Plague Years (Book 3): This Thing of Darkness I Acknowledge Mine

by Rounds, Mark

  “Sergeant,” said Lassiter’s voice over the speaker phone. “Just about everybody is armed these days if they aren’t suffering too badly from the plague. What makes you think these folks are who we are looking for?”

  “Several things,” said JD. “I don’t think they are local. None of my patrol knew any of them and Jacob Ulman grew up not four miles from that elevator. Next, they tromped a lot of the wheat down and left tracks like it didn’t matter and anyone from around here knows you don’t do that. Food is going to be scarce come winter.”

  “So, I get they were not local,” said Chad somewhat impatiently. “Why do you think it’s Nergüi?”

  “They were all in uniform,” said JD, “and they were better armed than locals. Finally, they were making a serious, if ineffective, effort to hide. The Fisher Elevator is a tumbled down mess. There are abandoned farm houses fairly close that are better shelter. If they knew the area, they would have headed for one of those, but I could still see the smoldering wreck of the bus they were travelling in. This was the closest thing they could find before it got light. They took pot shots at us which is something the locals never do because we patrol through here regularly. Harvest is coming and they know they will need labor from Moscow to help get it in. Lastly, there were a lot of them, like thirty or more when they ran across the field.

  “I know it’s a lot of little things but it all adds up. They have to be there.”

  “So where is the rest of your patrol, Sergeant?” asked Lassiter. “I would like to debrief them to get all the details we can.”

  “Sir they are at least forty-five minutes behind me,” said JD. “We felt that this information had to get out ASAP so part of the patrol went to the message drop we have with Major Tippet and the rest are following me. They are mounted on a mixed bag of trail horses, family pets, and such. Stomper is way faster.”

  “What’s a Stomper?” asked a perplexed Lassiter.

  “My horse, sir,” said JD smiling. “He’s a big assed quarter horse that can run like the wind … sir.”

  “Good report Sergeant,” said Chad covering a smile, “I will need a more formal debrief, but Corporal Taylor outside my office will take that all down.”

  “About that,” said JD sheepishly. “If he’s that tall Army corporal who was in your front office. I drafted him to hold Stomper. If I am not out there PDQ, Stomper will live up to his name and you may need another corporal.”

  “Take care of it, Sergeant,” said Chad “and then get Terry to help you with your report. As the rest of your patrol comes in, he can take their statements as well.”

  “What do you think we should do Captain?” said Lassiter once JD was out of the room.

  “Sir, I have some other intel that JD wasn’t aware of,” said Chad. “Our double agent has been contacted by Nergüi trying to buy transport out of the area. That jives with JD’s report. He’s desperate. Unfortunately, I don’t have enough force around here to have any chance of taking him down sir. Most all of my motor transport is out hunting him and we are way short of fuel. I need you to get with the Army and get a big enough team to take him, alive if possible.”

  “That’s a tall order, Captain,” said Lassiter after a moment. “Antonopoulos is back and he is kicking ass and taking names, but it’s going to be hours at best and maybe days before we have real cooperation. GEN Bossell is on board, but a substantial number of Army officers believe there is some sort of coup attempt going on.”

  “Then we need to keep him tied down until we can get support,” said Chad. “What do you have in the way of air assets?”

  “Not much,” said Lassiter. “I have my two drones and whatever they can shake loose from the Air Force. The Army has two alert birds but they are claiming they are for base security. Antonopoulos has a lot of issues to handle. It will be a while.”

  “Then sir, I request, we keep one of your drones over him as much as possible,” said Chad. “Make it look like a search pattern so he doesn’t suspect we have intel from inside. He will suspect the horse patrol for a while.”

  “What good do you think that will do?” asked Lassiter.

  “Either he will stay put which is good for us,” said Chad, “or he will panic and do something that gets him out in the open. Either way, we are buying time until we can get a capture mission together.”

  “I am also going to move Tippet and his force closer in,” said Lassiter. “If he does panic, they might be all we have to exploit it.”

  “I’ll make the call,” said Chad.

  July 11th, Saturday, 11:27 am PDT

  On the Sunset Road, South and west of Thornton WA

  “Ace,” said The Hammer looking at his service station road map, “It says here that the road we want is Huntley Road which I think is this dirt road right here. There are no freaking signs though and this GPS is hosed.”

  “They all work some of the time,” said Ace. “The bad guys are spending a lot of time and fuel to jam things. You know radios, TVs, and now GPSs. They also have been screwin’ with the cell towers some too. Sometimes you get through and sometimes not. Major Tippet says that they we have to assume the bad guys are listening even when you do get through. So which way?”

  “I think we ought to go that way,” said The Hammer pointing down the dirt road, “but it looks like all the other dirt roads around here.

  “Oh shit, oh dear!” he added looking up from his road map. The large metal sided farming building fifty yards distant from there cross road began belching out Infected. It must have been full to the rafters for they just kept coming and coming.

  “Let’s beat feet,” said Ace turning his cycle toward Thornton.

  “Give me a sec,” said The Hammer who looked for all the world like he was smelling something.

  “Time to go,” said Ace as the Infected reached the road.

  Both of the bikers took off in a cloud of gravel.

  Ten minutes later, they were flagging down Dave’s small convoy.

  “What’s going on?” said Dave as the cloud of dust swirled around them.

  “Four miles back down this road,” said Ace still panting a bit from the hard riding. “At the intersection of Sunset Road and Huntley there is a whole shitload of Infected headed this way.”

  “Define a shitload,” said Dave who was still trying to instill some rigor in his recon element. As they talked, The Hammer wandered over to where Chris was standing.

  “Chris, where’s Amber?” said The Hammer quietly so as not to gather Dave’s attention.

  “She’s in the van,” said Chris, “Why?”

  “I need to talk to someone else about … stuff.”

  “What kind of stuff is that?” asked Amber as she rolled down the window of the van.

  “We just saw a bunch of Infected,” said The Hammer. “Only there was something different about them.”

  “Tell me more,” said Amber quietly as she climbed down from the passenger seat of the van.

  “They hid in a building until we were close,” said Hammer. “And then came out after us. If they had waited another thirty seconds and we had started down the road, I wouldn’t be here. Something made them wait much longer than they normally would have.”

  “Did they just bar the door or something?” asked Chris.

  “Something else was restraining them,” said The Hammer. “I felt something.”

  “That’s ‘The Call’ you felt,” said Little Bear who seemed to appear from nowhere. “How did you feel it?”

  “He is one of us,” said Amber with a guilty look at Chris. “Chris didn’t tell me, but while you are pretty good at shielding yourself, you’re not perfect.”

  “Sayla spotted it too,” said The Hammer. “But I have felt ‘The Call’ before. This was different, stronger.”

  “Nergüi can do that,” said Little Bear. “He and some of the older ‘Chosen’ can control the Infected but it costs. That’s why they wanted you. They use up the Chosen with ’The Call’ like rounds in a
gun.”

  “But he didn’t take you, did he?” asked Chris quietly.

  “No,” said Little Bear in a subdued voice. “After we get over the Plague and discover what can be done with the Call, we are no use to them. Eventually, when I stop being useful to him, Nergüi will snuff me out like a match.”

  “So you are playing a balancing act,” said Amber scornfully. “You intend to milk him for all he is worth and then take him or kill him.”

  It wasn’t a question, but rather a caustic statement.

  “You act so high and mighty,” said Little Bear angrily, “but remember, until this spring, I was dealing with him alone. The Others thought that he was a lone wolf and you saw how they wanted to deal with him, just let his faction run its course and die out. Now, even when it’s clear that he is part of a larger organization that intends to throw the world back to the dark ages for their own goals, they simply want to hide and wait them out.

  “It wasn’t going to work then and it’s not going to work now. If you intend to kill a beast, you aim for the heart. I couldn’t do that. I know only about Nergüi, not his boss. Let’s say we get him. Put him in a cell. They will bring someone else out to keep this going. We need more than we got, so yeah, I am playing with him and he knows it.”

  “But if we capture him,” said Amber in a soothing voice, “Interrogate him, we can learn more …”

  “You think you can twist his mind like you did mine!” shouted Little Bear surprising them all. “You are strong, stronger than Nergüi maybe, but he is cunning and has done this for many years. You will make a mistake and he will be ready. He is old and he is patient.”

  “I can hear better than you think I can,” said Dave who surprised them all by walking up silently. “So, I have questions. First, why can’t The Hammer or Little Bear stand up to him, fight him? Why does it have to be Amber?”

  “If you could be inside my mind for just a few seconds, you would know,” said Little Bear looking down at the ground in shame. “I can resist him for a few minutes, enough to get away. I probably could have resisted Amber here if I was ready, but only for a few minutes.

  “But this guy” said Little Bear pointing at The Hammer, “and I are how one normally recovers from the Plague. We heal faster, live longer, and can get at a little of what other people are thinking. That’s it. We have to hide because Nergüi and others like him hunt us. The Hammer here is the best I have ever seen at covering up. He fooled me.”

  “Sayla knew,” said Chris quietly.

  “Sayla knew much,” said Little Bear again looking down, “including when to tell me to run even though it meant a literal living hell for him. Now I hope, for his sake, he is beyond this mortal coil because if Nergüi has him, he can and will make Sayla’s life hell for years.

  “Amber is different,” said Little Bear, “she will outlive us all and age even more slowly.”

  “This is all useful information,” said Dave, “but there are nearly a thousand infected coming this way. I think we had better be moving as I don’t think we have enough ammo to shoot them all.”

  “Major Tippet,” shouted Billie carrying the comm link. “There is someone on the sat phone for you!”

  “We have our first drone over your area with some good imaging,” said Chad without preamble after Dave got to the sat phone. “You aren’t going to like it.”

  “What do you have?” asked Dave resignedly after Little Bear and Hammer had left, “other than the thousand Infected just down the road from my location.”

  “That times three,” said Chad worriedly. “We have three groups out in the open, in a rough circle around Nergüi’s location. In addition, we have identified via infrared scanning that there are other possible sites where more Infected could be hiding. Apparently, Nergüi is protecting himself. Some of the groups may also be headed toward Moscow, perhaps to launch an attack to take the pressure off of Nergüi or at least to interfere with our efforts to get at him.”

  “If it was going to be easy,” said Dave rolling his eyes, “they would have monkeys doing it. OK, what other air support do we have? We are down to half a tank and that means patrolling is out. We have enough fuel to hit a target and extract.”

  “Antonopoulos is negotiating with the Army to get a strike team ready,” said Chad. “The second drone with a weapons package will be on station shortly. The Army has reluctantly agreed to support a C-17 mission to Fairchild with a flight of Little Birds embarked. They will have a standard armaments package. That should launch by the end of today. They are also reconfiguring two UH-60s for long range work and they will launch within the hour. Tell me Dave, you said you wouldn’t ever be without proper explosives again. Do you have some with you?”

  “Way ahead of you, cowboy,” said Dave with a smile. “We may not have enough ammo to shoot all the Infected but I do have more than a dozen homemade claymores. If we can use your drone to herd the Infected into a kill zone, we can blast the heck out of them. That begs the obvious question though. Why should we?”

  “We need to put pressure on Nergüi,” said Chad. “Capt. Lassiter is of the opinion that if we can ramp up the intensity of our operation in the attempt to capture Nergüi, he might make a mistake and that might allow you to take him or keep him tied down until the Army strike team is ready.”

  “I can only do this once,” said Dave, “and I may need to use some of those claymores to try to take down Nergüi. What’s his strength anyway?”

  “He has between twenty-five and thirty heat signatures at his site,” said Chad. “Call it a platoon. From what our cavalry patrol noted they were pretty well armed with modern small arms and the attack on Fairchild included a mortar barrage and MANPADs.”

  “Better equipment than what I have here,” mused Dave. “We can hit the Infected, but unless there are some serious casualties on their end, I am going to be hard pressed to take advantage of any mistakes they make.”

  “We’ll hope that Lassiter and Antonopoulos can get a strike together by then,” said Chad.

  “I’ll set up the ambush,” said Dave. “Keep me posted as to the angle of approach and distance of the Infected band.”

  Chapter 5

  July 11th, Saturday, 12:04 pm PDT

  Headquarters Building Joint Base Lewis–McChord Tacoma WA

  GEN Antonopoulos entered the staff meeting with all the major unit commanders at Joint Base Lewis–McChord who were getting up to speed and developing a plan to go forward. The lowest rank in the large conference room at I Corps Headquarters, other than the two aides who handled slides and various other duties, was the Marine Lieutenant Colonel who commanded the security battalion for the Kitsap Naval Base. There were several flag officers and fifteen full colonels. There were also a handful of civilians from key support organizations.

  Antonopoulos strode to the lectern and waited for everyone to settle down. The mood of the room was somber. Everyone knew that things had not gone smoothly for the last thirty-six hours and that Antonopoulos had been stranded in the field overnight. Antonopoulos had not changed, but rather had organized this meeting while airborne enroute to the base. He still wore his soiled utility uniform and carried his sidearm.

  “Ladies and Gentlemen,” said Antonopoulos somberly, “I won’t make the tired old joke about the purpose of this meeting. You all know why we are here. Before we get into the details, I would like to make an opening statement. During the conduct of the mission I have just returned from, two valiant American service members gave their lives protecting myself and the rest of our mission. One was a career Army NCO and the other was an Airman on her first hitch. They didn’t play political games nor did they engage in one-upmanship, instead they worked together and accomplished the mission.

  “America, and indeed the world, is in crisis. Hundreds of millions of people are dead around the globe and many more are infected with a disease that was maliciously fomented to bring the world to its collective knees. While this is happening, we have been involved in
petty peace time bureaucratic maneuvering and turf fights that don’t matter anymore. This must stop now.

  “General Buckley has been recalled to Washington DC for reassignment to Fort Hood. It is their hope that he can motivate the personnel at that base to pull off the same miracle you have achieved here. We have, thanks to the concerted efforts of nearly a quarter million service members and their families, built a self-sustaining military base that is slowly but surely fighting back the Plague and the evil organization behind it.

  “We can’t let that go by the wayside due to lack of trust. I will state upfront that I have no political aspirations. I surely have no desire to rule the world. Six months ago, I was looking forward to my retirement in two years and perhaps a teaching job. I still intend to follow that course as soon as this emergency is over.

  “But until then, I will serve as commander of the Washington State Military District until relieved by higher headquarters that are functional in Washington DC and elsewhere. We are all still bound by our oath to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic. This Plague, maliciously engineered to infect and kill as many people as possible, is the greatest threat to that document and the principles it represents since the founding of our nation. I will not rest until that scourge abates. I know we have a morale problem with the shakeup in command structure. I will make time to attend Commander’s Calls and we will restore the trust we had under General Buckley.

  “If you have complaints about how things are going, use your chain of command or if that isn’t appropriate, use the IG. We are still members of the American Military and we will, by God, conduct ourselves accordingly.

  “General Bossell will take over command Army Operations from General Johnson who is in custody. Admiral Turner’s replacement has been chosen by the CNO and he or she will be brought in from an active Fleet Command as our naval units return to their home ports. Captain Lassiter will become my chief intelligence officer. My previous gig, the Commander of the 62nd Air Lift Wing will fall to my Deputy Commander for Operations, Colonel Henry.