Backlash: Prequel to The Wildblood Series

by Hoag, S. A.

  “I am. I don't think . . . I won't flinch, I won't freeze, but later. What happens later?”

  “You'll deal with it. What did Mac tell you?”

  They stood at the edge of the depot property, following a stone wall that ran the length of a long driveway. It had been part of a resort, once upon a time. Rebuilt and reinforced, it was Security's southernmost base.

  Shan grimaced, wrinkling her nose and shrugging it off. “He said I'd deal with it.”

  “We all will. If and when.”

  “You and I both know it'll be 'when'.”

  “How long have you known that?”

  “Since the first time you had to.”

  Fresh out of training four years ago at a place they called The Junction, barely twenty miles from The Vista. An active gateway city, Security had problems there yearly. Wade nodded. “Sometimes it's absolutely unavoidable.”

  Their radios beeped in tandem. “Oh, hell, here we go again,” she said, heading back to the depot, glad for a few words with him.

  Wade agreed. “It's a code call.” They trudged back up the hill, mud and cold slowing them down, the urgency of intruders making their adrenalin run.

  “Team Sixteen just got ambushed at Divide,” Lambert caught them in the foyer before they could shed their parkas. “Mac's already en route, he's got Jasso with him.”

  “Get a car, and go,” Wade told Shan. “Lambert, you're with her. We're going to go have a look. See what we can see.”

  “By 'see', he means ghosts?” Lambert wanted to verify, thirty miles later.

  She nodded. “That's exactly what he meant. In the middle of a Code Call.”

  “Is that a good idea?”

  “It's Wade's idea. Good or bad, we're doing it.”

  ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

  Bracing her head on her hand, Shan leaned on the roof of the car and closed her eyes, feeling the warmth of the sun on her face. Wade was pacing and Mac was having a thermos of tea, sitting in the passenger's seat. Lambert, Taylor, Green and Ballentyne were there, the only other officers not sent back to the depot. Team Sixteen had received minor injuries and were already home. They were all parked a mile north of the scene, waiting.

  “Can I talk?” Taylor asked her.

  She nodded. “Just not to Wade. He's looking.”

  “Yeah, trying to see ghosts again. What if Team Three didn't have the Gen En and we had to figure this out anyway?”

  “We'd wait at Dillon until it snowed and then use it to track them.” She'd heard the discussion once already that morning. The weather forecast - mostly calculated guessing - was indicating snow in a handful of days.

  “That could work,” Taylor gave her. “But it might take all winter and we can't sit in a blackout all winter. Four days is already grating on nerves.” His included.

  And Mac's. “Aren't you supposed to be watching Wade?” He came around the car to stand with Shan, ushering Team Two over. Lambert was lookout.

  Anything inappropriate he was thinking, Taylor wisely kept to himself. “Got it,” he said, going off to shadow Wade.

  “Out of curiosity,” Ballentyne asked, indicating Taylor. “What happened to get Wade to have someone follow him around like this? It's not his style, not in his personality.”

  “About a year ago, Wade was in Council when there was a code call, and he knew it before it went on the air,” Mac detailed the story. “It was a public meeting, a hundred people were there. He faked being sick to get out of chambers, but it was a damned close call. Now Taylor is his second, his right hand, to make sure little slip ups like that don't happen.”

  “Does anyone follow you around? Or her?” Green was curious.

  “No need to follow me. Shan, she doesn't like the idea and Wade does.”

  “That's why Wade wants us around,” Green figured.

  Mac nodded, “Exactly. Just in case and because he'll win that argument, eventually.”

  “Just in case,” she agreed absently, wandering around the car, making an attempt to change her perception, to make it move sideways rather than forward. “Nightmares are just nightmares until Missouri Breaks gets nuked and we all watch the sky burn.”

  Mac let her wander and they followed his lead. After a couple minutes she stopped and stared north, shook her head and started pacing again. “Ask her what she sees,” he whispered to Green.

  “What's out there?” Green tried the casual approach.

  She didn't hear him or was ignoring them. A hundred yards down the interstate, Wade and Taylor were discussing what Command would be telling Council within the hour. Shan could hear that, she could see them talking about it like she was standing right there.

  “Shannon, can you see Team Sixteen?” Green asked.

  “I can,” she murmured. The men merely exchanged looks.

  “The hell of it is,” Wade was telling Taylor, “Council won't recognize this as a problem until they can see it from The Vista. It's just an 'incident', body count or not.”

  Shan felt as if time stuttered around her. She tried to move, to look up, feeling the air itself pulsing as something massive blocked out the sun.

  Ghosts, Wade knew but it was too late to tell them. He was watching the road and it was before Team Sixteen left the depot. The roar of it was deafening; he could hear it because she could. He could see it on his own.

  “Don't touch her,” Mac warned, seeing her gaze go fixed on things that weren't there now. Taylor was waving at them frantically. “They've never done it at the same time," he exhaled sharply, alarmed as the situation spiraled completely out of control in that moment.

  “What do we do if the Nomads show up?” Green asked.

  “You're in charge of getting her out,” Mac decided, pointing at Shannon. She was staring off towards the east, oblivious to them. “They can go defensive when they're like that and you interrupt it. Be warned.” He ran down the road to have words with Taylor.

  “Have they done this before?” he asked. “Because I've never seen it or heard about it.”

  “No,” Mac shook his head. “Not unless they decided not to tell us.” It was entirely possible.

  Part of their carefully thought out plans for Security included the idea that no one knew everything. That included all members of Team Three. “If we get company of any kind, you do whatever it is you do to snap him out of that.”

  “Clear.” Taylor knew when challenging Mac would cost him his career in Security.

  Shan tried to see what was happening. The blackness overhead was loud, disorienting. It slowly took a form as it moved, passing overhead and moving south. It changed, it turned gray. It became solid and real, an hour earlier. She sat down in the dirt, covering her ears until the noise faded away. When she looked around, Wade was crouched next to her.

  “Did you see it?” he asked quietly, but not so quietly the others couldn't hear him.

  “Yeah,” she frowned, too stunned to even swear. “What do we do now?”

  “What did you see?” Taylor interrupted, impatient.

  Wade stood up, still sorting it all out as well. He looked at Shan and she nodded in a silent agreement. “One, or was there two?”

  Mac offered her a hand up and she took it, dusting her backside off while she thought about it. “Two,” she finally answered. “There are two of them. We need to get to The Vista and get in the armory, now.”

  “For what?” Mac spoke up.

  “RPGs,” Shan answered. “We need RPGs.”

  “Why?” Taylor repeated.

  Wade answered. “They have helicopters. Two of them. The military sort, with big guns.”

  No one had a smart-ass response.

  “We need to get all qualified officers armed now,” Ballentyne decided. “What do we say about the helicopters, how we found them?”

  “We say we spotted them heading south while were we here clearing the area after the attack. Quick and simple.” Wade didn't care what sort of discussions might happen later. Right now, he had bigger problems than r
umors; two very big and likely very armed problems. “Get on the video at the main library,” he told Shannon. “I want an ID on what they are and what they're capable of.”

  “They were heading south,” she confirmed for everyone’s peace of mind.

  “Mac, go with her. It's late enough you'll be there overnight. Stay at Station Two unless you hear otherwise. I'll let you know when to come out tomorrow.”

  By 'hear', you mean . . .” Taylor started the question.

  “I'll use Dispatch,” Wade said.

  “You don't trust me now?” Shan asked, half serious.

  “Don't pretend you can't make mistakes,” Taylor said.

  “Not even for a moment.”

  “Fucking helicopters?” Mac asked, voicing what they were all wondering. “After a decade and a half, there are helicopters? How in the hell did that happen?”

  “Does it matter?” Ballentyne put to them all.

  “Yes,” Mac said. “It damned sure does.” They all knew he was thinking about the bomb on Missouri Breaks and the military bases dotted across the west.

  “We need to go,” Shan told him. “Now. You drive.”

  That threw him off almost as much as the revelation about helicopters.

  Chapter 4

  Sept 26, mid-morning, The Vista

  “Hey,” Mac put a hand on her shoulder, getting her attention. He'd left her at the library just long enough to change into civilian clothes and get a different car. They'd spent the night at their respective parents, having no other choice. Station Two was crammed with bivouacking Security personal.

  Shan had been leaning back in the chair, trying to watch old DVD recordings of military maneuvers, looking for a match of what they'd seen. She'd know it when she ran across it, but it hadn't taken long for her to lose concentration. Wade was on-edge, doing no-telling-what down at Dillon and they were stuck in The Vista. When Wade was tense, it bled over to her and a slightly lesser degree, Mac.

  “What now?” she asked, fatigued from staring at the screen.

  “Did you find it?”

  She ran the video backwards. “There is this,” she stopped the picture. “Sikorsky UH-60 helicopters, commonly called Black Hawks. They can carry up to fourteen people each. The armaments were anything from machine guns to missiles. Fairly complicated piece of machinery. Some Nomad didn't jump in the thing and figure out how to fly it in a week.”

  Mac nodded, reading the same statistics she was. “A range of 370 miles.”

  “So they could be anywhere, out in the badlands, in The Park, anywhere.”

  “Anywhere,” he agreed.

  “What are we doing now?”

  “We're running that bit of information to Cmdr. Perro before we go to the station and get orders.”

  “Sit on our . . . backsides,” she complained, jumping up and swiveling her head to stretch the sore muscles she'd acquired over the past few days. “If I have to stay here all day, I'll . . . go crazy.”

  Mac chuckled at that.

  “Laugh now; I'm taking you with me.”

  “I'll save you the trip,” Perro said, having come in through the main entrance and followed their voices. “Or at least, the one to see me. Crazy you have to deal with on your own.”

  Shan rubbed her eyes, mildly embarrassed. “Figure of speech, Commander.”

  “Ah,” he debated. “I was your age once, Officer Allen. Granted, the world was different then, but people weren't and young people haven't changed so much as you might think. I understand your impatience, but it's for the safety of everyone in The Vista.”

  Both grinned sheepishly, knowing they'd been lectured.

  “Is this what you spotted?” Perro asked, indicating the monitor.

  “It is,” Shan confirmed, back to being serious. “There were two.”

  He contemplated for a few moments. “I expect you to keep this information strictly in Security.”

  “Yes, sir,” they both answered.

  “A panic is the last thing we need,” he went on. “Our people, the civilians we're sworn to protect, are here in The Vista because they're survivors, fighters, smart and resourceful. And a few that are very lucky. Unless it becomes an imminent threat, there's no reason to disrupt lives. The Blackout has already gone a long way in doing that.”

  Mac understood. “We've been passing out RPGs this morning to all qualified officers.” About half of Security was qualified.

  “You're not qualified,” Perro said to Shannon.

  “No, I'm not even certain I've graduated from training.”

  “Cmdr. Duncan cleared you five days ago. Congratulations. Are you scheduled to go back to Depot South today? I'd like to pass on some information to Capt. Wade without the privacy, or lack of privacy on the air.”

  “I don't believe we are,” Mac said. “Even if there's a code call, we're a secondary team today.”

  “You can always order us to go,” Shan offered hopefully.

  Perro chuckled. “It's not urgent, Officer Allen, it can wait. Go about your business. Command plans to meet with all of Team Three, when the opportunity arises.”

  Twenty minutes after Perro had gone his way, the code call happened. “You've got to be fucking joking with me,” Mac threw up his hands, exasperated.

  “I doubt it,” Shan said, quickly gathering her belongings. She recalled Duncan's words of warning and did some swearing herself.

  ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

  “Get that car into cover, Taylor,” Wade warned on the handset. Nothing was going through Dispatch now. Only the Code Seven had been announced. The helicopter had circled wide, disappearing behind a stand of trees to the southeast. He could still hear it. With some planning, they had four points east of the depot set up with officers and artillery. If they could draw it back, they could take it down. If the second one showed, and Wade hoped it did, they could take them both and run the teams in a sweep south to clear out any stragglers. The entire incident could be finished in two days.

  “It's coming back,” Lambert warned, manning the southernmost point. Ballentyne was west, Saenz north and Wade east, with another half-dozen officers hidden along the main road. It had rained overnight and there was a sheen across the landscape; not quite ice or snow but a slushy mix. Two cars had minor damage from collisions early on in the day.

  “Everyone get set up. We only get one chance at surprise,” Wade reminded them.

  “Overhead,” Lambert said.

  “If you're clear, take the shot,” Wade said. “Even if you're not.”

  “Got it,” Lambert said, rushed.

  “All of you,” Wade said. “This needs to end now.” Then he carefully loaded a warhead into the tube, locking it in to place before stepping away from the SUV.

  “Got it,” Ballentyne said, quiet and calm per usual.

  “I can only hear it,” Saenz chimed in.

  “Shut up and aim,” Wade said, concentrating on the sound. In seconds, it emerged over the tree line, heading more northerly than west. It was low, faster than he expected and headed right for Ballentyne. “Mick, heads up,” he warned.

  The Black Hawk strafed Ballentyne's position; the machine gun sputtered and either jammed or ran out of ammo. Pulling up, it headed east again to make another run at him, gaining altitude.

  “I'm clear, keeping in the tree line,” Ballentyne announced after several long seconds.

  “When it comes around, it will drop to follow the highway,” Lambert said. “I've got the shot.”

  It took the helicopter five full minutes to lazily circle around. They all held their collective breath, thinking it might break off and continue east. Past their outer perimeter, out in to the badlands and no one in Security would follow them, not even Wade.

  “Heading west,” Wade noted. He hoped the next thing he heard was an RPG launch or Lambert announcing his intent to fire. Blood pounded in his ears and a line of sweat traced across his forehead despite the cold. There was only so long he could hold the intense concentration to see t
he target when it was out of sight.

  “Fire, fire, fire,” Lambert yelled, and a moment later did exactly that. The RPG spiraled towards its target and the helicopter swung around ninety degrees in an attempt to evade.

  Just as it emerged over the trees south of Wade, the missile hit. The explosion sent debris in all directions, some of the pieces large enough to be dangerous. Lambert was the only one close enough to worry about.

  “Check in, Lambert,” Wade called, worried about how close it had been. Nearly overhead, from the look of it to him. “You still with us, Denny?”

  “Hell yeah!” Lambert shouted. “Part of that shit landed on my car.” He was panting like he was winded, adrenalin getting the best of him.

  “Stick with Security protocol until we can clear the incident scene and be reasonably certain the second helicopter isn't close,” Wade went right back to being in charge. “There are Nomads on the ground too. Let's not forget that. Point officers meet at Lambert's position, the rest of you stay put. If you see anything, anything unusual, shout it out.”

  “I need a ride,” Ballentyne said.

  “Saenz, get Mick and come on over.”

  “I can't even fucking brag to my girlfriend,” Lambert grabbed Wade, slapping him on the back the moment he got out of his car.

  “You know it,” Wade said, breaking out of the stone face he'd been wearing for days. “Nice shot, by the way.”

  “Lucky shot,” Lambert confessed. “When we practice, there are no flying targets.”

  “We'll have to talk to Command about that,” Wade said. “Later, when we're locked down for the winter. When we have the other helicopter on the ground permanently.”

  “We should go look for survivors.”

  “You just want to go get a closer look at what's left of it.”

  “Don't you?” Lambert challenged.

  “Yes,” Wade nodded. He retrieved an Uzi from his car. “Let's go have a look.”

  “Hell yes.”

  ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

  Shan chugged a shot of whiskey, stuff older than she was. She stifled a cough, eyes watering. “That's smooth,” she rasped.

  Mac preferred Scotch and matched her shot. He didn't cough. They were quietly celebrating the news a team rotating in from Depot South had brought. “One down,” he was more excited about it than he should be, considering they missed the entire event. “I'd like to go see it.”