by Phil Maxey
“Very well then Major. Over.”
Static returned to the Zach’s radio.
“This is a mistake,” said Fiona looking out of the side window.
“Yup,” said Zach.
“I might not be a military strategist, but having all of the council in one place? Outside the walls? Seems not such a good thing,” said Michael behind them.
Bowers voice came from Zach’s radio. “Zach, my squad will come with you as well. Over.”
Zach smiled. “That suggestion is appreciated Captain. Over,” he put the mike down and looked at the tinge of light blue that was increasing to the east. He had a feeling it was going to be a long day.
CHAPTER 25
As Zach pulled into the parking lot of the Core the sun was up, but the overcast day wasn’t that brighter.
Abbey emerged from the lobby entrance and half walked half ran across the damp concrete to the convoy. Zach contained his shock of how she looked and instead was grinning from ear to ear when he got out and Abbey embraced him.
She pulled back. “I hope you don’t mind the bandages and things.”
“You look beautiful.”
She noticed Fiona getting out of the Humvee, and went to move towards her but stopped when Fiona walked away towards the lobby entrance.
Michael walked up to her and gave her a warm embrace. “You kicked their asses right?”
She smiled. “No, but it’s on my to-do list.”
Wyatt walked up to her awkwardly and just as she went to hug him there was a squawk from above together with an updraft and Mo landed with a light thud a few yards from them.
“Mo!” she yelped and tentatively walked towards and then knelt near the winged creature.
He’s head was bobbing up and down while giving out mild squawking noises.
“It’s good to see you too buddy!” She then looked up at Wyatt. “Thank you for keeping him safe.”
Captain Bower joined them, while his tired squad walked to the lobby.
“This is Captain Bower, he and his squad helped keep us alive over the last few days,” said Zach.
Abbey stood and held out her hand, which Bower quickly shook. “Thank you Captain.”
“My pleasure ma’am,” he then smiled and followed his people in the direction of the lobby.
“I’ll catch up with you later,” said Michael looking at Abbey.
“Yes, definitely!”
Michael then followed the Captain, leaving Zach and Abbey alone.
Her face turned to one of sadness. “I can’t believe Cal’s gone. How has Fiona been?”
Zach frowned. “I don’t know, she’s mostly kept to herself. I think she’s still processing. We all are.”
“How did it happen?” The words came out with an urgency she wasn’t sure she meant.
“We stumbled upon their forces. Convoy miles long of serious hardware. We took up defensive positions and waited to record what we saw, to get the information back here. I sent Cal to the top of an advertising mast to be our main eyes. And…these creatures appeared. They wanted to attack…”
Abbey could tell Zach was having trouble making his thoughts form words, and she embraced him briefly again. “You can tell me later. For now, Holland and Garland are waiting for you inside. They are leaving soon for the town. A drone has been dispatched to scout the area already.”
Zach nodded and they both walked to the lobby. Leaving Abbey he made his way to the main operations hall where Garland, Holland, Fiona, Elijah as well as others he didn’t recognized were standing around computer consoles and screens. He was surprised to see Fiona there, but now wasn’t the time to question her motives.
“Good to see you back Major,” said Holland. She then looked up at the large screen at the front of the hall. It showed footage of trees, fields and roads from high above. “This is a live feed from our drone, as you can see the area looks quite dead. We are not picking up gang or E.L.F activity there.”
Next to the live feed was an image of the United States, with a red line dividing the continent from west of Montana heading south-east across Kansas and ending up a few hundred miles to the east of New Orleans.
“As you can see most of the area’s we have already explored would be ours anyway—”
“Ma’am with all greatest respect. While they do have a lot of military hardware, so do we. Are we really willing to give up on half the country? There are communities out there, that we have no right to just hand over to those people and what happens when they return in a years time wanting more territory?”
Holland gave a stern look at Zach. “Unlike yourself most in this camp are not soldiers. They are just ordinary citizens who have survived the end of the world. They have no appetite for war.”
Zach had no doubt she was right about the people in the camp. Millions were trying to restart their lives, it was no surprise they did not want to plunge back into trying to stay alive once more, but leaders need to lead. He kept his thoughts to himself. “Yes, ma’am.”
“Good. Myself, and the four other councilors will leave with our escort shortly for the town of Coral,” the middle-aged woman then turned and left with some others.
Zach looked at Garland and Elijah who were both quiet. “You have a plan if all of this goes sideways?”
“Of course Major,” said Garland. “Our delegation will go on land with a platoon, but six apaches will go ahead of them and will be stationed close by. There will also be constant drone coverage of the town and its surrounding area. It’s about as close as you can get to complete protection.”
“What about protection from the things out there?” Elijah pointed in no particular direction.
“The platoon will have two Cascaders to take care of that side of things.”
Zach looked at the old man he had ignored for months. “What’s your take on this?”
Elijah looked back up at the big screens. “I think they are playing us. At least that’s what I would do. But the council wants to play the game anyway.”
“You think we should give up on half the country?”
“Hell no! But the more time we have to gather intel on their force strength the better we can defend against it.”
Zach frowned. “Okay.”
After a quick wash, and some food and drink with Abbey in the mess hall, Zach was back on the road with Bowers squad and Fiona. He strongly advised that she stay behind, but to be honest when she said ‘no’ he was relieved. He needed someone he trusted on this trip, even if he wasn’t sure her head was one hundred percent in the right place.
It was 10 am when they left by the north gate. Two main battle tanks and five armored personnel carriers, carrying twenty-four heavily armed troops, five council members and Zach and Fiona rattled onto the main road.
The skies above them were cloudy and gray. It was only a matter of time before rain would fall.
In their APC was councilor Sawyer the man who had switched his vote at the last minute, which meant the Cascaders ended up being interned. Zach examined him. He was a slim man in his late fifties, with a full head of hair which was surprisingly gray free. He looked like someone who could sell you insurance you didn’t need.
Sawyer noticed Zach was looking at him and leaned forward holding his hand out. “Corey Sawyer, nice to meet you. Major Felton, right?”
Zach remained motionless. “That’s my name.”
Sawyer sat back smiling. “Well I feel safer knowing you’re on this historic trip.”
Fiona who was sitting next to Zach looked at the older man who was sweating despite the temperature hovering around freezing.
An hour and a half later after a few pauses to avoid running into E.L.F’s they were entering the town of Coral. The convoy pulled off the main street into a side road and soon pulled up outside a church.
“It really does get hot in these things,” said Sawyer getting to his feet as the rear hatch of the APC opened. He quickly made his way out.
A light rain had been falling as Zach an
d Fiona stepped out onto the road and looked around.
It was a relatively small town, with only a few buildings taller than two storys. The church they were told the meeting would happen at was a modern building pretending to be old.
One of the tanks had left the convoy a few minutes before and was stationed at one end of the street, while the other continued on for a few hundred yards and stopped. Half of the soldiers immediately fanned out into the nearby buildings, while the others formed a protective cordon around the councilors as they approach the churches entrance.
Zach eyed the tallest building in the town, which was six floors high and on the corner of the long street they were in.
Fiona followed his gaze. “Gonna be hard to defend this position from the gang or E.L.F’s.”
“Yup,” said Zach following the group of soldiers and councilors into the church.
The entrance lobby was modest with stone colored walls intermixed with dark brown woodwork. Crucifixes hung at angles on the walls, together with the occasional statue.
Straight away Zach could see the Hell Fire gangs people had already arrived, for at the far side of the church in front of the pews was a long table, which three people were sitting at. Behind them were at least another twenty people with a tall man that Zach recognized from the cellular phone footage taken from inside the courthouse the day Tinley escaped. He also knew him as someone that Abbey had described. Even from the other end of the hall this man looked like a dog waiting to attack.
Zach and Fiona walked down the center aisle and sat half way to the front. The councilors flanked by soldiers who had their hands on their M4 automatic rifles moved to the front, as they did a man with a tattoo on his arm got to his feet.
“Thank you for coming. My name is Troy. You must be the five that make up the council of your camp?”
Holland stepped forward. “Yes, I am Amanda Holland, to my right is Tyrell Flack, Corey Sawyer and on my left, Daniel Stone and Hilary Forster.”
“Good, please take a seat. The man to my left is Aaron Lowe and to my left Arla Vila.”
The counselors did as asked.
“On the table ahead of you, as you can see is the same map that we gave to the woman we returned to you. And—”
“Yes, about that map of yours. If we agree to those borders, we will need compensation.”
“Compensation?”
“We have or had a number of outposts scattered around the country. It is our understanding that your people destroyed them. We would want compensation for the destruction you caused.”
Zach watched as Troy was unsure how to react to the request.
“What do you want?”
“You seem to have a lot of military hardware. We want some of it. Especially your planes.”
Troy started laughing. The men and women behind him shifted uneasily. “I’m sure you do, but you have manufacturing plants, you can build what you need. Everything we have we scavenged for. So that request will have to be denied.”
“Then what do you suggest?”
Aaron leaned over and whispered something in Troy’s ear, who nodded in response. “How about—”
As Troy explained what they were willing to offer, Zach looked at those standing behind Troy. There was something off about them. None of them were armed, and except for the angry looking man with the ponytail they weren’t exactly in fighting shape. Nor were they all young. Some looked painfully frail, while others looked so nervous they couldn’t stand still. They're no match for our troops, so why are they here?
A click came from Zach’s radio. He then got to his feet and walked back to the lobby and stepped outside. Standing on the steps he clicked it on and looked up at the high building at the end of the block. “What is it? Over.”
“We have a problem. Over.” Said Bower.
* * * * *
Captain Bower stood on the roof of a once grand hotel and looked out across the town of Coral to the fields and hills beyond and saw movement. Lots of it.
Zach had asked him and his squad to follow behind them and to take up position in the highest building they could find, and to also not tell Garland. Bower was uneasy about going ‘off-book’ but he understood the importance of what was going down and if it gave their side an advantage he was fine with it.
In his hands was a powerful scope, which he had used on many occasions when his squad had been sent out. Right now he wasn’t liking what it was showing him.
He turned to Diaz who was alongside him. “You sensing anything?”
She shook her head. “They are too far out. I can only sense them within a few miles. They look, what? Ten miles away?”
He handed her his scope. “Here take a look, try and tell me what types they are.”
“Okay, but I don’t know much about the science stuff.”
“It’s the same to the north,” shouted Freeman in his matter of fact manner. He was knelt looking through his riflescope about twenty yards away on the opposite side of the old roof.
Bower continued on his radio to Zach. “E.L.F’s. A whole bunch are approaching the town, from it looks all sides. Over.”
“How long we got until they are here. Over?”
Bower looked at Diaz who could hear what Zach asked.
“I dunno, they are moving pretty fast, maybe five-ten minutes,” she responded.
“Five-ten minutes. Over.”
“Are they large? How much of a threat we talking? Over,” said Zach still outside the church.
Bower took the scope back from Diaz and looked while holding the radio. “Oh yeah, they’re large. Some look similar to what we came across at the junction in Montgomery. Huge ape looking things, they are tearing up the forests on their—”
“In the air!” shouted Hayes looking up at countless dark dots miles out.
“We also got them coming from the air. Over.” Bower continued.
Zach ran forward into the street and looked up, but from his position he couldn’t see over the buildings around him. “Okay, I'll get the councilors out, keep me updated. Over,” he then ran back inside.
Fiona was in the lobby. “I was just coming to see what you were doing out here?”
“E.L.F’s, lots, heading towards the town.”
“How the fuck didn’t the drones spot them?”
“That’s a good question.” Zach stormed into the church and walked quickly down the central aisle.
Troy looked up at him as he approached Holland. “Ah, Major Felton I believe?”
Zach ignored him and leaned close to Holland. “We got E.L.F’s approaching from all sides of the town.”
Holland looked up at him incredulously. “What? Nonsense, our…”
“You can say the word drones, we know you have them,” said Troy smiling.
She gave a flat smile in response then twisted around to face Zach. “I would have been informed. And how do you know this?”
He leaned further into her so nobody else would hear. “I have a squad outside. They have a vantage point overlooking the town, and they are telling me we can’t stay here.”
She looked back at Troy. “Excuse me, I need to take a few minutes break.”
Troy lifted his hand. “Please do.”
“No, not a break, we—” said Zach becoming more agitated.
Holland held her hand up in front of Zach, while getting out of her seat. “Follow me,” she said walking back to the lobby and then outside. Zach and two soldiers followed her.
She looked at the soldier closest to her. “Sergeant, the Major is telling me we are in imminent danger, is this true?”
The young man sneered. “With all due respect to the Major, we got drones and we got the Apaches just outside the town, if—”
Zach’s radio burst to life with Bower’s voice. “Zach, I strongly advise you grab whoever you can and get the hell out of there.”
The sergeant looked concerned and backed off while talking on his own radio. “What?” and “Now?” were the only words
Zach caught before the sergeant returned to where Holland was standing. “Ma’am we have to leave right away.”
The blood ran from Holland’s face.
“Now ma’am!”
“Yes, of course, just let me tell Troy we are leaving.”
“No, there’s no time, we have to go.”
The sergeant looked at the other soldier, who grabbed Holland by the arm and started walking her to the closet APC. He then ran back into the church. The other soldiers outside anxiously waved their guns at the trees and buildings around them.
Zach clicked on the radio. “Talk to me, how far—”
Before Bower could answer, what sounded like distant explosions rang out from all around them.
“They’re entering the town now! I can see you, get the councilors out of there!” said Bower.
Zach swore and ran back into the church. He was met by Fiona corralling the councilors coming the other way. Soldiers were close behind. Zach briefly looked back to Troy and his people. Those at the table were grinning. Elijah’s words flashed through his mind. ‘I think they are playing us.’
He ran out into the street heading for the APC that he and Fiona had come in on, when he realized one of the councilors was missing. Where is Sawyer?
“What are you doing?” shouted Fiona standing half in and half out of the APC.
“Where’s Sawyer?” he shouted back.
Fiona shook her head.
Suddenly the ground around them shook. At the same time the tank to his left a hundred yards away fired off a shell at something Zach couldn’t see from where he was.
Turning he went to move in the direction of the church, when he was confronted by the solid looking doors which were closed. More booms rang out from now both tanks at each end of the street.
The sound of Bowers voice was just audible from Zach’s radio. He held it close to his ear as Fiona frantically waved to him. “They’re right on top of you! Get out of there!”
Zach started running towards Fiona, when someone pushed her backwards and the rear hatch of the APC slammed securely shut. She banged on it with her fist, then turned and looked upwards. As he went to do the same he sensed a change in air pressure and threw himself to the ground. A large scaly wing swept past his head as a creature which looked like a serpent from ancient books landed on one of the APC’s, instantly rocking it.
