Kingdoms of Sorrow

by JK Franks

  The two men walked down the long corridor and turned into a small break room in the abandoned industrial facility. It had been converted to a map room and was used to plan and direct the various movements of the group. They were currently between Little Rock and Memphis, their next destination. Lines radiating in various directions showed the routes of the mission teams, each led by a group of three Judges. The lines extended out thirty to fifty miles in most cases, but the ones going northeast toward Memphis were abruptly shorter.

  Michael looked troubled. “Hawley, are those converts still alive? The ones that told us about the survivor camps?”

  The other man shook his head. “Nah, they didn’t make it through the atonement ceremony.”

  He paused, expecting an outburst from his leader, but none came. “Pete questioned them at length, though, but I don’t think we woulda gotten anything else from ’em. They said the camp, well it sounded more like a fortified town, they said it was remote and really big. Supposedly somewhere in this valley here,” Hawley pointed at a spot on the large map. “It’s far enough away from Memphis to have stayed hidden, but they could’ve used these highways to bring supplies and people in.”

  “Those resources are the Lord’s,” Michael declared haughtily. “We have to find a way to bring them into the service of his Army. They are needed to feed the hungry . . . our hungry,” he added with a laugh. “Little Rock was a bust. Shit, we got nearly nothing here. But this, this is where we need to go,” he stabbed the map with his index finger. He saw this mystery camp as a great prize. He wanted the supplies, the equipment, the guns, all of it. He always wanted more, and this was the next more. “There’s no army anymore and not even any military bases anywhere nearby, so how many troops could they have? We have the numbers, and the Lord is on our side.” He walked away and looked out the single long window. “We must take that camp.”

  He turned dramatically as he continued in what he felt was a suitably military delivery, “Hawley, please recall as many of the other crews as you can . . . cancel every mission that is not heading toward Memphis. We will take them through numbers and sheer, overwhelming willpower. Whoever these gray-shirted troops are, they will suffer under the might of the Messengers.”

  Hawley always got worried when he heard Michael getting high and mighty like this, but he agreed that if the camp existed, it was a prize too good to ignore. “Yes, Your Holiness,” he bowed, leaving the man to stare at the maps. Hawley went to the radio rooms to begin summoning the Judges.

  The next several days were barely-organized chaos as most of the Missions returned to base camp. Judges and Marauders combined with Messenger regulars and new converts. Hawley was struggling to keep Michael and the camps under control. The Judges were all pissed at being re-called; several had not even bothered to respond. Whether they had gone rogue or were simply too deep in the hilly terrain to get the call, he didn’t know.

  One of the Mission crews from near Memphis had brought in more prisoners: heathens that had yet to be judged or to face atonement. Hawley had so much to do. He had had to delegate, and Pete and one of the Judges known simply as Red were offering confessional to the new arrivals now. Hawley could hear their darkly threatening words as he walked by the cage on the way to another meeting. One bloody mess of a body already lay, unmoving, on the floor. He had told Pete not to waste time. Get the intel and get it fast. His Holiness was waiting for it. They wanted every scrap of information on the camp or the troops in Memphis.

  So far, they had learned nothing new. Preparations to march on the mysterious camp were moving ahead, though. The objectives were to take the troops’ base first, then hit Memphis with the newly captured armaments. Hawley watched as another team of Judges roared up on their motorcycles. These stragglers had been assigned to track down a couple of recent runaways. “Nice of you boys to show up . . . Lynx, did you not get the fucking message?”

  “Hawley, lay off us, we’ve been up in the hills for two weeks looking for that jackass Montgomery,” the smaller of the three men responded with unbridled irritation.

  “Mr. Simpson, I would watch my tone if I were you. All I need to know—” he looked briefly over his shoulder, “—all His Holiness needs to know, is did you get them?”

  “Fuck no . . . I mean, yes, we got the woman. We tracked the man over to an area near the river, but then we got the recall. What the fuck is up?”

  Hawley spat a wad of tobacco at the dusty wheel of Lynx’s motorcycle. He had once been a Judge and resented the trio’s attitude. They were brutal thugs in his mind, rabid dogs best kept on leashes. But the Judges enjoyed Michael’s protection; nothing happened to them unless he said it could. “Never mind that, you’ll be briefed soon ’nuf. Sumthin’ big’s in the wind. But tell me, fellas. How the fuck did you let one guy slip through? Was he a ninja? Obviously, he bested you three.” He could tell he had struck a nerve, and his face cracked into a knowing smile. “Get some chow and a shower, you guys fucking stink. Be in the command room at 1500.”

  “Shit, Hawley, we need some sleep. We haven’t rested in . . .”

  Hawley cut them off with a look. “Do what I said!” Then in a quieter and more menacing voice, he continued, “You boys need to understand that your good graces with our esteemed leader only go so far. Don’t try pushing it with me.”

  Hawley turned his back on the men: a dangerous thing to do as he knew all of them would love to see him dead, but they wouldn’t risk it here in the camp, not in broad daylight. Just the same, he decided to head back closer to his top lieutenant’s location. He kicked a can as he passed in frustration; he couldn’t get over them letting that one get away. The man Montgomery murdered in the pleasure camp had been an original member, part of Michael’s inner circle. He couldn’t remember the last time anyone had survived an escape. Simpson and the other two would be in the doghouse with Michael over that. He would see to it.

  Chapter Forty-Two

  Three Months ago

  Azores, Eastern Atlantic

  The smaller ship pulled away, looking even rougher from a distance. The mid-ocean transfer had been precarious. Skybox was moved to the larger Praetor vessel, along with the doctor. Both were handled only by anonymous individuals dressed in full bio-suits and were split up as soon as they were onboard the vessel. He had caught just a glimpse of Captain Xiou—looking troubled—before being brusquely escorted back into the Zodiac used to ferry them to the ship.

  He didn’t care for the way this new crew was treating him. As a Praetor commander, he was accustomed to a certain level of respect. His service record and approximate rank required that. Here, it did not seem to carry any weight.

  He was now sitting on a thin mattress in a small sleeping berth. It looked more like a brig than a cabin. He had felt the vessel get underway soon after he boarded, but so far not one person had spoken to him. Skybox had seen no other crew since he was brought onboard. That had been several hours ago, and he was getting restless.

  The escorts who had deposited him in his quarters had told him to stay put, but he had been eyeing the cabin door with interest ever since. On the other boat he had been restricted as to where he could go and what he could see; he wondered if that was also going to be the case here. He wasn’t a prisoner, but he was clearly viewed as a threat to something or someone.

  Missions often ended in unusual ways . . . He could never assume the people transporting him had any idea of what he had just been through. He knew the world had changed dramatically. While he had been in his own nightmarish bubble, the rest of the world had also been going to shit. He was no longer clear of his command structure, nor the mission parameters. To a soldier and a leader, this was unacceptable. He survived through discipline; by following orders. Now he was in freefall. He needed to talk to Command and find out what the fuck was going on and what his orders were. It wasn’t long before he knew.

  “Commander, let’s be clear, the world has changed, but your mission has not. Your mission parameters w
ere clear, and yet the pathogen is spreading unchecked. We have your debriefing files. Do you have anything else you wish to add?” The large head of the man on the video screen was irritating Skybox in ways he rarely admitted to. He struggled to keep both his voice and emotions in check. Surely this dick isn’t pinning the outbreak on me?

  “Sir, my mission file and after-action notes are complete. Also, I would like to recommend each of my men for posthumous honors. They are all heroes, sir. No one could have survived out there.”

  The commander cut him off, “Yes, we expected that, but someone did survive, Commander. You. Do you have any idea why that is?”

  The question surprised him—not the fact that it had been asked, but why it had not been the first thing they wanted to know. It was what he asked himself hundreds of times every day. The shame of surviving had beaten his normal hyper-confidence into submission. “I have no idea, sir. Geng—I mean, our med tech said several of us were asymptomatic. We were all in the same AOs—similar backgrounds, same round of normal inoculations, same diet, but no signs of the disease.”

  The large head with no hair out of place nodded. “What happened to the others, commander? The ones who were like you?”

  “It’s in my report, sir,” Skybox was losing his patience with this man. “Can I ask, sir, where is my normal CO?” The supposed purpose for this VidCall had been a routine follow-up with his main contact in the command structure: a woman he had only known as Midnight.

  “I asked you a direct question, Commander.” The man nearly shouted the retort and Skybox’s training took over.

  “Yes, sir, sorry sir—each of the other three remaining uninfected soldiers . . . the final three soldiers of Talon Battlegroup were KIA. The disease made the enemy crazy and unpredictable. We were fighting skirmishes all the way to the coast. The last of them, an L3, call sign Hooch, made it nearly to the Persian Gulf with me before we were overrun. He provided . . .” Skybox’s voice wavered, “ . . . He provided a delay for me to get away. He was an incredible officer.”

  “Tell us again why he felt you needed to make it.” The Praetor commander looked increasingly perturbed.

  “Hooch and Genghis felt that those of us who were not infected with the Chimera Pox might carry an immunity. Genghis theorized that it could be the combination of our natural genetics and the myriad of other inoculations we received over the years. He tried to isolate it in the field to see if we could offer an antidote.”

  “What did your man find?”

  “He found that we were all infected, but in the four of us, the pathogen was having a hard time taking root. It was progressing at a much slower rate. In me, in particular, it seemed to actually be failing, dying off. He made Hooch promise to get me back to one of the labs at any cost.

  “I didn’t know about this until Hooch and I were within fifty klicks of the extraction site. We topped a hill to find our way was blocked—a large group pushing hundreds of infected out in front of them. Every one of my troops fought with everything they had, but it wasn’t enough. In the end, we were all overrun. Hooch went into the fray and detonated a block of Semtex. He cleared an escape path for me.”

  The man on the screen stared at Skybox for what seemed like an eternity. Skybox could feel him judging him, his actions, his command, his lost Talon Battlegroup.

  “Commander,” the voice said flatly. “You’ve been through hell, and I am sorry to make you relive it for our formal report. I need to know you are still the man we sent out there, which you clearly are. I am also sorry for your men. The losses we are facing worldwide are staggering, but none worse than yours. You are aware . . . your former contact, Midnight, informed you that Catalyst protocols are active.”

  While it was more a statement than a question, Skybox replied. “Yes, sir.”

  The man continued. “That means resources are stretched thin—too thin. We are recalling battlegroups from nonessential locations. We have numerous crisis points developing here in the US.” He pulled a paper and studied it for a moment. “It now appears Europe and Asia are beyond help. If we can’t keep the pandemic away from North America, then we will fall next. Your med tech may have been correct, and we want to get you into a bio-facility as soon as possible to find out how you are surviving. Once the ship you are on is within range, we will transport you by helicopter to the closest lab, where you will give your full cooperation. Is that clear?”

  “Yes sir,” he responded without enthusiasm. At least he had his orders.

  “Spit it out, son, what’s on your mind?” Rarely did a CO give permission to speak freely. Skybox had so many questions.

  “Forgive me, sir, I’m a soldier. I would rather be fighting than being a lab rat.”

  “No soldier will be doing more for our survival than you, Skybox.”

  “Sir . . . I need to know . . . did we create this disease? My tech was pretty sure it was our facility out there and that the pathogen was engineered and weaponized intentionally.”

  “I can’t answer that, soldier.”

  “Can’t or won’t?”

  While the Praetor groups had ground up command authority, he was getting dangerously close to insubordination with such a response. He knew, but he was getting beyond caring.

  The CO looked suddenly much older and wearier. “Can’t. At least not with any real confidence. The facility was ours, but I’m told the disease was not something we cooked up. One of our assets learned of its possible existence in an enemy facility, and we managed to acquire a small sample many years ago. I’m certain the sample was duplicated and possibly enhanced as they worked to develop countermeasures. All who worked on it are gone and the information we have on its development is incomplete. Of course, all research at the facility has been destroyed.”

  Skybox shook his head, “That sounds like bullshit, sir.”

  “It probably is,” the older man paused for a moment before he continued, “that is what we are best at, after all.”

  Skybox realized that he was not the only one suffering disillusionment. He moved to his next question, “Sir, what is the status of the US right now?”

  “Failed state,” came the immediate response. "No government, no working economic or judicial system . . . no leadership including law enforcement of any kind. The military bases have mostly gone dark . . . either abandoned or mutinied. Power is off to ninety-eight percent of the population. Rough estimates are that over 85 million citizens have perished, and the number is growing daily. Many of the safe zones have collapsed, and the reserve camps we set up as survival centers are being discovered and coming under near-constant attack by outsiders.

  “We have a small contingent of former military leaders, primarily Navy, that are under the impression that we’re the bad guys. They keep hitting us at strategic weak points. Commander, it is a veritable shit-show, and our Catalyst plan is ready to blow. It may not survive anything else, certainly not this virus. The protocol has already shifted focus.”

  “What is this new focus?” Skybox asked.

  “You won’t like it.”

  Skybox nodded impatiently, urging the man to go on.

  The CO sighed and continued, “We have determined that the US is no longer something we can protect as a nation, nor even as an ideal. Sadly, we’re no longer committed to ensuring the survival of the democratic nation state. We are now refocusing on the survival of the human species.”

  “Shit—um—sorry, sir. I just didn’t realize things were so bad . . . I thought those camps were fortified and could withstand attacks.”

  “They rely more on staying invisible, but yes, they do have solid countermeasures. Unfortunately, some of these rebel groups have assembled impressive numbers and are desperate enough to target military bases or, when they learn of them, our reserve camps. We have started recalling Praetor units to aid in the defense.”

  “What about The Ranch?”

  “The Ranch . . . yes. I saw in your files that that location is important to you. The Ran
ch has fallen. Survivors are being evac’d as we speak. A large group of mercenaries stormed the place several nights ago.”

  “H-how?” Skybox stammered, stunned. “That place is one of the most secure military facilities in the world. It trains elite soldiers, for God’s sake!”

  “Numbers, Commander. They had them, we didn’t. As I said, we are stretched thin. You will be happy to note that your friend was a survivor. They evacuated the hospitals prior to the breach. Magician is in one of the staging camps near Memphis. I can have him sent to whatever lab you will be undergoing your examination. You may not get to see him, but at least he will be close.”

  Skybox sighed in relief at this single piece of good news. “Thank you, sir. That would be very much appreciated.” He was beginning to warm to the man.

  “Least we can do for you. One other thing—I saw the video—the satellite and drone feed from your mission. You’ve been through hell, son. You and your men are heroes. Don’t take those losses personally. Put that away, for now, deal with it later, if there is a later. For now, let’s get you back stateside.

  “Guard Command out.” With that, the screen went black and the familiar circle-and-scorpion symbol appeared. The Praetor motto in Latin at the bottom read: Non Ducor, Duco. I am not led, I lead. Skybox gave a dry laugh at the slogan.

  Chapter Forty-Three

  Present Day

  Harris Springs, Mississippi

  “Dammit, Jack, I know. It’s just frustrating.” Todd’s eyes flared with anger. “I trust him, I know he’s loyal to us, but he’s also sympathetic to the Catalyst plans. At some point, Scott is going to have to make a choice. I’m beginning to wonder which it will be.”

  Jack approached the big man. “Seriously, friend? All of us have been through hell and back for each other. You know you can trust him, hell, you put him in charge when you went on your . . . your vision quest. He’s a good man, and despite whatever shit is between you and him, he would take a bullet for your big dumb ass, and you know it. So, what’s really the matter?”