Southlands

by D. J. Molles

  The wounded had been treated and were quiet now. Either medicated, or too exhausted to moan about it.

  But with the addition of the thirty soldiers from Oklahoma, it was getting close to standing room only. However, as any good soldier knows: Don’t stand when you can sit. They were packed in on either side of the main hall, their backs against the wall, their packs between their legs, talking and joking with one another.

  As Lee, Tex, Abe, and Menendez stepped out of the elevator, the eyes of everyone along the hall shifted in their direction. And it didn’t escape Lee that a lot of them were looking at him, and then muttering something to their buddies.

  The ripple of hushed comments almost caused Lee to stop, mid-stride.

  What did cause him to stop in mid-stride, and then take a half-step back, was a grizzly bear of a man who loomed up in front of him, eyes wide and bright, giant arms reaching for him.

  Lee’s own hands came up as though to ward off blows, and then latched themselves onto the man’s thick wrists, as recognition dawned on him.

  “Whoa, easy there, tiger!” the man rumbled, like a diesel truck turning over.

  “Cheech?” Lee gaped.

  Captain Trzetrzelewska grinned, his teeth stark white amid a short but very dense beard.

  Cheech had always stayed clean shaven—claimed he didn’t need an “operator beard” to make him look tough. Which was a good point. He was 6’5” and sizeable in every other dimension as well.

  But the beard had rendered him unrecognizable for a moment.

  “I can tell you like it,” Cheech observed, and yanked Lee into a bone-crushing embrace.

  “Easy, Cheech,” Abe said. “Poor bastard’s still healing from a chest wound.”

  Cheech released Lee with a back slap that hurt more than the hug, and held Lee at his considerable arm’s length. “No shit? So it’s true? They just can’t manage to kill you, huh?”

  Lee found himself smiling. “Well, it’s not for lack of trying, I promise.”

  “Damn, son,” Cheech breathed. “It’s good to see you again.” He looked at Abe. “And you too, you hadji fuck.”

  Abe grinned and accepted the impending embrace with a grunt. “Fucking Polack.”

  When he was finished with Abe, he turned to Tex and Menendez giving them a more average greeting. “You two I see all the time. Tully couldn’t make it. He’s got his own fires burning on his northern borders.”

  Tex nodded and gestured deeper into the bunker. “We’ll manage without him. If you guys wanna find a spot that’s not crammed full of grunts, I’ll get the maps, and we’ll get this shit show on the road.”

  Cheech nodded, and regarded Lee with an element of reservation that he hadn’t shown before. “So we’re not overly enthusiastic about this op, huh?”

  Tex slipped around them, heading towards the command center which would have hard copies of satellite imagery of certain points of interest around Texas, nuclear power plants being one of those places.

  Lee nodded, feeling the uneasiness come over him again. “Are you ever enthusiastic about assaulting a hard fortification?”

  Menendez led them down the hall, looking through doors, searching for a place that they could use to strategize. The soldiers on the ground pulled their boots out of the way. More interested mumbles as Lee passed.

  It embarrassed him. But he supposed it was a good thing.

  Maybe it would bolster everyone’s confidence.

  They found a room with only a handful of soldiers in it. It was the food stores. Nice and roomy. And the crates of freeze dried foods made ample seating and table space for the perusal of maps.

  Menendez kicked the soldiers out and took over the room.

  As they settled in, Lee moved out of their way, then slipped out, mumbling, “Give me a second. I’ll be right back.”

  He pushed through the crowded hall again, and found Julia three rooms down in what constituted a sick bay in the bunker. He knew what room she was in before he got there.

  Outside of the room, there were two clusters of soldiers. Heads bowed. Shoulders shaking. Murmuring things to each other. Unabashed that they were surrounded by their comrades. They didn’t begrudge their comrades their lack of grief. And their comrades didn’t begrudge them for showing it.

  Everyone else down the hall just acted like it wasn’t happening.

  The men in the clusters kept their voices down, like they were in a library.

  Lee had been in these situations before, both from the outside, and from the inside. It felt voyeuristic to watch others when it was happening to them, so you pretended it wasn’t happening at all. And you felt exposed when it was happening to you, like you’d been stripped naked in front of an audience, and the best thing you could do was block out the fact that others were around.

  Deal with it as quietly as you could.

  And when you were able, stop emoting.

  When you were able, stuff it all down.

  You didn’t want to affect the other people’s morale.

  Inside the room, there were several wounded men, IV lines still in, red stains growing on their bandages. There were also three black bags, stacked up near the door, but not blocking it.

  It was for these that the men outside held their quiet conferences of grief.

  Julia stood, hunched over a table. For a moment, Lee thought she was operating on the man that lay there, but then he realized she was simply staring off into nowhere.

  Lee knocked on the open door.

  Julia turned her head, like she already knew that it was him standing there. Her eyes looked tired. Spent. He could tell in an instant that she didn’t have anything left.

  And yet they were still going to hit this objective, weren’t they?

  And how many casualties were they going to take?

  It was hard to put a number on it, but Lee knew one thing for certain: Someone was going to die.

  Maybe even him.

  But that’s not the sort of thing you dwell on when it’s an imminent reality. That’s something you think about once you’re safe again, so you can lie awake at night with your heart pounding in your chest and stare at the black ceiling, thinking of all the ways you almost died, and sometimes how your friends did.

  Lee chucked a thumb over his shoulder. “We’re gonna discuss the op. If you’re at a stopping point, I’d like to have you there. Can you break free?”

  For a flash, Julia’s expression read like she didn’t know who Lee was, or even what he was. He could’ve been green with three heads, based on her expression.

  Then she blinked a few times and was there again. She nodded.

  “Yeah.” Her voice was a quiet crackle. “Sure. I can break free.”

  As she strode out of the room, past the body bags, he heard her mumble, “Not like they’re going anywhere.”

  Maybe this was too much.

  Maybe she should just stay in the bunker and deal with the wounded.

  Surely there were other people that could fill the medic role.

  But before Lee could make a decision, they stood in the doorway of the food-storage-turned-briefing-room. And Julia walked through.

  ***

  Tex laid out two maps, and then planted his fists on the crate of freeze-dried vegetables that had become the table, and hunched over them.

  Lee, Abe, Julia, Menendez, and Cheech all peered down at them.

  The maps were both about two feet square. Laminated satellite imagery. The first map showed a big-picture view of Squaw Creek Reservoir and the roads around it that led into the peninsula on which sat their objective.

  The next map was a detail view of Comanche Peak Nuclear Power Station itself.

  “Earlier this morning,” Tex began. “We got intel from our guy in Greeley about Nuevas Fronteras owning this power station.” He looked up at Cheech. “If you haven’t got the full story yet, we had a bit of a dust-up with them over the course of last night. Which is why everyone’s got full luggage racks under thei
r eyes right now.”

  Dim, tired smirks accompanied this.

  Cheech nodded. “I’d heard some of the details. But always best from the horse’s mouth.”

  Tex pushed off of the crate and folded his arms across his chest. “Intel said that Nuevas Fronteras got a little banged up after our altercation last night, and was concerned about us hitting the power station, as it was not very well defended.” Tex dipped his head in Lee’s direction. “Me and Lee put eyes on, just a few hours ago. It does appear to be occupied, and from what we can tell, the occupiers are consistent with Nuevas Fronteras personnel we’ve encountered in the past.”

  Cheech loomed over the table. “Numbers?”

  “Twenty, if we’re lucky,” Lee said. “Thirty if we’re not.”

  Cheech smiled. “So thirty.”

  Lee nodded. “Yeah. Let’s say thirty.”

  The big man glanced between Tex and Lee. “I mean…barring some ridiculousness that you guys haven’t told us about, me and my guys are in. But I gotta ask: What are we getting out of this, besides pissing off Nuevas Fronteras?”

  Tex gestured for Lee to explain.

  “While it’s nice to piss them off,” Lee said. “We’re getting two things out of it.” He held up two fingers and ticked them off. “First, if we can take this out of their hands, we’re going to interrupt Nuevas Fronteras turning on the pumps straight to Greeley. If we can interrupt that flow of oil, we can put the brakes on the relationship that they’re building, maybe even sour it a bit. As we understand it, it’s already something of a tense relationship, pretty much exclusively based on convenience and what they can offer each other. Without this power plant, the cartel won’t be able to pump oil to Colorado, and without the oil, Greeley won’t have any reason to continue to supply the cartel with equipment. So that’s number one.

  “Number two, the UES has a nuclear engineer. That’s how we got the lights turned on over in our neck of the woods. If we can separate Nuevas Fronteras and Greeley, and buy ourselves a little bit of breathing room here in Texas, we can send for that engineer and get the power station running for us. And if we can accomplish that, I think we can get the UES into the fight here. We just need to create a good opening.”

  Cheech nodded along. “So we interrupt the love affair between the cartel and Briggs. Then we siphon the resources off to North Carolina. The UES gets involved and teams up with us. We take over the Gulf Coast states, kick the cartel’s ass, then turn around and kick Greeley’s ass. Divide and conquer.” He gave the map an approving look. “I like it. It’s optimistic, but I like it.”

  Abe reached up and squeezed Cheech’s shoulder. “Well, you know us. Buncha perennial optimists.”

  “Of course,” Cheech rumbled. “So, how do we implement this majestic coup de grace?”

  Tex and Lee exchanged a bemused look. “Well,” Tex said. “I detect a bit of sarcasm. But I’m sure you’ll take it more seriously when I tell you that it involves canoes.”

  “Excellent,” Cheech said. “Summer camp and assaulting a fixed objective—my two favorite childhood activities, now combined into one.”

  Julia shifted between Lee and Cheech. She bore that expression on her face that she’d given Lee, just before deciding to come sit in on the briefing, except now she gave it to Cheech. Like she couldn’t figure out what form of life he was.

  It made Lee’s gut twist up.

  This was not Julia.

  She was not the type to look down on other people for using humor to alleviate the stress of impending death. She understood it. And she took part in it.

  It was like she was someone else right now.

  Cheech seemed to notice after a beat, but said nothing of it.

  They all returned their attention to the maps, the air of humor feeling brittle now.

  Lee cleared his throat and discreetly touched Julia’s lower back, just a gentle connection—I’m here. Stay with me.

  Tex put his hands on the table and leaned over the maps again. “We need to hit it tonight. Late. There’s a storm coming in. I’m hoping it’ll dump some rain. That’ll help us get close to the objective and limit the defender’s visibility.” He pointed to the single road that came into the peninsula on which the power plant sat. “This is going to be our first assault point. It’s a shitty move, like ramming your running back straight into the defensive line. So that’s where we’re putting our tank. The tank is going to move in with three light armored Humvees. It should easily be able to smash ‘n’ bash through any of the defenses on the road in.”

  Tex traced his finger along the road to where it terminated in the sprawling fortifications of the power plant. “Which brings us to the plant itself. This thick tan line you see surrounding it is a concrete wall, we’re estimating about ten feet thick and ten feet high. On the other side of the wall, there’s electrified fences—we don’t know if the current is running right now or not. There’s a few entrances into the power plant itself, but they’re all designed to be terrible choke points and they’re covered by defensive positions.”

  He gestured to several tall, white squares. The shadows they gave made it obvious what they were. “Guard towers. They’re all over the place. And yes, they are manned. What looks like precision rifles and some machine guns.”

  Cheech whistled. “Quite the shit show.”

  “Yes,” Tex agreed. “But the upside is that, I guess due to the lack of manpower, their defenses are almost exclusively tied to these guard towers, and a few defensive points, kind of like pill boxes. All of which are excellent targets for an HE round from an Abrams.”

  Tex pointed to a spot on the thick, concrete wall that surrounded the power plant. Here, they saw what appeared to be an opening wide enough for a vehicle to pass through. “Realistically, this is our only way into the plant. So, we’re going to use our Abrams as a battering ram to slam through the defenses, flatten the guard towers and suppress any other pill boxes. Which will open the door for ground forces to move into the compound.”

  Menendez flicked a finger up in the air. “Question. As the leader of the ground pounders, what do you want us to do once we’re inside? I mean, obviously we need to secure it. But…what do you want to do with the people? Do we have to be worried about any civilians? I mean, they were planning on turning the power on, right? Are we concerned about engineers running around?”

  Tex responded by looking at Lee and raising an eyebrow.

  “No,” Lee said.

  Menendez looked confused. “No?”

  “No, we’re not concerned about engineers,” Lee clarified. “We don’t have any intelligence to suggest that there are civilians inside the power plant. So we treat everyone like a combatant.”

  Cheech’s brow furrowed, but he didn’t say anything.

  Menendez nodded, once. “But, if people are unarmed or they surrender…”

  Julia made a chuffing noise. “Let’s be honest here. We’re gonna take casualties. I think everyone at this table knows that. Every casualty is two guys down, carrying that casualty to a triage point.” She shook her head. “You try to add in prisoners? Taking the time to secure them? Escort them? Guard them?” She folded her arms, her eyes blazing. “No. Uh-uh. That’s just gonna cause more casualties on our side.”

  She stopped talking, but Lee almost heard it, like a faint echo, the rest of Julia’s thought: And I can’t handle much more of this.

  “Julia’s right,” Lee said. “We can’t do it. If you’re inside that compound, and you’re not one of us, then you’re shit outta luck.”

  Tex gave Lee an approving nod and turned to Menendez. “It’s not how we typically do things. But necessity dictates. And I happen to agree. ROE is kill everything.”

  Menendez took a deep breath through his nose, and when he exhaled he looked like he’d made his peace with it. “Alright then. Certainly makes things easy.”

  “Bringing it back around to the ground forces,” Cheech said. “I’m assuming my guys are in that group.
And something tells me that this is where it gets interesting.” Cheech squinted, as though he was nervous about the answer. “How are the ground forces getting onto the peninsula?”

  Tex moved his finger to the big swath of open water between Squaw Creek Park and the power plant. He tapped it twice. “Well, that’s where the boats come in.”

  TWENTY-ONE

  ─▬▬▬─

  THE HOUSEWIFE

  Inside the Fort Bragg Safe Zone, near the western boundary, there sat a two hundred acre chunk of pine forest. Near the center of this pine forest, surrounded by chain link fencing topped with barbed wire, was a power substation.

  At the access gate of the chain link fence sat a barricade erected out of sandbags.

  Behind the sandbags, Private Gomez sat on an upturned bucket, shoulders slumped, head back, mouth open, groaning in abject misery.

  “Fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck,” was his beleaguered groan.

  He sat as though unconscious for a moment and then straightened up, sucking at some saliva that had started to edge toward the open corner of his mouth.

  “I’m so…bored…”

  His partner for the evening’s guard duty was some big, slow motherfucker named Riley. Why was he stuck here, doing this? He’d signed up for primal-hunting operations, just like Sam. Shit, he’d put his name on the list ahead of Sam. And yet Sam was off having fun, and here Gomez was, with goddamn Slowsville Riley, who was currently seated on the wall of sandbags, eating a bit of cold meat that didn’t smell good.

  At Gomez’s complaint, Riley nodded out into the forest. “Just watch the wildlife, man.”

  Gomez looked at him like he was crazy. “Just watch the fucking…? I look like fucking Dora the Explorer to you?”

  “Dora the Explorer?”

  “Yeah. You know, the little bitch that rescued the animals and shit.”

  “That was Diego.”

  Gomez blew a raspberry and looked away, mumbling under his breath, but still loud enough to be heard. “You would know about kids shows, you retarded-ass motherfucker…”

  Riley frowned at him. “I’m not retarded.”