“Oh my God.” Donnie grinned at his comrades. “Can you guys leave for a while? This is getting good.”
“Hello,” another voice appeared on the line. “Any of you boys over there know Mitch Thornton?”
The squad stared at him.
Mitch held out his hand. “Give it here.”
Donnie reluctantly parted with the radio.
Heart pounding, he keyed the handset. “Hey, Abigail. Been a long time.”
“Hi, Mitch. I just knew I’d find you over there.”
She’d never liked him going away on weekends with the Liberty Tree. Armed hooligans, she used to call them.
Well, these so-called hooligans were about to change America, just like he always told her they would.
“You know why I’m here,” he said. “What are you doing over there?”
“I don’t want to fight with you, Mitch.”
He smiled. “Then surrender.”
“How about you stop this nonsense before more people get killed?”
“Funny how you think standing up for the Constitution is nonsense. You’re in open rebellion against the legitimate president.”
“You ain’t standing up for anything,” his ex-wife said. “I know you, Mitch. You haven’t changed one bit.”
“I’m stronger than I ever was. And I know what’s right.”
“You ain’t doing this to save America. You’re doing it to save yourself. You’re doing it this way because you’re a mean son of a bitch.”
If he wanted to hate the enemy, she would do nicely. His face burned with a sudden and massive rage that left him shaking. “I fought for my country in the worst place on Earth. I came back, and you gave me hell every damn day. You took off on me after we buried our little girl. You want to know who changed, it was you. You ran off when I needed you most, you goddamn bitch.”
The radio went quiet. The squad looked away, embarrassed.
“Like I told you,” Abigail said. “You haven’t changed one damn bit.”
Mitch exhaled a frustrated sigh. “I’m sorry I said that. I told you a thousand times I was sorry about everything I did. You know I had a hard time after the war. But you don’t know me anymore. Don’t pretend you do.”
“I can understand fighting so a little girl can live. I can’t understand why you fight against it. Why you hate other people who have nothing instead of the people who took everything from you. You’re the guy who goes postal on his coworkers when he should be taking his gun to the next board meeting.”
She had no idea why he was fighting. Mitch had always held to a single maxim: Every time the government tried to make things better, it ended up destroying a little more freedom, so it governed best when it governed least.
A simple principle, but one he’d never been able to make her understand.
He said, “I’m hanging up, Abigail.”
“Before you go, somebody here wants to say hello.”
“I don’t need another crazy woman yelling at me tonight.”
The radio bleeped: “Mitch?” A child’s voice.
“Who is this?”
“You don’t remember me?”
It was the girl he’d met on the road to Indy. The girl who’d tried to commit suicide by soldier back at the daycare serving as the women’s HQ.
He chewed his beard for a moment, then keyed the handset. “Yeah.”
“Next time, I won’t miss. I’m gonna kill you and the giant.”
“I got no quarrel with a ten-year-old girl, Hannah. You should go home before you get yourself hurt.”
Alex Miller rushed over and held out his hand. “Please, Sergeant.”
“Why?”
“I think that’s my little sister.”
Stunned, Mitch handed over the radio and walked out of the house, feeling strange as hell as all the dots connected. He’d stopped Shook from raping Alex’s mother, and the boy later ended up fighting alongside him. He’d left his sister standing on the roadside, and she’d become a child soldier intent on killing him.
What a crazy war. Maybe Abigail was right, and the whole thing was nonsense.
The cold evening air braced him as it always did, but it did little to still his restless mind. Talking to Abigail again had unleashed an even stronger flood of feelings and memories, many of them happy ones, the rest dark and inflamed, love and hate all mixed up. They say time heals all wounds, but the scab was always there, waiting to be picked off.
And boy, did she ever love to pick.
Screw it all, he thought. So what. It changed nothing.
He needed to put all this drama behind him and get back to business. One thing he knew for sure, the day after tomorrow, they’d go after the libs with everything they had. And after it was all over, Abigail would see. They’d all see what the militias were fighting for, and that this war had been worth fighting.
Boots crunched snow. Ralph said, “How’s everything, Mitch?”
“It’s going all right, Colonel.”
“Any news?”
“The Free Women have radios now. We started tapping their communications.”
“The IMPD must be helping them. Interesting.” Ralph rubbed his hands to keep them warm. “You get any decent intel?”
“They’re staying put, and their morale seems good.”
“We’ll cure them of that shortly.”
“I’ll have the last of Second Platoon moved by tomorrow. The Angels will be in position to launch their attack the day after that.”
“Wednesday,” Ralph said. “New Year’s Day.”
Mitch spat in the snow. “Yup.”
The colonel pulled a wrinkled pack of Camels from his side pocket and lit one. “I’ll be glad when the offensive gets going. The sooner the First Angels are out of our hair, the better. They don’t like us much, and I don’t trust them.”
“They like the libs even less.” The Angels, they knew how to hate.
Ralph’s face darkened. “The enemy of my enemy is my friend.”
“Yes, sir. With friends like these… Still, you got to admire it a little. The will.”
“The only thing I admire about them is they have guns and they’re willing to use them against the libs. We’re not like them, Mitch.”
“No, sir. We ain’t.” Still, he worried about surviving this war with his moral integrity intact.
The colonel dropped his butt in the snow and appraised him. “You did an outstanding job taking over the platoon after Taylor got hit.”
“Thank you, sir.”
“No, I’m thanking you, Mitch. And I’m going to do something I should have done from the get-go instead of kissing donor ass and letting Taylor anywhere near combat. I’m promoting you to lieutenant, effective immediately.”
Mitch’s stomach soured. “Excellent, sir.”
“I know what you think of it. In fact, it’s why you’re perfect for it. The boys look up to you, you have experience, and you keep your head under fire.” The colonel stuck out his hand. “Second Platoon is yours, Lieutenant.”
He took a deep breath and shook it. “I’ll do right by you, Colonel.”
“I know you will. You’re an officer now.”
“Oh, brother.”
Ralph gazed into the sunset and grinned. “This is it, Mitch. New Year’s Day, the Angels will unleash hell, and then we’ll go in and mop up. It’ll be the start of a new era. We’re going to take Indy back. Then America.”
“Yes, sir,” Mitch said with more feeling. “We’ve come a long way.”
They were so close to victory now, he could taste it. Still, his ankle was killing him. He needed to rest and sleep off the pain and this feeling of strangeness that wouldn’t pass. The war could wait. He saluted and limped off toward his sleeping bag, where he hoped to forget the whole thing for a few hours.
It had to end soon. The Liberty Tree wasn’t like the Angels, but in another year, it might be. In another year, he might hate the libs enough to justify anything. As a platoon leader,
order it. A year after that, they’d all cross a line where the war was no longer worth fighting but was being fought for its own sake. And after yet another year, it might be impossible to ever live together again in peace.
The war had already reached a brutality that shocked even him. Evangelicals shooting enemy wounded in the head and leaving them on the ground like roadkill. Now there was a little girl out there who was hell-bent on murdering him.
Hannah Miller, he didn’t hate. No matter how much she hated him, he couldn’t hate her. He felt like he and Shook created her that night.
FIFTY
Alex pressed the talk button. “Hannah?”
His squad mates stared at him, still absorbing the news he’d been shooting at his little sister this whole time.
“It’s me,” he said. “It’s Alex.”
He waited. The radio was quiet. He turned up the volume in the hope of hearing something, anything.
A bleep, then crying.
A woman’s voice in the background: Are you okay, sweetie?
The crying filled the room. Their faces gray, the militiamen looked away. Then the radio went silent again.
Jack said, “Is that really your…?”
Alex covered his eyes with his free hand, face screwed tight to hold back his tears. He didn’t want them to see. He wanted to try again in the hope Hannah would answer, but he didn’t trust himself to speak.
The radio blatted again. “Alex?”
“Merry Christmas, sis.”
He kept his hand over his eyes, which allowed him to imagine they were completely alone. That the militias, the war, and everything else didn’t exist.
“You were stupid to run away.”
Alex smiled. “I know. Sorry.” He’d never been so happy to talk to somebody in his life. “Are you okay?”
“I’m good,” she said. “Why are you fighting for those men?”
“What are you doing fighting?”
“I’m not a kid anymore, Alex.”
“What do Mom and Dad think about it? How are they?”
The radio went silent again. Then: “They’re okay. They’re worried about you.”
Alex sank to his knees with a strangled sob. His sister had always been a terrible liar. He managed, “That’s good to hear.”
“Why did you run away?”
“I just wanted to go home. I didn’t want anything to change.”
But it did. And now his parents were dead. The knowledge severed his last hope things could ever go back to normal.
“We should have stayed together,” she said.
“Will you tell Mom and Dad I’m sorry?”
Another pause. “I’ll be seeing them soon. We’re going to have a big dinner to celebrate Christmas.”
“Do you think they’ll forgive me?”
“Of course they will. It’s Mom and Dad.”
Alex snorted. Mom and Dad would forgive them anything. It was one of the things that had driven his perverse need to test them.
Still, he was glad to hear it. Glad and heartbroken.
“Hey,” he said. “I’m sorry to you too. That I left you alone.”
“It’s okay. I’m not alone anymore.”
It was still hard for him to reconcile the needy little ball of energy he’d grown up with and the voice on the radio. When had she gotten so strong? His dumb little half-nerd sister with her diary and constant nagging and obsessions over this TV show or that. She used to bug him until he said, Eat my shorts, and then she’d run off to Mom to tell on him. When his friends spotted him babysitting her on an outing, he’d almost died from shame. They were merciless in their ribbing.
Typical family stuff. His embarrassment seemed ridiculous now. He gazed back at his anxious teenage world and its problems with nostalgia.
Hannah wasn’t that annoying little brat anymore. She was a soldier now, just like him. He guessed they’d filled her head with a bunch of propaganda and the gullible kid had swallowed all of it like she always did, but that wasn’t the end of it. Whatever she was now, she’d earned it.
While he’d cooked and saluted and carried stuff around for the men who’d started all this, she’d suffered. She’d watched their parents die. She’d buried them. She’d joined her own militia.
And in the process, she’d grown older than him, an unsettling thought.
He wanted to ask what had happened, but he didn’t. Maybe it was for the best he believed her lie. Mom and Dad were in Indy right now. They were fine. They were getting ready for a late Christmas dinner.
“I guess I’m not alone anymore either,” he said.
Radio silence. He’d made a mistake. He shouldn’t have brought up the war that separated them. He didn’t want her to leave.
He added, “Do you want to come over here to this side? Whatever you think you know about Mitch, you’ve got it wrong. He isn’t a bad guy. He’s taken good care of me.”
“Not after what the giant did to Mom.”
“What happened to Mom? What did Mitch have to do with it?”
“He was there. He let the giant go. He left us on the road.”
Alex wheeled to glare at his comrades. They were all studying their hands, minding their own business. Avoiding his eyes. Only Jack stared back at him. He hadn’t been there.
She said, “I’m here because I want to be. I belong here.”
“You belong with me, Hannah. I’ll look after you.”
“Dad got a turkey. They’re saving it for my next visit.”
He sighed. “Hannah—”
“And brown gravy.”
He paused. “Stuffing?”
“Just potatoes.”
“Sweet potatoes?” His favorite. His mom used to bake them smothered in bacon, lemon juice, and brown sugar.
“You betcha,” she said.
Alex was picturing it. Another holiday meal with his family, no longer boring in his mind but downright exotic and wondrous. Mom yelling at him not to text at the table, Grandpa drinking too much, Dad trying to steer the conversation away from politics. All of it.
“Sounds like a great time,” he told her. “Wish I could go.”
“You should come.”
“I can’t. I belong here too.”
“I have to go, Alex. The Free Women need the radio.”
“When this is all over, I’ll see you at our house, okay?”
“Okay.”
“You go to Sterling first chance you get and wait for me. I’ll be there. I love you, kid. Take care of yourself. Don’t do anything stupid in the meantime like get hurt. I’d go out of my mind if anything happened to you.”
“You better not shoot at me. I love you too, you big fart-face.”
He smiled at this glimpse of the old Hannah. “And one more thing…”
“What?”
“Tell Mom and Dad I love them too.”
“I will. Goodbye, big brother.”
“See ya, sis.”
A woman’s voice burst through the ether: “Runners are on the way, ladies. Section three, if you were listening, you know the amazing Hannah will be a little late with your dinner. Hang tight.”
Alex handed the radio back to Bud.
The RTO dropped his cigarette and ground it out with his boot. “She’s a tough little lady, huh?”
“She’s just a kid.”
“It was nice you got to talk to her,” Jack said.
Alex wheeled on him. “What happened?”
His friend raised his hands. “I have no idea what she was talking about.”
He glowered at the rest of the squad. “Who’s going to tell me?”
The men looked away again.
“Was it Sergeant Shook?” Alex demanded. “Did he do something?”
“Nothing happened,” Tom said.
Donnie winced, confirming it was something and it did happen.
Shook had done something awful to his parents. To his mom. The militiamen wouldn’t say what, but he could imagine plenty. Shook was capable
of anything. The rules of war and peace alike didn’t seem to apply to him.
Alex’s vision went red. “Son of a bitch.”
The militiamen jumped to their feet, unsure whether to allow him to leave or tackle him to the ground. Tom’s arm shot out to block the doorway.
“Move,” Alex growled.
The veteran calmly lowered it. “How about you and me take a walk?”
He snatched up his rifle and followed Tom outside. “Make it quick.”
The man gave him a warning glance. “I’m trying to help you out.”
“What happened?”
Tom kept walking. Alex gave chase. He wasn’t sure he wanted to know, but he had to know. The darkness closed in around them.
The soldier told him everything.
The IED killing his father, Shook coming along, Mitch stopping it. The squad on the clock, which forced them to leave Hannah and her mother behind.
“That IED wasn’t us,” the soldier added. “Probably antifa. It was dark. More than likely, they thought your family was militia on its way to Indy. They caught the bomb that was meant for us.”
“Did he…?” Alex winced. “Did he kill my mother?”
“No. She was alive when we left them. Your sister might have been telling the truth. About her still being alive.”
Alex already knew the truth. If she were alive, she’d never allow Hannah anywhere near a militia, much less join up with one.
His vision blurred as he started to bawl. The militia valued aggression and punished weakness, but he couldn’t stop it. He cried for Mom and Dad, and Hannah. He cried for himself. It just poured out of him.
They’d trained him to be a soldier, but he wasn’t a soldier. He was a fifteen-year-old boy who wanted his mother.
Tom placed his hand on Alex’s shoulder and squeezed. After a while, the tears slowed. He took a few long, jagged breaths. Then the rage returned.
“I’m going to kill him.” He started walking.
The world rocked, and he couldn’t breathe. The soldier had him gripped in a headlock. Alex struggled against it, but the man’s thick arm only tightened until he saw stars.
“Are you smart or are you stupid?” Tom said. “Give me a nod if you’re smart.”
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