Ex-Patriots (17 page)

“You sure you want to do this?”

“Yeah,” she said. “If they’ve got half the
resources John says they do out there, I’ll be able to give the
armor a major overhaul. Implement a couple of ideas I’ve had.”

He looked down E and saw Cesar and Lee
bringing out one of the smaller crates. HELMET was stenciled on it
in blue letters. The younger man shot him a sullen gaze as they got
closer. “And?”

“And what?”

He tipped his head back toward the
helicopter. “Are you coming back?”

She followed his gaze. “Maybe,” she said. “I
don’t know. I was talking with John last night. He thinks they
might want the suit to stay with them. If it stays, I stay.”

St. George’s forehead wrinkled at the
news.

“He’s not sure,” she added. “From what I
gather the military’s spread so thin they’ll probably ask most of
us to keep doing what we’ve been doing out here. You might be stuck
with me.”

He smiled. “It hasn’t been that bad so
far.”

“You haven’t been paying attention then,” she
said. Her eyes snapped to the soldiers as they took the crate from
Lee and Cesar. “Hey,” she called out. “Be gentle! That helmet cost
more than that helicopter.”

St. George laughed.

“Hey,” said Smith. He walked over to them.
Captain Freedom loomed behind him. “Did I miss something
funny?”

They shook their heads.

“So,” Smith continued, “it looks like
everything’s moving along. Did you guys decide who’s coming with
us?”

“I shall be accompanying you back to Yuma,”
said Stealth. She’d appeared behind them in the shadows. “Your
Colonel Shelly and I have much to discuss.”

Smith nodded. “Excellent. I’m glad to have
you with us.”

“I am not with you yet,” said Stealth. “That
is one of the points we shall be discussing. I dislike the idea of
removing one of our most powerful assets from the Mount.”

“The colonel isn’t about to leave you with
weak defenses, ma’am,” said Freedom. “We’ll work something
out.”

Smith turned his gaze to St. George. “I wish
you were coming with us.”

“We’ve got a run scheduled for this
afternoon,” said the hero. “We’re going down into Larchmont to
clean out a bunch of the fruit trees people had in their yards.
I’ll go with them and catch up with you later tonight.”

Freedom glanced over at the scavengers
loading a truck on the far side of the garden. “You’re making the
civilians search for supplies, sir?”

“We are not making them do anything,” said
Stealth.

“You’re at no risk,” the officer said to St.
George. “Wouldn’t it make more sense for you to go alone?”

He looked up at Freedom and gave a faint
smile. “It would if there was some way for me to bring four or five
hundred pounds of fruit back on my own,” he said. “It’s not like I
can throw it all in a few grocery bags and carry two in each
arm.”

“I was led to believe you could carry at
least three in each arm, sir.” Freedom’s expression didn’t change,
but there was a faint glimmer in his eye as he said it.

“Believe me,” said St. George, “no one goes
out who doesn’t want to and we minimize risks wherever we can.”

“So they’d like you to believe.”

Christian stood a few feet away with her
fists on her hips. Danielle recognized it as Gorgon’s sheriff pose.
The councilwoman ignored the heroes and spoke directly to Smith.
“These people have endangered our lives again and again and refused
to give us any voice in how we govern our lives here. It’s been a
fascist dictatorship, and I wanted to make sure the proper
authorities knew about it.”

St. George caught most of the sigh before it
slipped out, but a wisp of smoke spiraled up from his nostrils.
Danielle’s hands clenched into fists. Stealth grew very still,
which he knew was a bad sign.

Smith stepped forward and pulled Christian’s
hand into his. “Agent Smith, Department of Homeland Security,” he
said. “I’m helping the Army out as a government liaison. You must
be one of the local community leaders. It’s a pleasure to meet
you.”

She returned the handshake after a moment of
awkwardness and straightened up even more as she processed the
torrent of words. “Christian Nguyen. I’ve been elected by a
majority here to speak for the people of the Mount.”

“A majority of the people in your districts
doesn’t mean the majority of the people here,” scoffed
Danielle.

“Since your overlords refuse to hold
democratic elections, we all have to make do,” said the older
woman.

“I’m very sorry to hear you’ve been having
problems,” said Smith. He led her a few steps away from the heroes.
“We expected to hear about some problems when we encountered
survivors, but we’ll be wanting a full account of everything that’s
been going on for the past few years.”

“I’ll be glad to give one,” she said. “Under
oath, even.”

“I’m sure that won’t be necessary.”

She shot a suspicious glance back at the
heroes. “I just want to make sure it’s clear who’s been doing
what.”

He nodded. “I’m glad to know there are people
like you here in the Mount. People we’ll be able to depend on even
when things are tough.” He paused. “I can depend on you when things
get tough, can’t I, Christian?”

She smiled. It crossed St. George’s mind it
was the first honest, happy smile he’d ever seen on the woman’s
face. “Of course you can,” she said. “I’m always honored to serve
the people.”

“Excellent,” he said. He had his practiced
smile up again. “I’ll be in touch on my next trip out here. Do you
mind if we finish making our arrangements for this trip? There are
a few things we still need to iron out.”

“Of course, Agent Smith.”

He took her hand again and gave it a single
shake. “Please, just call me John.”

Christian beamed, and her eyes flashed with
triumph. “Of course, John.” She squeezed his hand back and walked
away.

“I take it back,” St. George murmured to
Danielle. “Maybe he’s not bad to have around after all.”

A soldier stepped forward and gave Freedom a
salute. “Ready to move out, sir.”

“Excellent.” He gestured them all towards the
helicopter.

“Time for us to get strapped in,” said
Smith.

Danielle pulled St. George aside. “Are you
sure you’re okay with this? All of us heading off and leaving the
Mount like this?”

“It’s not all of us,” he said. “You guys are
going now. I’ll be here for another few hours, and Barry’ll
probably be back before I leave. If all goes as planned, even if
you decide to stay, Stealth and I will be back tomorrow night.”

“And she’s okay with this?”

“Yeah. Kind of weird, I know, but...” He
shrugged.

“Just feels weird,” she said. “It’s been a
long time since we’ve had to say any goodbyes.”

He smiled and pushed her towards the Black
Hawk. “Unless you guys run into Zzzap on the way,” he said, “or I
see him here before I head out, I’ll see all of you out there later
tonight.”

Smith strapped himself in with some help from
one of the soldiers. He twisted his head over to look out the cabin
door and up at the sky. “I wonder if he’s made it out to Krypton
yet?”

“He left about half an hour ago,” said St.
George, “so, yeah, everyone there’s probably sick of him by
now.”

* * *

People of Krypton
, shouted Zzzap in a
deep, buzzing voice,
I tell you our world is doomed. We must
take refuge in the Phantom Zone!

“Hard as it may be to believe, sir,” said the
colonel, “we’ve heard all the Superman jokes you can think of.”
Shelly was in his mid-to-late forties, and in great shape whatever
age he was.

Dammit,
said the glowing figure. He
hung in the air a good thirty feet above the helipad. Close to a
dozen soldiers stood around the slab of concrete.
What about the
classics? Mysterious figure arrives at the Army base in the
desert?
The hum of his voice dropped an octave again.
I come
in peace. Take me to your leader.

“Are you done, sir?”

Tough crowd,
he sighed.
Yeah, I’m
done. Thanks for humoring me.

“Of course. On behalf of the United States
Army and Project Krypton, I’d like to welcome you to the Yuma
Proving Ground, sir. I’m Colonel Russell Shelly.”

I’m Zzzap, but you probably knew that
already. How do you want to do this?

“We can do a tour around the base,” said
Shelly. “Show you the perimeter, our supplies, anything you’d like
to see, sir, that’s not classified or restricted for safety
reasons. I thought you might like a late breakfast first. Nothing
special, I’m afraid. I think we’ve got scrambled eggs and bacon,
maybe some french toast. The coffee’s not too bad, though.”

Did you say you have bacon
and
coffee? Colonel, you may have just become my favorite person on
Earth.

Shelly gave a polite smile. “Right this way,
then, sir. I’ve got clothes and your other equipment waiting by my
office.”

It’s okay to say ‘wheelchair.’ It won’t come
as a big surprise to me, really.

“Sorry. I have to be honest, it caught me off
guard when Smith told me.”

Oh, believe me, the irony’s not lost on this
end, either.

A pair of soldiers waited for them by the
building. Their eyes went wide at the sight of the gleaming wraith.
They had a basic wheelchair with a seat made of faded leather. One
held a pair of boots in his hand and a set of camos draped over his
arm.

Zzzap flitted down and tilted his head to the
ground.
I don’t suppose you have a blanket or something?

The colonel glanced at the wide-eyed men. “We
could get one. Is it important?”

He sighed.
Not really. I just hate
crawling naked on hot pavement.

“If we swing around to the other side of the
building, sir, there’s a small lawn. It’s not much, but it’s—”

Don’t worry about it. Can you set the
clothes down there?

The soldier did as asked. Zzzap settled
closer to the ground, spreading his arms and legs wide. The
brilliant wraith dimmed, the air settled, and the dry sound of a
vacuum being filled echoed between the buildings. Barry dropped to
the steaming tarmac with a thump.

“Sonofabitch!”

“Are you okay?”

He rolled onto his side and reached for the
clothes. “Scraped my hand,” he said. “Nothing I haven’t done
before.” He dragged the pants across the ground and twisted his
legs into them. He wrestled the sand-colored tee shirt over his
head, waved off the boots, and hand-walked himself over to the
wheelchair. The soldiers stepped forward and lifted him in a
fireman’s carry for the last few feet, setting him down in the
leather seat. One of them handed him the coat. It had been stripped
of rank, but the name ZZZAP was on a velcro strip above the heart.
He smiled.

“Good, sir?”

“Yeah,” he said. “Thanks for the assist. Nice
jacket.” He draped it across his lap.

“Will you need an escort, sir?”

It took him a moment to understand they were
offering to push the wheelchair. “That’d be nice, thanks.”

They went up the ramp into the office
building. It was spotless, and the scent of cleaning chemicals hung
in the air. More than half the lights were out. Colonel Shelly
pulled off his cap, revealing a wire-brush scalp. He followed
Barry’s eyes up to the ceiling. “Power conservation,” he said. “We
try to run as few lights as possible, even at night.”

“Gotcha.”

“I appreciate your trusting us like this,
sir,” he said.

“We’ve all got to start somewhere,” said
Barry. “And could you not use ‘sir’? It always makes me feel like
my dad’s leaning over my shoulder.”

“Force of habit, but I’ll do my best. What do
you prefer?”

“Barry. Mr. Burke if that’s too casual for
you.”

“I can make do with Mr. Burke. Agent Smith
tells us you’ve got almost twenty-four thousand people out in Los
Angeles.”

“More or less.”

An older man was waiting for them in the
officer’s mess. His uncombed beard was a mess of gray and silver,
and it looked like he’d slept in his clothes for a while. He ran a
finger back and forth across the tabletop, like a blind man reading
a Braille headline again and again.

“This is Doctor Sorensen,” said Shelly. “He’s
the scientific head of Project Krypton. Captain Freedom and the
rest of the Unbreakables are the result of his work.”

Barry held out his hand. “You must be very
proud. They’re pretty amazing, from what I’ve seen. Not a lot of
people can take on St. George
mano-a-mano
, y’know?”

Sorensen looked up from the table. His watery
eyes met Barry’s and he reached out to take the hand. He moved in
slow motion, as if every action needed hours of rehearsal time he
hadn’t been given. “Hello,” he mumbled.

“Pleased to meet you.”

The older man moved his mouth a few times,
starting half a dozen words, and then went back to examining the
tablecloth.

There was a small buffet set up for them.
Bacon and eggs in one chafing dish, english muffins and french
toast in another. Two large pots of coffee. The soldier guided the
wheelchair along the table while Barry overfilled a plate. He
shoved some food in his mouth while they moved.

“Oh my God,” Barry said. “You don’t know how
much you miss bacon until after the zombie apocalypse.”

“We’re spoiled, I guess,” said Shelly. He and
Sorensen followed behind the wheelchair with plates of their own.
“The Army keeps these places well stocked, and even with the
rationing we’ve set there’s still enough food here and in Yuma for
another twenty-eight months or so.”

They took places at a table. Shelly paused to
say a silent grace and nodded for them to begin. Barry ate with his
usual gusto while the colonel took quick, precise bites.