by Angela White
“Yes.”
“Yes.”
Samantha ignored their simultaneous, concerned answers. “Good. I’ll be recharged by the time we make it through the line.”
“Recharged?” Neil asked, taking her right side.
“I ran out,” Samantha confessed, enjoying the sunlight even as it made the headache worse. “It appears to be refilling on its own.”
Neil instructed Jeremy to make a report.
Sam barely noticed when he left. She now had the power of wind. That would be a tremendous help when the government came.
“Samantha Moore?”
Time once again slowed as Samantha placed the voice and fate began laughing.
Shellie Mathews. Fellow Predictor. Also had a pass. Was out sick on D-day.
“Is that you, Sam?”
People stopped to observe the expected happy reunion as Sam clutched at Neil’s wrist in a vise-like grip. She’d thought she was safe! She was supposed to be safe now!
“What?” Neil demanded lowly. Her face and body language was complete panic.
“It is you. Sam!”
Shellie enveloped Samantha in a vigorous hug that ripped Neil from her grip.
“It’s so good to see you!”
Neil tried to get back to Samantha’s side before she bolted–he read it on her face–but the new woman hadn’t stopped the running diatribe of surprised recognition.
“I thought I saw you. You can’t imagine my shock. I mean, no one else made it from our office in Seattle…”
Sam started to turn away from the crowd, self-preservation screaming run, now!
“I came in late and saw you get on the chopper, and thought you’d never come up. How are you here with everyone else, when you had a pass?”
“….had a pass.”
Voices blurred into chaos that she had no idea how to control.
“Sam had a pass!”
“She was government.”
“She’ll bring them here. We know they survived.”
“She’s a spy!”
“Kill her!”
7
“Get in there!” Marc ordered, shoving people aside to reach them.
“She’s government!”
“Get her!”
Neil fired into the air, taking blows to keep them from Sam, but he was ignored. They knew he wouldn’t shoot unarmed camp members.
Marc’s Colt crashed and the mob paused. A few even fled, sure of the retribution that was coming, and Marc instantly understood why Angela had let Kenn push him into killing the snake women.
The Eagles hurried in to form a tight circle around Neil and Samantha, who was cowering behind him. This was her nightmare come true.
Marc faced the mob, as angry as they were. “She escaped the draft, just like many of you!”
“She’s government!”
“So am I! So is Adrian, and Kenn! We all had passes to NOARD and chose to be here instead.”
That wasn’t true, but few of them would be able to disprove it.
“Tell them, Sam!” Neil hissed. “Let them in or they’ll kill us.”
Samantha met Angela’s stern gaze over the mob that had grown to include half the camp. In that one look, Sam read no surprise and no mercy.
“The chopper went down after they forced me on at gunpoint. It went down in Wyoming and I was…captured by two brothers. I killed them to get away.” Sam’s voice lowered. “I didn’t want to, but they had me chained…”
She stopped, tears falling thickly, and Neil hid her in his arms.
“I’m sorry,” Sam sobbed.
“For what?” Marc demanded, following Angela’s silent instructions.
“For surviving.”
“Don’t regret that,” Marc ordered. “You’ve saved this camp with your skills. We would have all died in Nebraska if not for you.”
“Because of Adrian,” Sam stated, sniffing. “He knew I wanted to help my country, not her killers.”
Marc glared at the mob that had calmed enough to almost be considered just an angry group now. “We’ve always trusted her and she’s always helped us. Adrian brought her in. He’s not wrong.”
“But she hid it!”
“Where is Adrian?”
“Why isn’t Adrian running this camp?”
“Yeah! Why hasn’t he taken back over?”
“Where is he?!”
Marc waved a hand. “Behind you, of course. Where he always is.”
The crowd parted to let Adrian’s wheelchair through. More of the anger was diffused by the way he eagerly greeted and shook hands with people, pushing out happiness the entire time. It wasn’t what they’d come to expect from their leader when they broke the rules.
Adrian peered over his shoulder, finding Angela. When she silently ordered it, he began to speak, “We have a problem, a serious one.”
“She aint hurt!” someone pointed out.
“Samantha is not the problem,” Adrian snorted.
He immediately grimaced at the pain.
“You okay?”
“What is it?”
Adrian slowly lifted his shirt to reveal the wound. “No, I’m not all right.”
They gasped and groaned at the sight of the ugly wound that appeared worse than it was due to not changing the bandage for a full day.
“I’m not fit for duty, of any kind, until this heals.” Adrian lowered his shirt, voice grave. “But that isn’t our problem, either.”
Adrian again looked over his shoulder, terrified of spooking the herd.
She’s ready, Marc sent. Do it now.
Adrian instinctively brought up the shield in his mind at the evidence of Marc’s growing power.
“The government did survive, at least one bunker that we know of.” His voice rose over the instant shock. “They’re coming for me.”
Chaos took over, people shouting and shoving. Angela quickly brought the shield up. The bubble becoming visible made most of the mob start searching for the trouble.
Angela flanked Adrian, listening hard. “Everyone hit the ground!”
The Eagles, who knew better than to doubt her by now, fell to the grass, pulling those closest with them. Some of the camp followed, but most of them stared without comprehension.
“Get down, you idiots!” Angela snapped to those closest and the people slowly began lying on the ground.
Angela held up a hand. “Now wait.”
It was a long moment where all the magic users pushed calm over the prone camp.
Angela slowly lowered the shield. “It’s ours, stand down.”
Radios crackled an instant later. “The last team is back with bodies. Someone killed Tucker and Anderson.”
The crowd gasped, and immediately assumed the worst.
“It was Kyle!”
“Yeah, we saw them fighting.”
“No, it’s the soldiers!”
“They are coming!”
“We’ve got to hide!”
“I’m going to the mountains!”
“I’m staying!”
“So am I. Let them come!”
“We can’t fight the government!”
“Yes, we can!” Angela sent it loudly, in both oral and mental waves that stunned the crowd.
She stared at them, searching without moving. This was the worst time, when they might stampede and catch all of the descendants in the panic.
“I helped John. I helped my Brady. And I’ve helped you.” She began picking them out visually and mentally.
Peggy stood up. “She was sent to protect Safe Haven. I’ve told you that. So has Hilda.”
Anne added her voice. “With her help, we can fight.”
“Don’t forget us,” Theo spoke from the rear of the rear of the crowd that was slowly getting to their feet.
“We’ve been working on some things, under Samantha and Angela’s direction.” Theo waved at the other four to come forward. “This runs on solar power. It doesn’t fire rapidly, but it uses the heat it absor
bs to emit a larger charge.”
Two of the weapons men hefted the big device onto a nearby can, while the other two cleared a line of fire.
Curious, the rest of the crowd got to its feet and everyone moved back a little, allowing Theo and his team to show them what they’d made.
“You aim here, fire, and duck the debris. Simple.” He waved at Angela. “You try it.”
Angela leered like no one was staring at her as if she were from another planet. “Cool, new toys!”
A small titter ran through the crowd and she subtly shook her head at Marc when he would have come to her side.
Angela aimed the small rod at a far tree and hit the red switch. Nothing, for a second or two, and then the top branches of the moldy tree exploded into wooden shrapnel that showered over the camp.
“Damn!” she complained and admired at the same time. “Someone grab the medical kits so I tend those injuries while we keep talking.”
To many people’s surprise, she was obeyed without argument.
Angela waved at Marc. “Give them an idea of some of the things we’ve come up with. When we’re done, if they still want to run and hide, they can. Tell them all of it.”
Marc frowned, but did as he was told.
The list of weapons Marc rolled out was extensive, and Theo and his team added a few that they were still working on. It was impressive, but not enough.
Angela found Sam in the crowd, some of the people apologizing, some staring.
“Samantha’s like me.”
The crowd around Sam split up, faded into the larger group.
Samantha’s face broke at the betrayal and Angela made sure everyone heard her.
“That’s why the government is coming. They’ve found out we’re here and they want us under their control. It’s not for you. Each person here can flee and leave us to face them alone. That’s your choice.” She stared around pointedly. “Though, we would never do such to you.”
“What do you mean, she’s like you?” Jerry Jones asked. Since Roger’s death, the former Marine had become the leading voice of opposition.
“Exactly what I said, though she and I aren’t the only ones. There are more of us.” Her eyes glowed, but only enough to lighten them, not to let the red bleed through. “A lot of us, even.”
That sent fear running through the more timid, but the aggressive survivors that had managed to make it to Safe Haven also saw the opportunity.
“We are going to fight them when they come for Adrian. I won’t let him be taken. I’ll die first.”
There was no doubting her claim and no one was foolish enough to think that Marc would be able to change her mind.
“What if we…broke into smaller camps, hid from them?” someone asked.
“Until when?” Angela asked, perching on the edge of a table that had been cleaned. “And where will you go? We’ve seen the camps others form. There is no place like our Safe Haven.”
She glanced around. “You are the chosen people, and we are your Defenders. It’s up to you to accept that gift. If not, go. There are other groups out there who can come together and do what has to be done.”
Adrian’s voice came, “We’ve always put the herd first. We would never lead you into a slaughter.”
“We’ll have plans in place to evacuate if the tide turns against us, but I don’t think we’ll need them,” Marc led. “If we win one big battle, I believe we’ll be free.”
“How do you figure that?” Jones demanded, but even his voice held more interest than scorn.
“There’s only one bunker, only so many men. If we win one, we might weaken them so badly that they can’t come up and be a problem.”
“After one battle, we might outnumber them,” Angela finished harshly. “And then we make the rules.”
“And what will those rules be?” Hilda asked. “We don’t like the ends that were used to achieve this.”
Angela didn’t back off. “I’ll do whatever it takes to keep us alive and if that doesn’t work for you or anyone else, I wish you luck as you leave. We’ll send you out with a few days’ supplies if you choose to run, but that’s it. We’ll need it to care for the people who stay and fight with us.”
Angela motioned Kenn forward. “We printed ballots for this. It was too big of a choice to make alone. We’d planned to handle it at the monthly meeting tonight, but now works just as well.”
Kenn started passing around the slips of paper and small pencils.
Angela kept working on them while the other descendants pushed out calm obedience in mental waves that should have drowned them all.
“Before we vote, I want you to hear the plan. Nearly every member of Adrian’s army helped with it.” Angela settled on the ground, showing that she didn’t fear them, though they clearly did her. The hints had been enough. They’d observed too much over the last months to misunderstand.
She used her knife to draw in the dirt and as the crowd passed the details to those who were further away, the bubble glowing around them became a soothing blue.
Angela pointed at a place on her wide diagram. “We left a fake body for them here. They should find it in the next five days. They won’t know that it isn’t Adrian until they get it back to their bunker for testing. That’s another two weeks. Then, they have to get troops together and make it here from Utah. Another two or three weeks,” Angela stated firmly.
She looked round at the relaxing faces, the scared and defiant murmurers. “We’ll have a month, bare minimum, before they get here.”
“What then?” Zack asked, starting to get excited. Fear of the government returning and taking control of them had been on everyone’s mind this week, thanks to camp gossip.
Angela marked an area on her map and then slammed the blade into it. “That’s where we need to be when they come. We’ll start preparing over the next few days, stock up on food, water, and fuel, then get to those mountains and set the biggest ambush the new world has seen.” She pointed to an area far away from the battle zone. “This is where we’ll start hitting them. Teams will go out to pick them off, so that by the time they make it to our chosen place, there will be less than half of whatever they originally send out.”
Angela looked up at them, no longer pushing anything but the truth. “They want us because they know you guys are also survivors. Survivors who loathe them. They want our protection–from you, and our gifts, to control you. We chose to stand with the people they betrayed, the citizens they gunned down, the families of the draft. With you.”
Samantha reluctantly accepted her new role in the camp, moving to her team leader’s side. “We were born this way. We didn’t know why until we came to Safe Haven.”
Angela accepted the hand up from the ground, and gave Samantha a nod to continue.
“We don’t like being different, but at least now we know why we are. We were born into this time and place to protect you, to make sure America survives.”
“Not only survives,” Angela added, sheathing her knife. “We have to change it. The old world can never be allowed to restart. All the killing and greed, the ignorance of the government to the plight of the people. We have to stand against them. If we don’t, no one else will.”
“They’ll run this country again if we don’t fight,” Marc stated. “And that means they’ll take you for the draft, for experimentation and studies, and for labor.”
“As long as you remain with us, we’ll defend you,” Angela promised. “But you have to fight for yourselves, as well. We can’t do it alone.”
She gave them a minute to think, judging the mood, deciding how much more they needed.
A little push, Adrian advised. Careful, but hard.
Angela gestured to one of the Eagles, and he quickly escorted someone to her side.
“This is Adrian’s son.”
Angela put her hand on his wrist in comfort. “They had him and a group of kids locked up in Arkansas, kids like him and Charlie. One of them got a call out and Adrian w
ent in. It was a trap, as you’ve heard. What you weren’t told is that the Major and his men killed the other kids–slit their throats. The government hasn’t changed.”
“...we have.”
Angela smiled gently at Becky, thinking she appeared happy on Seth’s arm. “Yes, we have. We no longer live by their rules. We honor Adrian’s dreams for the future.”
Feeling time slow, Angela took a breath and spoke the words from her dream, the ones that would trigger the final scene. “The only thing that can sink us is a traitor contacting them. If that happens, we’re all dead. Please, if you leave, hold our secrets.”
Angela could feel the anger coming, the sense of togetherness that a rebellion instills, and then the radio crackled right on schedule.
“Too late, witch! I already called!”
Matt’s horrible laughter floated over every active radio in menacing taunts. “They know it’s a fake body. They turned the team around. Safe Haven won’t exist in a month.”
“Find him!” Marc’s growl of rage triggered the camp into a panicked frenzy of searching that began ripping down tents, scattering supplies, and turning out vehicles.
Angela let them go, sure Matt wasn’t in camp anymore. He’d made his own plans. Angela hoped some of them included future survival for him and his father. Mitch wouldn’t know how to provide food if a deer came and sat in his lap.
“Pass the word. It doesn’t change anything. We still have four weeks.”
“They’re pissed. If they find Matt, they’ll kill him,” Kevin stated.
Angela didn’t feel the need to act as if she was as shocked and angry as they were. “Traitors get what they deserve in this camp. Sometimes it just takes a while.”
“What if he was lying, trying to...”
Kevin knew by her look that it wasn’t the case. Matt had called the government. In roughly four weeks, the battle would start.
8
“Raven! QZ!”
Angela responded to that panicked call the same way Adrian would have.
“Lock us down, check-in, full team to the QZ,” Angela ordered to the men running alongside her.
The men on the QZ directed her to the medical camper, where John had been working on a batch of relief drinks for their cancer patients.
Angela climbed tiredly into the tin can to find Millie on the floor between two bloody bodies.
