"Conventional?" Emma asked. These were lessons that she never wanted to learn.
"Means they aren't using nukes or gas," Dukes voiced.
"That's right. Alaska and Hawaii are pushing with what is left of the Pacific Fleet, but without a coordinated effort on the ground, it just goes to shit. The National Guard troops from the western states have joined with the troops from the conventional bases, and they are doing their, well, the best that they can.” He stopped himself from revealing that he really thought that the west was a lost case.
"So, Sir," Dukes asked, his mind analyzing the data, and how best to respond. “What's our plan in the east?"
"Well, after we talk to your prisoner, I will lay that out for you. Take me to him," Horn ordered.
CHAPTER 4
"I tried to save the boy," Bob said, salty tears forming at the rims of his eyes.
"I know you did," Father Jeff consoled. Although Confession was not typically part of the liturgy of the Episcopal Church, Jeff felt that it would become commonplace as the days of this war turned into months and possibly years.
"If it wasn't for Ian. . .,"
"You mean the gentleman we met outside?"
"Yeah, if it weren't for him, well, I’m almost certain that Adam or I wouldn’t have made it back here alive."
"God sends angels sometimes when you least expect it," Jeff smiled, his faith was being tested, and he was not willing to let it break. He knew darker times were ahead of him and it would be his strong faith that would carry him, and his followers forward.
"Dad," Joshua knocked on the bedroom door.
"Yeah, come on in," his father waved him in. "What's up?" Jeff slid back from the side of the bed to let Joshua get closer.
"It's Dukes. He’s on the radio, and he wants to speak to you."
"Oh, okay," Bob said, swinging his legs out of the bed with a low gruff of pain. Both Joshua and Jeff helped him out the door and into a rolling desk chair next to the radios in the den. Bob donned his radio earphones and adjusted the dials on the radio.
Jeff saw Violet Tiller, Tasha and four other women come out of the basement at the sound of Bob moving from his bed.
"He really shouldn't be out of bed," Violet scolded her oldest son.
Joshua's eyes expanded as he shrugged. "It's Dukes; he said it was urgent."
She relented slightly with her scorn and grabbed a pillow to put behind her husband's back. "Can you please introduce Father Jeff to everyone else."
David and Ian walked into the farmhouse just as Bob began his conversation and Joshua went through the lineup of new semi-permanent houseguests.
Grace went to stand next to her mother and father, who just naturally gravitated towards each other. She shook David's hand. "Thank you for taking care of Tasha," she said, adding a genuine smile. "She seems like a remarkable lady."
David looked from Grace to Tasha, she was smiling at him, and he could tell that she had been crying. But, it was still good to see her smile.
"I'm so sorry for your loss," Leah said, putting her hand on David's shoulder. Tasha told us about your children being in Atlanta." She looked at her daughter, and breathed in deeply. "I can't even begin to imagine."
He nodded, accepting her intentions, and tried not to let his mind wander away to his vaporized offspring. He turned, with the others to focus on what Bob was doing out of bed.
Bob was jotting down notes and twisting a knob on his radio now and then. He was in a deep conversation with Dukes, his former Marine platoon mate and fellow prepper.
"What's he talking about?" David asked Ian in a whisper.
"I'm not sure," Ian answered, and he was just about to say something else, when Bob spoke the words, 'do I know someone that speaks Chinese?' He and Grace looked at each other; they both could speak Chinese.
< >
"The name on his uniform is Wa Ming," Specialist Clark briefed the Colonel as they descended the stairs.
"This is fortified," Horn said, really as a statement rather than a question.
"Yes, Sir," Dukes answered, he was proud of his bunker. "It is also shielded, so the EMP didn't touch the house."
“Impressive, considering the damage that it did,” Horn offered, looking around again as Clark spoke with the man guarding the door to the prisoner.
"Sir, this is Cooper. He’s the husband to Margaret, whom you met upstairs. Cooper, this is Colonel Horn, Commander of the Georgia Guard.” The men exchanged handshakes.
“Sir, he was typically armed,” Clark presented the facts. “We took an AK, a Chinese manufactured side arm, a 40 caliber, and two knives. We also discovered what I think is a battle field tracker, sewn into the shoulder of his uniform.” Clark picked up the device and handed to the officer.
“I cracked it open to peek inside,” Dukes admitted.
Horn looked at him and raised an eyebrow. “Well?”
“Mostly microchips, battery and a transponder. It’s state of the art, and I didn’t want to damage it, figuring that you would want it for analysis.”
“Good thinking,” Horn said, giving the device to Clark, and turning back to the door.
Clark accepted the device, and then placed it back into the ammo can, snapping the lid shut. He watched Horn; the officer seemed to harden as he looked at the closed door. Clark wondered what he thought was on the other side of the door - an alien, a monster of some sort.
"Wa Ming, you say?"
"Yes, Sir. His rank suggests he’s a sergeant. He was wounded at the end of the battle, lost a little bit of blood, and might have been, well, shoved around a little.
The colonel didn’t bat an eyelash.
“We treated him with the basics, but have shown him no hospitality. He has not said a word to us, and we haven't interrogated him too harshly, yet."
“Was he alone?”
“We killed a total of twenty-two soldiers and two in each of the two APCs, Sir.”
“Twenty-two ground pounders, plus this one,” he nodded to the door. “That an odd numbered platoon,” the colonel surmised.
“I agree,” Dukes said, his head nodding. “We swept as best as we could, but, there’s a lot of space out there, and I didn’t want us split up, or wandering too far from the house.”
The colonel listened to him and then made a decision. “With all that said, I bet there are at least two of them still out there somewhere. Let Sergeant Shaw know what you suspect,” Colonel Horn ordered, looking at Clark.
“Yes, Sir,” Clark responded, before leaning over to Cooper. “Will you do that for me?”
“Sure,” Cooper nodded, stepping away from the door. “Do you need me for any of this?” he waved at the closed door.
Clark shook his head in the negative. “We’ve got this one. I don’t know if you want to see what’s coming.”
Cooper nodded. “After seeing what they’ve done to us, I might have enjoyed it,” he said, darkly, unlocking the door for the trio to enter. He then closed the door behind them and moved upstairs to pass on the order.
The prisoner was sitting in a folding metal chair in the middle of the room. His arms and feet were bound to the chair. The back two legs of the chair were resting inside the openings of two cinder blocks; guaranteeing that he wouldn’t move from the center of the room. A black bandanna was being used as a blindfold. He was bleeding from a wound on the upper right shoulder. Blood had soaked through the bandage, and slowly trickling down his arm. There was a small red pool on the hardwood floor being fed by the blood.
Horn stepped deeper into the room and folded his arms. He sized the prisoner up quickly from the front, and then walked around him slowly, as if to learn more by viewing him from a different perspective. His steps were deliberate and soft, like a cat stalking prey in the bush.
Clark's job in the Army was military intelligence. He was trained as an analysis, but found himself volunteering for field duty as opposed to straddling a desk. The lure of a small bit of danger had always seemed more attractive, in his
eyes. Because of that, he had spent most of his military career deployed with field units as an intelligence officer. Being in the field allowed him to see, gather and analyze real time data as it was happening. He liked the sense of urgency involved with finding clues or data that led to making decisions involving life or death.
As far as torture was concerned, the military had very strict guidelines about what could and could not be done to someone being 'coerced' for more information. He found it amusing that the training manual actually referred to the one being tortured as a victim. Regardless, he had a series of lines in the sand that he could not cross; he knew them well. He had crossed that line only one other time in his career.
It was his third month in Afghanistan, and his unit was chasing a band of insurgents that they suspected had crossed over from Pakistan to raise hell against American troops. They called the group, the Al'Ahmaq, which was Arabic for ass-hole. The Al'Ahmaq had killed two men and taken two others hostage the day before.
Clark's unit flew in the face of the official U.S. Presidential policy. In an era where troops were supposed to be downsizing in the region, his unit remained as a sign to the locals that the U.S.A. was still actively engaged and committed to a cause. Their primary mission was to be visible, and support the exit strategy, with a secondary mission to gather intelligence. Clark was there because of the latter.
The mission changed after two American soldiers had been taken prisoner by Al’Ahmaq. Clark’s commanding officer pressed his men for intelligence on the whereabouts and status of his missing men. They caught a break during a house raid, and nabbed one of the known Al'Ahmaq fighters. Clark was on the raid, and knew that lines were about to get crossed.
Clark entered the room just as two soldiers blindfolded and tied the insurgent to a chair in a small mud hued home on the outskirts of Kabul. His Captain was also in the room, and looked like he was ready to strangle the blindfolded terrorist. Captain Olson two-finger waved Clark over to speak with him.
"Sir."
"Listen, I need to know where Jennings and Baker are ASAP. I don't care what you have to do to get that son-of-a-bitch to squeal. Do I make myself clear?"
"Yes, Sir," Clark whispered. He looked over at Chaves, a gifted translator in multiple languages. Chaves nodded, he had received the same talk from the captain two minutes earlier.
Clark went right to work as the Captain exited the room, leaving the two soldiers alone with the tied-up terrorist.
"Ask him were they are keeping our soldiers?"
Chaves translated, as Clark looked at how the man was tied up. His hands were tied to the arms of the chair; his hands gripped the end of the arms.
The man didn't answer the question.
Clark raised the butt of his rifle and brought it down with exacting force on the man's right hand. The blow crushing at least five bones. The man yelled in pain, but could not move. His face twisted and turned, trying to fight the pain. A tear ran out from under the blindfold.
"Ask him again."
The terrorist muttered something that Chaves did not understand completely.
"He said something like, go fuck yourself."
Clark smashed the same hand again.
"Tell him I will smash the other hand next time if he does not tell us where they are. Go ahead, ask him."
Chaves leaned in next to the man's ear and asked the question. Before the man could answer, Clark smashed his hand again, just to drive home the need for a response.
The man bellowed in pain. Clark took one of the man's broken fingers and bent it up towards the mud hut roof. The man yelled, and broke under the pain from the torture.
Clark walked out of the room and gave Captain Olson the information that would lead him to the mission soldiers.
“Oh, and Sir,” Clark stopped his captain, as the man was turning to exit the room. “It looks like the terrorist might have injured his hand before he was captured. Maybe a rock or something hard fell on it," Clark shrugged. "Sir."
“Understood. Once I have our boys back, have the medic take a look at him.” Captain Olson nodded and then went to rescue his men.
Now, Clark shook the experience from his psyche as he looked at the Chinese man tied to the chair in Dukes' basement. Colonel Horn was still studying him, his gaze intense and purposeful. The image of the Arabic man flashed into his head. Clark blocked it out, as Horn nodded at him.
“What is your name?” He asked in English, his tone was ice and left no room that he could be deadly answer or response.
"How many soldiers did you deploy with?"
No answer or response.
"What is the name of your commander?"
No answer or response.
"Do you speak English?"
No answer or response.
Horn stepped infant of Clark, and leaned in close to the Chinese soldier’s ear. "Do you fear death?"
The man seemed to straighten a bit at the presence of the new voice, but otherwise, there was no answer or response.
Horn stood erect and waved for Dukes and Clark to follow him out of the room.
"Sir?" Clark asked once the door was closed.
"We need a translator.”
“He speaks English, they teach it in grade school,” Dukes protested.
“Perhaps, Gunny, but what if our guy was picked up off of the family farm, with no formal education,” Horn surmised. “I’ll have to get him on the chopper ASAP and hope we can patch him into the pentagon, or that someone from the Savannah deployment speaks Arabic. But, that’s not something that I want to have to do.”
That statement gave both Clark and Dukes a reason to pause, and they exchanged the briefest of glances.
"Sir," Dukes cleared his throat. "I think we can do it here.”
“Go on.”
“I know a guy that can help. If your goal is to get information now, then we can patch him through on the shortwave."
Horn thought through that scenario for a second before looking at Clark. "You have a secured link to the Pentagon, right?" He was referring to the military laptop, the Presidential Humvee and their connection with Senior Airman Perez at the Pentagon.
"Yes, Sir, we do."
"Good. Gunny, make it happen with your contact. I want to run our side of the conversation through the encryption protocols, and have the broadcast distributed to a wider audience. I want to give the enemy a little taste of their own medicine. Understood?"
"Yes, Sir."
CHAPTER 5
Torture is reserved for disturbed bullies who pull whiskers off of cats, and for governments that want to extract information. Clark did not fit the role of a bully, and with the new reality of war on American soil, didn’t know where the lines of the government started and those of the Constitution ended.
But, with that said, he hated the man tied to the metal folding chair. The man represented a country that hated everything that he believed in. Clark smirked to himself, that yet another country hated everything about what made America great.
His past experience with torturing another human being was front and center in his mind’s eye. He gave moral credence to what he did, as it helped save the life of two American soldiers. But, that was different than what was happening now. Now, he felt like it was more than a couple of soldiers in peril, it was the very life of America was at stake.
Clark looked at Wa Ming, and instantly regretted saying his name in his head. He knew this was business, this was life and death, this was for the protection of his homeland.
Horn ripped the gag out of the prisoner's mouth so quickly that no one in the room saw him preparing for the motion.
"What's your name?" Horn asked, his voice commanding. He had not sought approval from anyone to do what they were about to do. Millions of Americans had died because of the invasion, and he didn't think that anyone politically would give two shits if one of the 'bad guys' felt some pain.
A voice from a speaker, mounted on the table next to the captive’s head, re
peated Horn's question; the room filling with the simplified Mandarin, translated by Ian Burrows.
For security purposes, none of the American's involved in this process had used their names in the establishment of the communications link. Only Birmingham Bob and Dukes knew whom the men involved were, and they were ordered by a highly powerful colonel to keep their mouths shut.
Horn looked at Dukes, and Dukes gave him a thumbs-up signal. At Horn’s order, the interrogation was being broadcast on multiple short-wave channels. The intent was that the Chinese would pick up on it, and also, so would the American civilians.
"Wa Ming," the bound Chinese soldier said, still blindfolded. He also gave his rank and his State ID number.
Clark was happy that the man gave that much information. His next question would dictate whether or not he would have to inflict pain.
"What is your mission?"
There was a pause before Ian broadcast his translation.
Wa Ming took a deep breath, he fought to flex his arm; the one that was dripping blood. Clark stepped in from behind, and placed his surgically gloved hand down on the bandage of the open wound. Wa Ming grunted from pressure and pain.
"What is your and mission?" Horn asked again, and again, Ian translated.
Wa Ming spoke a long sentence. It took double the amount of time for Ian to come back with the translation. "I am with the People's 5th Mechanized, and you can go fuck yourself."
Horn looked at Clark, and nodded. Clark squeezed his fingers together on the man's' shoulder, as if he were squeezing the air out of a tennis ball.
Wa Ming clinched his jaws together, fighting the agonizing pain.
Clark didn’t let up. He found himself wishing he knew the Chinese phrase for ass-hole. But, who was the ass-hole, the man following orders to invade a country, or the man following orders to try and save that country? The thought disturbed Clark, and he relaxed his grip.
Wa Ming recovered, and steeled his posture.
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