by Eric Walters
“Did you have your ear against the door while we were talking?”
“No, sir! I would never—” I stopped as he started chuckling. “Herb came out and talked to us. Is he retired military?”
“He’s former intelligence.”
“You mean like a spy?”
He nodded. “Probably he was CIA. You can see it in the way they look around the room, the way they always seem to be watching.”
“And that’s somehow different from the way you and my mother act?” I joked.
He laughed. “Point taken.”
“And you trust him?” I asked.
“Yes, I think I do, but I always put more weight on actions than words. If they get us the fuel he promised then I’ll know we have an ally and friend. And if what he said about their battle with The Division is true, then we have a strong ally.”
“The Division? Wait, I’ve heard about them.”
“They’re a paramilitary group. A larger, better-armed, and even more ruthless version of the group that attacked the Ward’s Island community.”
I felt a sudden rush of panic. I understood how they could be larger, but how could they be more ruthless?
“We’d heard chatter about The Division, but that talk has died down over the past two months. If Herb is to be believed, the reason for that is the work of his people,” Colonel Wayne said.
“They destroyed them?”
“They destroyed part of them. In fact, today on the flight here they were shot at by remnants of The Division. So our new friends could be powerful allies, or powerful enemies.”
“But you think they’ll be allies.”
“I’m hoping. As time progresses we’re going to need to gather allies around us because…well…” He let the sentence trail off. There was something in his expression that suggested he’d already said too much.
“Can they be trusted? Time will tell,” he said.
The door opened and our drinks were brought in.
“For now,” he said, “let’s just enjoy our coffee.”
36
We were traveling in a convoy that included six of our boats. My mother was on another boat. All together we had over seventy armed people with us. We hadn’t run into much—a few small ships out fishing, mainly—but we knew that dangers could be out here just as well as in the city.
We’d been sailing for almost four hours. I wondered how much longer it would be.
I walked up the stairs and onto the bridge. Sam was piloting our vessel. He was at the wheel, and three other guards were scanning the surrounding water with binoculars.
“Nice color,” Sam said.
“What?” I asked.
“Green skin goes nicely with your blue eyes.”
“Thanks, I was trying for color coordination. How far do we have to go?”
“Do you see that little tip of land to the right?”
I followed the direction he was pointing. “That’s it?”
“That’s the breakwater that protects Port Credit. When I was your age I used to take a boat there from the island all the time.”
“It’s a long way to come.”
“There was this girl I liked and she lived there. People in love do stupid things.”
“Or stupider things when they’re desperate.”
“Let’s not rule out the possibility that I was both in love and desperate. Are you worried?”
“Should I be?” I asked.
“I think being worried is healthy. This could be a setup.”
“Do you think it is?”
He shook his head. “I think we’re safe, but these people could be good friends or powerful enemies.”
They called their community Eden Mills. The way they described it, it was basically a subdivision that had been made into an armed compound. By air it was only an hour away, and so after meeting Herb, Colonel Wayne had arranged for the Mustangs to do a distant flyover, so high and wide that it was doubtful they could even be seen from the ground.
Next, Colonel Wayne, with their permission, had piloted one of the Mustangs and visited their community. He’d landed on a big blocked-off street that bordered their community which they used as a runway for their Cessna. He’d been given a tour by Herb and Adam’s mother, who was a police captain.
From what I’d been told it was a settlement that had a lot in common with ours. They had a perimeter wall with watch towers and lots of armed guards. They had cultivated all the land inside to grow crops. They were a little island of calm in the middle of the chaos on the mainland.
There was a cackle of communication over the radio. It was my mother. She was ordering two of the boats—including ours—to go ahead of the four other ships. We’d be the scouts.
Sam pushed the throttle open and we pulled away. The second boat was close behind.
Sam picked up a microphone. “Attention, attention, please,” he called out over the speakers. “Please take your stations and be prepared for landing.”
Ahead of us was a protected waterway bordered on one side by low-level apartment buildings and on the other side by a couple of piers and what looked like hundreds of boat slips, most of them filled with boats of different sizes. From the clothing strung from some of the rails of the boats it was obvious that they were inhabited.
A big white flag was unfurled from the lighthouse at the end of the pier.
“And there is the signal,” Sam said. He spun the wheel and slowly we moved toward the pier, where there was an open slip. Somebody walked onto the pier. It was Herb.
“Throw me a line!” Herb yelled as we closed in.
The man on the bow did as he was requested. Herb grabbed the line and pulled the boat in as Sam reversed the engines to slow down our momentum. The boat snugged in against the slip and a second man jumped off and tied off the stern.
“Welcome,” Herb said. Then he saw me. “Emma, I’m so pleased you could join us. Let me help you.”
He offered me a hand and I took it, stepping off the boat. Six of our guards moved along the pier and took up positions where they could take cover.
“I see you have your backup in the sky,” Herb said.
For an instant I didn’t understand, and then I saw two small dots on the horizon and knew it was our Mustangs.
“I appreciate people being careful,” Herb said. “I feel the same way myself. If you look hard enough you’ll find our Cessna up in the air circling as well.”
“Adam is up there?”
“His father is the pilot today. I like to have eyes in the sky.”
“You don’t trust us?”
“There are lots of bad people out there. I want to make sure we’re not taken by surprise by anybody else.”
Sam joined us. “So what happens now?”
In answer, Herb pulled a walkie-talkie out of his pocket and ordered “the truck” to come forward. “I’m going to give you the fuel you need.”
Almost instantly we heard an engine and grinding gears, and then a big fuel truck rumbled onto the pier.
“We have a whole lot of fuel to give you. We’d better get started.”
—
It was almost midnight when the final load was transferred to our big ship. It was long after our Mustangs had had to go home, but we were still well protected. In addition to our guards, Herb had brought squads with him. He never told us the numbers but they took up positions on the perimeter of the marina to protect us. He allowed my mother to take control of the truck and our guards to control the immediate positions around the pier.
Before the planes had left we’d radioed back to the airport and told them we were going to be late. There was a lot of fuel and it was a slow process to transfer it. I was so happy to be here with my mother. She didn’t need to worry about what was happening to me and I didn’t have to worry about why she was so late.
Each boat had running lights—green on the starboard, red on the port, and white on the stern. They were the only lights, except for the stars and
a crescent moon in the sky. The shore was over to our left somewhere. Out here we were safe. Today had been a long day. It had also been a good day. We’d gained more fuel than we’d thought was possible. And probably more important than that, we’d gained an ally, somebody we thought we could trust.
37
I watched the Cessna take off. Herb was in it, with Adam’s father at the controls. When they’d landed they’d gone directly to see Colonel Wayne, and they’d been there for no more than thirty minutes. It was a long way to fly for such a short meeting, unless there was something very important to discuss.
Colonel Wayne stood by the entrance to the terminal watching the plane disappear. I thought he’d just turn around and go back inside so I was more than a little surprised when he waved and motioned for me to come over. I trotted across the tarmac.
“I need you to do something,” he said.
“Yes, sir.”
“I want you to very quietly find your mother, Chris, Sam, Lieutenant Wilson, and Sergeant Miller. Ask them to come to my office at 1400 hours.”
“Um…sure.”
“Oh, and you should tell them not to mention the meeting to anybody else. I want them to casually make their way here.”
“Sure, but, why, if I could ask, sir?”
“I’ll explain all of that when they arrive.”
“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to pry.”
“Oh, did I mention that I want you to be part of this meeting? See you at 1400 hours.”
—
I settled into a chair in the corner of the room. Even though I had been invited, I wanted to be as much in the background as possible. Of course the colonel sat behind his desk. Sam and Chris shared the couch on one side and Lieutenant Wilson and my mother took the two chairs on the other side. The sergeant stood by the door.
“Thank you all for coming,” Colonel Wayne began. “And I appreciate your discretion in keeping this low-key. I would also ask that all of what I’m going to say be kept confidential for now.”
“Does this have something to do with the two guests who have just flown off?” Sam asked.
“Yes, it does. They came to tell me about a threat to their community,” Colonel Wayne said.
“What sort of threat?” my mother asked.
“You’re all familiar with a group that calls itself The Division. They have battled with the Eden Mills community before. They have re-emerged as a threat.”
“And what does Eden Mills want from us?” Chris asked.
“They are requesting support in the form of one hundred armed persons for a short period of time.”
“That’s a lot of guards to put in danger,” Sam said.
“The danger should be minimal. They are asking that our people be deployed along their walls while the Eden Mills people go outside their boundaries to engage the enemy.”
“There’s still a big element of danger,” Chris said.
“An element, but less than the community itself is facing,” my mother replied. “It’s always safer inside the wire than outside.”
“I meant for those of us who remain here. With that many guards gone, we’re vulnerable to attack,” Chris said.
“No question we will be more vulnerable, but we can compensate the same way we do when we send people out to get fuel or to scavenge.”
“But that’s fewer people and less time,” my mother said. “Away parties are only gone for the better part of a day. I’m assuming this will be longer.”
“They are asking for people for a period of between forty-eight and seventy-two hours.”
“And so you brought us here to discuss with us whether we should send our guards?” Chris asked.
Colonel Wayne shook his head. “No. I didn’t bring you to ask your permission. I have already given them my word that we will be providing them with support. This is a command decision and not open for discussion.”
The room went silent.
“Really, we’re only offering to them what we offered to the Ward’s Island community. I would think that those who lived because of our intervention there would be the first to understand,” Colonel Wayne continued.
“Although you didn’t ask for our permission, I want to voice my approval. I am completely aware of what our fate would have been. How could we possibly object to doing for others what was done for us?” Chris said.
“Thank you, I appreciate your words and support,” Colonel Wayne said. “But it’s more than that. We need our allies to stay strong for when we, in turn, might need their help.”
“Is there something else we need to know?” Chris asked.
“I’d be a fool to believe that there aren’t greater enemies out there, enemies that could destroy us.”
“Do you know that?” Chris asked anxiously.
“There has been talk, rumors, reports. This time we’re helping the Eden Mills community. The next time it could be us in need. We have to come to the defense of our friends so that they’ll be able to come to our defense.”
“I understand,” Chris said. “I think we all do.”
There was a nodding of heads around the room.
“Again, this is for your ears only at this time. I brought you here now to apprise you of what has been requested and what we are going to do, but, more importantly, to work through the logistics of how this can be accomplished in the time frame we’re discussing.”
“How long do we have?” my mother asked.
“They need us to be there in less than four days.”
“A week to ten days would be more realistic,” Lieutenant Wilson said.
“They have been given an ultimatum that is time-sensitive. The clock is ticking and we need to act,” Colonel Wayne explained.
“Are we going there by boat and then truck?” Sam asked.
“No, I think by plane.”
“But their Cessna can only carry three passengers,” Sam said. “That would be sixty or more trips.”
“We have one other possibility we’re going to utilize,” Colonel Wayne said.
38
Our big passenger plane sat on the runway surrounded by hundreds of people. Some were getting ready to board. Others were there to say goodbye to the passengers. But most people were there just to watch. It was impressive. The big plane—it was called a Stratoliner—was getting ready to take off.
The mechanics had been working on it for weeks, on and off, getting it ready to potentially fly again. It had never been a priority because we didn’t have a pilot to fly it, or a real need to put it up into the air. That had all changed, and over the past few days it had become their only focus.
The pilot was Adam’s father, Mr. Daly. He had been a commercial jet pilot before all of this had happened, and he said he’d flown the great-great-grandchildren planes of our Stratoliner. Twice yesterday and twice today he had taken it up into the air for test flights. It was incredible to see it roar down the runway and into the air. Everybody who wasn’t on guard duty—and probably all of those who were—watched as it took to the sky. It was both incredible and incredibly scary. It hadn’t been in the air for almost forty years, and there must have been hundreds of old parts that could have broken. I felt such a sense of relief when it finally touched back down that first time. With each test flight everybody became more confident, and now it was time to entrust it with the lives of our people.
The first people started up the stairs and onto the plane. This flight was going to have fifty passengers, half of the crew that was being sent to Eden Mills. A second flight, later today, would take the rest.
I moved through the crowd toward my mother. She was standing by the plane, checking people in as they boarded. She, along with Sergeant Miller, was in charge of the mission. They not only chose the people, they would lead them to Eden Mills.
As I got close she saw me and handed the clipboard to Sam. He was going along on this mission, as was Garth, and a lot of those who had military or police training—almost everybody I really trust
ed. Even Colonel Wayne was going to leave temporarily, as he was going to fly one of the Mustangs. My mother came forward, and before I could talk she motioned for me to follow as she led me away from the crowd.
“How are you doing?” she asked.
“I’m fine. I’m good.”
“I need you to remain calm and in charge.”
“Lieutenant Wilson is in charge,” I said.
“He is, but you have a pretty important role to play.”
With most of the guards—and almost all the most reliable guards—being sent away, they had asked the teenage guards to pull extra duty. We’d be on for twelve-hour shifts, then off for six, and then back on for twelve until they returned.
“I’ll take care of things. You know that.”
“I know you will.”
“Are you going on the first flight or the second?” I asked.
“I need to be there when the first group lands to start to get things set up properly. I’ll be fine. We’ll all be fine.”
“You can’t guarantee any of that.”
“You know there are no guarantees. I’ll do whatever I can, and I know you’ll do the same.”
I nodded. “I have to go. My shift on the wall starts in twenty minutes.”
We hugged, and then I turned and walked away. There was no point in watching her climb onto the plane. I’d be able to see it fly off from my spot on the fence.
—
It had been a long day. I’d been on the fence while the plane took off and I was still there when it came back for the second load of people. Seeing the plane come back of course told me that my mother was fine, the plane was still in one piece. Willow and I now watched as it took off again. It was so much more amazing when I didn’t have to worry about my mother being on board. It soared almost directly over my head, and I watched as it gained altitude and started to bank over the city.
Almost immediately it was followed into the air by first one of the Mustangs and then the other. They were traveling with it as an air escort. I watched as all banked and then disappeared into the distance. I couldn’t help but wonder what people on the ground would think when they looked up and saw three airplanes fly past.