by Mark Tufo
The ground shook very slightly as our shuttle finally landed. Couldn’t even see it, it was so far away. BT and I both shielded our eyes to the sun as we watched Tracy descend. Her leading battle pack caused a plume of dust as it struck terra firma first and then Tracy. She stuck the landing like a much better version of the aforementioned gymnast. She took two steps and was out of her harness.
“That’s how you do it,” she said as she walked up, opened up the pack and handed out our weapons.
“Now what?” BT asked, as we looked around the expansive desert we now found ourselves in.
“We wait.”
“Wait?” I looked over to her. “Wait for what?”
“Someone tried to shoot us down, don’t you think they’re going to come and investigate?”
“They’ve already tried to kill us once. Do you think we should just wait and see what their intentions are?”
“Yeah, what he said.” BT agreed with me for once.
“They were trying to shoot us down when they thought we were the enemy.”
“Your argument has valid points, but I just don’t like sitting here and seeing if we’re all playing for the same team. Just because they’re people doesn’t mean they’re friendly.”
“Yeah, what he said.”
“Okay, now it’s just getting weird,” I said to BT. “Maybe we should at least hide.”
“Alright, my beloved husband, lead on and hide us.”
I did a complete three-sixty. The only way the ground could have gotten any flatter and spread out for a longer distance would be if God himself came down and scraped the earth with the side of his palm. “Okay, so maybe waiting isn’t the worst idea.” There was not one good place to get a modicum of cover.
Tracy was the only one with the foresight to bring water, which she gladly shared. I wasn’t keen on passing a community canteen, but I was less keen on dehydrating.
“Why do you keep water-falling your drinks? You afraid of a few little germs?” BT laughed.
“Listen, man, the germs you have are probably pretty hardy and could kill a normal sized guy like me.”
BT shrugged a little and cocked his head. “You could be right. You’d better keep an eye on him,” he said as an aside to Tracy. “This shit only gets worse.”
“I know.” She was pulling out her magazine to check the rounds. Something we all found ourselves doing.
It took longer than I thought it would, but when we saw the dust trails approaching, it seemed that it was happening too fast. We all stood, our weapons were down, but the safeties were off.
“Military trucks,” I said, shielding my eyes to the watery wave-like hallucination as the vehicles approached.
“That’s good, right?” BT asked.
“It’s promising,” Tracy replied.
The tension got thicker as the trucks got closer. A Hummer took the lead and stopped about thirty yards from our position. A soldier was manning the .50 cal mounted on the small truck. We’d be lucky to even get our rifles up, much less get a shot off, before a hundred rounds were heading our way.
“I think it goes without saying that you should put your weapons down,” a voice said over a bullhorn mounted in front of the radiator.
“What do you think?” I asked.
“Are you serious, Mike? Put your gun down.” Tracy was already bending over, placing hers on the ground.
“Fuck.” BT and I followed suit.
“Now stand with your hands raised,” the voice said again.
“Want us to do a little fucking dance, too?” I asked. I couldn’t help myself.
“Your husband is going to get us shot,” BT muttered.
“Colonel Talbot?” the voice asked.
This was one of those times when you start mulling over whether to answer or not with the truth. Are you guilty of some past transgression and this person is trying to ascertain your identity before either punching you in the mouth or serving you a summons or maybe just collecting a debt? I mean, really, what do I know? Maybe he’s from the French Foreign Legion sent on an assassination mission for my part in the destruction of France. It could happen.
“I’m Major Talbot.” Tracy took the lead and stepped forward while she watched my internal struggle. A bevy of salutes followed, none of which I responded to; I let Tracy take care of all that.
“Major Talbot? You’re both alive? We had reports that both of you were killed.”
“Well, I can assure you that is not the case, Corporal. Who is the officer in charge?” My wife had already grabbed her weapon and was heading to the truck, while BT and I were still standing there with our hands in the air. “You two coming?” she asked.
“Ah, yeah, sure. Umm, I’m Colonel Talbot, too,” I said, clearing my throat.
“Too?” BT asked.
“Shut up, man.”
“Captain Firth is back at our base, so I guess that makes you in charge, Ma’am. I mean, Colonel.”
“That’s right I’m in charge. Let’s go back to base.”
“Two seconds ago you couldn’t even say your name, now you’re running the show?” BT whispered in my ear.
“I’ll have you arrested if you don’t shut up.”
We headed back to base at speeds I didn’t think the vehicles were capable of.
“We can’t stay out in the open too long, the Progerians have patrols all over the planet, and not much escapes their watchful eye,” the corporal explained.
We pressed the corporal for more information, but he seemed reluctant to talk, at least while we were vulnerable.
“Can you at least tell me where we’re headed?”
“I told you, sir, the base.”
“Listen, Corporal, you haven’t told me shit.” I leaned, in making sure my shiny full-bird insignia was directly in his face. “I’ll order a halt to this little convoy, and we’ll wait until either the Progs show up or you tell me where the hell we’re going.”
“No disrespect, sir...” The corporal was thinking through his words carefully. I’m thinking he wanted to tell me I wasn’t in charge. Yet, in reality, I was now maybe the highest ranking officer on the entire continent, so yeah, I was probably in charge of just about everything. Had to admit for a second there I caught a bit of the allure and intoxication of that power. Then I looked over to Tracy who was telling the corporal to keep moving and I realized it was all just an illusion.
“We’ll know soon enough, Colonel,” Tracy said. She used my rank but only because others were present.
“This place is real?” BT asked, as we passed a sign that read, “Area 51, Restricted Zone. Trespassers will be arrested and prosecuted.”
“News to me.”
Tracy didn’t say anything.
“Wait, you knew about this place? You knew about this place and didn’t say anything?”
“It’s classified top secret and is on a need-to-know basis.”
“I’m your husband.”
“That doesn’t mean you need to know.”
“What else do you know that you’re not telling me?”
“I can’t tell you, that’s the point.”
We were still a good mile or so from the middle of the base, but I could tell by the burned out husks of buildings almost reduced to their foundations that this was where the base had been located.
“The Progs do this?” I asked.
“No, sir. We did.” The corporal saw my querulous look. “We did it so they would have no reason to come any closer. The real base is coming up.”
“I hate this underground crap, makes me feel like a damn hiding rat.” I was in a sour mood and it was getting worse. Being nearly killed multiple times in the same day tends to have that effect on me.
The ground began to gently slope, and then we were under a canopy of radar deflecting camouflage netting. What was more impressive was the opening it was hiding, which had to have been fifty feet across.
“How has this been kept hidden from the public?” I asked as we pass
ed underneath. I was referring to when civilization still stood.
“This is new, we had to build it after we razed Building 51,” the corporal explained.
“Colonel, Major, good to have you here.” Captain Firth saluted us as we pulled in. Tracy had finished her salute, but the captain was still holding his, waiting for me to salute in return. I was too busy watching the beehive of activity going on around me, at least until Tracy pushed my side.
“Sorry,” I said when I realized what was happening. The area we were in had fighter aircraft of all sizes and nationalities. Trucks and tanks lined the far wall. Men and women were hustling about carrying various pieces of gear and weaponry.
“May I ask what is happening, Captain? You appear to be preparing for something,” Tracy asked.
“Certainly, Major. The Progerians have sent down three battalions’ worth of their heavy Genos not more than a hundred miles from here.”
“Mutes,” I spoke aloud.
The captain nodded.
“Do they know about this place?” she asked.
“I don’t believe so, they seem much less interested in gaining ground so much as scorching the earth. Simply put, if they knew we were here, they would have just bombed us out of existence.”
“Then why the mustering?” BT asked.
“And you are, sir?” the captain asked, like he’d just noticed the extremely large man.
“This is Captain BT of the Los Angeles Militia Squad.”
“Beatty?”
“Close enough.”
“I have not heard of them.”
“His unit saved my ass and put up one of the best defenses before we were overrun.”
“You were on the wall?” the captain asked. I could see his demeanor change as his level of respect for BT rose.
“Yes.”
“We were told that was mostly gang members, not military units.”
“Let’s not get into semantics, Captain. This man risked himself and his men to defend his city. It matters little what flag, or I guess rag, flew over his head before this shit started.”
“It’s times like this I hate you less, Mike.”
“Thanks, BT.”
The captain seemed alright with that explanation and continued. “We’re getting ready to leave is what it comes down to. We have no chance against the invaders.”
“The plan is to run?” I asked incredulously.
“Maybe you could learn a thing or two from him, Mike,” Tracy said.
“Yeah, you’re one to talk,” I shot back.
“It’s not the same ground war. They have learned, and they have massive amounts of air support. We’ve tried attacking them at different places and have always been met with devastating results.”
“That might have changed.” I was thinking out loud again.
“How so, sir?”
“Well Paul, I mean, General Ginson, is harassing the shit out of one of their war vessels. I would imagine they would recall all their support. If there’s one thing I know about the Progs, they’re much more interested in defending themselves than they are any Genos or Mutes.”
“I don’t have enough qualified personnel to risk something on an assumption, sir.”
“Dammit.” I would have brought my foot down on the ground if I were six and spoiled rotten.
“Mike?” Tracy queried.
“I just want to go check on our son.”
“But?”
“You know what the ‘but’ is.”
“No,” BT said, flat out refusing anything I was about to present. “No, goddammit!” he punctuated his point.
“Any chance you could communicate to me what he is so vehemently protesting?” the captain asked.
“What if I paint some targets for you with a laser, Captain? I’ll recon the landing zone, and if there’s no air support, I’ll radio for some fighters.”
“It’s highly unusual that the highest ranking officer would go out on a military mission, sir.”
“Just pretend I’m Captain Kirk, he did this crap all the time.”
“Oh please,” Tracy replied sarcastically.
“Who, sir?”
“Really? You don’t know who Captain Kirk is?”
The captain shrugged his shoulders.
“Spock?”
The captain shook his head.
“Okay, we’ll shoot from a different angle. Princess Leia?”
“She British, sir?”
“We don’t have time for this, Mike,” Tracy said.
“But how can he not know?”
“Not everyone is a damn nerd like you,” BT added.
“Funny, because apparently you know who I’m talking about.”
“One doesn’t need to be a nerd to enjoy a great cinematic experience.”
“Who are you kidding? You probably had all the collectable figurines.”
“Most of them.”
“Figured as much. Tracy, any chance I can convince you to stay here?”
“None.”
“Fair enough, had to ask.”
“You could order her, sir,” the captain said.
BT and I couldn’t even look at each other for fear of laughing. “Order? Not a chance. What about you, BT? What are your plans? I’ll get you transport back to L.A. if you want.”
“There’s nothing left there for me, not even a chance for revenge. Naw, man, for good or bad, I’m heading where you are.”
“Glad to have you, but are you sure you don’t want to go back and try to salvage some of your movie toys?”
“Don’t make me regret my decision this early on,” he growled.
“Oh, there will be plenty of time for that later,” Tracy said. “Let’s get some gear and get going. The sooner this is done, the sooner we can go get Travis.”
“Can’t argue with that.”
We spent the remainder of the day and stayed the night. The shuttle experience had drained us more than any of us cared to admit. The captain offered his quarters, I declined, instead getting a couple of cots and actually sleeping under the radar diffusing netting. I wasn’t a fan of being buried, and that’s the feeling I always got when I was underground. You’d think I’d had enough of peering at the stars. I don’t know…there was something calming in the cold indifferent light that shone down from them. The next morning we had a light breakfast and got ready to go. Captain Firth was the first to greet us.
“Captain, I’m going to need a laser targeting system and, do you have some mode of transportation that doesn’t look so conspicuous?” Tracy was grabbing ammunition and other supplies and thrusting them into BT’s hands and mine as we dutifully followed her.
“Ghillie suits? I hate those things—they itch like mad. And you’d need a forest-sized one to hide his ass.” I pointed behind me.
“Keep talking.” BT was biting the bottom of his lip.
Twenty minutes later we were on the road in a pickup truck that had seen better days but we were assured ran fine. The way it was pushed on us, I felt like we were at a used car dealership. I kept asking about the Caddy in the corner and the captain kept directing us back to the truck. I wanted to tell him my credit was decent and I wanted the nicer car, he was hearing none of it. Must have been his. I had to think he thought we weren’t coming back, which was a fair enough assumption. If the mission failed, we’d be dead. If the mission succeeded our next stop was Maine.
Tracy told him we’d be back once we got our son. The odds of that were incredibly much more unlikely than us even making it through this day. He’d also offered for two of his men to come with us in a separate vehicle. I quickly told him no, although I couldn’t bring myself to give him the reason why I’d said this. I suppose a journal is as good a place to put down one’s fears and superstitions. I’d already brought up the subject of Star Trek today, and all I could picture were two of the captain’s men joining the “away team” becoming disposable characters as larger events played out among us. I was convinced before we ever met
them that they’d be dead before the sun set. I didn’t want that guilt on my head, considering I’d already opened up that train of thought, and of course it would cosmically need to be followed through to its ultimate conclusion.
“We could have used the help,” Tracy said, adjusting her gear as I drove us out of the base.
“It’s a red shirt thing, am I right?” BT asked.
“How the hell did you know?” I asked as I looked back at him in the rearview mirror. He had the entire extended crew cab to himself, his legs outstretched and a grin on his face.
“Red shirt?”
“Anyone wearing a red shirt in a Star Trek landing party generally dies pretty violently and quickly.”
“Not sure why I asked. And you’re in on this with him?” Tracy asked BT.
He shrugged.
Chapter 11
CHAPTER ELEVEN – DRABABAN
Drababan and Tony had not gone more than a few miles from the cabin when a shuttle passed high over their head.
“I wonder where they’re going?” Tony had asked, looking up.
“It is no coincidence that shuttle is here.”
“You truly believe that they have come specifically to get my son?”
Dee turned to look at Mike’s father. “Your son escaped off of a hostile war ship with the commander of that ship. He was recaptured, fought his last battle, and was crowned the Earth champion. Before I could kill him, thus showing the Progerian superiority, he again escaped, this time leading successful raids against ground troops culminating in a Genogerian revolution that saw that same ship fall into enemy hands. Yes, I do believe they would make a special trip just to recapture him.”
“Well, when you say it like that…I don’t understand why they don’t just bomb this place like they have been doing everywhere else?”
“They must make a point of capturing him, of showing that humanity has no chance. We should keep moving. Once they realize he is not around, they will make sure he has no place to return to.”
Tony’s steps only faltered for a moment when they heard an explosion that could only be one thing. Drababan’s steps never faltered. “It was merely a gathering place, you can make another, that is what is important,” Dee said, attempting to soften the blow the man had received. “Down!”
