Surviving the Dead 03: Warrior Within (17 page)

“Mr. Garrett, I don’t suppose you have any interest in coming back onboard with the military, do you?”

I hesitated, surprised by the question. “It hadn’t really occurred to me, General.”

“Call me Phil.”

“Okay, Phil.”

His face lightened into a brief, tight smile before he picked up his coffee, sipped at it, and grimaced. He put it back town.

“I can’t offer much in the way of pay, things being what they are. But I can offer you a field commission as a captain. We need someone to help coordinate reclamation efforts in this part of the country, and I think you’d be perfect for the job.”

I stayed deliberately quiet for a few moments, holding his gaze and weighing carefully what I should say next. It was no accident that Jacobs had sprung the question on me out of nowhere—he wanted to catch me off balance. Probably thought he could fast-talk me into agreeing to his offer. Put it on the table, and make it sound like he was doing me a favor. It was a smart strategy, and it had probably worked for him with other people. But this was not my first rodeo.

“Phil, before I first came to this town, do you know what I was doing?”

His granite-colored eyes stayed steady as he shook his head.

“I was leading a small group of survivors westward, bound for Colorado. We weren’t going that way to join up with the military and fight the infected, or marauders, or anything else. We were trying to find a safe place to put down our guns and live in peace. That’s what we wanted.”

Jacobs tilted his head at an inquisitive angle and leaned forward, crossing his arms on the desk.

“I keep hearing you say ‘we’ this, and ‘we’ that. Is that really what
you
wanted? What were you going to do, be a farmer? Raise chickens and grow potatoes? Maybe sign on with a public works crew and dig ditches? You really think any of that would be the best use of your talents?”

I smiled, and shook my head. Bum-rushing me didn’t work, so now he was attempting good old-fashioned manipulatio
n. I had to give the man credit. He was persistent.

“Aren’t we getting off topic, Phil? I thought I was here to talk about the skirmish yesterday.”

The old soldier picked up the voice recorder. “I have your statement right here. I’ll hand it over to Captain McCray when he gets here and let him decide what to do with it.”

He saw me arch an eyebrow, and understood my question.

“I’m not here to lead the fight against the thugs plaguing this town.” He explained. “That’s McCray’s job, and I trust him to handle it. What I’m here to do is gather information, make an assessment of what this town needs, and make sure that the beancounters back in the Springs get off their asses and send it. My presence here is as much diplomatic as anything else. Command figured that showing up in person, bringing in supplies, and waving my star around would show the people here that we’re serious about helping them. Hell, I got two more communities to visit before the end of the month.”

“And the men you brought with you?” I asked, “What are they here for?”

He frowned, knowing I was trying to change the subject, but went on anyway. “They’ll be staying behind to help you train your militia, and to help cripple the insurgency.”

“Insurgency? Is that what we’re calling the Legion now?”

Jacobs shrugged. “It’s a term with a very specific resonance. Lets people know where the federal government stands on the issue.”

“And what about those communities that don’t want anything to do with the federal government? Are they insurgents now, too?”

His gaze turned to flint, and his scowl deepened. “What we’re trying to do, Mr. Garrett, is prevent this country from descending any further into chaos and bloodshed. Right now, there is a gigantic power vacuum out there, and a lot of forces are vying against each other to fill it up. I don’t know about you, but I’d hate to see this nation reduced to a bunch of scattered outposts constantly warring with one another over resources and territory. I would rather see the people of this nation come together to rebuild, and bring it back to something like the place it was before the Outbreak. I believe we can do it. If I didn’t, I wouldn’t be here. But we’re going to need the right kind of leadership to make it happen. Quite frankly, Mr. Garrett, what we need is people like you.”

I shook my head, and gave him a tired smile. “That was a nice speech, Phil, but you didn’t answer my question. What about those communities in the Midwest and California that have told the government to stay out of their business? What’s the president’s plan for them?”

Jacobs was quiet for a long moment. The hardness in his stare diminished, and the lines of his face seemed to deepen.

“Diplomatic efforts are ongoing,” he said. “Ambassadors have been sent to begin negotiations.”

I snorted. “You know, Phil, when people start talking to me in the passive voice, and regurgitating hackneyed political buzzwords, my bullshit detector starts beeping.”

His jaw twitched a few times, and he turned his eyes down from mine, suddenly finding the surface of his desk interesting. He didn’t say anything.

“It’s bad, isn’t it?”

The general nodded. “They’ve held elections.”

“Which ones?”

“The two biggest ones,” Jacobs said. “There’s a network of small, fortified city-states that stretches from Ohio to Illinois that call themselves the Midwest Alliance. They’re the biggest threat, and the most hostile. Then there’s the Republic of California. We don’t know much about them yet.”

I absorbed that for a moment, and said, “You think it’s going to come down to a fight?”

“Maybe, maybe not. They haven’t tried anything yet. If they do, we’ll be ready, but everyone back in the Springs is hoping that it doesn’t come to that.”

“You think they could win if it does?”

He shook his head. “Doubtful. We have pretty significant resources ourselves, and we’re actively working to get access to more. Unlike the other groups, we know where all of the doomsday stockpiles are. It’s just a question of reaching them. And both groups know that even if they do manage to win, they would take such heavy losses that it wouldn’t be worth it for them to try. Not yet, at least.”

“Meaning?”

“Meaning we’re working against the clock. It’s probably only a matter of time before they officially declare themselves as independent nations, and we need to be ready when they do.”

“Which is why you’re here in Hollow Rock. To garner support. Help people form militias, arm them, get them on your side. And you’re doing the same kind of thing elsewhere?”

He nodded. “It’s not just about territory, it’s about numbers. The Midwest Alliance, all combined, is at least the equal of the loyalists in Colorado. We don’t know for sure what the numbers are out in California, but we know it’s a lot, and we know that they’re … expanding.”

“Expanding?”

“Taking over new territory. A few refugees have fled as far east as our outposts in Nevada and their reports are worrisome, to say the least.”

I was about to ask him to elaborate on that when a knock sounded from the door behind me. A look of irritation swept over the general’s face.

“Yes, what is it?”

The door opened a fraction, and one of Jacobs’s personal guards stuck his head in the door. He was a tall man, broad-shouldered, crew-cut, and had eyes like a winter morning—blue, merciless, and cold.

“Captain McCray is here to see you, sir,” he said.

“Ah, outstanding. Tell him to wait outside and I’ll be with him in a minute. Thank you, Sergeant.”

The soldier nodded once, and then closed the door quietly.

“Do you need anything else from me, General? I have two wounded recruits expecting me to pay them a visit today.”

He put a hand under his chin and studied me again. Someone had put a new battery in the clock on the wall, and I heard a faint ticking as it counted down the seconds. Other than my own breathing, it was the only sound in the room as I waited for him to speak.

“You never did give me an answer, Mr. Garrett.”

“Actually, I thought I made myself pretty clear.”

He frowned. “So the answer is no?”

“Correct.”

“You don’t have any interest in being an officer in the most powerful military force in the country?”

“No, I don’t.”

“You don’t care about all the good you could do, all the lives you could save, all the people you could help? You just want to be selfish, and waste your abilities scraping in the dirt, or scavenging for a living? Is that it?”

My teeth clenched and my face began to heat up. “Don’t put words in my mouth, General. I did my time, I served my country, and I gave a hell of a lot more than I ever got back. You think you know me? You think you know anything about me? What I’ve been through, and what I’ve given up?”

I leaned forward and pointed a finger in his face. “You don’t know shit. You’re just like every other dumbfuck officer I’ve ever seen. You think you have all the answers because you sit behind your desk, and fly around in your helicopter, and send men to their deaths. You think you know what’s going on out there because you read after-action reports from men whose boots were on the ground doing your fighting for you. You never stop to question the decisions you make that cost them their lives. And none of it matters to you as long as you accomplish your mission. Let me ask you something, General, when was the last time you had your ass in the grass, huh? When was the last time you fired a fucking shot in anger? When was the last time you had to pick up a rifle and fight for your life because some West Point piece of shit with delusions of grandeur told you to? When was the last time you did anything except sit on your ass and ask better men than yourself to die for you? When General? Fucking when?”

My voice rose steadily as I spoke, and by the time I finished, I was nearly yelling in his face. The door opened behind me, and the same soldier from before stepped inside.

“Is everything all right in here, sir?”

Jacobs sat perfectly still for a few heartbeats before holding up a hand. “Everything’s fine, Sergeant. Please close the door.”

“Yes, sir.”

The door closed, and Jacobs let out a sigh as he reclined in his seat. He passed a hand over his jawline with a rasp of beard stubble. His eyes stared into a dark middle distance for a few seconds, and his façade of authority faded, leaving him looking old, tired, and rundown.

“Please don’t mistake my intentions here, Mr. Garrett,” he said, weariness grating in his voice. “I’m not evil, I’m not heartless, and I’m not a monster. I’m just desperate. We’re stretched thin. I’ve got too few people trying to do too many things over too big a territory, and I need all the help I can get. I need people who can lead, and individuals with your … unique skill set are a rare thing to find. I won’t press you anymore on it today, but if you reconsider—and I sincerely hope you do—come find me or Captain McCray, and we’ll get things moving for you. Fair enough?”

My temper has always been a quick thing, to the point where it is almost an understatement to call me short-fused. But I have lots of fuses, and the anger I had felt a moment ago, intense as it was, left me in a rush. Jacobs should have been angry that I had insulted him, but he had taken it in stride. Probably nothing that he hadn’t heard a hundred times from any number of pissed off survivors still holding a grudge. Insults didn’t bother him, but my refusal to sign on and help him did. That said a lot about the man.

“Listen, I appreciate the offer, Phil. I really do. And I’m not unsympathetic to your predicament. I’m just tired. Tired of fighting, tired of killing, and tired of people looking to me for answers. I know what I am, I know what I’m capable of, and I can see why people want me working for them. The problem is, no one ever bothers to take a second to consider what
I
might want.”

Jacobs nodded silently at that, stood up, and reached out a hand. “I appreciate your time, Mr. Garrett, and I want to thank you for what you did yesterday. If you were still in the service, I’d put you in for a Silver Star. That was damn fine work.”

I held his stare for a few seconds, thinking about those two kids’ families as they sat huddled and weeping in the funeral home. I released his hand, turned around, and walked out the door without another word.

As I left, I saw Captain McCray sitting at a small table in the main hall talking with one of the soldiers on General Jacobs’s security detail. He was back to wearing nondescript fatigues, brown combat boots, and the only weapon he had on him—at first glance at least—was a military-issue Beretta M9. It was odd seeing him without his ever-present tactical vest and tricked out M-14 rifle. He looked up and nodded to me as I walked by. I acknowledged him, and left through the front door.

I paused for a moment outside the hall, blinking to allow my eyes to adjust to the light, and without being too obvious about it, looking around for witnesses. Seeing no one, I put my hands in my pockets and began walking along the sidewalk to where it led around to the service entrance in the back.

The VFW hall was a squat cinderblock structure with a large banquet room in the front, a kitchen behind that, a bar along one wall, a storeroom, and two small offices tucked into the corner. If my estimation was correct, Jacobs’s office was two windows down from the edge of the building to the far right. As I rounded the corner, I saw that the ground at the rear of the hall sloped sharply downward, and that the window in question was several feet off the ground. Perfect.