by Mark Tufo
“That’s not fair, Beth. We both knew what their intentions were.”
“My point exactly, Deb.”
“We can’t just shoot them! I don’t want anything to do with this.”
“Little late now, my friend,” Beth said as she punched the accelerator again. The two men were desperately trying to cling to anything they could get a hand or foothold on, with little success. The men’s legs began to drag on the pavement. Their begging turned to screams of pain.
“Well, then shoot them! You can’t just drag them to their deaths!" Deb screamed. Beth picked up the gun and pointed it right at the man on the driver’s side. He could do little more than flinch; there was nowhere for him to go. Beth’s arm began to shake from fear. She wasn’t sure if she could pull the trigger looking straight into someone’s eyes.
“Is your seatbelt on, Deb?”
“Yes, but wh…” Deb never finished her question as she felt herself being flung towards the front of the car while the seatbelt dug deep into her shoulder and waist. She was about to complain of the pain to Beth when she heard the splintering of bones from both sides of the truck.
At first, Deb thought Beth had pulled the trigger, so loud was the snapping of bone and the tearing of cartilage. Deb thought it sounded like dry twigs being broken to start a campfire. The men had no restraints as the girls did, and were quickly thrown towards the front of the vehicle. Their arms had been wrenched free but at a savage price. Both men’s arms had been torn completely from their sockets. Smashing onto the front quarter panels hadn’t done them any good either.
“Well, I didn’t kill them but they’ll be out of commission for a while,” Beth whispered. Deb wasn’t sure if she should respond, she really didn’t know what to say anyway. Beth lingered for a few more seconds to make sure that neither one of the men were faking before she took off. Deb couldn’t figure out how they could possibly be. They looked like a pair of mismatched freaks. The man on the driver’s sides shoulder, or what was left of it, appeared to be hanging down somewhere in the middle of his chest.
The man on her side was even more grotesque. His arm was bent two more ways than it was ever designed to be. The man’s wrist had been broken in such a way that the back of his fingers were touching his forearm; and, below his elbow, his arm jutted out at a ninety degree angle. Deb thought she might become physically ill if she kept looking at it. Unfortunately human nature dictates differently. Deb didn’t stop looking until he became nothing more than a small speck in her vision, albeit a small distorted speck, but a speck nonetheless.
“Yeah, I guess stopping wouldn’t be such a good idea,” Deb said with a far off look in her eyes. “Are we going to have enough gas?”
“Well, we’ve got four more five-gallon jugs of gas in the back, but this truck is a pig on fuel. I don’t think so. We’re going to have to try to find a place to get some more. But I don’t think that we’re going to get as lucky as we did the last time.” The girls had taken Deb’s neighbors’ truck. It had been her neighbors’ baby. He only drove it on weekends, when he was going camping, fishing or hunting, hence the gun. It had been locked up in his shed in the backyard. Otherwise, it would have been taken or destroyed a long time ago by marauders or gangs or whatever the hell you wanted to call them.
Deb couldn’t understand it, for the most part, the people had been good citizens their entire lives, speeding tickets mainly being their biggest run-ins with the law. And now, these same people didn’t think twice about looting, or raping or worst of all, just flat out murder.
“I always considered Lord of the Flies a piece of fiction,” Deb said reflectively.
“What are you talking about, Deb? Have you been breathing in too many gas fumes?” Beth snorted.
“No, I just mean I never really thought that what happened on that island could ever really happen in real life. That’s all. People have gone completely nuts.”
“Well, you got a taste of that on the ship, didn’t you? Look at what some of those animals became. I hate to call them animals because even animals wouldn’t do that to their own kind.”
“And then there’s Mike, cutting through the gloom like a knight in shining armor.” Both girls stopped talking for the moment as they reflected on their lost love. Then they both realized why they were making this journey in the first place: to see him, and find out which one he loved more. Deb broke the silence first.
“I’d rather have only a piece of him than nothing at all. I don’t know if I would have anything worth living for if he rejected me.” Beth sympathized with Deb. She felt that pit lodged in her stomach too. If Mike picked Deb, what would she do? Where would she go? She couldn’t stay there; she’d be on her own, the thing she dreaded most.
“I feel the same way, Deb. I don’t think I could handle losing him. I’d rather have a piece of him too than to lose you or him.”
“Oh Beth,” Deb said as she leaned over to give Beth a hug and wipe away the tears that were beginning to form in her eyes.
Chapter 31
“Sir?” There was a quiet rap on the Paul’s door. It was soft enough but it echoed deeply through his migraine. “Sir, are you still awake?”
“What is it, Corporal?” Paul asked as he raised his head up from the cradle of his hands.
“Sir, there is someone here to see you, and he is very adamant.”
“Corporal, I’ve had a very long day at it doesn’t appear that it is going to get any shorter, can this wait until tomorrow?”
“No, Paul! It can’t wait until tomorrow!” Ron said as he pushed by the stunned corporal.
“Sir, you just can’t barge in here, you’ll have to make…”
“It’s alright, Corporal,” Paul said as he dismissed the man. “Ron, it’s good to see you.”
“Is it Paul? If it’s so good, why has it taken two weeks for you to do so?”
“Ron, you must realize what kind of endeavor this is. It takes everything I have to run this place.”
“Cut the crap, Paul. I’ve known you for a long time. I was the first person that found you lying in a pool of puke after your first run-in with Michelob.” Paul was visibly uncomfortable with Ron’s barrage. Leadership was a fragile existence; he didn’t need any stories like this leaking out and undermining his authority.
“Paul I cleaned you up and got you sober enough so that you didn’t spend the majority of your high school career grounded.”
“What do you want, Ron?”
“I want the truth, Paul. Where is my brother? Dennis has been giving me nothing but stall tactics. Every time I corner him on the subject, he turns tail and runs. What is going on, Paul? You owe me that much.”
“Do I, Ron? Do I owe you that much? What have I given you so far? Let’s see, the safety and well being of your family in this completely turned on its ear world. Is that not enough?!” Paul shouted. The weight of the day was beginning to collapse around him.
Now it was Ron’s turn to go on the defensive. “You know, Paul, that I’ll never be able to repay you for the sanctity you have provided for my family. I just want to know what has happened to my brother, your best friend.”
The fury drained out of Paul as fast as it had accumulated. “He was a spy,” Paul muttered.
“I… I can’t believe that, I won’t believe that,” Ron stammered as he backed up. Perhaps he was thinking that maybe, if he distanced himself from Paul’s words, it would make them less unbelievable.
“I couldn’t believe it either, Ron. If it makes it any easier, he wasn’t a spy in the traditional sense.”
“I… I don’t understand. What do you mean ‘in the traditional sense’?” Ron’s face had turned ashen with the realization of Paul’s words. Ron knew the fragility in which this encampment was set up. Extreme measures were constantly required to ensure the safety of the enclave.
“He didn’t know he was a spy.”
Ron’s face took on the look of a freshman trying to undertake his first trig problem. “What
does that mean, Paul? How could he not know he was a spy?”
“The aliens compromised him.” Ron was about to ask more questions when Paul silenced him with the wave of his hand. “Ron, no one was happier to see your brother than I was, no one. He saved my life once, and I loved him like the brother that I never had. When he showed up in Colorado, I almost fell over, we talked for hours when he got back."
“He told me everything that happened on that ship. And I told him about all the things that were going on around the mountaintop. But not everything, something just didn’t feel right. Call it a hunch, sixth sense, whatever, it doesn’t really matter. Something deep inside me kept telling me to not let him know about this place, the real reason for the training in the mountains. I was holding back from my best friend, from my brother."
“I concealed the true designs of what we started in his name’s sake. His story was fantastic, almost unbelievable; and then it hit me, maybe it was unbelievable.” Words began to form in Ron’s mouth again. “Please, Ron, let me finish. If I haven’t answered any of your questions when I am through, I will at the end.” That seemed to appease Ron for the time being."
“Sure, Mike took their supreme commander hostage and sure, their mother ship had been temporarily disabled, but I was beginning to think that perhaps those aliens let them go.”
“Let them go?” Ron interjected. “You just answered your own doubts! Mike had their leader and their ship was crippled.”
“No, Ron. Their ship was disabled, not crippled. I have high res scans of that ship straight from the now defunct DOD. That ship had a whole other side of bay doors. Thousands upon thousands of more ships could have launched within minutes of Mike’s departure.”
“Why would they hold off?” Ron questioned.
“With Mike’s knowledge of that ship, Ron, who do you think would want to see him?”
“Almost every military and governmental agency on the planet. So they sent him down as a plant? But you saw him! Paul, you can’t believe that he would turn on us. He hated those things more than I’ve ever seen anybody hate anything.”
“There’s no doubt in my mind, Ron, that he was on our side, but he was a spy nonetheless. He had been implanted with at least three different devices. We weren’t quite sure of their purposes, but it doesn’t take too much logic to figure that they were some sort of homing devices and or audio/video hook ups.
“Ron, one was attached to his optic nerve and the other to his left eardrum. My guess is they heard and saw everything he did and had his exact location at all times. My suspicions were completely confirmed with the initial phase of the invasion.”
Ron’s ears perked up. “How so?”
“Ron, the first installations hit were the ones that Mike had visited, almost without exception. The aliens blew up every critical governmental agency we had within the first few hours of the attack. It’s not a coincidence that they knew where to go.”
“Come on, Paul, those aliens had been watching us for months. Of course, they would know the most critical sites to hit; that doesn’t prove anything.” Ron now was beginning to look pissed off.
“Sure, Ron, I could see why they’d hit the Pentagon and the ‘Fortress’. But why would they bother with Area 51 or, for that matter, Camp Talbot? Come on! A bunch of rebels playing commando on a mountaintop? Of what significance could that have been to their master plan? They hit it because Mike was there. To a tee, they hit every military and government location where he stepped foot.”
“They set him up?”
“I’m not sure if they truly meant to set him up. I think that every slave on that ship was outfitted with the same devices he had. Talk about being inside the competitor’s head. They probably sold tickets to the viewings from the gladiators’ perspective. I feel confident that they had no desire to have a hole the size of Rhode Island blown into their hull or their leader taken hostage. However, when the opportunity presented itself, I think they felt it would be better to let them go than to endanger their Commander in open space. I’m sure they don’t feel that we are a viable threat to them, but then again, why take the chance? Learn your enemies’ innermost secrets and then use it to your advantage.”
“I don’t like where this conversation is going, Paul. You still have yet to tell me where my brother is.” Paul hesitated for a moment, studying Ron’s face. Paul was unsure of whether he should get some guards to protect him before he told Ron the truth. Ultimately, he felt that it would be better if he told him one on one, no matter what the outcome. Paul took in a heavy breath and almost immediately sighed. Age beyond years began to show on the surface of his face.
“Ron…”
“Sir!! We’re under attack!” Paul swiveled in his chair, almost ready to rip off the lance corporal’s head for interrupting him at that moment, when his words sunk in. Paul’s initial thought was that the aliens had discovered the base and all was lost. The last holdout of human safety had been compromised.
“Sir, the Stop and Shop is being assaulted!”
Why would the aliens bother with the store when they could have the whole mother lode? Paul thought.
“Sir, they have about fifty fully armed men. What should we do?” the lance corporal nearly shouted. The look of confusion on his commander’s face was doing little to allay his adrenaline rush. Men?
Men? “How many of our men are there?”
“Sir, we have a small squad of about fifteen.”
“Who’s in charge of the squad?”
“Sir, Captain Waggoner.” Paul aged almost ten years in ten-seconds. He easily had the manpower to squash the attack but compromising the Hill was not an option. A force that big was sure to have some scouts out there. And it would only take one error for this place to be discovered. The alternative seemed far worse to him. Could he leave one of his best friends out to dry?
“Has Captain Waggoner's squad radioed in their situation?”
“Sir, yes, sir. He said that four of his men were killed instantly when they were outside on their cigarette break. And another two were injured, one critically. He thought he could hold them off for another ten minutes or so but that he would greatly appreciate some reinforcements. And…”
“And what? Lance Corporal?” The lance corporal looked like he wanted to go and hide.
“And then the radio went dead.”
Paul’s heart fell. “Do we have any patrols out?”
“Sir, we have the silver and black patrols out, but they’re almost up on the east side of town. Even at full tilt, they wouldn’t be there for another fifteen minutes.”
“What are you doing, Paul? Dennis is down there in the fight of his life and you’re being indecisive!” Ron burst out. Paul was visibly upset. He wasn’t sure if it was because Ron was right or that he had pointed it out in front of one of his enlisted men.
“Ron, I’d appreciate if you kept your opinions to yourself. You don’t understand the situation.”
“What’s not to understand, Paul? The repeated fact that you don’t have a problem with disposing of those closest to you?”
“Ron, get the fuck out now or I’ll have you physically removed,” Paul said with icy cold seriousness.
“Don’t worry, Paul, I was leaving anyway. Unlike you, I’m going to get a firearm and whoever will come with me and go help Dennis and those men.”
“Ron, I will not let you fuck this up. Lance Corporal, escort this man out and make sure he is detained. He is not to leave this compound. If he so much as sees daylight today, your ass will be in front of a firing squad tonight.” Ron stood as if he were about to bull rush the lance corporal. But the lance corporal heeded the colonel’s warning, as well he should. The lance corporal pulled out his pistol and leveled it squarely on Ron’s chest. Ron was heaving with frustration and rage.
“Sir, what about the captain?”
“I’ll take care of that.”
“I’m sure you will, Paul,” Ron sputtered.
“Make sure he is
detained! Get him out of here!” The lance corporal waved Ron out of the room with his free hand. Paul got on his radio when the lance corporal left. “Sergeant McCabe! What’s the status on tunnel two?”
“Sir, I briefed you on that last week.”
“What’s the status NOW, goddammit?” The sergeant on the other end was taken aback by the force of the voice.
“Sir, we’ve advanced a few more feet through the collapse but it will be another two weeks or so before we break through.” The sergeant heard the audible pop of the radio clicking off and wondered to himself what he had done to spark such fury in the colonel. He ordered two more details to finish digging out the collapse.
‘I set this shit up to save my loved ones. I’ll be damned if I let another one die.’ Paul thought to himself.
“Major Salazar! Sound the Type I alarm,” Paul ordered. He could tell that the major was lying down by the disorientation in his voice, but he recovered extremely fast.
“Uh sir? Type I alarm? Yes, sir.” More conviction rang in his voice as the realization of the colonel’s words sunk in. “Are we under attack, sir?”
“Yes,” came the succinct reply. Paul knew that his own suspicions were now going through the colonel’s head. “Relax Frank. It’s not the aliens. Not yet, anyway. The Stop and Shop is under attack and our men are outnumbered nearly five to one.”
“Sir, the tunnel is collapsed. How do you propose an assault?”
“I know the tunnel is not serviceable.”
“Sir, we talked about this exact scenario. We’re supposed to let the Stop and Shop fall if this is the case and get it back at our discretion. If we fly out of our hidey-hole like pissed-off ants, somebody is sure to notice.”
“Frank, Dennis is in command down there.” Frank paused and sighed.
“What do you want to do, sir?”
“I want twenty of your alpha platoon to head out of emergency hatch three and go as stealthily and quickly as possible. I then want twenty civilian-looking personnel to head out hatch four and round up any potential scouts. Are we clear, Frank? I want everybody rounded up within one square mile of this facility.”
