by Tom Abrahams
She walked along a hallway on the first floor, following an armed soldier and leading her children, Nikki, Betty and Brian Brown, and Pop and Nancy Vickers. They’d traveled what felt like a crowded maze, weaving in and out until they came to what looked to Jackie like a lobby. On the wall was a large circular emblem. Across the middle it read “Mission Operations”. Above it, circling the logo along the top, were four Latin words: “Res Gesta Per Excellentiam”, “Achieve Through Excellence”. Jackie’s eyes lingered on the words and image of a rocket blasting into space. An image of Clayton flashed into her mind and she bit her lip, pressing hard with her teeth to fight back the wave of sadness threatening to force tears. Irma Molinares bounded around the corner, flanked by two men. They weren’t the same men who’d visited her home.
Irma smiled sympathetically and extended her arms wide for a hug. “Jackie,” she said. “I’m glad you decided to come.”
Jackie reciprocated the embrace. “Thank you for letting my friends come along. I couldn’t leave them. I—”
Irma pulled away and waved her off. “No further explanation needed. We’ve got space for all of you in one of the empty offices. It’s sleeping bags and lumpy pillows, but it’ll do.”
“It’ll be fine,” said Jackie. She reintroduced the Browns and the Vickers, and the group followed Irma up a flight of stairs and into an office. A laminate desk and matching bookshelf were shoved into a corner next to the lone window. There were rolled cotton sleeping bags and small pillows stacked on the desk.
Pop Vickers pointed to the overhead light. “You have power here?”
“For now,” said Irma. “We’re not running on full power. We’re trying to conserve as much as we can. Any other questions?”
“Bathrooms?” asked Betty Brown.
“Of course,” said Irma. “Down the hall and to the right. No showers on this floor, but there is a lock on the bathroom door, so you’ll have privacy enough to use the sink.”
Betty twisted her lips with disapproval. “The sink?”
Irma shrugged. “While I know it’s not ideal, it’s the best we have right now. There is food in the cafeteria. It’s open twenty-four seven. We’re working odd shifts around here and there’s always somebody on the job right now.”
“What do we do when we’re not eating, sleeping, or washing ourselves in the sink?” asked Betty.
“Good question,” said Irma. “Nothing for now. But I’m certain we’ll need each of you to sing for your supper, so to speak. Give us a couple of days to come up with something. Anything else? I’m sure you all would like to get some sleep.”
“Thanks again,” said Jackie. The group echoed her and began picking through the bedding.
“Jackie, I do need to talk with you privately,” Irma said. “Can you come with me for a minute?”
Jackie glanced over at Nikki.
“I’ll get them comfortable,” Nikki said. “You do what you need to do.”
“Thank you,” Jackie said and turned to Irma. “What is it?”
“Follow me, please.”
Jackie told Marie and Chris to get settled, make a bed for her, and that she’d be right back. She followed Irma and the two men out into the hallway and back down the stairs. They walked through a maze of corridors and out a side door, reentering a nearby building labeled 30-S.
Irma held the door for Jackie. “This is where the ISS program is housed,” she said. “These men with me are with the ISS team and they’ve got some news for you.”
An instantaneous lump formed in Jackie’s throat. Her stomach dropped and she shuddered involuntarily. “What do you mean?”
Irma didn’t answer at first, leading Jackie into what looked like a small control room. Jackie stood wide-eyed at the entrance, suddenly unable to move. There was a large flat-screen monitor on the far wall and a half-dozen manned computer terminals facing the monitor. The room was abuzz with activity, everyone seemingly hard at work. Jackie sensed an unnerving mix of urgency and anxiety.
The men checked with one of the terminal operators and then turned back to Jackie. One of them glanced over at Irma. “You can tell her,” he said.
Jackie swallowed past the ache in her throat. “Tell me what, Irma? What is going on?”
“Although we can’t be one hundred percent certain about this,” Irma said, “we are confident that it was Clayton in the Soyuz.”
Jackie braced herself against the door frame. Her knees weakened and her vision blurred. “Oh my G—” She collapsed.
Irma caught her under the arms and helped her to the floor. “Get her some water,” she called to the room.
Jackie blinked her eyes open, focusing on Irma’s drawn face. Her brow was knitted tightly, her mouth ajar with concern. “Did…you…say…”
Irma, still holding onto Jackie, handed her a cup of room-temperature water. “Drink this,” she said. “Don’t talk.”
Jackie sipped from the cup. “You said he landed?”
“Yes,” said Irma. “We are confident he landed. And we believe he is alive.”
Jackie’s head felt heavy. Her legs tingled. “What?”
“Jackie,” said Irma, “we think Clayton is alive. Your husband is alive and trying to get home.”
CHAPTER 4
WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 29, 2020, 12:06 AM CST
COUPLAND, TEXAS
Bouncing in the cab of the truck, Rick Walsh adjusted the seatbelt at his waist. The dim headlights provided barely enough light to see the lines marking the highway. He looked out the window into the darkness, thinking about Nikki.
He’d never met a woman like her, and that was saying something. He’d met a lot of women. Too many. Those women, and his inability to honor his wedding vows, had ended his marriage and probably scarred his son, Kenny, more than any Armageddon. Rick was admittedly a serial womanizer. It bordered on pathological. His therapist had told him he suffered from a histrionic personality disorder, a need for constant attention and approval. He’d stopped seeing that therapist so he could date her. It didn’t last.
Rick was restless. It was always as if he knew the end of the world was coming, and he couldn’t live with the thought of not having sampled every candy in the box.
With the apocalypse upon him and a woman unlike any he’d ever met falling into his life, there was a sense of longing that went deeper than basic carnal desires. Rick ached to be with her again. He pinched the bridge of his nose and took a long breath.
Gus Gruber took one hand off the wheel and punched Rick in the arm. “What are you thinking about? It’s like you’re not even here.”
Rick smirked at the retired firefighter who’d taken him in and given him a place to stay. He shrugged.
Gus tugged on the brim of his Mahindra ball cap and smacked his lips. He turned off the highway onto a side street. “We only got a couple more minutes until we’re there. At least, that’s what I heard on the radio.”
“I still can’t believe your radio works,” said Rick, leaning an elbow on the door frame. “This truck too.”
“Yeah, well,” Gus said, “like your Jeep, this here Dodge was built before electronics filled every nook and cranny of an automobile. This is a 1974 D200. It’s solid. No EMP is gonna kill this baby. And I keep my radio in a steel box. That way the magnetism don’t kill it.”
“Smart,” said Rick. “What exactly are we looking for? And why at midnight?”
“FEMA camp,” said Gus. “I keep hearing rumors. There’s supposed to be one about ten minutes north of Coupland in Taylor. Best to go at night when they can’t see us.”
Rick narrowed his eyes. “FEMA camp?”
He’d been leery of leaving the relative comfort of Gus’s property to begin with. Learning it was to search for a conspiratorial rumor made it worse.
Gus thumped Rick on the arm again. “Don’t look at me like that,” he said. “I know what you’re thinking.”
Rick raised an eyebrow. “What am I thinking?”
“You’re thinking I�
��m some paranoid Jade Helm conspiracy theorist. That ain’t so. I didn’t buy into that FEMA camp martial law crap back in 2015.”
Rick suppressed a yawn and tugged at the seatbelt.
Gus avoided a stalled car on the shoulder and turned north toward town. “I wasn’t one of those people. I believe 9/11 was a legit terror act. I believe Sandy Hook actually happened, and we did put men on the moon.”
“Then why are you a prepper?” Rick asked.
Gus slapped the steering wheel. “I knew it! Everyone thinks us preppers are right-wing nut jobs. It just ain’t so. We’re preppers because we’re self-reliant. We take care of our own and we don’t trust anyone else to do it for us when the sh—”
Gus slammed on the brakes and reflexively extended his right arm to brace Rick against his seat. The Dodge screeched to a stop. Rick jerked forward at his waist and slapped his shoulder sideways into the dash as the smell of burning tires filtered into the cab.
Rick grabbed his shoulder while trying to reposition himself in his seat. It was bruised at the least. When he rolled it forward, there was a sharp pain radiating out from the socket. He wasn’t sure he hadn’t torn something. He was so consumed with his injury he didn’t notice what had forced Gus to stop suddenly until he turned off the ignition, cut the lights, and cursed aloud at the sight in front of them.
Rick followed Gus’s stare to the brightly lit installation a hundred yards ahead. With the engine off, he could hear the constant, rumbling purr of diesel generators. They were powering what was best described as a fortified encampment. It looked as much a military installation as it did a prison.
“That’s it,” Gus said above a whisper. “It does exist. A freaking FEMA camp.”
“How do you know that’s what it is?” Rick said, playing devil’s advocate. “It could be a prison.”
Gus shook his head such that his cheeks flapped. “No. Prisons don’t have uniformed soldiers and Humvees at their gates. That’s a prison camp.”
“For what?”
“People like us,” said Gus. “No doubt. They don’t want preppers running amok. They want to control things, suppress us. It’s exactly what they were saying on the radio.”
“They?”
“Sheesh, Rick. Are you thick? The government. The military industrial complex. The United Nations. You name it.”
Rick wasn’t sure what to think. On one hand he’d driven through the checkpoints. He’d seen the military presence and the caravans of heavily armed soldiers traveling the highway on his way to Coupland. He’d also been allowed to keep his weapons and supplies. It didn’t make sense.
“Why would they have let me pass their checkpoints with weapons in the back of the Jeep if they were concerned about armed preppers?”
“You had what, a couple of guns?” said Gus. “And I doubt you’re on any watch list. That’s why they let you go. They figured you were too soft to be a threat.”
Rick rubbed his shoulder with his thumb until a spark of pain stopped him. He flexed his hand, extending his fingers before curling them into a fist. He could do it, but it hurt.
Gus restarted the truck and, with the headlights off, eased the truck to the side of the road, parking it between a pair of seemingly dead SUVs. He shut off the engine again and quietly opened the driver’s side door, reaching for the hunting rifle he had hanging in a rack covering the truck’s back window. “C’mon, we need to check this out.”
Rick reached across his body to open the door with his left hand and jumped onto the street with both feet. Gus was already ten yards ahead, moving like a hunter stalking prey.
“Hey,” Rick called, “you think you oughta show up at the gates armed? You’re liable to get shot, Gus.”
“We aren’t going to the gate,” he replied and scurried off the road to the left. “C’mon, man.”
The two of them ran alongside the southern shoulder of the road, darting between a Toyota Camry and a Ford F-150 to mask their approach. Gus stopped when they’d gotten within thirty yards of the perimeter, ducking behind a blue post office mailbox. A few feet from them, a large sign announced the entrance to the T. Don Hutto Residential Center. Beyond the sign was a ten-foot-high fence topped with looped razor wire.
“This place was an ICE detention center,” said Gus. “I mean, that’s what they said it was. It doesn’t look like it now.”
A group of soldiers armed with M4 rifles exited the fenced area and climbed into a Humvee. They were too far away for them to hear what they were saying before they cranked the engine. A shout from inside the fencing caught Rick’s attention. He shifted his weight to see beyond the fence, but couldn’t make out much of the scene. All he could see was the flash of camouflage running from the commotion. Someone was yelling, screaming about his rights. He cursed at what he called “fascist pigs”.
Another voice, presumably a soldier, tried to quiet the man and ordered him to calm down. It didn’t work. He grew louder and shrieked before falling silent. Although Rick and Gus tried working their way closer to the fence, they couldn’t get a clear view.
“Can you believe this?” Gus whispered, wide-eyed. “This is like WWII Germany. What are they doing here?”
Rick swallowed hard. “What are we doing here?”
Gus shrugged. “I wanted to see it for myself. I didn’t want to believe it, but—”
Another group of soldiers exited the perimeter fencing and marched toward a transport truck. They were discussing their operation loudly enough Rick could hear them.
“What’s the sitrep?” asked one of them. “What kind of resistance are we looking at? I need more than the briefing they gave us.”
Another soldier, cradling his rifle, spun around to walk backward. He addressed the group and they slowed to listen as he stopped.
Gus and Rick inched closer to listen. They stayed low and hidden behind a curbside UPS box.
“These operations are tougher than the last two,” he cautioned. “We know the first target is armed. He’s got at least a half-dozen people on his property. From social media posts before the first CME, he talked openly about his planned resistance. He’s antigovernment. Typical stuff.”
“And the second?” asked one of the soldiers.
“This target has a larger cache of weapons. He’s self-sufficient, almost off the grid. We believe he’s alone, but there’s some intelligence from a checkpoint east of Coupland that he may have visitors.”
One of the soldiers raised his hand. “How’d we find out about him if he’s off grid?”
“A tip. Not sure who. Somebody who’s already inside the camp gave us actionable intel during an interrogation.”
Rick and Gus exchanged glances. Rick saw recognition mixed with fear in Gus’s eyes.
“What are the rules of engagement?” asked another soldier.
“Same as before. Fire only if fired upon. Remember, these are American citizens. They’re not the enemy. Yet. Our job is to detain them peacefully and then transport them back here without incident. Understood?”
The half-dozen soldiers barked their understanding of the operation. Then they marched across the street to the awaiting transport truck.
Rick whispered, “They were talking about you. They had to be, right?”
Still crouched on the balls of his feet, Gus steadied himself against the UPS box. He was slack-jawed and seemed to be searching for words.
“Gus,” Rick pressed, “that was your place, wasn’t it?”
“I-I-I don’t know. It could be.”
“It had to be. Coupland? Off the grid? Who else could it—”
“I don’t know,” said Gus with a raspy whisper. “It’s too coincidental. We’re sitting here when the guys about to raid my house are talking about it? That’s like something out of a bad action flick.”
“I’d call it lucky,” said Rick. “Whether it’s your place or not, we better get back. If they’re coming for us, we need to be ready.”
Loaded with soldiers, the transport
truck pulled away from its parking spot near the fence and thundered around the corner toward the highway. Gus wobbled on his toes, blankly staring into space. He was mouthing something unintelligible. Rick reached out and touched his shoulder and Gus flinched back to reality.
“We should go,” Rick said. “Now.”
Gus, still dazed, led Rick back to the truck. He cranked the ignition and gripped the wheel with both hands, leaning forward as he drove.
“The headlights,” said Rick.
Gus fluttered his eyes. He turned on the dim lights. “Thanks.”
“You okay?” Rick asked, pulling on his seatbelt.
Gus nodded. “Yeah. I mean no. I don’t know. You prepare for the worst. You always think you’re ready for it. You do everything to be ready for it. Then it happens and it doesn’t seem real. None of this seems real.”
Rick watched the road ahead through the faint yellow fan of light beaming from the truck. Gus was right. No matter how prepared someone might think he was, he always failed to account for something. It was inevitable. Gus had done everything he thought was right: armed himself, became self-sustaining and virtually non-reliant on outside power and water. He hadn’t accounted for his own government seeing preparation as a threat.
Who would?
“What are we going to do if they come for us?” asked Rick.
Gus shrugged and shot Rick a glance, his eyebrows arched with concern. “I’m gonna be ready,” he said. “We’re gonna be ready.”
Rick scratched the thickening stubble on his chin. “What does that mean?”
Gus flexed his fingers on the steering wheel and adjusted himself in the driver’s seat. “I don’t know yet. I really don’t know.”
CHAPTER 5
MISSION ELAPSED TIME
75 DAYS, 7 HOURS, 01 MINUTE, 04 SECONDS
