The Malefic Nation (Graham's Resolution Book 4) (12 page)

Chapter 26 A Hunting Trip

“Where did they head off to?” Lieutenant Harding asked again.

Clarisse crossed her legs casually, but tried to contain her nervousness. “They’re on a hunting trip for meat to process. You see, we lost much of our emergency reserves when we fled, and we can’t expect you to feed us indefinitely.”

Harding sat at his side of the desk, contemplating her reasoning. Your commander didn’t mention this to me yesterday,” he said, shuffling papers around.

“Yes, well . . . you see, he’s not my commander, exactly. We work as a team.”

“But, he has the final say in any argument, correct?”

“No, no he doesn’t. Like I said, we’re a team. We usually come to agreement fairly easily. If there’s a difference we weigh the options and go with the best decision.”

Harding nodded at her with a slightly condescending smile, as if Clarisse were an innocent child. He obviously didn’t agree with her group’s methods, but they had worked well for them thus far.

She couldn’t help but think that the longtime residents of Hope must feel like prisoners. They couldn’t speak their mind. They might be allowed to leave, but it was the fact that they had to be
allowed to
in the first place that bothered Clarisse. She had to remember what freedom meant and how fleeting that concept could be from one place to another.

“I expect them to return by tomorrow night,” she said. “There’s nothing to worry about. We like to maintain our stores, and since you kept safe what we already had—and we really appreciate that, by the way—we won’t have to do much more hunting. We’ll share, if that’s what might be bothering you. Do you want us to share our hunt, lieutenant?”

“Henry,” he corrected her. “No, not at all. In fact, I had a meeting yesterday with our supply crew and we talked about how to include another thirty people into our calculations. It’s not a problem. We have gardens and farms within our borders. We work together and can maintain our way of life without having to leave here, and you don’t put an extra burden on our supplies. What I’m saying is, it wasn’t necessary to go on a hunt.”

“Yes, I understand your point of view, but what you’re not taking into account now is that since we are not vulnerable to the virus we’re not threatened by the possible exposure. Perhaps we can trade some venison for beef or bacon,” she said with a smile. “Soon your people will be able to go out hunting as well.”

He sat up in his chair. He’d barely thought about it. “It’s a foreign concept for us here. We’re just getting used to the idea. We’ve maintained the borders all this time. I’m not sure how the townspeople will take to this new freedom. It’s probably best to start off on small trips.”

“Yes, I think Dalton would be happy to take a small group out at a time, show them the ropes. Of course, we all also have the danger of the terrorists out there. Right now that’s the biggest threat. I wish you’d heed our words and prepare better.”

Harding held up his hand. “Yes, yes, I know what you’re going to say. Dalton and I had an extensive conversation about this too.” He picked up his pencil and began tapping it on the desk. “I concede that they’re a threat—but not an immediate one, as far as I can see. You have time here to regroup, to plan, but there’s no way you’d have had the time to figure out how to exterminate them from your own country.”

Clarisse squirmed in her seat a little when he used the term
exterminate
.

“I encouraged Dalton to consider joining us here. Our borders are secure, as you can see. We have an elaborate setup, and it’s sustainable. Our people are happy for the most part. They’ve recovered from the shock of the pandemic. And now, thanks to you, they’re also immune to the very threat that killed so many.”

Clarisse thought he was reaching a bit, but she said nothing.

“Not that I’m trying to argue with you, Henry, but your people are depressed; they’re
not
thriving. They wake up each day wondering if hiding here was the right thing to do instead of dying with the rest of humanity. They’re not happy, they’re barely surviving. They’re not free to leave these boundaries you’ve kept them in. Don’t get me wrong. It’s all warranted—you’ve saved their lives, after all—but they’re not happy. And honestly, neither are we. We’ve survived, but we’ve lost a lot in the process.
Happy
is not something any of us will be for a very long time. That’s a luxury for the future—
if
we survive this.
If
we make it beyond the terror.”

Harding wasn’t going to argue with her either. “Well, yes, you’re right there. I hope you consider staying with us here. If not, I’d advise you to travel farther north instead of south. Going back will be nothing short of suicide if what you say is true.”

“It’s a fact, actually. They’ll come here eventually.”

Harding looked a bit uncomfortable with her last statement and twisted sideways in his chair. He glanced at Clarisse a few times before saying, “So, have you located your dogs yet?”

He’s changing the subject
.

“No, we haven’t, and the kids are becoming more restless. We don’t want them traveling farther out, so we’ve decided they need to give up the search.”

“You’re team seems quite attached to those dogs.”

“Yes, well, one in particular is very special to part of the group. His name is Sheriff, and he’s saved lives. He’s one of us. It’s going to be a big loss if we don’t eventually find him.”

Harding leaned back in his chair. “We’ve had a few dogs here in Hope—still do. Our rule was, if they showed aggression at all, they had to be put down. That led to a near extinction of our pets. One neighbor would turn in another and, well, after a while even the tame dogs nearly disappeared. Only a few old timers are still around. All of them are out of breeding range. Before we realized what was happening, they were all but gone.

“The cats, on the other hand, began to breed out of control and we put them down because they were beginning to cause quite a problem. There are a lot of lessons living in a closed society that life on the other side doesn’t teach you. One of those things is when to recognize a bad idea in a vacuum. It’s not so easy when you think as a collective rather than an individual. So now we have few pets and those we do have are not fertile. They’re harbingers of a time past and they’re loved but, like an endangered species, they’re fleeting. Because of a few bad decisions, our lone society suffers the lack of furry companionship.”

Clarisse couldn’t help but wonder if he was talking about more than just their pet situation. She’d already noticed the lack of newborns among the residents of Hope. Perhaps after they were vaccinated they might have dreams for a future and therefore look toward having children again. Even the young teens she ran into looked downcast and unsociable with one another, preferring to linger with their parents rather than one another. Macy had tried on more than one occasion to interact with some of the girls her age, but every attempt had been met with one-word answers to her questions.

“Well, if we can find the dogs perhaps we can have a breeding program. Sheriff and Frank are both males, but Elsa is a female. Sheriff isn’t fixed; he was a police dog, and they don’t neuter them in order to keep a certain level of aggression—for obvious reasons. The female, Elsa—I’m not certain, but I don’t believe she’s been spayed. Perhaps we’ll have a litter of puppies and can reintroduce dogs to Hope. There are few mistakes a society can make that can’t be undone, this may be one of them. Forgive me for saying so, but I’ve noticed there are no young children or pregnant women here. I completely understand why people are holding back, but now that they’re inoculated, perhaps some will consider having babies.” She smiled at him and stood. “And speaking of children, I do need to return and check on my own group. I’d noticed that Tala is walking a little slower these days and I need to examine her.”

“How long before she delivers?”

“Only a few weeks now. We’re all very excited.”

“Do you need to use the medical facilities here?”

“That’s a good question. I’ve never actually delivered a baby before. I’ve attended live births, but I’ve never delivered one myself so this will be new to me. Do you have any midwives?”

Harding looked dumbstruck. “I don’t know. That’s a very good question. I’ll ask around. We obviously haven’t had any need for one before this.”

Clarisse laughed slightly at his composure. “Well, thank you once again.”

He held her hand a second longer than necessary. “Clarisse, we can’t thank you enough. If there’s anything you need, don’t hesitate to ask.”

She smiled and hoped he continued to feel that way when he eventually found out about their plan. “Well, have a good evening,” she said and walked outside of his office and back to the path that led her to their side of town.

It was a sunny late spring afternoon, without even the need for a sweater. As Clarisse walked she thought it odd that there were cars parked along the houses and in driveways, yet no one drove anywhere; they always walked. There probably wasn’t gasoline left in their tanks, but in the grand scheme of things that didn’t matter: no one was leaving Hope. The cars and trucks remained solely as a reminder of what used to be. Perhaps in the early days they had been a reminder that the townspeople couldn’t leave even if they wanted to. And, since then, maybe the vehicles had become invisible to them, like nothing more than a potted plant in front of a house.

Chapter 27 The Candidates

The light, just after the darkest hour of early morning, gave little visibility as they crept along Highway 3, first west and then south across the US border. Dalton figured they’d likely encounter a few scouting groups like the one they’d run into when he was mauled by the bear. They’d left the day before, and as they drove through the guard post in Hope he’d explained they were going hunting. It wasn’t a complete falsehood; a slight deception, but not exactly a lie.

Their first task had been, in fact, to do some deer hunting closer to Hope. Sam had sat out a few traps the previous afternoon, and after checking the first few they thought it might take them longer to actually come up with a deer to show for their efforts. But when they came upon the last trap, lo and behold, a nice buck stood, tethered. Sam hated to do it this way, said it was cheating and dishonest. Dalton felt for him and was about to offer to do the deed himself when Sam pulled back an arrow and cleanly shot the deer.

Once across the border, it took almost no time to locate the first jihadists—too little time, and that fact made the men nervous. The terrorists had moved north already; their vehicles were parked all over the roadway, so it was safe to assume they were camped nearby. Several miles away from their approach, the men stopped and put on their equipment. The plan was simple enough: grab three of the jihadists without making a sound or getting anyone killed, then hightail it back to Hope.

This was a dangerous mission, and it took five of them to do it. Graham, the father to be, was back in Hope, left to care for everyone—especially Tala.

Dalton still worried about McCann after the last failed mission. It had been too much too soon, an early and intense introduction to war for the young man. McCann was capable, but he had a strong survival trait running through him. Dalton worried that even if they succeeded, McCann would harden. He’d seen it happen to so many others before, and maybe it was a necessary fact of wartime, but Dalton didn’t want to see it happen to the young man. McCann was the strongest leader they had of the next generation. Mark was a great kid, but McCann would be the one to make sure they all survived, that Dalton’s sons would grow up to live a full life.

The next generation had been on his mind a lot lately with the coming of Tala’s child. They needed to vanquish these intruders, take their own country back, and work toward building their future.

After they had hiked in silence for two miles to avoid detection, Rick spotted a likely candidate.

The guy wasn’t much more than a kid himself—younger, even than McCann’s twenty years. Dressed in a white headscarf and robe, he stood stoically beside a line of vehicles in the dark. Perhaps he was the night watch? The young man looked bored with the task; he leaned against the vehicle, his head lolling to one side as he fought off asleep.

Dalton and Rick made hand signals to each other after locating the vacant tents of the others in the group who were apparently out for the night. Knowing there were probably two or three more night guards on watch, they made their way around the area to give them a wide berth. After recognizing three individuals left on watch on the perimeter, they decided this would be the least invasive way to go: just capture the guards and quietly make their way back across the border.

They devised a plan and split into two groups, Dalton, Sam and McCann in one, Rick and Reuben in the other. This ensured a sound set of skills for each group as they scoped the perimeter. Dalton’s group eyed the potential medial experiment candidate and planned to approach him from behind the vehicle. As the young man leaned left against the side of the truck with his hand near the trigger of his gun, Dalton approached from the right and silently looped his arm around the victim’s neck, applying quick and continuous pressure to his carotid artery; Sam grabbed the guard’s rifle. McCann injected the guy with a vial of the anesthetic Propofol, which rendered him unconscious.

Sam handed the rifle to McCann and looped the candidate over his shoulders in a fireman’s carry. Dalton guarded Sam as they retreated to their vehicles, quickly followed by Reuben, who carried his own contender, apparently also captured without a sound and in much the same way.

Rick and McCann silently scanned the area. They needed one more nominee for the sake of “research,” and they knew he was waiting nearby, oblivious to their antics.

They snuck off toward the third guy on watch and found him to be larger, older, and wide awake, moving right and then left, three or four paces at a time. This guy had more experience and was probably the leader of the three. Rick shook his head at Dalton. Pretty soon the alert guy would realize his other minions were out of commission and would come looking for them.

Dalton scanned the campsite again, and realized the lumps on the ground were a few tentless terrorists sleeping not ten yards away. Getting to this guy and taking him down to sleepy land wasn’t going to be easy without alerting these lumps.

Rick made a few hand signals suggesting that they time it right and run up behind him. Problem was, they were out in the open, and it would only take any small sound to alert those sleeping.

They could wait until an opportunity arose, but that wasn’t going to work out either. Finally Rick noticed that McCann was trying to get his attention, but since he lacked a proper knowledge of hand signals he was becoming more and more frustrated.

Dalton gave him his attention. McCann pointed at the walking guy and shook his head; then pointed at one of the sleeping lumps instead. Dalton dipped his head.
Why didn’t I think of that?

Bypassing the lone guard, they ninja-crept their way to the other end of the group and located the first lump that was farthest from the rest on the outside perimeter.

A blanket covered the form, and as Dalton grabbed at the face and neck to subdue any noise, Rick went for the arms. Once the form stopped struggling, they carried the body away through the night. Halfway to the waiting truck, Dalton stopped and exposed an arm for McCann to administer the Propofol. But when he pulled away the fabric, they were shocked to find out they had a woman in their arms. Dalton had assumed they’d snagged another young man; he never considered that they might actually have a woman in their scouting party.

Dalton met eyes with the others to see if there were any objections. No one said a word. McCann went ahead and plunged in the needle to put her to sleep. They had no idea what her story might be; it was a mystery for now, and besides that, it was too late to turn back.

Once their three prisoners were inside the vehicle, Reuben drove back through the night. The short drive back to camp—only about an hour and a half—caused all of them to realize that this spreading jihadist disease had come far too close. Sam had cuffed the prisoners’ hands and legs together and applied duct tape to their mouths.

“How long will they stay out?” Rick asked.

McCann answered, “forty-five minutes to an hour, depending on their weight. The woman, she’ll be out for longer.”

“Woman?” Reuben said.

“Ah, yeah. Looks like the last one we got was a woman, though we didn’t know it at the time.”

Sam pulled back the cover, revealing the woman’s headscarf. He patted her down for weapons, and when his hand roamed over something solid, he found she had a nine-millimeter Russian Makarov tucked into her waistband. He held it up for the others to see in the dim light.

“Well, she’s not a prisoner, clearly,” Rick commented.

“Guess we’ll find out more later, when she wakes up.”

Sam handed the gun to Rick and searched for other weapons; there was a knife strapped to her right inner thigh and another smaller one strapped to her left inner ankle.

“Christ, man, check her again just in case you missed something,” Rick said as Sam handed him the knives.

Sam found another blade under her arm, tucked into the bindings around her chest. Now, fairly confident that she was unarmed, they pulled her wrists together and cuffed them securely. “She looks to be mid- to late twenties. Maybe Arabic, but who knows?” Sam said

“Find anything on the others?” Dalton asked.

Sam chuckled, and Reuben laughed out loud. Pointing to the unconscious man on the right side of the vehicle, Sam said “Oh, yeah! This guy not only had a rifle but also this big damn knife and this pistol. The kid had the rifle he had on him as well as this little curved knife.”

“Hey, give me that,” Dalton said. Sam handed him the small knife. After examining it, Dalton asked, “You know what this is?”

They all gave him a blank look and a silence to fill. “It’s a kirpan, a Sikh baptismal knife. It’s ceremonial. Does he have a comb or a bracelet on him?”

“No, I didn’t find one,” Sam said, but that was tucked inside of his boot

“You think he’s a Sikh?” Reuben asked while he kept his eyes on the road.

“I don’t know what to think. He could have picked it off a victim. Who knows? Nothing sacred belongs to one man anymore. They’ve ruined it all. Just like the Holocaust, only on a ghastly scale, if that’s even possible. We’re on the brink of extinction here because of them. Don’t feel sorry for them—not one bit.” Dalton eyed McCann and then the others. They had a woman, a young man, and another man, and they were all the enemy. They were mere people, yet they were monsters who had taken many lives; theirs was a selfishness that extended to all things, even a multitude of souls.