Point of Crisis (The Perseid Collapse Post Apocalyptic Series)

by Steven Konkoly

  “You leave that up to me, sir,” said Jackson.

  “Not even a gun port?”

  “Fucks with the blast-resistant dynamics,” said Lianez.

  “What are you, a vehicle engineer?”

  “Mechanical engineering degree at Northeastern.”

  “You’re kidding.”

  “Negative, sir.”

  “I stumbled into the Einstein Battalion,” Alex muttered.

  “Lianez is the exception to the rule. Most of us are good ol’-fashioned New England hicks. No G.I. Bill for me. I do this shit for free,” said Jackson.

  “Good, because I have a feeling your next paycheck is going to be late,” said Alex. “Really late.”

  They followed the convoy to a security checkpoint at the entrance to a large parking lot. A white commercial sign with “Seacoast Aviation” in red letters protruded from the ground next to an improvised waist-level sandbag emplacement. A group of soldiers dressed in full combat gear cleared out of the way, giving the MTVs a wide berth. They stayed on the sides of the gravel road, waving Alex’s vehicle through.

  “Do you want me to stop, sir?”

  Alex examined the door again. They weren’t kidding; there was no way to talk to the soldiers without opening the door.

  “Just keep going and park us next to those Humvees. At least with those, you could roll down the windows,” said Alex.

  “Sounds like old-timer talk, sir,” said Lianez.

  “No wonder Grady gave you guys up without hesitation,” he said. “Stay with the vehicle. Don’t go making friends.”

  “We’re not in the business of making friends, sir.”

  “Good. Until I’m one hundred percent sure this operation is legit, I got one foot out the door,” he said, shutting the hatch and walking toward Seacoast Aviation’s passenger terminal.

  The last of the military trucks passed through a wide gate next to the terminal, disappearing behind the corrugated metal structure. Alex stopped next to one of the parked Humvees and stared through the fence at the other side of the closest tarmac. An olive-drab tractor with a post-hole digger attachment worked next to a group of soldiers wearing ACU pants, T-shirts and combat helmets. A cluster of flatbed trucks carrying sheets of rolled fencing sat in front of an empty hangar at the end of the tarmac. From what he could tell by the posts that had been installed along the far edge of the asphalt, engineers were fencing off a section of the airport.

  A tall soldier in ACUs and a patrol cap emerged from the open terminal door, holding an M4 carbine at low ready. Alex turned to face him, slowly removing the identification card from the front pouch of his tactical vest. He kept his hands off his rifle.

  “Sir, I need to see some ID,” said the sergeant.

  Alex noticed a second soldier pointing her rifle at him through the doorway.

  “I’m a provisional captain with 1st Battalion, 25th Marine Infantry Regiment,” said Alex, handing his badge to the sergeant.

  He gave it a quizzical examination. “Never seen one of these before. Captain, we have a provo marine! Showed up in a Matvee!”

  “Good timing,” said a voice from the other side of the door. “Get him in here.”

  With the female soldier’s rifle still trained on him, Alex stepped inside the dark, sweltering terminal. Two rows of dark orange connected plastic seats sat pushed against the left wall. A rectangular folding table occupied the center of the room, covered with ruggedized military laptops and dozens of cables. Four haggard-looking soldiers crowded around the table in folding chairs, typing and talking into headsets.

  “The captain’s in the last office,” said the soldier, handing Alex the ID card.

  “You can stop pointing that at me now,” said Alex.

  The pasty-faced, sweat-covered specialist didn’t blink.

  “You want to call her off? This is the second time I’ve had a rifle pointed at my head today.”

  “You can stand down, Crosby,” said the sergeant.

  The woman flipped the selector switch on her rifle to safe and let the rifle dangle across her body armor by its sling. She was the only soldier in the terminal wearing the MTV (Modular Tactical Vest), which added at least thirty pounds to a soldier or marine’s standard load out.

  “Why are you the only one wearing the MTV?” asked Alex.

  “Because she thinks the Chinese are gonna drop from the sky and take the airport,” stated one of the soldiers working on a laptop.

  “Crosby plans to take them all out,” announced another soldier.

  She shook her head and muttered a few expletives.

  “You might be on to something, Crosby,” said Alex, silencing her colleagues.

  Alex walked down the shadowy hallway, passing two pitch-black, empty offices. Light from the outside filled the third office, rendering the space useable. A desk chair scraped the floor inside the office, followed by muttering.

  “Where the fuck is this guy?”

  A dark-haired soldier charged out of the doorway, stopping himself before barreling into Alex.

  “Shit. Sorry about that. Did they run your ID?”

  “The sergeant gave it a once-over,” said Alex.

  “Goddamn it,” he muttered, extending a hand. “Captain Rick Adler. Commanding officer, 262nd Engineering Company out of Westbrook.”

  “Captain Alex Fletcher. United States Marine Corps. Provisional.”

  “Provo, huh? I just cracked the code on all of this shit. Mind if I grab your ID?”

  “Sure,” said Alex, handing it over again.

  “Follow me,” he said, storming down the hallway.

  “Listen up! We talked about provisional ID cards! You have to scan them at this computer and send the e-file to my desk. Easy enough?”

  The table of lethargic soldiers nodded and responded with wary, “Yes, sirs.”

  “That way, I know if I’m dealing with a civilian construction engineer sent by battalion, or…” He swiped Alex’s card and read the screen. “Huh. Let’s talk in my office.”

  Alex wasn’t sure how to interpret Adler’s sudden need for privacy. Once inside the spacious, ghastly hot office, Adler shut the door and offered him a drink from a water cooler behind his modular desk.

  “Room temperature. All of our juice is going to the comms gear, though it’s awfully tempting to run a line to the cooler.”

  Alex took a sip.

  “You could make hot cocoa with this,” he said, finishing the thin paper cup.

  “Without the central air-conditioning, the building is basically one big convection oven. Tin roof. Fucking miserable. It’s worse in the hangars.”

  “Really?” said Alex, immediately eliminating the possibility of bringing his family to the hangar.

  Adler slid Alex’s ID card across the desk. “This card identifies you as the airport’s MIF.”

  “MIF?”

  “Most Important Fucker. Congratulations. Until an EMIF arrives—your wish is my command.” At Alex’s questioning look, Adler explained, “Even More Important Fucker. I’m still cracking the code on this Regional Recovery Zone shit, but the hierarchy is well defined. Security and Intelligence is at the top of the food chain.”

  “You didn’t know about the Category Five response protocols?”

  “Negative. I can only assume that knowledge was kept at the battalion commander and above level. I had a sealed pod kept under lock and key at the unit armory—to be opened under certain circumstances. Suspected EMP was one of those circumstances. I found this laptop computer and a ROTAC satphone, along with instructions for tapping into the battalion’s SIPRNet through DTCS. We never used DTCS before Monday, now it’s the only way to communicate over any appreciable distance.”

  “We used real radios in my day, and if you didn’t have comms—you didn’t have comms. Portable sat-gear was borderline Star Wars shit, even at the battalion level,” said Alex.

  “Even today it’s not widely issued to regular units below the battalion level.”

/>   “Then why does it seem like every soldier and Marine has one?”

  “Good question. DTCS came to life in 2011. Too late to make a big difference in the War on Terror, but the Pentagon pushed it.”

  “I don’t blame them. I lost several Marines in Iraq because of shitty comms.”

  “That was the big selling point. One hundred percent worldwide coverage at all times. I studied the system a year ago in one of my Staff and Command courses. One case study after another where DTCS-enabled sat-gear could have saved lives. Made sense to me, except it was never rolled out below company level. Then the DTCS budget was drastically expanded in 2016.”

  “And they were issued along with helmets in boot camp.”

  “No. That was a big point of discussion during last year’s summer training. None of the guard or reserve units saw them. Neither did their active-duty counterparts.”

  “Then where did the radios come from?”

  “Category Five response load outs. We had a secure conex box set inside one of the buildings. I assume it was EMP hardened, like a Faraday cage. The keys and combinations needed to access the conex box were located in my secure pod.”

  “What was in the container?”

  “Dozens of ROTAC handhelds, heavier duty communications gear, computers, router equipment, night-vision devices, motion sensors, cameras—everything I needed for my role at Sanford Seacoast Regional Airport. Quite a coincidence, right? Especially given the fact that the conex box was delivered over two years ago.”

  “I’m discovering a lot of these post-Jakarta Pandemic coincidences,” said Alex.

  “Like the runway out there?” asked Adler.

  “Makes you wonder.”

  “I wouldn’t wonder too loudly. My initial Category Five orders also involved sending two soldiers home—booted from the company. Stripped of all rank and privileges, like they were criminals.”

  “Militia?”

  “Likely militia involvement.”

  “The orders said that?”

  “Negative. I called Colonel Hanson over ROTAC to confirm the orders, looking for an explanation. His orders came with a few more details. He lost a total of eight from the battalion. All with suspected or confirmed ties to Maine militia groups.”

  “That’s interesting given my role here,” said Alex.

  Adler stared at him for a moment, his expression flashing from doubt to panic. “Look, I’m in this for the long haul. Part of the team. I just can’t help making the connections to—”

  “Rick, what are you talking about?”

  Adler cocked his head. “Let’s just say I get worried when I see the label ‘security and intelligence’ accompanied by ‘provide unrestricted access.’ Call me paranoid.”

  “What else did my ID badge tell you?”

  “That’s the extent of it, but what else do you need? It’s more or less a carte blanche declaration, which is why it struck me as odd. The RRZ protocols are thick, delineating relationships, authority, this and that. Typical government bullshit. I have to go through ten layers of nonsense to move one of the airport’s porta-shitters ten feet to the left.”

  “It didn’t say what type of security? I was under the impression that the Marine battalion was an area security unit for southern Maine. Almost like MPs.”

  “You have one of the least defined security clearances I’ve ever seen. It set off my internal alarm. Let’s leave it at that.”

  “I think you might want to heed your spider sense. You never know who you’re talking to, or who’s listening.”

  “I hear you. Keep it zipped and do your job,” said Adler.

  “Especially when the Recovery Zone personnel start to arrive. Any idea when that might start?”

  “My first priority is to build a security barrier around the cluster of hangars and commercial buildings across the tarmac. I assume the RRZ folks will start rolling in once it’s finished.”

  “That’ll be one long line of EMIFs,” said Alex.

  “I won’t have to worry about that. A company of Rangers from the 2nd Ranger Battalion is scheduled to arrive tomorrow, along with a headquarters element from the 75th Ranger Regiment. They’ll take over physical security and general airport operations while I harden the perimeter. After that, it’s a nonstop parade of aircraft and vehicles. 4th Brigade Combat Team, 10th Mountain Division has been assigned to RRZ border control and FEMA camp security. They’re bringing part of the division’s Aviation Brigade. Blackhawks and Chinooks. You won’t recognize this place by next week.”

  “The entire Brigade Combat Team?”

  “That’s the plan. Advanced elements left Fort Drum this morning.”

  “I need to secure hangar space for my battalion—before it’s standing room only. Something out of the way, with quick access to a gate,” said Alex.

  Captain Adler stood up and walked to the window, pointing across the main runway.

  “See those long hangars? Two in front, along the taxiway, and one partially hidden behind them?”

  “Got it,” said Alex, feeling the heat pour through the thin glass as he neared.

  “We cleared the aircraft out yesterday. The hangars have their own gate and access road. Easy in, easy out. A straight shot down Airport Road to Route 109. How much room do you need?”

  “I’ll take all three hangars,” said Alex, staring past the waves of superheated air rising from the asphalt runway.

  “Why not? First come, first serve. Perfect timing, too. Your conex boxes arrived on that convoy. I’ll send them over to the hangars,” he said, nodding at the three trucks Alex had followed into the airport.

  “Were the conex boxes delivered to another airport?”

  “This is where it gets really interesting. They’re dragging container after container out of an old business park behind Walmart. Started two days ago.”

  “Want to take bets on when that business park was abandoned?” Alex asked wryly.

  “About the same time the runway was reinforced. I had a talk with the mayor,” said Adler. “The company that owned the business park let the leases expire on several local businesses between 2015 and 2016. They may have bought out a few of the longer term leases.”

  “I’m starting to get a bad feeling about this,” said Alex.

  “Starting?”

  Alex considered the implications raised by his conversation with Adler. One thing was certain. The federal government had been planning for a catastrophic, national-scale disaster since 2015, possibly earlier. The complexity of the Category Five Response Plan was mind-boggling. Hundreds, possibly thousands of active duty and reserve military commanders received orders governing and coordinating the deployment of their units. Countless thousands of equipment containers had been pre-staged across the United States for the express purpose of supporting Category Five requirements—or the Federal Recovery Plan.

  The relationship between the two looked hazy. Declaration of a Category Five Event triggered specific military missions, like Lieutenant Colonel Grady’s immediate deployment to Boston, but it also appeared to set the Federal Recovery Plan wheels in motion. Adler received orders to secure the airport and start building an inner perimeter, all tasks designed to support the Regional Recovery Zone. Maybe the declaration of a Category Five Event was synonymous with the activation of the Federal Recovery Plan. He didn’t know, and he was too exhausted to give it any more thought. He’d oversee the delivery of his battalion’s conex boxes to the distant hangars and head back to Limerick after he had a look at the contents.

  Chapter 5

  EVENT +5 Days

  Limerick, Maine

  Kate checked her watch and shook her head.

  Where the hell is he?

  Alex had been gone for nearly five hours, two hours longer than he had estimated. His absence was conspicuous given the circumstances. At first she had been angry, but now she was worried that he had run into trouble with the supposedly friendly militia group. Or worse, he had decided to ignore her rep
eated warnings about staying away from Eli Russell’s base camp and had been ambushed. She sensed a presence in the bathroom doorway.

  “I’m sure he’s fine, Kate,” said Tim Fletcher, Alex’s dad and Kate’s father-in-law.

  “He should have been back already,” she said, mopping at the hardened mixture of drywall dust on the tile floor.

  “We’d know if something was wrong. The Marines would get a distress call and respond.”

  “Unless they were taken out by an IED or a coordinated ambush. Six hours without a phone call?”

  “I’ll have Staff Sergeant Evans check in on them. Looking good in here,” Tim said, glancing at the entire mudroom.

  “Aside from the missing toilet, cracked sink and bullet holes,” she said.

  “It’s coming along. The first floor is clear of debris and drywall dust. We’ll put the kids to work on the upstairs after lunch. Tomorrow, we’ll start on the outside. If Alex can find plywood and heavy-duty hinges, we’ll fashion some crude hurricane shutters that can be pulled shut from the inside. It won’t look pretty, but we’ll be back in business in a few weeks.”

  “I don’t know.” Kate sighed. “Alex doesn’t seem optimistic about this whole Recovery Zone thing.”

  “I suppose we could make a go of it back at the Scarborough house. Put a little distance between ourselves and the border.”

  “We need to move away from the population centers, especially Portland. Plus, the house will be one giant mold spore in a few weeks. The water went up to the ceiling. I’d only recommend our house in an absolute emergency.”

  “Well, if the situation deteriorates, we’ll have to consider it.”

  “Worse than this?” she said, and they both laughed.

  Kate lowered her voice to a whisper. “Emily overheard Ed talking to Charlie and Linda about their place up in Belgrade. Maybe we should consider relocating—at least until the Marines destroy this militia group.”

  “Who’s to say the situation is any better up north?” Tim whispered back.

  “It has to be better than living in fear of a murderous lunatic,” she said.

  “We’re in pretty good hands here. I’d rather take my chances with what I know, and I didn’t get the impression that Charlie had a big place up there. Sounded like a cozy, four-season lake cottage. We have seventeen mouths to feed here. This is our best bet, if we can make it work.”