The Dying of the Light (Book 3): Beginning

by Jason Kristopher

  Graves’s chest ached with embarrassment. “We’re not going to leave you in the lurch, Chief. We’ll get some people in to help you out, but you’re all going to have to pull more weight and work harder than you have in years. You’re going to need to learn to be self-sufficient, without mooching off your neighbors.”

  Peltmeyer’s face grew red and his eyes small and hard. “Not all of us wanted that, Admiral.”

  Graves shook his head and groaned. “I can’t win, can I? Big ol’ foot sandwich I keep feeding myself.” He stood a little taller and looked the chief in the eye. “Look, however stupid some of the things I’m saying may be, I swear on my oath as an officer that we will not let you down. Good enough?”

  Peltmeyer stared at him for another long moment and then held out a hand. “My dad was a Navy man. Only one time in his life did he swear on his oath. I know what that means to you. That’s good enough for me. What can we do to help?”

  Graves smiled and let out a long breath as he shook the chief’s hand. “Thanks. I’m much better with boats than people. What’s your comms status?”

  Peltmeyer shrugged. “Most of our comms have been out for over a year now, but what little we have left, yeah, I’ll lock it down.”

  “That would explain why we couldn’t get in touch with you.”

  “You’ve been trying?”

  “Damn right we have.” Graves sighed, then looked at O’Reilly, who nodded. “Well, shit, Chief. We can’t leave a good man in a spot like this. I’ll take temporary command if you don’t have anyone here other than Marnes, and we’ll get you squared away. But nothing permanent. That’ll be up to you and the Council.”

  Graves turned to O’Reilly. “Get the word to the Council that we’re successful here, and send the go code to Anderson.”

  “Yes, sir,” O’Reilly said and moved to the communications equipment.

  Graves turned back to Peltmeyer. “With any luck, they’ve already taken Bunker Four and we don’t have anything to worry about. With, as I said, any luck.”

  “Sir?” O’Reilly said. “I’ve got something you need to see.”

  Graves grunted and walked over to the console where the commander perched on a chair. He looked down at the screen, and he gasped. “No shit, really?”

  “Yes, sir. It appears to be them, sir.”

  “Get Kilo to bring him up here, and send Juliet to find them and escort them topside.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Graves looked at the names glowing on the screen and shook his head. “Unbelievable. Finally, some good news.”

  Outside Bunker Four

  Charlotte, Iowa

  The summer sun blazed down on Eden’s back. Her arm ached something fierce despite the pain meds she’d taken. To top it off, she’d been lying in the same position for going on two hours now. She couldn’t take the good meds, because they’d make her loopy and unable to fight or even walk in a straight line, much less command her squad.

  As it was, they’d been waiting for word from Bunker Five for so long, she wondered if they’d gotten the right day. She stifled a yawn, then looked back through her rifle’s scope at the track in the Iowa grass. Long-term impressions from the patrols were clear.

  A patrol was due anytime in the next hour. As soon as they received the go code from Graves at Bunker Five, they could take it out. Eden hoped it would be soon. She hated waiting.

  There was a crackle in her ear and then a voice reporting no contacts. Dantos, she remembered. He was one of the best snipers they had and one of the most invisible. He’d infiltrated as far as he dared in a ghillie suit of his own make. From reports, he was less than a hundred yards from the bunker’s entrance. They had other snipers posted nearby to take out the guards who remained at the bunker’s topside installation. The main event was going to be the simultaneous ambush of four roving patrols.

  Assuming they didn’t change things up and send five today, of course.

  Anderson’s voice filled her ear. “Break-break,” he said, giving the signal for a priority transmission. “All teams, you have a go. Say again, all teams, you have a go. Out.”

  And there it was, the beginning of the end. Now they just had to wait for the next patrol.

  Marquez’s voice replaced that of Anderson. “All teams, action stations. Stay frosty. You know what to do. Now get it done.”

  Eden gritted her teeth against the pain and shifted her position a bit. She glanced at the dirt road leading to the grassy turnoff for the patrols. Unless you knew what to look for, you would miss the buried flashbangs and other IEDs they’d planted. They’d temporarily disable the enemy vehicles and disorient their passengers. Anderson said they’d made altered devices like those used by Iraqi insurgents decades before. Whatever an Iraqi was.

  She hadn’t paid too much attention to world history in school.

  “Contact,” Dantos said in her ear. “Two… three… that’s it. Looks like just three this time. They’re leaving the doors open, like before.”

  That was critical to their plan. Once those massive metal doors shut, nothing could open them again from outside. Nothing short of a tactical nuke anyway. They had to ambush the patrols, steal the vehicles, and take control of the main elevator before anyone inside the bunker realized what was happening. It wasn’t going to be easy, but with only three patrols, luck just might be on their side for once.

  Marquez spoke once more. “Uniform, move up and prepare to engage hostiles at the installation. Teams Alpha, Papa, Tango, stay on target.”

  A flurry of double clicks answered his orders, and Eden prepared to receive their guests. Recon showed the patrols would split up right after leaving the installation and disperse. They’d spend four hours patrolling and then return to the bunker. Always four hours later, on the nose. Whoever or whatever was maintaining their schedule was as good as an atomic clock, according to Celero.

  Right on schedule, she heard the roar of a Humvee engine approaching. She settled her rifle into her shoulder and peered through the scope. They’d let the Humvee approach until it reached the right spot in the road and then set off the IEDs. At the same time, Uniform would nullify the installation guards and take their place. If everything went to plan, there would be enough confusion in the control room to give them the time they needed to lock down the bunker’s access to their own main elevator.

  If everything went to plan. For Eden’s team at least, so far so good. She held the call until the last moment. “Now!” she shouted, and Foretti hit the detonator just as she snapped her eyes shut for a split second—long enough to avoid the effects of the flashbang, but short enough to maintain visual on her targets. The noise was ferocious, and she could see the flash through her eyelids, but its effect on her was negligible, being so far away.

  The occupants of the Humvee weren’t so lucky.

  The vehicle swerved and titled from the concussive force of the explosions, though they did little damage to the truck. The men inside rocked back and forth with violent jerks. They were too busy holding their hands over their ears and yelling at each other to realize what had happened. By that time, Eden and her team were already at a full sprint toward them. The dazed crew were all staring down the barrels of their rifles before they could come to grips with their predicament. Moments later, they were on the ground, trussed like Christmas turkeys, and Eden was grinning from ear to ear.

  “Alpha Four, package is secure.”

  “Papa Six, package secure.”

  “Tango Six, wait one.” There was the sound of gunfire and a startled yelp, then her counterpart in that team came back on the line. “Tango Six, package is secure.” Eden could’ve sworn she heard someone say, “You got ‘im in the ass, Bubba!”

  “Team Uniform, report,” Marquez called.

  Eden could hear rifle shots from the direction of the bunker. A fusillade of gunfire sounded, and then all was quiet. “Team Uniform, five tangos down. One casualty, no KIA. Request you get your asses in gear.”

 
Eden didn’t have to be asked twice and turned to find that her men had already moved the Bunker Four soldiers to the side of the road. They were a good distance apart and stripped down to their skivvies. They weren’t going anywhere. Even if they did manage to wriggle free, the whole mobile force of five different bunkers was about to roll right down this road behind the Hunters.

  “All right, fellas,” she said. “Mount up.” The others climbed in, and Eden spun the wheel as she sped up, sending a shower of dirt and gravel over the enemy soldiers. It didn’t take long to reach the bunker, but they’d just come in sight of it when there was a frantic call over the radio from the bunker.

  “All teams, all teams, stage one alert. RTB, say again, RTB!” The comms tech sounded frazzled, and her voice broke as it blared out of the radio.

  “Roger roger,” Foretti said as he grabbed the radio’s mic near him. “We are RTB.”

  Eden tapped the brakes as they crested a low hill and all four wheels left the ground. She could slow down a little, but they were on a schedule, and every second counted. She saw the other two vehicles approaching as she pulled over the last rise and began the descent toward the installation. They made it look good as they screeched in through the gate and the metal doors onto the elevator.

  As they dismounted, she noticed Celero in the topside guardshack, punching away at his field laptop. She guessed he was working on the hack and knew there was nothing she could do to help with that.

  Her part was over for now. It would be a race between their hacker and the bunker to see who could gain control of the elevator and door systems first. Just as she thought about the doors, the alert klaxons sounded, and they began to roll shut.

  “Well, that’s not good,” Marquez said as he strode over from his own commandeered Humvee. “How you doin’ in there, Celero?”

  “Questions aren’t helping, Captain,” the tech said.

  Eden could see the sweat on the man’s face and knew that it wasn’t from the sun. The weather wasn’t the only thing stressing the man out, if the veins on his neck popping out like that were any indication.

  “They’ve got someone good on their side,” Celero said. “Really good.”

  “How good?” Marquez asked as he walked a little closer.

  “Almost better than me,” Celero turned to them with a big grin. “Almost.” He hit one final key, the klaxons ceased, and the doors rolled back to their open position. “They’re locked out, Captain. We have full access to the doors and to the main elevators. Beyond that, it’s their show. For now.”

  “Great work, Celero. Great work.” Marquez looked back to the west in the direction of Des Moines. “Valkyrie, Broadsword. All clear on the eastern front. Come join the party.”

  “Roger, Broadsword. See you in five. Out.”

  Marquez turned back to Celero. “Get to work on those other systems. See what you can turn against them. Maybe try a remote via Bunker One? I want them begging us to let them out, Lieutenant.”

  “Roger, Captain. I’ll see what I can do.”

  The roar of a dozen vehicles came from over the horizon, and the assembled AEGIS personnel turned to watch their reinforcements arrive, except Celero, who Eden noticed kept working regardless of what was going on around him.

  What other vehicles could fit on the elevator’s platform pulled in next to the Humvees, with one of the Strykers taking up the majority of the room. The other started its rolling patrol around the installation. Celero joined them on the platform.

  Eden walked over to join Anderson and Marquez, who were conferring in hushed tones.

  “. . . without a hitch, which has me worried,” Marquez said. “It’s too easy.”

  “Ask Blake here how easy it was,” Anderson replied, nodding his chin in Eden’s direction. “The asshole seeded Des Moines with Driebachs, for fuck’s sake.”

  Everyone staggered as the elevator lurched into motion, and Celero turned red as everyone looked at him. “Sorry. Unfamiliar controls.”

  Anderson snorted and looked up at the camera mounted to the inner wall of the surface installation. “Well, this should be interesting. Get ready. Make sure your REAPR bands are active. Move, people!”

  They dispersed to the vehicles and crouched as low as they could inside. The Stryker was as full as it could get. Whichever level they stopped on, the bunker personnel were going to be waiting for them, and it was going to be a bloodbath. As a team leader, Eden had a place in the Stryker, but she worried about her men.

  She’d promised Anderson no more lost Hunters, and she’d already failed with Mancuso, even if he was still alive. She had a feeling more were going to die before this was all over.

  Bunker Five

  Mount Davis, Pennsylvania

  It took a while for Kilo team to arrive, and Graves was more than a little impatient at the delay. He was pacing back and forth at the main gate when the unit pulled up in their own pristine Humvee and disembarked. Ennis Norman climbed out with the help of one of the soldiers, a young corpsman, who helped him into the wheelchair they’d also brought along.

  “What’s this all about, Admiral? Are you in control of the bunker?”

  “Well, sir, I’d say that’s for you to decide, you and the Council. I’m in temporary command until relieved, but that’s neither here nor there. For now, it’s not important. For now, we have a surprise for you.” Graves looked up at the corpsman. “You’ve got push duty.”

  “An honor, sir,” the young woman said.

  “A surprise?” the president asked. “Boy, what in hell are you on about?”

  “This is something worth taking time out for. Follow me, sir.”

  Graves led Ennis inside and through the semi-labyrinthine passages to Operations. He opened the door to the briefing room and stepped to one side without entering. “There’s some people you need to see, sir,” he said with a grin.

  Ennis shook his head as the corpsman wheeled him through the door with Graves following close behind. When the older man waved at his assistant to stop, Graves turned to make sure he was all right, then looked back at the room’s occupants.

  “We didn’t believe it when we found them in the system, but it’s them, sir.” He smiled at the older woman who stood there with two twenty-somethings who were obviously her children. “They’ve been informed of your situation—the fact that you lost your memory, sir—and they’re ready to help you reclaim it. Renee, Madeline, and Michael have been waiting a long time for you.”

  Madeline and Michael hung back, but Renee stepped forward. Her eyes filled with tears, she reached her hand out to caress her husband’s cheek. Ennis had frozen, barely breathing, but tears spilled down his cheeks as well. At her touch, his silence broke and he pulled her in for a big bear hug.

  “I… I remember,” he choked out. “I’ve missed you for so long…”

  That broke the spell, and suddenly, they were a family again, crying and holding each other.

  Graves stepped outside with the corpsman. “You let me know if they need anything, and I mean anything,” he said to her, and she nodded. Graves started to head back to Ops to coordinate with the ground team at Bunker Four. But for a moment, he took pleasure in doing something right.

  Sometimes, just sometimes, life turned out okay.

  Abandoned Costco

  Clayton, New Mexico

  Rachel coughed at the dust that had settled over everything in the warehouse. Everyone was drawing straws for “roof duty,” despite the long climb up, just for the fresh air. It might not be toxic inside, but that didn’t make it pleasant. It was her turn next, along with a few others. She sneezed and looked over at Carson, who was doing okay but was still immobile.

  The attack as the treatment convoy had passed through Clayton had taken more out of all of them than they’d realized. Being on the wrong side of a siege wasn’t helping. He was resting now, finally, and she wasn’t about to wake him up. Besides, it was dark outside, and there wasn’t anywhere they could go.

 
; Rachel was readying her pack for her roof duty when one of the soldiers walked up with a careful tread. “Permission to speak freely, ma’am,” MacPherson asked in a quiet voice.

  “Granted, Mac. What’s on your mind?”

  “We can’t stay here much longer, ma’am. Two days has put us in a rough spot.”

  Rachel didn’t argue. She glanced over at the short row of body bags that lay off to one side of their makeshift indoor camp. Two days, three dead. They couldn’t absorb losses like this. It was a siege, and she didn’t have enough of any of the necessary resources to maintain it.

  She needed help. They all did.

  “Mac, how’s Charlie coming with yanking the radio out of the Stryker?” she asked.

  “Not good, as far as I can tell. She doesn’t have the tools, and it may not reach. I’ll wake her up.”

  Rachel hated to do that, as they’d all been on long shifts over the last few days, but she had no choice. A few minutes passed, and Charlie stood before her, rubbing sleep from her eyes.

  “Reporting as ordered, ma’am,” she said as she stifled a yawn.

  Rachel hid her own behind a hand too. “What’s our status on the radio?”

  “No joy yet, ma’am. I can’t figure how to get it out of the Stryker and up to the roof, at least not in any working order. We just don’t have the tools.”

  “You checked the tire center?” she asked. “Looks like a lot of equipment back there.”

  “Yeah, but none of it works anymore, and it doesn’t look like what we need, so I doubt it’d make any difference anyway.”

  “There’s gotta be something in this place that you can use, Charlie.” She waved her hand at the soaring racks of sealed merchandise, immune to the passage of time and mostly useless. “What about those, Charlie?”

  Charlie followed her line of vision to some walkie talkies stored in ordered rows inside their display boxes. “Just $49.99,” read the sign. “I saw those when we did our initial inventory, ma’am, but they don’t have the range. Not even close. Although, now that I’ve had a closer look at Betty’s internals, maybe…” Charlie trailed off, lost in thought. “I think we can make it work, ma’am. I think. Give me an hour.”