“AI, check Jose’s records to see if he has any family members we need to notify of his death when we get to Salt Lake City.
“Oh, one final thing. Stephen, find someone among the White Warriors you trust to take over Jose’s job with the laser fence security duty. I also need the White Warriors to beef up security to prevent this from happening again.”
Everyone stood to leave, and the AI turned off the security halo.
“Emily, stay a moment,” Brogan asked her daughter.
During the more than two weeks of the journey, Brogan could see Emily had matured greatly. As they spent more time together in intense discussion of rebel spy tactics, Emily lost her teenager frivolity and became more serious and thoughtful. Her eighteenth birthday wasn’t for more than seven months, but she was growing up quickly. While Brogan hated to see her forced to leave her childhood behind, she was proud of the woman she was becoming: intelligent, fierce, bold, proud and yet still caring.
“What did you need, mother?”
“I’ve been teaching you defensive tactics on this trip. I just hope it is enough. Stay alert. We have a killer in our midst.”
Brogan reached up with a twisted, arthritic hand to touch her daughter’s lovely face. She was taller than her now and so beautiful; more than she realized herself. Her heart ached because she knew it was impossible for her to be able to always protect her. She swallowed the knot in her throat and shot an arrow-prayer heavenward.
“Don’t worry, mother. I’ll be careful.” And turned and walked confidently out of the pod.
Ah, the naivety of youth. Brogan sighed and sat down heavily in her chair. Only her family knew how hard this trip was on her physically. The constant pain from her arthritis made it difficult to sleep. Dr. Polk offered to give her injections but after one injection she was not happy with the resulting headaches it brought on.
“Unfortunately,” he told her, “that’s one of the side effects of the injections. You have to decide which is worse: the pain from the arthritis or the headaches.”
Brogan couldn’t think right with the headaches, so she decided to suck it up and live with the pain. But sometimes after days without a good night’s sleep she would give in and ask for an injection, just so she would have one night of sleep. The next day’s rousing headache was difficult, but at least the arthritis diminished for a few hours.
Originally, only the doctor knew of her battles with pain, or so she thought. Before they left on the journey, those closest to her could tell from the way she moved and the frequent uncontrollable grimaces on her face when she was having a bad day. They would do everything they could to make things easier for her by surreptitiously taking responsibilities away from her.
After a week on the journey, while they were still on the train and just before the clan transferred to the robo-cars, Brogan had enough. She called a meeting of Doctor Polk, Emily, Stephen and Alice.
“Okay, what’s going on?”
The four looked at each other. “What do you mean, mother?” Emily asked, trying to look innocent.
“You have been taking responsibilities away from me and trying to hide it from me. What’s going on?”
They all looked at each other sheepishly.
“Here’s the thing, mother,” Dr. Polk said, “I told your family about your severe arthritis and how much pain you are in.”
“You what!” Brogan exploded. “You had no right to do that!”
“I disagree,” the doctor calmly replied. “They are your family and they needed to know.”
After Brogan sputtered for a while and finally calmed down, she realized he was right. Tears filled her eyes as she looked around at her family.
“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have tried to hide this from you.”
“Brogan, honey, we love you. We are your family,” Stephen sat down beside her. “We hate that you are in so much pain. And we want to do everything we can to ease your pain. Let us help you. When you don’t let us help you, you are depriving us of the joy of helping you, okay?”
“I never thought of it like that,” Brogan said thoughtfully. “I just didn’t want to burden you all. But you are right. Family is supposed to support each other. I was wrong. If I’m having a bad day, I’ll tell you. How’s that?”
Emily laughed. “Don’t worry, mother, we already know when you are having a bad day.”
Brogan looked chagrined. “That bad, huh?”
“Yeah, sometimes it is. But that’s okay. We love you. And I’ll bet if we had as much pain as you do, we’d be real grouches.”
Now as she sat alone in the camping pod, she knew her days of being able to defend herself from an attacker might be over. She was physically too weak, and her joints were too stiff. She had to figure out other self-defense tactics or she might die by an assassin before they arrived at their destination in Oregon.
As she was thinking about it, she heard someone clear their throat outside the camping pod.
“Mother, are you available? One of the clan members would like to talk to you.”
She recognized the voice of Henry Blake, one of the White Warriors designated as her security detail. She knew anyone who entered her pod was first checked for weapons, so she wasn’t worried about a possible assassin.
“Certainly, Henry. Let them in.”
Brogan’s eyes narrowed as a young, beautiful, blond woman entered. She surreptitiously keyed an emergency switch on her AI pod to alert Stephen and her security detail.
“Welcome, young lady. What’s your name? I’m sure I’ve met you, but I can’t place you.”
“Good morning, mother. My name is Victoria Plumer. Jose was my boyfriend.”
She started to cry. “Oh, mother. I am so upset. I was asleep last night in my pod and I didn’t find out about what happened until this morning. Can you tell me anything about what happened?”
She was now crying so hard she was hiccupping. Brogan’s first instinct was to go to the young woman and comfort her, but if she was the murderer, it might be dangerous. She needed to stall until someone came to help.
Just then her security detail burst into the tent. Startled, Victoria whipped around, a ceramic knife suddenly appearing in her hand. When she saw it was security, she turned and ran toward Brogan.
But Brogan was ready, without hesitation, she pulled a lethal knife from her boot and threw it straight at the young woman, hitting her in the throat. She collapsed at Brogan’s feet.
Brogan calmly stood just as Stephen rushed into the pod. “Well, it looks like we found Jose’s murderer,” she said. “And I’m guessing, since she just tried to assassinate me, she was a spy for the king and queen. What I want to know is how she passed our background screening and what other spies we might have in our midst?”
Chapter Thirty-seven
A Spring Boom-Day
King Jamil had never seen Queen Jacqueline so excited. Today was the day the synergy jets left for San Antonio. It was April 30th. There were 50 jets: half would be loaded with sarin gas and half with machine gun turrets mounted on their bellies.
After refueling in San Antonio, they were scheduled to do their bombing run over Mexico City the next day, May 1st, dubbed Boom-Day by the queen. It took every bit of persuasion on the king’s part to keep her from climbing into one of the jets to participate in the event.
“It is too dangerous,” King Jamil argued. “You are the queen. You can watch the holograms from our suite. I mounted a camera in one of the jets which will allow us to see exactly what is happening, okay?”
Eventually she relented, but he could tell by the expression on her face, she was very unhappy. And, an unhappy queen was going to make everyone around her miserable for quite some time.
The flight to the Lackland Air Force Base, near San Antonio was without incident. Dr. Delis was in the lead jet. He convinced the royals he needed to go along to make sure the gas was loaded properly into the bombs after the refueling of the jets.
After secretly discussing it with Andrew, h
e decided to tell the royals he would do the final mixing in San Antonio to make sure the gas was at its most lethal state before dropping the bombs. Since they knew nothing about the science behind the gas, they did not question his logic. But, he had no intention of doing any final mixing.
After the jets landed in San Antonio, Dr. Delis received a BL coded message from Andrew telling him to casually walk away from the jets.
Following instructions, Delis slowly walked away from the jet, stretching his arms and acting like he was simply looking around. He was about 50 feet from the jet when he was knocked to the ground by a tremendous explosion.
Dazed, he stood up and turned to look behind him and could see at least half of the jets were in flames. Hundreds of BL rebels were running towards the jets, firing laser rifles. Dozens of white motorcycles, with some type of machine guns mounted on them seemed to come out of nowhere. Riding them were warriors dressed all in white. It had to be the famous White Warriors.
Although his ears were still ringing from the explosions, he could hear someone yelling at him to put his hands up. As if in a fog, he followed instructions and was shackled and marched to a robo-car into which he was unceremoniously shoved.
The battle was over in minutes. The surprise attack meant most of the jets were destroyed. Those that were not would become the property of the rebels. Because the gas had not been mixed, there was no contamination released into the air.
Dr. Delis sat quietly in the robo-car, not sure what his fate would be. He was sure Andrew was the only one who knew he was a clandestine supporter of the Book Liberators. For the first time in months, he was at peace. There would be no sarin gas bombs; millions of people would not die because of something he was forced to do. Even if the BL rebels executed him, he was okay with that. His beloved wife was safe, and he knew Andrew could take care of himself. He laid his head back against the head-rest and dozed.
He didn’t know how long it was before he was suddenly awakened when someone sat in the robo-car beside him. The man beside him looked to be in his 50’s, dressed in a military uniform, with some stars on his shoulder.
“Are you Dr. Delis?”
“Yes, I am.”
“I am delighted to meet you, sir. I am General Juan Veracruz, leader of the Book Liberators rebel forces. I have heard a lot about you from your son, Andrew.”
“You know Andrew?”
“Not directly, but from the leader of the rebel cell he belongs to in Boston. He is a brave lad. He told us about your efforts to sabotage the sarin gas bombs. He also kept us informed so we would know when the jets arrived. That’s how we were able to attack and stop the bombing. You did an incredible service to your country and undoubtedly saved millions of lives.”
Dr. Delis felt his eyes fill and his chest tighten at the kind words. It was difficult to speak, but he finally said, “Thank-you, sir. I only did what anyone else would do. You and the BL rebels are the ones who deserve the thanks for what you do in destroying the bombs and jets.”
He suddenly realized he was now going to be a hunted man by the empire. But, before he could say anything, apparently the general was a few steps ahead of him.
“We are going to put out a rebel message saying not only did we destroy the jets and bombs, but there were no survivors; everyone on board was killed. That should take care of anyone trying to hunt you down.”
“Is there any way to let Andrew know I’m okay?”
“Certainly, doctor. We’ll pass the word to the BL rebel cell by code and they will let him know. That’s one talented young man you have as a son. You must be very proud of him. I don’t think we could have pulled this off without his help.
“Now, how about we get out of here, just in case some imperial troops decide to show up. How do you feel about a move to Mexico City? I think you might fit right in with a professor we have who is working on some great projects which might help us win this war.”
“Sounds great, sir.”
Meanwhile, back at the imperial pyramid, the queen was having a fit. Fortunately for the rebels and Dr. Delis, the jet with the camera was one of the first ones destroyed in the raid.
The king and queen watched in horror as the jets were surrounded by rebels, but before they could see anything else the hologram disappeared as the camera was destroyed because of the explosion.
“How the hell did the rebels find out about the jets? All that hard work destroyed! Somebody will pay.”
“Calm down, Jacqueline,” the king replied. “There is nothing we can do about it now. We’ll just have to come up with another plan.”
Their discussion was suddenly interrupted by a rebel message hacked on to their vid-phones.
Attention American citizens. The Book Liberators have scored a decisive victory over the corrupt king and queen by destroying their entire fleet of jets in San Antonio, in the Texas Province. There were no survivors.
The jets were in San Antonio to refuel before a bombing run scheduled to disburse deadly sarin gas against the innocent citizens in Mexico City. We know this because we were able to interrogate one of the pilots before he died.
How long will you, the citizens of the American Empire, put up with this kind of tyranny? Tyranny from a king and queen against their own citizens who dare to disagree with their policies; policies that prevent us from reading, writing and worshiping as we choose. Tyranny which would have killed millions of citizens by lethal gas if we had not stopped them. Policies that are starving and killing our citizens.
Rise up, citizens, against these cruel rulers. Join the Book Liberators in our fight against tyranny and support our fight for freedom!
Before the BL’s message finished, the queen lost control and began picking up anything she could find and throwing it across the room. It didn’t matter if it was a priceless work of art, in her rage she was blinded to its value. With her strength from the exoskeletal implant, when she threw a particularly heavy iron sculpture at the clear security glass facing the harbor, it cracked.
King Jamil knew better than to try and stop her. He could not match her strength and she needed to wear herself out before she would be reasonable. He retreated to the bedroom to wait out her rage, pondering their next moves to retain control of the empire and defeat the rebels.
Chapter Thirty-eight
The Journey Continues
After the assassination attempt, the Mother Warrior’s journey with the clan to the Snake River had been uneventful. The periodic run-in with rattlesnakes or insect bites were swiftly and easily dealt with.
The clan members remained outside Salt Lake City, rather than deal with curious questions or potential imperial troops. A few of the security team went into the city to replenish water and food supplies.
The journey from Tegucigalpa had already taken almost two months, longer than what Brogan hoped, but the weary travelers were probably three-quarters of the way to Vista Point. The damaged train rails, the breakdown of robo-carts and other broken equipment, having to deal with extremely rough terrain, and the assassination attempt had all contributed to delays in their trip.
While the clan waited outside Salt Lake City for the security team members to return with supplies, Brogan called for a council meeting. Along the journey, the clan had decided to appoint representatives to a twenty-member council, including Stephen, Sally and even young Emily who was already showing leadership skills as she trained under her mother’s tutelage.
“I expect the next phase of our journey to be more treacherous,” Brogan stated as she began the council meeting. “We will need to alternate between river and land travel. And we need to have some of the security team scouting ahead to determine when the Snake River is safe for travel and when the rapids are too dangerous, and we need to switch to land travel.”
The rest of the council meeting focused on detailed planning and how to shift cargo around so not everything was in just a few transport vehicles in case they got swept away by rapids.
“Excuse me, Mot
her,” Charlene Davis spoke up. She was a geologist, somewhat shy but really knew the area they would be traveling in.
“Yes, what is it, Charlene?”
“I’ve been looking carefully at some of the maps I have of the Snake River, as you asked me to. I appreciate your allowing me to use the AI for the research. And I discovered something which I think might reduce the hazards significantly.
“If we use the robo-carts as amphibious vehicles to head west from Pocatello on the Snake River, we shouldn’t have any problems. The rapids don’t really hit until after Boise. There is a small frontier town about 60 miles west of there, called Ontario, right on the border of Idaho and Oregon where the Snake River heads directly north into Hells Canyon. That’s where the worst of the rapids begin.
“I recommend we leave the river at Ontario and head northwest toward the Columbia River overland. We would be following the old Oregon Trail and miss the rapids entirely that way. We would have a small mountain range to cross, called the Blue Mountains, but it shouldn’t be too bad. We will probably be able to resupply in La Grande at the edge of the mountains; from there it is only about 200 miles to the Columbia River.
“There used to be an old highway along the Columbia River, but there is no way to know its condition, so we may have to take the river to Vista Point, which is probably less than a hundred miles after we reach the river.”
“Great work, Charlene!” Brogan said enthusiastically, “It really makes it sound like Vista Point is within our grasp.”
There were eager murmurs of hope among the council members.
“Excuse me, mother,” Charlene interrupted, “There are some other things I need to bring up.”
“Go ahead, Charlene.”
“The AI indicated there are several wild bands of hobos between Ontario and Portland. Apparently, after World War III, the area became lawless. Because it is so remote, the empire has not bothered to send any troops in to subdue them. We are apt to run into trouble with possible thieving bands of hobos. We need to be prepared for trouble.”
The Mother Warrior Page 17