Day One (Book 2): Choices (3 page)

Andrews just glared at me for several long moments. At one point I actually thought he was about to shoot the man through me just to prove a point to all of those that were watching, as we were now the center of attention on the base. You could almost hear a pin drop in the massive slurs of silence, ringing like church bells on Sunday morning.

“You had your chance,” he said to me and holstered his weapon. Turning to what appeared to be an assistant of some kind, he spoke. “Arrest these three men, immediately.”

The assistant did as ordered and drew several soldiers close by to hold them at gunpoint until they were cuffed and led away.

Andrews turned toward me. “Never hesitate when I give you orders again, are we clear?”

I simply stood there completely lost as to what had just happened before my eyes. I couldn’t believe any of it – I think I didn’t want to actually, as somewhere within me I held this understanding and admiration for the man that had saved me and my daughter when others would surely have sacrificed us to escape.

I was left there on the flight line after Captain Andrews and his assistant had left. I could feel every pair of eyes burning through me, as though I was a snitch and they hated me for it. I had never wanted or planned it to go this way, if anything; I hoped to get my point across or maybe an explanation as to why they had shot at us. I didn’t get what I’d set out to achieve. All I had managed to do was put three young men in jail, ground a chopper that had to be useful for something, and felt like the school yard kid who had just got his ass beat and everyone watched silently as the bullies were lead away.

Chapter Two.

Johnny sat on his bunk listening intently as I told him what had happened. He’d seen it unfold through the window and worried about the possibilities if the proverbial shit hit the fan. For almost an hour the conversation hung on my courageous actions, until the words ran dry. It was then that he confided in me something very special, information that put an even bigger smile upon my face.

“Are you absolutely sure you can do that, because I don’t want to get my hopes up for nothing,” I asked.

“I’ve never been more serious in my life,” he answered and there was something in his eyes, as well as his voice that made me believe without a doubt.

“That’ll be a million times harder to pull off then what we were already discussing though, don’t you think?” I asked, adding a few extra words to let him know that I wasn’t grounding his idea. “I’m not saying impossible here, just that it’s damn sure close to that – next door you could say.”

He shook his head. “They run patrols almost like clockwork around here, and with that we use it to our advantage and turn the tide on them.”

I pointed at Kember, who was at the foot of the bed playing with a doll.

“It’ll work, Brandon. All you have to do is have a little faith,” he said.

“I’m not saying that I don’t have any faith,” I said and looked at Kember once more. “I just have a lot more to lose if this goes south quickly.”

“No one can guarantee success, but I can say with the utmost certainty that our odds are better than what they’d be staying here, especially with that whacko Captain arresting his own men after trying to shoot them in front of everyone. There’s something seriously wrong with that guy when you have to resort to violence to keep your men in line.”

“One condition,” I said.

“Name it,” Johnny said, and then watched me pull a small map and point to a specific location.

“That’s where my son lives, with my Ex. We go there and get him first thing, or you’re on your own,” I told him.

“And if he’s not there?”

I took a moment to reflect, thinking back to the last chance I had to rescue him over a week ago. I could still feel the anger for myself just near the surface, circling and waiting for me to crash into its murky depths where it could attack me without mercy. “I screwed up once already… I won’t do that again. We look for him, or as I said, you go alone.”

He leaned forward to get closer, maybe so I would hear something in his voice or see the purity of his comment in his eyes. “I would never say no to anyone in that situation, but what I want you to think about, and I mean really think long and hard about, is that it’s been well over a week so far. Lots of things can happen, and have… I just want you to be prepared for whatever we do or do not find.”

I knew what he was telling me. It was the very thing that I didn’t want to think about and had stopped myself from thinking more than I could count so far. He just wanted me to be prepared and ready to accept the outcome, as well as anything that was attached to it.

“One more thing,” Johnny added.

I looked to him. “What’s that?”

“We’ll be limited in the amount of time we have to look for him, so don’t think we are going to spend hour upon hour checking each and every house in that town. Put together a few extra places he might go, friends’ houses, grandparents, stuff like that. So if he isn’t there, at least we’ll have a few backups to check before blowing out of town for good.”

I nodded to him. “I’ll start on that now.”

“Make sure you mark them on the map as well,” he added.

I nodded once again.

He studied the map for several long minutes, getting his bearings as to which would be the best direction to come in from and leave out of, plus a few alternates just in case things got hairy and we had to bug out quickly. The last thing we needed was to get caught with our pants around our ankles and our asses hanging in the breeze, so to speak.

The euphoria was slipping over me by now and I felt like a new man. I felt as though we could go right now and come back victorious, but still smart enough to know better than to believe that will all my heart and soul. I was far from better – the opposite direction, no doubt, but still far from whom I thought I was.

“We’re going to go out and get some air,” I told Johnny as I lifted Kember off the bed and headed toward the door. He looked up quickly, nodded and went back to studying. We left.

The sun was bright as we slipped into its radiating glow. I drew several deep breaths and felt the coolness invigorate my lungs as we moved along the nearby fence line. Kember picked handfuls of rocks and tossed them about, smiling each time as though proud with her newfound skill. I followed her at a distance while I smoked ensuring none of the harmful stench would bother her.

She found several small animals, which scurried from nowhere, crossed her field of vision and drew her full attention. She’d point at them and babble merrily before seeing a different one, to which she would look at me with amazement flourishing in her little eyes, and then go back to watching them.

Here, even in the midst of the end, my Daughter found wonder in the smallest of things, catapulting them to a level I could not for the life of me understand. Where I saw death, she found life and wonder. Where I saw the end, she was able to point out the beginning of life to me, at least making the pill we were all now up against a little easier to swallow. She made it feel that we were not facing the end after all, but somehow welcoming in a new era of living.

How could the mind of a two year old be superior to that of an adult?

It’s a question I would think about often.

To me, it was like she was there to guide me through this new world and show me all the splendid wonders that were being made, instead of me there to protect and care for her, she was the one taking care and protecting me.

I found solace in that moment. I found release from all the things that had once held me back, corrupted my judgment, or otherwise swayed me to see or think something that was nowhere near the truth. I was blown away by her.

This little person that I’d had a hand in making, which was standing before me with a smile on her face and a handful of dirty rocks, was showing me how simple life should be. She was telling me without words that everything around us was alive and in full swing, as if the end had no more started than there was a man living on the moon. Her knowledge was timeless… it seemed limitless and I found myself loving her even more, if that was possible.

I had lost my wife, she her mother, but we had gained the personalities of both and they could never be taken from us. We had each other, and like I’ve said a few times in the past, I would let nothing happen to her while I still drew breath. I’d fight the pits of hell for her and arise victorious. With this little girl by my side, I felt I could take on what was left of the world single handedly, beat every odd stacked against me, and overcome any obstacle with ease.

She was my hero. I think she always had been. I’d just been too blinded by the world to see it until now.

I dropped the cigarette and moved up to her, knelt and smiled at her. She smiled back and tossed the rocks, flicking some small chunks of dirt on my face. I wiped them away and shook my head. “You make me laugh, little bit. Do you know that?”

A single word escaped her mouth that started an already powerful fire within me to erupt even higher. “Bubba.”

“That’s right, baby. Daddy’s going to get your, bubba. And nothing’s going to stop me this time,” I stated to her, and as if she knew exactly what I was saying, she smiled and said it again.

A faint echo pierced my right ear and I turned in time to see the massive clouds of black smoke rising into the dawning sky. At first I was certain that there had been a plane crash, although the reality of the moment caught me quicker than that. Had it been a plane crash, I first would have heard the aircraft, and then seen the explosion. What I had heard instead was further away and muffled, plus there had been no bright light as the fuel exploded on contact with the ground. I took a deeper look into what I was watching and my heart sank.

There in the distance, just barely above the far scorched trees, rose the fragmented pencil shapes of once glorious skyscrapers. There pointed and flat tops burned with yellowish balls of fire, resembling the tiki torches one would put in their backyard in the summer time for a party. But this wasn’t a party, and nor were those magnificent buildings of human engineering cheap side-show props. They were offices and homes to many people.

I stood there watching in horror, unable to look away, unable to think of anything else but the depravity faltering before my very eyes. And as the moments slowly passed by, one of the proud buildings could take no more and bowed to the earth in a spire of manic flames and dusty debris, snuffing every living thing within it out.

Kember pointed toward the reigning fire, even from her level she was able to see what I had and I wanted to pull her into my arms and never let her go. But this was the new life we were all facing now, so sugarcoating anything would only lead to more tragedy. I couldn’t shield her from this new horror for long, and letting her out into the world based upon lies would only inhibit her more than help. She needed to know the horrors of life and to be able to avoid them.

Against my better judgment as a parent, I let her watch as untold scores of people were silenced in those fleeting seconds. I knelt beside her as her eyes lit with amazement at the sights before us. She had no idea what was happening. To her it was simply an impressive lightshow from afar and she smiled and pointed more intently at it, calling daddy several times in a row.

“We lost the city two hours ago,” a voice said from behind me, which I rendered as Andrews even before turning to look at him. “There were simply too many of them to push back… they just kept coming and coming, so they had no choice but to pull out. What you’re seeing is what those things will eventually do to every city in this country before it’s over with.”

“What city was that?” I asked.

“It doesn’t matter anymore,” he replied. “From here on out, there is no name for any place. Everything you knew as a child, everything she would have learned, just go ahead and forget it. The only name that remains is this place. We lay our heads to rest here… therefore, it is home. That should be enough.”

I looked at him through worn eyes. “It should be enough?”

He nodded to me.

“And what will this place be when they find their way here?” I asked snidely. “Because we cannot hide forever. They’ll find us sooner or later, that is unless we pick up and go.”

Andrews was either confused at my words or offended due to his own pride. “Pick up and go?”

“Yes,” I said.

“Pick up and go, where?” He asked. “We are surrounded by them on every side. You drive west and you’ll run into them, east the same thing, west and so on and so on,” he added. “We
have
nowhere to just pick up and go too, son.”

My mind was racing so far ahead of our conversation that I was unable to keep up with what we were talking about, where we were or anything of utter importance, and with that my mouth overloaded my ass, as usual, and I spoke without thought. “My son is out there somewhere, lost, alone, confused, and I’m here where it’s safe surrounded by hundreds of soldiers. Give me the means to go and get him, or at least try.”

“Why ask me for something you already have in motion?” He asked.

I looked up at him, a bit unsure of what I had heard him say. “What?”

“Come on, Brandon. Please don’t think so lowly of me that I didn’t know what was going on under my own nose. I’m not that stupid,” Andrews said.