interfered. Just the construction alone was impressive. Pushing that away from his thoughts, Talon moved with caution, until he was back by the 1st building. Billy had told him the apartment complex main office was in building one, and that was where he was going to start.
Moving over to the front doors of the main office, he found the doors unlocked and wasted no time as he slipped into the lobby. Reaching up, he turned on his IR light and moved towards the reception desk. Quickly checking the desk for any keys, he was not surprised there were no keys. Most people keep their keys with them. However, he also knew people in the upper management that did not use the master keys daily, usually left them in their desks. Moving to the manager’s office, it only took him a couple of minutes to find a key ring that held six master keys. Each of the keys was marked with the first key reading main gate, and each subsequent key marked building 1, building 2, etc.
Talon exited the building and using the key for the main gate, he unlocked the pedestrian gate and departed the compound to first go by and check their horses and then to recon the FEMA camp. Moving carefully as he could, Talon set a steady pace back to the residential area where they had stabled their horses. Observing no one or signs that anyone was out and about, Talon approached the house they had left the horses at.
Talon stood and watched the house for several minutes before he approached the house and confirmed the gates and front door had not been tampered with. Entering the house, Talon stopped by the hot water heater and turned on the discharge nozzle. Walking to the kitchen sliding glass doors, he checked and made sure the water hose was still in the kids’ swimming pool and that the water was running. The horses had seen him and were gathered at the door. Talon grabbed the oats sack and slid open the patio door. Quickly pouring four piles to get the horses started, he divided up the remaining oats between all of the horses. Talon took the time to pet each of the horses and talked quietly to them as he gave each of them some attention. Waiting until the pool had refilled about halfway, Talon returned into the house and turned off the water hose. Glancing around while he thought, Talon decided that all was good and departed the burned-out house.
Once outside, he took a couple of minutes to study his map before folding the map and replacing it inside his vest. Pulling his face paint kit out, he applied his makeup and made sure his ghillie cape was in place. Talon double-checked that he had all of his gear then headed out for the George Mason Campus. As Talon walked alongside the paved road, he recalled the many times he had driven by the campus where the FEMA camp was located now. Talon had even attended one basketball game at the university back in the 1990s. From what he could remember and from the map, he should be able to get fairly close to the campus before he needed to worry too much.
As Talon was coming from the west of the campus, he had the cover of several large tracts of woods leading up to the athletic complex. By 0400, Talon was in place and could observe the activity taking place on the athletic fields directly behind the large basketball facility. Between the brush around his hide site and the use of his ghillie blanket, he was all but invisible. The military or FEMA had set up military-style canvas tents on both the track infield and the football stadium.
Around 0500, the camp began to show signs of life. Talon shut down his night vision and put the device and harness away. The sun would be up in the next 15 minutes, and it was already light enough to begin to see details with his regular binoculars. Many of the lanterns that had been lit along the pathways were being put out by the guards. The pathways led to a long line of port-a-johns on the northern end of the track field, between the living area tents and what Talon assumed was the chow hall set up in the basketball facility.
So far, Talon had observed three different color jumpsuits worn by the refugees. It appeared that men were mostly assigned blue, women red, and a small number of both men and women were wearing a khakis colored jumpsuit. He also noted there was some difference in the uniforms of the guards. So far, he had observed the DHS personnel in all-black military fatigues, guards in Army Combat Uniforms (ACU), FEMA personnel in khakis with red FEMA polo shirts.
The uniform issue of the refugees was somewhat explained when groups of refugees began to form up for breakfast in front of the basketball gymnasium. The refugee’s wearing brown jumpsuits turned out to be some type of squad leader. Nothing like the end of the world to get people to be compliant and not ask questions thought Talon.
