Authors: Steven Konkoly
Harrison exhaled, searching his thoughts unsuccessfully for a counterargument. It had more than crossed his mind over the past fifteen minutes. In that short span of time, he had encountered two government-sponsored groups conducting operations without the bigger picture, making decisions in a vacuum. He couldn’t blame Littner for wanting to sit this one out. The more he learned about the RRZ, the harder he wondered if it was too late to back out of his arrangement with Captain Fletcher.
“I can’t convince you to ride this out a little longer?”
“You don’t sound convinced yourself,” Littner said, finally cracking a thin smile.
“I don’t know. I feel like I have to give this a shot.”
“If members of the Berwick chapter want to stick it out with the brigade, I won’t stand in the way. They can appoint a new leader and carry on. I’ll turn everything over.”
“This doesn’t mean you’re out of the brigade, Dave. Let’s call it a temporary hiatus,” said Harrison.
“No. I think this is it for me. I don’t see a good end to any of this. Good luck, Harrison. It’s been an honor serving with you. We’ve done some good.”
“Sorry to hear it, Dave. If you need anything at all, no matter what it is, you know where to find me,” said Harrison, shaking his hand.
When Harrison turned to walk back to the vehicles, Staff Sergeant Taylor kept a respectful distance. Taylor wore a pained expression.
“Parting ways?” asked the marine.
“Yeah. Dave’s been with us since we started. Real shame.”
“If we’d been here ten minutes earlier, this could have been avoided,” said Taylor.
“Or three days ago, like Captain Fletcher said.”
“Or that.”
“It probably wouldn’t have mattered in the long run,” he muttered.
“Why not?”
“It doesn’t matter. You said I can make a station-to-station call with the ROTAC, not just a radio-channel call?” said Harrison.
“Yes, sir. If you know the call sign, you can either scroll down your saved list or input the first few letters using the touchpad.”
“Captain Fletcher is Patriot 2 Alpha, correct?”
“Affirmative, but you won’t be able to reach him.”
“We just saw him less than an hour ago,” said Harrison, starting to walk toward the vehicles.
“I just tried to reach him, to see what he can do about getting your folks some ID cards. My Marines say he left the compound twenty minutes ago in a civilian jeep, and he forgot to bring his ROTAC.”
“Where is he headed?”
“Nobody will say,” said Taylor.
“The Marines won’t say?”
“Family and friends won’t say,” he said, shrugging his shoulders. “It’s none of my business.”
“Have you been out to this compound?”
“That was my first stop before reporting to the airport.”
“What did you see out there?” said Harrison.
Taylor stared at him quizzically. “The whole thing exists, if that’s what you’re asking.”
“I just wanted to know if Captain Fletcher was for real.”
“That’s not really what you were asking.”
“I suppose not.”
“Unfortunately, this is all very real. A nightmare—but real,” Taylor said. “We should probably hold up until your folks get out of here safely.”
Harrison thought hard about what Taylor had just said. He couldn’t forget that every one of the men and women deployed to the RRZ had left behind family, some without the chance to say farewell. None of them wanted to be here, even the ones convinced of their mission. They were just too wrapped up in their roles to realize it. They were soldiers, trained to fight wars, not implement a civil disaster recovery plan.
Then again, the government couldn’t have possibly planned for a catastrophe of this magnitude. It didn’t matter at this point. The RRZ was their new reality, and based on Captain Fletcher’s description of the worsening refugee situation across New England, the RRZ was the lesser of two evils. He wondered why Fletcher had left his radio behind. There was no way he forgot it. Taking a civilian vehicle was an odd choice as well, unless…
son of a bitch.
Unless all of the military gear was imbedded with tracking devices.
What are you up to, Captain Fletcher? Or are you just Alex Fletcher right now?
Harrison’s money was on the latter.
Chapter 16
EVENT +9 Days
Yarmouth, Maine
Alex emptied the two-and-a-half-gallon plastic gas can into the Jeep’s tank, keeping an eye on his surroundings. The shadows grew long across Route 88, enshrouding the tree-covered street in a premature dusk, finally providing some relief from the relentless sun. Their afternoon diversion had taken far longer than he expected, putting them back on the road to Belgrade close to dark. Barring any unforeseen circumstances along the turnpike, they’d arrive at Charlie’s camp by nine, well after the last vestiges of light on the horizon had vanished.
Approaching the lake house at night worked out better, in his opinion. He’d drive the final mile without the Jeep’s lights, relying on night-vision goggles and his GPS unit to reach the house. They should be able to arrive at the house without attracting much attention. Anyone that heard their arrival would have to go exploring to determine their destination, which was unlikely given the circumstances.
Alex and his dad would thoroughly scout the property before approaching the house, mindful of the possibility that it might have new occupants. He hoped it was empty. Removing squatters presented an unacceptable risk, especially at night. Unless he could scare them into leaving without a fight, he and his group would have to leave. Options would be severely limited at that point, unless he exercised his positional authority to rain down some RRZ pressure on the occupants. He wanted to avoid that, since it would attract attention to the location. Keeping this spot a secret was in everyone’s best interest, especially if things went bad and his family needed a backup plan. The trip today had been all about creating options. Time well spent, even if it meant returning at the crack of dawn.
The last of the gasoline drained into the tank. They had started the trip with a full tank, topped off from the house’s supply of gasoline. Averaging roughly eighteen miles per gallon, according to the trip computer, Alex calculated they used slightly more than the two and a half gallons to drive fifty-two miles. The rest of their journey would drain an additional ten gallons, leaving them with less than half of a tank. He could justify using thirteen gallons of gasoline, especially in light of the circumstances. They had fourteen gallons split between several containers back at the house, in addition to the three-quarters full tank in the BMW SUV, and they’d need most of it to pull off an evacuation.
With seventeen people, four of whom were injured, they’d have to make at least two runs between locations, burning up most of the gas just to transport personnel and a limited amount of gear. Ideally, they would return a third time to pack the cars with as much food and supplies as feasible. A third trip would require them to start siphoning gas from disabled cars—a dangerous proposition depending on the location of the car. Since the EMP hit at five in the morning, most vehicles were parked on private property or streets within sight of the owners. Few people would react well to the prospect of having their cars drained in front of them. He could always take several empty cans to the airport to fill and make something up about the farm’s tractor, hoping nobody knew offhand that his John Deere used diesel.
Alex tipped the container as high as possible, trying to drain the last drops out of the can. His father caught the motion in his peripheral vision.
“Ready?” asked Tim.
“Yeah.” He nodded, pulling the clear plastic nozzle out of the gas tank.
His father took a few steps away from the driver’s side door and scanned the quiet neighborhood of shingle-style Cape Cod homes. He wasn’t visibly armed, but his M-14 rifle lay across the front seat of the Jeep, where he could easily grab it through the open window. Aside from the pistol strapped to Alex’s thigh, they had kept their weapons out of sight, finding the journey uneventful. The prevalence of roadblocks seemed confined to southern Maine, which made sense given that most of the mayhem during the Jakarta Pandemic had taken place near the border or along the Maine Turnpike.
They encountered two police checkpoints, one on the outskirts of Gorham and another in South Portland. Alex’s provisional security identification and Maine driver’s license got them through both with little scrutiny. It helped that Alex had chosen to wear his issued MARPAT uniform, especially at the Coast Guard station, where sentries had barred the gates to keep hundreds of gathering civilians off the base. Upon sighting the mob of people outside of the front gate, they parked the Jeep at a safe distance. Alex had approached a less crowded point along the fence, attracting the attention of a guard. Within thirty minutes he had negotiated the necessary help required to secure another option in the event that the border situation proved untenable.
He screwed the gas cap back onto the tank and looked at the deserted street with his father. The neighborhood looked mostly unchanged, with the exception of missing windows and a few downed tree branches. Yarmouth had been spared the brunt of the tsunami’s landfall. Most of the wave’s energy had been sapped by the shelter islands of inner Casco Bay. The Royal River had experienced a significant tidal surge, as evidenced by debris and high watermarks far into one of the parking lots, but the docks didn’t suffer any direct damage. Physically, the sheltered marina and anchorage remained intact, like he’d hoped.
“Ever get the feeling you have a hundred sets of eyes peeking at you?” his dad asked.
“Not until you just said that,” said Alex, throwing the gas can into the back of the Jeep.
“I’m worried she won’t be there if we need her,” said Tim, nodding down Route 88 in the direction they had just come.
“We can always find another. Plenty to choose from, here or along the coast,” said Alex. “It’s not like there’s anyone around to haul them out.”
Alex opened the passenger-side door and waited for his father to move the M-14 to the back before dropping his exhausted body into the seat. He was still running on empty, having slept less than four hours a night since returning from Boston. Even with the Marines on the perimeter, he found it nearly impossible to sink into a restful sleep. He shuddered to think what might have happened if they had arrived in Limerick twelve hours later. Ironically, the Boston-based militia had forced Alex north with Grady’s Marines—just in time to save his family from another militia group. It was insanity.
Tim pulled the Jeep off the gravel shoulder. “I like the idea of a land-based escape better. Especially with the weather changing.”
“Wait until you see Charlie’s place. The term ‘cottage’ is generous.”
“Can’t be worse than eight people crammed into a thirty-eight-foot sailboat.”
“I’ll let you be the judge of that,” said Alex, digging through a small rucksack at his feet for a green thermos. “Coffee?”
Alex’s dad started to speak, but stopped. He shook his head. “I almost said we should stop at Dunkin’ Donuts.”
“I catch myself doing that all day. It’s a hard habit to break,” Alex lamented. “Same thing happened during the pandemic. Getting whatever we want, whenever we want is a deeply ingrained behavior.”
Tim stared at the road unfolding in front of them, shaking his head almost imperceptibly. “I wonder if we’ll ever see those days again…”
“It depends on how long the government takes to get the electricity flowing. From what I can tell, they planned for an EMP. Let’s hope that preparations included stockpiling the big-ticket items like transformers and substation parts. Without those, we’ll be watering down the instant stuff within a month or two.”
“I don’t mind the instant stuff. They use those flavor crystals.”
“It’s just coffee-flavored water at that point. Not really coffee,” Alex said, opening the top of the thermos and wafting steam into the Jeep.
His dad started laughing. “That’s all coffee is! Coffee-flavored water!”
“With that attitude, I can’t justify sharing any of this with you.”
“Smells good, doesn’t it?” said Tim.
“Dark roast,” said Alex, inhaling the lightly toasted scent.
His dad kept grinning.
“This isn’t instant coffee. Kate wouldn’t do that to me.”
“She didn’t want to waste the good stuff on me,” said Tim. “Made me promise not to tell…until you couldn’t turn back.”
“She knows me all too well.”
Alex poured a small amount into the thermos cup and tested it. He shrugged his shoulders. “It’ll work in a pinch,” he said, downing the rest.
“Maybe we should save it for the drive home,” Tim said. “It’s going to be a long night.”
“Let’s hope not.”
Chapter 17
EVENT +10 Days
Limerick, Maine
Brown’s earpiece crackled and went silent. That was the second possible transmission attempt in the past few minutes.
“Liberty Extract, this is Overwatch. Your transmission was garbled. Say again. Over,” he stated quietly.
Another burst of static filled his left ear, followed by nothing. It had to be his pickup. The chance of another radio user selecting the same subchannel was extremely low, reduced even further by the late hour. 2:20 AM. He had been told late in the afternoon, via radio relay, that a vehicle would retrieve him a few hours after midnight. He permanently disassembled his hide site a few hours after sunset, stowing the climbing harness in his backpack and descending the tree to wait in the thick bushes near the side of the road. As midnight approached, he started to get worried about the proposed timing of his pickup.
The black Jeep Wrangler had left Gelder Pond Lane in the early afternoon and hadn’t returned, creating the possibility of an unplanned meeting between the two vehicles in the vicinity of Limerick. Not a big chance, but even the smallest window of opportunity seized by the enemy represented a possible disaster. He’d learned this lesson the hard way in Afghanistan during 2015 when the Taliban came out of hiding, untouched and unfazed by the pandemic.