SODIUM:2 Apocalypse (13 page)

I climbed onto our lookout perch in the tree and used the spotter scope to look back at the situation. There were several fighters now circling the beach and a couple of the transport freighters hovering just above the ground. Upon closer inspection I noticed that there were a multitude of the smaller helper robots moving about. It took a few minutes to notice that they were spraying a green fog as they moved around.

I then focused on a pair that were moving around a large piece of a shot down fighter. As they sprayed the fog the material of the fighter seemed to melt away. It was as if they were trying to clean up any leftover damaged parts so that they would not fall into enemy hands. I next turned my attention to the water ship that lay upside down on the beach. It too had hundreds of the little robots spraying about. The same thing was happening to the remains of the other water ship just offshore.

I wasn't sure why they were so intent on covering up their technology from discovery when there were only a handful of us left, but I guessed they were just being thorough. Why give the enemy any advantage when you didn't have too.

I watched until dark as the robots continued their spraying. Janie was stabilized, but was still unconscious. I felt helpless as my little warrior lay there so badly injured, but there was nothing more I could do. As the Sun set and the Moon rose the helper robots had all been picked up from on shore and moved to spray the upside down water ship.

The rage had been building in me since I had climbed the tree and once again laid eyes on our nemesis. There was a full moon this night providing enough light to drive without headlights and I decided that if we could sneak back into our base camp we might be able to get off one last set of shots at the remaining robots and their transports. The fighters had moved back offshore over the other downed water ship.

Rachel remained with Janie while David and I made our way back to the Daytona base camp in Bubba. Power at the camp was out, but the gun by the power station was still functional. And if we could get the rapid fire gun on the back of Bubba hooked up to the power also we would again be in business.

It took half an hour at a slow pace to sneak Bubba out to the power station gun. Another half hour was needed to connect the rapid fire gun to the substation and we were once again ready for battle. A substantial portion of the upside down water ship had vanished with the sprayers working continuously. The fighters remained further out near the other water ship that was also almost invisible except for the hovering transports and circling fighters.

There were still a few dozen helper robots spraying on the upside down water ship, so David and I decided to send them a message. David would fire the larger gun at the transports offshore while I tried to mop up the robots. A few short bursts later and half of the shoreline robots were destroyed. David laid careful aim at one of the transports and pulled the trigger. The transport instantly exploded and dropped into the sea.

The remaining transport circled the area below it snatching up robots as it went. It sprayed a fog over the entire area and then turned away towards the mother ship in the distance. It only took me a few more bursts before there was no activity left around the upside down water ship. The fighters turned away with the transport and soon disappeared into the darkness. I could not make out anything left from the far water ship and the one onshore continued to melt away.

It seemed the robots had accomplished their work and there would be little left to fall into enemy hands that day. But David and I felt a bit justified at once again chasing them off. We returned to Two Mile camp to check on the other half of our battered, but heroic family. The following morning we made our way back to the colony at first light.

For the next two days Janie lay silent with Rachel by her side. I tried to persuade her to sleep, but she would not budge. Only after fatigue had taken its toll did she fall asleep in the chair next to Janie.

I gently lifted Rachel and lay her on her own mattress. David and I then took turns tending to chores and watching over our fearless young fighter. She had risked her own life in order to save David and Rachel. It was something each of us would have done for any of the others a thousand times over.

While I had attended church regularly with my parents as a child, religion had not been an active part of my life as an adult. I had gone to the occasional holiday service, but my faith was something that I had not paid much attention to. As I sat beside Janie on the middle of the third day I was startled by a whimpering noise outside the bunker door. At the time, I realized that I had been praying for her for hours.

I was begging for the recovery of a treasured member of my family while at the same time feeling guilty for not having been better with my faith. I don’t know if it was from my prayers or because it was in God’s plan all along, but that afternoon Heinz had returned. He was much leaner than before and was sporting a few battle scars, but he was otherwise in good shape.

I got up and let him in and he immediately went past me to Janie’s side. He began to lick her hand. Moments later Janie opened her eyes. I was leaning over her when she came too and the slight smile that she could manage sent my heart soaring into the clouds.

I awakened Rachel and called David in from outside. We all welcomed Janie and Heinz back. She was only awake for five minutes before she dozed off again for several more hours. We were all beside ourselves with excitement at our good fortune that day.

When Janie next awoke we got a glass of juice into her and had her nibble on a bit of chicken. I could tell she was in severe pain from the damage to her arm, but she was a trooper as always and didn’t complain. The stitching I had done was ugly, but it had held. And so far, there were somehow no signs of an infection. With luck we would have Janie back in our ranks in a few days.

Heinz was a little thinner, but looked to otherwise be in good health. We never found out where he had run off to, but we were happy with his return. Since his departure we had not had any sightings of wild dogs so we guessed he was either leading them or keeping them at bay. Either way we were happy to see him.

Since our return I had been spending a lot of time outdoors, always watching the skies for our visitors. There had been no sign of the intruders since bringing Janie home.

Were they regrouping? Were they bringing reinforcements from elsewhere? Would they soon be scouring the countryside in pursuit of us? I had no way of knowing and my old tried and true technique of not stressing over things you don’t control... was not working. There was too much on the line and I was stuck with running scenario after scenario of outcomes through my head.

After several weeks the stress and idleness was beginning to take its toll. I knew we would need to get back to Daytona soon if we wanted to continue our fight, if not only for my own sanity. Janie was now in good enough shape to travel. She needed to rest, but I knew I was going to have a hard time making her do so. Even with her pain and injuries she was ready to get back in the fight. We spent most of an afternoon getting supplies together and getting the farm in order for another extended stay away from home.

David’s automatic feeders had worked perfectly for the chickens. I continued to be impressed by his abilities, especially when those abilities were so needed for our continued survival. I had questioned early on whether or not he would be a contributor to our group and those questions had certainly been answered.

With our farm in good shape we again decided to make our way back to Two Mile camp. Heinz remained at the compound as our lookout as we dare not have him running about and attracting unnecessary attention in battle.

Upon arrival David and Rachel raced up the tree to our stand. Using the binoculars and spotter scope they swept the countryside for signs of the aliens. I had to restrain Janie to prevent her from climbing up with them. She was not stable enough yet for that level of activity, so she stayed with me on the ground.

David’s first report was that he could not see the giant ship. Rachel peered towards the beach with the binoculars and alerted David of an area that looked suspicious. David soon called down that there was indeed activity just off the beach at the sight of the first downed water ship.

It appeared as though they were trying to recover from our attack. David and Rachel again swept the skies and only after a full minute of doing so reported back that some type of smaller black craft was landing on the beach near where the downed ship had been, before the sprayers the sprayers had fogged the debris.

It was too far to tell if it was a fighter or one of the transports. There was no sign of the mother ship which made me even more nervous. We would have to once again venture down towards the beach to get a better look.

We made our way to the Daytona camp with the hopes of first getting the big gun up and running again. Debris from the last crashed fighter had severed our power and communications cables between there and the howitzer setup.

We would have to disconnect the power at the substation before affecting repairs. As I approached the howitzer station I was encouraged to see that everything there looked to be as I had left it. Upon close inspection I was thrilled that the howitzer was still charged and ready to fire. I posted David at the howitzer while Rachel, Janie and I continued to the substation to cut the main gun power.

Again, the substation seemed to be in perfect working order. With a little time we would have all of our weaponry once again up and ready to use. With David manning the howitzer and Rachel manning Bubba’s machine gun I would be free to reconnoiter the beach and the activity around the downed ship.

After disconnecting the fuse and affecting our repairs on the power cable, I once again flipped the fuse into place. The arc told me we were now powering up the big gun. While we were there I also took the time to plant another smoke decoy by the vertical gun. We had been lucky and had taken out a fighter with it once so maybe our luck would hold if needed a second time.

When we returned to Bubba I helped Rachel into the bed of the pickup and made sure the machine gun was again fully functional. I had Janie come with me as I began to head towards the beach. We hadn’t made it 50 yards when I spotted a black craft making its way towards us. Janie and I both turned and ran towards Bubba. Once again time seemed to almost stand still as I ran. I could only see one craft approaching, but that was all that would be needed to kill us all.

I was not ready to go without a fight though and began immediately to aim the big gun when I returned. I know Janie wished she could contribute more, but nonetheless she had a single thirty-eight out and cocked. If she was going to go it would be while fighting.

I wanted to call David and warn him, but our communications line was still down. I had not had the time to splice the coax cable that had been severed by the fighter debris. All we could each do now was to hope that the other was ready.

Once again the predictable craft came straight towards us. I could not believe our luck. I instructed Rachel to wait until it was almost upon us before firing the machine gun. I would have one good shot with the big gun so I didn’t want the distraction from her gun firing. I watched patiently as the craft slowly moved right into my line of fire.

I only needed a few more seconds when all of the sudden soldiers seemingly came out of the woodwork and were screaming at us to freeze. It took me several seconds to realize they were speaking English... and they were ours!

When I turned around it was American soldiers with their weapons trained on us. I glanced back at the craft just in time to notice that it was a Blackhawk and not one of the fighters. It was one of our own! Had some of our military survived? Were they here to help? What of the rest of the world? The aliens?

I had a thousand questions that I wanted to ask all at once. My thoughts then turned to David and the Howitzer. Was he about to blast our own people from the sky? Without our communications link I had no way of stopping him. Luckily our soldiers had coordinated their raid and taken David at the same time.

Several minutes later we were confronted by an Army Colonel who demanded to know why we were in a militarized zone. I began to tell him our story and after a few minutes he was on the horn to his commander.

Twenty minutes later another Blackhawk landed and a four star General stepped out and greeted us. By this time the other patrol had brought David over. Another five minutes with the General and he was ready to fly us off for a debriefing.

It only took me seconds to convince him that it might be to our advantage to give his troops a quick training session on the coil guns. I was informed that there had been no further sign of the aliens and the General’s intelligence indicated that the remaining large craft had left the atmosphere. The fighting was over.

I couldn’t help but think that our little rag tag army had defeated this gigantic enemy by ourselves. At that moment I know that I was looking around at David and the girls with my jaw dropped. Once again the goose bumps shot up on my arms.

With another ten minutes taken, the soldiers were given the how-to on the coil guns in case the aliens returned. The final lesson was to let one of them cut loose a burst from the machine gun on Bubba. All the soldiers were in awe and I could tell they each wanted a go at it, the destruction was impressive.

We had requested that Heinz be picked up. I gave the General my address and they had a chopper ready to go get him in 10 minutes. David and Rachel volunteered to ride in the chopper to pick him up. Within a half hour the soldiers had a tent set up with tables, chairs and refreshments. It seemed the General was able to travel with some comforts.

A short while later the chopper returned with David, Rachel and Heinz. We talked with the General for several hours. I told him of our battles and the aftermath with the aliens cleaning up their losses before leaving. That's when he informed me that there was still one fighter laying on the beach. I guessed they must have wanted to recover it, so it had not been fogged. Had David and I not gone back that last night and drove them off they would have left no evidence of their existence behind, that is, except for the immense death and destruction.

Before we were to leave I turned to the General and asked if he could do me a favor. I asked him if we could have a close look at the downed fighter that was still intact on the beach. He of course approved and our group made its way to the beach. The craft sat nose first in the sand, it had come skipping in on the waves after being knocked from the sky.

It was 80 feet long and shaped like an arrowhead. There was no windshield or any other indication that it could be piloted by anyone or anything. The exterior was much like that of the larger ships and was covered with piping and boxes. An examination under one side revealed two rails that had the same appearance of the propulsion discs on the larger ships; we had speculated it was how they moved about.

On one side there was what looked to be one of the helper robots now only partially attached. It was eerie looking even though it was lifeless. As I looked it over I imagined that David would probably love to begin dissecting it. The helper robots were like a slice out of a sphere, domed on the bottom and largely flat across the top with three spindly legs.

On the fighter ship there appeared to be a carved out space where the dome of the robot would reside for transport. I imagined that the bottom of their transport ships had been covered with the dome shaped depressions and when the last transport made its run to gather robots they had popped right in place on the bottom of the ship as it moved over them. This one on the fighter may have attempted to free itself, but one of its legs had been trapped underneath the fighter.

The robot had what looked like ten tiny eyes spaced evenly around the rim of the dome which I surmised was how they could see. On the curved bottom were three long spindly legs with several joints on each one. At the lowest joint there appeared to be a claw mechanism that could be used for grabbing or cutting when the end section of the leg was folded up.

As I looked closely at the claw I was suddenly aware that the solenoid mechanism that powered the claw looked exactly like the object the crazy old man had given me so many years before! The aliens had visited us before and had left this tiny piece of evidence behind! Better yet, that tiny piece of evidence had just been used to defeat them! My head was swirling as I tried to put all the pieces of the past years together.

I had a million questions that I wanted to ask the old man. How did he come by the solenoid? Had he seen them? Had he fought with them himself? It had easily been thirty five years since I had encountered the old man. I didn't hold out much hope at that moment that he was still alive. What a difficult life he had probably endured not only knowing the aliens were out there, but with everyone he told his story to probably thinking he was a crackpot.

I continued listening to the General about the world as we continued to walk around the ship. As it turned out the aliens had come in over Tampa and began the systematic destruction of Central Florida. The governments of the world were then all notified of the terms of Earth's surrender.

After the slaughter of four and a half million souls in just a few days, coupled with the total ineffectiveness of our weapons, the U.S. government along with the U.N. Security Council and the world body of the U.N. unanimously agreed to the surrender terms set forth.

The alien’s terms were for the peninsula of Florida to be completely evacuated. That included south Florida whose inhabitants had to all be loaded onto cargo and cruise ships and taken to other U.S. gulf ports. It also called for complete radio silence.